At the passionate "Nell! Nell!" at the grasp of his hand, the blood
rushed to Nell's face, and her breath came painfully. She was startled
and not a little alarmed. Why was he kneeling at her feet, why did he
call upon her name with the appeal of love, the note of entreaty, in his
voice? He was no longer Drake Vernon, but the Earl of Angleford, the
promised husband of Lady Lucille.
The color left her face, and she drew her hand from his and shrank away
from him, so that she almost leaned against the tree.
He half rose and looked at her penitently, and with something like shame
for his vehemence. Indeed, he had rushed from the lodge in search of
her, remembering nothing, thinking of nothing, but the fact that they
were both free. But now he realized how suddenly he had come upon her,
how great a shock his passionate words, his excited manner, must have
been to her.
"Forgive me!" he said, still on one knee; "forgive me! I have frightened
you. I forgot."
Nell tried to still the throbbing of her heart, to regain composure; but
she could not speak. He rose and stood before her, his eyes fixed on
her, eloquent with love and admiration. She had never seemed more
beautiful to him than at this moment. Her face was thinner and paler
than it had been in the happy days at Shorne Mills, but it had grown in
beauty, in that spiritual loveliness which replaces in the woman that
which the girl loses. The gray eyes were pure violet now, and fuller and
deeper, as they mirrored the soul which had expanded in the bracing
atmosphere of sorrow and trial.
He had fallen in love with an innocent, unsophisticated girl; he was
still more passionately in love with her now that, a girl still in
years, she had developed into glorious, divine womanhood. His eyes
scanned her face hungrily, yet reverently, as he thought: Was it
possible that he had once kissed those beautiful lips, had once heard
them murmur "I love you?" And was it possible that he might again hear
those magic words? His soul thirsted for them. It seemed to him that if
he were to lose her now, if she were to send him away, life would not be
worth having, that nothing remained for him in the future but misery and
despair. To few men is it given to love as he loved the girl before him,
and in that moment he suffered an agony of suspense which might well
have caused the recording angel to blot out the follies of his past
life.
But he must not frighten her, he must not drive her away from him by
revealing the intensity of his passion.
So his voice was calm, and so low that it was little more than a
whisper, as he said:
"I have come in search of you; I have something to say that I hope, I
pray, you will hear. Won't you sit down again?" and he motioned to the
place where she had been seated.
But Nell shook her head and remained standing, her hands clasped loosely
before her, her eyes downcast.
"What is it, Lord Angleford?" she said, in a voice as low as his. "I--I
want to go back to the lodge."
"Wait a few minutes," he said imploringly. "I will not keep you long. I
have just left the lodge. He--Mr. Falconer--is all right; he will not
mind--will not miss you for a few minutes. And I must speak to you. All
my happiness, my future, depends on it--upon you!"
"Ah, let me go!" she said, almost inaudibly; for at every word he spoke
her heart went out to him, and she was tempted to forget that he was no
longer her lover, but the betrothed of Lady Lucille. Whatever he said,
she must not forget that!
"No; it is I who will go, when I have spoken, and if you tell me," he
said gravely. "When you sent me away last time I went--I obeyed you. I
promise to do so now if you send me away again. Nell--ah! I must call
you so. It is the name I think of you by, the name that is engraven on
my heart! Nell, I want to ask you if there is no hope of my recovering
my lost happiness. Do you remember when I told you that I loved you,
there at Shorne Mills? I told you I was not worthy of you. Even then I
was deceiving you."
She drew nearer to the tree, and put her hand against it for support.
"I was masquerading as Drake Vernon. I concealed my real name and rank;
but I had no base motive in doing so. I was sick of the world, and weary
of it and myself, and I longed to escape the maddening notoriety which
harassed me. And then, when I thought--ah, no! I won't say thought, for;
I know that then, then, Nell, you loved me!"
Her lips quivered, but she kept the tears back bravely.
"Then it seemed so precious a thing to know that you should have loved
me for myself alone, that you were not going to marry me for my rank and
position, as many another girl would have done, that I was tempted to
play the farce to the end. It was folly, but the gods punish folly more
surely and quickly than they punish crime. The night that you
discovered I had deceived you, I had resolved to tell you the truth and
beg your forgiveness. But it was too late. Most of our good resolutions
come too late, Nell. You had learned that I had deceived you; you had
learned that I was not worthy to win and hold the love of a pure and
innocent girl, and you sent me away."
She raised her eyes and glanced at him, half bewildered. Was it possible
that he thought that was her only reason for breaking the engagement?
"You were right, Nell. I think you would be right if you sent me away
now; but I am daring to hope that you won't do so. It is but the
shadow--the glimmer of a hope, and yet I cling to it, for it means so
much to me--so much!"
There was silence for a moment, then he went on:
"I left Shorne Mills that day, and I sailed in the _Seagull_, determined
that I would accept your sentence, that I would never harass or worry
you, that, if it were possible, you should never be troubled by the
sight of me. But, Nell, though I left you, I carried your image with me
in my heart. I tried to forget you, but I could not. I have never ceased
to love you; not for a single day have you been absent from my mind, not
for a single day have I ceased to long for you!"
