Nevertheless, Helen was already learning something of what Marion called the common lot,—she was acquiring some knowledge of the difficulty of reconciling conflicting desires, and of the impossibility of finding things made smooth and easy. Now and then there was a wistful look in her eyes, which touched her mother deeply, and made her ready to consent to anything which would restore sunshine to one who seemed so wholly made to enjoy it.
But Mrs. Dalton was not blind to one fact, which may or may not have been clear to Helen,—the significant fact that Rathborne had not, since the return home of her daughter, pressed his suit with his former ardor. He had not begged that the conditional and merely tolerated engagement should be converted into an open and positive one; he seemed quite satisfied with matters as they stood, and took Helen's sentiments entirely too much for granted, so Helen's mother thought. What to do, however, she did not clearly perceive, and Father Barrett strongly advised a policy of inaction. "Let matters take their own course," he said. "I am of opinion that Helen may be spared what you fear most for her; but this cannot be brought about by any effort of yours, which would tend, on the contrary, to rouse opposition. If the child must suffer, in any event do not let her have the additional pain of thinking that she owes any of the suffering to you."
To this counsel Mrs. Dalton gave heed—or thought she did. But many things betrayed to Helen that her mother's disapproval of Rathborne's suit had not lessened with time. Anxious to avoid any possible conflict, the girl shrank from broaching the subject; but it was a growing pain to her affectionate nature that there should be a subject—and that the nearest her heart and life—in which she was not sure of her mother's sympathy—where her deepest feelings might yet be arrayed against each other, and a difficult choice be made necessary.
To Marion, meantime, Rathborne had become somewhat troublesome. As we learn in many an old legend that it is easier to raise a fiend than to put him down, so she found it easier to make the impression which she had desired than to regulate the effect of that impression. She had made it with the utmost ease,—an ease very flattering to her vanity; but, innocent as she had been of any intention save that of gratifying vanity, retribution followed hard upon her steps. Apart from the fact that she was incapable of deliberately betraying Helen's confidence, she trusted Rathborne no further than most other people did. Moreover, her arrogance of spirit was as great as her ambition, and she considered herself fitted for a position much higher than he could possibly offer her—had she believed him ready to offer anything. But, so far from believing this, she gave him no credit for any sincerity of intention toward her, knowing well that self-interest was the sole rule of his life. "He dares to think that he can amuse himself with me and then marry Helen!" she thought. "There may be two who can play at that game. Let us see!"
The thought that it was a very dangerous game did not occur to her; or, if it occurred, did not deter her. At this time of her life she had only a sense of worldly honor to deter her from anything which she desired to do; and she desired most sincerely to punish the man whom she believed to be true neither to Helen nor herself. Therefore, although his attentions began to annoy her, she did not discourage them, notwithstanding that she noted scornfully how he avoided, as far as possible, devoting himself to her when he was likely to be observed. But his precautions had not saved him, as we are aware, from the keen observation of Frank Morely; and Mrs. Dalton herself, with eyes sharpened by a mother's anxiety, began to perceive that Marion possessed a great attraction for him.
Matters were in this by no means satisfactory state when Mrs. Singleton, growing weary of other forms of amusement, decided to patronize Nature. There was a great deal of beautiful scenery in the vicinity of Scarborough, which she declared had been too long neglected. "A picnic is horrid!" she said. "The very word is full of vulgar associations, and the thing itself is tiresome beyond expression. One would grow weary of the most delightful people in the world if doomed to spend a whole day in the woods with them. But a few hours in the pleasantest part of the day—that is another matter. A gypsy tea is just the thing! We will go out in the afternoon to Elk Ridge, have tea, look at the sunset, and return by moonlight; is not that a good idea?"
"Excellent," said the persons whom she addressed—a party of five or six who had been dining with her. "It will make a very pleasant excursion, only we must be sure of the moon."
"Oh! we have only to consult the almanac for that," said the lively hostess. "I think there is a new moon due about this time."
Marion laughed, and, touching the arm of old Mr. Singleton, by whom she sat, pointed out of a western window to the evening sky, where hung the beautiful crescent of the moon, framed between the arching boughs of tall trees.
"Hum—yes," observed that gentleman. "Anna's attention to Nature is altogether controlled by the question of whether or not it can be made to contribute to her amusement. Now that the moon has arrived, it will not be long before the gypsy tea takes place."
And, indeed, in a few days all arrangements for this festivity were completed, the party made up, and the programme settled. Mrs. Singleton wished that Marion should accompany her; but Helen protested so much against this that the arrangement was changed; and it was finally settled that Marion and herself, with Rathborne and Morley, would make up aparti carréin a light open carriage.
There is nothing more attractive to youth, nothing more suited to its natural lightness of heart and spirit, than such pleasures as these—golden afternoons in summer woods and under summer skies; sunsets when all nature is flooded with beauty, like a crystal cup filled to the brim; and nights of spiritual, entrancing loveliness. Even with older persons, the sense of care seems lifted from the mind for a little time among such scenes; while to the young and happy, care is a thing impossible to realize when earth itself in transformed into Arcadia.
So Helen felt as she started on this excursion. In some subtle fashion, the doubts which had weighed upon her for a considerable time past were lifted. She did not say to herself that she had been foolish, for she was little given to self-analysis; but involuntarily she felt it, involuntarily she threw off the shadow which had fallen over her, and grasped the pleasure offered, as a child puts out its hand to grasp sunbeams. When they drove away, her heart was as light as a feather, her face as bright as the day, and she turned back to wave her hand in gay farewell to her mother.
CHAPTER X.
ElkRidge, the place selected by Mrs. Singleton for her gypsy tea, was a very picturesque and beautiful locality, distant seven miles from Scarborough. The drive there, through the soft, golden beauty of the August afternoon, was delightful; and the beauties of the height when reached well repaid any exertion that might have been necessary to gain it. Since none was necessary, however, it proved a great surprise to those who had not been there before to find themselves on a noble eminence, crowned by splendid masses of rock, and commanding a most extensive view of the smiling country around and the blue mountains in the distance. It was an ideal spot foral frescoamusements, and the party assembled were in the mood to enjoy it.
Very soon a kettle was hung from crossed sticks over a blazing fire; and while the water was boiling, and the arrangements for tea in progress, all those who were not actively engaged in these arrangements scattered over the summit, admiring the view, and now and then climbing some of the more accessible of the great granite boulders. Among the last were Helen and Frank Morley, both in high spirits, and laughing like a pair of merry children. Marion shrugged her shoulders over their exploits.
"I have never been young enough for that," she said to Rathborne. "I could never, at any stage of existence, see the 'fun' of risking one's neck."
"It is childish!" he responded, with ill-concealed contempt. He had endeavored to dissuade Helen, but for once she had been deaf to his remonstrances. Her spirits were so high this afternoon that an outlet for them was indispensable; and she was still so much of a child that this special outlet of physical exertion and daring was very agreeable to her.
"I suppose it is a good thing to be childish now and then," said Marion. "I don't thinkIever was; and, no doubt, it is so much the worse for me."
"On the contrary, I think, so much the better," replied Rathborne. "Where there is childishness there must be folly, and I cannot imagine you guilty of that."
