"No," says Dulce, in a tone so low that he can scarcely hear her.
"Forgive me once more," he says, "if I say that he never appreciated you. And you – where is your pride? Will you not show him now that what he treated with coldness another is only too glad to give all he has for in exchange? Think of this, Dulce. If you wished it I would die for you."
"I almost think I do wish it," says Dulce, with a faint little laugh; but there is a kindness in her voice new to it, and just once she lifts her eyes and looks at him shyly, but sweetly.
Profiting by this gleam of sunshine, Gower takes possession of her hand again and draws her gently towards him.
"You will marry me," he says, "when you think of everything." There is a meaning in his tone she cannot fail to understand.
"Would you," she says tremulously, "marry a woman who does not care for you?"
"When you are once my wife I will teach you to care for me. Such love as mine must create a return."
"You think that now; you feel sure of it. But suppose you failed! No drawing back. It is too dangerous an experiment."
"I defy the danger. I will not believe that it exists; and even if it did – still I should have you."
"Yes, that is just it," she says, wearily. "But how would it be with me? I should have you, too, but – " Her pause is full of eloquence.
"Try to trust me," he says, in a rather disheartened tone. He is feeling suddenly cast down and dispirited, in spite of his determination to be cool and brave, and to win her against all odds.
To this she says nothing, and silence falls upon them. Her eyes are on the ground; her face is grave and thoughtful. Watching her with deepest anxiety, he tells himself that perhaps after all he may still be victor – that his fears a moment since were groundless. Is she not content to be with him? Her face – how sweet, how calm it is! She is thinking, it may be, of him, of what he has said, of his great and lasting love for her, of —
"I wonder whom Roger will marry now," she says, dreamily, breaking in cruelly upon his fond reverie, and dashing to pieces by this speech all the pretty Spanish castles he has been building in mid-air.
"Can you think of nothing but him?" he says, bitterly, with a quick frown.
"Why should I not think of him?" says Dulce, quite as bitterly. "Is it not natural? An hour ago I looked upon him as my future husband; now he is less to me than nothing! A sudden transition, is it not, from one character to another? Then a possible husband, now a stranger! It is surely something to let one's mind dwell upon."
"Well, let us discuss him, then," exclaims he, savagely. "You speak of his marrying. Perhaps he will bestow his priceless charms on Portia."
"Oh, no!" hastily; "Portia is quite unsuited to him."
"Julia, then?"
"Certainly not Julia," disdainfully.
"Miss Vernon, then? She has position and money and so-called beauty."
"Maud Vernon! what an absurd idea; he would be wretched with her."
"Then," with a last remnant of patience, "let us say Lilian Langdale."
"A fast, horsey, unladylike girl like that! How could you imagine Roger would even look at her! Nonsense!"
"It seems to me," says Stephen, with extreme acrimony, "that no one in this county is good enough for Roger; even you, it appears, fell short."
"I did not," indignantly. "It was I, of my own free will, who gave him up."
"Prove that to him by accepting me."
"You think he wants proof?" She is facing him now, and her eyes are flashing in the growing twilight.
"I do," says Stephen, defiantly. "For months he has treated you with all the airs of a proprietor, and you have submitted to it. All the world could see it. He will believe you sorry by-and-by for what has now happened; and if he should marry before you, what will they all say – what will you feel? What – "
She is now as pale as death. She lifts her hand and lays it impulsively against his lips, as though to prevent his further speech. She is trembling a little (from anger, she tells herself), and her breath is coming quickly and unevenly, so she stands for a moment collecting herself, with her fingers pressed against his lips, and then the agitation dies, and a strange coldness takes its place.
"You are sure you love me?" she asks, at length, in a hard, clear voice, so unlike her usual soft tones, that it startles even herself.
"My beloved, can't you see it?" he says, with deep emotion.
"Very well, then, I will marry you some day. And – and to-morrow – it must be to-morrow– you will let Roger know I am engaged to you? You quite understand?"
He does, though he will not acknowledge it even to himself.
"Dulce, my own soul!" he says, brokenly; and, kneeling on the grass at her feet, he lifts both her hands and presses them passionately to his lips.
