RONA'S KNIGHT
"Lady," he said, "your lands lie burnt
And waste: to meet your foe
All fear: this have I seen and learnt.
Say that it shall be so,
And I will go."
* * * *
And there the sunset skies unseal'd
Like lands he never knew,
Beyond to-morrow's battlefield
Lay open out of view
To ride into.
--D. G. ROSSETTI.
This was something new--something for which Felix, unused to women,
to society, to youth and charm, was oddly unprepared. Was that Rona?
That young immortal, with faintly blooming cheeks, elastic tread, and
all those burnished locks? As frequently happens to girls of her
age, she had grown considerably taller during the weeks of her
illness.
The young man gazing at her felt his heart shaken by a pain which was
worse than anything he had suffered yet. He was a skulking fugitive,
a disgraced man, one who had taken dark oaths against society and
authority, and was seeking to flee from the men who would have held
him to them. What link was there between him and Veronica Leigh?
He bitterly recalled the proverb, "Necessity makes strange
bed-fellows." Necessity had obliged the maiden, in the throes of her
desperate struggle for liberty, to trust herself to him for a few
short hours. Those hours had changed the face of the world for him.
For her they were no doubt already half-forgotten. She had, as it
were, set her foot upon his neck to climb out of the pit. Here she
was once more, seated at her ease among the elect, safe, cherished,
and no more in need of her slum companion. He thought of the kindly,
peremptory, half-patronizing letter he had written to her, and grew
hot all over to think that he had dared.
The figures of the three were disappearing down the drive together.
He crept into the summer-house, where there were not so many
pea-sticks as usual, sat down upon the dusty bench, and let his head
drop into his hands. There was a swelling at his throat as if he
must choke. The air was full of the tossing chimes, which, as he sat
there, changed to the monotonous stroke of the five minutes bell. It
was a knell, ringing for him, he thought--the knell of Felix Vanston,
now forever dead and lost.
Ask _her_ to run away and marry him, upon a pound a week!
Only in that bitter moment did he realize that he had meant to beg
and pray her to do so.
One sometimes has no measure by which to gauge height, except the
violence of one's fall.
* * * * * * *
A sound, slight but distinct--the rattle of gravel beneath a light
foot, the rustle--indescribable--of a woman's apparel--and he lifted
his dim eyes to see Rona standing in the doorway. With no word
spoken she slipped inside the hut, round behind the bunches of
sticks, to where he sat. "David--here I am," she said, timidly.
He made her no reply, but let his craving eyes rest upon her. She
flushed, and began to tremble. His evident misery pained her. Also,
the surprise was not only upon his side. This young man was not the
ragged, famished outcast who had grappled with her in his weakness
and extremity, dragging her back to safety as she overhung the abyss.
She, too, was smitten with the feeling that they were strangers.
Into his soul were thronging all kinds of desires and
consciousnesses, for the first time. He wished he were shaved. He
wished he had a better suit; he wished he were handsome; he longed to
be rich.
True, the disfiguring blue glasses were hidden in his pocket; but
even so, what kind of a champion was he, dusty pilgrim that he was,
for this princess?
He stood up awkwardly, and his face was dyed crimson, with a shame
the more awful because it was wholly inarticulate. His first words
left his lips before he had time to consider them.
"Forgive me. I ought not to have come."
She gazed at him pitifully, her trouble growing. "Ought not to have
come? Oh, David, why? I--I thought you were--my brother."
She was overswept with a sudden consciousness--much like that which
had just overtaken the young man. After all, what was the link that
bound them? A few hours of common danger, of frantic flight? She
felt curiously friendless, and as though she had lived these past
weeks under a comforting delusion. "Why ought you not to have come?"
He said, brokenly, "I have no right." Then, with passion, "I have no
right, have I? You are happy, and among kind people of your own
class. You have no need of a ruffian like me."
He turned away his face, lest she should see the working of his
features, which he could not control. But Rona, with woman's
swiftness of apprehension, had now the key to his unexpected mood.
"David," she said, reproachfully, "are you jealous? Did you think I
had forgotten you? How silly of you! You--you can't have a very
high opinion of me."
She took his hand, in a steadfast, trustful grasp. She sat down upon
the bench, and with a gentle pull drew him to sit by her. "Have I
deserved it? Am I ungrateful?" she asked, wistfully.
He held on to the hand as if he had been drowning. Its warm contact
sent comfort thrilling along his veins.
"Why should you have anything to do with me? Nobody else ever wanted
me, or cared what became of me," he stammered, incoherently.
She lifted to his her shadowy eyes, full of understanding. "Perhaps
you have not saved other people's lives at the risk of your own," she
sweetly said.