"Can you not?" She paused an instant and seemed to reflect. "But there are things worse than folly," she said, with one of her sudden impulses of candor; "and I might be guilty of some of them."
"Oh! you might—yes." He laughed. "So might I. Perhaps for that reason I have more sympathy with them than with folly."
Marion gave him a glance which he did not understand nor yet altogether fancy. "Yes," she said, "I am very sure you have more sympathy with what is bad than with what is foolish."
Before he could reply to such an equivocal speech, Mrs. Singleton sent a messenger for Miss Lynde to come and help her pour out tea; and the young lady rose and walked away.
It was very gay and bright and pleasant, that gypsy tea among the rocks, with depths of verdure overhead and far-stretching beauty of outspread country below. The amber sunshine streamed over the scene; pretty pale-blue smoke, from the fire over which the kettle hung, mounted in the air; there was a musical chatter of tongues and sound of laughter. At such times and in such scenes it is difficult for the most thoughtful to realize the great sadness of the world, the care that encompasses life, and the pain that overshadows it. But these light hearts were never at any time troubled with the realization of such things. They were all young and, for the most part, prosperous; life went easily with them, and nothing seemed more remote than trouble or unhappiness. The hours sped lightly by, as such hours do, and presently it was time to think of returning. The sun sank into his golden bed, the moon would soon rise majestically in the east, and the drive back to Scarborough would be as delightful as the drive out had been.
But just before the move for departure was made Rathborne came to Marion and said: "You have not yet seen the finest view—that from the other side of the Ridge. Would you not like to walk over there and look at it?"
"I think not," replied Marion, who did not care for atête-à-têtewith him. "I am not very fond of views."
"O but, Marion, this view is really fine!" cried Helen, eagerly. "Pray go; you will be repaid for the exertion."
Not caring to make her refusal more marked, Marion rose with an inward sense of vexation. "Very well, then," she said to Rathborne; "since Helen is sure I will be repaid for the exertion, I will go; but, sinceIam not sure, I hope the exertion required is not very much."
"It is only that of walking about a hundred yards," he answered. And as they turned and followed a well-defined path, which led among the rocks and trees, he added, "I do not mean, however, to insist upon any exertion which would be disagreeable to you."
Marion might truthfully have answered that it was not the exertion which was disagreeable to her; but she had no desire to make an enemy of this man, and instinct told her that whoever wounded his vanity was thenceforth to him an enemy. So she replied lightly that she was very indolent, especially where the beauties of nature were concerned; but that she had no doubt the view would repay her after she reached it.
"I think it will," said Rathborne; "otherwise I should not have proposed your coming."
And indeed even Marion, who was right in saying that the beauties of nature did not greatly appeal to her, was moved by the loveliness and extent of the view suddenly spread before her, when they came to the verge of the Ridge, on the other side, where the hill broke off in a sheer precipice. The great rock-face of this precipice shelved downward to a soft, pastoral valley, beyond which were belts of encircling woodlands, green hills rising into bolder heights as they receded, and a distant range of azure mountains fair as hills of paradise.
"Oh! thisisglorious!" cried Marion, involuntarily, as the broad scene, with the long, golden lights and beautiful shadows of late evening falling across it, was suddenly revealed by an abrupt turn in the path. She walked to the edge of the precipice and stood there, with hands lightly clasped, looking into the far, magical distance. At this moment, as in other moments like it, something stirred in her nature deeper and nobler than its ordinary impulses. She had a consciousness of possibilities which at other times were remote from her realization,—possibilities of loftier action and feeling, of a higher standard, of a loftier aim than her life had known. It was a state of feeling not unlike that which came to her in the Catholic church, and she shrank from it. By this grand arch of bending, lucid sky, by those distant heavenly heights with their mystical suggestions, thoughts were roused in her which seemed in little accord with the other thoughts of her life. She forgot for a moment the man who stood beside her, and started when he spoke.
"It repays you—I see that," he said. "And so I am repaid for bringing you."
"Yes, it is very beautiful," she answered, slowly; "but I am not sure that I am obliged to you for bringing me here. It produces in me feelings that I do not like."
"What kind of feelings?" inquired Rathborne, curiously.
She swept him with a quick glance from under her half-drooped eyelids, and he had again the impression that it conveyed something of contempt.
"If I could define them," she said, "I doubt if you would be able to understand them. I am certain that you have never felt anything of the kind."
"Why should you be certain of that?" he asked, a little irritated as well by her tone as by her glance. "You do not surely think that you have gauged all my possibilities of feeling."
"I have made no attempt to do so," she said, indifferently. "Why should I? But one receives some impressions instinctively."
"And you think, perhaps, that I have no feeling," he replied quickly; "that I am cold and hard and selfish, and altogether a calculating machine. But you are mistaken. I was all that once—I frankly confess it,—but since I have known you, I have changed. I have learned what it is to feel in the deepest manner."
There was a short silence. Marion's heart gave a great bound and then seemed to stand still. A fear which she had striven to put away was now a horrible certainty. She had played with fire, and the moment of scorching was come—come to desecrate a place which she had felt to be a sanctuary filled with the consciousness of God. Her first impulse was to turn and go away without a word; her next, to utter words as scornful as her mood.
"If I am mistaken, so are you, Mr. Rathborne," she said,—"exceedingly mistaken in imagining that I have given any thought to your feelings, or that I am in the faintest degree interested in them."
Her tone stung him like the stroke of a whip, and roused a passion on which she had not calculated. He took a few hasty steps toward her; and she found herself prisoned between the precipice on one side, and this man, who stood and looked at her with eyes that gleamed under his frowning brow.
"Do you mean to tell me," he said, peremptorily, "that you have no interest in feelings which you have deliberately excited and encouraged? Do you mean to say that you have meant nothing when by every art in your power you have led me on to love you?"
Surely retribution was very heavy upon Marion at that moment. The injustice of the charge—for of any such intention her conscience acquitted her—only added to her sense of angry humiliation, and to the consciousness, which she could not ignore, that she had, in some degree at least, brought this upon herself. Her indignation was so deep, her anger so great, that for once her readiness of speech failed, and she could only reply:
"How dare you address me in this manner?"
He laughed—a short, bitter laugh, not pleasant to hear. "You are a good actor, Miss Lynde," he said. "I never doubted your capacity in that line; but I see that it is even greater than I imagined. How dare I address you with the truth! Why should I not? You have made me believe that you desired nothing more than to hear it. Your manner to me, since the first evening we met, has admitted of but one interpretation—that you wished to excite the feeling I have not hesitated to show you. And so long as I merelyshowedit, you were pleased; but now that I utter it, you profess an indignation which it is impossible you can feel."
"You are speaking falsely!" cried Marion, whose anger was now so excessive that no words seemed strong enough to express it. "I have never for one instant wished to encourage the feeling of which you speak. I knew you were engaged to Helen, and I thought you something, at least, of a gentleman. I now see that you have no claim whatever to that title. Let me pass!"