They are so cold and lifeless that they chill him to his very heart.
CHAPTER XVII
"Too early seen unknown, and known too late!"
– Romeo and Juliet.
"There's neither honesty, manhood, nor good fellowship in thee."
– Henry IV.
It is next day. There has been rain in the night —heavy rain – and the earth looks soaked and brown and desolate. Great storms, too, had arisen, and scattered the unoffending leaves far and wide, until all the paths are strewn with rustling types of death. Just now the drops are falling, too – not so angrily as at the midnight past, but persistently, and with a miserable obstinacy that defies all hope of sunshine. "The windy night" has made "a rainy morrow," and sorrowful, indeed, is the face of Nature.
Sorrowful, too, is the household. A lack of geniality pervades it from garret to basement; no one seems quite to know what is the matter, but "suspect" that "crow that flies in Heaven's sweetest air" stalks rampant up stairs and down, and damps the ardor of everyone.
Dulce had waked early, had risen from her bed, and – with the curious feeling full upon her of one who breaks her slumber knowingly that some grief had happened to her over night, the remembrance of which eludes her in a tantalizing fashion – had thrown wide her window, and gazed with troubled eyes upon the dawning world.
Then knowledge came to her, and the thought that she had made a new contract that must influence all her life, and with this knowledge a sinking of the heart, but no drawing back and no repentance. She dressed herself; she knelt down and said her prayers, but peace did not come to her, or rest or comfort of any sort, only an unholy feeling of revenge, and an angry satisfaction that should not have found a home in her gentle breast.
She dressed herself with great care. Her prettiest morning gown she donned, and going into the garden plucked a last Maréchal Niel rose and placed it against her soft cheek, that was tinted as delicate as itself.
And then came breakfast. And with a defiant air, but with some inward shrinking she took her place behind the urn, and prepared to pour out tea for the man who yesterday was her affianced husband, but who for the future must be less than nothing to her.
But as fate ordains it she is not called upon to administer bohea to Roger this morning. Mr. Dare does not put in appearance, and breakfast is got through – without, indeed, an outbreak of any sort, but in a dismal fashion that bespeaks breakers ahead, and suggests hidden but terrible possibilities in the future.
Dulce is decidedly cross; a sense of depression is weighing her down, a miserable state of melancholy that renders her unjust in her estimate of all those around her. She tells herself she hates Roger; and then again that she hates Stephen, too; and then the poor child's eyes fill with tears born of a heartache and difficult of repression; to analyze them she knows instinctively would be madness, so she blinks them bravely back again to their native land, and having so got rid of them, gives herself up to impotent and foolish rage, and rails inwardly against the world and things generally.
Even to Portia she is impatient, and Julia she has annihilated twice. The latter has been lamenting all the morning over a milliner's bill that in length and heaviness has far exceeded her anticipations.
But this is nothing; Julia is always so lamenting, and indeed, I never yet saw the milliner's bill, however honest, that wasn't considered a downright swindle, and three times as exorbitant as it ought to be!
"Now look at this, my dear Dulce," says the unobservant Julia, holding out a strip of paper about half a yard in length to Miss Blount, who has been ominously silent for the past hour. "I assure you the trimmings on that dress never came to that. They were meagre to the last degree; just a little suspicion of lace, and a touch of velvet here and there. It is absurd – it is a fraud. Did your trimmings ever come to that?"
"Don't know, I'm sure," says Dulce, impatiently; "I never keep any accounts of my own money. I make a point of not doing that. If it's spent, it's spent, you know, and one gains nothing by thinking of it. It only shows one how extravagant one has been, and I do so hate scolding myself!"
"But, my dear child, Madame Grande must have made a mistake. It is all nonsense; if you would just look it over, if only to convince yourself. I am not unreasonable."
"I won't look it over," says Miss Blount, promptly. "I hate looking over things, and I hate bills, and I hate Madame Grande, and I hate – everything."
After this outburst she makes for the door, and the morning-room knows her no more for a considerable time. Portia looks up from her painting in some surprise, and Julia tries to smother the thought that the final expression of hatred should have ended in the word "you."