"Then you do feel--you do consider that there is a kind of link
between us," he faltered. "You don't wish me to resign you entirely?
Oh--let us have no doubt about it! I haven't much heart for life,
but if I thought you would not forget me it would make such a
difference--such a difference----"
She broke in, "Forget you? Are you going away, then?"
He held his breath, for there was dismay in her clear tones. All the
emotions that in his wild youth had never been called forth till now,
woke to life and filled him with an ecstasy which made his heart
pound, and his breath pant, and the currents of his being flow
together till his head swam. "You care?" he gasped. "It matters to
you whether I go or stay?"
"Matters? Oh, David! how can you?"
She turned to him impulsively. His arms went round her; and in a
moment--exalted, unlooked for, sweet with a sweetness
unbelievable--her head, with all its tumbled curls, was on his
shoulder, and he was holding her close, close, as though again she
was striving to hurl herself into eternity.
"Rona," he said at last. "Rona, I ought not to let you. I am not a
fit man for you to love!"
"You are the man that saved me," said Rona, clinging to him. "How
strange it seems. I never thought of you as a young man, somehow,
until I saw you sitting here with such a sad, grave face."
"And I," said Felix, with a depth of wonder that was almost
stupefaction--"I actually never knew that you were beautiful until
this evening. But now I know. I see everything with a new
clearness. I am a man, and you are going to be a woman in a year or
two. And I want you for my wife."
She was silent, hushed with a new awe. "For your wife? Oh, David!"
"Will you?" he urged, beseeching her with eyes and hands and voice.
"Will you promise that, if I can make a home for you, you will come
and live in it? Will you give me something to work for, something to
keep me from despair? Oh, Rona, I ought not to ask it! How can I be
mad enough to ask it?"
"But of course I shall promise, if you wish it," said the girl, in
her youth and immaturity eager to promise she knew not what, eager to
give joy to the being who, apparently, depended upon her for all his
hopes in life.
Even at the moment, even holding her against his heart, and feasting
his famished nature with the sweetness of her womanhood and the
brilliancy of his new hopes, her dutiful words, emphatic though they
were, sent a chill through him. In spite of his inexperience, there
is an insight which love gives; and he knew that Rona did not love
him, but was merely willing that he should love her. She was not
grown up, he told himself. When she came to be completely a woman
she would love, as he now loved, with that surrender which to him was
so new, so unexampled a sensation. It was long before he could calm
down the turbulence of his emotions to anything like a consideration
of the situation. But their time was short, and after ten minutes of
more or less incoherent bliss and shy caresses, he began to explain
to Rona some of his thoughts and plans. Now that they understood
each other, these were far more easily explained than he had thought
possible.
It appeared that the girl had not been informed of the extent of the
benevolent intentions of the Squire and Miss Rawson on her behalf.
But she was quite sensible enough to understand that, as she and
David were not really brother and sister, but desired another sort of
relationship, it would not be fitting for them to travel about
together, until the time came when they could be husband and wife.
Felix explained to her, fully and with care, the good prospect opened
out to him by the patronage of Vronsky. He was also able to make her
see clearly that it was dangerous for him to stay in England, seeing
that the police supposed him to be dead.
He ascertained, by guarded and careful questioning, that neither
Denzil nor his aunt had said a word to Rona concerning the black
sheep of the family, nor his disappearance. As far as Normansgrave
was concerned, it appeared that he was as though he had never been.
The main difficulty which Felix had foreseen in this interview, was
that of convincing Rona that they must not make a clean breast of
their circumstances, without giving her the true reason for his
silence.
But on this point he found her unexpectedly amenable.
He began, with much diffidence.
"You know, Rona, you asked me in your letter, whether you might not
tell Miss Rawson everything?"
"Yes," said the girl impulsively, "but I am sorry for that. As soon
as I had written, I was sorry. Because, of course, I see that we
can't do that."
He was puzzled. "You do see that we can't?"
"Certainly we can't. Because, if we did, they would have to know
that you had been in--prison--and that they shall never know through
me."
He gazed at her with ever-increasing admiration. "You see that?"
"Yes. I am growing up, you see. I think and hope I grow more
sensible every day. I am learning, learning, every minute. Oh,
David, you can't think how ignorant and foolish I am, or was. Inside
those convent walls there was no world, only the circle of our
everyday life, and the question of lessons and punishments, and being
good, and being naughty, and fasts and festivals and penances and so
on. But I believe that really I have plenty of brains, and I have a
strong will too----"
--"That you have, or you never would have escaped, the determined way
you did----"
--"And I know that, if these people, who are as kind as the people in
a fairy-tale, do give me a chance to learn more, I shall take full
advantage of it. Oh, David, by the time you come back, I shall be so
changed! Twice as sensible and better instructed, and able to help
you--to earn my own living, or help you earn yours."