"No," he said—and now he extended his hand and caught her wrist in a vise-like grasp. "I have no doubt, from the proficiency you exhibit, that you have played this game before with success; but you shall not have the pleasure of playing it successfully with me. In one way or another, I will make it a costly game to you, unless you tell me that all this affected indignation means nothing, and that if I end my entanglement with Helen, you will marry me."
"Let me go!" said Marion, pale and breathless with passion. "If you were free as air—if you had never been engaged to Helen—I would not think of marrying you! Is that enough?"
"Quite enough," he answered—but still he did not release her wrist. "Now listen to me. I am not a man with whom any woman—not even one so clever as you are—can amuse herself with impunity. I do not mean to be melodramatic; I shall not curse you for your deception, for the heartlessness with which you have sacrificed me to your vanity; but I warn you that you have made an enemy who will leave nothing undone to pay his debt. I read you very thoroughly, beautiful and unscrupulous schemer that you are; and I promise you that in the hour when you think your schemes are nearest success, you will find them defeated by me. To that I pledge myself."
There is something terrible in feeling one's self the object of hatred, even if that hatred be both undeserved and impotent; and, brave as Marion was, proud and defiant as she was, she felt herself shiver under these words, and under the gaze which seconded them. What, indeed, if she had made a mistake on the very threshold of the life in which she had expected to manage so well. What if, instead of making a satisfactory test of her power, she had roused an enmity which even her experience knew to be more powerful and more tireless than love? She did not quail under the fiery gaze bent on her, but her heart sank with a sense of apprehension, of which she was strong enough to give no outward sign.
"It is a very worthy object to which you pledge yourself," she observed, with scorn. "But I am not afraid of a man who is cowardly enough to threaten a woman with his enmity because she rejects and despises what he calls his love."
Her voice had always a peculiar quality of clearness in speaking, but when she was at all excited it was like silver in its resonance. Therefore the words distinctly reached the ears of one who was coming toward them, and the next instant Helen's pale face and startled eyes rose before her.
She uttered a sharp exclamation, which stopped the words that were rising to Rathborne's lips; and, wrenching her arm from his grasp, she sprang forward to her cousin's side. "Helen!" she cried, unconscious almost of what she said, "what are you doing here?"
It is not always the people who seem most weak whom emergency proves to be so. At this moment Helen exhibited a self-control which would have surprised even those who knew her best. She was pale as marble, and her violet eyes had still their startled, piteous look; but she answered, quietly:—
"I came to look for you. It was foolish—I will go back now. Don't trouble to come with me."
But as she turned, Marion seized her arm. "Helen!" she exclaimed, "don't misjudge me! Don't think that this is my fault!"
"No," replied Helen, with the same strange quietness; "I heard what you said. I don't blame—any one. I suppose it was natural."
Then it was Rathborne's turn. "Helen," he said, coming up to her, and speaking with an attempt at the old tone of authority; "you must listen tome."
But she turned away from him with something like a shudder. "No," she said, "do not ask me—not now. I may be weak, but not so weak as not to understand—this. Don't come with me. Frank will look after me and take me home. That is all I want."
She moved away through the beautiful greenery, a slender, lovely figure, with drooping head; and the two whom she left behind watched her with one sensation at least in common—that of a keen sense of guilt, which for the moment no other feeling was strong enough to stifle.
CHAPTER XI.
WhenMarion returned to the party, who were preparing for their homeward drive, Frank Morley came up to her with a very grave face.
"Helen tells me that she is feeling so bad, Miss Lynde," he said, coldly, "that she wishes me to take her home. I have, therefore, arranged for our return in the buggy in which Netta came out, and she and her escort will take our places in the carriage with you."
"Make whatever arrangement you please," answered Marion, as coldly as himself; "but pray leave me out of it. There is a vacant seat in Mrs. Singleton's carriage, which I shall take for the return."
"Very well—the matter, is settled, then," he said. "I will take Helen away at once." And he walked off with a scant courtesy, which his youth and indignation excused.
But it was a new sensation to Marion to be treated with discourtesy by any one; and she had to pull herself together with an effort before she was able to approach Mrs. Singleton in her usual manner, and announce that she was willing to take the seat she had before declined.
"I don't like to repeat anything, not even a drive, in exactly the same manner," she said by way of explanation; "so if you will allow me, I will join you for the homeward drive."
"I shall be delighted to have you," answered Mrs. Singleton. "I thought you would do better to come with me. Tom will be delighted, too. You shall sit with him, and drive if he will let you."
Good-natured Mr. Singleton was much pleased to share his box seat with such a companion, and even to make over the reins to her whenever the road was good enough to allow of it with safety; while to Marion there was distraction from her own thoughts—from the recollection of unpleasant complications, and the sense of angry humiliation—in guiding the spirited horses, that tried all the strength of her arms and wrists, and required an undivided attention.
However, the drive was soon over, and then she had before her the disagreeable necessity of facing her aunt and Helen. Brave as she was, she was assailed by a cowardly impulse to avoid meeting them. What if she went home with Mrs. Singleton, and for the evening at least did not meet them? But what would be gained by that, except delay? She knew that unless she wished to leave it in Rathborne's power to make what statement he chose, shemustgo to them with her own statement; and, this being so, delay would serve no end except to give the impression of heartless indifference. No, there was nothing for it but to meet at once what had to be met sooner or later; so when the Singleton carriage drew up at her aunt's gate, she exchanged a gay farewell with her companions, and with a heavy heart and reluctant step took her way to the house.
How different from its usual aspect that house looked, as she drew near it! Usually at this hour bright lights shone from the windows; there would be snatches of music, sounds of voices and laughter; if the moon were shining as to-night, a gay party would be assembled on the veranda. Now it was still and quiet; the lights in the drawing-room were turned low; the broad, open hall looked deserted. Only one figure emerged from the shadow of the vines on the veranda into the full moonlight as she approached. It was a small figure—that of Harry Dalton.
"Why, Harry!" exclaimed Marion, with an effort to speak as usual, "are you all alone? Where is Helen?"
"Helen has gone upstairs; she has a headache," answered Harry. "But mamma is in the sitting-room, and wants to see you."
"Very well," said Marion. She began to unbutton her gloves, as some outward relief to her inward agitation, and without pausing, walked into the house. Since the interview must take place, the sooner it was over the better—so she said to herself as she entered the room where her aunt awaited her.
Mrs. Dalton was sitting by a table on which stood a shaded lamp, and, with a book open before her, seemed to be reading; but her effort to fix her mind on the page had not met with much success. She had, in reality, been waiting for the sound of her niece's step; and when she heard her coming, she was conscious of as much shrinking from the interview as Marion felt. "I must be reasonable," she said to herself; and then, pushing back her volume, she looked up as the girl entered.
It was characteristic of Marion that she spoke first. "I am sorry to hear that Helen is not well, aunt," she said. "Has she been at home long?"
"About half an hour," answered Mrs. Dalton. "She has gone to her room; she asked that she might be left alone. That is so unlike Helen, that I am sure something very serious has occurred. And I judge from a few words which Frank said, that you know what it is, Marion."
"What did Mr. Frank Morley say?" inquired Marion, sitting down. The introduction of his name roused in her an immediate sense of defiance. After all, what right had they to suppose that what had happened was any fault of hers?