In the hall outside, Dulce almost runs into Stephen's arms, who has come up to see her very early, being in a restless and most unsatisfactory mood. His eyes brighten and he flushes warmly as he meets her, but she, drawing back from him, gives him to understand by the very faintest of imperative gestures that he is to come no nearer.
"You!" she says, ungraciously.
"Yes – you expected me?" This question suggests the possibility that he fears he is not altogether welcome. She waives it, and goes on as though she had not heard him.
"Have you done what you promised?" she asks, coldly.
"No, you mean – ?" he hesitates.
"You must remember. You were to tell Roger next day; this (though it hardly sounds right) is next day; have you told him that I have promised to marry you some time?"
There is not the faintest nervousness or girlish confusion in her tone. Stephen, watching her closely, feels a terrible despair that threatens to overwhelm him. If only one little blush would mantle her cheek, if for one second her beautiful, feverishly bright eyes would droop before his! He battles with the growing misery, and for the time being, allays it.
"Not yet;" he says. Then he colors hotly, and his eyes leaving her face seek the ground. A sense of shame betrays itself in every feature. "It is early yet," he says, in a strange reluctant tone; "and if – if you think it better to put it off for a day or two, or even to let him find out for himself by degrees – or – "
"No!" – remorselessly – "he shall be told now – at once! Remember all you said about him last evening. I have not forgotten. What!" cries she, with sudden passion, "do you think I will live another day believing he imagines me regretful of my decision – cut to the heart, perhaps, that I am no longer anything to him? I tell you no! The very thought is intolerable."
"But – "
"There must be no hesitation," she says, interrupting him with a quick gesture. "It was in our agreement that he should be told to-day. If one part of that agreement is to be broken, why then, let us break it all; it is not too late yet. I shall not care, and perhaps it will be better if – "
Her cruelty stings him into vehement declaration.
"It will not be better," he says, wrathfully. "I will do anything, everything, you wish, except" – bitterly – "give you up."
To him it seems a wretched certainty that it is her wish already to break the bond formed between them but a few short hours ago. Has she so soon repented?
"Where is Roger?" he asks, turning from her, all the lover's gladness gone from his eyes. He is looking stern and pale, and as a man might who is determined to do that against which his soul revolts.
How shall he tell this man, who was once his dearest friend, that he has behaved as a very traitor to him.
"In the stables, no doubt," replies she, scornfully. The change in his manner has not touched her; nay, he tells himself it has not so much as been noticed by her.
Moving abruptly away, he goes down the hall and out of the open door, and down the stone steps across the gleaming sunshine, and so is lost to sight.
Dulce watches him until the portico outside hides him from view, and then, walking very slowly and with bent head, she goes in the direction of Fabian's room. She is so absorbed in her own reflections that she hardly hears approaching footsteps, until they are quite close to her. Looking up, with a quick start, she finds herself face to face with Roger.
The surprise is so sudden that she has not time to change color until she has passed him. Involuntarily she moves more quickly, as though to escape him, but he follows her, and standing right before her, compels her to stop and confront him.
"One moment," he says. His tone is haughty, but his eyes are more searching than unkind. "You meant what you said last evening?" he asks, quickly, and there is a ring in his voice that tells her he will be glad if she can answer him in the negative. Hearing it, she grows even paler, and shrinks back from him.
"Have I given you any reason to doubt it?" she says, coldly.
"No – certainly not." His tone has grown even haughtier. "I wish, however, to let you know I regret anything uncivil I may have said to you on – that is – at our last interview."
"It is too late for regrets." She says this so low that he can scarcely hear her.
"You are bent, then, upon putting an end to everything between us?"
"Yes." At this moment it seems impossible to her to answer him in anything but a monosyllable. Her obstinacy angers him.
"Perhaps you are equally bent," he says, sneeringly, "upon marrying Gower?"
I suppose he has expected an indignant denial to this question, because, when silence follows it, he starts, and placing both his hands upon her shoulders, draws her deliberately over to a side window, and stares into her downcast face.
"Speak," he says roughly. "Are you going to marry him?"
"Yes."
