"YOU NEVER WERE MINE"
--You have taken from me
The Present, and I murmur not, nor moan;
The Future too, with all her glorious promise;
But do not leave me utterly alone!
Spare me the Past.
--ADELAIDE A. PROCTER.
For Denzil Vanston the days which ensued upon his homecoming were
days of charm and wonder. Life for him took on new colors, the
presence of Rona in the house gave an unwonted zest even to the most
trivial things.
Miss Rawson watched, well pleased, the intercourse between the two.
They played tennis and golf, they rowed and punted together. Rona's
physical health was perfect, and she was apparently never tired.
But when a fortnight of such dalliance had gone by, the vigilant aunt
began to think that, if anything were to come of it, she had better
take some steps to force the pace.
Denzil had never been a hot-blooded young man, and he was no longer
in his first youth. He seemed quite satisfied with what his aunt
impatiently characterized to herself as "philandering" with the
beautiful girl with whom his generosity had enabled him to be on
terms of intimacy. He did not make love to Veronica. He
complacently played a semi-paternal part, treating her indulgently,
as a beloved child; and he was, to all appearance, abundantly content
with the situation as it was.
But the looker-on knew that this apparently stable and well-balanced
position must of necessity be of a most temporary and elusive
character. Veronica had not been a week in the house, when the young
men of the neighborhood took to coming to call in a persistent and
unusual manner; and invitations to dinner arrived, pointedly
including "the young friend who is staying with you."
It should be remarked that Mr. Vanston possessed in a marked degree
one valuable quality--the virtue of discretion. He had held his
tongue about the waif girl whom his aunt had rescued from the canal
barge. One or two of the old servants at Normansgrave--Chant, the
butler, for example--knew of the circumstances of Rona's first
appearance. So also did Dr. Causton. The nurse who had then been
employed at the Cottage Hospital had since married and left the
neighborhood; and as Rona had not been seen for two years, and nobody
had spoken of her, she was not, upon her reappearance, associated in
people's minds with the circumstances of her first arrival. This had
taken place just at the time when poor Felix's suicide, or
disappearance, had been in the foreground of everybody's thoughts
concerning the Vanstons. Everybody who called upon Miss Rawson
during the sad period had been so eager to be informed upon the
subject, that the topic of the girl from the barge had not been
necessary in order to maintain conversation.
And now that Rona had come to stay at Normansgrave for an indefinite
term, Denzil decided that she should use her own name, of Leigh, and
not be called Smith any longer, as for safety's sake, and in case
anybody should be making inquiries for her, she had been called
during her two years abroad. Nobody was likely to associate the
tall, graceful, well-dressed Miss Leigh, now visiting her friends,
with the pale, half-grown creature who had been the first patient at
the now popular Cottage Hospital.
Denzil had taken an opportunity of telling Dr. Causton that he wished
no mention of the barge episode to be made. He said that there was a
reason for silence. Dr. Causton, who possessed both brains and eyes,
had naturally perceived that Rona was not among her accustomed
surroundings when he first found her upon the _Sarah Dawkes_. He
concluded that the secret had been confided to the Vanstons, who had
so generously befriended her, and kept his counsel accordingly.
To inquiring friends Miss Rawson simply said that Denzil was acting
as guardian to Miss Leigh for her brother, who was in Siberia; a
statement which, as far as she knew, was perfectly true.
If Miss Rawson had found Rona interesting in her youth and
helplessness, she was now amazed at the character and ability
developed by the foundling. She knew that this was a most unusual
girl: she believed that she was the very woman for Denzil, could she
but be induced to think so. And at this point in her career--before
she had discovered her power--and while the glow of her gratitude to
Denzil, and the fact of her having known no other young men,
conspired to make him acceptable in her eyes--it seemed this might be
compassed.
To Aunt Bee's acute intelligence, the fact of the girl's nameless,
homeless condition was by no means altogether a drawback. She had
been most carefully trained from early childhood; she seemed to have
no undesirable relatives, with the one exception of the Wicked Uncle;
and having no mother or sisters of her own to interfere, she would be
more dependent upon Miss Rawson. And this dear lady would hardly
have been human had she not felt that she would like a certain amount
of influence with Denzil's wife.
But, if it were to be done, it must be done at once. She felt this
keenly. Rona was already longing to stretch her wings. Her second
story had been bought by the editor who took her first. She had,
apparently, a play of fancy of that graceful, iridescent kind which
suits the pages of the modern magazine. And here was a source of
income, likely to become considerable. And no doubt Rona had
imbibed, with her modern education, modern ideas of womanly
independence, though at present these were tempered by the conventual
upbringing.
