That Girl in Black; and, Bronzie

"Oh, dear no! Quite the contrary, Mai--Miss Ford is a great pet of hers. Gertrude was angry with me for not being civil to her," and he laughed.

"Not being civil to her," she repeated. "And you were falling in love with her? How do you mean?"

"That was afterwards. I was brutally uncivil to her at first. That's how it began somehow," he said, disconnectedly.

Mrs Selby felt utterly perplexed. Was he being taken in by a designing girl? It all sounded very inconsistent.

"Despard," she said after a little silence, "shall I try to find out all about her from Mrs Englewood? She would not refuse any information if it was for your sake."

He considered.

"Well, yes," he said, "perhaps you'd better."

"And--" she went on, "if all is satisfactory--"

"Well?"

"You will go through with it?"

"I--suppose so. Altogether satisfactory it can't be. I'm fairly well off as a bachelor, but that's a very different matter. And--Maddie--I should hate poverty."

"You would have no need to call it poverty," she said rather coldly.

"Well--well--I'm speaking comparatively of course," he replied, impatiently. "It would be what _I_ call poverty. And I am selfish, I know. The best of me won't come out under those circumstances. I've no right to marry, you see--that's what's been tormenting me."

"But if she likes to face it--would not that bring out the best of you?" said Mrs Selby hopefully, though in her heart rather shocked by his way of speaking.

"Perhaps--I can't say. But of course if she did--"

"And you are sure she would?" asked Madeline, suddenly awaking to the fact that Miss Ford's feelings in the matter had been entirely left out of the question.

Despard smiled.

"Do you mean am I sure she cares for me?" he said. "Oh, yes--as for that--"

"I don't like a girl who--who lets it be seen if she cares for a man," she said.

Mr Norreys turned upon her.

"Lets it be seen," he repeated angrily. "Maddie, you put things very disagreeably. Would I--tell me, is it likely that _I_ would take to a girl so utterly devoid of delicacy as your words sound? And is it so improbable that a girl would care for me?" He smiled in spite of himself, and Mrs Selby's answering smile as she murmured: "I did not mean that, you know," helped to smooth him down. "She did her best to make me think she detested me," he added. "But--"

"Ah, yes, but--" said his sister fondly. "Then it is settled, Despard," she went on. "I shall tackle Mrs Englewood in my own way. You can trust me. You don't know where Miss Ford is at present?" she added.

He shook his head despondently.

"Not the ghost of an idea. I didn't try to hear. I thought I didn't want to know, you see. But--Maddie," he added, half timidly, "you'll write at once?"

"As soon as I possibly can," she replied kindly, for glancing at him she saw that he looked really ill and worn. "And," she went on, "as my reward, you will go with me to the Densters' garden-party this afternoon. Charles can't, and I hate going alone. I don't know them-- it is their first year here, though everybody says they are very nice people."

"Oh, dear," said Despard. "Very well, Maddie. I must, I suppose."

"Then be ready at a quarter to four. I'll drive you in the pony-carriage," and Madeline disappeared through the glass door whence she had emerged.

"I wonder if she will write to-day," thought Mr Norreys, though he would have been ashamed to ask it. "I should like to know it's done--a sort of crossing the Rubicon. And it's a good while now since that last day I saw her. She was never quite so sweet as that day. Supposing I heard she was married?"

His heart seemed to stop beating at the thought, and he grew white, though there was no one to see. But he reassured himself. Few things were less likely. Portionless girls, however charming, don't marry so quickly nowadays.

Madeline's feelings were mingled. She was honestly and unselfishly glad of what she believed might be a real turning point towards good for Despard. Yet--"if only he had not chosen a girl quite so denuded of worldly advantages as she evidently is," she reflected. "For of course if she had either money or connection Mrs Englewood would not have kept it a secret. She is far too outspoken. I must beg her to tell everything she knows, not to be afraid of my mixing her name up in the matter in any way. When she sees that Charles and I do not disapprove she will feel less responsibility."

And it was with a comfortable sense of her own and "Charles's" unworldliness that Mrs Selby prepared to indite the important letter.

She saw little of her brother till the afternoon. He did not appear at luncheon, having left word that he had gone for a long walk.

