JOCK was not allowed to come down to dinner that day, and Lucy, refusing to leave him, sat with the culprit on her knee, their arms clasped about each other, their hot cheeks touching. “Oh, if we could go away! if we only had a little hut anywhere, you and me, in the loneliest place, where we should never see any of these people more,” Lucy cried; and Jock, though he was still in a state of wild excitement, calmed down a little, and began to think of a desolate island, that favorite fancy of childhood. “I should not be so clever as Hazel was—for he was a fellow that knew everything; but couldn’t I build you a house, Lucy?” the little fellow said, his wet eyes lighting up at the thought. He had read “Foul Play” not long before. Jock was not fond of the modern novel; but he made an exception in favor of Mr. Reade, as what boy of sense would not do? With this forlorn fancy they consoled themselves as they sat dinnerless, clinging to each other—a lonely pair. Mrs. Ford, half alarmed at the success of her punishment, which was so much greater than she expected, for, to do her justice, she wanted only a lawful submission, and not to deprive a little delicate boy of a meal, came upstairs several times to the door to ask if Jock would submit; but he would not say he was sorry, which was what she required. “Why couldn’t she let my Lucy alone? I would do it again,” he said, turning a deaf ear to all Mrs. Ford’s moral addresses. All this time Lucy held him close, kissing his little tear-wet cheeks, and crying over him, so that, perhaps, his firmness was not wonderful. “You should not encourage him, Lucy,” said Mrs. Ford. “Come down to your dinner. It is a shame to encourage a little naughty boy; and you can’t go without your dinner.” “If you had but one in all the world to stand up for you, only one, would you go and forsake him?” cried Lucy, with floods of hot tears. And then Mrs. Ford went down-stairs very uncomfortable, as are all enforcers of domestic discipline, when the culprits will not give way. Against this kind of resistance the very sternest of household despots fight in vain, and Mrs. Ford was not a household despot, but only an ignorant, well-meaning woman, driven to her wits’ end. If she were unkind now and then, it was not that she ever meant to be unkind. She grew more and more uncomfortable as time after time she returned beaten to the dinner-table down-stairs, which she, herself, could not take any pleasure in, because these two troublesome young persons were fasting above.
This was a mournful meal in the house. Ford himself, satisfying his usual good appetite in the natural way, was fallen upon by his wife, and, so to speak, slaughtered at his own table. The dainty dishes she had prepared specially for Lucy were sent away untouched, and the good woman herself eat nothing. She did nothing but talk all through that meal of Jock’s misdemeanor. “And Lucy spoils him so. She will not listen to me. It is bad for the child—dreadfully bad for the child. He ought to be at school, knocking about among other boys. And instead of that she sits and cries and kisses him, and goes without her dinner. It’s enough to kill the child,” cried Mrs. Ford, “at his age, and a delicate boy, to eat nothing all day.”
“Then why don’t you let him come down and have his dinner?” said Ford, his mouth full of a fugitive morsel.
“Oh, you never—you never understand anything! Am I the one to ruin that child’s morals, and make him think he can do what he likes, for the sake of a dinner? Not till he gives in and says he is sorry,” said Mrs. Ford, pushing her plate away with angry emphasis; “but it is Lucy that makes me unhappy,” she said; “anybody—anything else for the sake of that boy.”