The word comes with difficulty from between her pale, dry lips.
"He has asked you?"
"He has."
"You were engaged to him even before you broke off your engagement with me?"
"Oh, no, no!"
"Since when, then? Was it last evening he spoke to you?"
"Yes."
"After you had parted from me? Sharp work, upon my life."
He laughs – a short, unmirthful laugh – and taking his hands from her shoulders, moves back from her, yet always with his eyes on her face.
"You should be glad," she says, slowly.
"No doubt. So he was your confidant – your father-confessor, was he? All my misdemeanors were laid bare to him. And then came pity for one linked to such an unsympathetic soul as mine, and then naturally came what pity is akin to! It is a pretty story. And for its hero 'mine own familiar friend.'" He laughs again.
She makes a movement as though to leave him, but he stops her.
"No, do not go yet," he says. "Let me congratulate you. Le roi est mort, vive le roi. My successor, it seems, was not difficult to find; and – By-the-by, why are you alone now? Why is not your new lover by your side?"
"My first lover —not my new lover," she says, bitterly, speaking now with some spirit.
"I didn't count, I suppose."
"You – !" She draws her breath quickly, and, then, having subdued the indignation that had almost overcome her, goes on quietly: "you never loved me. There was never a moment in all my knowledge of you when I could have flattered myself with the thought that I was more to you than a cousin."
"He is very different, I suppose?" He flushes a dark crimson as he puts this question.
"Altogether —utterly! At least, I can tell myself, I am to him something more than a necessary evil, a thing forced upon him by circumstances. To you I was only that, and worse. There were moments when I believe you hated me."
"We need not discuss that now," says Dare coldly. "Where is Gower?"
"I don't know; at least, I am not sure. What do you want with him? There is no use in quarreling with him," she says, nervously.
"Why should I quarrel with any man because a woman chooses to prefer him to me? That is her affair altogether."
He walks away from her, and she, moving into the deep embrasure of the large bow window, stands staring blankly upon the sunlit landscape without.
But presently he returns and, standing beside her, gazes out, too, upon the flowers that are bowing and simpering as the light wind dances over them.
"I am going away this evening," he says, at length, very gently. "It is uncertain when I shall return. Good-by."
He holds out his hand, awkwardly enough, and even when, after a momentary hesitation, she lays hers in it, hardly presses it. Yet still, though he has paid his adieux, he lingers there, and loiters aimlessly, as if he finds a difficulty in putting an end to the miserable tete-a-tete.
"You were wrong just now," he says, somewhat abruptly, not looking at her; "there was never one second in my life when I hated you; you need not have said that."
"Where are you going?" asks she, brokenly.
"I don't know. It doesn't matter. But before I go, I want to say to you – that – that – if ever you want me, even if I should be at the end of the world, send for me, and I will come to you."
Are there tears in his eyes? He drops her hand, and turning hastily away, goes down the corridor, and is beyond recall before she can muster courage to say anything to him kind or forgiving.
Going into the yard to order the dog-cart to take him to the station to catch the up-train, he encounters Stephen Gower (who, by-the-by, had gone to encounter him), on his knees before a kennel, fondling a two-months old setter pup.
This pup is a baby belonging to one of Roger's favorite setters, and is, therefore, a special pet of his.
"Put that dog down," he says, insolently.
"Why?" says Stephen, just as insolently.
"Because petting is bad for young things, and because I wish it."
"Oh, nonsense!" says Stephen, rather cavalierly, continuing his attention to the dog.
"Look here," says Dare, furiously, "it has nothing to do with the dog, you will understand —nothing– but I want to tell you now what I think of you, you low, mean, contemptible – "
Gower literally gasps for breath. Letting go the dog, he rises to his feet, and coming close to Roger, says, passionately,
"What do you mean by that?"
"Have you not been making love to my cousin behind my back? Deny that if you can!"
"I won't deny that I love her, certainly."
"Will you deny anything else? That you have acted as few men would have done. Without honor – without – "
This of course puts an end to even enforced civility; Mr. Gower instantly and most naturally strikes out with the most exemplary vigor, and presently these two most mistaken young men are clasped in an embrace, warm indeed, but hardly so loving as one might desire.