"Provided only that he is not too late for the Densters'," thought Madeline, with a little sigh over the perversity of mankind.

But her fears were unfounded. At ten minutes to four Mr Norreys made his appearance in the hall, faultlessly attired, apologising with his usual courtesy, in which to his sister he never failed, for his five minutes' delay, and Mrs Selby, feeling pleased with herself outwardly and inwardly, for she was conscious both of looking well in a very pretty new bonnet, and of acting a truly high-minded part as a sister, seated herself in her place, with a glance of satisfaction at her companion.

"Everybody will be envying me," she said to herself, with a tiny sigh as she remembered former air-castles in Despard's behoof. "The Flores-Carter girls and Edith and Bertha Byder, indeed all the neighbourhood get quite excited if they know he's here. He might have had his choice of the best matches in this county, to my own knowledge, and there are several girls with money. Ah, well!"

The grounds seemed already fall of guests when the brother and sister drove up to the Densters' door. Mrs Selby was at once seized upon by some of her special cronies, and for half an hour or so Despard kept dutifully beside her, allowing himself to be introduced to any extent, doing his best to please his sister by responding graciously to the various attentions which were showered upon him. But he grew very tired of it all in a little while--a curious dreamy feeling began to come over him, born no doubt of the unwonted excitement of his conversation with Madeline that morning. He had gone a long walk in hopes of recovering his usual equanimity, but had only succeeded in tiring himself physically. The mere fact of having put in words to another the conflict of the last few months seemed to have given actual existence to that which he had by fits and starts been trying to persuade himself was but a passing fancy. And even to himself he could not have told whether he was glad or sorry that the matter had come to a point--had, as it were, been taken out of his own hands. For that Madeline had already written to Mrs Englewood he felt little doubt.

"Women are always in such a desperate hurry," he said to himself, which, all things considered, was surely most unreasonable. Nor could he have denied that it was so, for even as he made the reflection he began to calculate in how many, or how few rather, days they might look for an answer, and to speculate on the chances of Mrs Englewood's being acquainted with Maisie's present whereabouts.

"Maisie," he called her to himself, though he had somehow shrunk from telling the name to his sister. It was so sweet--so _like_ her, he repeated softly, though, truth to tell, sweetness was not the most conspicuous quality in our heroine. But Despard was honestly in love after all, as many better and many worse men have been before him, and will be again. And love of the best kind, which on the whole his was, is clairvoyant--he was not wrong about Maisie's real sweetness.

"I do care for her, as deeply, as thoroughly as ever a man cared for a woman. But I don't want to marry; it's against all my plans and ideas. I didn't want to fall in love either, for that matter. The whole affair upsets everything I had ever dreamt of."

He felt dreaming now--he had managed to leave his sister and her friends, absorbed in the excitement of watching a game of lawn tennis between the best players of the county, and had stolen by himself down some shady walks away from the sparkle and chatter of the garden-party. The quiet and dimness soothed him, but increased the strange unreal feeling, of which he had been conscious since the morning. He felt as if nothing that could happen would surprise him--he was actually, in point of fact, _not_ surprised, when at a turn in the path he saw suddenly before him, advancing towards him, her cloudy black drapery-- for she was in black as ever--scarcely distinguishable from the dark shrubs at each side, the very person around whom all his thoughts were centring--Maisie--Maisie Ford herself!

He did not start, he made no exclamation. A strange intent look came into his eyes, as he walked on towards her. Long afterwards he remembered, and it helped to explain things, that she too had testified no surprise. But her face flushed a little, and the first expression he caught sight of was one of pleasure--afterwards, long afterwards, he remembered this too.

They met--their hands touched. But for a moment he did not speak.

"How do you do, Mr Norreys?" she said then. "It is hot and glaring on the lawn, is it not? I have just been seeing my father off. He was too tired to stay longer, and I was glad to wander about here in the shade a little."

"Your father?" he repeated half mechanically.

"Yes--we are staying, he and I, for a few days at Laxter's Hill. I am so sorry he has gone--I would so have liked you to see him."

She spoke eagerly, and with the peculiar, bright girlishness really natural to her, which was one of her greatest charms.