The uncle who had designed the girl for the stage had been a man of
penetration. She was not only beautiful, she was beautiful in a
dramatic style. Soon--very soon--somebody would tell her so. Soon
she would awake to the consciousness of Power. And then good-by to
Denzil's chances!
Miss Rawson had no wish to entrap the girl before she was old enough
to judge for herself. She sincerely thought that, if it could be
brought about, she would be happy with Denzil, that the career of
being mistress of a house, and a personage in the county, would
occupy her talents in a safe and satisfactory manner. She would
kindle her husband's ambitions, she would be the mother of splendid
children. In her the traditions of the family would blossom once
more.
Such was the earnest ambition of Aunt Bee. She knew the good in
Denzil. He was capable of being an excellent husband and father.
But he must secure Rona before passion awoke in her.
To this end she plotted. She invited a house-party to stay at
Normansgrave. Among them was that same Miss Myrtle Bentley whom
Denzil had once thought that he could like well enough to bestow upon
her the priceless treasure of his heart. There is little doubt that
she would have accepted it, most gratefully; for she was
twenty-eight, and the slight primness which endeared her to Denzil
was not an attraction in the eyes of other men.
She came; and Denzil marveled that he could ever have been drawn
towards her. Others came too. Several young men. Aunt Bee asked
none whom she thought likely to be dangerous to Rona; but several to
whom she thought Rona would inevitably be dangerous.
As a few days fleeted by, she congratulated herself upon the success
of her maneuver. The young men surrounded Rona as flies hover about
honey. Denzil was no longer able to monopolize her. He felt the
change acutely. His aunt had strong hopes that, before long, his
calm must give way, and he be driven over the verge of a declaration.
It was to her unaccountable that he should be so slow to move. But
she had to admit that Veronica gave him no help. Veronica was not
the least bit in love. She was reveling, with all her intense
physical capacity, in the pleasure which life gave her. Surrounded
by summer weather, pleasant people, and beautiful country, she gave
herself up to holiday happiness--picnics by river, picnics by motor,
garden-parties, golf, and dancing--each thing in turn was new, was
absorbing, was delightful.
She seemed fast slipping into that daughterly attitude towards Denzil
which Aunt Bee dreaded and strove to avert.
The girl was living in the golden present moment. There was a dark
background to her thought. Now and then, even in the midst of her
mirth, the shadow of her secret betrothal flapped its black wings in
the sunshine. But she turned her mind and her heart away from it.
She was gloriously amused, she was glowing with the pride of life and
youth. She was not going to think upon any disagreeable subject.
And then, one morning, there lay upon her plate a letter. A letter
with the usual Russian stamps and the usual typewritten address. For
Felix never dared risk his handwriting, for fear of recognition.
Veronica gazed upon that envelope as a man may look upon the Black
Hand which is the secret summons of some nefarious society, and calls
upon him to prepare for death. A gust of loathing memory swept over
her. Again she saw the dun half-daylight of a London winter; again
the endless lines of railway far below. She smelt the odor of hay
and tarpaulin, and saw the dizzy lights upon the black, slow river.
She resented being reminded of the terrible moment of her despair,
her escape, her accident, her privations. She looked down the
breakfast-table at the well-looking, prosperous people who were
feeding there. What had she and they in common with anarchy and
jail, and all the other awful things that lie out of sight, in the
darker corners of life?
Whatever happened, she could not open and read her letter then. She
slipped it into her pocket unnoticed. She intended to read it as
soon as she should be alone. But immediately after breakfast all was
bustle and movement, since they were going to scull up the Wey to the
ruins of Newark Abbey for a picnic. There was no leisure to break
the fatal seal.
One person had noted the arrival of the letter. This was Miss
Rawson. She welcomed it. This might bring matters to a climax,
where she had failed to do so. If Rona's brother was coming to fetch
her away, then surely Denzil would find out the nature of his own
complaint, and take steps to prevent her departure.
She watched Veronica with some keenness, as she went to and fro,
playing assistant hostess very prettily under Aunt Bee's directions,
and seeing that everybody was comfortably seated in the various
motors and traps, with rugs, cushions, and so on. Miss Rawson had
slightly sprained her knee, and was in consequence unable to go that
day's expedition. She stood in the hall superintending the departure.
Denzil was driving his own dogcart, and by a little gentle
maneuvering, Myrtle Bentley had secured the seat beside him. This
made him rather cross, though he knew quite well that Rona and he, in
consideration of their guests, could not well drive down together.
His face was moody as he sought for a missing whip among the contents
of a stand in the hall.
His aunt's eyes twinkled. "I suppose," she very softly remarked, in
a pensive way, "that it is, after all, a good thing that Rona will so
soon be leaving us."
Denzil looked up with great suddenness. "What do you mean?" he
demanded.
