"Leo?"
She wept on.
"Try to hear me. Try to understand me. Leo, there is a greater thing than Love."
"No, no, there is not—there is not."
"There is." He drew a breath, a long, deep breath. "There is Honour."
She was silent. The tears hung on her cheeks.
"I have lost all besides," said he, simply, "but I have kept that, and will keep it." He paused, and continued: "If Maud were different, other things might also be different, but you know your sister; to break faith with her would be—she could not endure it. I have taught her to believe that I am wholly hers, and she has never seen nor guessed that—that a change has come. And however acutely Maud would feel that, if she knew—which, so help me God, she never shall—she would be infinitely more distressed, more humiliated—her pride—her self-respect—no, it is not to be thought of." He was now walking on alone, and so fast that she could scarcely keep pace with him. She could catch only broken utterances—some perhaps not meant for her. It appeared as though he had forgotten her presence.
"Love? Honour?
"Love lost, much lost.Honour lost, all lost."
"Love lost, much lost.Honour lost, all lost."
Honour is not lost—not yet. Happiness? That's nothing. Life is short, and there's another life to look to. A coward turns his back on the fight. A deserter falls out of the ranks. The strong should hold up the weak"—suddenly he looked round for her—"Leo?"
Leo meekly raised her eyes, overmastered, dumb. It was the hardest moment of Paul's life. One look, one word between them, and she would have been dragged down into the whirlpool from which it was his part to save her. A great convulsion shook his frame, and he set his teeth and swore, then drew her gently to his side.
"My little sister must forget all this. It is a bad dream and it is over and past. She must promise me——"
"What—Paul?"
"She must promise me—solemnly—before God, in Whose Presence we are"—he looked up, the sky was clear and shining overhead—"that she will never—mark me, Leo,never—as long as life lasts, allow herself to think of cutting it short again. Before God, Leo!"
He lifted her hand, still fast in his, as though invoking the Unseen Presence, and almost inaudibly she repeated after him the words of the promise.
"We must hasten home now," said Paul, with a rapid transition to another tone. "The short cut from Claymount is somewhere hereabouts," looking round—"and we shall get back," he took out his watch, "before the house is shut up, if we walk briskly. You can walk, can't you? I mean, of course you will have to walk, but can you step out? If you would care to have an arm——"
"I can walk quite well, thank you—but, oh, Paul, just this—mayn't I say it——?"
"Better not, dear." The word slipped out; he was unconscious of it, but she heard. They hurried home.
"No, you don't—and don't you think it."
Somebody, and that a formidable personage, had been a witness of the scene just narrated.
We would not for a moment call poor Val Purcell an eavesdropperau naturel, but he certainly had a talent for picking up by the wayside things which did not exactly belong to him.
Val, as we know, was not quite like other people.
It was only now and then that he showed this; in the ordinary give and take of society he passed muster well enough, and no one would more readily have spurned the notion of doing what others did not do—that being the poor boy's code of conduct,—yet he is not to be hardly judged if occasionally it failed him at a pinch. Wherefore if when passing through the Abbey woods on the afternoon in question, he heard voices and crept near to peep and listen, let it be believed that the feeling which arrested his footsteps was in its way innocent. His curiosity was roused, and he had a hearty sympathy with sylvan lovers; so if Jack and Jill were courting, there was no reason why he should not see which Jack and Jill it was? He would not tell tales, not he.
But when, instead of the expected rustic figures, his starting eyes beheld Paul Foster and—not Paul's betrothed—not the girl with whom alone he had a right to wander in that dim solitude at that mystic hour—but Leonore, Leonore who was nothing, or should have been nothing to her sister's lover, curiosity gave place to another feeling.
So how? He would spy if he chose.
He would jolly well discover what the devil those two were about? They were up to no good hiding away by themselves in the woods, and, damnation! holding each other's hands.
That beast Paul—he had always thought him a beast—no, he hadn't, but he did now—so he was playing a double game, was he? Engaged to Maud, and flirting with Leo under the rose?
Leo could flirt, of course; she had made a fool of himself once,—but he had got it into his head that she rather disliked Paul;—she had never cracked him up as the rest did,—oh, she was a cunning, crafty little jade, and he would put a spoke in her wheel, be hanged if he didn't!
The undergrowth was so thick at the point to which Paul had half led, half dragged his trembling companion at this juncture, that it was easy for a third person to draw very near unperceived,—and though much that now passed was unintelligible to one not possessed of the key of the mystery, Val heard enough.
He did not indeed hear any love-making,—but instinct guided him straight to the mark which another by reasoning might have failed to reach. He was as fully convinced that Maud had been supplanted as if he had heard the fact avowed a hundred times; and though he stole off, afraid to linger, before Paul's final adjuration which might have puzzled and mystified him, he had got as much as his brain could carry, and got it in very good order.
The next day he presented himself at Boldero Abbey. His plan of campaign, conned over and over with ever-increasing wrath and valour, was not confided to gran. Gran had never liked Maud, and in old days he would often affect a hopeless passion for the latter for the sake of getting amusement out of the old lady. Then an argument would ensue, and he very nearly felt the passion. He could not see that one Boldero was not as good as another; and as he could not be bluntly told that Leonore had money while her sister had not, he held to it that gran was prejudiced to the point of injustice. Accordingly he kept his own counsel now, and plumed himself thereon mightily.
And Fortune favoured him; for though all the ladies were at home, the one he sought was by herself in the drawing-room, when he was ushered in.
"I say, it's you I want," said Val, immediately. "Look here, Maud, I want to see you alone, and without any one's knowing. Where are the others?"
"Sue and Sybil are out——"
"But I was told they were in!"
"That's Grier's laziness. He has grown intolerably lazy of late. As he is under notice to go, he won't put himself out of his way for any one of us, and says 'At Home' or 'Not at Home,' just as it suits him, without taking the trouble of finding out."
"Where are they gone?" demanded Val, as usual diverted from his course by any chance observation. Despite the purpose with which he was big, he could not help feeling inquisitive as to which house in the neighbourhood was being honoured.
"Only to the rectory," said Maud, indifferently; "but they are there, and there they will stay for ages. It is a sort of farewell visit. What do you want to see me about?"
"Stop a bit. There's Leo. Is she—where is she?"
"In bed. She caught a chill yesterday going out in the damp."