"He said that Helen had overheard something which passed between Paul Rathborne and yourself," answered Mrs. Dalton; "and that afterward she had asked him to bring her home alone. He told me this in reply to my questions. Helen said nothing; but I feel that I ought to know how matters stand, so I ask you what did she overhear?"
"She overheard me tell Mr. Rathborne that I rejected and despised the love that he ventured to offer me," replied Marion, speaking in her clearest and most distinct tone.
A quick contraction of the brow showed how much the answer pained, if it did not surprise, Mrs. Dalton. "My poor child!" she said, as if to herself. Then she looked at Marion with something like a flash in her usually gentle eyes. "And do you hold yourself guiltless in this matter?" she asked. "If Paul Rathborne is a traitor to Helen—as he surely is,—have not you encouraged his admiration? Does not your conscience tell you that you have sacrificed her happiness for the gratification of your vanity?"
"No," replied Marion; "my conscience tells me nothing of the kind. How could I prevent Mr. Rathborne's folly? But, of course, I expected to be blamed for it," she added, bitterly. "That is the justice of the world."
"God forgive me if I am unjust!" said Mrs. Dalton. "I did not mean to be. But, Marion, this is not altogether a surprise to me. I have seen his admiration for you, and I have seen—I could not help seeing—that you did not discourage it."
"Why should I have discouraged it?" asked Marion. "I saw no harm in it. I could not imagine that because he found some things to like—to admire, if you will—in me, he would become a traitor to Helen. It is asking too much to demand that one turn one's back on a man because he is a shade more than civil."
Mrs. Dalton shook her head. "Those are merely words," she said. "They do not deceive yourself any more than they deceive me. You know that you have used this man's admiration as fuel for your vanity, and that so cautious and so selfish a man would never have acted as he has done if he had not felt himself encouraged. Do not misunderstand me," she added, more hastily. "For Helen's sake I am not sorry that this has happened. It is better for her, even at the cost of great present suffering, that her eyes should be opened to his true character. But you, Marion—how can you forgive yourself for the part you have played? And what is to become of you if you do not check the vanity which has led you to betray the trust and wring the heart of your best friend?"
The quiet, penetrating words—gentle although so grave—seemed to Marion at that moment like a sentence from which there was no appeal. Her conscience echoed it, her eyes fell, for an instant it looked as if she had nothing to reply. But she rallied quickly.
"I am sorry if you think I have wilfully done anything to pain Helen," she said, coldly. "It does not strike me that I could have averted this, unless I had been gifted with a foreknowledge which I do not possess. I could never have imagined that Mr. Rathborne would be so false with regard to Helen, and so presumptuous with regard tome."
The haughtiness of the last words was not lost on the ear of the listener, who looked at the beautiful, scornful face with a mingling of pity and indignation.
"You expected," she said, "to encourage a man's admiration up to a certain point, and yet to restrain his presumption? A little more knowledge of human nature would have told you that was impossible; a little more feeling would have kept you from desiring it." She paused a moment, then went on, with the same restrained gravity: "I am sorry if I seem to you harsh, but nothing in this affair is worse to me than the revelation it makes of your character. I am grieved by Helen's suffering, and shocked by Paul Rathborne's treachery; but for the first I have the comfort that it may in the end spare her worse suffering, and for the second I feel that it is not a surprise—that I never wholly trusted his sincerity. Butyou, Marion—what can I think of you, who, without any stronger feeling than vanity to lead you on, have trifled with your own sense of honor, as well as with the deepest feelings of others? What will your future be if you do not change—if you do not try to think less of unworthy objects and more of worthy ones—less of gaining admiration and more of keeping your conscience clear and your heart clean?"
"What will my future be!" repeated Marion. She rose as she spoke, and answered, proudly: "That concerns myself alone. I have no fear of it; I feel that I can make it what I will, and I shall certainly not will to make it anything unworthy. But it need not trouble you in the least. I am sorry that my coming here should have brought any trouble on Helen. The only amend I can make is to go away at once, and that I will do."
"No," said Mrs. Dalton, quickly; "that can not mend matters now, and would only throw a very serious reflection upon you when it is known that Helen's engagement is at an end. I cannot consent to it."
"But Helen's engagement might not be at an end if I went away," responded Marion.
"You do not know Helen yet," said Mrs. Dalton, quietly. "I have not spoken to her on the subject, but I am certain what her decision will be."
Marion herself was by no means certain that Mrs. Dalton's judgment was correct. She thought Helen weak and yielding to the last degree, and believed that very little entreaty would be requisite on Rathborne's part to induce her to forgive him. "It will be only necessary for him to throw all the blame on me," she thought, with a bitter smile, as she went to her chamber. Nevertheless, it was not a very tranquil night that she passed. Whatever change the future might bring, she knew that Helen was suffering now—suffering the keen pangs which a loving, trusting heart feels when its love and trust have been betrayed. "It is hard on her, she is so good, so kind, so incapable herself of betraying any one!" thought the girl, whose conscience was still in a very dormant state, but whose sense of pity was touched. "How sorry Claire would be if she knew!" And then came the reflection, "What would Claire think of me?" followed by the quick reply, "She would be as unjust as the rest, and call it my fault, no doubt."
The thought of Claire's judgment, however, was another sting added to those which already disturbed her; and it was not strange that she tossed on her pillow during the better part of the night, only falling asleep toward morning. As is usually the case after a wakeful night, her sleep was heavy, so that the first sound that roused her was the breakfast bell. She opened her eyes with a start, and to her surprise saw Helen standing beside her.
The memory of all that had happened flashed like lightning into her mind; and, unable to reconcile that memory with this appearance, she could only gasp, "Helen!—what are you doing here?"
"I knocked at the door, but you did not answer, so I came in," Helen responded, simply. "It is late, else I should not have disturbed you. But I wanted to speak to you before you went down."
"Yes," said Marion. She sat up in bed, with white draperies all about her, and looked at her cousin. She expected a demand for explanation, perhaps reproaches, but she did not expect what came.
"I only want to tell you," said Helen, with the same quiet simplicity, "that I have no reason to blame you for—what occurred yesterday. It was not your fault: you could not have helped it. I don't know that any one is to blame very much," she added, with a sigh; "but I felt that I ought to tell you that I do not blameyouat all."
"Helen!" cried Marion. All her proud self-control suddenly gave way, and she burst into tears. The generosity which underlay the erring surface of her nature was touched to the quick, and her conscience spoke as it had never spoken before. "Helen, you are too good," she said. "You judge me too kindly. I do not feel myself that I am not to blame. On the contrary, I have no doubt my aunt is perfectly right, and that I am very much to blame. I let my vanity and my love of admiration carry me too far, but never with the intention of injuring you or betraying your trust—never!"
"I am sure of that," said Helen, gently. She laid her hand on the bent head of the other. It startled her to see Marion display such feeling and such humility as this. "Mamma was thinking of me," she went on; "else she would not have blamed you; for how could you help being more attractive than I am? If I was unreasonable enough to think for a little time last night that you were to blame, I know better now. God has given me strength to look at things more calmly. I can even see thathemay not be greatly in fault. No doubt he thought he loved me—until he saw you."
