"Why, of course you may smoke, Tony," she said, after ringing the bell and ordering more tea. "I"ll have a cigarette myself to soothe my nerves."
"Never noticed any signs of nerves about you, old thing," laughed Tony, as he proffered his case and struck a match to light the cigarette Myra accepted. "Nerves! The risks you have been taking of late in the hunting field have made my blood run cold. The way you took that hedge last week during the run with the Quorn made my heart stand still.
Honestly, Myra, I shall be glad when I have you safely aboard the _Killarney_, and we are on our way to Spain."
"I am not going to Spain," said Myra, very abruptly.
"Not going to Spain?" repeated Tony, in surprise.
"No, Tony, I am not going to Spain. Don Carlos has offended me beyond pardon."
"I say, Myra, you"re ragging, aren"t you?" asked Tony. "I thought you had made it up with Don Carlos. Don"t tell me the villain has been making love to you again!"
"Why, of course I have," exclaimed Don Carlos. "I am madly in love with Myra, and it is because she is afraid of falling as desperately in love with me as I am with her, and being forced, in consequence, to jilt you, that she has again decided not to go to Spain. She is afraid of me--and of love."
"What a pair of leg-pullers you are!" chuckled Tony, a.s.suming the whole thing was a jest. "Half the men one meets are in love with Myra, but I refuse to believe she is afraid of any of them."
"Ah, but she is afraid of me, my dear Standish, and you should realise I am your most dangerous rival," Don Carlos said gravely, and again Tony chuckled amusedly. "Perhaps it is not only of me but of herself, and for herself, that Myra is afraid," Carlos continued, with a challenging glance at Myra, who felt she would like to box his ears and also to shake Tony for being so dense. "The lovely senorita is also afraid of being captured by El Diablo Cojuelo, who would make her an ideal husband."
"I say, that"s hardly complimentary, old fellow!" Tony commented.
"Sort of _faux pas_, isn"t it, to suggest that a brigand would be a better husband for Myra than yours truly, and that Myra is a suitable wife for a brigand?"
"That, of course, depends on the brigand," answered Don Carlos, with a smile. "Of course, if Myra is really scared, and is genuinely afraid to come to Spain lest she should lose her heart----"
"I am afraid of nothing!" interrupted Myra, exasperated beyond measure; and immediately she regretted the impulsive words.
"So you will prove the fact by keeping your promise to come to Spain as my guest?" queried Don Carlos quickly.
"That will depend on whether you know your duty to a guest and your obligations as a host," retorted Myra curtly, and Tony raised his eyebrows, surprised by her unusual rudeness.
"I flatter myself, dear lady, that I have a reputation as a host whose hospitality is boundless," said Don Carlos gravely.
A footman entering with the tea-tray relieved the tension, and Tony began to question Don Carlos about his trip, and to tell him what sport he had been enjoying.
CHAPTER VII
Don Carlos took his leave a few minutes later, leaving Myra and Tony alone together, and again Myra could not make up her mind whether or not to tell her fiance what had happened. It happened that Tony, as soon as they were alone, became particularly sentimental and wanted to kiss her--a fact which somehow seemed to make the situation still more difficult and complicated.
"I don"t want to be kissed, Tony," Myra objected, when her lover tried to embrace her. "I feel as if I never want to be kissed again, and I don"t want any love-making. Leave me alone!"
"You certainly are in a queer mood to-day, Myra," Tony commented.
"What has upset you, darling? You were quite rude to poor old Don Carlos, and now you are snubbing me. What"s the matter, old thing?"
"Oh, Tony, my dear, I--I don"t know just what is the matter with me, and I don"t know what to do," exclaimed Myra, laughing tremulously and feeling inclined to give way to tears. "I don"t understand myself.
Oh, why are you so stupid? Why don"t you make love to me and force me to kiss you? Why don"t you kiss and kiss me against my will?"
"Why, hang it all, Myra, I"ve just been trying to make love to you and asking you to give me a kiss, and you wouldn"t. Now--oh, dash it all, I don"t know what to make of you, my dear. You are a most puzzling girl!"
"And you are the most exasperatingly dull man," Myra retorted, still half-laughing, half-crying. "Oh, Tony, my dear, take care of me and love me terribly if you want to keep me. Hold me fast and grapple me to you with hooks of steel, or you will lose me."
She almost hurled herself into Tony"s arms, buried her face in his shoulder, and burst into tears. Tony did not know what to make of it at all, and he felt utterly helpless. Agitatedly he patted her on the back and stroked her hair.
