"Is this not rather sudden? You have given me no intimation of your intentions," I stammered.
"I didn"t think it wise to dawdle any longer," he replied. "Surely you have known what I"ve been driving at ever since I first clapped eyes on you. There"s plenty of time. I don"t want to hurry you, only I want you to be engaged to me for safety."
He spoke as usual in his slow tw.a.n.gy drawl, which would have proclaimed his Colonial nationality anywhere. No word of love was uttered to me and none requested from me.
I put it down to his conceit. I thought that he fancied he could win any woman, and me without the least palaver or trouble. I felt annoyed. I said aloud, "I will become engaged to you;" to myself I added, "Just for a little while, the more to surprise and take the conceit out of you when the time comes."
Now that I understand his character I know that it was not conceit, but just his quiet unpretending way. He had meant all his actions towards me, and had taken mine in return.
"Thank you, Sybylla, that is all I want. We will talk about the matter more some other time. I will go up to Caddagat next Sunday. You have surprised me nearly out of my wits," here he laughed. "I never dreamt you would say yes so easily, just like any other girl. I thought I would have a lot of trouble with you."
He approached me and was stooping to kiss me. I cannot account for my action or condemn it sufficiently. It was hysterical--the outcome of an overstrung, highly excitable, and nervous temperament. Perhaps my vanity was wounded, and my tendency to strike when touched was up in arms. The calm air of ownership with which Harold drew near annoyed me, or, as Sunday-school teachers would explain it, Satan got hold of me. He certainly placed a long strong riding-whip on the table beneath my hand!
As Harold stooped with the intention of pressing his lips to mine, I quickly raised the whip and brought it with all my strength right across his face. The instant the whip had descended I would have smashed my arm on the door-post to recall that blow. But that was impossible. It had left a great weal on the healthy sun-tanned skin. His moustache had saved his lips, but it had caught his nose, the left cheek, had blinded the left eye, and had left a cut on the temple from which drops of blood were rolling down his cheek and staining his white coat. A momentary gleam of anger shot into his eyes and he gave a gasp, whether of surprise, pain, or annoyance, I know not. He made a gesture towards me.
I half expected and fervently wished he would strike. The enormity of what I had done paralysed me. The whip fell from my fingers and I dropped on to a low lounge behind me, and placing my elbows on my knees crouchingly buried my face in my hands; my hair tumbled softly over my shoulders and reached the floor, as though to sympathetically curtain my humiliation. Oh, that Harold would thrash me severely! It would have infinitely relieved me. I had done a mean unwomanly thing in thus striking a man, who by his great strength and s.e.x was debarred retaliation. I had committed a violation of self-respect and common decency; I had given a man an ignominious blow in the face with a riding-whip. And that man was Harold Beecham, who with all his strength and great stature was so wondrously gentle--who had always treated my whims and nonsense with something like the amused tolerance held by a great Newfoundland for the pranks of a kitten.
The clock struck eleven.
"A less stinging rebuke would have served your purpose. I had no idea that a simple caress from the man whose proposal of marriage you had just accepted would be considered such an unpardonable familiarity."
Harold"s voice fell clearly, calmly, cuttingly on the silence. He moved away to the other end of the room and I heard the sound of water.
A desire filled me to tell him that I did not think he had attempted a familiarity, but that I had been mad. I wished to say I could not account for my action, but I was dumb. My tongue refused to work, and I felt as though I would choke. The splash of the water came from the other end of the room. I knew he must be suffering acute pain in his eye. A far lighter blow had kept me sleepless a whole night. A fear possessed me that I might have permanently injured his sight. The splash of water ceased. His footfall stopped beside me. I could feel he was within touching distance, but I did not move.
Oh, the horrible stillness! Why did he not speak? He placed his hand lightly on my head.
"It doesn"t matter, Syb. I know you didn"t mean to hurt me. I suppose you thought you couldn"t affect my dark, old, saddle-flap-looking phiz.
That is one of the disadvantages of being a big lumbering concern like I am. Jump up. That"s the girl."
I arose. I was giddy, and would have fallen but for Harold steadying me by the shoulder. I looked up at him nervously and tried to ask his forgiveness, but I failed.
"Good heavens, child, you are as white as a sheet! I was a beast to speak harshly to you." He held a gla.s.s of water to my lips and I drank.
