“Did you by chance hear from Christopher whether he got your note last night or no?” he said.I went and fetched it from my bedroom when I put on my hat. Robert read it aloud:“Travellers’ Club,“Sunday night.“Souvent femme varie, fol qui se fie!”Hope you found your variation worth while.“C. C.”“What dam cheek!” he said in his old way; he hasn’t used any “ornaments to conversation” since we have been—oh! I want to say it—engaged!Then his eyes flashed. “Christopher had better be careful of himself. He will have to be answerable to me now!”“Do be prudent, Evangeline, dear!” Lady Merrenden said gaily, “or you will have Robert breaking the head of every man in the street who even glances at you! He is frantically jealous!”“Yes, I know I am,” said Robert, rearranging the tie on my blouse with that airofsans gêneand possession that pleases me so.I belong to him now, and if my tie isn’t as he likes, he has a perfect right to re-tie it! No matter who is there! That is his attitude, not theleastceremony or stuff, everything perfectly simple and natural!It does make things agreeable. When I was “Miss Travers” and he “Lord Robert,” he was always respectful and unfamiliar—except that one night when rage made him pinch my finger! but now that I amhisEvangeline, and he ismyRobert (thus he explained it to me in our Paradise hour) I am his queen and his darling—but at the same time his possession and belonging, just the same as his watch or his coat. I adore it, and it does not make me the least “uppish,” as one might have thought.“Come, come, children!” Lady Merrenden said at last, “we shall all be late!”So we started, dropping Robert at Vavasour House on our way. It is a splendid place, down one of those side streets looking on theGreen Park, and has a small garden that side. I had never been down to the little square where it is before, but, of course, every one can see its splendid frontage from St. James’s Park, though I had never realized it was Vavasour House.“Good luck!” whispered Lady Merrenden as Robert got out, and then we drove on.Several people were lunching at Carlton House Terrace, Cabinet Ministers, and a clever novelist, and the great portrait painter, besides two or three charming women, one as pretty and smart as Lady Ver, but the others more ordinary looking, only so well mannered. No real frumps like the Montgomeries. We had a delightful lunch, and I tried to talk nicely, and do my best to please my dear hostess. When they had all left I think we both began to feel excited, and long apprehensively for the arrival of Robert. So we talked of the late guests.“It amuses my husband to see a number of different kinds of people,” she said, “but we had nothing very exciting to-day, I mustconfess—though sometimes the authors and authoresses bore me—and they are often very disappointing, one does not any longer care to read their books after seeing them.”I said I could quite believe that.“I do not go in for budding geniuses,” she continued, “I prefer to wait until they have arrived—no matter their origin, then they have acquired a certain outside behaviour on the way up, and it does notfroisséone so. Merrenden is a great judge of human nature, and variety entertains him. Left to myself I fear I should be quite contented with less gifted people who were simply of one’s own world.”In all her talk one can see her thought and consideration for Lord Merrenden and his wishes and tastes.“I always feel it is so cruel for him our having no children,” she said; “the Earldom becomes extinct, so I must make him as happy as I can.”What a dear and just woman!At last we spoke of Robert, and she told me stories of his boyhood, amusing Eton scrapes,and later feats. And how brave and splendid he had been in the war; and how the people all adored him at Torquilstone; and of his popularity and influence with them. “You must make him go into Parliament,” she said.Then Robert came into the room. Oh! his darling face spoke, there was no need for words! The Duke, one could see, had been obdurate.“Well?” said Lady Merrenden.Robert came straight over to me, and took my face in his two hands: “Darling,” he said, “before everything I want you to know I love you better than anything else in the world, and nothing will make any difference,” and he kissed me deliberately before his aunt. His voice was so moved—and we all felt a slight lump in our throats, I know; then he stood in front of us, but he held my hand.“Torquilstone was horrid, I can see,” said Lady Merrenden. “What did he say, Robert—tell us everything? Evangeline would wish it too, I am sure, as well as I.”Robert looked very pale and stern, one cansee how firm his jaw is in reality, and how steady his dear blue eyes.“I told him I loved Evangeline, whom I understood he had met yesterday, and that I intended to marry her——”“And he said?” asked Lady Merrenden, breathless.I only held tighter Robert’s hand.“He swore like a trooper, he thumped his glass down on the table and smashed it—a disgusting exhibition of temper—I was ashamed of him. Then he said, ‘Never, as long as he lived and could prevent it—that he had heard something of my infatuation, so as I am not given that way he had made inquiries, and found the family was most unsatisfactory.’ Then he had come here yesterday on purpose to see you—darling,” turning to me—“and that he had judged for himself. The girl was a ‘devilish beauty’ (his words not mine) with the naughtiest provoking eyes, and a mouth—No! I can’t say the rest, it makes me too mad!” and Robert’s eyes flashed.Lady Merrenden rose from her seat, andcame and took my other hand. I felt as if I could not stand too tall and straight.“The long and short of it is, he has absolutely refused to have anything to do with the matter; says I need expect nothing further from him, and we have parted for good and all!”“Oh, Robert!” it was almost a cry from Lady Merrenden.Robert put his arms round me, and his face changed to radiance.“Well, I don’t care—what does it matter! A few places and thousands in the dim future—the loss of them is nothing to me if I have only my Evangeline now.”“But, Robert, dearest,” Lady Merrenden said, “you can’t possibly live without what he allows you, what have you of your own? About eighteen hundred a year, I suppose, and you know, darling boy, you are often in debt. Why he paid five thousand for you as lately as last Easter. Oh, what is to be done!” and she clasped her hands.I felt as if turned to stone. Was all thisdivine happiness going to slip from my grasp? Yes, it looked like it, for I could never drag Robert into poverty, and spoil his great future.“He can’t leave away Torquilstone, and those thousands of profitless acres,” Lady Merrenden went on, “but unfortunately the London property is at his disposition. Oh! I must go and talk to him!”“No!” said Robert. “It would not be the least use, and would look as if we were pleading. His face had fallen to intense sadness as Lady Merrenden spoke of his money.“Darling,” he said, in a broken voice. “No, it is true it would not be fair to make you a beggar. I should be a cad to ask you. We must think of some way of softening my brother after all!”Then I spoke.