"If he only knew!" she murmured. "If he only knew the terrible secret that struck me down that night! But I dare not tell--I dare not, even if that voice from the dead had not forbidden me. I love him so dearly--so dearly! Ah, pitiful Lord! let him never know!"
CHAPTER XVI.
THE BARONET"S BRIDE.
The winter months wore by. Spring came, and still that most devoted of lovers, Sir Everard Kingsland, lingered in Paris, near his gray-eyed divinity. His life was no dull one in the gayest capital of Europe.
He had hosts of friends, the purse of Fortunatus, the youth and beauty of a demi-G.o.d. Brilliant Parisian belles, flashing in ancestral diamonds, with the blue blood of the old _regime_ in their delicate veins, showered their brightest smiles, their most entrancing glances, upon the handsome young Englishman in vain. His loyal heart never swerved in its allegiance to his gray-eyed queen--the love-light that lighted her dear face, the warm, welcoming kiss of her cherry lips, were worth a hundred Parisian belles with their ducal coats of arms.
"Faithful and true" was the motto on his seal; faithful and true in every word and thought--true as the needle to the North Star--was he to the lady of his love.
The weeks went swiftly and pleasantly enough; but his red-letter day was the Sat.u.r.day afternoon that brought him to his darling. And she, buried among her dry-as-dust school-books and cla.s.sic lore--how she looked forward to the weekly day of grace no words of mine can tell.
But with the first bright days of April came a change. He was going back to England, he told her, one Sat.u.r.day afternoon, as they sat, lover-like, side by side, in the prim salon. She gave a low cry at the words, and looked at him with wild, wide eyes.
"Going to England! Going to leave me!"
"My dearest, it is for your sake I go, and I will be gone but a little while. The end of next October our long year of waiting ends, and before the Christmas snow flies, my darling must be all my own. It is to prepare for our marriage I go."
She hid her glowing face on his shoulder.
"I would make Kingsland Court a very Paradise, if I could, for my bright little queen. As I can not make it quite Paradise, I will do what I can."
"Any place is my Paradise so that you are there, Everard!"
"Landscape gardeners and upholsterers shall wave their magic wands and work their nineteenth century miracles," he said, presently, reverting to his project. "My dear girl"s future home shall be a very bower of delights. And, besides, I want to see my mother. She feels herself a little slighted, I am afraid, after this winter"s absence."
"Ah, your mother!" with a little sigh. "Will she ever like me, do yon think, Everard? Her letter was so cold, so formal, so chilling!"
For this high-stepping young lady who had ridden at the fox-hunt with reckless daring, who was so regally uplifted and imperious, had grown very humble in her new love.
Harrie had written to my lady an humble, girlish, appealing little letter, and had received the coldest of polite replies with the "b.l.o.o.d.y hand" and the Kingsland crest emblazoned proudly, and the motto of the house in good old Norman French, "Strike once, and strike well."
Since then there had been no correspondence. Miss Hunsden was too proud to sue for her favor, and Sir Everard loved her too sensitively to expose her to a possible rebuff.
My lady was unutterably offended by her son"s desertion of a whole winter. She was nothing to him now. This bold, masculine girl with the horrible boy"s name was his all in all now.
Sir Everard Kingsland met with a very cold reception from his lady mother upon his return to Devonshire. She listened in still disdain to his glowing accounts of the marvels the summer would work in the grand old place.
"And all this for the penniless daughter of a half-pay captain; and Lady Louise might have been his wife."
Sir Everard ran heedlessly on.
"You and Milly shall retain your old rooms, of course," he said, "and have them altered or not, just as you choose. Harrie"s room shall be in the south wing--she likes a sunny, southern prospect--and the winter and summer drawing-rooms must be completely refurnished; and the conservatory has been sadly neglected of late, and the oak paneling in the dining-room wants touching up. Hadn"t you better give all the orders for your own apartments yourself? The others I will attend to."
"My orders are already given," Lady Kingsland said, with frigid hauteur. "My jointure house is to be fitted up. Before you return from your honey-moon I will have quitted Kingsland Court with my daughter. Permit Mildred and me to retain our present apartments unaltered until that time; then the future Lady Kingsland can have the old rooms disfigured with as much gilding and stucco and ormolu as she pleases."
The young man"s fair face blackened with an angry scowl as he listened to the taunting, spiteful speech. But he restrained himself.
