Marion Arleigh's Penance by Charlotte Mary Brame (freenovel24 .TXT) 📖

the glorious eastern skies.

While she sits there, with that despairing prayer rising from the depths of her despairing heart, we will tell the story of Marian Arleigh's penance.


CHAPTER II.


"You cannot be cruel. You cannot think it is wrong to meet me. My whole life, with everything in it, belongs to you. If you told me to lie down here and die at your feet, I should do so and smile. Why do you say it is wrong, Marion?"

A lovely, child-like face was raised to the speaker.

"I do not know. I have a vague idea that anything requiring secrecy must be wrong. Is it not so?"

He laughed.

"No, sweet. What would the great diplomatists of the world say to such a theory? Rather try to believe that what is stolen is sweet."

She smiled, but the anxious expression still lingered on her lovely young face. He noticed it.

"As a rule, Marion, you are quite right. Concealments are odious. But there are exceptions--this is one--I love you; but I am only a poor artist, struggling to make a name. You, sweet, are rich and beautiful. From your high estate you smile upon me as a queen might smile on a subject. You are a true heroine. You are content 'to lose the world for love.'"

"I am content," said the girl, with a little sigh of supreme happiness; "but I wish it were all open and straightforward. I wish you would go to my guardian and tell him you love me. Then tell Miss Carleton. Indeed, she would not be angry."

"Do you know what would happen if I did as you advise, Marion?" he asked.

"Nothing would happen," she replied; "and they would be pleased to see me happy."

"You have to learn some of the world's lessons yet," he said. "If I were to go to Lord Ridsdale and say to him, 'My Lord, I love your ward and she loves me,' do you know what he would do?"

"No," she replied, slowly.

"He would send for you at once, and take such measures as would prevent me from ever seeing you again. If I were to tell him, Marion, we should be parted forever. Could you bear that, darling?"

"No," she replied, "I could not, Allan. If you think so, we--we will keep our secret a little longer."

"Thank you," he said, gratefully, kissing the little white hand clasped in his. "I knew you would not be cruel, Marion. You are so heroic and grand--so unlike other girls; you would not darken my solitary life for an absurd scruple--you would not refuse to see me, when the sight of you is the only sunbeam that cheers my life."

The beautiful face brightened at his words.

"You will write to me, Marion--and, darling, my heart lives on your words--they are ever present with me. When I read one of your letters it seems to me your voice is whispering, and that whisper makes the only music that cheers my day. Tell me in your letters once, and once again, that you will be my wife, that you will love me, and never care for any one else."

"I have told you so," she said; "but if the words please you, I will tell you over and over again, as you say. You know I love you, Allan."

"I know you are an angel!" cried the young man. "In all the wide world there is none like you."

Then he clasped the little white hands more tightly in his own, and whispered sweet words to her that brought a bright flush to her face and a love light to her eyes. She drooped her head with the coy, pretty shyness of a bird, listening to words that seemed to her all poetry and music.

It was a pretty love scene. The lovers stood at the end of an old-fashioned orchard; the fruit hung ripe on the trees--golden-brown pears and purple plums, the grass under foot was thick and soft, the sun had set, the dew was falling, and the birds had gone to rest.

The girl, standing under the trees, with downcast, blushing face and bright, clear eyes, was lovely as a poet's dream. She was not more than seventeen, and looked both young and childlike for that age. She had a face fair as a summer's morning, radiant with youth and happiness. Greuze might have painted her and immortalized her. She had a delicate color that was like the faint flush one sees inside a rose. She had eyes of the same beautiful blue as the purple heartsease, and great masses of golden-brown hair that fell in rich waves on her neck and shoulders.

She was patrician from the crown of her dainty head to the little feet; the slender, girlish figure was full of grace and symmetry, the white, rounded throat and beautiful shoulders were fit models for a sculptor. She had pretty white hands, with a soft, rose-leaf flush on the fingers. She was a lovely girl, fair, high-bred and elegant, and she gave promise of a most superb and magnificent womanhood. Such was Marion Arleigh on this June evening. The young man by her side was handsome after a certain style; the impression his face left upon every one was that he was not to be trusted; his dark eyes were not frank and clear, the thin lips were shrewd, with lines about them that betokened cruelty; it was a face from which children shrank instinctively, and women as a rule did not love. They stood side by side under the shade of an elder tree. Plainly as patrician was written on her beautiful face and figure, plebeian was imprinted on his. He was tall, but there was no high-bred grace, no ease of manner, no courteous dignity such as distinguishes the true English gentleman. His face expressed passion, but half a dozen meaner emotions were there as well. None were perceptible to the girl by his side. She thought him perfection and nothing else.

