CHAPTER XIV.THE BETROTHAL.
Mrs. Alexander smiled at the young lover’s ardor, while she regarded his handsome, earnest face with a look almost of affection.
“Mr. Hamilton,” she said, as he concluded, “to be frank with you, I must tell you that I have been expecting a request of this nature from you.”
Rupert looked a trifle surprised at this declaration.
“A mother’s eyes are very sharp,” the lady resumed, “and it has not required much penetration to see that you were learning to regard my Virgie with more than friendly affection; besides, Mr. Knight told me of the conversation that he had with you at San Jose, and warned me of what I might expect when you returned to New York. And now I will confess to you freely that I was very much opposed to the idea of having Virgie become the wife of an Englishman. I had reason for the prejudice, which I will explain to you some other time; and I resolved you two should not meet again if I could help it. I did help it, as you know; that was the reason why I left New York so early; but only to be overreached by fate, which decreed that we should all come aboard at the same time. The moment Virgie introduced you to me, on board the Cephalonia, I felt that I was powerless, and so resigned myself to the inevitable. I must admit, however,” Mrs. Alexander added, with a genial smile,“that I was disarmed of my prejudices before I had known you many hours, and as I became better acquainted with you, I could but acknowledge with Mr. Knight, who, by the way, is a strong champion in your favor, that I should be proud to give my daughter to so true a man; and so, Mr. Hamilton, you have my full and free permission to win my darling if you can, and——”
“Oh, thank you!” Rupert cried, seizing his companion’s hand in his gratitude, his face luminous with joy; “you have made me the happiest man in London.”
“I like to see young people happy,” Mrs. Alexander replied, still smiling, but with a little sigh; “and I imagine it is safe to tell you I think you have no cause for fear. But now tell me something about yourself and your family; I should not like to make inquiries about you of other people.”
“There is not very much to tell,” Rupert said. “I am an orphan; my mother died when I was an infant; my father was a major in her majesty’s service, and the only relatives I have living are an uncle and his family, by the name of Shaftonsbury, so my home has been with my guardian in Hampshire County——”
“Ah! Hampshire! Who is your guardian?” hastily asked Mrs. Alexander, paling a little at the familiar name.
“He was my father’s dearest friend, Sir——” began Rupert, but before he could speak the name the door opened, and Virgie, looking flushed and beautiful from her exercise in the open air, stood upon the threshold, and the young man, forgetting both question and answer, sprang forward to greet her.
The conversation became general then for a little while; but by and by Mrs. Alexander excused herself, saying she had letters to write, and left the young couple alone.
Rupert’s eyes had been seeing a great deal ever since Virgie came in; so much that she could not meet them without her color coming and going with tell-tale consciousness; and when, the moment the door closed after her mother, he arose and came to her side, she knew instinctively what was trembling on his lips.
“My darling,” he said, in a low, earnest tone, “I have just told your mother that I love you, and she has given me leave to win you if I can. Virgie, I have loved you ever since those delightful days that we spent together on the way to California. I might have told you of it even then, had not Mr. Knight and my own sense of what was right warned me against it. But now, dearest, there are no barriers, unless you yourself raise one between us, and my heart bids me hope that you will not. Tell me, dear, that you love me—that you will be my wife.”
He knelt by her side and gathered the two small hands that lay upon her lap into his, while he searched the lovely downcast face with his eager eyes.
She did not repulse him; she made no effort even to release her hands from his clasp. She cast one shy, sweet glance into his face, a little smile of love and joy trembled on her lips, while rosy blushes surged up to the waves of bright hair lying on her forehead, and Rupert needed no other answer to assure him of his heart’s desire.
“You do love me, my darling!” he cried, drawingher into his arms. “I read it in your dear face, in your beautiful eyes; but let me hear it from your lips. I am selfish enough not to be satisfied with anything less. Virgie, you will give yourself to me?”
“Yes,” she whispered, her head drooping until her hair almost mingled with his; “youmademe love you on that journey.”
“Oh, if I had known it then I fear I could not have held my peace,” he interrupted, laying his lips fondly against her forehead. “I had, in fact, to run away from you at San Jose lest I should violate all bonds and betray myself in spite of the caution of Mr. Knight, who said I must wait until you were safely back with your mother.”
“Did Mr. Knight suspect?” faltered Virgie, growing crimson again.
“Indeed he did. He is a very observing old gentleman, and took me to task for monopolizing you so much. He was right, too, dear, for it would have been rash and imprudent for me to have tried to win you then, and I honored him for restraining me, though it required a terrible wrench for me to tear myself away from you; but I knew my only safety was in flight. I resolved, however, that I would settle the question when I returned to New York; but I was very miserable when I came back in May and could not find you.”
“And I, too, Rupert,” Virgie confessed. “I thought it is very hard when the doctor ordered mamma away just at the very time when I was looking for you; but of course I could not say a word, for her health was of more importance than anything else, while——”
“While what, Virgie?” her lover asked, as she stopped in confusion.
“While I was not sure but that I was nourishing a delusion; and, taking it all in all, I was very wretched.”
“Ah! and you have been loving me all this time?” Rupert breathed, as he bent to kiss the lips that had confessed so much. “And I have been fearing that you might send me away hopeless.”
