CHAPTER XX.
FATE WILLED OTHERWISE.
“Ah, Charley, it is you. I am so glad, for you were just now in my thoughts!” cried Rosalind, beaming up at him with a tender smile.
Charley throwing himself down carelessly into the opposite chair, returned lightly:
“Very complimentary, I am sure, for I fancied you were thinking of the other fellow.”
She wrinkled her brows at him.
“The other fellow?”
“Yes, you know, Rosalind—the one who was so nice you would have accepted his proposal if you hadn’t been engaged to me.”
“So Marie told you that nonsense, Charley! Ha! ha! Of course it was only a jest!” laughed Rosalind, looking up at him with arch blue eyes, full of tenderness.
Charley Bonair did not return the fond glance, he looked at her with serious gravity, unmoved by all her coquettish beauty and rich attire. He answered frankly:
“I am sorry to hear that it was a jest. I hoped it was truth.”
“Charley!”
“Yes, I hoped it was true,” he reiterated gravely, “because I came in here to tell you it was not too late to call him back.”
“Oh, Charley!” reproachfully.
“Honor bright,” he answered, still without smiling, and adding nervously, “oh, Rosalind, can’t you see that he would be a better match for you than I, because he loves you, while I—I, in spite of myself, have grown cold, careless, indifferent to you!”
“Cruel! Cruel!” sobbed the girl, behind her jeweled fingers.
“Yes, I know it, dear, but I cannot help it. I tried to be true to you, but fate willed otherwise, and I’ve struggled too long! I give it up for useless now. Despise me if you will, I deserve it, I know, and I don’t blame you. But, Rosalind, if you held me to my promise I couldn’t make you happy. I should hate you, instead of loving you. There, the bitter truth is out! Will you set me free?”
“It might not be as easy for me as for you, Charley. I am not so fickle-minded, perhaps, but I suppose I have a right to ask you one question!”
“Oh, yes, go on,” he said.
“It is only this, Charley, dear: Has your heart only wandered from me, or is there—some one else?”
His handsome face flushed a little under her sorrowful glances, but he answered bravely:
“Forgive me for hurting you, Rosalind, but I will not deceive. Yes, you have guessed the truth. There is some one else!”
Rosalind sighed heavily:
“It is worse than I thought. Indifference might be cured if I had no rival, but this is hopeless. Oh, Charley, who is she, the girl who has won your love from me? Her name?”
“Rosalind, I would rather not tell you yet.”
“That is unfair to me, Charley, very unfair!” bitterly. “Surely I have a deep interest in my successful rival. Does she love you?”
“I hope so.”
“Then you have not asked her yet?”
“I waited for my release from you.”
“Oh, then, you will ask her now, at once! Is she near at hand, Charley, or perhaps I should say, Mr. Bonair, now?”
“Call me Charley always if you will, and let us be true friends, my dear girl, instead of lovers,” he pleaded, with outstretched hands.
Rosalind placed her cold little hand eagerly in his, and answered:
“This is very sudden, and very hard on me, Charley, because I have loved you dearly for a year, and looked forward with joy to a life spent by your side. Before I promise to release you, grant me one favor.”
“Name it, Rosalind.”
“You have not asked your new love yet, and you are not sure she will love you in return?”
“I am reasonably sure,” he said, with the confidence of a sanguine mind.
“How long will it be before you can have your answer?”
“A week—perhaps two,” he replied, suddenly remembering that Berry was yet precariously ill.
“Then this is what I ask you, Charley, dear—yes, still dear, despite the wound in my heart. Keep our secret until you have your new love’s acceptance of your suit. Let us remain to the world lovers still, until you are plighted to another. Then I will release you from your vow.”
“It shall be as you say,” he answered, so grateful for her promise of release, that he did not think it mattered going on with the farce of an engagement a while longer.
“If it will make it any less painful for you, Rose, you can say you jilted me, you know. I shouldn’t mind at all!”
“Thank you—I will think it over,” she answered dejectedly, and the last glimpse he had of her was just as she hid her face in her hands again and sat silent, like a statue of despair.
He went immediately down to the keeper’s cottage, as he did every day, for news of Berry, and his heart leaped with joy when Mrs. Cline told him there was a marked change for the better, and the invalid had begun to take notice and to try to talk a little.
“When the doctor came this morning he was so pleased with the improvement, he said she was quite sure to get well now,” she said.
“Thank Heaven!” he cried fervently, and after a momentary hesitation, he added earnestly:
“Mrs. Cline, do me one favor, and I will never forget it. If that fellow, Weston, comes to see her again, do not admit him to see the patient. Tell him she is improving, but can see no one.”
“I’ll do as you say, sir, but Lor’ bless you, some of them actor folks comes here every day to ask about her.”
“But remember, I wish to be the first one admitted to her presence when she is able to see any one,” he replied.