Despard looked at her; her voice and manner helped him a little to throw off the curious sensation of unreality. But he was, though he scarcely knew it, becoming inwardly more and more wrought up.

"I should have liked to see him exceedingly," he began, "any one so dear to you. I may hope some other time, perhaps, to do so? I--I was thinking of you when I first caught sight of you just now, Miss Ford-- indeed, I have done nothing--upon my word, you may believe me--I have done little else than think of you since we last met."

The girl's face grew strangely still and intent, yet with a wistful look in the eyes telling of feelings not to be easily read. It was as if she were listening, in spite of herself, for something she still vaguely hoped she was mistaken in expecting.

"Indeed," she began to say, but he interrupted her.

"No," he said, "do not speak till you have heard me. I had made up my mind to it before I met you just now. I was just wondering how and when it could be. But now that this opportunity has come so quickly I will not lose it. I love you--I have loved you for longer than I knew myself, than I would own to myself--"

"From the very first, from that evening at Mrs Englewood's?" she said, and but for his intense preoccupation, he would have been startled by her tone.

"Yes," he said simply, yet with a strain of retrospection in his eyes, as if determined to control himself and speak nothing but the unexaggerated truth--"yes, I almost think it began that first evening, rude, brutally rude as I was to you. I would not own it--I struggled against it, for I did not want to marry. I had no thought of it. I am selfish, very selfish, I fear, and I preferred to keep clear of all ties and responsibilities, which too often become terribly galling on small means. I am no hero--but now--you will forgive my hesitation and--and reluctance, will you not? You are generous I know, and my frankness will not injure me with you, will it? You will believe that I loved you almost from the first, though I could not all at once make up my mind to marrying on small means? And now--now that I understand--that--that all seems different to me--that nothing seems of consequence except to hear you say you love me, as--as I have thought sometimes--Maisie--you will not be hard on me?--"

He stopped; he could have gone on much longer, and there was nothing now outwardly to interrupt him. She had stood there motionless, listening. Her face he could scarcely see, it was half turned away, but that seemed not unnatural. What then caused his sudden misgiving?

"Maisie," he repeated more timidly.

Then she turned--there was a burning spot of red on each cheek, her eyes were flaming. Yet her voice was low and quiet.

"Hard on you!" she repeated. "I am too sorry for myself to think or care much about you. I am--yes, I may own it, I am so horribly disappointed. I had really allowed myself to think of you as sincere, as, in spite of your unmanly affectations, your contemptible conceit, an honest man, a possible friend I was beginning to forgive your ill-bred insolence to me as a stranger at the first, thinking there was something worthy of respect about you after all. But--oh, dear! And to try to humbug me by this sham honesty--to dare to say you did not think you could have cared for me enough to risk curtailing your own self-indulgences, but that now--it is too pitiful. But, oh, dear--it is too horribly disappointing!"

And as she looked at him again, he saw that her eyes were actually full of tears.

His brain was in a whirl of bewilderment, bitterest mortification and indignation. For the moment the last had the best of it.

"You have a right to refuse me, to despise my weakness if you choose-- whether it is generous to take advantage of my misplaced confidence in you in having told you all--yes, _all_, is another matter. But one thing you shall not accuse me of, and that is, of lying to you. I have not said one untruthful word. I did--yes, I _did_ love you, Mary Ford-- what I feel to you now is something more like--"

He hesitated.

"Hate, I suppose," she suggested mockingly. "All the better. It cannot be a pleasant feeling to hate any one, and I do not wish you anything pleasant. If I could believe," she went on slowly, "if I could believe you had loved me, I think I should be glad, for it would be what you deserve. I would have liked to make you love me from that very first evening if I could--just to but unluckily I am not the sort of woman to succeed in anything of that kind. However--"

She stopped; steps approaching them were heard through the stillness. Maisie turned. "I have nothing more to say, and I do not suppose you wish to continue this conversation. Good-bye, Mr Norreys."

And almost before he knew she had gone, she had quite disappeared.

Despard was a strong man, but for a moment or two he really thought he was going to faint. He had grown deathly white while Maisie's hard, bitter words rained down upon him like hailstones; now that she had left him he grew so giddy that, had he not suddenly caught hold of a tree, he would have fallen.

