And then at last she ventured to raise her eyes, and what did those eyes behold? It was the look--_the look_--on the face of Paul!
And now her head was on his breast, and his kisses on her cheek. "Cruel doubts tortured me often," he whispered, "for how could I tell what changes time might not have wrought? It had left _my_ love untouched, but what right had I to expect that you might not have lost the feeling you had--yes, I did know you once had for me? Leo, darling, can you think how terrible it was to know that, and have to affect ignorance? To have every beat of my heart go out towards you, and to feign indifference? To meet your poor, piteous eyes, and keep the answer to their appeal out of mine? Not that you meant to show, dear; oh, no, you never dreamed your secret was revealed--and it was _not_, to others,--but to me----"
"Oh, Paul! Oh, Paul!"
"Hush, you were not to blame. It was no fault of yours, you poor, brave, little thing. You played your part n.o.bly----"
"Oh, no--oh, no."
"You may think not, but I know you did. I know, for I shared the struggle. There was once," he paused and considered, "there was that day when we were together in the green-house. You were cold and careful at first, but gradually the mask wore off and--and mine too slipped. We were happy, too happy. I think we both knew it. We did not look at each other as we came away, but I gave you a red vine leaf, and I saw that you did not put it with the others, even with those I had picked for you before."
"I have it now, Paul."
"After that, I began to suspect myself. I had hardly done so before, for there was only a vague sense of disappointment, and dissatisfaction with things as they were. Your sister was not--but no matter. I reasoned myself out of this over and over again. I argued that I was not well, was not fully recovered from my late attack of fever--in short, that I was hipped, and would certainly take a more cheerful view of things as my strength came back. I really had been rather bad, you know--and was low and easily depressed. But what might have opened my eyes to the truth was that all depression vanished, and all inertia ceased, directly _you_ appeared,--and _that_ was after I had ceased to hear your gay little laugh and merry voice. For though you soon grew grave as myself, my heart would jump when you came into the room, or when I came upon you in some distant corner, not knowing you were there."
"Paul, Paul, my heart jumped too."
He drew her closer--ah, she was very close now. "I scarcely ever spoke to you, do you remember? We avoided each other; and I cannot even now imagine how I came to know you so well,"--and so on, and so on....
Presently Leo had a question to ask. Where had he been during those three blank days when no communications from Boldero Abbey reached him?
He had disposed of them in a fashion that satisfied others, but not her.
"No, you were too clear-sighted. I knew that," said he. "But what could I do? I could not tell the truth, which was that I never went near the place whose address I gave Maud! My one desire was to be out of range of her letters; for Leonore--I had--I cannot tell how, a sort of dreadful certainty that she would recall me. For those three days I wandered about,--I went down to a wild, little, sea place, and fought the demon within. Then because I simply felt weaker, I fancied soul as well as body brought into subjection. You all told me I looked bad when I returned--now you know why."
But though they thus skirted round and round one dread remembrance which was--how could it help being?--in both their minds, each shrank from approaching a subject avoided by the other; until at length Leonore, tremulous but resolute, realised that it was for her, not him, to speak.
"Paul, dear Paul, I don"t want to leave _anything_ unsaid. Paul, on that worst day of all," she hesitated, and his hand pressed the little hand within it. "Dear Paul," she whispered, "I did not know what I was doing; indeed, indeed I did not. Something in my head seemed to have snapped, and I felt so strange--I never felt like it before. And it was not only about you that I was so unutterably wretched, there was--there was--something else."
"Something else?"
"A man told me the day before that I had broken his heart,--oh, Paul, don"t start. He was not a man I could ever have given a thought to. He was not one I should ever have spoken to--in that way. Only our village doctor"s a.s.sistant, and the rest of us hardly knew that he existed,--but I, I was so unhappy, even before you came to Boldero, that I let myself go,--that is, I let the poor silly creature run up a kind of friendship with me. That was all, Paul; truthfully it was--on my part. I amused myself with him--a little; and then--and then----"
"What was fun to you was death to him?"
"It had no right to be," said Leo, with dignity. "It never went any length; we only just met each other once or twice, and----"
"Flirted?"
"Not even that. I let him adore," she laughed, but shamefacedly--"and he mistook."
"I see."
"Paul, dear, I am not excusing myself; only I do not think, I do not think that wretched Tommy Andrews ought ever to have presumed--it was frightful, it was untrue what he said. I did _not_ break his disgusting heart----"
"Oh, Leo!" Paul tried not to laugh.
"But he made me think I had. He accused me of it, and I was in such a state at the time that I believed him, and it drove me wild. It was the last straw, the finishing touch. I seemed not only to have made a mess of my own poor life, but of another"s--and while I was very angry and contemptuous, I was enraged with myself for being so. I stormed and raved when I was alone, and vowed to end it all,--but I know now that I--Sue says I was not accountable, Paul,--" wistfully.
"Sue is right, dearest. Your nerves were altogether unstrung. You were overstrained and off your balance for the time being."
"Had--had you noticed anything, Paul?"
"Everything. It was that which made me fear--and follow you."
"At night I hardly slept at all. And, I couldn"t eat; I loathed food. I may tell you all this, mayn"t I? It just kills me to keep things to myself; doing _that_ was what, I think, began it all."
"You shall tell me everything," said he.
"Well, but Paul," after an interlude, "there is still a mystery; what are you doing here? And was it not the strangest thing our meeting here?"
He smiled. "Not so very strange, seeing that this is my usual walk about this hour."
"Your--what did you say?--your "usual" walk?"
"Look, Leo." He drew her along to the opening of the vista she had pa.s.sed before, and pointed to the mansion beyond, now glistening in the setting sun. "That is my home--and yours."
"Oh, Paul!"
"I bought it a year ago, but have been busy with alterations and improvements, so only came to live here within the last few weeks. I was so tired of a wandering life, Leo; and though I had only the vaguest hope that you--but somehow hope never quite deserted me."
"Then the strangeness is on our part. That _we_ should come to where _you_ were!"
"You had really no suspicion, Leo?" He looked at her with laughter in his eyes. "Sue kept her own counsel well;" added Paul demurely.
He and Sue had been in communication from--from precisely the date at which he took up his residence at Mere Hall. He had left for Mere Hall the day after he last saw Sue in London.
"You saw Sue in London?" She could scarcely speak for astonishment.
"Several times. The Fosters, my brother and his wife, put me up to it.
Your sister is good and kind and sensible--mine is both the first, but not exactly the last, bless her for it! Her very lack of what is commonly admired, proved my salvation. She first extracted the truth from me, and then went straight for Sue, and hammered it into her that there was no earthly reason why we two should not be made happy now. She could not endure to see my long face, she said;--and though I gathered that Sue was somewhat startled by her abruptness--for Charlotte is not famed for tact--eventually the two understood each other, and I was brought on to the stage."
"Was that," cried Leo, with a sudden flash of memory, "was that one day, oh, it must have been that day!--Sue was so odd and unlike herself. I wondered what could have excited her in a private view of rather stupid water-colours, and why she began all at once to say she longed for the country? Were you in the water-colour gallery?"
He was, and all was explained.
"Coo-coo," came the plaintive note of a dove from the leafy shades close by--but it cooed unheard. The streamlet splashed on unheeded. The sun went slowly down behind the mountain-tops unseen. And still they sat on....
CHAPTER XIX.
EPILOGUE.