CHAPTER XV.
All in a minute, as it seemed, he was putting on her first finger the splendid solitaire diamond from his own hand.
“Will you wear this for an engagement ring, or shall I buy you a new one?” he asked.
“I prefer this because you have worn it,” she answered, frankly, and blushing very much, at which Cecil was delighted.
To herself she said, sadly:
“That is the truth, but there is another reason still for my preference. I must not put him to the expense of a new ring, for this will do for the few days that I shall be able to keep up the farce of an engagement.”
She sat silent, twisting the costly gem uneasily about her finger, when suddenly she saw coming toward her across the lawn Mrs. Barry, attended by Agnes Walker, her maid.
The sight roused Molly from the dream of bliss into which she was falling. She pulled the ring from her finger.
“Here, take it back; I—I can’t marry you. Don’t tell Aunt Thalia, please,” she faltered, desperately.
Cecil took the ring and her hand with it, and pushed the jewel back on the slim, rosy finger.
“My darling, what a bashful little goose you are!” he returned, laughingly; and just then Mrs. Barry came up and found him holding the little hand tightly in his own.
“Louise, I was so uneasy about your long absence, I took Agnes and came to hunt you; but if I had known that Cecil was with you, I should not have been alarmed,” she said.
Molly muttered something incoherently, and tried to wrest her hand from its captor, but Cecil held it up triumphantly before Mrs. Barry, who laughed in glee as she caught the glitter of the diamond.
“Engaged!” she exclaimed, gladly.
“Yes,” he replied, jubilantly. “Will you give us your blessing, Aunt Thalia?”
“With all my heart,” replied the old woman. “Louise, do not look so bashful and frightened, my dear, for I am very much pleased at your choice;” and she actually kissed the little bit of white forehead that was visible above the arm with which Molly had hidden her face.
Agnes Walker, too, looked very proud and pleased, and uttered a few words of congratulation that would have delighted Molly if this had not been, as she said to herself, “all a dreadful sham.”
She sat like one in a dream, listening to Mrs. Barry’s cracked voice in its complacent chatter.
“Of course you will not go abroad so soon now, Cecil?”
“I am afraid I ought to go. Mother and father will expect me, and I promised to go as soon as I had attended to that business. But—it will be hard to go now. I have a bright idea. Can not you and Louise go with me?”
Molly’s heart leaped wildly, then calmed again as Mrs. Barry shook her head.
“I am too old to cross the sea again. I want to die in my native land,” she said.
“Louise, then—with a maid, of course?” he said, but again the old woman shook her head.
“I’m afraid it would not be exactly proper then,” she replied.
“Then I shall write to my folks that I shall delay my return until my bride is ready to accompany me,” he replied, with a tender smile at Molly, who replied, in a fright:
“No, no, I’m too young yet.”
“Nonsense!” said Mrs. Barry, sharply. “Why, Louise Barry, inmyyoung days a girl of five-and-twenty was considered an old maid, and here you are talking of being too young. Don’t mind her, Cecil. I’ll order her wedding things at once, and she shall be ready as soon as you wish.”
“Thank you, Mrs. Barry!” exclaimed the prospective bridegroom, radiant.
But Molly muttered, frantically:
“I know Aunt Lucy will not be willing!”
“Lucy Everett has nothing to do with it. I shall not ask her advice, nor Cecil her consent. If you love Cecil, there is no more to do but to marry him and settle down,” proclaimed Mrs. Barry with the air of an autocrat, and she added, after a minute, sharply: “I don’t think I shall even invite Lucy Everett to the wedding, for she would want to bring that Trueheart girl, andsheshall never withmyconsent cross the threshold of a Barry!”
“As for the wedding things, don’t they order them always from Paris? Then, what more will Louise need but a traveling-dress, since we will go straight to Europe on our wedding-tour. She can get all the dresses she wants, then,” said Cecil Laurens, eagerly.
“That is true,” said the old lady, adding slyly: “What a hurry you are in all at once, Cecil!”
He flushed and laughed, then said, with a fond glance at Molly:
“I am in a hurry for my happiness; but then you know, Mrs. Barry, I have been a spoiled boy always, and never had patience enough to wait for anything I wanted!”
“You neverhadto wait, being one of Fortune’s favorites, always!” she replied, indulgently.
