HOW LADY HELENA TOOK IT.
But the driving-party did not come off. The ruins of Eastlake Abbey were unvisited that day, at least. For while Edith and Trixy"s somewhat unpleasant interview was taking place in one part of the house, an equally unpleasant, and much more mysterious, interview was taking place in another, and on the same subject.
Lady Helena had left the guests for awhile and gone to her own rooms.
The morning post had come in, bringing her several letters. One in particular she seized, and read with more eagerness than the others, dated London, beginning "My Dear Aunt," and signed "Inez." While she sat absorbed over it, in deep and painful thought evidently, there came a tap at the door; then it opened, and her nephew came in.
She crumpled her letter hurriedly in her hand, and put it out of sight.
She looked up with a smile of welcome; he was the "apple of her eye,"
the darling of her life, the Benjamin of her childless old age--the fair-haired, pleasant-faced young baronet.
"Do I intrude?" he asked. "Are you busy? Are your letters _very_ important this morning? If so--"
"Not important at all. Come in, Victor. I have been wishing to speak to you of the invitations for next week"s ball. Is it concerning the driving-party this afternoon you want to speak?"
"No, my dear aunt; something very much pleasanter than all the driving-parties in the world; something much more important to me."
She looked at him more closely. His face was flushed, his eyes bright, a happy smile was on his lips. He had the look of a man to whom some great good fortune had suddenly come.
"Agreeably important, then, I am sure, judging by your looks. What a radiant face the lad has!"
"I have reason to look radiant. Congratulate me, Aunt Helena; I am the happiest man the wide earth holds."
"My dear Victor!"
"Cannot you guess?" he said, still smiling; "I always thought female relatives were particularly sharp-sighted in these matters. Must I really tell you? Have you no suspicions of my errand here?"
"I have not, indeed;" but she sat erect, and her fresh-colored, handsome old face grew pale. "Victor, what is it? Pray speak out."
"Very well. Congratulate me once more; I am going to be married."
He stopped short, for with a low cry that was like a cry of fear, Lady Helena rose up. If he had said "I am going to be hanged," the consternation of her face could not have been greater. She put out her hand as though to ward off a blow.
"No, no!" she said, in that frightened voice; "not married. For G.o.d"s sake, Victor, don"t say that!"
"Lady Helena!"
He sat looking at her, utterly confounded.
"It can"t be true," she panted. "You don"t mean that. You don"t want to be married. You are too young--you are. I tell you I won"t hear of it! What do boys like you want of wives!--only three-and-twenty!"
He laughed good-humoredly.
"My dear aunt, boys of three-and-twenty are tolerably well-grown; it isn"t a bad age to marry. Why, according to Debrett, my father was only three-and-twenty when he brought home a wife and son to Catheron Royals."
She sat down suddenly, her head against the back of a chair, her face quite white.
"Aunt Helena," the young man said anxiously, approaching her, "I have startled you; I have been too sudden with this. You look quite faint; what shall I get you?"
He seized a carafe of water, but she waved it away.
"Wait," she said, with trembling lips; "wait. Give me time--let me think. It _was_ sudden; I will be better in a moment."
He sat down feeling uncommonly uncomfortable. He was a practical sort of young man, with, a man"s strong dislike of scenes of all kinds, and this interview didn"t begin as promisingly as he had hoped.
She remained pale and silent for upward of five very long minutes; only once her lips whispered, as if unconsciously:
"The time has come--the time has come."
It was Sir Victor himself who broke the embarra.s.sing pause.
"Aunt Helena," he said pettishly, for he was not accustomed to have his sovereign will disputed, "I don"t understand this, and you will pardon me if I say I don"t like it. It must have entered your mind that sooner or later I would fall in love and marry a wife, like other men. That time has come, as you say yourself. There is nothing I can see to be shocked at."
"But not so soon," she answered brokenly. "O Victor, not so soon."
"I don"t consider twenty-three years too soon. I am old-fashioned, very likely, but I do believe in the almost obsolete doctrine of early marriage. I love her with all my heart." His kindling eyes and softened voice betrayed it. "Thank Heaven she has accepted me. Without her my life would not be worth the having."
"Who is she?" she asked, without looking up. "Lady Gwendoline, of course."
"Lady Gwendoline?" He smiled and lifted his eyebrows.
"No, my dear aunt; a very different person from Lady Gwendoline. Miss Darrell."
She sat erect and gazed at him--stunned.
"Miss Darrell! Edith Darrell--the American girl, the--Victor, if this is a jest--"
"Lady Helena, am I likely to jest on such a subject? It is the truth.
This morning Miss Darrell--Edith--has made me the happiest man in England by promising to be my wife. Surely, aunt, you must have suspected--must have seen that I loved her."
"I have seen nothing," she answered blankly, looking straight before her--"nothing. I am only an old woman--I am growing blind and stupid, I suppose. I have seen nothing."
There was a pause. At no time was Sir Victor Catheron a fluent or ready speaker--just at present, perhaps, it was natural he should be rather at a loss for words. And her ladyship"s manner was the reverse of rea.s.suring.
"I have loved her from the first," he said, breaking once more the silence--"from the very first night of the party, without knowing it.
In all the world, she is the only one I can ever marry. With her my life will be supremely happy, superbly blessed; without her--but no!
I do not choose to think what my life would be like without her. You, who have been as a mother to me all my life, will not mar my perfect happiness on this day of days by saying you object."
"But I do object!" Lady Helena exclaimed, with sudden energy and anger.
"More--I absolutely refuse. I say again, you are too young to want to marry at all. Why, even your favorite Shakespeare says: "A young man married, is a man that"s marred." When you are thirty it will be quite time enough to talk of this. Go abroad again--see the world--go to the East, as you have often talked of doing--to Africa--anywhere! No man knows himself or his own heart at the ridiculous age of twenty-three!"
Sir Victor Catheron smiled, a very quiet and terribly obstinate smile.
"My extreme youth, then, is your only objection?"
"No, it is not--I have a hundred objections--it is objectionable from every point. I object to _her_ most decidedly and absolutely. You shall not marry this American girl without family or station, and of whom you know absolutely nothing--with whom you have not been acquainted four weeks. Oh, it is absurd--it is ridiculous--it is the most preposterous folly I ever heard of in my life."
His smile left his face--a frown came instead. His lips set, he looked at her with a face of invincible determination.