The Hoyden by Margaret Wolfe Hungerford (best value ebook reader TXT) 📖

HOW TITA HEARS OF THE ARRIVAL OF ANOTHER GUEST.


Tita, going down the stairs after her interview with Margaret, meets Randal in the hall below.

"You look rather down on your luck!" says he.

"My looks belie me, then," says she stoutly. "But you--what is the matter with you?"

"Ruin!" says Mr. Gower tragically. "My looks do _not_ belie me."

"Good gracious, Randal!"

"Ruin stares me in the face," says he, "look where I will."

"Very rude of it," says Tita, with an irrepressible laugh. "One should never stare people out of countenance. You should speak to Ruin."

"Oh, it's all very fine making a joke of it!" says Mr. Gower, who is, however, laughing too.

"Where are you going now?" asks Tita, as he moves away from her towards the hall door.

"'Anywhere--anywhere out of the world,'" quotes he, with a dismal shake of the head.

"Is it so serious as all that?" cries Tita. "Look here, Randal, wait a moment, can't you? I have a last request to make. If you _are_ bent on dying, do it; but do it nicely--be picturesque: something original, and no blood. Promise me there will be no blood!"

"'So young, and so untender!'" says Gower, gazing at her with deep reproach.

He seems full of quotations.

"But where are you going, really?"

"Out."

He pauses.

"Not out of your mind, I hope?"

"Don't be too sure."

"Well, wait, and I'll go with you," says she, glancing at the stand in the hall where her garden hat is generally to be found.

"Not to-day," says Gower; "you mustn't come with me to-day. I'm going out on business."

"Business!"

Mr. Gower and business seem so very far apart.

"Gruesome business," repeats he, dropping his voice to a whisper. "I'm going with my aunt--'my dear, unmarried aunt.' It's my last chance. I shall do or die to-day, or else"--an afterthought striking him--_"she_ will."

"Where are you going with her?"

"I am taking her," says Mr. Gower, looking darkly round him, "for a row on the lake. She says she dotes on lakes. I don't think she will dote on your lake when she returns, if"--with a murderous eye--"she ever does."

"Are you going to drown her?" asks Tita, catching him by the arm.

She is laughing still.

"I hope not--I _hope_ not," says Gower gloomily. "Circumstances _may_ be favourable. We must pray for the best."

He tears himself away from her with a profound sigh, and she is still standing, laughing in the hall, when the library door opens, and Rylton comes into the hall.

Her laughter dies quickly. Rylton, after a swift, careless glance at her, goes towards the letter-rack and places a letter in it, then goes back to the library. As he reaches the door, however, he hears little running feet behind him.

"Don't go--don't go," says Tita. She has laid one hand upon his arm, and is looking up at him. "You are angry with me, and----"

"Angry? No!"

"You are--you know you are! And you want to scold me, and----"

"You are quite mistaken," says Rylton, shaking off her hand gently, but with decision. "I have no desire whatever to scold you. Why should I?"

He goes past her into the library, but she follows him--a lovely little penitent--with lowered eyes.

"Do scold me!" says she. "I was wrong; and I did it on purpose, too."

"On purpose?"

"Yes," hanging her pretty head; "I did it to annoy you! You were so--so nasty about Tom the other night--do you remember? So I wanted to make you _really mad_ this time--just for revenge, you know; but, honestly, I didn't mean to be late for breakfast."

"Didn't you?" drearily.

"No, I didn't; you _must_ believe that." She goes nearer to him, and slips her hand through his arm. "Maurice!" whispers she. He makes her no answer. She moves even closer to him, and, leaning her little head against his shoulder, looks up at him. _"Do_ scold me!" says she again. The tender, childish voice touches him; it goes home to his heart--the heart that is so full of another. He looks down at her, and, stooping, lays his lips on hers. It can hardly be called a kiss; yet it satisfies _her_, to whom, as yet, kissing means so little. "Now I am forgiven," cries she triumphantly. "Is _that _your scolding?"

"I told you I couldn't scold you," says he.

As he says this he sighs heavily.

"What a sigh!" She pushes him from her with both hands. "After all, I believe you hate me!"

"No, I don't," says Rylton.

He smiles. After all, why not be friends with her? Had he explained that indifference was the word she should have used for hate, would she be any the wiser?

"No--really?" She has flung herself into a chair, and is looking at him with her hands clasped behind her head. "Well," thoughtfully, "I don't hate you, either. That's a blessing, isn't it?"

"A great one."

He feels a little piqued, however, at the nonchalance of her manner. Why should it occur to her that she might hate him? She has, unknowingly certainly, but unquestionably, blocked his way to the fulfilment of his desires, but he---- He changes colour; is he standing in _her_ way, then?

"What was the letter you were reading this morning when I came in?"

"A letter?"

He brings himself back to the present with an effort.

