"I did answer him, papa."
"Yes,--you refused him. But he hopes that perhaps you may think better of it. He has been with me and I have told him that if he will come to-morrow you will see him. He is to be here after dinner and you had better just take him up-stairs and hear what he has to say.
If you can make up your mind to like him you will please all your family. But if you can"t,--I won"t quarrel with you, my dear."
"Oh papa, you are always so good."
"Of course I am anxious that you should have a home of your own;--but let it be how it may I will not quarrel with my child."
All that evening, and almost all the night, and again on the following morning Mary turned it over in her mind. She was quite sure that she was not in love with Larry Twentyman; but she was by no means sure that it might not be her duty to accept him without being in love with him. Of course he must know the whole truth; but she could tell him the truth and then leave it for him to decide. What right had she to stand in the way of her friends, or to be a burden to them when such a mode of life was offered to her? She had nothing of her own, and regarded herself as being a dead weight on the family. And she was conscious in a certain degree of isolation in the household,--as being her father"s only child by the first marriage.
She would hardly know how to look her father in the face and tell him that she had again refused the man. But yet there was something awful to her in the idea of giving herself to a man without loving him,--in becoming a man"s wife when she would fain remain away from him! Would it be possible that she should live with him while her feelings were of such a nature? And then she blushed as she lay in the dark, with her cheek on her pillow, when she found herself forced to inquire within her own heart whether she did not love some one else. She would not own it, and yet she blushed, and yet she thought of it. If there might be such a man it was not the young clergyman to whom her mother had alluded.
Through all that morning she was very quiet, very pale, and in truth very unhappy. Her father said no further word to her, and her stepmother had been implored to be equally reticent. "I shan"t speak another word," said Mrs. Masters; "her fortune is in her own hands and if she don"t choose to take it I"ve done with her. One man may lead a horse to water but a hundred can"t make him drink. It"s just the same with an obstinate pig-headed young woman."
At three o"clock Mr. Twentyman came and was at once desired to go up to Mary who was waiting for him in the drawing-room. Mrs. Masters smiled and was gracious as she spoke to him, having for the moment wreathed herself in good humour so that he might go to his wooing in better spirit. He had learned his lesson by heart as nearly as he was able and began to recite it as soon as he had closed the door. "So you"re going to Cheltenham on Thursday?" he said.
"Yes, Mr. Twentyman."
"I hope you"ll enjoy your visit there. I remember Lady Ushant myself very well. I don"t suppose she will remember me, but you can give her my compliments."
"I certainly will do that."
"And now, Mary, what have you got to say to me?" He looked for a moment as though he expected she would say what she had to say at once,--without further question from him; but he knew that it could not be so and he had prepared his lesson further than that. "I think you must believe that I really do love you with all my heart."
"I know that you are very good to me, Mr. Twentyman."
"I don"t say anything about being good; but I"m true:--that I am. I"d take you for my wife to-morrow if you hadn"t a friend in the world, just for downright love. I"ve got you so in my heart, Mary, that I couldn"t get rid of you if I tried ever so. You must know that it"s true."
"I do know that it"s true."
"Well! Don"t you think that a fellow like that deserves something from a girl?"
"Indeed I do."
"Well!"
"He deserves a great deal too much for any girl to deceive him. You wouldn"t like a young woman to marry you without loving you. I think you deserve a great deal too well of me for that."
He paused a moment before he replied. "I don"t know about that," he said at last. "I believe I should be glad to take you just anyhow.
I don"t think you can hate me."
"Certainly not. I like you as well, Mr. Twentyman, as one friend can like another,--without loving."
"I"ll be content with that, Mary, and chance it for the rest. I"ll be that kind to you that I"ll make you love me before twelve months are over. You come and try. You shall be mistress of everything. Mother isn"t one that will want to be in the way."
"It isn"t that, Larry," she said.
She hadn"t called him Larry for a long time and the sound of his own name from her lips gave him infinite hope. "Come and try. Say you"ll try. If ever a man did his best to please a woman I"ll do it to please you." Then he attempted to take her in his arms but she glided away from him round the table. "I won"t ask you not to go to Cheltenham, or anything of that. You shall have your own time. By George you shall have everything your own way." Still she did not answer him but stood looking down upon the table. "Come;--say a word to a fellow."