She looked at him again, wonder and indignation dividing her emotion.
There was truth in his accents, in his eyes. Had he forgotten Lady
Lucille?
"There was no more wretched and unhappy man on God's earth than I was at
that time," he went on. "Nell, if you had been called upon to find a
punishment heavy enough for the deceit which I practiced, I do not think
you could have hit upon a heavier one. For I could not be rid of my love
for you. I could not forget your sweet face; your dear voice haunted me
wherever I went, and I moved like a man under a curse, the curse of
weariness and despair."
His voice almost broke, and he put his hand to his forehead as if he
still felt the weight of the weary months.
"Then came the news of my uncle's sudden death; but when I had got over
my grief for him--he had been good to me, and I was fond of him!--even
then I could find no pleasure in the inheritance which had fallen to me.
Of what use was the title and the rest of it, if all my happiness was
set upon the girl I had lost forever? I came home to do my duty, in a
dull, dogged fashion, came home with the conviction that I should not be
able to rest in England, that I should have to take to wandering again.
I loved you still, Nell, but I hoped--see, now, I tell you the
truth!--that I might at least get some peace, might learn to deaden my
heart. And then, as the Fates would have it, I find you here, and----"
He paused for a moment and caught his breath.
"Hear that you were going to marry another man."
Nell started slightly, and the color rose to her face. She had forgotten
Falconer!
"That was the last drop in my cup of misery. Somehow, I had always
thought of you as the little girl of Shorne Mills, as--as--free. I had
not reflected that it was inevitable that some other man should admire
and love you. You see, you--you still, in some strange way, seemed to
belong to me, though I knew I had lost you!"
No words he could have uttered could have touched her more sharply and
deeply than this simple avowal. She turned her head aside so that he
might not see the quivering of her lips, the tenderness which sprang
into her eyes.
"That was the hardest blow of all that Fate had dealt me, Nell. It
almost drove me mad to know that you once loved me, and yet that you
were to be the wife of another man! It made me mad and desperate for a
time, then I had to face it, as I had faced my loss of you. But,
Nell----"
He paused again, and ventured to draw a little nearer to her; but as she
still shrank from him, and leaned against the tree, he stopped short and
did not venture to take her hand.
"Now I have just left Mr. Falconer, I have heard from his own lips that
there is no engagement, that----Oh, Nell! It was the knowledge that you
were still free that sent me to you just now, that made me cry out to
you as I did! I love you, Nell, more dearly, more truly, if that be
possible, than I did! Won't you forgive me the folly which made you send
me away from you? Won't you let me try and win back your love?"
There was silence, broken only by the rustle of the leaves in the summer
breeze, by the note of a linnet singing in the branches above their
heads.
"See, dear, I plead as a man pleads for his life! And on your answer
hangs all that makes life worth living. Forgive me, Nell, and give me
back your love! I have been punished enough, rest assured of that.
Forgive me that past folly and deceit, Nell! I'll teach you to forget in
time. Dearest, you loved me, did you not? You loved me until that night
of the ball--at the Maltbys'--when you discovered who I was!"
Back it all came to her, and she turned her face to him with grief and
reproach in her violet eyes.
"I was on the terrace," she said, almost inaudibly. "It is you who
forget. It was not because you kept your right name and rank from me. I
was on the terrace. I saw you and--and Lady Luce!"
He started, and his hand fell to his side. He could not speak for a
moment, the shock was so great, and in silence he recalled, saw as in a
flash of lightning, all the incidents of that night.
"You--you were there? You saw--heard?" he said, half mechanically.
"Yes," she said.
She was calm, unnaturally calm now, and her voice was grave and sad
rather than reproachful.
"I saw and heard everything. I saw her and Lady Chesney before you came
out. I heard Lady Luce telling her friend that you and she were engaged,
that you had parted, but that she still cared for you, and that you
would come back to her; and when you came out of the house on the
terrace, I saw her--and you----Oh, why do you make me tell you? It is
hateful, shameful!"
She turned her face away, as if she could not bear his gaze fixed on her
with amazement, and yet with some other emotion qualifying it.
"You saw Lady Luce come to meet me, heard her speak to me, saw her kiss
me?" he said, almost to himself; and even at that moment she was
conscious of the fact that there was no shame in his voice, none in his
eyes.
She made a motion with her hand as if imploring him to say no more, to
leave her; but he caught at her hand and held it, though she strove to
release it from his grasp.
"My God! and that was the reason? Why, oh, Nell! Nell! why did you not
tell me what you had seen? Why did you say no word of it in your letter?
If you had done so--if you had only done so!"
She looked at him sadly.
"Was it not true? Were you not engaged to her?" she asked, almost
inaudibly.
