A Mad Marriage by May Agnes Fleming (best ebook reader android .TXT) đ
- Author: May Agnes Fleming
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Dynely, much as he loves and venerates her, or rather because of that
great love and veneration, he stands in awe of her. But France
sympathizes with him, more than ever in these later days, and listens
dreamily, while Mr. Dennison pours forth the story of his love.
âWhat a good fellow you are, Terry,â she says now regretfully. âIt is a
pity to throw you away upon any insipid little country girl. (I know by
her photograph she is insipid.) I have half a mind to fall in love with
you myself.â
âOh, but donât, please!â says Terry, piteously; âlet it be half a mind,
donât make it a whole one. If you insisted upon it, I should knock under
at onceâwomen can always do what they please with me, and then two
clever people should never marryâit doesnât work; besides, you belong
to Eric.â
âDo I?â France responds, gravely. âI am not so sure of that. Eric seems
in no hurry to come and claim his belongings.â
âItâs a shame,â says Terry; âand so Lady Dynely has just been saying.
Sheâs awfully angry. Eric deserves to be shot.â
ââThe absent are always in the wrong,ââ Miss Forrester quotes. âI donât
see why my lady should be angry with EricâIâm not. Let the poor boy
enjoy himself. But, for you, Terry, you shall go down to Lincolnshire
to-morrow, if you wish it. It is too bad, and too selfish of us, to keep
you tied to our apron-strings when the prettiest and sweetest girl in
England is pining for you among the Lincolnshire fens and marshes. I
shall speak to Lady Dynely, at once. Yours is the most aggravated case
of âcruelty to animalsâ on record.â
âNo, no! It may annoy Lady DynelyâI would not for the world. My affairs
can wait,â Terry remonstrates in alarm.
âSo can ours. I am very fond of my lady, but I donât worship the ground
she walks on, as some people do. I shall ask her.â
Miss Forrester kept her word. She sought out Lady Dynely, and broached
the subject at once.
âLady Dynely, canât you let Terry off duty for a couple of weeks? The
poor fellow is falling a prey âto green and yellow melancholy,â and the
âworm iâ the bud is preying on his damask cheek.â In plain English, heâs
in love; and now that your generosity has given him something to live
on, he naturally wants to go and tell herâwants to lay his hand and
fortune at her feet, and do the âcome, share my cottage, gentle maidâ
sort of thing, you know.â
France spoke lightly. Lady Dynely laid down her penâshe was writing
that indignant protest to Master Ericâand looked up with a face that
turned to the color of ashes.
âWants to marry!âTerry!â was all she could say.
âNaturally. We have made him our âfetch and carryâ spaniel, I know; but
he is a man for all that. We have treated him as though he were a page
or footman; but he is a lieutenant of dragoons, and nearly twenty-four
years old. Not a Methuselah, certainly, but old enough to take unto
himself a wife if he wishes to perpetrate that sort of imbecility.â
âTerry! a wife!â Then Lady Dynely sits still, and over the gray pallor
of her face a look of anger flashes. âIt is absurd!âit is preposterous!
Terry with a wife! Why, he is only a grown-up baby himself. I will not
hear of it.â
âHe is more than three years older than Eric,â says Miss Forrester, her
eyes kindling at this injustice. âWhen it is Ericâs lordly will to take
a wife, you wonât put in that plea of youth, will you?â
âThe cases are altogether differentâthere is no comparison,â says Lady
Dynely, coldly. âWho is the girl?â
âShe is one of the Miss Higginses. There are nine Miss Higginses,â says
France, with a slight shudder. âShe is the youngest but one, poor thing.
Terry and she have been in love with each other ever since they ate pap
out of the same bowl and wore pinafores. And I think it is a little too
bad, Lady Dynely,â concludes France, indignantly, âthat poor Terry canât
have a wife if he wants one.â
âSend Terry here,â is Lady Dynelyâs answer. âI will speak to him on this
subject.â
âAnd donât be too hard on the poor fellow,â pleads France, imploringly.
âOh, Lady Dynely, he loves you as it is the fate of few mothers to be
loved. So well that I believe if you order him to give up this girl, to
go away and turn Trappist, he will obey you. As you are strong, be
mercifulâdonât be hard on Terry.â
Then she goes, and Terry comes. He looks uncommonly foolish and guilty,
much as he used to do when caught apple-stealing down in Lincolnshire
long ago, and was called up before the vicar to answer for his crime.
Her ladyship is still pale, very pale, her lips are set, her eyes look
anxious, the hands that are folded in her lap tremble nervously at his
approach.
âWhat is this, Terry?â she asks, and her clear voice is not steady. âIs
it a jest of Franceâs, or do you really wish toââ
âMarry Crystal Higgins? Yes, Lady Dynely, with your permission,â Terry
answers, looking up firmly enough.
âYou really wish it?â
âI really wish it, with all my heart.â
âSilly boy,â Lady Dynely says, âwhat folly is this? You are too young.