"Well, I conclude her brother will be coming for her very shortly. I
saw she heard from him this morning, and he seems to be doing very
well. I am glad she will have a home, for she could not well stay
here after you are married, could she?" with a mischievous
inclination of her head towards the open door, where, in the
sunshine, sat the decorous Myrtle, in a somewhat starchy white
washing frock.
"What do you mean?" repeated Denzil, vacantly, a second time,
standing as if rooted to the spot.
Aunt Bee shrugged her expressive shoulders. "I have to consider the
future, you know, dear boy. And if Rona decides upon a literary
career in London, I think I shall go and share her one room.
Good-by, and good luck!"
She laughed, in the teasing way that poor Denzil never understood.
He was as nearly rude to Miss Bentley on the drive down as he ever
permitted himself to be to a lady. She described him to herself,
with some ladylike resentment, as grumpy. He did not seem to think
the day fine, nor the drive pleasant, nor to admire the lovely view
of the river, which moved her to unusual warmth of expression.
Down at the canal side, just where once the _Sarah Dawkes_ had been
moored, with a delirious, broken girl aboard her, stood Rona, upright
as a dart, her punt-pole in her hand. She wore a pale silvery green
washing silk. The masses of her hair were glorious under the shade
of her sweeping hat.
"You are never going to punt to-day, Rona?" cried the Squire, quite
sharply. "Do you realize that we have to get up to Newark?"
She raised her glorious eyes, full of astonishment at his unwonted
petulance--an astonishment which made him hot all over.
"Of course not. I am only steadying the boats," she said, with a
chill in that voice that was, to him, the barometer of his happiness.
"I had arranged to scull this boat with you."
His heart leaped.
"Oh, Miss Leigh, I don't think that is fair," broke in Captain Legge,
a young man who admired Rona considerably. "You and Vanston are such
swells, you must not pull together. I will go in your boat, and he
had better come here."
"Yes," cried the lady in this boat, "and here is room for Miss
Bentley in the stern."
Legge swiftly stepped into Rona's boat, and it would have been hard
to dislodge him without more commotion being made than the Squire
approved. He had to go with the other party, and to start for the
day with the remembrance that he had spoken sharply to his adored,
and had no chance to apologize. Myrtle could not scull; well and
good. But she thought she could steer, and was deceived in her
opinion. This was very bad indeed. All the way up, the temper of
the young man was continually chafed, and he had to go on smiling at
her well-meant apologies, as she bumped the boat under every one of
the tiny bridges which span the stream thereabouts, and must be shot,
sculls shipped, by an experienced "cox."
It was nearly a quarter to two when they at last piloted their tiny
fleet up the deep dykes, once cut by the monks for the due supply of
their Abbey, placed with rare felicity among the windings of many
streams. Little as survives of the fabric, the situation of Newark
renders it a particularly pathetic ruin. On this day the sun poured
down upon the meadow-sweet, drawing up its fragrance in gusts of
perfume; the track of each rill was marked by a fringe of purple
loose-strife; and among the forget-me-nots darted dragon-flies, like
moving gems, over the surface of the quiet waters.
It took long to discuss the excellent fare provided by Miss Rawson;
and then, in the golden afternoon, people grew drowsy, smoked,
talked, told stories, or teased and joked among themselves. In the
midst of it all the thought of her letter darted into Rona's mind.
Her conscience smote her. She told herself that she was a selfish,
unfaithful friend, a girl whom, were she to read about her in a book,
she would unhesitatingly condemn. With the excuse of hunting for
flowers, she slipped away, and seeking shelter from the burning sun,
wandered into the inclosure where the ruins stand, and sat herself
down by a wall, among the grass. She thought of David as she had
last seen him. For the past two years she had hardly thought of him
at all. Now it seemed as if his very voice spoke--"You will be true
to me? You won't fail me--will you?"
The hot blood dyed her face. She was not conscious of
unfaithfulness, in the sense of having preferred anyone else to
David. But she was conscious of a complete change of mind with
regard to him. She wished he had not written. But the letter must
be opened. She drew it from her pocket with reluctant fingers, and
broke the seal.
"Savlinsky Copper Mines,
"Barralinsk,
"Siberia, via Moscow.
"MY DEAR RONA,--I have not written to you for many, many weeks, and
this for two reasons. The first of these is that, since you told me
of your change of feeling towards me, I have found it very difficult
to know what to say to you. The other concerns my own personal
safety.
"I do not know whether it will interest you. Since your letter I
have several times thought that my best course would be to disappear
and let you hear no more of me. But the desire in me for a kind word
from you is too strong for that.
"If you are not interested, simply do not read this.