“I could not send you away, Rupert.”
“Oh, Virgie, I hope I shall not wake to find this all a dream,” he breathed, as he folded her closer in his arms, and drew her head upon his breast.
“Do not fear,” the young girl returned, looking archly up into his eyes. “I assure you I have ample evidence that you are very much awake now, and, if you please, it won’t do to disarrange my hairtoomuch, for Grace Huntington is coming back in an hour to help me plan for Lady Dunforth’s ball that is to occur next week.”
Rupert laughed, but released her, smoothing very tenderly the tresses that he had disarranged; then seating himself on the sofa beside her, he asked:
“How will it be, my Virgie—can you be content to remain in England, or are you such a stanch American that you will pine for your native land?”
“It is said that ‘home is where the heart is,’ and ifyouare to live in England, I am afraid that America would not seem very home-like to me, even though it was my birthplace,” Virgie confessed, with a shy smile that was very bewildering.
“Then you will not mind becoming an English matron?” Rupert observed, with a caress that again endangered the glossy tresses.
“Yes, I think I shall mind it very much,” Virgie retorted; “so much that I should be unhappy to be anything else. Besides,” she added, more gravely, “my father was an Englishman.”
“Is it possible? But I do not think that Alexander is an English name,” Rupert returned. “Of what portion of England was he a native?”
“I do not know, Rupert,” Virgie said, looking troubled. “I imagine there is something about my father that mamma has never been willing to tell me. She always grows so sad and pale whenever I speak of him that I have not the heart to question her, although, as I have grown older, I have been very desirous of knowing more concerning him.”
“Do you remember him?”
“Oh, no; I never saw him. He was called home to England a few weeks before my birth, and was lost.”
“Lost at sea! How sad! Mrs. Alexander must have been very young.”
“Yes, she was only a little over twenty.”
“You will probably visit your father’s home now that you are here,” Rupert remarked.
“I asked mamma that one day, and she grew so white that I was frightened. She remarked that that was one object she had in coming abroad, but it was chiefly for my sake; and then she shivered as if there was something about it that she regarded with great dread. But hush! she is coming back to us.”
Mrs. Alexander entered at that moment, and smiled as she saw the happy faces of the two young lovers, although Virgie was sure that there was a suspicious redness about her eyes, as if she had been weeping.
“I have won her, Mrs. Alexander,” Rupert said, taking Virgie by the hand and leading her to hermother. “This dear girl has promised to be my wife, and I am sure you will give us your blessing and congratulations.”
“Indeed I will,” she responded, heartily, though she appeared greatly agitated as she drew Virgie into her arms and tenderly kissed her blushing cheek; “and I give her to you very willingly, because I feel sure that you are worthy of her, and I am confident that you will make each other happy. Still,” she added, a little sadness in her voice, “it is not an easy thing for a mother to give away her only child, or to feel that she has been supplanted in her affections.”
“Not supplanted, mamma—do not say that!” cried Virgie, clinging to her; “it could not be! I could never love you less, even though I——”
“Even though you love Rupert more,” interposed her mother, archly. “I expect that, of course, and would not have it otherwise. I wish you to be all in all to each other, and,” her voice growing husky with emotion, “may no cloud ever dim your happiness; may nothing ever come between you to mar your confidence in each other. Oh, my darling!” she cried, in a voice of agony, as she folded the lovely girl almost convulsively to her heart, and seeming to forget for the moment where she was, “I would rather lay you away in your grave to-day than to have you live to suffer what I have suffered.”
“Mamma,” cried Virgie, looking up anxiously into the almost convulsed face bending over her, “what can you mean? I have never seen you so unnerved before. Surely if you are in trouble, you should not hide it from me.”
“Forgive me, love, for casting a shadow upon your joy at this time,” said her mother, recovering herselfwith an effort; “but your happiness brought back all my own early hopes—hopes that were most cruelly blighted—so vividly that I forgot myself. Do not mind me, Virgie; your future looks very bright, and I have done wrong even to allude to anything to distress you on this day of all others.”
Virgie stood back and looked gravely into her mother’s face.
“Mamma,” she said, with a seriousness that was new to her, “I fear that you have been hiding something from me all my life. I have often suspected it, and your excessive agitation this morning proves it. If you have known any great trouble in the past; if, as I surmise, it is connected with my father, I feel that you ought to confide it to me, and let me at least sympathize with, if I cannot alleviate, your sorrow.”
Mrs. Alexander grew very thoughtful at these words. For a moment she stood irresolute, then a look of resolve overspread her face, and she said:
“Sit down, my children, and listen to me. I believe the time has come when I should open my heart to you, my Virgie, and since Rupert is now one of us it will be just as well for him to hear the story that I have to tell you at the same time; it will save a repetition, and I am not strong enough to review the past many times. Perhaps, too,” she added, turning to the young man, who, in obedience to her request, had drawn his betrothed back to her seat upon the sofa, “you may be able to give me some advice regarding a duty which I have soon to perform.”
She sat down near the lovers as she ceased speaking, but looking more like a statue of wax than a livingbeing, for it seemed almost like going to her own execution to confess the wrongs which had been the death-blow to all the hopes of her own youth.