PART III.
“Alas! it’s far from russet friezeTo silks and satin gowns,But I doubt if God made like degreesIn courtly hearts and clowns;Yet homely hose must step apartWhere gartered princes stand;Ah, may he wear my love at heartThat wins her lily hand!”
“Alas! it’s far from russet friezeTo silks and satin gowns,But I doubt if God made like degreesIn courtly hearts and clowns;Yet homely hose must step apartWhere gartered princes stand;Ah, may he wear my love at heartThat wins her lily hand!”
“Alas! it’s far from russet friezeTo silks and satin gowns,But I doubt if God made like degreesIn courtly hearts and clowns;Yet homely hose must step apartWhere gartered princes stand;Ah, may he wear my love at heartThat wins her lily hand!”
“Alas! it’s far from russet frieze
To silks and satin gowns,
But I doubt if God made like degrees
In courtly hearts and clowns;
Yet homely hose must step apart
Where gartered princes stand;
Ah, may he wear my love at heart
That wins her lily hand!”
—Hood.
“Well, I warned you,” said old Katharine, “but you would not heed an old crone’s tale. I warned your grandmother before you, but she would not listen, and there was the young squire of Elmdale broke his heart and died for love of her, and she knowing all the time that she caused it all by her unwise love of him. Oh, I’ve no patience with these willful Chiltons! But I’m getting on, thank the Lord! I won’t live to see your unborn children, my lady, driving thoughtless men to their death.”
“Oh, Kathie, how wicked and cruel you are!” sobbed Lady Edith.
Lady Edith lifted a warm, white face from the pillow and looked at old Katharine with heavy eyes full of pain and remorse. The long wretched night had worn away, and the old nurse was opening the blinds, letting in the morning sunshine. It glowed through the rosy silk of the curtains, and made Edith’s face look terribly pale and sad in its dim light. She had not slept all night, and she looked as conscience-stricken and remorseful as her nurse could possibly desire.
“Don’t think I’m not sorry for you, dearie,” soothed the old crone. “But I’m grieved for the manly young fellow—yester eve so full of life and love and health—to-day another victim to the dreadful curse that has come down to us from barbarous times to blight the innocent and unoffending.”
Lady Edith bowed her head in a passion of tears.
“Oh,” she sobbed. “I never knew the truth until it was too late, too late! Guy, Guy, I would have given my life to have saved yours!” she cried in a passion of impotent despair.
Old Katharine took the slight form into her motherly arms, and let Edith sob on until the rest of exhaustion stole over her, and, too weak for tears or cries, she lay still, with her violet eyes fixed on vacancy, and a frozen calm, more terrible than tears, on her lovely face.
Presently the kind old face of the earl, her uncle and guardian, looked in upon his petted darling.
“Dear uncle, you—have—news! Speak, but do not tell me that—that—he is dead!” she cried, with trembling lips.
“Tut, no, of course he is not dead, my love; but——” He broke off and looked distressfully at her pale face.
“Speak!” she cried, almost imperiously in her impatience.
“Yes, I have news,” he said. “Eustace and I went to Lady Heathcote’s this morning to see the poor fellow, and she told us that it had been discovered that Guy was not mortally wounded—a flesh wound, deep, but not necessarily fatal, but——” He paused and regarded her curiously.
“Poor darling, how badly she looks! Yet I never suspected before that she and her brother’s handsome tutor were in love with each other,” he thought.
“Dear uncle, please go on,” she exclaimed, eagerly.
“Oh, yes. Where was I when I stopped to think? Yes, Lady Heathcote told us that this morning, at daybreak, a conveyance was sent for Mr. Winthrop. An old gentleman was in it who claimed to be a relative of the young man. He insisted on taking the wounded man away, and as no one had the authority to prevent him, he did so.”
“And you followed?” she asked.
“No, for he left no address, saying bitterly that the young fellow had no friends to mourn for him. That is all I have to tell you, Edith.”
“But Guy will certainly send and let Eustace know where he is, uncle, do you not think so?”
Lord Chilton looked relieved at her brightening face.
“Certainly, undoubtedly, to-day or to-morrow,” he replied, cheerily. “Keep up your heart, little one. I will go now and send your brother to sit with you this morning if indeed he can tear himself away from the library, dry book-worm that he is. By-by, dear.”
He kissed her, smoothed her fair curls lovingly, and went out.
Presently came Eustace—pale, studious, quiet—a handsome pair they made—he was twenty, she eighteen.
Edith leaned her head on his shoulder and wept softly. Poor Eustace, he hardly knew how to soothe a girl’s grief. He was shy and quiet, his thoughts were up among the stars. He meant to be a great scholar. But he smoothed her hair and said, tenderly:
“Don’t cry, sis, Guy will be sure to let us hear from him soon, and I hope he will soon get well. I didn’t know you loved each other, dear, but I’m not sorry it’s so, and uncle and I sha’n’t oppose your marriage. I don’t hold with so much nonsense about rank and blue blood. A scholar is as good as a man of rank, and Guy Winthrop is one of the greatest scholars of his time.”
But between tears and blushes Lady Edith whispered the story of old Katharine’s story—the minstrel’s curse that must part her from her lover, and cause his death, Lord Eustace laughed the old tradition to scorn.
“Nonsense,” he said, lightly. “There’s nothing in it, and when Guy comes back to us alive and well, you’ll forget old Katharine’s superstitions in your new-found happiness.”
“Yes, when he comes back,” croaked the old nurse, entering, and catching the sentence. “But he hasn’t come back yet.”
The longest day of Edith’s life dragged wearily to its close.
And still no word from Guy. The suspense grew almost unendurable.
After dinner she threw a long wrap over her white dress, and walked alone in the garden.
Twilight had fallen long ago, and the air was chilly. Lady Edith walked briskly up and down the elm avenue, thinking, thinking, till her brain seemed on fire. Was it only yesterday he had told her how he loved her? How long ago it seemed. Perhaps he was dead now. The dark eyes would never look into hers again. A stifled sob escaped her lips.
Hark! a footstep. Through the gloom a man came toward her with uncovered head, mutely respectful. He bore a note which she deciphered hurriedly in the moonlight. Oh, heavens! what cruel, cruel words to be signed with her lover’s name!
“Edith, I am dying, they tell me. Will you come to me with Eustace?
Guy.”