And it can not be denied that little Jock, at least, heard the rattle of the plates and dishes as they were cleared away with a sinking of the heart; but he would not give in. Lucy was less moved by it. She had something of that contempt for dinners which is an attribute of the female mind, and she was worn with excitement, cast down, and discouraged in every way. She said to herself that she could not have swallowed anything; the mere suggestion seemed to bring a lump in her throat. She wanted to see nobody, to turn her face to the wall, to “give in” altogether. Lucy could not have told what vague mysterious despair was implied in the idea of “giving in,” but it seemed the end of all things, the lowest depth of downfall. Notwithstanding this wild desperation and desire to turn her back upon all the world, it was a very welcome interruption when Katie Russell knocked softly at the door, and came in with a subdued eagerness and haste which betrayed that she had something to tell. Katie was not like her usual self any more than Lucy was. There was a soft flush upon her face, an unusual excitement and brightness in her eyes. She came in rapidly, with an “Oh, Lucy—” then stopped short when she saw Jock, and the lamentable air of the little group still clinging close together, whose mournful intercourse she had interrupted. Katie burst forth into a little laugh of excitement. “What’s the matter with you?” she said. Jock slid out of Lucy’s arms, and Lucy rose up from her chair at this question. They were glad enough to come to an end of the situation, though they had both made up their mind to accept no comfort. And when Lucy had told the story, Katie’s amusement and applause did her friend good in spite of herself. “Bravo, Jock!” Katie cried, with another laugh, which her own personal excitement and need of utterance had no small share in; and she was so much delighted by Mrs. Rushton’s discomfiture that both sister and brother began to feel more cheerful. “Oh, how I should have liked to see her!” said Katie. And then her own affairs that were so urgent, rushed into her mind with a fresh suffusion of her face and kindling of her eyes. Lucy was not great in the art of reading looks, but she could see that there was something in Katie’s mind that was in the most urgent need of utterance—something fluttering on her very lips that had to be said. “I have got free for the day,” she said, with a little quaver in her voice. “Let us go somewhere or do something, Lucy, I can not stop still in one place. I have something to tell you—”
“I saw it directly in your face—what is it? what is it?” Lucy said. But it was not till she had gone to her room to get her hat, where Katie followed her, that the revelation came. “Will you have me for a relation?” the girl said, crossing her hands demurely, and making a little courtesy of pretended humility; and then natural emotion regained its power, and Katie laughed, and cried, and told her story. “And you never guessed!” she said; “I thought you would know in a moment. Didn’t you notice anything even yesterday? Ah, I know why; you were thinking of your own affairs.”
“I was not thinking of any affairs,” said Lucy, with a sigh; “I was tormented all day; but never mind—tell me. Philip! he has always seemed so stolid, so serious.”
“And isn’t this serious?” said Katie. “Oh, you don’t half see all that it means. Fancy! that he should turn his back upon all the world, and choose me, a girl without a penny!”
“But—all the world? I don’t think Philip had so much in his power. What did he turn his back upon? But I am very glad it is you,” Lucy said. Still her face was serious. She had not forgotten, and she did not quite understand the scene of last night.
Katie grew very serious, too. “I want to speak to you, Lucy,” she said. “We are two girls who have always been fond of each other; we always said we would stand by each other when we grew up. Lucy, look here, if you ever thought of Philip—if you ever once thought of him— I would cut off my little finger rather than stand in his way!”
Hot tears were in her eyes; but Lucy looked at her with serious surprise, wondering, yet not moved. “I don’t know what you mean,” she said.
“Oh, but you must know what I mean, Lucy! Perhaps you are not clever; but everybody always said you had a great deal of sense. And you know you are the greatest prize that ever was. How can you help knowing? And Philip is one that you have known all your life. Oh, Lucy, tell me, tell me true! Don’t you think I would make a sacrifice for him? It would break my heart,” cried the girl, “but I would sacrifice myself and Bertie, too, and never think twice—for him! Answer me, answer me true—between you and me, that have always been fond of each other, Lucy!” cried Katie, seizing her hands with sudden vehemence, “answer me as if we were two little girl at school. Did you ever think of Philip? Would you have had him if—if he had not liked me?”
Lucy drew her hands away with an energy which was violence in her, “I think you are all trying to drive me out of my senses. I! think of Philip or any one! I never did, I never will,” she cried, with sudden tears. “I don’t want to have any one, or to think of any one, as you say. Will you only let me alone, all you people? First one and then another; and not even pretending,” the poor girl cried, with sobs, “that it is for me.”
“I am not like that, Lucy,” Katie said, in mournful tones; for why should Lucy cry, she asked herself, if it were not that she had “thought of” Philip. “I am fond of you, and I know you would make any one happy. It is not only for your money. Oh, I know, I know,” Katie cried; “what a difference it would make to him if he married you! and what is pride between you and me? Only say you care for him the very least in the world—only say— Lucy,” cried Katie, solemnly, “if it was so, though it would break my heart, I would make poor Bertie take me off somewhere this very day, to New Zealand or somewhere, and not leave a word or a trace, and never see either of you more.”