"Helen, he is not worthy of you!" cried Marion, passionately. "He loves no one but himself."
Helen shook her head. "Surely he loves you," she said; "else why should he tell you so? But we need not discuss this. Will you come down when you are ready?"
"Oh! yes," said Marion, with an effort; "I will be down very soon."
She rose as Helen left the room, and dressed very hastily, a prey the while to many conflicting emotions. Relief was mingled with self-reproach, and admiration of Helen's generosity with scorn of her weakness. "For, of course, her excuses for him mean that she will forgive him!" she thought. "I have heard that women—most women—are fools in just that way, and Helen is exactly the kind of woman to be guilty of that folly. The miserable dastard!"—she remembered his threat to herself—"I wish I could punish him as he deserves for his treachery and presumption!"
It did not occur to her to ask whether or notshedeserved any punishment for the share she confessed to having borne in the treachery. Had the idea been suggested to her, she would have said that her share was infinitesimal compared with his, and that she had already been punished by the insolence she had drawn upon herself.
CHAPTER XII.
ButHelen's quietness did not deceive her mother, whose heart ached as she saw in the pale young face all the woful change wrought by one night of suffering, one sharp touch of anguish. Yet, if she had only known it, the girl brought back into the house a very different face from that which she had taken out in the early morning, when, driven by an intolerable sense of pain, she had gone in search of strength to bear it. There was but one place where such strength was to be found, and thither her feet had carried her direct. She was the first person to enter the little church when it was opened to the freshness of the summer morning; and long after the Holy Sacrifice was over she had still knelt, absorbed and motionless, before the altar. Everyone went away: she was left alone with the Presence in the tabernacle; and in the stillness, the absolute quiet, a Voice seemed speaking to her aching heart, and bringing comfort to her troubled soul. When at length, warned of the passage of time by the striking of a distant clock, she lifted her face from her clasped hands, even amid the stains of tears there were signs of peace. The sting of bitterness had been taken out of her grief; and, that being so, it had become endurable. She might and would suffer still; but when she had once brought herself to resign this suffering into the hands of God, and with the docility of a child accept what it pleased Him to permit, the worst was over.
The first result of the struggle she had made and the victory she had gained was apparent when, on her return home, she went to Marion's room. The generous heart could not rest without clearing itself at once of the least shadow of injustice,—and she had implied, if she had not expressed, a blame of Marion which she was noble enough to feel might be unjust. Hence that visit which so deeply touched the girl, whose own conscience failed to echo Helen's acquittal.
Breakfast passed very quietly. Mrs. Dalton saw that her daughter was making an heroic effort to appear as usual, and she seconded it as far as lay in her power, talking more than was her custom in order to allow Helen to be silent, and to prevent the boys from asking questions about events of the preceding afternoon. To make no change in her manner to Marion was more difficult; but, with the example that Helen set, she was able to accomplish even this; and finally the usual separation for the morning took place with great sense of relief to all concerned. Marion put on her hat and went out, ostensibly to keep an appointment with Mrs. Singleton, but really to be safely out of the way in case Rathborne should make his appearance.
Helen herself had some fear of this appearance, and she took refuge in her own chamber, dreading the necessary explanation to her mother, not so much on her own account as on account of the judgment upon Rathborne which she knew would follow. Tenderness does not die in an hour or a day; and although her resolve to put him out of her life was firm, she was not yet able to put him out of her heart, nor to think without shrinking of the severe condemnation which her mother would mete out to him. There was no need for haste in speaking; she might rest a little, and gather strength for the trial, knowing that Mrs. Dalton would make no effort to force her confidence.
So she was resting on the bed, where she had not slept at all the night before, when the door softly opened and Mrs. Dalton entered the room.
"Helen," she said, gently, "I am sorry to disturb you, but Paul Rathborne is downstairs and asks to see you. What shall I tell him?"
"Tell him that I cannot see him," answered Helen. "It is impossible! You must speak for me—you must make him understand that he is entirely free from any engagement to me, and I do not blame him for what he could not help. I suppose you have guessed that something is the matter," she added, wistfully. "It is only that I have found out he cares for Marion—not for me."
Mrs. Dalton put her arm around her with a touch full of sympathy, without speaking for a moment. Then she said: "My child, I always knew he was not worthy of you."
"But this does not prove him unworthy of me," replied Helen, in a tone sharp with pain. "It only proves that he was mistaken when he thought of me."
"Men of honor do not make such mistakes," said Mrs. Dalton.
"How could he help falling in love with Marion?" continued Helen. "She is so much more beautiful, so much more attractive than I am! And that he has done so, settles the doubt of his disinterestedness which you always entertained. Do him so much justice, mamma. You feared that he professed to care for me because I have a little money. But Marion has none."
"We need not discuss that, my dear," said Mrs. Dalton, who was touched but not convinced by this generous plea. "It is enough if, satisfied that his affections have wandered, you are determined to dismiss him."
"Yes," said Helen, "I am determined on that. But I cannot see him. You must go to him, and tell him from me that I do not blame him, but that all is at an end between us."
With this message Mrs. Dalton went downstairs. Her own mood with Rathborne was far from being as charitable as her daughter's; and her face, usually set in very gentle lines, hardened to sternness as she descended. She was not inclined to deal leniently with one who had so shamefully betrayed the trust placed in him, and had overshadowed so darkly the sunshine of Helen's life. Like some other parents, she had up to this time imagined that the stern conditions of human existence were to be relaxed for Helen, and that one so formed for happiness was to be granted that happiness in a measure which is allowed to few. A sense of keen injury was, therefore, added to her indignation at a treachery for which she could find no palliation.
Rathborne, who was anxiously expecting yet dreading to see Helen, drew his breath with a sharp sense of vexation when his aunt entered. This was worse than he had feared. Calculating upon Helen's gentleness, he had not thought that she would refuse to see him; and if she saw him, he believed that his influence would be strong enough to induce her to overlook anything. But when Mrs. Dalton entered, he knew that the consequences of his treachery were to be fully paid. A cold greeting was exchanged between them, and then a short silence followed, as each hesitated to speak. It was Mrs. Dalton who broke it, as soon as she felt able to control her voice.
"I have told Helen that you are here," she said, "but she declines to see you. It is not necessary, I presume, to explain why she declines. Of that you are fully aware. It is not necessary, either, that I should add anything to her own words, which are, briefly, that you will consider everything at an end between you. She added also that she does not blame you for anything that has occurred—but I hardly think that your own conscience will echo that."
"No," said Rathborne, who had paled perceptibly, "my own conscience does not echo it. On the contrary, I feel that I am deeply to blame; yet I hoped that Helen might believe me when I say that I am not so much to blame as appears on the surface. A man may be tempted beyond his strength, and some women are experts in such temptations."
Mrs. Dalton looked at him with scorn in her eyes. "If you think," she said, "that you will serve your cause with Helen by such cowardly insinuations as that, you are mistaken. And, as far as I am concerned, you have only taken a step lower in my esteem. But that is a point which does not matter. Wherever the blame rests, the fact remains that if Helen did not take the decision of the matter into her hands,Ishould do so. You have proved yourself a man whom it is impossible I can ever consent to trust with my daughter's life and happiness."
