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April's Lady: A Novel

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<h2>CHAPTER XX.</h2> <div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> "'I thought love had been a joyous thing,' quoth my uncle Toby.'"</div> <div class="stanza"></div> <div class="stanza"> "He hath a heart as sound as a bell, and his tongue is the clapper. For what his heart thinks his tongue speaks."</div> </div> <hr style="width: 65%;" /> "More?" says Dysart startled by her expression, and puzzled as well. "Yes!" hurriedly. "This!" The very nervousness that is consuming her throws fire into her eyes and speech. "During all these long twelve months I shall be free. Quite free. You forgot to put that in! You must remember that! If—if I should, after all this thinking, decide on not having anything to do with you—you," vehemently, "will have no right to reproach me. Remember," says she going up to him and laying her hand upon his arm while the blood receding from her face leaves her very white; "remember should such a thing occur—and it is very likely," slowly, "I warn you of that—you are not to consider yourself wronged or aggrieved in any way." "Why should you talk to me in this way?" begins he, aggrieved now at all events. "You must recollect," feverishly, "that I have made you no promise. Not one. I refuse even to look upon this matter as a serious thing. I tell you honestly," her dark eyes gleaming with nervous excitement, "I don't believe I ever shall so look at it. After all," pausing, "you will do well if you now put an end to this farce between us; and tell me to take myself and my dull life out of yours forever." "I shall never tell you that," in a low tone. "Well, well," impatiently; "I have warned you. It will not be my fault if——O! it is foolish of you!" she blurts out suddenly. "I have told you I don't understand myself: and still you waste yourself—you throw yourself away. In the end you will be disappointed in me, if not in one way, then in another. It hurts me to think of that. There is time still; let us be friends—friends——" Her hands are tightly clasped, she looks at him with a world of entreaty in her beautiful eyes. "Friends, Felix!" breathes she softly. "Let things rest as they are, I beseech you," says he, taking her hand and holding it in a tight grasp. "The future—who can ever say what that great void will bring us. I will trust to it; and if only loss and sorrow be my portion, still——As for friendship, Joyce; whatever happens I shall be your friend and lover." "Well—you quite know," says the girl, almost sullenly. "Quite. And I accept the risk. Do not be angry with me, my beloved." He lifts the hand he holds and presses it to his lips, wondering always at the coldness of it. "You are free, Joyce; you desire it so, and I desire it, too. I would not hamper you in any way." "I should not be able to endure it, if—afterward—I thought you were reproaching me," says she, with a little weary smile. "Be happy about that," says he: "I shall never reproach you." He is silent for a moment; her last speech has filled him with thoughts that presently grow into extremely happy ones: unless—unless she liked him—cared for him, in some decided, if vague manner, would his future misery be of so much importance to her? Oh! surely not! A small flood of joy flows over him. A radiant smile parts his lips. The light of a coming triumph that shall gird and glorify his whole life illumines his eyes. She regarding him grows suddenly uneasy. "You—you fully understand," says she, drawing back from him. "Oh, you have made me do that," says he, but his radiant smile still lingers. "Then why," mistrustfully, "do you look so happy?" She draws even further away from him. It is plain she resents that happiness. "Is there not reason?" says he. "Have you not let me speak, and having spoken, do you not still let me linger near you? It is more than I dared hope for! Therefore, poor as is my chance, I rejoice now. Do not forbid me. I may have no reason to rejoice in the future. Let me, then, have my day." "It grows very late," says Miss Kavanagh abruptly. "Let us go home." Silently they turn and descend the hill. Halfway down he pauses and looks backward. "Whatever comes of it," says he, "I shall always love this spot. Though, if the year's end leave me desolate, I hope I shall never see it again." "It is unlucky to rejoice too soon," says she, in a low whisper. "Oh! don't say that word 'Rejoice.' How it reminds me of you. It ought to belong to you. It does. You should have been called 'Rejoice' instead of 'Joyce'; they have cut off half your name. To see you is to feel new life within one's veins." "Ah! I said you didn't know me," returns she sadly. <hr style='width: 45%;' /> Meantime the hours have flown; evening is descending. It is all very well for those who, traveling up and down romantic hills, can find engrossing matters for conversation in their idle imaginings of love, or their earnest belief therein, but to the ordinary ones of the earth, mundane comforts are still of some worth. Tea, the all powerful, is now holding high revelry in the library at the Court. Round the cosy tables, growing genial beneath the steam of the many old Queen Anne "pots," the guests are sitting singly or in groups. "What delicious little cakes!" says Lady Swansdown, taking up a smoking morsel of cooked butter and flour from the glowing tripod beside her. "You like them?" says Lady Baltimore in her slow, earnest way. "So does Joyce. She