Then at last she spoke--"Give me--six months to think of it."
"Six months! If you"d say six weeks."
"It is such a serious thing to do."
"It is serious, of course. I"m serious, I know. I shouldn"t hunt above half as often as I do now; and as for the club,--I don"t suppose I should go near the place once a month. Say six weeks, and then, if you"ll let me have one kiss, I"ll not trouble you till you"re back from Cheltenham."
Mary at once perceived that he had taken her doubt almost as a complete surrender, and had again to become obdurate. At last she promised to give him a final answer in two months, but declared as she said so that she was afraid she could not bring herself to do as he desired. She declined altogether to comply with that other request which he made, and then left him in the room declaring that at present she could say nothing further. As she did so she felt sure that she would not be able to accept him in two months" time whatever she might bring herself to do when the vast abyss of six months should have pa.s.sed by.
Larry made his way down into the parlour with hopes considerably raised. There he found Mrs. Masters and when he told her what had pa.s.sed she a.s.sured him that the thing was as good as settled.
Everybody knew, she said, that when a girl doubted she meant to yield. And what were two months? The time would have nearly gone by the end of her visit to Cheltenham. It was now early in December, and they might be married and settled at home before the end of April.
Mrs. Masters, to give him courage, took out a bottle of currant wine and drank his health, and told him that in three months" time she would give him a kiss and call him her son. And she believed what she said. This, she thought, was merely Mary"s way of letting herself down without a sudden fall.
Then the attorney came in and also congratulated him. When the attorney was told that Mary had taken two months for her decision he also felt that the matter was almost as good as settled. This at any rate was clear to him,--that the existing misery of his household would for the present cease, and that Mary would be allowed to go upon her visit without further opposition. He at present did not think it wise to say another word to Mary about the young man;--nor would Mrs. Masters condescend to do so. Mary would of course now accept her lover like any other girl, and had been such a fool,--so thought Mrs. Masters,--that she had thoroughly deserved to lose him.
CHAPTER XXVII.
"WONDERFUL BIRD!"
There were but two days between the scenes described in the last chapter and the day fixed for Mary"s departure, and during these two days Larry Twentyman"s name was not mentioned in the house. Mrs.
Masters did not make herself quite pleasant to her stepdaughter, having still some grudge against her as to the 20. Nor, though she had submitted to the visit to Cheltenham, did she approve of it. It wasn"t the way, she said, to make such a girl as Mary like her life at Chowton Farm, going and sitting and doing nothing in old Lady Ushant"s drawing-room. It was c.o.c.king her up with gimcrack notions about ladies till she"d be ashamed to look at her own hands after she had done a day"s work with them. There was no doubt some truth in this. The woman understood the world and was able to measure Larry Twentyman and Lady Ushant and the rest of them. Books and pretty needlework and easy conversation would consume the time at Cheltenham, whereas at Chowton Farm there would be a dairy and a poultry yard,--under difficulties on account of the foxes,--with a prospect of baby linen and children"s shoes and stockings. It was all that question of gentlemen and ladies, and of non-gentlemen and non-ladies! They ought, Mrs. Masters thought, to be kept distinct.
She had never, she said, wanted to put her finger into a pie that didn"t belong to her. She had never tried to be a grand lady. But Mary was perilously near the brink on either side, and as it was to be her lucky fate at last to sit down to a plentiful but work-a-day life at Chowton Farm she ought to have been kept away from the maundering idleness of Lady Ushant"s lodgings at Cheltenham. But Mary heard nothing of this during these two days, Mrs. Masters bestowing the load of her wisdom upon her unfortunate husband.
Reginald Morton had been twice over at Mrs. Masters" house with reference to the proposed journey. Mrs. Masters was hardly civil to him, as he was supposed to be among the enemies;--but she had no suspicion that he himself was the enemy of enemies. Had she entertained such an idea she might have reconciled herself to it, as the man was able to support a wife, and by such a marriage she would have been at once relieved from all further charge. In her own mind she would have felt very strongly that Mary had chosen the wrong man, and thrown herself into the inferior mode of life. But her own difficulties in the matter would have been solved. There was, however, no dream of such a kind entertained by any of the family.
Reginald Morton was hardly regarded as a young man, and was supposed to be gloomy, misanthropic, and bookish. Mrs. Masters was not at all averse to the companionship for the journey, and Mr. Masters was really grateful to one of the old family for being kind to his girl.