Rathborne rose to his feet. The decisive words seemed to leave him no alternative. He felt that he had committed a blunder which was altogether irretrievable; and combined with the keen mortification of failure was a hatred, which gathered bitterness with every moment, against the woman he believed to have led him on and deceived him.
"In that case," he said, "there is nothing for me to do but to go. I had hoped that Helen might understand—that she would not let a moment of folly outweigh the devotion of years; but if she judges me as hardly as you seem to imply, I see that my hope is vain. Tell her from me that if she knew the whole truth she would regard the matter in a different light. But if she does not wish to know the truth—if she prefers to judge me unheard,—I can only submit."
"It is best she should not see you," said Mrs. Dalton, who was glad that Helen herself had decided this point. "Even if you persuaded her to trust you again, I could not give my consent to the renewal of an engagement which has been ended in this manner."
"Youhave always distrusted me," said Rathborne, bitterly.
"No," she replied, gravely; "so far from that, I trusted you as my own son, though I did not think you were the person to make Helen happy. I had always a fear that you did not care for her enough, and now I am forced to believe that you did not care for her at all. If you had done so, this could never have happened, just as it could never have happened if you had possessed the right principle and the sense of honor which I should certainly wish my daughter's husband to possess."
Rathborne could hardly believe the evidence of his ears as he listened to these severe, incisive words. He had always regarded Mrs. Dalton as a person who was mild to weakness, and whom, whenever it suited him, he could influence in whatever manner desired. He therefore scarcely recognized this woman, with her sentence of condemnation based on premises which he could not deny, though he made a faint attempt to do so.
"You do not understand," he said, "how a brief infatuation—a delirium of fancy—can attack a man, let his sense of honor be what it may. As for my attachment to Helen, that is something which has lasted too long to be doubted now."
"Will you inform me, then, how you proposed to reconcile it with your declaration to Marion?"
"That was drawn from me—forced from me!" he exclaimed. "It was a madness of the moment, into which I was led by her art."
Mrs. Dalton rose now, a bright spot of color on each check. "That is enough!" she said. "I can listen to nothing more. No man of honor would, for his own sake, utter such words as those—even if they were true, and I am sure they are not. Great as my niece's faults may be, she is incapable of such conduct as you charge her with. Go, Paul Rathborne! By such excuses you only prove more and more how unworthy you are of Helen's affection or Helen's trust."
"Very well," he answered, his face white and bitter with anger. "As you and she have decided, so be it. But take care that the day does not come when you will deeply regret this decision."
Then he turned, and, without giving her time to reply had she been so inclined, left the room.
Mrs. Dalton looked after him with a heavy sigh. Regret her decision she knew that she would not; but it would be vain to say that she did not regret the necessity for it, that she did not think with a keen pang of Helen's suffering, and that she did not feel, with much bitterness, that Marion had not been guiltless in the matter. Yet even in the midst of her indignation she had pity for the girl, whose vanity and ambition were likely to wreck her life, as they had already gone far to alienate her best friends.
Meanwhile Marion could not disguise the fact that she was not in her usual spirits—for the thought of Helen weighed heavily upon her,—and Mrs. Singleton, observing this, drew at once her own conclusions.
"I am afraid the gypsy tea was not altogether a success, so far as you were concerned or your cousin either," she said. "I heard that she went home with Frank Morley instead of with herfiancé. I will not ask any indiscreet questions, but I suspect that your attractions have drawn Mr. Rathborne from his allegiance. It is what I have anticipated for some time."
Marion frowned a little, annoyed by this freedom, which, however, she felt that she had drawn upon herself, and had no right to resent. But she evaded the implied question.
"Helen was not feeling well, and so she made her cousin take her home before we were ready to start," she said. "I am not particularly partial to Miss Morley's society, or Mr. Rathborne's either, and thought I would accept the seat you offered me. That was the whole matter."
"I am delighted to hear it," said Mrs. Singleton, not deceived in the least. "I was afraid there had been a lover's quarrel, and that perhaps you were the innocent cause of it. That is always such an awkward position. I have occupied it myself once or twice, so I speak from knowledge."
"I am sure that if you occupied it, it must have been innocently," said Marion, with malice. "But we need not discuss what is not, I trust, likely to occur, so far as I am concerned. How is Mr. Singleton this morning?"
"Not well at all. This is one of his bad days. And it is one of mine, too," she added, with a slight grimace; "for I have just heard that Brian Earle is coming."
"And who is Brian Earle?"
"Surely you have heard my uncle talk of him? At least, it is most astonishing if you have not; for he likes him better than any one else in the world, I think; although they don't agree very well. I have no fancy for Brian myself: I find him entirely too much of a prig; but I will say that he might twist the old man around his finger if he would only yield a little more to his wishes and opinions. It is a lucky thing for us that he will not, but it does not make his folly less. Fancy! Mr. Singleton asked him to live with him, look after his business, and generally devote himself to him during his life, with the promise of making him his sole heir, andhe refused! Can you believe that?"
"I must believe it if you are sure of it," replied Marion, smiling at the energy of the other. "But why did he refuse?"
Mrs. Singleton shrugged her shoulders. "Because he was not willing to give up control of his own life, and spend the best years of his youth in idleness, waiting for an old man to die. That is what he said. As if he would not gain by that waiting more than his wretched art would bring him if he toiled at it all his life!"
"His art—what is he?"
"Oh! a painter—or an attempt at one. Are such people always visionary and impracticable? I judge so from what I have read of them, and from my knowledge of him. It is true that his folly serves our interest very well; for if he had agreed to what his uncle proposed, we should have no chance of inheriting anything; but, nevertheless, one has a contempt for a man with so little sense."
"I think you should have the highest regard for him in this instance, since he is serving your interest so well. But why is he coming?"
"To see his uncle before going abroad again. Mr. Singleton has a strong attachment for him, notwithstanding the way he has acted; and I should not be surprised if he made him his heir, after all. So you see there is no reason why I should be overjoyed at his visit, especially since he is not at all an agreeable person, as you will see."
"I may not see," said Marion; "for I do not think I shall be in Scarborough much longer."
"You are going away?" said Mrs. Singleton, with a quick flash of comprehension in her eyes.
"In a few days probably," was the reply. "I promised to spend only a month with Helen, and I have been here now six weeks."
"But I thought you were good for the season," said Mrs. Singleton; while her inward comment was: "So matters are just as I thought!"
CHAPTER XIII.
Reticencewas not Mrs. Singleton's distinguishing characteristic. It was not very long, therefore, before she mentioned her suspicions about Marion both to her husband and her uncle. The first laughed, and remarked that it was only what he had expected; the latter looked grave, and said: "In that case it will not be pleasant for her to remain in her aunt's house."
"So far from it," was the careless reply, "that she is speaking of leaving Scarborough."
Mr. Singleton glanced up sharply. "That would be very undesirable," he said. "Her singing is a great pleasure to me; for the matter of that, so is her society. Ask her to come and stay with you."