"You are sure she is not out in the damp again, to-day?" said Val, significantly, and gave his companion what he considered a meaning look. "Hey? Are you sure of that, Maud?"
"As I was with her five minutes ago, I think I may be," retorted Maud, and convinced by this preamble that Leo, not herself, was the real object of the visit, she was less gracious than before. "I thought you said it was me you wanted?"—she threw out, however.
"So it is. I don't want Leo—not a bit. I don't want her ever again, that's more. You'd say the same if you'd seen what I saw. Give me time, and I'll tell you all about it. That's what I came for."
"Really, Val, I—it's not the thing, you know, to come to one of us with complaints of the other. If you have any fault to find with Leo, you must say so to herself."
"You wait till you hear. You won't be so keen for me to go to Leo——"
"But I really can't," said Maud, rising. Her pride revolted at the idea of being the confidant of some silly quarrel, which did not concern her in the slightest. "I don't know anything about it, and I don't want to know. Do talk of other things."
"What? When I came here on purpose——?"
"Hush,—you needn't be excited. Of course if you are determined to speak, you had better speak and be done with it; but I warn you I shan't take your part, or any one's part——"
"As long as you don't take Paul's part," cried he, with a flash of inspiration, "the rest doesn't matter."
"Paul's part?" For very amazement Maud fell into her chair again, and stared at the speaker as though he had struck her a blow. "What—what did you say? Did you say 'Paul's part'?"
"Yes, I did—I did say just that. I told you you'd jolly well better hear me out instead of being so infernally supercilious. Oh, I say, I'm sorry I said that, Maud; I'm—I'm sorry for you altogether."
"You speak in enigmas, Val,"—but her laugh was a little forced; his earnestness and persistency told; and then there was "Paul's part"?
"He is—but look here, you needn't mind what he is. Don't you take it to heart——"
"I know what Paul is, thank you," haughtily.
"That's just what you don't——"
"Excuse me, Val——"
"Excuse me, Maud——"
"You are impertinent now, I shall listen no longer."
"Listen no longer? You haven't evenbegunto listen. Confound it, you shouldn't treat a fellow like this, when a fellow is doing all he can for you, and feels for you as—as I do. You know I've always been fond of you, Maud," softening, "and I've come to say that if you'll marry me instead——"
"Have you gone crazy, Val?" But vanity whispered a flattering solution of the problem, and his ear detected an opening. To the same suggestion Leo had cried "Nonsense!" and although affronted at first, he had ultimately accepted the "Nonsense!" with philosophy,—but he had weapons in reserve now, and would soon show that he was not "crazy". No, damn it, he was not "crazy". The idea!
With the rush of a torrent he told his tale.
"And you saw this—and you heard this?" said Maud, at last. "You did not dream it? You—you are sure you did not dream it?"
"I'll take my solemn Davy I saw it all, and heard it all. Leo is a little cat; and as for Paul, to think that he should dare—but I say, Maud, you will checkmate him, won't you?"
"Hush;" she waved him back, for he had pressed forward. "Let me think—let me think. If this is true—but it isn't, it can't be true,—" and she pressed her hands upon her forehead. A thousand trifles, insignificant in themselves, which had secretly perplexed and chafed her spirit of late, rushed back upon her memory. Paul had lost the air of a happy lover. He had become moody, silent, solitary in his habits. He had, it is true, obeyed to the strictest extent the dictates of custom, but there were moments which in the retrospect maddeningly bore out Val's accusation. He had played—he was still playing her false? She was, or would be, a laughing-stock? She quailed and faltered.
"Take me," urged Val. "It's not—not only for your own sake, though of course that's what I'm thinking of most, but——"
"I must know first. I must make sure of the truth first."
"If you do, you'll give the show away. You ought never to let out that you know anything, and throw him over before he throws you. Then—there you are!"
"You mean that I must not unveil Paul's treachery? That he is to go unpunished?"
"You can't cut off your nose to spite your face, you know. Once you have a row with Paul the fat is in the fire, and it will be all over the place that he's jilted you."
"And for my own sister;" said she, bitterly.
She longed to rush to Leo, to Paul, to both severally or together, and denounce them. She could scarce restrain herself from proclaiming her wrongs upon the housetops, but—she paused and looked thoughtfully at Val. There was no doubt about Val's integrity. Up to his lights he was universally accounted "straight," and she need never fear being tricked and cheated a second time. He had acted well by her at this crisis, and to reward him? The idea grew in favour.
On the other hand, how terrible would be her position if she refused—and Position was a god she worshipped. She would be talked about, pointed at, and worst of all, pitied. Her ignominy—she could not face it.
"I say, Maud, you know I am fond of you?"
Yes, poor boy, he was fond of her; she had always felt complacently secure of his fondness, though occasionally nettled of late by misgivings as to his having transferred his first allegiance elsewhere. Leo had been bidden to Claymount oftener than she; and gran had made much of the younger sister, whereas she had always been cool and distant to the elder.
Maud, in her slow way, had resented this, and given herself considerable airs towards the old lady after her engagement. To triumph over her—over everybody—vindicate her own charms, and prove to the world the unswerving devotion of her old admirer would be something, would at any rate be better than nothing.
She sighed gently, and emboldened, he pressed his suit. A long interview closed with this decision. If satisfied as to the truth of his statements—but satisfied she must be—she would send for him next day, and—and do whatever he asked her.
"That's right, that's all I want;" his face shone with satisfaction. "Of course you wouldn't have wanted me if you had had Paul—not that Paul is any shakes now, (and whatever he is, he's not for you," in parenthesis,) "and—and I'm your man. I'll see you through, Maud; trust me."
"You will make all the arrangements?—that is, if I send for you?"
"Won't I? I had the whole thing in my head when I came here, and I'll work it out again going home. I'm a bit flustered just now, but you'll see if I don't do the square thing. We'll be off by the first train for London town and a registry office—but don't I just wish it was Gretna Green, and a gallop through the night! I have often thought what a jolly skidaddle one might have behind four horses to Gretna Green."
"Go, now;" said Maud, authoritatively. "But if I send word to come, Come."
And the message went, "Come".
Mr. Anthony Boldero and Mr. John Purcell were putting their heads together in the window of a Pall Mall club. The two gentlemen had a subject in common to discuss; and as old acquaintances, who had recently become new neighbours, they had a great deal to say and said it freely.