"Myra, for heaven"s sake don"t cry," he said, in what was intended to be a soothing tone. "You make me feel so bally awful. I"ve never seen you crying before, and I can"t make out what is the matter. What on earth has upset you, darling? You"re quite hysterical. Hadn"t I better ring for your maid, dear?"
Poor Tony did not realise how sadly he was blundering, how sorely he was failing in an emergency.
"Oh, why can"t you understand!" burst out Myra pa.s.sionately. "Why can"t you love in the right way? Don"t pat my head and my back as if I were a pet dog, you ninny! Tony, I--I--oh, I can"t bear it!"
She broke from him and rushed from the room, banging the door behind her.
"Well I"m sunk!" muttered Tony, distractedly running his fingers through his sandy hair. "What on earth is a fellow to do in these circ.u.mstances? I hope to goodness Myra won"t carry on like this after we are married, or I shall never know where I am. I wonder what upset her?"
Troubled in mind, he took his departure, and on his way to his Club he was fortunate enough to meet Lady Fermanagh.
"My dear Tony, all women are more or less creatures of impulse, liable to do the most unexpected and quixotic things," her worldly-wise Ladyship told him, when he had explained what had happened and asked her to advise him what to do. "That is what makes us so interesting.
We do not understand ourselves, and if men understood us we should cease to interest or attract them."
"Yes, I suppose so, Lady Fermanagh," agreed Tony, with a disconsolate shake of his head. "But it would be rather awful to marry a woman who puzzled one all the time. I couldn"t make Myra out at all to-day, and can"t think what can have upset her."
"Remember, dear boy, that Myra is Irish and has the Celtic temperament," said Lady Fermanagh. "Probably someone, or something, had upset her before you called, and you had to suffer for it."
"It wasn"t only I who had to suffer," remarked Tony. "Poor old Carlos was there when I blew in, and Myra was snubbing him unmercifully.
Between ourselves, Lady Fermanagh, Myra was positively insulting. Don Carlos took it rather well, but I fancy he was upset all the same."
"H"m! So Don Carlos is back?" commented her ladyship, with an inscrutable smile. "That may explain matters. Perhaps it was he who was responsible for Myra"s tantrums. But don"t worry, Tony. Myra will probably be particularly nice to you if you see her to-night."
"I"m not exactly worried, Lady Fermanagh, but I"m very puzzled," said Standish. "I don"t suppose Don Carlos had anything to do with the matter, really, although he did say chaffingly that he had been making love to Myra again and said she was afraid of him. But after he had gone Myra seemed uncommonly annoyed with me for some reason or other, and--er--well, a fellow doesn"t know exactly what to do in the circ.u.mstances, and I thought you"d be able to give me advice."
"My advice to you, Tony, is to make ardent love to Myra, to woo her as if she had not already promised to marry you," Lady Fermanagh responded. "It is just possible, my dear Tony, if you will forgive my suggesting it, that you have not been playing the part of devoted lover wholeheartedly enough."
"Perhaps so," said Tony, rather ruefully. "Er--the difficulty is that when I try to talk and make love like the chaps do in novels and plays, Myra laughs at me and tells me not to be sloppy. I say, Lady Fermanagh, don"t tell Myra I"ve been talking to you about her. She might be angry. But if you can size things up and give me a hint later as to why she was vexed with me this afternoon I"ll be tremendously obliged."
Lady Fermanagh had a very shrewd idea that she could have told him there and then who was the cause of the trouble, remembering well Myra"s boast that she would make Don Carlos fall in love with her, and her resentment at his lack of courtesy in going off to Spain without a word of farewell.
"Yes, Tony, I"ll do my best to "size things up," as you so gracefully put it, and may be able to drop you a hint later," she said.
She did some hard thinking as she drove home, where she arrived to find Myra seated listlessly in an armchair by the fire, an unlighted cigarette between her fingers, and a brooding expression in her blue eyes.
"No, there"s nothing really the matter, auntie, and I"m quite well,"
Myra said, in answer to her ladyship"s questions; "but--oh, I can"t explain, but I feel fed up with everything. I don"t think I shall go to the Cavendish"s dance to-night."
"What, or who, has made you suddenly feel "fed up with everything," as you put it?" inquired Lady Fermanagh. "You seemed in quite good spirits at lunch-time. I noticed Don Carlos de Ruiz"s card in the salver in the hall as I came in. Was it he, by any chance, who upset you, Myra?"
Myra"s fair face blushed hotly, and she hesitated before replying.
Then, impulsively, she decided to tell her aunt everything, and did so.