Mrs. Singleton lifted her eyebrows. This was far from what she anticipated or desired. There had been a little malicious pleasure in her announcement, but she would certainly have refrained from making it had she feared such a result as this. She was so vexed that for a moment she could scarcely speak. Then she said: "You are very kind; but, although I like Miss Lynde, I do not care enough for her society to ask her to stay with me."
"I never imagined for an instant that you cared for her society," replied Mr. Singleton, coolly. "I was not thinking of your gratification, but of my own, in desiring you to ask her here. Of course, it is necessary that she should be nominally your guest; although, as we are aware, really mine."
"I think, then, that it would be best she should be nominally as well as really yours," said Mrs. Singleton, too much provoked to consider for the moment what was her best policy.
Mr. Singleton looked at her with an ominous flash in his glance. "Very well," he answered, deliberately. "That is just as you please. We can easily change existing arrangements. I will speak to Tom about it."
But this intimation at once brought Mrs. Singleton to unconditional surrender.
"There is no need for that," she said, hastily. "Of course I will do whatever you desire. I only thought it might be best that the matter should be clearly understood. I have no fancy for Miss Lynde, nor any desire for her companionship. To speak the truth, I do not trust her at all."
Mr. Singleton shrugged his shoulders—a gesture to which he gave an expression that many of his friends found very irritating. It said plainly at present that nothing mattered less in his opinion than whether Mrs. Singleton trusted Miss Lynde or not.
"Let us keep to the point," he said, quietly. "What your sentiments with regard to the young lady may be I do not inquire. I only desire you to ask her to come here. If you object to do this—and far be it from me to place any constraint upon you,—I must simply make an arrangement by which it can be done. That is all."
"Why should I object?" asked Mrs. Singleton. "If she comes as your guest, it is certainly not my affair."
"I have requested, however, that you ask her to come as your guest. Do not misunderstand that point. And do not give the invitation so that it may be declined. I should consider that tantamount to not giving it at all. See that she comes. You can arrange it if you like."
With this intimation the conversation ended, and Mrs. Singleton had no comfort but to tell her husband of the disagreeable necessity laid upon her. "I am to ask Marion Lynde to come here as my guest, and I am to see that she comes! Could anything be more vexatious?" she demanded. "I am so provoked that I feel inclined to leave your uncle to manage his own affairs, and to get somebody else to invite guests for his amusement."
"Nothing would be easier than for him to do so," said Mr. Singleton. "We are not at all necessary to him, you know. And why on earth should you object to asking Miss Lynde, if he desires it? It seems to me that you might desire it yourself."
"Oh! it seems so to you, does it?" asked the lady, sarcastically. "Because she has a pretty face, I presume. It does not occur to you that a girl who has drawn her cousin'sfiancéinto a love affair with her—for I am certain that is what has occurred—would betray us just as quickly, and use her influence with this infatuated old man to any end that suited her."
Mr. Singleton looked a little grave at this view of the case. "Well," he said, "that may be so, but how are we to help it? Certainly not by showing that we are afraid of her."
"I might have helped it by letting her go away without telling him anything about it," said the lady. "And I wish I had!"
"Useless!" said her philosophical husband. "He would have found it out for himself. Don't worry over the matter. Ask her here with a good grace, since you have no alternative, and trust that he will tire of her as he has tired of everybody else."
That this was good advice—in fact, the only advice to be followed—Mrs. Singleton was well aware. And she proceeded to do what was required of her, with as good a grace as she could command. The invitation surprised Marion, but it was not unwelcome, as cutting the knot of her difficulties. For, anxious as she now was to leave her aunt's house, and to spare herself the silent, unconscious reproach of Helen's pale face, she was deeply averse to returning to her uncle's home. She had registered a passionate resolve never to return there if she could avoid it; but she had begun to fear that she would be unable to avoid doing so, when Mrs. Singleton's invitation offered her, at least, a temporary mode of escape. She received it graciously, saying that she would be happy to accept it whenever her aunt and cousin would consent to let her go.
"Oh! I am sure they will be averse to giving you up," said Mrs. Singleton, with the finest sarcastic intention. "But if you are intending to leave them in any event, they can not object to your coming to me for a time."
"They will certainly not object to that," replied Marion. "The question is onlywhenI can avail myself of your kind invitation."
This proved to be quite soon; for when Mrs. Dalton heard of the invitation, she advised Marion to set an early day for accepting it. "I think it necessary," she said, "to take Helen away for change of air and scene. I should have asked you to accompany us; but, under the circumstances, the arrangement proposed by Mrs. Singleton is best. I am sure you will understand this."
"I understand it perfectly," said Marion; "and am very sorry that you should have been embarrassed by any thought of me."
So it was settled. Helen was quite passive, ready to do whatever was desired of her; but the spring of happiness seemed broken within her—that natural, spontaneous happiness which had appeared as much a part of her as its perfume is part of a flower. It was hard for Mrs. Dalton to forgive those who, between them, had wrought this change; although she knew that it was well for her daughter to be saved, at any cost, from a marriage with Rathborne.
But Rathborne himself was naturally not of this opinion; and, being a person of strong tenacity of purpose, he was determined not to give up his cause as lost until he had tested his influence over Helen. The opportunity to do this was for some time lacking. He knew that it would be useless to go again to Mrs. Dalton's house and ask for an interview, even if his pride had not rendered such a step impossible. He waited for some chance of meeting Helen alone; but she shrank from going out, so he had found no opportunity, when he heard of her intended departure. This brought him to see the necessity of vigorous measures, and consequently he appeared the next morning at the Catholic church, having learned at what hour Mass was said.
Entering late—for he did not wish to be observed more than was unavoidable,—he found the Mass in progress, and about half a dozen persons representing the congregation. His glance swept rapidly over these, and at once identified Helen, observing with a sense of relief that she was alone. Satisfied on this point, he dropped into a seat near the door to wait until the service ended, looking on meanwhile with a careless attention which had not the least element of comprehension. To him it was an absurd and unintelligible rite, which he did not even make the faintest effort to understand.
When it ended, he thought that his waiting would also end; but to his irritated surprise he found that Helen's devotions were by no means over. The other members of the congregation left the church, each bestowing a curious glance on him in passing; but Helen knelt on, until he began to suspect that she must be aware of his presence and was endeavoring to avoid him. The thought inspired him with fresh energy and obstinacy. "She shall not escape me. I will stay here until noon, if necessary," he said to himself; while Helen, entirely unconscious of who was behind, was sending up her simple petitions for submission and patience and strength. They did not really last very long; and when she rose, Rathborne rose also and stepped into the vestibule to await her.
His patience had no further trial of delay there. Within less than a minute the door leading into the church opened and Helen's face appeared. At the first instant of appearing, it had all the serenity that comes from prayer; but when she saw him standing before her, this expression changed quickly to one of distress. With something like a gasp she said; "Paul!" pausing with the door in her hand.
Rathborne stepped forward, with his own hand extended. "Forgive me for startling you," he said; "but this was my only chance to see you, and I felt that I must do so."
"Why?" asked Helen. She closed the door, but did not give her hand. "There is no reason, that I am aware of, why you should wish to see me," she added, in a voice which trembled a little. "Everything has been said that need be said between us."