"As I have told you, for a period of nearly two years I was let alone
by the Brotherhood so completely that I began to think that I had
shaken them off. Most of the men who had had to do with me were
killed during the Russian Revolution. But one man, a Pole called
Cravatz, bore me a special grudge. He has tracked me in all my
movements, and at last, when he found me in Siberia, settled in a
position of responsibility and trusted everywhere, he found means to
communicate with me. The Governor of this Province of Barralinsk is
obnoxious to the Brotherhood. He was in command of a regiment in St.
Petersburg during the rising, and it was believed that he had urged
the severe treatment of rebels. Knowing him as I do, I think this
most unlikely; but however, he is on the proscribed list. Cravatz
brought me the official command from the Brotherhood, that I was to
be the instrument of their vengeance upon this man. That means that
I am under orders to commit a murder. If it is not done by the last
day of August my own life will not be safe for an instant.
"This was a crushing blow to me for more reasons than one. To begin
with, the Governor is my personal friend. From him I have always
received the utmost kindness, as well as from his daughter.
"But in addition to this, I have got on so well, and my prospects are
so good, that I am in a position to gratify the only wish I have in
the world, were the woman I love only brave enough to face a life in
this lonely place. But I could not, of course, think of asking you
to encounter the risk of my being murdered, perhaps before your eyes.
"However, Vronsky, my well-loved Vronsky, who is a second father to
me, thinks he sees a way out. Cravatz is a thorough-paced scoundrel,
and he has put himself within reach of the law out here.
"If we can get him arrested all will be well; there is no other
member of the Brotherhood to follow the thing up.
"And now comes the question. If I can arrange this matter--will you
come to me? I would travel to England, for I can get three months'
leave--and marry you and bring you out here. It is a desolate
village, but lovely in summer-time. You would have a comfortable
house and good servants.
"But what is the use of writing this? Even as I do it, I laugh at
myself. Is it likely that such a thing as this should happen to me?
"You are not mine, and never will be. You never were mine. It was
your sweet child-sympathy that made you think for a few minutes--a
few minutes of pity and regret--that you could love me. You repented
almost at once--did you not?
"Don't think that I am going to reproach you. The thing was
inevitable. I had no right to suggest to you what I did.
"You must not reproach yourself. I am older, harder, stronger now.
I shall not take laudanum, even though I have to live without hope.
"I have delayed the sending of this letter for three awful months of
consuming impatience, in order to be pretty certain that we had a
reasonable chance of laying hold of Cravatz. That assurance Vronsky
now gives me. I therefore write. My feeling for you has never
changed. I am, as always, your lover, and would-be husband.
"But should you send to me the words I dare not think of as
possible--should your answer be 'Yes, I will come to you'--then there
are things about myself that I must tell you.
"Don't keep me waiting, will you? Decide quickly, write, put me out
of my pain. Life here is long, days pass slowly, and I am starving
for a word. Remember that, and be merciful.--I am your devoted DAVID
SMITH."
Rona sat, with this letter in her hands, staring across at the
pine-covered hill which fronts the Abbey; and it seemed as if her
world were turning upside down. It had come. The thing which had
loomed in the dim future, the thing that during the past months she
had almost forgotten, was now upon her. She had received from David
a definite offer of marriage, and it must be answered, one way or
another.
And, in the passionate revolt of her whole nature, she felt that she
could not do it. Her home was here--here at Normansgrave, where
first she had known happiness in all her lonely, unfriended life.
Meanwhile, she had given her promise. She had given it fully,
freely, without hesitation, to the young man who was as friendless,
as forlorn as she. But in the time which had passed since then she
had found home and friends, life was opening before her--while he was
lonely still. Lonely and wanting her. What was she to do?
With a passion of terror and repulsion she contemplated the idea of
going off with this stranger, whom she had known only for three wild
days--of leaving for his sake, England, and all that England means.
Oh--she could not do it; as he said in his letter, he ought not to
demand it!
In the agony of her feelings she bowed her head upon her hands; and
it seemed as if some inner barrier broke so that the tears came. She
was a girl who seldom wept, and having once given way, she grieved
with an abandonment which frightened her. To her horror she found
that she could not control herself. She was obliged to bend before
the storm which shook her. It was half shame. By all the rules, she
should be ready to die for this man who had saved her; and she, on
the contrary, recoiled with shuddering from the mere thought of him.
It was upon this desolation of grief that Denzil, wandering in search
of her, came, with a thrill of horror unspeakable. With a leap into
life of something within him, he flung himself down upon the grass
beside her. He lifted her up, he held her in his arms, he found
himself kissing away her tears before he knew what he was about--and
the only words that came into his head as he clasped her close were:
"My darling, my own darling, what has made you cry?"