"Nothing." His last words have frozen within her all desire for reconciliation. Is he, indeed, in such great haste to be gone? Without another word, she goes to the door, but, as she puts out her hand to open it, something within her grasp becomes known to her. It is the glove she had picked up on the balcony half an hour ago, and has held ever since almost unconsciously.
"Was it--was it you that threw this from the window?" she says, suddenly, for the last time raising her beautiful eyes to her husband"s face.
"Yes. This was no place for it," returns he, sternly.
Going down the staircase, full of grief and wounded pride, she encounters Lord Sartoris.
"He has come?" asks the old man, in an agitated manner, laying his hand on her arm.
"He has. If you wish to see him, he is in his own room," replies she, in a singularly hard tone.
"Have you told him everything?" asks Sartoris, nervously. "It was a fatal mistake. Do you think he will forgive me?"
"How can I say?" says Mrs. Brans...o...b.., with a bitter smile. "I can only tell you he has not forgiven me."
"Bless me!" says Lord Sartoris; "then, I suppose, I haven"t a chance."
He is disheartened by her words, and goes very slowly on his way towards his nephew"s room. When they are once more face to face, they pause and look with uncertainty upon each other. Then the older man holds out his hands beseechingly.
"I have come to demand your forgiveness," he says, with deep entreaty.
"Dorian--grant it!--I am very old----"
In an instant Dorian"s arm is round his neck, as it used to be in the days long ago, before the dark cloud had rolled between them.
"Not another word, or I shall never forgive you!" says Brans...o...b.., tenderly, with the old smile upon his lips. And Sartoris, strong, obstinate, self-willed man that he is, lays his head down upon his "boy"s" shoulder, and sobs aloud.
CHAPTER x.x.xV.
"Oh, what a deal of scorn looks beautiful In the contempt and anger of her lips."--_Twelfth Night._
The dark day is growing colder and more drear. The winds are sighing sadly. A shivering sobbing breeze, that rushes in a mournful fashion through the naked twigs, tells one the year is drawing to a close, and that truly it is "faint with cold, and weak with old."
Clarissa, riding along the forest path that leads to Sartoris, feels something akin to pleasure in the sound of the rushing torrent that comes from above and falls headlong into the river that runs on her right hand.
There is, too, a desolation in the scene that harmonizes with her own sad thoughts. She has watched the summer leaves and flowers decay, but little thought her own hopes and longings should have died with them.
Is she never to know peace, or joy, or content again? On her "rests remembrance like a ban:" she cannot shake it off.
"Rest! rest! Oh, give me rest and peace!" she cries aloud to her soul, but no rest cometh. The world seems colorless, without tint or purpose. She would gladly forget, if that might be, but it seems impossible to her.
"Ourselves we cannot recreate, Nor get our souls to the same key Of the remembered harmony."
The past--that is, her happy past--seems gone; the present is full of grief; the future has nothing to offer. This fact comes to her, and, with her eyes full of tears, she turns the corner and finds herself face to face with Horace Brans...o...b...
The old smile is on his face; he comes to her and holds out both his hands to take hers. He is worn and thin, and very handsome.
"I am too fortunate to meet you so soon," he says. "Yet I hardly think I should shake hands with you." Evidently, some thought unknown to her is in his mind.
"I am glad you have come to that conclusion," she says, "as there is no desire whatever on my part that our hands should meet."
He is plainly puzzled.
"What a strange welcome!" he says, reproachfully. "My letters during the past week should have explained everything to you."
"I have had none," says Clarissa, shortly.
"No? Was that why I received no answers? I have risen from a sick-bed to come to you, and demand the reason of your silence."
"I am sorry you troubled yourself so far. Ruth Annersley could have given you the answer you require."
His face blanches perceptibly; and his eyes, in their usual stealthy fashion, seek the ground.
"What have I to do with her?" he says, sullenly.
"Coward!" says Miss Peyton, in a low tone. "Do you, then, deny even all knowledge of the woman you have so wronged?"
"Take care! do not go too far," cries he, pa.s.sionately, laying his hand upon her bridle, close to the bit. "Have you no fear?"
"Of you? none!" returns she, with such open contempt as stings him to the quick. "Remove your hand, sir."
"When I have said all I wish to say," returns he, coa.r.s.ely, all his real brutality coming to the surface. "You shall stay here just as long as I please, and hear every word I am going to say. You shall----"
"Will you remove your hand?"
"When it suits me," returns he; "not before."
Pa.s.sionate indignation conquers her self-control. Raising her arm, she brings down her riding-whip, with swift and unexpected violence, upon his cheek. The blow is so severe that, for the moment, he loses his presence of mind, and, swaying backward, lets the bridle go. Clarissa, finding herself free, in another moment is out of his reach and on her way to Sartoris.
As she reaches the gate, she meets James Scrope coming out, and, drawing rein, looks at him strangely.
"Have you seen a ghost?" asks he, slipping from his saddle, and coming up to her. "Your face is like death."
"I have, the ghost of an old love, but, oh, how disfigured! Jim, I have seen Horace."
She hides her face with her hands. She remembers the late scene with painful distinctness, and wonders if she has been unwomanly, coa.r.s.e, undeserving of pity. She will tell him,--that is, Scrope,--and, if he condemns her, her cup will be indeed full.
Sir James--who, as a rule, is the most amiable of men--is now dark with anger.
"Brans...o...b..--here?" he says, indignantly.
"Yes. He had evidently heard nothing. But I told him; and--and then he said things he should not have said; and he held my reins; and I forgot myself," says poor Clarissa, with anguish in her eyes; "and I raised my whip, and struck him across the face. Jim, if you say I was wrong in doing this thing, you will kill me."
"Wrong!" says Scrope. "Hanging would be too good for him. Oh, to think you should have been alone on such an occasion as that!"
"But it was a hateful thing to do, wasn"t it?" says Miss Peyton, faintly.