HESTER RECEIVES A PROPOSAL.
Annot was certainly curious to know what was passing between the two
whom she had seen wandering into the cooler atmosphere of the
conservatory; but she could not at the same time relinquish the
society of Roland, and to suggest that they should adjourn thither
might only mar the end she wished--without any real affection for
Hester--to come to pass, as she had not been without her own
suspicions retrospectively. But, sore though it was, we fear that
the heart of Hester Maule was not to be caught on the rebound.
And in dread and dislike of Annot's observation, her jests and
comments, she had--so far as she could--lately avoided being, if
possible, for a moment alone with Malcolm Skene, or giving him an
opportunity of addressing her, and he had felt this keenly.
In the long drawing-room the dancing was still gaily in progress, and
the soft strains of Strauss went floating along the leafy and
gorgeous aisles of the conservatory, where Skene and Hester had--so
far as she was concerned--unconsciously wandered. She seated
herself, wearily and flushed with dancing, while he hung over her,
with his elbow resting on a shelf of flowers, while looking pensively
and tenderly down on her--on the heaving of her rounded bosom, her
long dark lashes, and the clear white parting of the rich brown hair
on her shapely head, longing with all his soul to place his arms
round her, and draw that beloved head caressingly on his breast; and
yet the words he said at first were somewhat commonplace after all.
But Hester, while slowly fanning herself to hide the tremulousness of
her hands, knew and felt intuitively that a scene between them was on
the tapis; and, deeming it inevitable at some time or other, she
thought the sooner it was over the better; and in the then weariness
of her heart, she felt a little reckless; but his introductory
remarks surprised her by their bluntness.
'My life now seems but one manoeuvre, Miss Maule--to be alone with
you for a moment or two.'
Hester made some inaudible reply; so he resumed:
'I have heard it said by some--by whom matters not--that you are
engaged, Miss Maule?'
'Then they know more than I do--but to whom have my good friends
assigned me?'
'To your cousin.'
'Roland!'
'Yes.'
'I am not engaged to Roland certainly,' replied Hester, her lips and
eyelashes quivering as she spoke.
'I thought not,' said Malcolm Skene, gathering courage; 'Miss
Drummond seems to me his chief attraction. If he is as happy as I
wish him, he will be the happiest of deserving men.'
'The phrase of a novel writer, Mr. Skene,' said Hester, a little
bitterly, as she thought over some episodes at Merlwood; 'but do not
talk so inflatedly of what men deserve. The best of them are often
unwise, unkind, unjust.'
'Do not blame all men for the faults perhaps of one,' said Skene at
haphazard, and a little unluckily, as the speech went home to
Hester's heart. She grew pale, as if he had divined her secret.
'I do not understand you,' she faltered a little haughtily, while
flashing one upward glance at him.
'Considering the way you view men now, and the way you avoid or
rebuff me, I wonder that I have got a word with you, as I do
to-night.'
'Do I rebuff you?'
'Yes--to my sorrow, I have felt it.'
'Sorrow--of what do you really accuse me?'
'Treating me with coldness, distance----'
'I am not aware--that--that----' she paused, not knowing what to say.
'Hester--dearest Hester,' said he in a low and earnest voice, while
stealing nearer her and assuring himself by one swift glance that
they were alone in the conservatory; 'let me call you so, were it
only for to-night--you know how long I have loved you, and surely you
will love me a little in time. I know how true, how tender of heart
you are; I know, too, that I have no rival in the present--with the
past I have nothing to do; but tell me, even silently, by one touch
of your hand, that you love me in turn, or will try to love me in
time, Hester--dear, dear Hester!'
She opened her lips, but no sound came from them, and her interlaced
hands trembled in her lap, for the 'scene' had gone somewhat beyond
her idea in depth and earnestness; and she felt that Malcolm Skene's
deduction as regarded there being no rival in the present was a
mistake in one sense.
Encouraged by her silence, and construing it in his own favour,
little conceiving that her head was then full of a false idol, he
resumed:
'Hester, ever since I first saw and knew you, it has been the great
hope of my existence to make you my wife.'
Still the girl was voiceless, and felt chained to her seat.
She could feel--yea, could hear her heart beating painfully, as she
had a pure regard and most perfect esteem for the young fellow by her
side; and thought that to the end of her days the perfume of the lily
of the valley, of stephanotis, and other plants close by would come
back to memory with Malcolm's voice, the strains of Strauss, the
strange atmosphere of the conservatory, and the dull sense of
unreality that was over her then.
'Oh, Hester, will you not tell me that you will try to love me--to
love me a little? Have you not a single word to give me?'
Passionately earnest were his handsome eyes--anxious and eager was
his lowered voice and the expression of his clearly cut face. He
said nothing to her, as other men might have done, of his fortune, of
his estate, of his lands of Dunnimarle that overlooked the Forth, of
his prospects or his future; all such items were forgotten in the
present. Neither did he urge that he was going far--far away from
her soon--much sooner than he had then the least idea of--to enhance
his value in her eyes, or win her interest in his favour; for even
that, too, he forgot.
She looked up at him with her soft, velvety, dark-blue eyes suffused,
gravely and kindly; the charming little tint gone from her rounded
cheeks; her whole face looking very sweet and fair, but not wearing
the expression of one who listened with happiness to a welcome tale
of love.
'Oh, why do you say all this to me, Mr. Skene--Malcolm I shall call
you for old acquaintance' sake--why ask me to marry you?'
'Why? a strange question, Hester,' said he, a little baffled by her
apparent self-possession, while tremulous with joy to hear for the
first time his Christian name upon her lips.
'Yes--why?' she asked, wearily and sadly.
'Because I love you as much as it is in the nature of an honest man
to love a woman.'
'But--but I do not return the sentiment--I cannot love you as you
would wish.'
'Not even in the end, Hester?'
'What end?'
'Any time I may give you and hopefully wait for?'
She shook her head and cast down her white eyelids.
'And yet no one else seeks your love?' said he a little reproachfully.
'No one else.'
'Can I never make you care for me?' he urged in a kind of dull
desperation.
'Pardon me--but I do not think so; my regard, my friendship and
gratitude will ever be yours; but please--please,' she added almost
piteously, 'do not let us recur to this matter again.'
'You feel the impossibility----'
'Of receiving your words as you wish.'
'You are at least candid with me, Hester; and I shall, indeed,
trouble you no more.'
He spoke with more grief than bitterness, as he dropped the little
and softly gloved hand which he had captured for a moment.
She then passed it over his arm and rose, as if to show that all was
over and that they were to return to the drawing-room--which she now
deeply regretted having quitted--and with them the dancing, the joy,
and the brilliance of Maude's little fête had departed for the night.
Skene felt that nothing was left for him now but to quit Earlshaugh
at once, and the time and the hour came sooner than he expected, and
all the more welcome now.
But the adventures of the night--adventures in which Mr. Hawkey
Sharpe bore a somewhat prominent part--were not yet over.