"A most disgraceful business;" the one bald head wagged, and the other responded. "'Pon my soul," asserted Mr. Purcell, vivaciously, "it is no wonder it killed the old lady. She might have hung on long enough, but for that. Although she was seventy-seven. Seventy-seven. A ripe age, Boldero."
He was only a little over sixty himself, and had often wondered how long his step-mother was going to keep him out of the property? It had for years been a secret grievance that a second wife should have had its tenancy for life, and made her descendant, a poor creature like Val, its master in appearance if not in fact. He could not therefore affect to be inconsolable.
Was it possible that the "disgraceful business" had had anything to do with General Boldero's demise?—he queried next. Could he have known, or suspected anything?
Mr. Anthony Boldero thought not. The general had been as cock-a-hoop as possible over his daughter's engagement; as insufferably patronising and condescending as over the first affair.
"Anditturned out a fiasco, of course," observed his friend. "While he lived, Boldero contrived to keep going his own version, I'm told; and they sealed up the girl as tight as wax to prevent her telling tales—but every one knows now. So you think he was crowing over Maud's marriage too? Well, well, what would he have said to this?"
They then talked of Major Foster. Major Foster had behaved like a gentleman, taken himself quietly out of the way, and made no fuss. Mr. Anthony Boldero thought he was probably well out of the connection; the Boldero girls were too big for their boots, and Maud was the worst of them. All the same, no man likes to be jilted.
"Is it the case that your nephew has had nothing left him by his grandmother?—" he suddenly demanded, having disposed of Paul.
"He's not my full nephew, you know; he's only my half-brother's son. And, fact is, the old lady had nothing, or next to nothing to leave. Her money was all jointure, and reverts to the estate."
"And you have come in for Claymount free and unencumbered, as I have for the Boldero property? Ah!" said his companion, thoughtfully.
Presently he looked up. "Suppose between us we do something for those two lunatics, Purcell? We can't let them starve, eh? Suppose we make a bit of a purse, and ship them off to the colonies? British Columbia, eh? That's the only place for them and their sort; and if they can be put on a decent footing there, they won't be in a hurry to come back again. Eh? What d'ye say? I'm willing, if you are. I have no great affection for these relatives of mine, but after all, theyarerelatives, and blood is thicker than water."
"Well—yes;" said Mr. Purcell, dubiously. He had been mentally putting off this evil day, uneasily conscious that it was bound to come.
"The general was the worst of the lot," proceeded his companion; "the most arrogant, conceited, humbugging, old swelled-head I ever came across. But he's gone, and the poor girls—well, I'm sorry for them. Sue is a good creature. I hardly know the younger ones,—but none of them have given me any trouble since I had to deal with them. Except for this scandal of Maud's of course—and anyhow that doesn't affectme. Well, what about her and her precious husband? You are bound to do something for him, I suppose?"
And it ended in Mr. Purcell's doing it.
Before Maud sailed, it was necessary for her to take leave of her sisters, and this was Leonore's worst time. Till then she had been shielded from the outer world by the illness which was impending when Maud described it as a chill contracted by going out in the damp, and the event which followed was generally accredited with developing the chill into something more serious,—but although Sue was obliged to ask a month's grace from Mr. Anthony Boldero, in order that her sister might be sufficiently recovered to run no risk from moving—(a request which he had sufficient goodness of heart to ignore when alleging that he had had no trouble about family arrangements)—Leo was now well enough to have no excuse for evading a farewell scene.
In respect to Maud she knew not what to think. Had any hint or rumour of the truth ever reached her, or could it have been mere coincidence that caused her flight to follow Paul's confession almost on the instant?
Had Paul's vaunted inflexibility broken down? Had he reconsidered his resolution?
Yet, if so, this must have become known; it was impossible that it should have been kept secret; and he, not Maud would have been accounted guilty.
"Where is Paul? What is Paul doing?" The faint bleat of a weak and wounded creature came incessantly from Leonore's pillow, all through the first long day that followed theesclandre. They hid it from her that Paul had gone.
Sue and Sybil would fain have kept him, yearning to breathe forth contrition and sympathy every hour, every moment—but he could not be prevailed upon. They thought he was too deeply hurt, too cruelly affronted,—and they thought they would not tell Leo.
It was all so inexplicable that even the very servants who know us, their masters and mistresses, better than we know each other, could draw no conclusions, and the prevailing amazement downstairs found vent in ejaculations of "Miss Maud! Miss Maud of all people! Now if it had been Leonore"—but the speaker, a pert young thing, was sharply called to order for impudence—"'Mrs. Stubbs' then,—the name ain't so pretty she need have it always tagged on to her"—with a giggle—"she's got it in her to run away with any number of 'em,shehas. And Val was her one, Mary and me thought. But, Lor, it's looks that tells: and pretty as she is, Leonore—Mrs. Stubbs," giggling again, "can't stand up to her that's Mrs. Val now. See her in her weddin' dress—my! We little thought she wasn't never to put it on in earnest, when we was let to have a sight of her that day it come home. A real treat it was!"
Maud's first letter was a triumph of equivocal diplomacy. She did not utter a single verbal falsehood, and without such contrived to blindfold every one. Her feelings towards her affianced husband had changed of late—("of late" is an elastic term)—she had "learnt to value the lifelong devotion of her dear Val,"—(when learned was again left to the imagination)—and "seeing no course left but to break with Paul before it was too late," she had fled to avoid a scene which would have only given him pain, and not altered her resolution.
"Had you any sort of premonition of this, Paul?" Sue inquired in tremulous accents, an hour having elapsed since the letter came.
"She put one or two rather strange questions to me yesterday;" hesitated he.
"Might I ask—could you tell me what they were?"
"I think I would rather not. It can do no good now." He spoke gently, but she could not press the point.
"She knows;" said Paul, to himself. "How she knows I cannot fathom; but all this about the change in her feelings is only a blind.She knows; and though she has given me my release, I can never avail myself of it."
He left the Abbey within the hour.
And this was now a story three months old, and Maud was coming to say "Good-bye" before beginning a new life in another land.
Heretofore she had obstinately rejected the olive branch held out by Sue. Sue, acting as mouthpiece for the three, had written time and again, begging that for all their sakes no estrangement should take place; entreating the delinquents to believe that they would only meet with kindness and affection in Eaton Place, where the sisters were established, and where room was plentiful. Would not Val and Maud come and make their home also there for the present?