“Robert,” I said, “if you were only John Smith I would say I would willingly go and live with you in a cottage, or even in a slum—but you are not, and I would not foranything in the worlddrag you down out of what is your position in life—that would be a poor sort oflove. Oh! my dear,” and I clasped tight his hand—“if everything fails, then we must part, and you must forget me.”He folded me in his arms, and we heard the door shut. Lady Merrenden had left us alone. Oh! it was anguish and divine bliss at the same time the next half hour.“I will never forget you, and never in this world will I take another woman, I swear to God,” he said at the end of it. “If we must part, then life is finished for me of all joy.”“And for me, too, Robert!”We said the most passionate vows of love to one another, but I will not write them here, there is another locked book where I keep them—the book of my soul.“Would it be any good if Colonel Tom Carden went and spoke to him?” I asked, presently. “He was best man at papa’s wedding, and knows all that there is to be known of poor mamma, and do you think that as mamma’s father was Lord de Brandreth, a very old barony, I believe, it is—oh! can it make any difference to the children’s actual breeding, their parentsnot having been through the marriage ceremony? I—I—don’t know much of those sort of things!”“My sweet!” said Robert, and through all our sorrow he smiled and kissed me, “my sweet, sweet Evangeline.”“But does the Duke know all the details of the history,” I asked, when I could speak—one can’t when one is being kissed.“Every little bit, it seems. He says he will not discuss the matter of that, I must know it is quite enough, as I have always known his views, but if they were not sufficient, your wild, wicked beauty is. You would not be faithful to me for a year, he said. I could hardly keep from killing him when he hurled that at my head.”I felt my temper rising. How frightfully unjust—how cruel. I went over and looked in the glass—a big mirror between the window—drawing Robert with me.“Oh! tell me, tell me what is it. Am I so very bad looking? It is a curse surely that is upon me!”“Of course you are not bad looking, mydarling!” exclaimed Robert. “You are perfectly beautiful—slender, stately, exquisite tiger-lily—only—only—you don’t look cold—and it is just your red hair, and those fascinating green eyes, and your white lovely skin and black eyelashes that, that—oh! you know, you sweetheart! You don’t look like bread and butter, you are utterly desirable, and you would make any one’s heart beat!”I thought of the night at “Carmen.”“Yes, I am wicked,” I said, “but I never will be again—only just enough to make you always love me, because Lady Ver says security makes yawns. But even wicked people can love with a great, great love, and that can keep them good. Oh! if he only knew how utterly I love you, Robert, I am sure, sure, he would be kind to us!”“Well, how shall we tell him?”Then a thought came to me, and I felt all over a desperate thrill of excitement.“Will you do nothing until to-morrow?” I said. “I have an idea which I will tell to no one. Let us go back to Claridge’s now, anddo not come and see me again until to-morrow at twelve. Then if this has failed, we will say good-bye. It is a desperate chance.”“And you won’t tell me what it is?”“No—please trust me—it is my life as well as yours, remember.”“My queen!” he said. “Yes, I will do that, or anything else you wish, onlynever, nevergood-bye. I am a man after all, and have numbers of influential relations. I can do something else in life but just be a Guardsman, and we shall get enough money to live quite happily on—though we might not be very grand people. I will never say good-bye—do you hear. Promise me you will never say it either.”I was silent.“Evangeline, darling!” he cried, in anguish, his eyebrows right up in the old way, while two big tears welled up in his beautiful eyes. “My God! won’t you answer me!”“Yes, I will!” I said, and I threw all my reserve to the winds, and flung my arms round his neck passionately.“I love you with my heart and soul, and pray to God we shall never say good-bye.”When I got back to Claridge’s, for the first time in my life I felt a little faint. Lady Merrenden had driven me back herself, and left me, with every assurance of her devotion and affection for us. I had said good-bye to Robert for the day at Carlton House Terrace.They do not yet know me, either of them—quite—or what I can and will do.Claridge’s,Monday night.I feltto carry out my plan I must steady my mind a little, so I wrote my journal, and that calmed me.Of all the things I was sure of in the world I was most sure that I loved Robert far too well to injure his prospects. On the other hand to throw him away without a struggle was too cruel to both of us. If mamma’s mother was nobody, all the rest of my family were fine old fighters and gentlemen, and Ireally prayed to their shades to help me now.Then I rang and ordered some iced water, and when I had thought deeply for a few minutes, while I sipped it, I sat down to my writing-table. My hand did not shake, though I felt at a deadly tension. I addressed the envelope first, to steady myself:ToHis Grace,The Duke of Torquilstone,Vavasour House,St. James’s, S.W.Then I put that aside.“I am Evangeline Travers who writes,” I began, without any preface, “and I ask if you will see me—either here in my sitting-room this evening, or I will come to you at Vavasour House. I understand your brother, Lord Robert, has told you that he loves me, and wishes to marry me, and that you have refused your consent, partly because of the history of my family, but chiefly because my type displeases you. I believe, in days gone by, the prerogative of a great noble like you was to dispense justice. In my case it is still yourprerogative by courtesy, and I ask it of you. When we have talked for a little, if you then hold to your opinion of me, and convince me that it is for your brother’s happiness, I swear to you on my word of honour I will never see him again.“Believe me,“Yours faithfully,“Evangeline Travers.”I put it hastily in the envelope, and fastened it up. Then I rang the bell, and had it sent by a messenger in a cab, who was to wait for an answer. Oh! I wonder in life if I shall ever have to go through another twenty-five minutes like those that passed before the waiter brought a note up to me in reply.Even if the journal won’t shut I must put it in.“Vavasour House,“St. James’s,“Nov. 28th.“Dear Madam,—I have received your letter, and request you to excuse my calling upon you at your hotel this evening, as I am very unwell, but if you will do me the honourto come to Vavasour House on receipt of this, I will discuss the matter in question with you, and trust you will believe that you may rely upon myjustice.“I remain, Madam,“Yours truly,“Torquilstone.”