How things might have ended, whether with death or only with bloody noses, no one now can tell, because Sir Mark Gore, coming on the scene just at this awful moment, seizes Roger by the shoulder and by sheer force of arm and will, forces him back from his adversary.
"What do you two boys mean by this burst of insanity?" he says, angrily. "Such an example to the young fellows in the yard; you ought to be ashamed of yourself, Roger." This is plainly meant for two stable boys in the distance, who, with open mouths, are staring at the combatants, and have been plainly enjoying themselves to the utmost.
"Well, I'm not," says Roger, doggedly, who is still thirsting for blood. "If shame should attach itself to any one, it should be to that fellow there," pointing contemptuously to Gower.
"Well, I forbid any more of this," says Sir Mark. "Stop it at once. It is all about that child indoors, I suppose; I never heard of – "
"At all events, I have told him what I think of him," says Roger, panting. "Low, underhand sneak."
"What?" says Stephen, fiercely, making a step forward.
"I insist on knowing what it is all about," says Sir Mark, authoritatively. "Of course, one understands a disgraceful scene like this always means a woman, but is it Dulce?"
"To come here under the guise of friendship and deliberately make love to the girl to whom he knew I was engaged; was there ever such treachery since the world began?" says Roger. "Would any fellow, with any claim to the word gentleman, do that? Now, I leave it to you, Gore?"
"My dear fellow, you must remember it is apparent to everybody that you don't want her," says Sir Mark, taking Stephen's part, though in his soul he is on Roger's side. "Would you act the part of the dog in the manger? You don't affect her yourself, yet nobody else must look at her. She has found out, I suppose, that she prefers some one else to you. Women, as a rule, will choose for themselves, and who shall blame them! When, later on, you choose for yourself too, you will be very grateful to her and Stephen for this hour. Just now self-love is disagreeing with you. If I were you I should clear out of this for a bit."
"Oh? as for that, I'm going," says Roger; "but I'm glad I have had a chance of speaking to him before I go; he undermined me, and poisoned her mind with regard to me from first to last. I wasn't quite blind, though I said nothing. He spoke evilly of me behind my back, I have no doubt, and maligned me most falsely when there was a chance; a more blackguardly transaction – "
"You shall answer to me for this," says Gower, in a white rage; "you have lied in your statement from beginning to end."
"No one shall answer for anything," says Sir Mark, promptly; "I won't hear of it. Are you both gentlemen! and to dream of dragging a woman's name into a scandalous quarrel of this kind? For shame! Take my advice, Roger, and go abroad, or to the – or anywhere you like for a month or two, and see what that will do for you. You know you are only trying to make a grievance out of nothing; you never really cared for her, as a man should for his wife." Sir Mark's eyes sadden as he says this, and an irrepressible sigh escapes him; is he thinking of the time when he could have cared for a woman with all his heart and soul?
"No, of course not; you and she and all are quite agreed about that," says Roger, bitterly.
"My good boy, all your world knows it," says Sir Mark, persistently.
"My world is wiser than even I gave it credit for," says Roger, sneeringly. But there is a sob in his voice as he turns away that sends a pang through Sir Mark's heart. What has happened? Have they all been mistaken, then? Even have the principal actors in this small drama been blind until now, when the awakening has come too late.
Without another word to Stephen, Sir Mark goes slowly indoors, and, passing through the hall, meets Portia coming toward him, a troubled expression in her large sad eyes.
"What is it, Mark?" she says, laying her hand on his arm, "Something has happened to Dulce; she is lying on her bed, and will not speak to me or any one. Has she really quarreled finally with Roger?"
"Oh, it is worse than that," says Gore, with something that is almost a groan.
"It can't be true that she has thrown him over for Mr. Gower?" says Portia, recoiling.
"One never knows what a woman will do," says Mark, gloomily, "I think she has."
"But what is it all about? How did it begin?"
"With a chocolate cream," says Sir Mark, sententiously. "I assure you, my dear Portia, for the sake of a paltry box of bon-bons she has sacrificed the entire happiness of her life!"