"A continual battle goes on in a child's mind between what it knows and what it comprehends."
"A continual battle goes on in a child's mind between what it knows and what it comprehends."
"Well?" says he.
He advances even nearer, and dropping on a stone close to her, takes possession of one of her hands.
"As you can't make up your mind to him; and, as you say, you like me, say something more."
"More?"
"Yes. A great deal more. Take the next move. Say—boldly—that you will marry me!"
Joyce grows a little pale. She had certainly been prepared for this speech, had been preparing herself for it all the long weary wakeful night, yet now that she hears it, it seems as strange, as terrible, as though it had never suggested itself to her in its vaguest form.
"Why should I say that?" says she at last, stammering a little, and feeling somewhat disingenuous. She had known, yet now she is trying to pretend that she did not know.
"Because I ask you. You see I put the poorest reason at first, and because you say I am not hateful to you, and because——"
"Well?"
"Because, when a man's last chance of happiness lies in the balance, he will throw his very soul into the weighing of it—and knowing this, you may have pity on me."
As though pressed down by some insupportable weight, the girl rises and makes a little curious gesture as if to free herself from it. Her face, still pale, betrays an inward struggle. After all, why cannot she give herself to him? Why can't she love him? He loves her; love, as some poor fool says, begets love.
And he is honest. Yes, honest! A pang shoots through her breast. That, when all is told, is the principal thing. He is not uncertain—untrustworthy—double-faced, assomemen are. Again that cruel pain contracts her heart. To be able to believe in a person, to be able to trust implicitly in each lightest word, to read the real meaning in every sentence, to see the truth shining in the clear eyes, this is to know peace and happiness; and yet—
"You know all," says she, looking up at him, her eyes compressed, her brow frowning; "I am uncertain of myself, nothing seems sure to me, but if you wish it——"
"Wish it!" clasping her hands closer.
"There is this to be said, then. I will promise to answer you this day twelve-month."
"Twelve months," says he, with consternation; his grasp on her hands loosens.
"If the prospect frightens or displeases you, there is nothing more to be said," rejoins she coldly. It is she who is calm and composed, he is nervous and anxious.
"But a whole year!"
"That is nothing," says she, releasing her hands, with a little determined show of strength, from his. "It is for you to decide. I don't care!"
Perhaps she hardly grasps the cruelty that lies in this half-impatient speech, until she sees Dysart's face flush painfully.
"You need not have said that," says he. "I know it. I am nothing to you really." He pauses, and then says again in a low tone, "Nothing."
"Oh, you mustn't feel so much!" cries she, as if tortured. "It is folly to feel at all in this world. What's the good of it. And to feel about me, I am not worth it. If you would only bear that in mind, it might help you."
"If I bore that in mind I should not want to make you my wife!" returns he steadily, gravely. "Think as you will yourself, you do not shake my faith in you. Well," with a deep breath, "I accept your terms. For a year I shall feel myself bound to you (though that is a farce, for I shall always be bound to you, soul and body) while you shall hold yourself free, and try to——"
"No, no. We must both be equal—both free, while I—" she stops short, coloring warmly, and laughing, "what is it I am to try to do?"
"To love me!" replies he, with infinite sadness in look and tone.
"Yes," says Joyce slowly, and then again meditatively, "yes." She lifts her eyes presently and regards him strangely. "And if all my trying should not succeed? If I never learn to love you?"
"Why, then it is all over. This hope of mine is at an end," say he, so calmly, yet with such deep melancholy, such sad foreboding, that her heart is touched.
"Oh! it is a hope of mine too," says she quickly. "If it were not would I listen to you to-day? But you must not be so downhearted; let the worst come to the worst, you will be as well off as you are at this instant."
He shakes his head.
"Does hope count for nothing, then?"
"You would compel me to love you," says she, growing the more vexed as she grows the more sorry for him. "Would you have me marry you even if I did not love you?" Her soft eyes have filled with tears, there is a suspicion of reproach in her voice.
"No. I suppose not."
He half turns away from her. At this moment a sense of despair falls on him. She will never care for him, never, never. This proposed probation is but a mournful farce, a sorry clinging to a hope that is built on sand. When in the future she marries, as so surely she will, he will not be her husband. Why not give in at once? Why fight with the impossible? Why not break all links (frail as they are sweet), and let her go her way, and he his, while yet there is time? To falter is to court destruction.
Then all at once a passionate reaction sets in. Joyce, looking at him, sees the light of battle, the warmth of love the unconquerable, spring into his eyes. No, he will not cave in! He will resist to the last! dispute every inch of the ground, and if finally only defeat is to crown his efforts still——And why should defeat be his? Be it Beauclerk or another, whoever declares himself his rival shall find him a formidable enemy to overcome.
"Joyce," says he quickly, turning to her and grasping her hands, "give me my chance. Give me those twelve months; give me your thoughts now and then while they last. I brought you here to-day to say all this knowing we should be alone, and without——"
"Tommy?" says she, with a little laugh.