“His grace’s brougham is waiting below for you, Madam,” the waiter said, and I flew to Véronique.I got her to dress me quickly. I wore the same things exactly as he had seen me in before, deep mourning they are, and extremely becoming.In about ten minutes Véronique and I were seated in the brougham and rolling on our way. I did not speak.I was evidently expected, for as the carriage stopped the great doors flew open, and I could see into the dim and splendid hall.A silver-haired, stately old servant led me along, through a row of powdered footmen, down a passage dimly lit with heavily shaded lights (Véronique was left to theirmercies). Then the old man opened a door, and without announcing my name, merely, “The lady, your grace,” he held the door, and then went out and closed it softly.It was a huge room splendidly panelled with dark carvedboiserieLouis XV, the most beautiful of its kind I had ever seen, only it was so dimly lit with the same sort of shaded lamps one could hardly see into the corners.The Duke was crouching in a chair, he looked fearfully pale and ill, and had an inscrutable expression on his face. Fancy a man so old-looking, and crippled, being even Robert’s half-brother!I came forward; he rose with difficulty, and this is the conversation we had.“Please don’t get up,” I said, “if I may sit down opposite you.”“Excuse my want of politeness,” he replied, pointing to a chair, “but my back is causing me great pain to-day.”He looked such a poor miserable, soured, unhappy creature, I could not help being touched.“Oh, I am so sorry!” I said. “If I had known you were ill, I would not have troubled you now.”“Justice had better not wait,” he answered, with a whimsical, cynical, sour smile. “State your case.”Then he suddenly turned on an electric lamp near me, which made a blaze of light in my face. I did not jump. I am glad to say I have pretty good nerves.“My case is this: to begin with, I love your brother better than anything else in the world——”“Possibly: a number of women have done so,” he interrupted. “Well?”“And he loves me,” I continued, not noticing the interruption.“Agreed. It is a situation that happens every day among young fools. You have known one another about a month, I believe?”“Under four weeks,” I corrected.He laughed bitterly.“It cannot be of such vital importance to you then in that short time!”“It is of vital importance to me, and you know your brother’s character; you will be able to judge as well as I if, or not, it is a matter of vital importance to him.”He frowned. “Well, your case.”“First, to demand on what grounds you condemned me as a ‘devilish beauty?’ and why you assume that I should not be faithful to Robert for a year?”“I am rather a good judge of character,” he said.“You cannot be—or you would see that whatever accident makes me have this objectionable outside, the me that lives within is an honest person who never breaks her word.”“I can only see red hair and green eyes, and a general look of the devil.”“Would you wish people always to judge by appearances then?” I said. “Because, if so, I see before me a prejudiced, narrow-minded, cruel-tempered, cynical man, jealous of youth’s joys. ButIwould not be so unjust as to stamp you with these qualities because of that!”He looked straight at me, startled. “I maybe all those things,” he said. “You are probably right!”“Then, oh, please don’t be!” I went on quickly. “I want you to be kind to us. We, oh, we do, do so wish to be happy, and we are both so young, and life will be so utterly blank and worthless for all these years to the end if you part us now.”“I did not say I would part you,” he said, coldly. “I merely said I refused to give Robert any allowance, and I shall leave everything in my power away from the title. If you like to get married on those terms you are welcome to.”Then I told him I loved Robert far too much to like the thought of spoiling his future.“We came into each others lives,” I said. “We did not ask it of Fate, she pushed us there; and I tried not to speak to him because I had promised a friend of mine I would not, as she said she liked him herself, and it made us both dreadfully unhappy, and every day we mattered more to one another; until yesterday—when I thought he had gone away forgood, and I was too miserable for words—we met in the Park, and it was no use pretending any longer. Oh! youcan’twant to crush out all joy and life for us, just because I have red hair! It is so horribly unjust.”“You beautiful siren,” he said. “You are coaxing me. How you know how to use your charms and your powers; and whatmancould resist your tempting face!”I rose in passionate scorn.“How dare you say such things to me!” I said. “I would not stoop to coax you—I will not again ask you for any boon! I only wanted you to do me the justice of realizing you had made a mistake in my character—to do your brother the justice of conceding the point that he has some right to love whom he chooses. But keep your low thoughts to yourself! Evil, cruel man! Robert and I have got something that is better than all your lands and money—a dear, great love, and I am glad; glad that he will not in the future receive anything that is in your gift. I shall give him the gift of myself, and we shall do very well withoutyou,” and I walked to the door, leaving him huddled in the chair.Thus ended our talk on justice!Never has my head been so up in the air. I am sure had Cleopatra been dragged to Rome in Augustus’s triumph she would not have walked with more pride and contempt than I through the hall of Vavasour House.The old servant was waiting for me, and Véronique, and the brougham.“Call a hansom, if you please,” I said, and stood there like a statue while one of the footmen had to run into St. James’s Street for it.Then we drove away, and I felt my teeth chatter, while my cheeks burnt. Oh! what an end to my scheme, and my dreams of perhaps success!But what a beast of a man! What a cruel, warped, miserable creature. I will not let him separate me from Robert, never, never! He is not worth it. I will wait for him—my darling—and, if he really loves me, some day we can be happy, and if he does not—but oh! I need not fear.I am still shaking with passion, and shall go to bed. I do not want any dinner.Tuesday morning, Nov. 29th.Véroniquewould not let me go to bed, she insisted upon my eating, and then after dinner I sat in an old, but lovely wrap of white crêpe, and she brushed out my hair for more than an hour—there is such a tremendous lot of it, it takes time.I sat in front of the sitting-room fire, and tried not to think. One does feel a wreck after a scene like that. At about half past nine I heard noises in the passage of people, and with only a preliminary tap Robert and Lady Merrenden came into the room. I started up, and Véronique dropped the brush, in her astonishment, and then left us alone.Both their eyes were shining, and excited, and Robert looked crazy with joy; he seized me in his arms and kissed me, and kissed me, while Lady Merrenden said, “You darling,Evangeline, you plucky, clever girl, tell us all about it!”“About what!” I said, as soon as I could speak.“How you managed it.”“Oh, I must kiss her first, Aunt Sophia!” said Robert. “Did you ever see anything so divinely lovely as she looks with her hair all floating like this—and it is all mine—every bit of it!!!”“Yes, it is,” I said sadly. “And that is about all of value you will get!”“Come and sit down,” said Robert, “Evangeline, you darling—and look at this!”Upon which he drew from his pocket a note. I saw at once it was the Duke’s writing, and I shivered with excitement. He held it before my eyes.