"On your side, perhaps so," he answered; "but not on mine. I have said nothing. You have given me no opportunity to say anything. You have condemned me unheard."
"Condemned you! No," she replied. "I have never had any intention or desire to condemn you. On the contrary, I said from the first that I did not blame you for what was probably beyond your power to control. But I desired that all might be ended between us; and, that being so, there is nothing more to say on a subject that is—that must be—painful to you as well as to me."
"It will not be painful if I can induce you to listen to me and to believe me," he said. "That is what I have come this morning to beg of you—the opportunity to set myself right. Appoint a time when I can come and find you alone, or meet me where you will. Only give me the opportunity to justify myself to you."
He spoke with an earnest pleading which was by no means simulated, for he never lost the consciousness of how much for him depended upon this; and that the pleading had an effect upon Helen was evident in her growing pallor, in the look of pain that darkened her eyes. But she answered, with a firmness on which he had not reckoned:—
"You should not ask of me something which could not serve any good end. No explanation can alter facts, and I would rather not discuss them. What happened was very natural. No one knows that better than I. But nothing can efface it now."
"Not if you heard that I was led into folly by every possible art?" he demanded, carried beyond self-control by the unforeseen difficulty of bending one who had always before seemed so pliant to his influence. "Not if I proved to you that your cousin—"
Helen lifted her hand with a gesture which had in it something of a command. "Not another word like that," she said. "I will not listen to it. If what you imply were true, how would it help matters? A man who is weak enough to be led away by the art of another is as little to be trusted as the man who deliberately breaks his faith. He may not be as blamable—I do not say that,—but one could never repose confidence in him again. That is over."
"Helen!" said Rathborne. He was amazed, almost confounded, by a dignity of manner and tone which he had not only never seen in Helen before, but of which he would not have believed her capable. He did not reckon on the judgment and strength which earnest prayer had brought, nor did it occur to him that the worst place he could have chosen for the exertion of his influence was the threshold of the church, where day after day she had come to beg for the direction that in such a crisis would surely not be denied her. "I hardly know you," he went on, in the tone of one deeply wounded. "How changed you are!—how cold! What has become of the sweet and gentle Helen I have known and loved?"
She looked at him with the first reproach that had been in either tone or glance. "The Helen you knew—who trusted you so absolutely and loved you so well—is dead," she answered. "There is no need that we should speak of her." She paused for an instant, and then, with her voice breaking a little, went on: "I am going away—I may not see you again in a long time. Meanwhile I will try, with the help of God, to forget the past, and I beg you to do the same; for it can never be renewed. And if you wish to spare me pain, you will never speak of it again."
Had Rathborne uttered what was in his mind, he would have replied that whether he gave her pain or not was a matter of the utmost indifference to him, if only he might gain his desired end. A sense of powerless exasperation possessed him, the greater for his disappointment. He had been so certain of bending Helen to his will whenever he met her alone; yet now Helen stood before him like a rock, with immovable resolution on her gentle face. He lost control of himself, and, stepping forward, seized her by the hand.
"You are not speaking your own mind in this," he said. "You are influenced by others, and I will not submit to it. The dictation of your mother or your priest shall not come between us."
"Nothing has come between us except your own conduct and my own sense of right," answered Helen. She grew paler still, but did not falter. "It is best that we should part at once; for you have made me feel more strongly that it is best we should part altogether. Let me go. You forget where we are."
"You will not listen to me?—you will not give me an opportunity to explain?"
"There is nothing to explain," she said, faintly; for the strain of the interview was telling upon her. "Nothing can alter the fact of what I heard. I could never trust you or believe in your affection after that. Once for all,everything is at an end between us. Now let me go."
He released her with a violence which sent her back a step. "Go, then!" he said. "I always knew that you were weak, but I never knew before how weak. You are a puppet in the hands of others, and both you and they shall regret this."
He left the vestibule; while she, after waiting for a moment to recover herself, turned and re-entered the church.
CHAPTER XIV.
"Andso, Brian, I find you as obstinate as ever!" said Mr. Singleton, in a complaining tone.
The person whom he addressed smiled a little. He did not look very obstinate, this pleasant-faced young man, with clear gray eyes, that regarded the elder man kindly and humorously. They were sitting in the latter's private room, which opened into the drawing-room—Mr. Singleton leaning back in his deep, luxurious chair; Brian Earle seated opposite him, but nearer the open window, through which his glance wandered now and then, attracted by the soft summer scene outside, flooded with the sunshine of late afternoon.
"I am sorry if it seems to you only a question of obstinacy," he said, in a voice as pleasant as his face; "for that is the last thing I should wish to be guilty of. Mere obstinacy—that is, attachment to one's will simply because it is one's will—always seemed to me a very puerile thing. My impulse is to do what another wishes rather than what I wish myself—all things being equal."
"Indeed!" said Mr. Singleton, with the sarcastic inflection of voice which was very common with him. "Then I am to suppose that, where I am concerned, your impulse is exactly contrary to what it is in the case of others; for certainly you have never consented to do anything that I wish."
"My dear uncle, is that quite just, because I can not doonething that you wish?"
"That one thing includes everything. You know it as well as I do. In refusing that, you refuse all that I can or ever shall ask of you."
"I am sorry to hear it," said the other. "But do you not think that it is a great thing to ask of a man to resign his own plan and mode of life, to do violence to his inclination, and to give up not only his ambition but his independence as well?"
"Yes," answered Mr. Singleton, "itisa great deal; but I offer a great deal also. You should not forget that."
"I do not forget it. You offer an immense price, but it is the price of my freedom and my self-respect."
"In that case we will say no more about it," returned Mr. Singleton, hotly. "If you consider that you would lose your freedom and your self-respect by complying with my wishes—wishes which, I am sure, are very moderate in their demands,—I shall certainly not urge you to do so. We will consider the subject finally closed."
"With all my heart," said Earle. "It is a very painful subject to me, because I regret deeply that I am unable to comply with your wishes."
Mr. Singleton made a wave of his hand which seemed peremptorily to dismiss this regret. "Nothing would be easier than for you to gratify me in the matter if you cared to do so. Since you do not desire to do so, I shall cease to urge it. I have some self-respect, too."
To this statement Earle wisely made no reply, and he was also successful in repressing a smile; though he knew well from past experience that his uncle's resolution would not hold for a week, and that the whole ground would have to be exhaustively gone over again—probably again and again.
"You seem very pleasantly settled here," he observed after a moment, by way of opening a new subject. "This is a charming old place."
"Yes. I should buy it if I expected to live long enough to make it worth while," replied Mr. Singleton. "The climate here suits me exceedingly well."
"And the people are agreeable, I suppose?" observed Earle, absently, his eye fastened on the lovely alterations of light and shade—of the nearer green melting into distant blue—which made up the scene without.
"I know little or nothing of the people of the town," said Mr. Singleton; "but I meet a sufficient number of my old friends—brought here, like myself, by the climate—to give me as much society as I want. Tom and his wife have, of course, a large circle of acquaintances; so you need entertain no fear of dullness in the short time you are good enough to give me."