"Oh, well! You must confess I got rid of him," says he, smiling too, and glad in his heart to find her so cheerful. "I think if you look into it, that my stratagem, the inciting him to the overcoming of his sister in that race, was the work of a diplomatist of the first water. I quite felt that——"
A war whoop behind him dissolves his self-gratulations into nothing. Here comes Tommy the valiant, triumphant, puffed beyond all description with pride and want of breath.
"I beat her, I beat her," shrieks he, with the last note left in his tuneful pipe. He staggers the last yard or two and falls into Joyce's arms, that are opened wide to receive him. Who shall say he is not a happy interlude? Evidently Joyce regards him as such.
"I came back to tell you," says Tommy, recovering himself a little. "I knew," with the fearless confidence of childhood, "that you'd be longing to know if I beat her, and I did. She's down there how with Bridgie," pointing to the valley beneath, "and she's mad with me because I didn't let her win."
"You ought to go back to her," says Dysart, "she'll be madder if you don't."
"She won't. She's picking daisies now."
"But Bridget will want you."
"No," shaking his lovely little head. "Bridgie said: 'ye may go, sir, an' ye needn't be in a hurry back, me an' Mickey Daily have a lot to say about me mother's daughter.'"
It would be impossible to describe the accuracy with which Tommy describes Bridget's tone and manner.
"Oh! I daresay," says Mr. Dysart. "Me mother's daughter must be a truly enthralling person."
"I think Tommy ought to be educated for the stage," says Joyce in a little whisper.
"He'll certainly make his mark wherever he goes," says Dysart, laughing. "Tommy," after a careful examination of Monkton, Junior's, seraphic countenance, "don't you think you ought to take your sister on to the Court?"
"So I will," says Tommy, "in a minute or two." He has climbed into Joyce's lap, and is now sitting on her with his arms round her neck. To make love to a young woman and to induce her to marry you with a barnacle of this sort hanging round her suggests difficulties. Mr. Dysart waits. "All things come to those who wait," says a wily old proverb. But Dysart proves this proverb a swindle.
"Now, Tommy," says he, "the two minutes are up."
"I don't care," says Tommy. "I'm tired, and Bridgie said I needn't hurry."
"The charms of Mr. Mickey Daly are no doubt great," says Dysart, mildly, "yet I think Bridget must by this time be aware that she wasn't sent out by your mother to tattle to him, but to take you and your sister to play with Bertie. Here, Tommy," decisively, "get off your aunt's lap and run away."
"But why?" demands Tommy, aggressively. "What harm am I doing?"
"You are tiring your aunt, for one thing."
"I'm not! She likes to have me here," defiantly. "I ride a 'cock horse' every night when she's at home, don't I, Joyce? I wish you'd go away," wrathfully, "because then Joyce would come home and play with us again. 'Tis you," glaring at him with deep-seated anger in his eyes, "who are keeping her here!"
"Oh, no; you are wrong there," says Dysart with a sad smile. "I could not keep her anywhere, she would not stay with me. But really, Tommy, you know you ought to go on to the Court. Poor little Bertie is looking out for you eagerly. See," plunging his hand into his pocket, "here is half a crown for you to spend on lollipops. I'll give it to you if you'll go back to Bridget."
Tommy's eyes brighten. But as quickly the charming blue in them darkens again. There is no tuck shop between this and the Court.
"'Tisn't any good," says he mournfully, "the shop's away down there," pointing vaguely backward on the journey he has come.
"You look strong in wind and limb; there is no reason to believe that the morrow's sun may not dawn on you," says Mr. Dysart. "And then think, Tommy, think what a joy you will be to old Molly Brien."
"Molly gives me four bull's-eyes for a penny," says Tommy reflectively. "That's two to Mabel and two to me, because mammy says baby mustn't have any for fear she'd choke. If there's four for a penny, how many is there for this?" holding out the half crown that lies upon his little brown shapely palm.
"That's a sum," says Mr. Dysart. "Tommy, you're a cruel boy;" and having struggled with it for a moment, he says "one hundred and twenty."
"No!" says Tommy in a voice faint with hopeful unbelief. "Joyce, 'tisn't true, is it?"
"Quite true," says Joyce. "Just fancy, Tommy, one hundred and twenty bull's-eyes, all in one day!"
There is such a genuine support of his desire to get rid of Tommy in her tone that Dysart's heart rises within him.
"Tie it into my hankercher," says Tommy, without another second's hesitation. "Tie it tight, or it'll slip out and I'll lose it. Good-bye, and thank you, Mr. Dysart," thrusting a hot little fist into his. "I'll keep some of the hundred and twenty ones for you and Joyce."
He rushes away down the hill, eager to tell his grand news to Mabel, and presently Joyce and Dysart are alone again.
"You see you were not so clever a diplomatist as you thought yourself," says Joyce, smiling faintly; "Tommy came back."
"Tommy and I have one desire in common; we both want to be with you."
"Could you be bought off like Tommy?" says she, half playfully. "Oh, no! Half a crown would not be good enough."