“Dear Robert,” it began, “I have seen her. I am conquered. She will make a magnificent Duchess. Bring her to lunch to-morrow. Yours,Torquilstone.”I really felt so intensely moved I could not speak.“Oh, tell us, dear child, how did it happen—and what did you do—and where did you meet?” said Lady Merrenden.Robert held my hand.Then I tried to tell them as well as I could, and they listened breathlessly. “I was very rude, I fear,” I ended with, “but I was so angry.”“It is glorious,” said Robert. “But the best part is that you intended to give me yourself with no prospect of riches. Oh, darling, that is the best gift of all.”“Was it disgustingly selfish of me?” I said. “But when I saw your poor brother so unhappy looking, and soured, and unkind, with all his grandeur, I felt that to us, who know what love means, to be together was the thing that matters most in all the world.”Lady Merrenden then said she knew some people staying here who had anappartementon the first floor, and she would go down and see if they were visible. She would wait for Robert in the hall, she said, and she kissed us good-night, and gave us her blessing.What a dear she is! What a nice pet to leave us alone!Robert and I passed another hour of bliss, and I think we must have got to the sixth heaven by now. Robert says the seventh is for the end, when we are married—well, that will be soon. Oh! I am too happy to write coherently.I did not wake till late this morning, and Véronique came and said my sitting-room was again full of flowers. The darling Robert is!I wrote to Christopher and Lady Ver, in bed as I sipped my chocolate. I just told Lady Ver the truth, that Robert and I had met by chance, and discovered we loved one another, so I knew she would understand—and I promised I would not break his heart. Then I thanked her for all her kindness to me, but I felt sad when I read it over—poor, dear Lady Ver—how I hope it won’t really hurt her, and that she will forgive me.To Christopher I said I had found my “variation” worth while, and I hoped he would come to my wedding some day soon.Then I sent Véronique to post them both.To-day I am moving to Carlton House Terrace. What a delight that will be—and in a fortnight, or at best three weeks, Robert says we shall quietly go and get married, and Colonel Tom Carden can give me away after all.Oh the joy of the dear, beautiful world, and this sweet, dirty, enshrouding fog-bound London! I love it all—even the smuts!Carlton House Terrace,Thursday night.Robertcame to see me at twelve, and he brought me the loveliest, splendid diamond and emerald ring, and I danced about like a child with delight over it. He has the most exquisite sentiment, Robert, every little trifle has some delicate meaning, and he makes mefeelandfeel.Each hour we spend together we seem to discover some new bit of us which is just what the other wants. And he is so deliciously jealous and masterful and—oh! I love him—so there it is!I am learning a number of things, and I am sure there are lots to learn still.At half past one Lady Merrenden came, and fetched us in thebarouche, and off we went to Vavasour House, with what different feelings to last evening.The pompous servants received us in state, and we all three walked on to the Duke’s room.There he was, still huddled in his chair, but he got up—he is better to-day.Lady Merrenden went over and kissed him.“Dear Torquilstone,” she said.“Morning, Robert,” he mumbled, after he had greeted his aunt. “Introduce me to yourfiancée.”And Robert did with great ceremony.“Now, I won’t call you names any more,” I said, and I laughed in his face. He bent down, and kissed my forehead.“You are a beautiful tiger cat,” he said, “but even a year of you would be well worth while.”Upon which Robert glared, and I laughed again, and we all went in to lunch.He is not so bad, the Duke, after all!Carlton House Terrace,Dec. 21st.Oh! it is three weeks since I wrote, but I have been too busy, and too happy, for journals. I have been here ever since, getting mytrousseau, and Véronique is becoming used to the fact that I can have no coronet on mylingerie!It is the loveliest thing in the world being engaged to Robert!He has ways!—Well, even if I really were as bad as I suppose I look, I could never want any one else. He worships me, and lets me order him about, and then he orders me about, and that makes me have the loveliest thrills! And if any one even looks at me in the street, which of course they always do—he flashes blue fire at them, and I feel—oh! I feel, all the time!Lady Merrenden continues her sweet kindness to us, and her tact is beyond words, and now I often do what I used to wish to—that is, touch Robert’s eyelashes with the tips of my fingers!It is perfectly lovely.Oh, what in the world is the good of anything else in life, but being frantically in love like we are.It all seems, to look back upon, as if it werelike having porridge for breakfast, and nothing else every day—before I met Robert!Perhaps it is because he is going to be very grand in the future, but every one has discovered I am a beauty, and intelligent. It is much nicer to be thought that than just to be a red-haired adventuress.Lady Katherine, even, has sent me a cairngorm brooch and a cordial letter (should now adorn her circle!)But oh! what do they all matter—what does anything matter but Robert! All day long I know I am learning the meaning of “to dance and to sing and to laugh andto live.”The Duke and I are great friends, he has ferreted out about mamma’s mother, and it appears she was a Venetian music mistress of the name of Tonquini, or something like that, who taught Lord de Brandreth’s sisters—so perhaps Lady Ver was right after all, and far, far back in some other life, I was the friend of a Doge.Poor dear Lady Ver! she has taken it very well after the first spiteful letter, and now Idon’t think there is even a tear at the corner of her eye!Lady Merrenden says it is just the time of the year when she usually gets a new one, so perhaps she has now, and so that is all right.The diamond serpent she has given me has emerald eyes—and such a pointed tongue.“It is like you, Snake-girl,” she said, “so wear it at your wedding.”The three angels are to be my only bridesmaids.Robert loads me with gifts, and the Duke is going to let me wear all the Torquilstone jewels when I am married, besides the emeralds he has given me himself. I really love him.Christopher sent me this characteristic note with the earrings which are his gift, great big emeralds set with diamonds:“So sorry I shall not see you on the happy day, but Paris, I am fortunate enough to discover, still has joys for me.“C. C.“Wear them, they will match your eyes!”And to-morrow is my wedding-day, and I am going away on a honeymoon with Robert—away into the seventh heaven. And oh! and oh! I am certainsureneither of us will yawn!End of Evangeline’s JournalCHISWICK PRESS: PRINTED BY CHARLES WHITTINGHAM AND CO.TOOKS COURT, CHANCERY LANE, LONDON.
“Did you by chance hear from Christopher whether he got your note last night or no?” he said.
I went and fetched it from my bedroom when I put on my hat. Robert read it aloud:
“Travellers’ Club,
“Sunday night.
“Souvent femme varie, fol qui se fie!”