But though the offer, delicately worded, might have been presumed tempting enough to two almost penniless people, it was coldly declined.
"And she seems as ifshewere angry withus!" cried Sybil, "she who dragged the whole family through the mud, and left us to bear the brunt!"
"Certainly she does write as if she bore us a grudge," owned Sue, "and yet, how can she? What have we done? What has any one of us done that Maud should refuse to be one with us again? I am sorry, but of course if that is the spirit in which poor Maud receives overtures of peace, I really—really I do not think I can go on thrusting them upon her." For Sue also had her pride, though it was a poor, weak, back-boneless pride, which would have melted at the first soft word from her sister.
The emigration concocted in the club window, however, effected what all besides had failed to do. By the time the final arrangements were complete and the tickets taken, Maud, on the eve of departure, was won upon to come to Eaton Place, though she still declined to take up her abode there.
Nor would she come alone.
"Val's with her," announced Sybil, having peeped from the balcony; "she might have left him behind, I think. I did want to find out if I could, what Maud really means by all this? Whyweare in disgrace, becauseshehas behaved like an idiot?"
"We shall never discover that now;" said Sue,—and the event proved her right.
Maud had taken the best and surest precaution against conversation of an intimate nature. She had put on one of the smartest dresses of her elaborate trousseau—having left it unpacked on purpose,—and her step as she entered was that of a stranger on a foreign soil. She was studiously polite; she inquired with a becoming air of solicitude after their healths, and she looked kindly at Sue:—but a jest of Sybil's fell flat, and Leo was conscious that her sister's lips never actually touched her cheek.
Leo herself was trembling from head to foot.
"We have been rather anxious about dear Leo," said Sue, with a tender glance towards the shrinking figure in the background.
"Indeed? There is a good deal of influenza about;" replied Maud carelessly. Before anyone could rejoin she changed the subject. "They tell us the weather look-out is favourable, and we ought to have a good passage." She never once looked at Leo, nor spoke to her.
And she rose to go as soon as decency permitted. But though a good deal was said about future home-comings, and Val declared that he for one would never rest till he was back in Old England again, there was a general feeling that the impending separation would prove if not absolutely final, at least of long duration. Maud was evidently longing to be off. Her voice as she hurried to the door was sharp and impatient. She could scarcely wait for Val to make his adieux properly, and sprang into the hansom while he was still in the hall.
Then she leaned forward and beckoned, and Leo ran out. Leo was yearning for one little word, one kind look to prove her dreadful fears unfounded, but, "It was not you I wanted," said Maud, rearing her chin; "send my husband to me."
She turned her face aside, and Leonore, like Paul, cried within herself, "She knows".
"Hoots, it's in the blood," said Dr. Craig, briefly.
An old friend had come to visit him, and started the topic which had ceased to be a nine days' wonder in the neighbourhood.
"There's a wild strain in the Bolderos somewhere," continued the doctor, crossing his legs, and settling down for a chat. "Those lassies have had a gay lady among their forebears at some time or other, for they didn't get their pranks from old Brown-boots. To do Brown-boots justice, he was respectable—I'm thinking it was his one virtue. Proud as Lucifer, and vain as a peacock—they say you can't be both, but hewas—and so was Maud—and it was just her vanity that got the whip hand of her pride at the last. It must have been," musing; "nothing else could account for her throwing over a nice fellow like Foster, and a good match too, for poor loony Val without a sixpence. She didn't know he hadn't a sixpence, mind you; she meant to come back and queen it at Claymount,—where I doubt not she would soon have ruled the roost, if she hadn't had the ill-luck to kill the old lady instead. She wanted to show she had two strings to her bow, d'ye see?" He smoked and nodded, then started afresh:—
"Aye, aye, and there was Leonore—Leonore Stubbs—the widow. Her that played the mischief with that poor lad of mine, Tommy Andrews, and lost me the best assistant I ever had. I tried to get Tommy back after the Bolderos left, but no; he scunnered the place; she had just eaten the heart out of him, Leonore had. My word, she was a jaunty bit creature. I fair weakened to her myself, when she would stand by the road-side looking up at me in the gig, with those big, laughing eyes of hers—and her wee bit moothie, it was the prettiest bit thing—though mind you, I ran her down to Tommy. Poor Tommy!"
"He wouldn't take a telling," resumed the speaker, after a pause. "They never will, you know—those dour, close, machine-like lads; they'll make no resistance; they'll let you talk and talk and think you've convinced them—and it just rolls like water off a duck's back. Tommy garred me believe it was all over and done with. He went about his work, and kept out of little pussycat's way, and then, phew! all at once the murder was out! It was simply bottled up; and one fine day—I don't know what happened, for cart-ropes wouldn't drag it out of him—butsomethingdid, and he came in, looking battle and murder and sudden death. He was off at crack of dawn,—and that was just a few days before Maud's fine elopement took place. We had never had such an excitement before in these humdrum parts, and we never shall again."
To all of this the friend, also a Scot, hearkened without emitting a syllable.
When, however, his ear detected the accents of finality, he shook the ashes from his pipe and opened his lips: "I fell in with the rejected gentleman the other day".
"Foster? No? Did you? Did you really? How was that?" In an instant the doctor was on the alert.
"I was on my holiday, doing a bit of fishing in an out-of-the-way part of Sutherland, and there were only two or three of us in the hotel. Foster was one."
"A tall, thin man, with a lantern-jawed face?"
"That's him. One of the others had got wind of this tale, and told me. We were talking of you, I fancy; and he had been down here a whiley ago, when the affair was fresh."
"What was Foster doing there?"
"Fishing like the rest of us—but always by himself. He wasn't uncivil, only unsociable. I had a walk with him one day, and he talked about India. A good part of his life had been spent in India, and he could tell a lot about it, but when the talk came round home, he shut up like a knife, and I kind of jaloused there was something wrong. That was before I knew what it was."
"He looked—how did he look?"
"How? I can't tell you how. He justlooked. That was enough for me."
"Well, you saw the sort of chap he was, just the one to take a woman's fancy,—and to think that Maud Boldero could be so blind daft as to throw him over for that poor Val, whom she could have picked up at any time!"
"What has become of the others? Do you ever hear anything of them?"
