THE STRANGER WITHIN THE GATES
Sue waited--expectant and still--until the last sound of the young man's
footsteps had died away in the direction of the house.
Then with quick impulsive movements she ran to the gate; her hands
sought impatiently in the dark for the primitive catch which held it to.
A large and rusty bolt! she pulled at it--clumsily, for her hands were
trembling. At last the gate flew open; she was out in the woods, peering
into the moonlit thicket, listening for that most welcome sound, the
footsteps of the man she loved.
"My prince!" she exclaimed, for already he was beside her--apparently he
had lain in wait for her, and now held her in his arms.
"My beautiful and gracious lady," he murmured in that curiously muffled
voice of his, which seemed to endow his strange personality with
additional mystery.
"You heard? ... you saw just now? ..." she asked timidly, fearful of
encountering his jealous wrath, that vehement temper of his which she
had learned to dread.
Strangely enough he replied quite gently: "Yes ... I saw ... the young
man loves you, my beautiful Suzanne! ... and he will hate me now ..."
He had always called her Suzanne--and her name thus spoken by him, and
with that quaint foreign intonation of his had always sounded infinitely
sweet.
"But I love you with all my heart," she said earnestly, tenderly, her
whole soul--young, ardent, full of romance, going out to him with all
the strength of its purity and passion. "What matter if all the world
were against you?"
As a rule when they met thus on the confines of the wood, they would
stand together by the gate, forming plans, talking of the future and of
their love. Then after a while they would stroll into the park, he
escorting her, as far as he might approach the house without being seen.
She had no thought that Richard Lambert would be on the watch. Nay! so
wholly absorbed was she in her love for this man, once she was in his
presence, that already--womanlike--she had forgotten the young student's
impassioned avowal, his jealousy, his very existence.
And she loved these evening strolls in the great, peaceful park, at
evening, when the birds were silent in their nests, and the great
shadows of ivy-covered elms enveloped her and her romance. From afar a
tiny light gleamed here and there in some of the windows of Acol Court.
She had hated the grim, bare house at first, so isolated in the midst of
the forests of Thanet, so like the eyrie of a bird of prey.
But now she loved the whole place; the bit of ill-kept tangled garden,
with its untidy lawn and weed-covered beds, in which a few standard
rose-trees strove to find a permanent home; she loved the dark and
mysterious park, the rusty gate, that wood with its rich carpet which
varied as each season came around.
To-night her lover was more gentle than had been his wont of late. They
walked cautiously through the park, for the moon was brilliant and
outlined every object with startling vividness. The trees here were
sparser. Close by was the sunk fence and the tiny rustic bridge--only a
plank or two--which spanned it.
Some thirty yards ahead of them they could see the dark figure of
Richard Lambert walking towards the house.
"One more stroll beneath the trees, _ma mie_," he said lightly, "you'll
not wish to encounter your ardent suitor again."
She loved him in this brighter mood, when he had thrown from him that
mantle of jealousy and mistrust which of late had sat on him so ill.
He seemed to have set himself the task of pleasing her to-night--of
making her forget, mayhap, the wooing of the several suitors who had
hung round her to-day. He talked to her--always in that mysterious,
muffled voice, with the quaint rolling of the r's and the foreign
intonation of the vowels--he talked to her of King Louis and his tyranny
over the people of France: of his own political aims to which he had
already sacrificed fortune, position, home. Of his own brilliant past at
the most luxurious court the world had ever known. He fired her
enthusiasm, delighted her imagination, enchained her soul to his: she
was literally swept off the prosy face of this earth and whirled into a
realm of romance, enchanting, intoxicating, mystic--almost divine.
She forgot fleeting time, and did not even hear the church bell over at
Acol village striking the hour of ten.
He had to bring her back to earth, and to guide her reluctant footsteps
again towards the house. But she was too happy to part from him so
easily. She forced him to escort her over the little bridge, under the
pretense of terror at the lateness of the hour. She vowed that he could
not be perceived from the house, since all the lights were out, and
everyone indeed must be abed. Her guardian's windows, moreover, gave on
the other side of the house; and he of a surety would not be moon or
star gazing at this hour of the night.