Lucy had recovered a little spirit during this last assault upon her. She had got to the lowest depth of humiliation, she thought, and rebounded. The emergency gave her a force that was not usual to her. “I once read a book like that,” she said; “a girl went away, because she thought another girl cared for the gentleman. Don’t you think that would be pleasant for the other girl? to think that she had made such an exhibition of herself, and that the gentleman had been cheated into caring for her? I— I am sure I never made any exhibition of myself,” Lucy cried, with rising warmth. “One is to me just like another. I am very willing to be friends if they will let me alone; but as for Philip! I am glad you like him,” she said, recovering her serenity with an effort. “I am very glad you are going to marry him. And, Katie!” here a sudden thought flashed into the mind of the heiress. If it, ever could be made to appear natural to give money a way, surely here was the occasion. She clapped her hands suddenly, with an unaffected simple pleasure, which was all the more delightful that it was a flower plucked, so to speak, from the very edge of a precipice. “They can not say anything against that,” she cried; “it will be only like a wedding present.” And satisfaction came back to Lucy’s heart.
“Oh, never mind about the wedding present—so long as you like it, Lucy—that is the best,” cried the other; and then Katie’s confidences took the more usual form. “Fancy, I have not seen him yet,” she said; “I got the letter only this morning, and I answered it, you know. Don’t you think a girl should give an answer straight off, and not keep him in suspense? for I had always, always, you know, from the very beginning, from that night when he came in—don’t you recollect? Now I see you never can have thought of Philip, Lucy, for you don’t recollect a bit! It was a beautiful letter; but it was a funny letter too. He said he could not help himself. Oh, I understand it quite well! Of course he did not want, if he could have helped it, to marry a girl without a penny in the world.”
“Does that matter, when he is fond of you?” Lucy said.
“Ah! it is only when you are awfully rich that you can afford to be so disinterested,” cried Katie. “Naturally, he did not want to marry a girl with nothing. And you may say what you like, Lucy; but for a man to have a chance of you and like me the best! There, I will never say another word; but if it makes me vain can I help it? To choose me when he had the chance of you!”
“He never had the chance of me,” cried Lucy, with returning indignation. “What do you all take me for, I wonder? Am I like something in a raffle in a bazaar? Can people take tickets for me, and draw numbers, and every one have a chance? It is not like a friend to say so. And there is no one, if you fail me, Katie, no one that I can trust.”
“You may trust me, to my very last breath,” cried Katie, with indescribable favor. And Lucy felt, with a softening sensation of relief and comfort, that surely here was a stronghold opening for her; Katie and Philip. She could trust in them if in nobody else. Philip had been the one honest among all the people round her. He had loved somebody else, he had not been able to pretend that it was Lucy he loved. She thought of the scene of the previous night with an uneasy mixture of pleasure and pain. How strange that they should all think so much of this money, which to Lucy conveyed so little comfort! But Philip had escaped the snare. And now she thought there could be no doubt that she had found a pair of friends whom she could trust.
Jock all this time waited down-stairs; but he was not impatient. Jane, the house-maid, charged with a sandwich which Mrs. Ford herself had prepared, waylaid him on the landing, and Jock wanted small persuading. He was a boy who liked sandwiches; and to have his own way, and that too, was enough to reconcile him to a little waiting. He had just time to dispose of it while the girls lingered; and it was very good, and he felt all the happier. He sallied forth a little in advance, as was his habit when Lucy was not alone, his little nose in the air, his head in the clouds. He did not pay any attention to the secrets the others were whispering; why should he? At eight the superiority of sex is as acutely felt as at any other age. Jock was loyal to his sister through every fiber of his little being; still Lucy was only a girl when all was said.