"Sybil has married. She married pretty quickly after they left. A London man; a barrister, I think. Sybil is good-looking enough, they are all good-looking; though Maud's the pick of the bunch. Stop a bit, I'm not sure that the little rascal Leonore—but no, no; she hadn't the air, the style; it was just a way she had,—eh, she was a bit beguiling thing. There's that new boy of mine, he has twice the go that poor Tommy had, though nothing like the brains—but he's all over the place among the lasses, and when I hear him whistling here and whistling there, with his nose in at every open door, thinks I to myself, 'Thank the Lord, Leonore Stubbs is out of Jock's way'."
Leonore was out of everybody's way, it seemed,—or it might have been that she had ceased to be beguiling. People who met her during the next year of her life, found a quiet young girl—she still looked very young—with rather an interesting countenance; but if drawn thereby to prosecute her acquaintance, they tried to engage her in their pursuits and pleasures, they were disappointed. She did not respond to buoyant propositions; games and pastimes did not attract her; they thought she did not know how to flirt.
In short she was dull, and rather tiresomely devoted to her half-sister, whom no one thought of inviting to join in youthful escapades—so after a time Leo was not invited either.
This was a trouble to Sue, and one day she made a suggestion. Was there any use in remaining in London, if the life there was not in accordance with either of their tastes? If Leo no longer cared for society—though she owned she thought that a pity at her age—and here the speaker paused.
"I don't—at present," owned Leo, frankly. "I may again—some time,"—but to herself she wondered, would that some time ever come?
Then news came from America, sad news, which put all other thoughts aside for the moment. A child had been born, but its birth had cost the mother her life, and the next cable announced that poor Val had lost his little son also. He was begged to return home, and assured of welcome and maintenance there,—but to the surprise of all replied evasively. He would see how matters were by-and-by; he could not bring himself to move just yet.
The next letter expatiated on the wonderful beauty and climate of California, and the kindness and hospitality of friends, who had carried him off for a trip, to distract his thoughts.
Again another letter was full of nothing but these friends. Poor simple Val had not the art of concealment, and long before he knew himself, the sisters knew what to expect. He had been "most awfully sad and lonely," and he "would never forget Maud,"—but he had found a dear girl who reminded him of her, and (here the pen had raced) by the time dear Sue and Leo received the letter, he would be married to the richest heiress in California. A newspaper followed, announcing that the ceremony had actually taken place.
"So we need not go out to Val," said Leo, with a smile.
She and Sue were wandering hither and thither with no particular reason for being anywhere, and it had been in contemplation to cross the Atlantic. Sue's investments had prospered of late, and there would have been no difficulty about funds—yet each sister was conscious of a sense of relief when the expedition was abandoned. Sue was timorous and a bad traveller,—while Leo, from whom the suggestion had emanated, no sooner found it taking shape than she repented. What was she going for? What could the new country yield that the old could not? Could it heal her sore heart? Could it banish remembrance? Could it give her news of Paul? Paul, who had vanished from the face of the earth?
Rather she would be turning her back upon any possibility of either hearing of or seeing him again; and though, of course, she could not wish that they should meet, and in the natural sequence of events, they were most unlikely to meet, it would be something only to—oh, anything would be better than that bitter blank, that desolation of ignorance which was so impenetrable, so insurmountable.
Sue knew now about Paul. When Maud died there was no further reason for concealment, and albeit the shock was great, it was a consolation to both sisters to drop the veil between them.
"But you do understand, don't you, that he never—never even when I almost forced it from him, said that it wasI?" murmured Leo. "I knew it; I felt it; but he did not, he would not say it. Oh, I did so long for him to say it just once—but he never did. Sue, you know that little old jug I have upstairs?" suddenly she broke off, as it appeared inconsequently.
"Little old jug?" Sue reflected, but could not remember. And she wondered somewhat. What could "a little old jug" have to do with the present conversation?
"The one with the French soldier's motto. It used to be on the anteroom mantelpiece at Boldero. Oh, you must remember it, Sue."
"We had so much china, dear——"
"But this was the one I asked you to give me for my own—however, listen. The motto was:—
"Mon âme â Dieu,Ma vie au Roi,Mon coeur aux Dames,L'honneur pour moi."
"Mon âme â Dieu,Ma vie au Roi,Mon coeur aux Dames,L'honneur pour moi."
"Paul noticed it one day, and turned round and said, 'That's splendid,'—and read it again. That was when he first came. And afterwards, when things were getting very bad, I came upon him standing in front of the mantelpiece, staring at the jug. I rather liked it myself, but I didn't see it as he did, for on that dreadful day," she looked down, even when it was only Sue, she looked down—"when Paul saved me from myself——"
"When you were too ill to know what you were doing, darling."
"He looked at me and said with a sort of smile, 'L'honneur pour moi.' Sue?"
Sue looked attention.
"You know how poor Maud bored us—I mean how she insisted on Paul's religion as if it were something which gave him a sort ofcachet—something quite overourheads?—and how father—oh, Sue, I must say it—do you remember how father once shut her up by declaring that Paul was too much of a gentleman to introduce unpleasant subjects? It was only father's way, you know. He didn't mean any harm, and I do think, don't you, that father was changed a little, that he was different those last few weeks? He said to me once: 'There's more in it than you think'. Anyway, Sue, he did like and admire Paul."
"Yes—yes, he did."
"Now I want to say something," Leo changed the subject, which each felt to be a sad one. "Sue, what really—what I shall never forget, is, that when the worst moment of all came, when Paul and I were together, all alone, and I was ready—oh, Iwasready to fall into his arms if he had held out his little finger—he didn't hold it. He stood there like a statue. And I know, Iknowwhat held him back. If all the world had called Paul a good man, and he had preached goodness from morning to night, it wouldn't have had the least effect, but when he said 'L'honneur pour moi'"—her tears overflowed, and Sue wept likewise....
They often wondered how much and how little had been suspected by Maud, inducing her own line of action. In the light of her subsequent attitude it seemed more than probable that she had either learnt or divined that all was not as it appeared, but so cleverly had she kept up a show of being in good spirits up to the close of the day which was to Leo like the day of judgment, that nothing could be certain.
Sue could recall that after Leo had been seen to bed, obviously ill, on her return to the house before dinner, Maud had expressed a sort of satisfaction, pointing out that this accounted for the peculiarities of her sister's behaviour throughout the day. "Really one is glad to know it wasthat," she had exclaimed more than once.