"You are happy here?" he wistfully asked.
"Happy? I should think so. It is such a nice place, and they are so
good. I don't mean only kind to me, but good to everyone. They do
their duty all day long, and the priest and the doctor seem to come
to them for everything they want."
"And you like the Squire?"
"Oh, very much. Not as much as I like Miss Rawson, of course. Miss
Rawson is more--more--I don't think I can describe it. She has more
mischief in her, somehow. He is fussy over little unimportant
things, and he is rather prosy sometimes. But he is very kind, and
he takes such an interest in me."
He sat gazing upon her as she spoke out her innocent thought. The
idea of her being there, in his own home, until he came to summon her
forth into the world with him, was so surpassingly sweet that it was
with the utmost difficulty that he refrained from telling her how he
had first seen the light within the walls that now sheltered her.
"It--it would disappoint you very much if they should decide not to
keep you?"
She looked earnestly at him. "What would that mean? Would it mean
that you would take me away at once?"
"Yes. They demand that I should make a clean breast of things to
them. I can't do that. I will tell them all I can. But not
everything. If they say, 'Very well, we can't keep her'--then I
should have to fetch you, and we should have to fare into the wide
world together. And I swear that I would take the same care of you
that your own brother might."
He leaned forward, fervently, gazing deep into her eyes; and her lips
curved into an adorable smile. "I don't think I should be so very
much disappointed," she slowly said. "I believe you would let me
learn as much as we could afford--wouldn't you?"
"I'd worship you--you should be to me like a saint--like a thing
apart from the world," he whispered.
And she smiled happily.
After a few moments' thought, he asked her:
"You never heard of any other relative of yours, with the exception
of this one uncle?"
"No, never."
"What did the Reverend Mother tell you?"
"That both my parents were dead. That was all she knew."
"You have no sort of clew to their family? Have you nothing that
belonged to your mother?"
"I had one or two things--a pearl ring, a gold watch and chain, and a
few other things, such as a cashmere shawl and some lace. But my
uncle took them all away. There were no letters or papers of any
kind: nothing that one could find out anything from."
"Then it appears that nobody but this brute has any claim upon you?"
"As far as I know, nobody at all."
"They would not run much risk in keeping you," said Felix, his brows
knit in thought.
"I expect that was what Mr. Vanston was thinking of when he asked if
I had ever been abroad," remarked Rona. "Suppose they should let me
go abroad to be educated?"
"You would like that?"
She assented. "I want to see the world," she announced, very simply.
Felix smiled at the thought of Denzil's benevolence. He knew of old
his pleasure in a certain tepid, but always well-meant philanthropy.
The resentment and hatred of his half-brother, which for years back
had filled his heart, seemed to him a thing to be ashamed of, now
that, in love's light, he saw his own career with new eyes. He
pitied Denzil, in an impersonal kind of way, for having such an
unsatisfactory brother. No wonder they never spoke of him--the
scapegrace for whom the old honorable family must blush when his name
was mentioned.
And then came an idea which caused him to smile to himself. What
would Denzil say, did he know that he was befriending that same
scapegrace brother's future wife? He had no scruple in the feeling
that money was being expended for such a purpose. But it reminded
him of another matter.
"Listen, Rona," he said. "I shall send you money whenever I can. At
first it will not be much. But as soon as I am in regular work, I
should like to send you enough to buy your own clothes, and so on--so
that you should not be beholden to these good people for absolutely
everything. I have brought you half a sovereign to-day, just for
pocket-money, and I shall send more at the first opportunity. That
will make me feel as if you were real--as if, one day, you really
would belong to me."
As he spoke, the church clock chimed a quarter to eight. In ten
minutes, folks would be coming out of church. Their enchanted
interview was almost over.
He looked at her with a kind of despair. "Rona, I must go! I never
thought that it could be as terrible as this to say good-by!"
She looked at him helplessly, her eyes swimming in tears.
--"And I have nothing to give you--nothing to offer but my wretched
self----"
He dived into his pocket, brought out a sixpence, and with a pair of
pocket-pliers, divided it neatly in two pieces. Then, with a piercer
in his pocket-knife, he drilled a tiny hole in each half, and made
her promise that she would suspend the charm about her own neck, as
he would about his--as the only tangible sign of their plighted vows.
There was but a moment, after this ceremony, to be spent in
leave-taking. Felix, to his own utter astonishment, broke down
completely.
