CHAPTER XXVII.HOW QUEENIE BORE THE NEWS.
She saw the long train as it came across the plains from East Merrivale—saw it shoot under the bridge, past the station, and glide swiftly on by the river-side until it was lost to view in the deep cut by the old gold-mine, and remembered that afterward she heard the whistle as the train stopped at West Merrivale a few minutes and then went speeding on to the West But she never dreamed that it carried with it a young man whose face was pale as ashes as he sat with folded arms, and hat pulled overhis eyes, seeing nothing of what was passing around him, and thinking only of her, listening even then for the sound of his horse’s feet coming up the hill. For Queenie felt sure he would come back to her, and that in some way they would make it up, and resume their old, delightful relations with each other. And she watched for him all day long, and was beginning to get restless and impatient, when, about sunset, the Rossiter carriage came slowly up the hill and into the yard.
In a trice Queenie was at the door, feeling certain that the recreant Phil had driven over with his sisters, as he sometimes did. But only Ethel and Grace were there, and it struck Queenie that there was something a little strange in their manner, while Grace had evidently been crying.
“I am so glad you have come!” she said, as she led the way into the house. “I have been so lonely to-day, with not a person to see me except the major and Anna, who were here a few moments this morning, and who are so absorbed in each other as to be of no account to any one else. I do believe he is in earnest, and means to marry her; and then won’t we have to bow to my Lady Rossiter! Where’s Phil, and why has not he been here to-day?”
“Phil has gone; you surely knew that, or, at least, that he was going; he was here yesterday,” Ethel said; and in her voice there was a hardness, as if her cousin were trifling with her thus to ask for her brother.
But she knew better when she saw how white Queenie grew, as she repeated after her:
“Gone, and I knew of his going! You are mistaken; I know nothing. Where has he gone?”
“To India!” Ethel said.
And then Reinette grasped the chair near which she was standing with both hands, and leaning heavily upon it, asked, in a half whisper, for something was choking her so that she could not speak aloud:
“To India! For what? And how long will he be gone?”
As rapidly as possible Ethel told all she knew of a matter which had taken them so by surprise, and which had so affected her mother that she was sick in bed.
For a moment Queenie did not speak, but stood staring at Ethel, who, sure that she was in fault, went pitilessly on:
“We thought you had something to do with it; that you sent him away, for it was after he came from here yesterday that he decided to go; he had given it up before.”
“I sent him away!—sent him to India to die, as he will! No, no; I did not do that,” Queenie cried, piteously. “I said I could not marry him, and he my cousin; and I could not, any more than you could marry him, he being your brother. But I did not think he’d go away. Oh! what shall we do without Phil?”
Reinette was sobbing passionately, and Ethel and Grace were crying with her, for Phil had made the happiness of their lives, and without him they were very desolate.
“Did he speak of me?” Queenie asked, at last. “Did he leave no word? no message? no good-by?”
“He left this for you,” Ethel said, passing the letter to Queenie, who clutched it eagerly, but would not read it there with the sisters looking on. That they blamed her, and held her responsible for Phil’s India trip, she was certain, and she felt glad when they at last said good-night, and left her to herself and her letter—Phil’s letter—which she read in the privacy of her room, and which nearly broke her heart.
“Dear Queenie,” he began, “I am going away—for a year certainly, and perhaps, forever, for men of my habits, who have never been accustomed to hardships of any kind, die easily in that hot climate.”
“Oh-h!” and Reinette groaned bitterly, as shethought, “Why did Phil say what will make me feel like his murderer, if he should die out there.”