"There is no necessity for your withdrawal from your old home. If you leave, it will be against my wish. Neither my wife nor I could ever desire such a step."
"Your wife! Does she take state upon herself already? To you and your wife, Sir Everard Kingsland, I return my humble thanks, but even Kingsland Court is not large enough for two mistresses. I will never stand aside and see the pauper daughter of the half-pay captain rule where I ruled once."
She swept majestically out of the room as she launched her last smarting shaft, leaving her son with face of suppressed rage, to recover his temper as best he might.
"He will never ask me again," she thought. "I know his nature too well."
And he did not. He went about his work with stern determination, never consulting her, never asking advice, or informing her of any project--always deferential, always studiously polite.
There was one person, however, at the Court who made up, by the warmth of her greeting and the fervor of her sympathy, for any lack on his mother"s part. It was Miss Sybilla Silver who somehow had grown to be as much a fixture there as the marble and bronze statues.
She had written to find her friends in Plymouth, or she said so, and failed, and she had managed to make herself so useful to my lady that my lady was very glad to keep her. She could make caps like a Parisian milliner; she could dress her exquisitely; she could read for hours in the sweetest and clearest of voices, without one yawn, the dullest of dull High Church novels. She could answer notes and sing like a siren, and she could embroider _prie-dieu_ chairs and table-covers, and slippers and handkerchiefs, and darn point lace like Fairy Fingers herself.
She was a treasure, this ex-lad in velveteen, and my lady counted it a lucky day that brought her to Kingsland. But Miss Sybilla belonged to my lady"s son, and not to my lady. To the young lord of Kingsland her allegiance was due, and at his bidding she was ready, at a moment"s notice, to desert the female standard.
Sir Everard, who took a kindly interest in the dashing damsel with the coal-black hair and eyes, who had shot the poacher, put the question plump one day:
"My mother and sister leave before the end of the year, Sybilla. Will you desert me, too?"
"Never, Sir Everard! I will never desert you while you wish me to stay."
"I should like it, I confess. It will be horribly dreary for my bride to come home to a house where there is no one to welcome her but the servants. If my mother can spare you, Sybilla, I wish you would stay."
As once before, she lifted his hand to her lips.
"Sybilla belongs to you, Sir Everard! Command, and she will obey."
He laughed, but he also reddened as he drew his hand hastily away.
"Oh, pooh! don"t be melodramatic! There is no question of commanding and obeying about it. You are free to do as you please. If you choose to remain, give Lady Kingsland proper notice. If you prefer to go, why, I must look out for some one to take your place. Don"t be in a hurry--there"s plenty of time to decide."
He swung on and left her.
"Plenty of time to decide," she repeated, with a smile curling her thin lips. "My good Sir Everard, I decided long ago! Marry your fox-hunting bride--bring her home. Sybilla Silver will be here to welcome her, never fear!"
The baronet stayed three weeks in England--then returned impatiently to Paris. Of course the rapture of the meeting more than repaid the pain of parting.
She was growing more beautiful every day, the infatuated young man thought, over her books; and the sun of France shone on nothing half so lovely as this tall, slender damsel, in her gray school uniform and prim, black silk ap.r.o.n.
The summer went. Sir Everard was back and forth across the Channel, like an insane human pendulum, and the work went bravely on! Kingsland was being transformed--the landscape gardeners and the London upholsterers had _carte blanche_, and it was the story of Aladdin"s Palace over again. Sir Everard rubbed his golden lamp, and, lo! mighty genii rose up and worked wonders.
September came--the miracles ceased. Even money and men could do no more. October came.
Sir Everard"s year of probation was expired. The Reverend Cyrus Green overcame heroically his horror of seasickness and steamers, and went to Paris in person for his ward. As plain Miss Hunsden, without a shilling to bless herself with, the Reverend Cyrus would not by any means have thought this extreme step necessary; but for the future Lady Kingsland to travel alone was not for an instant to be thought of. So he went, and the first week of November he brought her home.
Miss Hunsden--taller, more stately, more beautiful than ever--was very still and sad, this first anniversary of her father"s death. Lady Kingsland, when she and Mildred called--for they did, of course--was rather impressed by the stately girl in mourning, whose fair, proud face and calm, gray eyes met hers so unflinchingly. It was "Greek meets Greek" here; neither would yield an inch.
The wedding was to take place early in December--Sir Everard would not wait, and Harrie seemed to have no will left but his. Once she had feebly uttered some remonstrances, but he had imperatively cut her short.