"Would all the riches the world contains be good enough?" says he in a voice very low, but full of emotion. "You know it would not. But you, Joyce—twelve months is a long time. You may see others—if not Beauclerk—others—and——"
"Money would not tempt me," says the girl slowly. "If money were your rival, you would indeed be safe. You ought to know that."
"Still—Joyce——" He stops suddenly. "May I think of you as Joyce? I have called you so once or twice, but——"
"You may always call me so," says she gently, if indifferently. "All my friends call me so, and you—are my friend, surely!"
The very sweetness of her manner, cold as ice as it is, drives him to desperation.
"Not your friend—your lover!" says he with sudden passion. "Joyce, think of all that I have said—all you nave promised. A small matter to you perhaps—the whole world to me. You will wait for me for twelve months. You will try to love me. You——"
"Yes, but there is something more to be said," cries the girl, springing to her feet as if in violent protest, and confronting him with a curious look—set—determined—a little frightened perhaps.
"'I thought love had been a joyous thing,' quoth my uncle Toby.'""He hath a heart as sound as a bell, and his tongue is the clapper.For what his heart thinks his tongue speaks."
"'I thought love had been a joyous thing,' quoth my uncle Toby.'"
"He hath a heart as sound as a bell, and his tongue is the clapper.For what his heart thinks his tongue speaks."
"More?" says Dysart startled by her expression, and puzzled as well.
"Yes!" hurriedly. "This!" The very nervousness that is consuming her throws fire into her eyes and speech. "During all these long twelve months I shall be free. Quite free. You forgot to put that in! You must remember that! If—if I should, after all this thinking, decide on not having anything to do with you—you," vehemently, "will have no right to reproach me. Remember," says she going up to him and laying her hand upon his arm while the blood receding from her face leaves her very white; "remember should such a thing occur—and it is very likely," slowly, "I warn you of that—you are not to consider yourself wronged or aggrieved in any way."
"Why should you talk to me in this way?" begins he, aggrieved now at all events.
"You must recollect," feverishly, "that I have made you no promise. Not one. I refuse even to look upon this matter as a serious thing. I tell you honestly," her dark eyes gleaming with nervous excitement, "I don't believe I ever shall so look at it. After all," pausing, "you will do well if you now put an end to this farce between us; and tell me to take myself and my dull life out of yours forever."
"I shall never tell you that," in a low tone.
"Well, well," impatiently; "I have warned you. It will not be my fault if——O! it is foolish of you!" she blurts out suddenly. "I have told you I don't understand myself: and still you waste yourself—you throw yourself away. In the end you will be disappointed in me, if not in one way, then in another. It hurts me to think of that. There is time still; let us be friends—friends——" Her hands are tightly clasped, she looks at him with a world of entreaty in her beautiful eyes. "Friends, Felix!" breathes she softly.
"Let things rest as they are, I beseech you," says he, taking her hand and holding it in a tight grasp. "The future—who can ever say what that great void will bring us. I will trust to it; and if only loss and sorrow be my portion, still——As for friendship, Joyce; whatever happens I shall be your friend and lover."
"Well—you quite know," says the girl, almost sullenly.
"Quite. And I accept the risk. Do not be angry with me, my beloved." He lifts the hand he holds and presses it to his lips, wondering always at the coldness of it. "You are free, Joyce; you desire it so, and I desire it, too. I would not hamper you in any way."
"I should not be able to endure it, if—afterward—I thought you were reproaching me," says she, with a little weary smile.
"Be happy about that," says he: "I shall never reproach you." He is silent for a moment; her last speech has filled him with thoughts that presently grow into extremely happy ones: unless—unless she liked him—cared for him, in some decided, if vague manner, would his future misery be of so much importance to her? Oh! surely not! A small flood of joy flows over him. A radiant smile parts his lips. The light of a coming triumph that shall gird and glorify his whole life illumines his eyes.
She regarding him grows suddenly uneasy.
"You—you fully understand," says she, drawing back from him.
"Oh, you have made me do that," says he, but his radiant smile still lingers.
"Then why," mistrustfully, "do you look so happy?" She draws even further away from him. It is plain she resents that happiness.
"Is there not reason?" says he. "Have you not let me speak, and having spoken, do you not still let me linger near you? It is more than I dared hope for! Therefore, poor as is my chance, I rejoice now. Do not forbid me. I may have no reason to rejoice in the future. Let me, then, have my day."
"It grows very late," says Miss Kavanagh abruptly. "Let us go home."
Silently they turn and descend the hill. Halfway down he pauses and looks backward.
"Whatever comes of it," says he, "I shall always love this spot. Though, if the year's end leave me desolate, I hope I shall never see it again."
"It is unlucky to rejoice too soon," says she, in a low whisper.
"Oh! don't say that word 'Rejoice.' How it reminds me of you. It ought to belong to you. It does. You should have been called 'Rejoice' instead of 'Joyce'; they have cut off half your name. To see you is to feel new life within one's veins."
"Ah! I said you didn't know me," returns she sadly.