Nor must it be supposed that Mary herself had any expectations or even any hopes. With juvenile aptness to make much of the little things which had interested her, and p.r.o.ne to think more than was reasonable of any intercourse with a man who seemed to her to be so superior to others as Reginald Morton, she was anxious for an opportunity to set herself right with him about that scene at the bridge. She still thought that he was offended and that she had given him cause for offence. He had condescended to make her a request to which she had acceded,--and she had then not done as she had promised. She thought she was sure that this was all she had to say to him, and yet she was aware that she was unnaturally excited at the idea of spending three or four hours alone with him. The fly which was to take him to the railway station called for Mary at the attorney"s door at ten o"clock, and the attorney handed her in. "It is very good of you indeed, Mr. Morton, to take so much trouble with my girl," said the attorney, really feeling what he said. "It is very good of you to trust her to me," said Reginald, also sincerely. Mary was still to him the girl who had been brought up by his aunt at Bragton, and not the fit companion for Larry Twentyman.
Reginald Morton had certainly not made up his mind to ask Mary Masters to be his wife. Thinking of Mary Masters very often as he had done during the last two months, he was quite sure that he did not mean to marry at all. He did acknowledge to himself that were he to allow himself to fall in love with any one it would be with Mary Masters,--but for not doing so there were many reasons. He had lived so long alone that a married life would not suit him; as a married man he would be a poor man; he himself was averse to company, whereas most women prefer society. And then, as to this special girl, had he not reason for supposing that she preferred another man to him, and a man of such a cla.s.s that the very preference showed her to be unfit to mate with him? He also cozened himself with an idea that it was well that he should have the opportunity which the journey would give him of apologising for his previous rudeness to her.
In the carriage they had the compartment to themselves with the exception of an old lady at the further end who had a parrot in a cage for which she had taken a first-cla.s.s ticket. "I can"t offer you this seat," said the old lady, "because it has been booked and paid for for my bird." As neither of the new pa.s.sengers had shown the slightest wish for the seat the communication was perhaps unnecessary. Neither of the two had any idea of separating from the other for the sake of the old lady"s company.
They had before them a journey of thirty miles on one railway, then a stop of half an hour at the Hinxton Junction; and then another journey of about equal length. In the first hour very little was said that might not have been said in the presence of Lady Ushant,--or even of Mrs. Masters. There might be a question whether, upon the whole, the parrot had not the best of the conversation, as the bird, which the old lady declared to be the wonder of his species, repeated the last word of nearly every sentence spoken either by our friends or by the old lady herself. "Don"t you think you"d be less liable to cold with that window closed?" the old lady said to Mary.
"Cosed,--cosed,--cosed," said the bird, and Morton was of course constrained to shut the window. "He is a wonderful bird," said the old lady. "Wonderful bird;--wonderful bird;--wonderful bird," said the parrot, who was quite at home with this expression. "We shall be able to get some lunch at Hinxton," said Reginald. "Inxton," screamed the bird--"Caw,--caw--caw." "He"s worth a deal of money," said the old lady. "Deal o" money, Deal o" money," repeated the bird as he scrambled round the wire cage with a tremendous noise, to the great triumph of the old lady.
No doubt the close attention which the bird paid to everything that pa.s.sed, and the presence of the old lady as well, did for a time interfere with their conversation. But, after awhile, the old lady was asleep, and the bird, having once or twice attempted to imitate the somnolent sounds which his mistress was making, seemed also to go to sleep himself. Then Reginald, beginning with Lady Ushant and the old Morton family generally, gradually got the conversation round to Bragton and the little bridge. He had been very stern when he had left her there, and he knew also that at that subsequent interview, when he had brought Lady Ushant"s note to her at her father"s house, he had not been cordially kind to her. Now they were thrown together for an hour or so in the closest companionship, and he wished to make her comfortable and happy. "I suppose you remember Bragton?" he said.
"Every path and almost every tree about the place."
"So do I. I called there the other day. Family quarrels are so silly, you know."
"Did you see Mr. Morton?"
"No;--and he hasn"t returned my visit yet. I don"t know whether he will,--and I don"t much mind whether he does or not. That old woman is there, and she is very bitter against me. I don"t care about the people, but I am sorry that I cannot see the place."