"Great Jupiter, there"s nothing to worry about! I know you hadn"t the slightest intention of hurting me. It"s nothing--I"ll be right in a few moments. I"ve often been amused at and have admired your touch-me-not style. You only forgot you had something in your hand."
He had taken it quite as a matter of fact, and was excusing me in the kindest possible terms.
"Good gracious, you mustn"t stew over such a trifling accident! It"s nothing. Just tie this handkerchief on for me, please, and then we"ll go back to the others or there will be a search-party after us."
He could have tied the handkerchief just as well himself--it was only out of kindly tact he requested my services. I accepted his kindness gratefully. He sank on his knee so that I could reach him, and I tied a large white handkerchief across the injured part. He could not open his eye, and hot water poured from it, but he made light of the idea of it paining. I was feeling better now, so we returned to the ballroom. The clock struck the half-hour after eleven as we left the room. Harold entered by one door and, I by another, and I slipped into a seat as though I had been there some time.
There were only a few people in the room. The majority were absent--some love-making, others playing cards. Miss Beecham was one who was not thus engaged. She exclaimed at once:
"Good gracious, boy, what have you done to yourself?"
"Looks as if he had been interviewing a belligerent tramp," said aunt Helen, smilingly.
"He"s run into the clothes-line, that"s what he"s done," said Miss Augusta confidently, after she had peeped beneath the bandage.
"You ought to get a bun for guessing, aunt Gus," said Harold laughing.
"I told them to put the clothes-lines up when they had done with them. I knew there would be an accident."
"Perhaps they were put up high enough for ordinary purposes," remarked her nephew.
"Let me do something for you, dear."
"No, thank you, aunt Gus. It is nothing," he said carelessly, and the matter dropped.
Harold Beecham was not a man to invite inquiry concerning himself.
Seeing I was un.o.bserved by the company, I slipped away to indulge in my foolish habit of asking the why and the wherefore of things. Why had Harold Beecham (who was a sort of young sultan who could throw the handkerchief where he liked) chosen me of all women? I had no charms to recommend me--none of the virtues which men demand of the woman they wish to make their wife. To begin with, I was small, I was erratic and unorthodox, I was nothing but a tomboy--and, cardinal disqualification, I was ugly. Why, then, had he proposed matrimony to me? Was it merely a whim? Was he really in earnest?
The night was soft and dark; after being out in it for a time I could discern the shrubs dimly silhouetted against the light. The music struck up inside again. A step approached me on the gravelled walk among the flowers, and Harold called me softly by name. I answered him.
"Come," he said, "we are going to dance; will you be my partner?"
We danced, and then followed songs and parlour games, and it was in the small hours when the merry goodnights were all said and we had retired to rest. Aunt Helen dropped to sleep in a short time; but I lay awake listening to the soft distant call of the mopokes in the scrub beyond the stables.
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
My Unladylike Behaviour Again
Joe Archer was appointed to take us home on the morrow. When our host was seeing us off--still with his eye covered--he took opportunity of whispering to me his intention of coming to Caddagat on the following Sunday.
Early in the afternoon of that day I took a book, and, going down the road some distance, climbed up a broad-branched willow-tree to wait for him.
It was not long before he appeared at a smart canter. He did not see me in the tree, but his horse did, and propping, snorted wildly, and gave a backward run. Harold spurred him, he bucked spiritedly. Harold now saw me and sang out:
"I say, don"t frighten him any more or he"ll fling me, saddle and all. I haven"t got a crupper or a breastplate."
"Why haven"t you, then? Hang on to him. I do like the look of you while the horse is going on like that."
He had dismounted, and had thrown the bridle rein over a post of the fence.
"I came with nothing but a girth, and that loose, as it was so hot; and I was as near as twopence to being off, saddle and all. You might have been the death of me," he said good-humouredly.
"Had I been, my fortune would have been made," I replied.
"How do you make that out? You"re as complimentary as ever."
"Everyone would be wanting to engage me as the great noxious weed-killer and poisonous insect exterminator if I made away with you," I answered.
I gave him an invitation to take a seat with me, and accepting, he swung up with easy grace. There was any amount of accommodation for the two of us on the good-natured branches of the old willow-tree.
When he had settled himself, my companion said, "Now, Syb, I"m ready for you. Fire away. But wait a minute, I"ve got something here for you which I hope you"ll like."