It was a beautiful day after the yesterday’s rain. The blue of the sky had a certain sharpness, as skies are apt to have when they have wept much; but the air was light and soft, relieved of its burden of moisture. It was Katie who was the directress of the little party, though the others were not aware of it. She led them through the streets till they reached a little ornamental park into which the High Street fell at one end. Then suddenly in a moment, Katie gave her friend’s arm a sudden pressure. “Oh, Lucy,” she cried, “have a little feeling for him: you have so much for me, have a little for him,” and disengaging herself, she ran on and seized Jock’s hand, who was marching serenely in front. Lucy, astonished, paused for a moment, not knowing how to understand this sudden desertion, and found her hand in the hand of Bertie Russell, who had appeared she could not tell from whence.
“This is good fortune indeed,” he said; “what a happy chance for me that you should take your walk here!”
Lucy felt her heart flutter like a bird fallen into a snare. It was not that she was frightened for Bertie Russell, but it was that she had been betrayed in the very tenderness of her trust. “Katie brought us,” she said gravely. Katie, who was stimulating Jock to a race, had got almost out of hearing, and the other two were left significantly alone. Lucy felt her heart sink; was there another scene like that of yesterday to be gone through again?
“Katie is perhaps more kind to me than she is to you, Miss Trevor,” said Bertie; “she knew I wanted to tell you—various things; and she did not realize, perhaps, that it would be so disagreeable to you.”
This troubled Lucy in her sensitive dislike to give pain. “Oh,” she said, “Mr. Bertie, indeed I did not mean to be rude.”
“You could not be rude,” he said, with an audible sigh. “Those who have not the gift to please have only themselves to blame. I wanted to call, but your old lady does not like me, Miss Trevor. I heard this morning from Mrs. Berry-Montagu. Did I tell you she had taken me up? She has been in Scotland in her husband’s shooting-quarters, and she says Sir Thomas Randolph is off to the East again.”
“To the East!” Lucy said: what did it mean? for a moment the sight seemed to go out of her eyes, the world to swim round her. A great giddiness came over her; was she going to be ill? she did not understand what it was.
“Yes,” said Bertie’s voice, quite unconcerned; and, even in the midst of this wonderful mist and darkness, it was a consolation to her that he did not seem to perceive her condition. “When that mania of travel seizes a man there is no fighting against it. Mrs. Montagu says that Lady Randolph is in despair.”
“I should think she will not like it,” Lucy said. The light was beginning slowly to come back. She saw the path under her feet, and the shrubs that stood on either hand, and Bertie by her side whom she had been so alarmed to see, but whom she thought nothing of now. What did it mean? she was too much confused and confounded in all her faculties to be able to tell. And she asked no questions. That was why Sir Tom had not written, had not taken any notice. Lucy had thought herself very wretched, abandoned by heaven and earth this morning, but how different were her sensations now! An invisible prop had been taken away, which had held her up without her own knowledge. She felt herself sink down to the very dust, her limbs and her courage failing alike. And all the time Bertie’s voice went on.
“I have been wandering about the town renewing my acquaintance with it, and making notes. May I tell you about what I am going to do, Miss Trevor? Perhaps it will only bore you? Well, if you will let me— I am about beginning my second book; and your advice did so much for me in the first. I know how much of my success I owe to you.”
“Oh, no, no, Mr. Bertie,” said Lucy, “you only say so. I never gave you any advice, you don’t owe anything to me.”
“Perhaps not,” he said, with a smile. “Perhaps the Madonna on the mast does not save the poor Italian fisherman from the storm. You may think, if you are a severe Protestant, that she has nothing to do with it, but he kneels down and thanks our lady when he gets on shore, and you must let me thank the saint of my invocation too.”