Meantime the hours have flown; evening is descending. It is all very well for those who, traveling up and down romantic hills, can find engrossing matters for conversation in their idle imaginings of love, or their earnest belief therein, but to the ordinary ones of the earth, mundane comforts are still of some worth.
Tea, the all powerful, is now holding high revelry in the library at the Court. Round the cosy tables, growing genial beneath the steam of the many old Queen Anne "pots," the guests are sitting singly or in groups.
"What delicious little cakes!" says Lady Swansdown, taking up a smoking morsel of cooked butter and flour from the glowing tripod beside her.
"You like them?" says Lady Baltimore in her slow, earnest way. "So does Joyce. She thinks they are the nicest cakes in the world. By the by, where is Joyce?"
"She went out for a walk at twenty minutes after two," says Beauclerk. He has pulled out his watch and is steadily consulting it.
"And it is now twenty minutes after five," says Lady Swansdown, maliciously, who detests Beauclerk and who has read his relations with Joyce as clear as a book. "How she must have enjoyed herself!"
"Yes; but where?" says Lady Baltimore anxiously. Joyce has been left in her charge, and, apart from that, she likes the girl well enough, to be uneasy about her when occasion arises.
"With whom would be a more appropriate question," says Dicky Browne, who, as usual, is just where he ought not to be.
"Oh, I know where she is," cries a little, shrill voice from the background. It comes from Tommy, and from that part of the room where Tommy and Mabel and little Bertie are having a game behind the window curtains. Blocks, dolls, kitchens, farm yards, ninepins—all have been given to them as a means of keeping them quiet. One thing only has been forgotten: the fact that the human voice divine is more attractive to them, more replete with delightful mystery, fuller of enthralling possibilities than all the toys that ever yet were made.
"Thomas, are you fully alive to the responsibilities to which you pledge yourself?" demands Mr. Browne severely.
"What?" says Tommy.
"Do you pledge yourself to declare where Miss Kavanagh is now?"
"Is it Joyce?" says Tommy, coming forward and standing undaunted in his knickerbockers and an immaculate collar that defies suspicion.
"Yes—Joyce," says Mr. Browne, who never can hold his tongue.
"Well, I know." Tommy pauses, and an unearthly silence falls on the assembled company. Half the county is present, and as Tommy, in the character ofreconteur, is widely known and deservedly dreaded, expectation spreads itself among his audience.
Lady Baltimore moves uneasily, and for once Dicky Browne feels as if he should like to sink into his boot.
"She's up on the top of the hill with Mr. Dysart," says Tommy, and no more. Lady Baltimore sighs with relief, and Mr. Browne feels now as if he should like to give Tommy something.
"How do you know?" asks Beauclerk, as though he finds it impossible to repress the question.
"Because I saw her there," says Tommy, "when Mabel and me was coming here. I like Mr. Dysart, don't you?" addressing Beauclerk specially. "He is a very kind sort of man. He gave me half a crown."
"For what, Tommy?" asks Baltimore, idly, to whom Tommy is an unfailing joy.
"To go away and leave him alone with Joyce," says Tommy, with awful distinctness.
Tableau!
Lady Baltimore lets her spoon fall into her saucer, making a little quick clatter. Everybody tries to think of something to say; nobody succeeds.
Mr. Browne, who is evidently choking, is mercifully delivered by beneficent nature from a sudden death. He gives way to a loud and sonorous sneeze.
"Oh, Dicky! How funny you do sneeze," says Lady Swansdown. It is a safety valve. Everybody at once affects to agree with her, and universal laughter makes the room ring.
"Tommy, I think it is time for you and Mabel to go home," says Lady Baltimore. "I promised your mother to send you back early. Give her my love, and tell her I am so sorry she couldn't come to me to-day, but I suppose last night's fatigue was too much for her."
"'Twasn't that," says Tommy; "'twas because cook——"
"Yes, yes; of course. I know," says Lady Baltimore, hurriedly, afraid of further revelations. "Now, say good-bye, and, Bertie, you can go as far as the first gate with them."
The children make their adieus, Tommy reserving Dicky Browne for a last fond embrace.
"Good-bye, old man! So-long!"
"What's that?" says Tommy, appealing to Beauclerk for information.
"What's what?" says Beauclerk, who isn't in his usual amiable mood.
"What's the meaning of that thing Dicky said to me?"
"'So-long?' Oh that's Browne's charming way of saying good-bye."
"Oh!" says Tommy, thoughtfully. He runs it through his busy brain, and brings it out at the other end satisfactorily translated. "I know," says he: "Go long! That's what he meant! But I think," indignantly, "he needn't be rude, anyway."
The children have hardly gone when Joyce and Dysart enter the room.
"I hope I'm not dreadfully late," cries Joyce, carelessly, taking off her cap, and giving her head a little light shake, as if to make her pretty soft hair fall into its usual charming order. "I have no idea what the time is."
"Broken your watch, Dysart?" says Beauclerk, in a rather nasty tone.