"It feels like a sunstroke," he said vaguely to himself, as he realised that his senses were deserting him, not knowing that he spoke aloud.

He did not know either that some one had seen him stagger, and almost fall. A slightly uneasy feeling had made Maisie stop as she hurried off and glance back, herself unobserved.

"He looked so fearfully white," she said; "do--do men always look like that when girls refuse them, I wonder?"

For Maisie's experience of such things actually coming to the point, was, as should be the case with all true women, but small.

"I thought--I used to think I would enjoy seeing him humbled. But he did seem in earnest."

And then came the glimpse of the young fellow's physical discomfiture. Maisie was horribly frightened; throwing all considerations but those of humanity to the winds she rushed back again.

"Perhaps he has heart-disease, though he looks so strong," she thought, "and if so--oh, perhaps I have killed him."

She was beside him in an instant. A rustic bench, which Despard was too dizzy to see, stood near. The girl seized hold of his arm and half drew it round her shoulder. He let her do so unresistingly.

"Try to walk a step or two, Mr Norreys," she said, "I am very strong. There, now," as he obeyed her mechanically, "here is a seat," and she somehow half pushed, half drew him on to it. "Please smell this," and she took out a little silver vinaigrette, of strong and pungent contents, "I am never without this, for papa is so delicate, you know."

Despard tried to open his eyes, tried to speak, but the attempt was not very successful. Maisie held the vinaigrette close to his nose; he started back, the strong essence revived him almost at once. He took it into his own hand and smelt it again. Then his face grew crimson.

"I beg your pardon a thousand times. I am most ashamed, utterly ashamed of myself," he began.

But Maisie was too practically interested in his recovery to feel embarrassed.

"Keep sniffing at that thing," she said, "you will soon be all right. Only just tell me--" she added anxiously, "there isn't anything wrong with your heart, is there?"

"For if so," she added to herself, "I must at all costs run and see if there is a doctor to be had."

Despard smiled--a successfully bitter smile.

"No, thank you," he said. "I am surprised that you credit me with possessing one," he could not resist adding. "The real cause of this absurd faintness is a very prosaic one, I fancy. I went a long walk in the hot sun this morning."

"Oh, indeed, that quite explains it," said Maisie, slightly nettled. "Good-bye again then," and for the second time she ran off.

"All the same, I will get Conrad or somebody to come round that way," she said to herself. "I will just say I saw a man looking as if he was fainting. _He_ won't be likely to tell."

And Despard sat there looking at the little silver toy in his bands.

"I did not thank her," he said to himself. "I suppose I should have done so, though she would have done as much, or more, for a starving tramp on the road."

Then he heard again steps coming nearer like those which had startled Maisie away.

They had apparently turned off elsewhere the first time--this time they came steadily on.

CHAPTER FOUR.

As Despard heard the steps coming nearer he looked round uneasily, with a vague idea of hurrying off so as to escape observation. But when he tried to stand up and walk, he found that anything like quick movement was beyond him still. So he sat down again, endeavouring to look as if nothing were the matter, and that he was merely resting.

Another moment or two, and a young man appeared, coming hastily along the path by which Despard had himself made his way into the shrubbery. He was quite young, two or three and twenty at most, fair, slight, and boyish-looking. He passed by Mr Norreys with but the slightest glance in his direction, but just as Despard was congratulating himself on this, the new-comer stopped short, hesitated, and then, turning round and lifting his hat, came up to him.

"Excuse me," he said, "do you know Lady Margaret--by sight? Has she passed this way?"

He spoke quickly, and Mr Norreys did not catch the surname.

"No," he replied, "I have not the honour of the lady's acquaintance."

"I beg your pardon," said the other. "I've been sent to look for her, and I can't find her anywhere." Then he turned, but again hesitated.

"There's nothing the matter, is there? You've not hurt yourself--or anything? You look rather--as if a cricket ball had hit you, you know."

Mr Norreys smiled.

"Thank you," he said. "I have got a frightful pain in my head. I was out too long in the sun this morning."

The boyish-looking man shook his head.

"Touch of sunstroke--eh? Stupid thing to do, standing in the sun this weather. Should take a parasol; I always do. Then I can't be of any service?"