"Yes. It was so interesting," says she, making him a little malicious grimace, "that you could not spare a moment from the reading of it to acknowledge my presence."

"It was from my mother."

"No wonder it was so engrossing," says Tita naughtily. "Well----"

"It isn't well; it is ill," returns he, laughing. "She says she is coming to stay with us for a week or so on her way to Lady Sarah's."

"Why is she coming?"

"For our sins, I suppose. I really don't know any other reason." He casts an anxious glance at her. "I am afraid that you won't care about it."

"Well, I shan't," says Tita frankly; "but if she wants to come, there is nothing more to be said. What _I_ am afraid of is that Marian won't like it."

"Marian?"

"Yes, Marian. It struck me that she was not very fond of your mother. Was I right?"

"I could not possibly answer for Marian."

"No?"

"Certainly not."

"Yet I thought," with a swift glance, "that you were the one person in the world who could have told me all about her."

"You were wrong, then. I have known Marian, and--liked her; but I think no human being can answer for another's likes and dislikes."

"Perhaps so." She looks down thoughtfully. "When is your mother coming?"

"To-morrow. I shall run up to town and meet her, and bring her on."

"You will be back to-morrow night?"

"Well, she seems to think so; but I expect she will be tired, and stay in town until next morning. In the meantime," smiling at her, "I leave the house and the guests and everything in your charge."

"How delightful!" cries Tita, clapping her hands.

Rylton turns away.


CHAPTER IV.

HOW TITA'S SOUL AT LAST IS STIRRED; AND HOW HER HAPPINESS IS THREATENED AND HERSELF SET AT NAUGHT; AND HOW MINNIE HESCOTT SPEAKS.


"Such a day to go out on the lake!" says Mrs. Bethune, with a contemptuous curve of her lip. "Really, that old woman must be as mad as she is disagreeable."

"Well, she could hardly be _more_ so," says Mrs. Chichester.

They are all in the oriel chamber, the windows of which look upon the lake, and now they can see Randall and Miss Gower rowing apparently in the utmost peace across it.

"She has a perfect passion for boating," says Margaret.

"So I should say. I dare say it seems to her pretty and idyllic."

"Her passions ought to be at a low ebb by this time," says Mrs. Bethune with a sneer. She has suffered many things at the old maid's hands.

"Well, let us pray Randal will bring her home in safety," says Tita, laughing.

"My _dear_ Lady Rylton!"

"Heavens--what a prayer!" exclaims Mrs. Chichester.

"Let us say it backwards," says captain Marryatt, which is considered such a wonderful departure for him, such a stroke of wit on his part, that everyone laughs in the most encouraging fashion.

"You'll be a reigning wit yet, if you don't look out," says Mrs. Chichester.

"As you are a reigning toast," responds he, quite fired by the late ovation.

"Oh, goodness!" says Mrs. Chichester, shrugging up her thin shoulders and casting a queer glance round her from under her brows; "let us take him away quickly, before he cuts himself with his own smartness."

"Yes. Come down to the library, it's warmer there," says Tita. She leads the way to the door, and when at it looks back over her shoulder at her husband. "Are you coming, Maurice?"

"In a moment or two. I have a few letters to write first."

"And you?" says Tita, looking at Mrs. Bethune.

"I, too, have some letters to write," returns Marian.

Her tone is quite ordinary, but to the young girl gazing at her there seems something defiant in her eyes and her smile. What is it in the smile--a sort of hateful amusement.

Tita leaves the room. She goes out and down the spiral stairs quite collectedly, to all appearance, yet she is not aware for a moment that Margaret's hand is on her arm. For the first time--the first time in all her young and most innocent life--a sin has touched her soul. She has learned to hate--she as yet does not know why--but she knows she hates Marian Bethune.

As the door closes behind her and her guests, Rylton turns on Marian.

"Why did you say that? Why didn't you go?" says he.

His face is white as death. He cannot account to himself for the agitation that is consuming him.

"Why should I not say what is the truth?" returns she, her beautiful daring eyes full on his. "Why should I go? Does Lady Rylton demand that all her guests should be at her beck and call, morning, noon, and night?"

"She demands nothing," says Rylton.

The terrible truth of what he is saying goes home to him. What has she ever demanded, that poor child, who has given him her fortune, her life? Her little, sweet, half-pathetic face as she looked back at him from the doorway is before him. Her face is often before him now.

"She must be a fool, then," says Marian insolently. She takes a step nearer to him. "Don't let us talk of her. What is she to us?" cries she, in a low fierce tone that speaks of words held back for many days, words that have been scorching her, and must find sound at last. "Maurice! Maurice! how long is this to go on!" She takes a step nearer to him, and then, as if it is impossible to her to hold back any longer, she flings herself suddenly into his arms. "Maurice, speak to me. My love! My life!" Her words are low, dispirited, broken by little sobs.

Rylton presses her to him. It is an involuntary movement, the action of one who would succour