thinks they are the nicest cakes in the world. By the by, where is Joyce?" "She went out for a walk at twenty minutes after two," says Beauclerk. He has pulled out his watch and is steadily consulting it. "And it is now twenty minutes after five," says Lady Swansdown, maliciously, who detests Beauclerk and who has read his relations with Joyce as clear as a book. "How she must have enjoyed herself!" "Yes; but where?" says Lady Baltimore anxiously. Joyce has been left in her charge, and, apart from that, she likes the girl well enough, to be uneasy about her when occasion arises. "With whom would be a more appropriate question," says Dicky Browne, who, as usual, is just where he ought not to be. "Oh, I know where she is," cries a little, shrill voice from the background. It comes from Tommy, and from that part of the room where Tommy and Mabel and little Bertie are having a game behind the window curtains. Blocks, dolls, kitchens, farm yards, ninepins—all have been given to them as a means of keeping them quiet. One thing only has been forgotten: the fact that the human voice divine is more attractive to them, more replete with delightful mystery, fuller of enthralling possibilities than all the toys that ever yet were made. "Thomas, are you fully alive to the responsibilities to which you pledge yourself?" demands Mr. Browne severely. "What?" says Tommy. "Do you pledge yourself to declare where Miss Kavanagh is now?" "Is it Joyce?" says Tommy, coming forward and standing undaunted in his knickerbockers and an immaculate collar that defies suspicion. "Yes—Joyce," says Mr. Browne, who never can hold his tongue. "Well, I know." Tommy pauses, and an unearthly silence falls on the assembled company. Half the county is present, and as Tommy, in the character of reconteur, is widely known and deservedly dreaded, expectation spreads itself among his audience. Lady Baltimore moves uneasily, and for once Dicky Browne feels as if he should like to sink into his boot. "She's up on the top of the hill with Mr. Dysart," says Tommy, and no more. Lady Baltimore sighs with relief, and Mr. Browne feels now as if he should like to give Tommy something. "How do you know?" asks Beauclerk, as though he finds it impossible to repress the question. "Because I saw her there," says Tommy, "when Mabel and me was coming here. I like Mr. Dysart, don't you?" addressing Beauclerk specially. "He is a very kind sort of man. He gave me half a crown." "For what, Tommy?" asks Baltimore, idly, to whom Tommy is an unfailing joy. "To go away and leave him alone with Joyce," says Tommy, with awful distinctness. Tableau! Lady Baltimore lets her spoon fall into her saucer, making a little quick clatter. Everybody tries to think of something to say; nobody succeeds. Mr. Browne, who is evidently choking, is mercifully delivered by beneficent nature from a sudden death. He gives way to a loud and sonorous sneeze. "Oh, Dicky! How funny you do sneeze," says Lady Swansdown. It is a safety valve. Everybody at once affects to agree with her, and universal laughter makes the room ring. "Tommy, I think it is time for you and Mabel to go home," says Lady Baltimore. "I promised your mother to send you back early. Give her my love, and tell her I am so sorry she couldn't come to me to-day, but I suppose last night's fatigue was too much for her." "'Twasn't that," says Tommy; "'twas because cook——" "Yes, yes; of course. I know," says Lady Baltimore, hurriedly, afraid of further revelations. "Now, say good-bye, and, Bertie, you can go as far as the first gate with them." The children make their adieus, Tommy reserving Dicky Browne for a last fond embrace. "Good-bye, old man! So-long!" "What's that?" says Tommy, appealing to Beauclerk for information. "What's what?" says Beauclerk, who isn't in his usual amiable mood. "What's the meaning of that thing Dicky said to me?" "'So-long?' Oh that's Browne's charming way of saying good-bye." "Oh!" says Tommy, thoughtfully. He runs it through his busy brain, and brings it out at the other end satisfactorily translated. "I know," says he: "Go long! That's what he meant! But I think," indignantly, "he needn't be rude, anyway." The children have hardly gone when Joyce and Dysart enter the room. "I hope I'm not dreadfully late," cries Joyce, carelessly, taking off her cap, and giving her head a little light shake, as if to make her pretty soft hair fall into its usual charming order. "I have no idea what the time is." "Broken your watch, Dysart?" says Beauclerk, in a rather nasty tone. "Come and sit here, dearest, and have your tea," says Lady Baltimore, making room on the lounge beside her for Joyce, who has grown a little red. "It is so warm here," says she, nervously, that one remark of Beauclerk's having, somehow, disconcerted her. "If—if I might——" "No, no; you mustn't go upstairs for a little while," says Lady Baltimore, with kindly decision. "But you may go into the conservatory if you like," pointing to an open door off the library, that leads into a bower of sweets. "It is cooler there." "Far cooler," says Beauclerk, who has followed Joyce with a sort of determination in his genial air. "Let me take you there, Miss Kavanagh." It is impossible to refuse. Joyce, coldly, almost disdainfully and with her head held higher than usual, skirts the groups that line the walls on the western side of the room and disappears with him into the conservatory. <hr style="width: 65%;" /> <div style="break-after:column;"></div>

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