Hope you found your variation worth while.
“C. C.”
“What dam cheek!” he said in his old way; he hasn’t used any “ornaments to conversation” since we have been—oh! I want to say it—engaged!
Then his eyes flashed. “Christopher had better be careful of himself. He will have to be answerable to me now!”
“Do be prudent, Evangeline, dear!” Lady Merrenden said gaily, “or you will have Robert breaking the head of every man in the street who even glances at you! He is frantically jealous!”
“Yes, I know I am,” said Robert, rearranging the tie on my blouse with that airofsans gêneand possession that pleases me so.
I belong to him now, and if my tie isn’t as he likes, he has a perfect right to re-tie it! No matter who is there! That is his attitude, not theleastceremony or stuff, everything perfectly simple and natural!
It does make things agreeable. When I was “Miss Travers” and he “Lord Robert,” he was always respectful and unfamiliar—except that one night when rage made him pinch my finger! but now that I amhisEvangeline, and he ismyRobert (thus he explained it to me in our Paradise hour) I am his queen and his darling—but at the same time his possession and belonging, just the same as his watch or his coat. I adore it, and it does not make me the least “uppish,” as one might have thought.
“Come, come, children!” Lady Merrenden said at last, “we shall all be late!”
So we started, dropping Robert at Vavasour House on our way. It is a splendid place, down one of those side streets looking on theGreen Park, and has a small garden that side. I had never been down to the little square where it is before, but, of course, every one can see its splendid frontage from St. James’s Park, though I had never realized it was Vavasour House.
“Good luck!” whispered Lady Merrenden as Robert got out, and then we drove on.
Several people were lunching at Carlton House Terrace, Cabinet Ministers, and a clever novelist, and the great portrait painter, besides two or three charming women, one as pretty and smart as Lady Ver, but the others more ordinary looking, only so well mannered. No real frumps like the Montgomeries. We had a delightful lunch, and I tried to talk nicely, and do my best to please my dear hostess. When they had all left I think we both began to feel excited, and long apprehensively for the arrival of Robert. So we talked of the late guests.
“It amuses my husband to see a number of different kinds of people,” she said, “but we had nothing very exciting to-day, I mustconfess—though sometimes the authors and authoresses bore me—and they are often very disappointing, one does not any longer care to read their books after seeing them.”
I said I could quite believe that.
“I do not go in for budding geniuses,” she continued, “I prefer to wait until they have arrived—no matter their origin, then they have acquired a certain outside behaviour on the way up, and it does notfroisséone so. Merrenden is a great judge of human nature, and variety entertains him. Left to myself I fear I should be quite contented with less gifted people who were simply of one’s own world.”
In all her talk one can see her thought and consideration for Lord Merrenden and his wishes and tastes.
“I always feel it is so cruel for him our having no children,” she said; “the Earldom becomes extinct, so I must make him as happy as I can.”
What a dear and just woman!
At last we spoke of Robert, and she told me stories of his boyhood, amusing Eton scrapes,and later feats. And how brave and splendid he had been in the war; and how the people all adored him at Torquilstone; and of his popularity and influence with them. “You must make him go into Parliament,” she said.
Then Robert came into the room. Oh! his darling face spoke, there was no need for words! The Duke, one could see, had been obdurate.
“Well?” said Lady Merrenden.
Robert came straight over to me, and took my face in his two hands: “Darling,” he said, “before everything I want you to know I love you better than anything else in the world, and nothing will make any difference,” and he kissed me deliberately before his aunt. His voice was so moved—and we all felt a slight lump in our throats, I know; then he stood in front of us, but he held my hand.
“Torquilstone was horrid, I can see,” said Lady Merrenden. “What did he say, Robert—tell us everything? Evangeline would wish it too, I am sure, as well as I.”
Robert looked very pale and stern, one cansee how firm his jaw is in reality, and how steady his dear blue eyes.
“I told him I loved Evangeline, whom I understood he had met yesterday, and that I intended to marry her——”
“And he said?” asked Lady Merrenden, breathless.
I only held tighter Robert’s hand.
“He swore like a trooper, he thumped his glass down on the table and smashed it—a disgusting exhibition of temper—I was ashamed of him. Then he said, ‘Never, as long as he lived and could prevent it—that he had heard something of my infatuation, so as I am not given that way he had made inquiries, and found the family was most unsatisfactory.’ Then he had come here yesterday on purpose to see you—darling,” turning to me—“and that he had judged for himself. The girl was a ‘devilish beauty’ (his words not mine) with the naughtiest provoking eyes, and a mouth—No! I can’t say the rest, it makes me too mad!” and Robert’s eyes flashed.
Lady Merrenden rose from her seat, andcame and took my other hand. I felt as if I could not stand too tall and straight.
“The long and short of it is, he has absolutely refused to have anything to do with the matter; says I need expect nothing further from him, and we have parted for good and all!”
“Oh, Robert!” it was almost a cry from Lady Merrenden.
Robert put his arms round me, and his face changed to radiance.
“Well, I don’t care—what does it matter! A few places and thousands in the dim future—the loss of them is nothing to me if I have only my Evangeline now.”
“But, Robert, dearest,” Lady Merrenden said, “you can’t possibly live without what he allows you, what have you of your own? About eighteen hundred a year, I suppose, and you know, darling boy, you are often in debt. Why he paid five thousand for you as lately as last Easter. Oh, what is to be done!” and she clasped her hands.
I felt as if turned to stone. Was all thisdivine happiness going to slip from my grasp? Yes, it looked like it, for I could never drag Robert into poverty, and spoil his great future.
“He can’t leave away Torquilstone, and those thousands of profitless acres,” Lady Merrenden went on, “but unfortunately the London property is at his disposition. Oh! I must go and talk to him!”
“No!” said Robert. “It would not be the least use, and would look as if we were pleading. His face had fallen to intense sadness as Lady Merrenden spoke of his money.
“Darling,” he said, in a broken voice. “No, it is true it would not be fair to make you a beggar. I should be a cad to ask you. We must think of some way of softening my brother after all!”
Then I spoke.
“Robert,” I said, “if you were only John Smith I would say I would willingly go and live with you in a cottage, or even in a slum—but you are not, and I would not foranything in the worlddrag you down out of what is your position in life—that would be a poor sort oflove. Oh! my dear,” and I clasped tight his hand—“if everything fails, then we must part, and you must forget me.”