"Come and sit here, dearest, and have your tea," says Lady Baltimore, making room on the lounge beside her for Joyce, who has grown a little red.
"It is so warm here," says she, nervously, that one remark of Beauclerk's having, somehow, disconcerted her. "If—if I might——"
"No, no; you mustn't go upstairs for a little while," says Lady Baltimore, with kindly decision. "But you may go into the conservatory if you like," pointing to an open door off the library, that leads into a bower of sweets. "It is cooler there."
"Far cooler," says Beauclerk, who has followed Joyce with a sort of determination in his genial air. "Let me take you there, Miss Kavanagh."
It is impossible to refuse. Joyce, coldly, almost disdainfully and with her head held higher than usual, skirts the groups that line the walls on the western side of the room and disappears with him into the conservatory.
"Who dares think one thing and another tell,My heart detests him as the gates of hell."
"Who dares think one thing and another tell,My heart detests him as the gates of hell."
"A little foolish going for that walk, wasn't it?" says he, leading her to a low cushioned chair over which a gay magnolia bends its white blossoms. His manner is innocence itself; ignorance itself would perhaps better express it. He has decided on ignoring everything; though a shrewd guess that she saw something of his passages with Miss Maliphant last night has now become almost a certainty. "I thought you seemed rather played out last night—fatigued—done to death. I assure you I noticed it. I could hardly," with deep and affectionate concern, "fail to notice anything that affected you."
"You are very good!" says Miss Kavanagh icily. Mr. Beauclerk lets a full minute go by, and then——
"What have I done to merit that tone from you?" asks he, not angrily; only sorrowfully. He has turned his handsome face full on hers, and is regarding her with proud, reproachful eyes. "It is idle to deny," says he, with some emotion, half of which, to do him justice, is real, "that you are changed to me; something has happened to alter the feelings of—of—friendship—that I dared to hope you entertained for me. I had hoped still more, Joyce—but——What has happened?" demands he suddenly, with all the righteous strength of one who, free from guilt, resents accusation of it.
"Have I accused you?" says she, coldly.
"Yes, a thousand times, yes. Do you think your voice alone can condemn? Your eyes are even crueller judges."
"Well I am sorry," says she, faintly smiling. "My eyes must be deceivers then. I bear you no malice, believe me."
"So be it," says he, with an assumption of relief that is very well done. "After all, I have worried myself, I daresay, very unnecessarily. Let us talk of something else, Miss Maliphant, for example," with a glance at her, and a pleasant smile. "Nice girl eh? I miss her."
"She went early this morning, did she?" says Joyce, scarcely knowing what to say. Her lips feel a little dry; an agonized certainty that she is slowly growing crimson beneath his steady gaze brings the tears to her eyes.
"Too early. I quite hoped to be up to see her off, but sleep had made its own of me and I failed to wake. Such a good, genuine girl! Universal favorite, don't you think? Very honest, and very," breaking into an apparently irrepressible laugh, "ugly! Ah! well now," with smiling self condemnation, "that's really a little too bad; isn't it?"
"A great deal too bad," says Joyce, gravely. "I shouldn't speak of her if I were you."
"But why, my dear girl?" with arched brows and a little gesture of his handsome hands. "I allow her everything but beauty, and surely it would be hypocrisy to mention that in the same breath with her."
"It isn't fair—it isn't sincere," says the girl almost passionately. "Do you think I am ignorant of everything, that I did not see you with her last night in the garden? Oh!" with a touch of scorn that is yet full of pain, "you should not. You should not, indeed!"
In an instant he grows confused. Something in the lovely horror of her eyes undoes him. Only for an instant—after that he turns the momentary confusion to good account.
"Ah! you did see her, then, poor girl!" says he. "Well, I'm sorry about that for her sake."
"Why for her sake?" still regarding him with that charming disdain. "For your own, perhaps, but why for hers?"
Beauclerk pauses: then rising suddenly, stands before her. Grief and gentle indignation sit upon his massive brow. He looks the very incarnation of injured rectitude.
"Do you know, Joyce, you have always been ready to condemn, to misjudge me," says he in a low, hurt tone. "I have often noticed it, yet have failed to understand why it is. I was right, you see, when I told myself last night and this morning that you were harboring unkindly thoughts toward me. You have not been open with me, you have been willfully secretive, and, believe me, that is a mistake. Candor, complete and perfect, is the only great virtue that will steer one clear through all the shoals and rocks of life. Be honest, above board, and, I can assure you, you will never regret it. You accused me just now of insincerity. Have you been sincere?"
There is a dead pause. He allows it to last long enough to make it dramatic, and to convince himself he has impressed her, and then, with a very perceptible increase of dignified pain in his voice, he goes on.
"I feel I ought not to explain under the circumstances, but as it is to you"—heavy emphasis, and a second affected silence. "You have heard, perhaps, of Miss Maliphant's cousin in India?"
"No," says Joyce, after racking her brain in vain for some memory of the cousin question. And, indeed, it would have been nothing short of a miracle if she could have remembered anything about that apocryphal person.
