"Only you said it was not worth my while to learn to housekeep. Why do you say that? I am very young, you are young. If we are to go on always together, I ought to become wise and sensible. I ought to have knowledge. What do you mean, Gerald? Have you had an omen? Do you think you will die? Or perhaps that I shall die? I should not at all like it.
I hope--I trust--no token of death has been sent to you about me."
"None, my very dearest, none. I see before you a life of--of peace.
Peace and plenty--and--and--honor--a good life, Valentine, a guarded life."
"How white you are, Gerald. And why do you say "you" all the time? The life, the peaceful life, and it sounds rather dull, is for us both, isn"t it?"
"I don"t know--I can"t say. You wouldn"t care, would you, Val--I mean--I mean----"
"What?"
Valentine had risen, her arms were thrown round Gerald"s neck.
"Are you trying to tell me that I could be happy now without you?" she whispered. "Then I couldn"t, darling. I don"t mind telling you I couldn"t. I--I----"
"What, Val, what?"
"I like you, Gerald. Yes, I know it--I do like you--much."
It ought to have been the most dreadful sound to him, and yet it wasn"t. Wyndham strained his wife to his heart. Then he raised his eyes, and with a start Valentine and he stepped asunder.
Mr. Paget had come into the room. He had come in softly, and he must have heard Valentine"s words, and seen that close embrace.
With a glad cry the girl flew to his side, but when he kissed her his lips trembled, he sank down on the nearest chair like a man who had received a great shock.
CHAPTER XV.
"I"m afraid I can"t help it, sir," said Wyndham.
Mr. Paget and his son-in-law were standing together in the very comfortable private room before alluded to in the office of the former.
Wyndham was standing with his back to the mantel-piece; Valentine"s lovely picture was over his head. Her eyes, which were almost dancing with life, seemed to have something mocking in them to Mr. Paget, as he encountered their gaze now. As eyes will in a picture, they followed him wherever he moved. He was restless and ill at ease, and he wished either that the picture might be removed, or that he could take up Wyndham"s position with his back to it.
"I tell you," he said, in a voice that betrayed his perturbation, "that you must help it. It"s a clear breaking of contract to do otherwise."
"You see," said Wyndham, with a slow smile, "you under-rated my attractions. I was not the man for your purpose after all."
"Sit down for G.o.d"s sake, Wyndham. Don"t stand there looking so provokingly indifferent. One would think the whole matter was nothing to you."
"I am not sure that it is much; that is, I am not at all sure that I shall not take my full meed of pleasure out of the short time allotted to me."
"Sit down, take that chair, no, not that one--that--ah, that"s better.
Valentine"s eyes are positively uncomfortable the way they pursue me this evening. Wyndham, you must feel for me--you must see that it will be a perfectly awful thing if my--my child loses her heart to you."
"Well, Mr. Paget, you can judge for yourself how matters stand. I--I cannot quite agree with you about what you fear being a catastrophe."
"You must be mad, Wyndham--you must either be mad, or you mean to cheat me after all."
"No, I don"t. I have a certain amount of honor left--not much, or I shouldn"t have lent myself to this, but the rag remaining is at your service. Seriously now, I don"t think you have grave cause for alarm.
Valentine is affectionate, but I am not to her as you are."
"You are growing dearer to her every day. I am not blind, I have watched her face. She follows you with her eyes--when you don"t eat she is anxious, when you look dismal--you have an infernally dismal face at times, Wyndham--she is puzzled. It wasn"t only what I saw last night.
Valentine is waking up. It was in the contract that she was not to wake up. I gave you a child for your wife. She was to remain a child when----"
"When she became my widow," Wyndham answered calmly.
"Yes. My G.o.d, it is awful to think of it. We must go in, we daren"t turn back, and she may suffer, she may suffer horribly, she has a great heart--a deep heart. It is playing with edged tools to make it live."
"Can"t you shorten the time of probation?" asked Wyndham.
"I wish to heaven I could, but I am powerless. Wyndham, my good friend, my son--something must be done."
"Don"t call me your son," said the younger man, rising and shaking himself. "I have a father who besides you is--there, I won"t name what I think of you. I have a mother--through your machinations I shall never see her face any more. Don"t call me your son. You are very wise, you have the wisdom of a devil, but even you can overreach yourself.
You thought you had found everything you needed, when you found me--the weak young fool, the despairing idiotic lover. Poor? Yes, cursedly poor, and with a certain sense of generosity, but nothing at all in myself to win the heart of a beautiful young girl. You should have gone down to Jewsbury-on-the-Wold for a little, before you summed up your estimate of my character, for the one thing I have always found lying at my feet is--love. Even the cats and dogs loved me--those to whom I gave nothing regarded me with affection. Alack--and alas--my wife only follows the universal example."
"But it must be stopped, Wyndham. You cannot fail to see that it must be stopped. Can you not help me--can you not devise some plan?"
Wyndham dropped his head on his hands.
"Hasten the crisis," he said. "I want the plunge over; hasten it."
There came a tap at the room door. Mr. Paget drew back the curtain which stood before it, slipped the bolts, and opened it.
"Ah, I guessed you were here!" said Valentine"s gay voice; "yes, and Gerald too. This is delightful," added she, as she stepped into the room.
"What is it, Val?" asked her father. "I was busy--I was talking to your husband. I am very much occupied this afternoon. I forgot it was the day you generally called for me. No, I"m afraid I can"t go with you, my pet."
Valentine was looking radiant in winter furs.
"I"ll go with Gerald, then," she said. "He"s not too busy."
She smiled at him.
"No, my dear, I"ll go with you," said the younger man. "I don"t think, sir," he added, turning round, with a desperately white but smiling face, "that we can advance business much by prolonging this interview, and if you have no objection, I should like to take a drive with my wife as she has called."
Valentine instinctively felt that these smoothly spoken words were meant to hide something. She glanced from the face of one man to another; then she went up to her father and linked her hand in his arm.
"Come, too, daddy," she said. "You used always to be able to make horrid business wait upon your own Valentine"s pleasure."
Mr. Paget hesitated for a moment. Then he stooped and lightly kissed his daughter"s blooming cheek.
"Go with your husband, dear," he said, gently. "I am really busy, and we shall meet at dinner time."
"Yes, we are to dine with you to-night--I"ve a most important request to make after dinner. You know what it is, Gerry. Won"t father be electrified? Promise beforehand that you"ll grant it, dad."