Oh, yes, Terry, you areâyou are ten years younger than your yearsâin
spite of all you have lived in the world, you are as ignorant of it as a
girl in her teens. I donât object to that; I like you the better for it
indeed. But you are not up to the rïżœle of Benedick, the married man. And
besides, the income that is sufficient for you, with your simple habits,
will not suffice for a wife and family. I canât conceive of you in love,
Terry, you who treat all the young ladies of your acquaintance with an
indifference as unflattering as I am sure it is sincere.â
âI love Crystal,â is Terryâs answer, and his blue eyes light. âI have
loved her pretty much, I think, since I saw her first.â
âAnd sheââ
âOh, I donât knowâshe likes me, that I am sure of. She is only
seventeen, Lady Dynely, and knows nothing of the world beyond the
vicarage, the village, and her native marshes. And yet I think when I
ask her to be my wife she will not refuse.â
âYou mean to ask her then?â
âWith your permission, Lady Dynely.â
She lays her hand on his head; her lips tremble.
âYou are a good boy, Terry; it would be difficult to be hard to you if
one wished. But I donât wish. I only ask thisâpostpone your visit for a
little, donât ask her to be your wife untilâuntil Eric comes.â
He lifts her hand and kisses it.
âIt shall be as you please,â he answers.
âUntil Eric comes,â she repeats, and that grayish pallor is on her face,
that troubled look in her eyes. âI have something to tell himâsomething
to tell you. When that is told you shall do as you pleaseâyou will be
absolutely your own master thenceforth.â
âYou are not angry, Lady Dynely?â Terry asks, in a troubled tone.
âAngry! with you? Ah, no, Terry; you have never given me cause for anger
in your life.â She sighs heavily; she thinks of one, as dear to her as
the very heart beating in her bosom, who has given her cause for anger
often enough.
âIt is a compact between us. You will wait until I have told you what I
have to tell before you speak?â
âI will wait,â he answers. And then, with a troubled, mystified look on
his face he goes out. âSomething to tell; what can it be?â Mr. Dennison
wonders. He is not good at guessing; mysteries have never come near his
simple life, and they sorely perplex and upset him when they do. For
Lady Dynely, she drops her face in her hands with a passionate cry.
âI have put it off so long,â she sobs, âand now the day is hereâis
here.â
âWell,â says Miss Forrester, imperiously, âhas your superior officer
given you leave, Mr. Dennison?â
Terry explainsâstammering a good deal. Not just yetâhe is to wait
until Eric comes home.
âUntil Eric comes home! Grant me patience!â is Miss Forresterâs prayer.
âNow what under the sun has Eric to do with it? If Lady Dynely could,
the whole world would revolve at Ericâs pleasure, the sun only shine
when it was his sovereign will. I need not ask, Mr. Dennison, if you
mean to obey?â
âYou need not, indeed, Miss Forrester,â he answers, coolly; âI mean to
obey.â
She looks at him curiouslyâalmost patheticallyâand yet with admiration
too.
âI think better of my fellow-men, Terry, since I have known you. You
give me an exalted idea of human nature. I thought gratitude an extinct
virtueâwent out with the dark agesâyou teach me my mistake. You love
and venerate Lady Dynely in a way that is simply wonderful.â
âShe has done so much for me,â Terry says, âno gratitude can ever repay
her.â
âYours will, donât be afraid. You will have chance enough of showing
it.â Miss Forrester has thrice the worldly wisdom of poor Terry. âHow
was it all? Your relationship to the Dynely family seems somehow such a
hazy affair. What was your life like before she came for you?â
But on this point Terryâs recollections are misty. A troubled look
crosses his faceâit was all wretchedness and squalor that he vaguely
remembers, also that those with whom his early years were spent were
kind to him, in a rude sort of way. Out of this blurred picture, the
rainy day upon which she entered their hovel, like a very angel of
light, with her fair face and rich garments, stands out clear. She came,
and all his life changed. No mother could do more for a son than she had
done for him.
âCould they not?â Miss Forrester says, rather doubtfully, thinking how
differently the lives of Eric and Terry are ordered. But she will not
throw cold water on his enthusiasm. It is beautiful in its belief and
simplicity, this worship of Lady Dynely in a world where gratitude is
the exception, not the rule.
âBut why did she do it? And what claim have you really upon her?â she
asks.
Here Terry is âfar wideâ again. His father was some sort of relation of
the late Lord Dynely, that much her ladyship told the Vicar of Starling,
and that meagre scrap is all Mr. Dennison knows of himself or his
history.
âCurious,â France says, thoughtfully, looking at him. âLady Dynely is
the last to adopt a ragged child through a whim and do for him as she
has done for Terry. There is something on the cards we donât see, and
something I fancy not quite fair.â
So all thought of going down into Lincolnshire and making the eighth
Miss Higgins blessed for life, was given up by Mr. Dennison for the
present, and he resumed his âfetch and carryâ duties as France called
them, and dutifully escorted his two lady friends everywhere. Even down
to the Brompton studio, which bored him most of all, for he didnât care
for pictures, and Mr. Locksleyâa good fellow enoughâwas monopolized by
the ladies and had no time
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