She had also rallied Paul for his indifference on the subject. It appeared he had been out with Leo, and on such a raw evening he might have seen that it was rash and foolish of her not to keep within doors. "But I suppose you thought as it wasn'tme——?" she had wound up; and Sue, conscious that Sybil was watching also, owned that the triumphant smile by which the words were accompanied, made her strangely uncomfortable.
"And the next morning she pored over a new set of illustrated papers," continued she; "it is odd that I should remember it all so clearly, but I do. What happened afterwards stamped it on my memory, no doubt. I racked my brains to think if Paul could have offended her in any way, and if a sudden angry impulse—you know poor Maud was apt to get angry, and to be very implacable too—but they seemed quite as friendly as usual. We had grown to think, Sybil and I, that Paul had not—not perhaps found Maudallthat he expected, and that sometimes he looked a little grave after they had been together. Sybil spoke to me about it, but we kept it to ourselves, as we fancied you saw nothing."
"Well?" said Leo, slowly. "Well?" She was drinking in every word.
"The next evening—the evening you were in bed—stop, let me consider: no, I don't think there was any palpable difference; nothing to attract attention, ofthatI am sure. Maud had great command over herself. She told us as if it were an ordinary piece of news, that she had had a long visit from Val—but whether she intended Paul to take any notice of that, or not, I cannot tell. I cannot tell anything about that evening, because my own thoughts were rather taken up with you, and I was up in your room a good deal, you may remember?"
Yes, Leo remembered. Remembered also how she tried every means to get rid of the kindly, patient intruder, who tortured her by her presence and anxiety. "I never thought I should be able to tell you the truth, Sue. And oh, I was so miserable, I was in hell——"
"Darling Leo, don't; don't say that. It is not quite right, you know."
"Yet we talk of being in heaven, why is the other place worse?"
Sue however could not tell why, and only shook her head gently.
"Well, then, I was, you know where," resumed Leo, with a nod; "and what's more, I had been there for ages. I was wicked for quite a long time before that, you know;" and she leaned her elbows on Sue's lap, and looked up into her face. "It began soon after I came home. I did so hate being a widow—oh, poor Godfrey! Sue, it had nothing to do with Godfrey; it was the awful clothes, and the being shut up in dark corners——"
"Dark corners, Leo?"
"That was what it seemed like to me. I was hustled out of the way when people came, and whatever happened, it didn't happen forme. Sometimes I could hardly believe itwasme; I used to pinch myself and say 'You horrid little black thing, who are you? Are you "Leonore," or "Leonore Stubbs"?—because they are two quite different people. Leonore is a harmless little tom-fool—but Leonore Stubbs is an odious, artificial creature, a sham all round.' And then, Sue, something, never mind what, started a new idea, I felt that I had never really beenin love, nor had any one really beenin lovewith me. Godfrey and I had just been fond of each other, and I couldn't help—yes, I could have helped, but I didn't—trying to get up the real thing. I longed for it, I craved for it—and I made several shots for it. Oh, I am ashamed,"—and she hid her face.
"My poor little Leo!"
"Your poor little Leo is a mighty bad lot. However, it wasn't till Paul came that she was—no, I don't think that she really was to blame, I don'tindeed;" said Leo, earnestly. "Because directly she suspected—I mean directly she began to feel—it, she was frightened to death. She was in a vile temper all the time, but she kept her secret, and Paul does not know it yet. Oh, Sue, do you think, do you think he does?" she broke off suddenly.
"No, dear, how should he?"
"I hoped perhaps he might. Of course I don't want him to, but still if he did——"
"You yourself said he never gave you to understand he had any feeling for you."
"But I didn't say he might not have—understood that I had any feeling for him."
"Would you wish it, Leo?"
"No."
But after a long pause the face was turned up again. "Yes."
Still nothing was heard of Paul, and the sisters grew to talk of him less and less. They laid plans for their future irrespective of his existence, they visited Sybil, who had now a home on the south coast, her husband having become a County Court judge; and they flitted quietly up and down the various highways and byeways of rural England.
One April they found themselves in a land of hills, and lakes, and green, leafy foregrounds.
"Let us stay here for a while," said Sue.
Beautiful scenery always appealed to Sue, and a good hotel was not to be despised. The lapping of the waters of the lake beneath her window was pleasant, even when the wind sent tiny wavelets running along the shore in a sort of mock animosity—and when the surface was calm as a mirror, she thought it was Paradise.
"It really is very nice," said Leo. "I have been out exploring. There is a lovely glen about a mile off, with woods and a stream—a little splashing stream—and the banks are simply covered with blue-bells. I should have picked some, but the path looked suspiciously well cared for, and there were little gates, as if it belonged to some big place; to tell the truth, I had an inkling I was trespassing, though there were no boards up. It would have been awkward to have been met by the owner, with my hands full of blue-bells. However, I mean to go again to-morrow, and spy out the land. If it's safe, you shall come."
"Could I walk so far?"
"You can have a little carriage, and leave it at the gate. You could not get it up the valley, as there is only a footpath, but I think you could walk that part. I can't tell you how delightful it was,—the sunlight speckling through the trees, and the cuckoos answering each other across the brook;—I could have stayed forever, but I remembered you and flew home."
She flew back, however, the following evening. It was an equally calm, bright evening, after a day of heat and growth,—and buds that had been fast closed at dawn, had burst on every side. Tassels hung from the larches, giving forth their resinous fragrance; and the pink buds of young oaks, and sprays of waving yellow broom mingled with the many shades of green above and beneath.
"What a heavenly spot!" sighed Leonore, enraptured. She could not resist wandering on and on; the woods at Boldero were nothing to this fairy dell, and at every tinkling waterfall, she was down the thymy bank overhanging it.
But she noted anew that she was neither preceded nor followed by other invaders. She also experienced a little thrill of dismay at seeing through a vista—a long vista, it is true—a country house towards which a byepath led direct. Oh, well, she must risk it; if met—? She started and the courage of a moment before began to ebb, for something certainly moved behind the trees, and now she distinctly saw a figure on the path in front.
To put a bold face upon it when no one challenged the face was easy, but it was another matter to—her pulses beat a little faster.
Conning an apology, and prepared to offer it with the best grace she could muster, she walked slowly forward, with downcast eyes,—then, oh, what?—oh, who was this? She stood face to face with—Paul.