"You will understand that I speak to you in the strictest confidence," says Beauclerk, earnestly: "I wouldn't for anything you could offer me, that it should get back to that poor girl's ears that I had been discussing her and the most sacred feelings of her heart. Well, there is a cousin, and she—you may have noticed that she and I were great friends?"
"Yes," says Joyce, whose heart is beating now to suffocation. Oh! has she wronged him? Does she still wrong him? Is this vile, suspicious feeling within her one to be encouraged? Is all this story of his, this simple explanation—false—false?
"I was, indeed, a sort of confidant of hers. Poor dear girl! it was a relief to her to talk to somebody."
"There were others."
"But none here who knew him."
"You knew him then? Is his name Maliphant, too?" asks Joyce, ashamed of her cross-examination, yet driven to it by some power beyond her control.
"You mustn't ask me that," says Beauclerk playfully. "There are some things I must keep even from you. Though you see I go very far to satisfy your unjust suspicions of me. You can, however, guess a good deal; you—saw her crying?"
"She was not crying," says Joyce slowly, a little puzzled. Miss Maliphant had seemed at the moment in question well pleased.
"No! Not when you saw her? Ah! that must have been later then," with a sigh, "you see now I am betraying more than I should. However, I can depend upon your silence. It will be a small secret between you and me."
"And Miss Maliphant," says Joyce, coldly. "As for me, what is the secret?"
"You haven't understood? Not really? Well, between you and me and the wall," with delightful gaiety, "I think she gives a thought or two to that cousin. I fancy," whispering, "she is even in—eh? you know."
"I don't," says Joyce slowly, who is now longing to believe in him, and yet is held steadily backward by some strong feeling.
"I believe she is in love with him," says Beauclerk, still in a mysterious whisper. "But it is a sore subject," with an expressive frown. "Not best pleased when it is mentioned to her. Mauvais sujet, you understand. But girls are often foolish in that way. Better say nothing about it."
"I shall say nothing, of course," says Joyce. "Why should I? It is nothing to me, though I am sorry for her."
Yet as she says this, a doubt arises in her mind as to whether she need be sorry. Is there a cousin in India? Could that big, jolly, lively girl, who had come into the conservatory with Beauclerk last night, with the light of triumph in her eyes, be the victim of an unhappy love affair? Should she write and ask her if there is a cousin in India? Oh, no, no! She could not do that! How horrible, how hateful to distrust him like this! What a detestable mind must be hers. And besides, why dwell so much upon it. Why not accept him as a pleasing acquaintance. One with whom to pass a pleasant hour now and then. Why ever again regard him as a possible lover!
A little shudder runs through her. At this moment it seems to her that she could never really have so regarded him. And yet only last night——
And now. What is it? Does she still doubt? Will that strange, curious, tormenting feeling that once she felt for him return no more. Is it gone forever? Oh! that it might be so!
"So over violent, or over civil!""A man so various."
"So over violent, or over civil!""A man so various."
"Dull looking day," says Dicky Browne, looking up from his broiled kidney to glare indignantly through the window at the gray sky.
"It can't be always May," says Beauclerk cheerfully, whose point it is to take ever a lenient view of things. Even to heaven itself he is kind, and holds out a helping hand.
"I expect it is we ourselves who are dull," says Lady Baltimore, looking round the breakfast table, where now many vacant seats make the edges bare. Yesterday morning Miss Maliphant left. To-day the Clontarfs, and one or two strange men from the barracks in the next town. Desertion indeed seems to be the order of the day. "We grow very small," says she. "How I miss people when they go away."
"Do you mean that as a liberal bribe for the getting rid of the rest of us," says Dicky, who is now devoting himself to the hot scones. "If so, let me tell you it isn't good enough. I shall stay here until you choose to cross the channel. I don't want to be missed."
"That will be next week," says Lady Baltimore. "I do beseech all here present not to forsake me until then."
"I must deny your prayer," says Lady Swansdown. "These tiresome lawyers of mine say they must see me on Thursday at the latest."
"I shall meet you in town at Christmas, however," says Lady Baltimore, making the remark a question.
"I hardly think so. I have promised the Barings to join them in Italy about then."
"Well, here then in February."
Lady Swansdown smiles at her hostess, but makes no audible reply.
"I suppose we ought to do something to-day," says Lady Baltimore presently, in a listless tone. It is plain to everybody, however, that in reality she wants to do nothing. "Suggest something, Dicky."
"Skittles," says that youth, without hesitation. Very properly, however, no one takes any notice of him.
"I was thinking that if we went to 'Connor's Cross,' it would be a nice drive," says Lady Baltimore, still struggling with her duties as a hostess. "What do you say, Beatrice?"
"I pray you excuse me," says Lady Swansdown. "As I leave to-morrow, I must give the afternoon to the answering of several letters, and to other things besides."
"Connor's Cross," says Joyce, idly. "I've so often heard of it. Yet, oddly enough, I have never seen it; it is always the way, isn't it, whenever one lives very close to some celebrated spot."