He folded me in his arms, and we heard the door shut. Lady Merrenden had left us alone. Oh! it was anguish and divine bliss at the same time the next half hour.
“I will never forget you, and never in this world will I take another woman, I swear to God,” he said at the end of it. “If we must part, then life is finished for me of all joy.”
“And for me, too, Robert!”
We said the most passionate vows of love to one another, but I will not write them here, there is another locked book where I keep them—the book of my soul.
“Would it be any good if Colonel Tom Carden went and spoke to him?” I asked, presently. “He was best man at papa’s wedding, and knows all that there is to be known of poor mamma, and do you think that as mamma’s father was Lord de Brandreth, a very old barony, I believe, it is—oh! can it make any difference to the children’s actual breeding, their parentsnot having been through the marriage ceremony? I—I—don’t know much of those sort of things!”
“My sweet!” said Robert, and through all our sorrow he smiled and kissed me, “my sweet, sweet Evangeline.”
“But does the Duke know all the details of the history,” I asked, when I could speak—one can’t when one is being kissed.
“Every little bit, it seems. He says he will not discuss the matter of that, I must know it is quite enough, as I have always known his views, but if they were not sufficient, your wild, wicked beauty is. You would not be faithful to me for a year, he said. I could hardly keep from killing him when he hurled that at my head.”
I felt my temper rising. How frightfully unjust—how cruel. I went over and looked in the glass—a big mirror between the window—drawing Robert with me.
“Oh! tell me, tell me what is it. Am I so very bad looking? It is a curse surely that is upon me!”
“Of course you are not bad looking, mydarling!” exclaimed Robert. “You are perfectly beautiful—slender, stately, exquisite tiger-lily—only—only—you don’t look cold—and it is just your red hair, and those fascinating green eyes, and your white lovely skin and black eyelashes that, that—oh! you know, you sweetheart! You don’t look like bread and butter, you are utterly desirable, and you would make any one’s heart beat!”
I thought of the night at “Carmen.”
“Yes, I am wicked,” I said, “but I never will be again—only just enough to make you always love me, because Lady Ver says security makes yawns. But even wicked people can love with a great, great love, and that can keep them good. Oh! if he only knew how utterly I love you, Robert, I am sure, sure, he would be kind to us!”
“Well, how shall we tell him?”
Then a thought came to me, and I felt all over a desperate thrill of excitement.
“Will you do nothing until to-morrow?” I said. “I have an idea which I will tell to no one. Let us go back to Claridge’s now, anddo not come and see me again until to-morrow at twelve. Then if this has failed, we will say good-bye. It is a desperate chance.”
“And you won’t tell me what it is?”
“No—please trust me—it is my life as well as yours, remember.”
“My queen!” he said. “Yes, I will do that, or anything else you wish, onlynever, nevergood-bye. I am a man after all, and have numbers of influential relations. I can do something else in life but just be a Guardsman, and we shall get enough money to live quite happily on—though we might not be very grand people. I will never say good-bye—do you hear. Promise me you will never say it either.”
I was silent.
“Evangeline, darling!” he cried, in anguish, his eyebrows right up in the old way, while two big tears welled up in his beautiful eyes. “My God! won’t you answer me!”
“Yes, I will!” I said, and I threw all my reserve to the winds, and flung my arms round his neck passionately.
“I love you with my heart and soul, and pray to God we shall never say good-bye.”
When I got back to Claridge’s, for the first time in my life I felt a little faint. Lady Merrenden had driven me back herself, and left me, with every assurance of her devotion and affection for us. I had said good-bye to Robert for the day at Carlton House Terrace.
They do not yet know me, either of them—quite—or what I can and will do.
Claridge’s,
Monday night.
I feltto carry out my plan I must steady my mind a little, so I wrote my journal, and that calmed me.
Of all the things I was sure of in the world I was most sure that I loved Robert far too well to injure his prospects. On the other hand to throw him away without a struggle was too cruel to both of us. If mamma’s mother was nobody, all the rest of my family were fine old fighters and gentlemen, and Ireally prayed to their shades to help me now.
Then I rang and ordered some iced water, and when I had thought deeply for a few minutes, while I sipped it, I sat down to my writing-table. My hand did not shake, though I felt at a deadly tension. I addressed the envelope first, to steady myself:
To
His Grace,
The Duke of Torquilstone,
Vavasour House,
St. James’s, S.W.
Then I put that aside.
“I am Evangeline Travers who writes,” I began, without any preface, “and I ask if you will see me—either here in my sitting-room this evening, or I will come to you at Vavasour House. I understand your brother, Lord Robert, has told you that he loves me, and wishes to marry me, and that you have refused your consent, partly because of the history of my family, but chiefly because my type displeases you. I believe, in days gone by, the prerogative of a great noble like you was to dispense justice. In my case it is still yourprerogative by courtesy, and I ask it of you. When we have talked for a little, if you then hold to your opinion of me, and convince me that it is for your brother’s happiness, I swear to you on my word of honour I will never see him again.
“Believe me,
“Yours faithfully,
“Evangeline Travers.”
I put it hastily in the envelope, and fastened it up. Then I rang the bell, and had it sent by a messenger in a cab, who was to wait for an answer. Oh! I wonder in life if I shall ever have to go through another twenty-five minutes like those that passed before the waiter brought a note up to me in reply.
Even if the journal won’t shut I must put it in.
“Vavasour House,
“St. James’s,
“Nov. 28th.
“Dear Madam,—I have received your letter, and request you to excuse my calling upon you at your hotel this evening, as I am very unwell, but if you will do me the honourto come to Vavasour House on receipt of this, I will discuss the matter in question with you, and trust you will believe that you may rely upon myjustice.
“I remain, Madam,
“Yours truly,
“Torquilstone.”
“His grace’s brougham is waiting below for you, Madam,” the waiter said, and I flew to Véronique.
I got her to dress me quickly. I wore the same things exactly as he had seen me in before, deep mourning they are, and extremely becoming.
In about ten minutes Véronique and I were seated in the brougham and rolling on our way. I did not speak.
I was evidently expected, for as the carriage stopped the great doors flew open, and I could see into the dim and splendid hall.