Her mood was somewhat reckless. The talk with which he had filled her
ears had gone to her brain like wine. She felt intoxicated with the
atmosphere of mystery, of selfless patriotism, of great and fallen
fortunes, with which he knew so well how to surround himself. Mayhap,
that in her innermost heart now there was a scarce conscious desire to
precipitate a crisis, to challenge discovery, to step boldly before her
guardian, avowing her love, demanding the right to satisfy it.
She refused to bid him adieu save at the garden door. Three steps led
up straight into the dining-room from the flagged pathway which skirted
the house. She ran up these steps, silently and swiftly as a little
mouse, and then turned her proud and happy face to him.
"Good-night, sweet prince," she whispered, extending her delicate hand
to him.
She stood in the full light of the moon dominating him from the top of
the steps, an exquisite vision of youth and beauty and romance.
He took off his broad-brimmed hat, but his face was still in shadow, for
the heavy perruque fell in thick dark curls covering both his cheeks. He
bent very low and kissed the tips of her fingers.
"When shall we meet again, my prince?" she asked.
"This day week, an it please you, my queen," he murmured.
And then he turned to go. She meant to stand there and watch him cross
the tangled lawn, and the little bridge, and to see him lose himself
amidst the great shadows of the park.
But he had scarce gone a couple of steps when a voice, issuing from the
doorway close behind her, caused her to turn in quick alarm.
"Sue! in the name of Heaven! what doth your ladyship here and at this
hour?"
The crisis which the young girl had almost challenged, had indeed
arrived. Mistress de Chavasse--carrying a lighted and guttering candle,
was standing close behind her. At the sound of her voice and Sue's
little cry of astonishment rather than fear, Prince Amédé d'Orléans too,
had paused, with a muttered curse on his lips, his foot angrily tapping
the flagstones.
But it were unworthy a gallant gentleman of the most chivalrous Court in
the world to beat a retreat when his mistress was in danger of an
unpleasant quarter of an hour.
Sue was more than a little inclined to be defiant.
"Mistress de Chavasse," she said quietly, "will you be good enough to
explain by what right you have spied on me to-night? Hath my guardian
perchance set you to dog my footsteps?"
"There was no thought in my mind of spying on your ladyship," rejoined
Mistress de Chavasse coldly. "I was troubled in my sleep and came
downstairs because I heard a noise, and feared those midnight marauders
of which we have heard so much of late. I myself had locked this door,
and was surprised to find it unlatched. I opened it and saw you standing
there."
"Then we'll all to bed, fair mistress," rejoined Sue gayly. She was too
happy, too sure of herself and of her lover to view this sudden
discovery of her secret with either annoyance or alarm. She would be
free in three months, and he would be faithful to her. Love proverbially
laughs at bars and bolts, and even if her stern guardian, apprised of
her evening wanderings, prevented her from seeing her prince for the
next three months, pshaw! a hundred days at most, and nothing could keep
her from his side.
"Good-night, fair prince," she repeated tenderly, extending her hand
towards her lover once more, while throwing a look of proud defiance to
Mistress de Chavasse. He could not help but return to the foot of the
steps; any pusillanimity on his part at this juncture, any reluctance to
meet Editha face to face or to bear the brunt of her reproaches and of
her sneers, might jeopardize the romance of his personality in the eyes
of Sue. Therefore he boldly took her hand and kissed it with mute
fervor.
She gave a happy little laugh and added pertly:
"Good-night, mistress ... I'll leave you to make your own adieux to
Monseigneur le Prince d'Orléans. I'll warrant that you and he--despite
the lateness of the hour--will have much to say to one another."
And without waiting to watch the issue of her suggestion, her eyes
dancing with mischief, she turned and ran singing and laughing into the
house.