Often and often afterwards she wondered how she felt, how she looked and what she did at that supreme moment? In the retrospect it was all a mist—a blurred canvas—a confused phantasm.
"Paul!"
"Leonore!"
An outcry—then a terrible silence; agitation on his part, trepidation on hers—each alike stupefied, breathless.
And Leonore's heart sank, and her eyelids fell.
Was thisall? Was this the end? Oh, misery, misery.
Was it amazement alone which had first forced her name from his lips, and then shut them fast? Was he shocked, perhaps sore that a thing had happened which he had resolved should never happen? Was it pain, disgust, horror, she heard in that single involuntary utterance?
Ah, then, she knew what she must do.
Sick disappointment sent a shiver through her frame, and all at once she felt her limbs totter.
But to fall? To betray emotions which were nothisemotions? To be weak where he was bold and strong? No, a thousand times, no; she drew herself upright and made a passionate effort.
"Paul, I am—so sorry. I did not know, I never dreamt—of this. Indeed, indeed I never did. Believe me, oh, do believe me, Paul."
"Believe you, Leo? I do not understand?" He gazed at her, bewildered, then took a step forward, and she felt him trying to take her hand. She drew it back hurriedly.
"Wait. Wait a moment. Let me speak. We did not know you were here, we did not indeed. We have not known anything of you, for a long, long time. It was only yesterday we, Sue and I, came to this place; and we can go away again to-morrow—or to-night. We would not trouble you, Paul."
"Trouble me?" He laughed, a curious laugh, bitter and sweet, scornful and surpassingly tender. It might have enlightened her, but she was past listening.
"You will believe, Paul, that we—that to annoy you, to distress you,—oh, not for worlds, not for worlds. We will go to-night." And she turned as though to fly on the spot, but he caught her arm.
"Leo?"
She was faintly trying to free herself. The arm went further and held her fast.
"Can you think," said a voice in her ear, "can you suppose that the sight ofyou, you who have been with me night and day in dreams, and thoughts, and hopes, and fears, that this could—what did you call it?—'annoy' me? Leo, my own, my beloved, don't you, can't you see—now?"
"Paul!"
"You whom I might not love, and yet could not but love? Listen. You say you had lost sight of me—that was because I dared not come to you. I dared not trust myself—perhaps, may I say it?—I could not trust either of us. We had once—and that must never happen again. You are listening? My darling, how you tremble, why do you tremble so, Leo? There is nothing to fear now. Let me go on, and you will see. It was only the other day I learned the tidings that set me free. You see I had no means of knowing; and then when I did hear, I could not—it would have been horrible to be in haste to take advantage of it. So, though life opened anew, I meant to wait quietly till the time came when perhaps I might hope to prevail—but, oh, to think ofthis!"
And then at last she ventured to raise her eyes, and what did those eyes behold? It was the look—the look—on the face of Paul!
And now her head was on his breast, and his kisses on her cheek. "Cruel doubts tortured me often," he whispered, "for how could I tell what changes time might not have wrought? It had leftmylove untouched, but what right had I to expect that you might not have lost the feeling you had—yes, I did know you once had for me? Leo, darling, can you think how terrible it was to know that, and have to affect ignorance? To have every beat of my heart go out towards you, and to feign indifference? To meet your poor, piteous eyes, and keep the answer to their appeal out of mine? Not that you meant to show, dear; oh, no, you never dreamed your secret was revealed—and it wasnot, to others,—but to me——"
"Oh, Paul! Oh, Paul!"
"Hush, you were not to blame. It was no fault of yours, you poor, brave, little thing. You played your part nobly——"
"Oh, no—oh, no."
"You may think not, but I know you did. I know, for I shared the struggle. There was once," he paused and considered, "there was that day when we were together in the green-house. You were cold and careful at first, but gradually the mask wore off and—and mine too slipped. We were happy, too happy. I think we both knew it. We did not look at each other as we came away, but I gave you a red vine leaf, and I saw that you did not put it with the others, even with those I had picked for you before."
"I have it now, Paul."
"After that, I began to suspect myself. I had hardly done so before, for there was only a vague sense of disappointment, and dissatisfaction with things as they were. Your sister was not—but no matter. I reasoned myself out of this over and over again. I argued that I was not well, was not fully recovered from my late attack of fever—in short, that I was hipped, and would certainly take a more cheerful view of things as my strength came back. I really had been rather bad, you know—and was low and easily depressed. But what might have opened my eyes to the truth was that all depression vanished, and all inertia ceased, directlyyouappeared,—andthatwas after I had ceased to hear your gay little laugh and merry voice. For though you soon grew grave as myself, my heart would jump when you came into the room, or when I came upon you in some distant corner, not knowing you were there."
"Paul, Paul, my heart jumped too."
He drew her closer—ah, she was very close now. "I scarcely ever spoke to you, do you remember? We avoided each other; and I cannot even now imagine how I came to know you so well,"—and so on, and so on....
Presently Leo had a question to ask. Where had he been during those three blank days when no communications from Boldero Abbey reached him? He had disposed of them in a fashion that satisfied others, but not her.
"No, you were too clear-sighted. I knew that," said he. "But what could I do? I could not tell the truth, which was that I never went near the place whose address I gave Maud! My one desire was to be out of range of her letters; for Leonore—I had—I cannot tell how, a sort of dreadful certainty that she would recall me. For those three days I wandered about,—I went down to a wild, little, sea place, and fought the demon within. Then because I simply felt weaker, I fancied soul as well as body brought into subjection. You all told me I looked bad when I returned—now you know why."
But though they thus skirted round and round one dread remembrance which was—how could it help being?—in both their minds, each shrank from approaching a subject avoided by the other; until at length Leonore, tremulous but resolute, realised that it was for her, not him, to speak.
"Paul, dear Paul, I don't want to leaveanythingunsaid. Paul, on that worst day of all," she hesitated, and his hand pressed the little hand within it. "Dear Paul," she whispered, "I did not know what I was doing; indeed, indeed I did not. Something in my head seemed to have snapped, and I felt so strange—I never felt like it before. And it was not only about you that I was so unutterably wretched, there was—there was—something else."
"Something else?"