"Yes," he replied quickly. "I kept that from you; but it was true. You
read of the engagement in that paragraph in the stupid paper, you
remember? I ought to have told you, and I thought that it was because I
had not, as well as because I had concealed my rank, that you broke with
me. But, Nell, my engagement with her was broken off by herself; when
there was a chance of my losing the title and the estates, she jilted
me. I was free when I asked you to be my wife. You believe that? Great
heavens! you do not think me so bad, so base----"
"No," she said, with a sigh. "No; but you went back to her. Oh, I do not
blame you! She is very beautiful; she was a fitting wife----"
He uttered an exclamation--it was very like an oath--and caught her hand
again.
"No, no," he said, almost fiercely. "You are wrong--wrong!"
She sighed again.
"I saw you--and her," she said, as if that were conclusive.
"I know it," he said. "You saw her come toward me and greet me as
if--Heaven! I can scarcely bear to speak of it, to recall it!--as if she
were betrothed to me. You saw her kiss me. But, Nell--ah! my dearest,
listen to me, believe me!"--for she turned away from him in the
bitterness of her agony, the remembrance of the agony she had suffered
that night on the terrace. "You must believe me! The kiss was hers, not
mine. I would rather have died than my lips should have touched her that
night."
Nell's heart began to throb, and something--a vague hope--the touch of a
joy too great and deep for words--began to steal over her.
"I am a fool, and weak, but, as Heaven is my witness, I had no thought
for her that night. All my heart, my love, were yours! The very sight of
her, her presence, was painful to me! Even as she came toward me, I was
thinking of you, was in search of you. And her kiss! If the lips had
been those of one of the statues on the terrace, it could not have moved
me less. Nell, be merciful to me! What could I do? I am a man, she is a
woman. Could I thrust her from me? I longed to do so; I would have told
her I loved her no longer, that my love was given to another, to you,
Nell; but there was no time. She left me before I could scarcely utter a
word. And then I went in search of you--and the rest you know. Think,
Nell! When you sent me away, did I go to her? No; I left England with my
disappointment and my misery. Ah, Nell, if you had only told me that you
had beheld the scene on the balcony! Go back to her--and leave you!"
He laughed with mingled bitterness and desperation. The strain was
growing too tense for mere words.
At such moments as this, the man, if there is aught of manliness in him,
has need of more than words.
"Think, dearest!" he said hoarsely. "Compare yourself with poor Luce!
You say she is 'beautiful.' Do you never look in the glass? Dearest, you
are, in all men's sight, ten times more lovely! The pure and flawless
gem against the falsely glittering paste! Oh, Nell, if my heart was not
so heavy, I could laugh, laugh! And you thought I had left you for her,
gone back to her! And so you sent me away to exile and misery!"
His voice grew almost stern.
"Nell! It is you who ought to plead for forgiveness! Yes! You have
sinned against me!"
She started and looked at him, open-eyed in her amazement.
"Yes, you also have sinned, Nell! You ought to have spoken to me,
brought your accusation. I could have explained it all; we should have
been married--and happy! And I should have been spared all these months
of unhappiness, this awful hell upon earth!"
He had struck the right note at last. Convince a woman that she has been
cruel to you, and, if she loves you, the divine attribute of pity will
awaken in her, and bring her, who a moment before was as inflexible as
adamant, to your feet.
Nell, panting for breath, looked at him; questioningly at first, then,
by short degrees, pleadingly, almost penitently.
"Drake!" she breathed piteously.
He sprang forward and caught her in his arms, and pressed a torrent of
kisses upon her lips, her hair.
"Nell! My love, my dearest! Oh, have I got you back again? Have I? Tell
me you believe me, Nell! Tell me that I may hope; that you will love me
again!"
She fought hard to resist him; but when a man holds the woman he loves,
and who loves him, in his arms, the woman fights in vain. Every sense in
her plays traitor, and fights on the man's side.
Nell put her hands on his broad chest, and tried to hold him off; but he
would not be denied.
"Nell, I love you!" he cried hoarsely. "I want you. Let the past go.
Don't hold me at arm's length, dearest! I love you! Nell, you will take
me back?"
She still struggled and protested against the flood of happiness which
overwhelmed her.
"But--but she?" she said, meaning Luce. "Since you have been
here----They say----Ah, Drake!"
He laughed as he pressed her to him.
"Let them say!" he retorted. "Nell, I'll tell you the whole truth. If
you had been engaged to poor Falconer, I should have married Luce----"
"Ah!" she breathed, with a shudder she could not repress.
"But you are not. And I am still free! And you are free! Nell, lift your
head! Give me one kiss--only one--and I will be satisfied."
Her head still drooped for a moment, then she raised it and kissed him
on the lips.
The summer breeze made music in the leaves, the linnet sang his heart
out above their heads, the soft air breathed an atmosphere of love, and
these two mortals were, after months of misery, happy beyond the power
of words to express.
And as they sat, hand in hand, talking of the past, and picturing the
future, neither of them naturally enough gave a thought to Lady Luce.
And yet he had asked her to come back to Anglemere; and without doubt
she would come.