"Celebrated or not, it is at least lovely," says Lady Baltimore. "You really ought to see it."
"I'll drive you there this afternoon, Miss Kavanagh," says Beauclerk, in his friendly way, that in public has never a tincture of tenderness about it. "We might start after luncheon. It is only about ten miles off. Eh?" to Baltimore.
"Ten," briefly.
"I am right then," equably; "we might easily do it in a little over an hour."
"Hour and a half with best horse in the stables. Bad road," says Baltimore.
"Even so we shall get there and back in excellent time," says Beauclerk, deaf to his brother-in-law's gruffness. "Will you come, Miss Kavanagh?"
"I should like it," says Joyce, in a hesitating sort of way; "but——"
"Then why not go, dear?" says Lady Baltimore kindly. "The Morroghs of Creaghstown live not half a mile from it, and they will give you tea if you feel tired; Norman is a very good whip, and will be sure to have you back here in proper time."
Dysart lifting his head looks full at Joyce.
"At that rate——" says she, smiling at Beauclerk.
"It is settled then," says Beauclerk pleasantly. "Thank you ever so much for helping me to get rid of my afternoon in so delightful a fashion."
"It is going to rain. It will be a wet evening," says Dysart abruptly.
"Oh, my dear fellow! You can hardly be called a weather prophet," says Beauclerk banteringly. "You ought to know that a settled gray sky like that seldom means rain."
No more is said about it then, and no mention is made of it at luncheon. At half-past two precisely, however, a dog cart comes round to the hall door. Joyce running lightly down stairs, habited for a drive, meets Dysart at the foot of the staircase.
"Do not go," says he abruptly.
"Not go—now," with a glance at her costume.
"I didn't believe you would go," says he vehemently. "I didn't believe it possible—or I should have spoken sooner. Nevertheless, at this last moment, I entreat you to give it up."
"Impossible," says she curtly, annoyed by his tone, which is perhaps, unconsciously, a little dictatorial.
"You refuse me?"
"It is not the question. I have said I would go. I see no reason for not going. I decline to make myself foolish in the eyes of everybody by drawing back at the last moment."
"You have forgotten everything then."
"I don't know," coldly, "that there is anything to remember."
"Oh!" bitterly, "not so far as I am concerned. I count for nothing. I allow that. But he—I fancied you had at least read him."
"I think, perhaps, there was nothing to read," says she, lowering her eyes.
"If you can think that, it is useless my saying anything further."
He moves to one side as if to let her pass, but she hesitates. Perhaps she would have said something to soften her decision—but—a rare thing with him, he loses his temper. Seeing her standing there before him, so sweet, so lovely, so indifferent, as he tells himself, his despair overcomes him.
"I have a voice in this matter," says he, frowning heavily. "I forbid you to go with that fellow."
A sharp change crosses Miss Kavanagh's face. All the sudden softness dies out of it. She stoops leisurely, and disengaging the end of the black lace round her throat from an envious banister that would have detained her, without further glance or word for Dysart, she goes up the hall and through the open doorway. Beauclerk, who has been waiting for her outside, comes forward. A little spring seats her in the cart. Beauclerk jumps in beside her. Another moment sees them out of sight.
The vagrant sun, that all day long had been coming and going in fitful fashion, has suddenly sunk behind the thunderous gray cloud that, rising from the sea, now spreads itself o'er hill and vale. The light has died out of the sky; dull muttering sounds come rumbling down from the distant mountains. The vast expanse of barren bog upon the left has become almost obscure. Here and there a glint of its watery wastes may be seen, but indistinctly, giving the eye a mournful impression of "lands forlorn."
A strange hot quiet seems to have fallen upon the trembling earth.
"We often see, against some storm.A silence in the heavens, the rack stand still,The bold wind speechless, and the orb belowIs hushed as death."
"We often see, against some storm.A silence in the heavens, the rack stand still,The bold wind speechless, and the orb belowIs hushed as death."
Just now that "boding silence reigns." A sense of fear falls on Joyce, she scarcely knows why, as her companion, with a quick lash of the whip, urges the horse up the steep hill. They are still several miles from their destination, and, though it is only four o'clock, it is no longer day. The heavens are black as ink, the trees are shivering in expectant misery.
"What is it?" says Joyce, and even as she asks the question it is answered. The storm is upon them in all its fury. All at once, without an instant's warning, a violent downpour of rain comes from the bursting clouds, threatening to deluge them.
"We are in for it," says Beauclerk in a sharp, short tone, so unlike his usual dulcet accents that even now, in her sudden discomfort, it startles her. The rain is descending in torrents, a wild wind has arisen. The light has faded, and now the day resembles nothing so much as the dull beginning of a winter's night.
"Have you any idea where we are?" asks Beauclerk presently.
"None. You know I told you I had never been here before. But you—you must have some knowledge of it."
"How should I? These detestable Irish isolations are as yet unknown paths to me."
"But I thought you said—you gave me the impression that you knew Connor's Cross."