And Molly thought, with a hushed sigh:
“He will hate me one day, because he will meet his first disappointment through me!”
Mrs. Barry believed in taking time by the forelock, and, unknown to the youngfiancé, she sent an order that very day to New York—an order for arecherchéwedding-dress, a traveling costume in all its details, several dresses besides, comprising walking, dinner, and ball dresses, hats and bonnetsad. lib., and a dozen outfits of embroidered lawn and linen underwear. These articles were to be furnished within three weeks.
“They will be as much as she will need until she gets to Paris. I will give her a large check to take with her for atrousseauthere. I can afford to be generous as all my money will go to her some day, and as she is marrying so well,” said the old lady to Agnes Walker, feeling very complacent over the happy turn events had taken. She was very fond of the bride-elect from that time forward, and often thought remorsefully of the time when she had locked the girl into the garret.
Cecil Laurens was greatly altered, too, for the better,by his love. He ceased to see a single fault in the gay, young girl whom he had at first condemned. He lavished the whole wealth of his heart upon her, and he could not fail to see through all her shyness that his love was fully returned.
Molly had not known herself capable of such depths of passion as her lover’s devotion roused in her breast. She gave herself up with feverish delight to the happiness of the flying weeks, salving her conscience with the thought that her deception would soon be over—that at the very last she would break off with him even though he would go away from her hating her memory forever.
But day by day the bonds of love grew stronger. That which she thought but a garland of roses strengthened into a chain that held her fast. A mad love made the brave, honest little girl a traitor.
The day that had been set for her marriage dawned, yet she had never spoken the words that were to save Cecil Laurens from wedding a deceiver.
“For I could not break it off without telling him the truth, andthatwould ruin Louise. And how could I part withhimnow?” she would sigh to herself when alone, and gradually her love and his made a bond that she could not break through.
“I should die if I were parted from him now,” she sighed. “Of course I know that he would find me out some day, and then I should lose him forever. But I should have a little happiness first. It would not be so terrible to die of grief, having had my day first.”
Then Molly would sob bitterly until she fell asleep upon her tearwet pillow. Truly the love to whichshe clung so desperately was not all unalloyed pleasure, but perhaps its element of uncertainty made it all the more precious.
They went back to Ferndale, and Mrs. Barry, in the seventh heaven of delight, made preparations on a grand scale for a real old-fashioned country wedding. Invitations were sent out far and near to the friends of the family. A dozen cooks took possession of the kitchen and dining-room. Flowers were ordered from a New York florist. The old lady declared that her niece’s wedding should be the grandest that ever took place in Greenbrier County.
It was. A hundred guests danced at Molly Trueheart’s wedding with Cecil Laurens. Ferndale did not look like the “poky old hole” she had called it two months ago. By the aid of lights and flowers and music it was temporarily transformed into fairy-land. The trees were illuminated by picturesque Chinese lanterns. The old house in every corner was as bright as day, and the light glowed resplendently on the trailing lengths of Molly’s white satin bridal-dress as she came down the wide stairway almost an hour later than the time appointed, for at the very last her conscience had stung her so cruelly that she had hidden herself in a closet, from which she was dragged forth after vigilant search by her almost distracted aunt.
“Louise Barry, what do you mean by such a caper? You’ve given me such a fright as I never had in my life! I’ve a mind to give you a good shaking!” she vociferated, excitedly, and Molly whimpered, faintly:
“Please forgive me, Aunt Thalia. I—I was so frightened, I thought I’d rather not—”
“Rather notwhat?” sharply.
“Not—get—married,” sighed the delinquent, and Mrs. Barry burst out laughing.
“What under the heavens makes girls so silly when they are going to be married?” she cried, and just then one of the bridesmaids tapped at the door.
“Is the bride ready yet? It’s almost an hour past the time, and Mr. Laurens sent me to ask—” she began, but Mrs. Barry cut the sentence short by opening wide the door.
“She’s ready. Tell the bridesmaids to come in,” she said; and then she whispered in Molly’s ear: “Behave yourself like a little lady now, and I’ll never tell Cecil that you were such a baby as to hide in the closet because you were afraid to have a husband.”
“I’ll behave,” Molly answered, desperately; and so well did she keep her promise that Mrs. Barry had no occasion to tell her husband of that hour in which Molly’s good angel had been pleading for the right.