A silver-haired, stately old servant led me along, through a row of powdered footmen, down a passage dimly lit with heavily shaded lights (Véronique was left to theirmercies). Then the old man opened a door, and without announcing my name, merely, “The lady, your grace,” he held the door, and then went out and closed it softly.
It was a huge room splendidly panelled with dark carvedboiserieLouis XV, the most beautiful of its kind I had ever seen, only it was so dimly lit with the same sort of shaded lamps one could hardly see into the corners.
The Duke was crouching in a chair, he looked fearfully pale and ill, and had an inscrutable expression on his face. Fancy a man so old-looking, and crippled, being even Robert’s half-brother!
I came forward; he rose with difficulty, and this is the conversation we had.
“Please don’t get up,” I said, “if I may sit down opposite you.”
“Excuse my want of politeness,” he replied, pointing to a chair, “but my back is causing me great pain to-day.”
He looked such a poor miserable, soured, unhappy creature, I could not help being touched.
“Oh, I am so sorry!” I said. “If I had known you were ill, I would not have troubled you now.”
“Justice had better not wait,” he answered, with a whimsical, cynical, sour smile. “State your case.”
Then he suddenly turned on an electric lamp near me, which made a blaze of light in my face. I did not jump. I am glad to say I have pretty good nerves.
“My case is this: to begin with, I love your brother better than anything else in the world——”
“Possibly: a number of women have done so,” he interrupted. “Well?”
“And he loves me,” I continued, not noticing the interruption.
“Agreed. It is a situation that happens every day among young fools. You have known one another about a month, I believe?”
“Under four weeks,” I corrected.
He laughed bitterly.
“It cannot be of such vital importance to you then in that short time!”
“It is of vital importance to me, and you know your brother’s character; you will be able to judge as well as I if, or not, it is a matter of vital importance to him.”
He frowned. “Well, your case.”
“First, to demand on what grounds you condemned me as a ‘devilish beauty?’ and why you assume that I should not be faithful to Robert for a year?”
“I am rather a good judge of character,” he said.
“You cannot be—or you would see that whatever accident makes me have this objectionable outside, the me that lives within is an honest person who never breaks her word.”
“I can only see red hair and green eyes, and a general look of the devil.”
“Would you wish people always to judge by appearances then?” I said. “Because, if so, I see before me a prejudiced, narrow-minded, cruel-tempered, cynical man, jealous of youth’s joys. ButIwould not be so unjust as to stamp you with these qualities because of that!”
He looked straight at me, startled. “I maybe all those things,” he said. “You are probably right!”
“Then, oh, please don’t be!” I went on quickly. “I want you to be kind to us. We, oh, we do, do so wish to be happy, and we are both so young, and life will be so utterly blank and worthless for all these years to the end if you part us now.”
“I did not say I would part you,” he said, coldly. “I merely said I refused to give Robert any allowance, and I shall leave everything in my power away from the title. If you like to get married on those terms you are welcome to.”
Then I told him I loved Robert far too much to like the thought of spoiling his future.
“We came into each others lives,” I said. “We did not ask it of Fate, she pushed us there; and I tried not to speak to him because I had promised a friend of mine I would not, as she said she liked him herself, and it made us both dreadfully unhappy, and every day we mattered more to one another; until yesterday—when I thought he had gone away forgood, and I was too miserable for words—we met in the Park, and it was no use pretending any longer. Oh! youcan’twant to crush out all joy and life for us, just because I have red hair! It is so horribly unjust.”
“You beautiful siren,” he said. “You are coaxing me. How you know how to use your charms and your powers; and whatmancould resist your tempting face!”
I rose in passionate scorn.
“How dare you say such things to me!” I said. “I would not stoop to coax you—I will not again ask you for any boon! I only wanted you to do me the justice of realizing you had made a mistake in my character—to do your brother the justice of conceding the point that he has some right to love whom he chooses. But keep your low thoughts to yourself! Evil, cruel man! Robert and I have got something that is better than all your lands and money—a dear, great love, and I am glad; glad that he will not in the future receive anything that is in your gift. I shall give him the gift of myself, and we shall do very well withoutyou,” and I walked to the door, leaving him huddled in the chair.
Thus ended our talk on justice!
Never has my head been so up in the air. I am sure had Cleopatra been dragged to Rome in Augustus’s triumph she would not have walked with more pride and contempt than I through the hall of Vavasour House.
The old servant was waiting for me, and Véronique, and the brougham.
“Call a hansom, if you please,” I said, and stood there like a statue while one of the footmen had to run into St. James’s Street for it.
Then we drove away, and I felt my teeth chatter, while my cheeks burnt. Oh! what an end to my scheme, and my dreams of perhaps success!
But what a beast of a man! What a cruel, warped, miserable creature. I will not let him separate me from Robert, never, never! He is not worth it. I will wait for him—my darling—and, if he really loves me, some day we can be happy, and if he does not—but oh! I need not fear.
I am still shaking with passion, and shall go to bed. I do not want any dinner.
Tuesday morning, Nov. 29th.
Véroniquewould not let me go to bed, she insisted upon my eating, and then after dinner I sat in an old, but lovely wrap of white crêpe, and she brushed out my hair for more than an hour—there is such a tremendous lot of it, it takes time.
I sat in front of the sitting-room fire, and tried not to think. One does feel a wreck after a scene like that. At about half past nine I heard noises in the passage of people, and with only a preliminary tap Robert and Lady Merrenden came into the room. I started up, and Véronique dropped the brush, in her astonishment, and then left us alone.
Both their eyes were shining, and excited, and Robert looked crazy with joy; he seized me in his arms and kissed me, and kissed me, while Lady Merrenden said, “You darling,Evangeline, you plucky, clever girl, tell us all about it!”
“About what!” I said, as soon as I could speak.
“How you managed it.”
“Oh, I must kiss her first, Aunt Sophia!” said Robert. “Did you ever see anything so divinely lovely as she looks with her hair all floating like this—and it is all mine—every bit of it!!!”
“Yes, it is,” I said sadly. “And that is about all of value you will get!”
“Come and sit down,” said Robert, “Evangeline, you darling—and look at this!”
Upon which he drew from his pocket a note. I saw at once it was the Duke’s writing, and I shivered with excitement. He held it before my eyes.