"A man told me the day before that I had broken his heart,—oh, Paul, don't start. He was not a man I could ever have given a thought to. He was not one I should ever have spoken to—in that way. Only our village doctor's assistant, and the rest of us hardly knew that he existed,—but I, I was so unhappy, even before you came to Boldero, that I let myself go,—that is, I let the poor silly creature run up a kind of friendship with me. That was all, Paul; truthfully it was—on my part. I amused myself with him—a little; and then—and then——"
"What was fun to you was death to him?"
"It had no right to be," said Leo, with dignity. "It never went any length; we only just met each other once or twice, and——"
"Flirted?"
"Not even that. I let him adore," she laughed, but shamefacedly—"and he mistook."
"I see."
"Paul, dear, I am not excusing myself; only I do not think, I do not think that wretched Tommy Andrews ought ever to have presumed—it was frightful, it was untrue what he said. I didnotbreak his disgusting heart——"
"Oh, Leo!" Paul tried not to laugh.
"But he made me think I had. He accused me of it, and I was in such a state at the time that I believed him, and it drove me wild. It was the last straw, the finishing touch. I seemed not only to have made a mess of my own poor life, but of another's—and while I was very angry and contemptuous, I was enraged with myself for being so. I stormed and raved when I was alone, and vowed to end it all,—but I know now that I—Sue says I was not accountable, Paul,—" wistfully.
"Sue is right, dearest. Your nerves were altogether unstrung. You were overstrained and off your balance for the time being."
"Had—had you noticed anything, Paul?"
"Everything. It was that which made me fear—and follow you."
"At night I hardly slept at all. And, I couldn't eat; I loathed food. I may tell you all this, mayn't I? It just kills me to keep things to myself; doingthatwas what, I think, began it all."
"You shall tell me everything," said he.
"Well, but Paul," after an interlude, "there is still a mystery; what are you doing here? And was it not the strangest thing our meeting here?"
He smiled. "Not so very strange, seeing that this is my usual walk about this hour."
"Your—what did you say?—your 'usual' walk?"
"Look, Leo." He drew her along to the opening of the vista she had passed before, and pointed to the mansion beyond, now glistening in the setting sun. "That is my home—and yours."
"Oh, Paul!"
"I bought it a year ago, but have been busy with alterations and improvements, so only came to live here within the last few weeks. I was so tired of a wandering life, Leo; and though I had only the vaguest hope that you—but somehow hope never quite deserted me."
"Then the strangeness is on our part. Thatweshould come to whereyouwere!"
"You had really no suspicion, Leo?" He looked at her with laughter in his eyes. "Sue kept her own counsel well;" added Paul demurely.
He and Sue had been in communication from—from precisely the date at which he took up his residence at Mere Hall. He had left for Mere Hall the day after he last saw Sue in London.
"You saw Sue in London?" She could scarcely speak for astonishment.
"Several times. The Fosters, my brother and his wife, put me up to it. Your sister is good and kind and sensible—mine is both the first, but not exactly the last, bless her for it! Her very lack of what is commonly admired, proved my salvation. She first extracted the truth from me, and then went straight for Sue, and hammered it into her that there was no earthly reason why we two should not be made happy now. She could not endure to see my long face, she said;—and though I gathered that Sue was somewhat startled by her abruptness—for Charlotte is not famed for tact—eventually the two understood each other, and I was brought on to the stage."
"Was that," cried Leo, with a sudden flash of memory, "was that one day, oh, it must have been that day!—Sue was so odd and unlike herself. I wondered what could have excited her in a private view of rather stupid water-colours, and why she began all at once to say she longed for the country? Were you in the water-colour gallery?"
He was, and all was explained.
"Coo-coo," came the plaintive note of a dove from the leafy shades close by—but it cooed unheard. The streamlet splashed on unheeded. The sun went slowly down behind the mountain-tops unseen. And still they sat on....
About a year after Paul and Leonore were married, they received a visit from Mr. and Mrs. Valentine Purcell, travelling in all the state that money could buy and ingenuity devise.
Val was glorious: even prouder of his new wife's cleverness than he had been of her predecessor's beauty. Marietta was superb: there never was such a woman; managed everything—ran the entire show. He was allowed a tailor's bill though,—and he looked down at a new suit with all his old complacency.
He was perfectly easy, happy, and friendly. He had not an awkward remembrance, nor an uncomfortable sensation.
It was splendid to be among his dear old friends again, and to find them all so fit; Mere Hall was a delightful place, and he was awfully glad that it was Sue's home too.
He did wish that he could get them all out to California. Sue ought really to see California. If she would hop across the pond, he would meet her himself in New York, and take her across the Rockies in his own car. He and his wife always travelled in their own car.
As for Paul and Leo, of coursetheywere coming, but Sue—he had a sly whisper for Leo's ear anent Sue. "What about Salt Lake City? That would be Sue's chance: those Mormons are awful jossers for wives. I never let Marietta within a hundred miles of 'em. You send old Sue out to me, Leo."
Paul he speedily pronounced the best fellow in the world—taking him as an entirely new personage. Paul's alterations in the house were a triumph of architecture, and the steeple he was adding to the church a masterpiece.
"Quite right to look after the church," said Val, seriously. "I always take care that Marietta goes to church, and she's come rather to like it. Now that she has been here, she says she's going to be more religious, and I daresay I shall too. It's so awfully jolly to live as you and Paul do, you know."
Another day he was alone with his old playmate, and raised his head after a reverie.
"So you and Paul got each other after all, Leo?"
Leo, who was dressing a bowl with roses, dropped one, and looked attentively at the speaker.
"Got each other after all, Val?"
"Oh, don't you come the innocent over me, Mrs. Stubbs—Mrs. Foster, I mean. I know you and your tricks. You are just the same little wag you always were—but I know you. And I know about you and Paul too."
"Know about us? What about us?"—quickly.
"Tell you if you like. I was in the woods that day. I was going home from shooting and heard a row,—so then I crept along to see what was up, and hid behind some big hollies; and there you were, you and Paul, holding each other's hands, and shouting into each other's faces!"
"Did you—did you hear what we said, Val?"
"Lord, no—though I tried all I could. And what the dickens made you speak so loud—you, especially—I could not imagine. If I hadn't had to keep dark behind the beastly bushes, I could have heard every word. Anyhow I heard enough—and saw enough—to know what you were up to."
He paused.
"And I was mad with you both, Leo. Because, you see, it wasn't Queensberry—however it's all right now."
"And it was you who told Maud?"
"Why, of course," said Val, simply.