"You'll be true to me, Rona--you won't fail me?" he gasped,
half-blinded by the choking tears; and Rona, with those tears wet
upon her cheek, promised, knowing no more than a kitten what she was
promising, nor why.
For one instant their lips were together, the young man trembling,
ashamed of his weakness, his hot heart filled with a surge of emotion
so unexpected as to be to him alarming; and then he was running from
her, not daring to look back, stumbling away in the evening dusk with
a heart more joyful, but with pangs more dire than he had imagined
possible.
And now the future lay before him, like the battle-field upon which
to-morrow's conflict should take place. To the old Felix he had
bidden farewell. He had now no mind to regenerate society, only to
make one woman happy. Rona, who knew the worst of him--Rona, who had
come to him at the moment when he touched bottom--Rona loved him.
Then to conquer the world was a mere detail. It could be done, and
he, Felix, was the man to do it.
* * * * * * *
In the course of the ensuing day, Miss Rawson received the following
letter.
It was typewritten, and dated from a London hotel.
"Miss Rawson (Private).
"DEAR MADAM,--I must begin this letter with some attempt to express
my deep sense of the great kindness you have shown to my young
sister. I scarcely know how to write. Words mean so little. But as
I have nothing else, I must, all the same, make use of them to tell
you of my undying gratitude to you and Mr. Vanston for a help so
prompt and so effectual as that you have already bestowed. But,
madam, not only am I your debtor for all these favors--you actually
speak of interesting yourself further in my sister's case--upon
conditions.
"I cannot tell you how much it would mean to me to know that she was
safe, and in trustworthy hands, during the next year or two. I have
thrown up my old work, and, for reasons I shall explain, I cannot
return to it. I have now the offer of work which will, I trust, turn
out well for me, but of such a character--involving residence abroad
and much movement from place to place--as would make it very
difficult at first to have my sister with me.
"But now, madam, we come to the crucial point. You most naturally
stipulate that the kind offer you make is contingent upon my
frankness. Before we go further, let me avow, without disguise, that
I dare not be perfectly frank with you. The reason for this is that
we are fugitives. We have an uncle, who was in charge of my sister,
and from whose wicked hands she was escaping when she met with her
accident. Should he find out where she now is, he would no doubt try
to repossess himself of her.
"We are orphans; and in justice to your kindness, and relying on your
secrecy, I will own to you that our name is not Smith in reality, but
Leigh. My uncle made an unjustifiable attempt to compel my sister to
adopt as her profession the music-hall stage--to which she was
strongly averse. He paid a premium for her complete training to a
man who was neither more nor less than an unprincipled scoundrel. On
my sister's declining to submit to his treatment, he tried to starve
her into submission by locking her up and leaving her without food.
In rescuing her from this terrible position--only just in time--I was
so unfortunate as to allow her to fall from a considerable height,
with the result that, as you know, she was seriously hurt.
"We made our escape, penniless and without resources, in the canal
barge.
"You will see that I am being frank with you as regards the
circumstances. I refrain only from the mention of names and places.
I am fully aware that, by so doing, I put it out of your power to
verify any part of my story. But what can I do? My uncle is furious
at having paid down a large sum for my sister's training, only to
lose her. He will leave no stone unturned to recapture her. He has
set detectives upon our track, though he has not allowed the
newspapers to make our flight known. I cannot even give you the
address of the school at which my sister was educated, as this is the
first place in which my uncle would make inquiries; and the
lady-principal might think it her duty to answer them, should you let
her know where we are.
"My uncle is my sister's legal guardian until she comes of age. Any
court of law would, on his application, restore her to his care,
unless we could adduce satisfactory proof of his brutality, which
would be very difficult.
"I hope you will see that there are strong reasons for my reticence.
Nevertheless, on reading this over, I feel that it is very likely
that you may, even if you believe what I say, wish to disembarrass
yourself of a charge who might quite possibly prove a difficulty
should her guardian discover her place of refuge.
"But I am perfectly determined that, whatever happens, she shall not
go back to a life she justly loathes--a life in which she would be
ruined, body and soul. Should you decide not to keep her, I will
fetch her away, take her abroad with me, and manage as best I can for
her.
"I will add no more to a letter already long enough to need apology.
Accept, then, madam, my profound thanks, and my assurance that,
however you decide, I consider myself deeply your debtor. If you
feel that you do not care to accept further responsibility in the
matter, please let me know at once, as I must then make arrangements
to fetch my sister.--I am, madam, your grateful and obliged servant,
"DAVID SMITH.
"P.S.--With the exception of the uncle in question, we have no
relations."