How comes Marion Arleigh, the heiress of Hanton, ward of Lord Ridsdale, one of the proudest men in England, and pupil of Miss Carleton, to be alone in the sweet, soft eveningtide with Allan Lyster, whose name was not of the fairest repute among men?

If Lord Ridsdale had known it, his anger would have been without bounds; if Miss Carleton had guessed it, she would have been too shocked ever to have admitted Miss Arleigh in her doors again. How came she there? It was the old story of girlish imprudence, of girlish romance and folly, of a vivid imagination and bright, warm poetical fancy wrongly influenced and led astray. Much may be forgiven her, for lovely Marion Arleigh, one of the richest heiresses in England, was an orphan. No mother's love had taught her wisdom. She had no memory of a mother's gentle warning, or sweet and tender wisdom. Her mother died when she was born, and her father, John Arleigh, of Hanton, did not long survive his wife. He left his child to the care of Lady Ridsdale--his sister--but she died when Marion was four years old, and Lord Ridsdale, not knowing what better to do, sent his little ward to school. He thought first of having a governess at home for her; that would have necessitated a chaperon, and for that he was not inclined.

"Send her to school," was the advice given him by all his lady friends, and Lord Ridsdale followed it, as being the safest and wisest plan yet suggested to him. She was sent first to a lady's school at Brighton, then to Paris, with Lady Livingstone's daughters, then to Miss Carleton's, and Miss Carleton was by universal consent considered the most efficient finishing governess in England.

Marion was very clever; she was romantic to a fault; she idealized everything and every one with whom she came into contact. She had a poet's soul, loving most dearly all things bright and beautiful; she was very affectionate, very impressionable, able, generous with a queenly lavishness, truthful, noble. Had she been trained by a careful mother, Marion Arleigh would have been one of the noblest of women; but the best of school training cannot compensate for the wise and loving discipline of home. She grew up a most accomplished and lovely girl; the greatest fault that could be found with her was that she was terribly unreal. She knew nothing of the practical part of life. She idealized every one so completely that she never really understood any one.

Lord Ridsdale wondered often what he was to do with this beautiful and gifted girl when her school days were ended.

"She must be introduced to the world then," he thought; "and I fervently hope she'll soon be married."

But as her coming to Ridsdale House would cause so great an alteration in his way of life, he deferred that event as long as it was possible to do so.

When Adelaide Lyster came as a governess-pupil to Miss Carleton's school Marion Arleigh was just sixteen. Miss Lyster was not long before she knew the rank and social importance of her beautiful young pupil.

"When you have the world at your feet," she would say to her sometimes, "I shall ask you a favor."

"Ask me now!" said Marion, and then Miss Lyster told her how she had a brother--a genius--an artist--whose talent equaled that of Raphael, but that he was unknown to the world and had no one to take an interest in his fortunes.

"One word from you when you are a great lady will be of more value to my brother than even the praise of critics," she would say; and Miss Arleigh, flattered by the speech, would promise that word should be spoken. Adelaide Lyster spent long hours in talking of her brother--of his genius, his struggles, his thirst for appreciation; the portrait she drew of him was so beautiful that Marion Arleigh longed to know him. Her wish was gratified at last. The drawing master who for many years had attended the school died, and Adelaide besought Miss Carleton to engage her brother. The astute lady was at first unwilling. Allan Lyster was young, and she did not think a young master at all suitable. But Adelaide represented to her that, although young, he was highly gifted--he could teach well, and his terms were lower than most masters.

"There could be no danger," she said, "Miss Carleton's pupils were all rich and well born--the young artist poor and unknown. They were all educated with one idea, namely, that the end and aim of their existence was to marry well, was to secure a title, if possible--diamonds, an opera box, a country house and town mansion. With that idea engraven so firmly on heart, soul and mind, it was not possible that there could be any danger in receiving a few drawing lessons from a penniless, unknown artist like Allan Lyster."

So Miss Carleton, for once laying aside her usual caution, engaged him, and Adelaide Lyster told her favorite pupil as soon as the engagement was made. The governess-pupil had laid her plans well. On her first entrance into that high school where every girl had either riches, beauty or high birth, Adelaide Lyster had sworn to herself to make the best use of her opportunities, and to secure wealth at least for this her beloved brother. Allan should marry one of the girls, and then his fortune in life would be made. After passing them all in review she decided on Marion Arleigh. Not only was she the wealthiest heiress, but in her case there