Lucy made no reply. She did not understand what he meant by all these fine words, and if she had understood she did not care. What did it matter? His voice was not much more to her than the organ playing popular tunes in the street beyond. The two sounds made a sort of half-ludicrous concert to her ears. She heard them and heard them not, and went on in a maze, still giddy, not knowing where she was going, keeping very still to command herself. Going to the East! all that, she thought, had been over. He had gone to Scotland, from whence he was to write, and she to him, if she wanted advice or anything! And he had written to her, but not for a long time. And now he was going away again, going away perhaps forever. This was what was going on in Lucy’s mind while Bertie spoke. She had no feeling about Bertie now, or about the betrayal of her trust by his sister. What did it matter? Sir Tom was going—going to the East. Sometimes she felt disposed to grasp at Bertie’s arm to steady herself, and sometimes there came over her an almost irrestrainable impulse to break in, to say, “To the East! do you mean that he is really, really going to the East?” It was only instinct that saved her, not anything better. When the words came to her lips, she became vaguely conscious that he was talking about something else.
Bertie, on his part, was too much occupied with his own idea to perceive that Lucy was preoccupied also. He thought indeed that she was listening to him with a sort of interested absorption, unresistingly—which, indeed, was true enough. Katie and Jock sped on before, leaving him full space and leisure for his suit. She was altogether at his mercy, walking downcast by his side, listening timidly, too shy to make any reply. It flashed across his mind that it was just thus that he would describe a girl who was going to yield and make her lover happy—making him happy. Yes, there could be no doubt of that; she would make him happy, as very few had it in their power to do. The bliss Lucy could bestow would be substantial bliss. What unappreciated efforts Bertie made! the hero of a novel was never more eloquent. He compared Lucy to all manner of fine things. And she heard him, and heard him not. It was very hard upon Bertie. But when, beginning to feel discouraged by her silence, he went back upon the recollections of her life in Grosvenor Street, Lucy woke up from her abstraction. Even Mrs. Berry-Montagu restored her interest. “May I send a message from you when I write to her?” he said. “She is always inquiring after you. There are none of your acquaintances that do not take an interest in you—unless, perhaps it might be an old man about town, like Sir Tom.”
“Sir Thomas is always kind—there is no one so kind,” cried Lucy, with a little excitement; “if you say he does not take any interest, it is because you don’t know.”
“Oh, I did not mean any harm; but pardon me if I can not bear to see a man like Sir Tom come near you, Miss Trevor. People show their feelings in different ways. Mine—you don’t much care to hear about mine—take an old-fashioned form. There are people who are not worthy to touch the hem of your dress.”
“I don’t know what you mean, Mr. Russell. Sir Tom is better, far better, than most of the people I know; and as for me, I am not sacred, I don’t know why any one should think of the hem of my dress.”
“But you are sacred to me,” said Bertie, feeling that the moment was come. “Pardon me if I go too far. But what else can a man say when he has put himself under you as his saint, as his guiding star, since ever he began to be worth anything; that is only since I knew you, Lucy. Of course I know I am not half nor a quarter good enough for you. But ever since you began to come to Hampstead you know what you have been to me; you have inspired me, you have made me what I am. You thought, or the Randolphs thought, that it was presumption to put your name upon my book—”
“Oh, Mr. Bertie, why do you bring that up again? it is all over and past. You made people talk of me and laugh at me, and put me in the papers. It was dreadful! but it is all over, and I don’t want to hear of it any more.”
“It was the best I had,” said Bertie, with not unnatural indignation. “It was all I had, and queens have not scorned such offerings; but, if you do not care for that, you might care for a man’s devotion, Lucy—you might care for a—”
“Oh, Mr. Bertie, don’t, please don’t say any more.”
“I know how to take an answer,” he said; “I won’t persecute you as that cub did yesterday; but I must know whether you mean it really—whether you know what I mean. Lucy—you must let me call you so just once more—is it only shyness? are you frightened? don’t you understand? or do you know that, when I offered my book to you, I offered, like all the poets, my heart, my life, my—”
“Lucy,” said Jock, suddenly rushing upon her, rushing between them and pushing, with the mere force of his coming, the impassioned suitor away, “Katie has met Philip, and they don’t want me. What are you doing, talking so long? Philip looks so queer, I don’t know what is the matter with him. And I want to go home. I hate a walk like this—there is no fun in it. And I want to go home; come!” cried the child, hanging on to her skirts. Bertie looked at him with a vindictive stare of rage and disappointment. There was not another word to say.