"I regret it if I did," shortly. The rain is running down his neck by this time, leaving a cold, drenched collar to add zest to his rising ill temper. "I had heard of Connor's Cross. I never saw it. I devoutly hope," with a snarl, "I never shall."
"I don't think you are likely to," says Joyce, whose own temper is beginning to be ruffled.
"Well, this is a sell," says Beauclerk. He is buttoning up a heavy ulster round his handsome form. He is very particular about the fastening of the last button—that one that goes under the chin—and having satisfactorily accomplished it, and found, by a careful moving backward and forward of his head, that it is comfortably adjusted, it occurs to him to see if his companion is weather-proof.
"Got wraps enough?" asks he. "No, by Jove! Here, put on this," dragging a warm cloak of her own from under the seat and offering it to her with all the air of one making a gift. "What is it? Coat—cloak—ulster? One never knows what women's clothes are meant for."
"To cover them," says Joyce calmly.
"Well, put it on. By Jove, how it pours! All right now?" having carelessly flung it round her, without regard for where her arms ought to go through the sleeves. "Think you can manage the rest by yourself? So beastly difficult to do anything in a storm like this, with this brute tugging at the reins and the rain running up one's sleeve."
"I can manage it very well myself, thank you," says Joyce, giving up the finding of the sleeves as a bad job; after a futile effort to discover their whereabouts she buttons the cloak across her chest and sits beside him, silent but shivering. A little swift, wandering thought of Dysart makes her feel even colder. If he had been there! Would she be thus roughly entreated? Nay, rather would she not have been a mark for tenderest care, a precious charge entrusted to his keeping. A thing beloved and therefore to be cherished.
"Look there," says she, suddenly lifting her head and pointing a little to the right. "Surely, even through this denseness, I see lights. Is it a village?"
"Yes—a village, I should say," grimly. "A hamlet rather. Would you," ungraciously, "suggest our seeking shelter there?"
"I think it must be the village called 'Falling,'" says she, too pleased at her discovery to care about his gruffness, "and if so, the owner of the inn there was an old servant of my father's. She often comes over to see Barbara and the children, and though I have never come here to see her, I know she lives somewhere in this part of the world. A good creature she is. The kindest of women."
"An inn," says Beauclerk, deaf to the virtues of the old servant, the innkeeper, but altogether alive to the fact that she keeps an inn. "What a blessed oasis in our wilderness! And it can't be more than half a mile away. Why," recovering his usual delightful manner, "we shall find ourselves housed in no time. I do hope, my dear girl, you are comfortable! Wrapped up to the chin, eh? Quite right—quite right. After all, the poor driver has the worst of it. He must face the elements, whatever happens. Now you, with your dear little chin so cosily hidden from the wind and rain, and with hardly a suspicion of the blast I am fighting, make a charming picture—really charming! Ah, you girls! you have the best of it beyond doubt! And why not? It is the law of nature—weak woman and strong man! You know those exquisite lines——"
"Can't that horse go faster?" said Miss Kavanagh, breaking in on this little speech in a rather ruthless manner. "Lapped in luxury, as you evidently believe me, I still assure you I should gladly exchange my present condition for a good wholesome kitchen fire."
"Always practical. Your charm—one of them," says Mr. Beauclerk. But he takes the hint, nevertheless, and presently they draw up before a small, dingy place of shelter.
Not a man is to be seen. The village, a collection of fifty houses, when all is told, is swept and garnished. A few geese are stalking up the street, uttering creaking noises. Some ducks are swimming in a glad astonishment down the muddy streams running by the edges of the curbstones. Such a delicious wealth of filthy water has not been seen in Falling for the past three dry months.
"The deserted village with a vengeance," says Beauclerk. He has risen in his seat and placed his whip in the stand with a view of descending and arousing the inhabitants of this Sleepy Hollow, when a shock head is thrust out of the inn ("hotel," rather, as is painted on a huge sign over the door) and being instantly withdrawn again with a muttered "Och-a-yea," is followed by a shriek for:
"Mrs. Connolly—Mrs. Connolly, ma'am! Sure, 'tis yourself that's wanted! Come down, I tell ye! There's ginthry at the door, an' the rain peltin' on em like the divil. Come down, I'm tellin' ye! Or fegs they'll go on to Paddy Sheehan's, an' thin where'll ye be? Och, murdher! Where are ye, at all, at all? 'Tis ruined ye'll be intirely wid the stayin' of ye!"
"Arrah, hould yer whisht, y'omadhaun o' the world," says another voice, and in a second a big, buxom, jolly, hearty-looking woman appears on the threshold, peering a little suspiciously through the gathering gloom at the dog cart outside. First she catches sight of the crest and coronet, and a gleam of pleased intelligence brightens her face. Then, lifting her eyes, she meets those of Joyce, and the sudden pleasure gives way to actual and honest joy.
"It is Mrs. Connolly," says Joyce, in a voice that is supposed to accompany a smile, but has in reality something of tears in it.
Mrs. Connolly, regardless of the pelting rain and her best cap, takes a step forward.