“Dear Robert,” it began, “I have seen her. I am conquered. She will make a magnificent Duchess. Bring her to lunch to-morrow. Yours,Torquilstone.”
I really felt so intensely moved I could not speak.
“Oh, tell us, dear child, how did it happen—and what did you do—and where did you meet?” said Lady Merrenden.
Robert held my hand.
Then I tried to tell them as well as I could, and they listened breathlessly. “I was very rude, I fear,” I ended with, “but I was so angry.”
“It is glorious,” said Robert. “But the best part is that you intended to give me yourself with no prospect of riches. Oh, darling, that is the best gift of all.”
“Was it disgustingly selfish of me?” I said. “But when I saw your poor brother so unhappy looking, and soured, and unkind, with all his grandeur, I felt that to us, who know what love means, to be together was the thing that matters most in all the world.”
Lady Merrenden then said she knew some people staying here who had anappartementon the first floor, and she would go down and see if they were visible. She would wait for Robert in the hall, she said, and she kissed us good-night, and gave us her blessing.
What a dear she is! What a nice pet to leave us alone!
Robert and I passed another hour of bliss, and I think we must have got to the sixth heaven by now. Robert says the seventh is for the end, when we are married—well, that will be soon. Oh! I am too happy to write coherently.
I did not wake till late this morning, and Véronique came and said my sitting-room was again full of flowers. The darling Robert is!
I wrote to Christopher and Lady Ver, in bed as I sipped my chocolate. I just told Lady Ver the truth, that Robert and I had met by chance, and discovered we loved one another, so I knew she would understand—and I promised I would not break his heart. Then I thanked her for all her kindness to me, but I felt sad when I read it over—poor, dear Lady Ver—how I hope it won’t really hurt her, and that she will forgive me.
To Christopher I said I had found my “variation” worth while, and I hoped he would come to my wedding some day soon.
Then I sent Véronique to post them both.
To-day I am moving to Carlton House Terrace. What a delight that will be—and in a fortnight, or at best three weeks, Robert says we shall quietly go and get married, and Colonel Tom Carden can give me away after all.
Oh the joy of the dear, beautiful world, and this sweet, dirty, enshrouding fog-bound London! I love it all—even the smuts!
Carlton House Terrace,
Thursday night.
Robertcame to see me at twelve, and he brought me the loveliest, splendid diamond and emerald ring, and I danced about like a child with delight over it. He has the most exquisite sentiment, Robert, every little trifle has some delicate meaning, and he makes mefeelandfeel.
Each hour we spend together we seem to discover some new bit of us which is just what the other wants. And he is so deliciously jealous and masterful and—oh! I love him—so there it is!
I am learning a number of things, and I am sure there are lots to learn still.
At half past one Lady Merrenden came, and fetched us in thebarouche, and off we went to Vavasour House, with what different feelings to last evening.
The pompous servants received us in state, and we all three walked on to the Duke’s room.
There he was, still huddled in his chair, but he got up—he is better to-day.
Lady Merrenden went over and kissed him.
“Dear Torquilstone,” she said.
“Morning, Robert,” he mumbled, after he had greeted his aunt. “Introduce me to yourfiancée.”
And Robert did with great ceremony.
“Now, I won’t call you names any more,” I said, and I laughed in his face. He bent down, and kissed my forehead.
“You are a beautiful tiger cat,” he said, “but even a year of you would be well worth while.”
Upon which Robert glared, and I laughed again, and we all went in to lunch.
He is not so bad, the Duke, after all!
Carlton House Terrace,
Dec. 21st.
Oh! it is three weeks since I wrote, but I have been too busy, and too happy, for journals. I have been here ever since, getting mytrousseau, and Véronique is becoming used to the fact that I can have no coronet on mylingerie!
It is the loveliest thing in the world being engaged to Robert!
He has ways!—Well, even if I really were as bad as I suppose I look, I could never want any one else. He worships me, and lets me order him about, and then he orders me about, and that makes me have the loveliest thrills! And if any one even looks at me in the street, which of course they always do—he flashes blue fire at them, and I feel—oh! I feel, all the time!
Lady Merrenden continues her sweet kindness to us, and her tact is beyond words, and now I often do what I used to wish to—that is, touch Robert’s eyelashes with the tips of my fingers!
It is perfectly lovely.
Oh, what in the world is the good of anything else in life, but being frantically in love like we are.
It all seems, to look back upon, as if it werelike having porridge for breakfast, and nothing else every day—before I met Robert!
Perhaps it is because he is going to be very grand in the future, but every one has discovered I am a beauty, and intelligent. It is much nicer to be thought that than just to be a red-haired adventuress.
Lady Katherine, even, has sent me a cairngorm brooch and a cordial letter (should now adorn her circle!)
But oh! what do they all matter—what does anything matter but Robert! All day long I know I am learning the meaning of “to dance and to sing and to laugh andto live.”
The Duke and I are great friends, he has ferreted out about mamma’s mother, and it appears she was a Venetian music mistress of the name of Tonquini, or something like that, who taught Lord de Brandreth’s sisters—so perhaps Lady Ver was right after all, and far, far back in some other life, I was the friend of a Doge.
Poor dear Lady Ver! she has taken it very well after the first spiteful letter, and now Idon’t think there is even a tear at the corner of her eye!
Lady Merrenden says it is just the time of the year when she usually gets a new one, so perhaps she has now, and so that is all right.
The diamond serpent she has given me has emerald eyes—and such a pointed tongue.
“It is like you, Snake-girl,” she said, “so wear it at your wedding.”
The three angels are to be my only bridesmaids.
Robert loads me with gifts, and the Duke is going to let me wear all the Torquilstone jewels when I am married, besides the emeralds he has given me himself. I really love him.
Christopher sent me this characteristic note with the earrings which are his gift, great big emeralds set with diamonds:
“So sorry I shall not see you on the happy day, but Paris, I am fortunate enough to discover, still has joys for me.
“C. C.
“Wear them, they will match your eyes!”
And to-morrow is my wedding-day, and I am going away on a honeymoon with Robert—away into the seventh heaven. And oh! and oh! I am certainsureneither of us will yawn!
End of Evangeline’s Journal
CHISWICK PRESS: PRINTED BY CHARLES WHITTINGHAM AND CO.TOOKS COURT, CHANCERY LANE, LONDON.