Then she read on:
“I am going to India on business for a firm in New York, of which Mr. Beresford’s uncle is the head. The salary is good, and the duties such as I can perform, and so I am going. Mr. Beresford made me the offer this morning, and with my usual indolence I declined it, but I did not then know your opinion of me; did not know how you despised me for my effeminacy and laziness. Queenie, I do believe that hurt me more than your refusal of me. I might live without your love, perhaps, but not without your respect, and so I am going to begin life anew, with some aim, some occupation, and you shall never taunt me again with my idleness. But oh, Queenie, how I love you, and how I long to hold you in my arms as my own darling. It is a strange power which you have over us men—a power to hold us at your will by one glance of your eyes, or toss of your head. Other faces may be more beautiful than yours; some would say that Margery La Rue’s was one of them, but there is something about you more attractive than mere regularity of feature or purity of complexion, and men go down before it as I have done, body and soul, with no hope or wish for anything else, if you must be denied me. May you never know how my heart is aching as I write this, my farewell to you; and yet to have known and loved you is the dearest thing in life, and the memory of you will help to make me a man. I know you will be sorry when I am gone, and miss me everywhere, but you will get accustomed to it in time. Some one else will take my place; and, just here, although I do not pretend to be so good or unselfish that it does not cost me a pang to do it I would say a word for Mr. Beresford. He knows why I go away, for I told him, and like the splendid fellow he is, he confessed what he said of me to you, and asked my pardon for it, and I forgave him, andyou must do so, too, and not be hot, and rash, and bitter against him, as something tells me you may be, when you know I am gone, and that possibly Mr. Beresford suggested to you the words which made me go. He told me of your refusal of himself, but he hopes time may change you; and if it does—oh, my darling, how can I say it, loving you as I do?—if it does, don’t worry and tease him, but deal with him honestly and openly, as a true woman should deal with a true, honest man. And now, good-by, and if it is forever—if I never come back again—remember that I love you always, always! and I shall carry your image with me wherever I go, and so, in fancy, I put my arms around you and hold you for a moment as my own, and kiss your dear face, feeling sure that if it were really so, that I was saying good-by to you forever and you knew it, you would kiss me back once at least, in token of all we have been to each other.”
“Oh, Phil, Phil, yes, a thousand times would I kiss you, if you were back again! and I am so sorry for the nasty words I said about your idleness,” Reinette cried, as, with Phil’s letter clutched tightly in her hand, she lay upon her face sobbing bitterly, and wondering what life was worth to her now, that Phil was gone.
“I couldn’t marry him, I couldn’t, for he is my cousin!” she said; “and I do not love him that way, but he was so much to me, how can I live without him?”
And then there began to creep into her heart hot, resentful feelings toward Mr. Beresford, who had put it into her mind to taunt Phil with his idleness.
“I hate him—I hate him!” she said, stamping her little feet by way of emphasis, but when she remembered that Phil had forgiven him, and still held him as his friend, and wished her to do so, she grew more calm and less resentful toward him, but declined to see him, when, next morning, he rode over to Hetherton Place and asked for her.
“Tell him I am sick,” she said to Pierre, “and cansee no one, unless it is Margery. Ask him, please, to call at her door, and tell her to come to me, for I am in great trouble.”
With a suspicion as to the nature of Queenie’s trouble, Mr. Beresford rode back to town and delivered the message to Margery, who went at once to her friend and tried to comfort her. But Queenie refused to be comforted. Phil was gone, and what was there now for her?
“You can bring him back. The ship does not sail for some days you say, and a word from you will change his mind,” Margery said, caressing the bowed head resting on her lap.
“Do you think—do you believe he would come back, if I were to write and beg him?” Queenie asked, quickly, lifting up her tear-stained face.
“I’ve no doubt of it,” Margery said; “but, darling, if you do that he will have a right to expect you to marry him. Sending for him to come back would mean nothing else, nor would anything else satisfy him.”
“Then he must go,” Queenie answered, with a rain of tears. “I cannot marry my cousin; that is a part of my religion. It would be hideous to do it. Phil must go; but my whole life goes with him. Oh, Phil, I am nothing, nothing without you. Why were you so silly as to fall in love and so spoil everything?”
That night, as Margery sat with her mother over their tea talking of Queenie, Mrs. La Rue said to her;
“If Mr. Rossiter were not her cousin, do you think she would marry him?”
“I have no doubt of it,” Margery replied. “She fancies she does not love himin that way, as she expresses it, but if the obstacle of cousinship were removed, I believe she would feel differently. Poor little girl, she is so cast down and wretched, thinking she has driven him away to die, as she declares he will.”
Mrs. La Rue had listened intently to all Margerytold her of Reinette’s distress, and there were tears in her eyes as she cleared away the tea things, and busied herself with her household cares.
“Poor little girl,” she whispered to herself. “Would her love for him outweigh everything—everything, I wonder? Is it mightier than her pride?”