He paused a moment, while a softer expression swept over his fine face.
"Wentworth, what ails you?" he continued in a more friendly tone. "What has made you so strangely antagonistic toward me all these years? I fail to understand it. It began away back during our first term in college; what caused it? Where is your manliness that you could cherish a grudge for so long? Believe me, I never had the slightest personal ill-will against you, and certainly you must have been in a very uncomfortable frame of mind most of this time. If I have unconsciously done you any wrong in the past, I should be very glad to be told of it."
Again he paused, but Philip stood silent, with downcast eyes and a sullen frown upon his brow. Clifford saw that he was incorrigible, and, repressing a sigh of regret for a life so warped by selfishness, he observed:
"Possibly I am unwise in appealing to you in any such way; but I believe the day will yet come when you will regret some of these things."
He turned and went swiftly back the way he had come, while Philip watched him with a lowering brow and a look of hate in his eyes.
Suddenly a slight rustle caused him to turn and look behind him, when an exclamation of dismay escaped him, for, leaning against the tall vase, and pale as the snowy dress she wore, he saw Gertrude Athol standing not a dozen feet from him.
"Gertrude!" the young man faltered, for he knew from her manner that she must have overheard much of what had pa.s.sed--how much he dared not think.
The sound of his voice acted like a shock of electricity upon her. She stood erect, swept into the path where he was, and confronted him.
"I have heard all," she said in a cold, quiet tone. "I had no intention of playing the eavesdropper, however. Miss Heatherford and I were here in the conservatory a while ago, when my father called me, but he only wished to ask me a question or two, and then I thought that I would come back to Miss Heatherford, and that is how I happened to be here. I came just as you were declaring that she and she alone held your life and your future in her hands----" and the beautiful girl"s nostrils dilated with supreme contempt as she thus repeated his words. "Therefore, considering the relations that have existed between you and me for the last four years, I felt that I had the right to hear you out and learn just to what extent I had been made your dupe----"
"Oh, Gertrude!"
"Hush!" she commanded imperatively. "I will not listen to a word of extenuation from you--there is none--there can be none. I will say my say out, and that will end everything between us. I have long felt that I might perhaps be building my hopes for the future upon shifting sand--there have been many indications of it, but I hoped that you might change for the better--that your good qualities would in the end overbalance your weakness. For more than four years I have worn your ring, believing myself pledged to you," Gertrude went on, as she calmly began to unlace the glove on her left hand, "but to-night you have said in my presence that for many years you have been betrothed to another--that you have loved--worshiped that other."
She turned the glove wrong-side out, to remove it the more quickly, slipped the ring from her finger, and held it out to him. "Here, take it. You and I will part here and now. And do not think that I shall eat my heart out and die because of disappointed love--like the girl of whom we read that summer in the mountains. I am not in the slightest danger of such a fate, for you have this night slain every spark of regard or respect that I ever entertained for you."
"Gertrude, hear me----" Philip began, as he shrank away from the hand that held the ring out to him.
"I have already heard all I wish to hear," she spiritedly returned, and with an inflection that made him wince. "Take it!" she reiterated as she again offered him the ring. "Very well," as he still refused, "I will leave it here for you to think about."
She hung it upon a twig of the plant before him, then turning abruptly from him, swept down and out of the conservatory with the air and step of one who exulted in recovered freedom.
As she disappeared he reached forth his hand and secured the ring, for it was a valuable one, but with a shamefaced air and a muttered curse at his--"luck."
Fifteen minutes later, when he sought his mother, to inform her that he "was not well, and was going home," he espied Mollie and Gertrude standing in an alcove chatting socially together, and as calmly and serenely as if no thought of regret in connection with him had power to cast a shadow across their pathway. Gertrude was perhaps a trifle paler than usual, but she was bright and animated, and he was a.s.sured that she "never would eat her heart out for him."
The contempt that had vibrated in her tones as she said it was still ringing in his ears as he left the house, making him quiver from head to foot with a sense of humiliation such as he had never experienced before.
When Gertrude Athol entered her own room, after her return from the reception, she sat down and tried to calmly review the recent scene between her discarded lover and herself, and to consider what influence it was likely to have upon her future.
"I believe I can truly say that I am glad to be free," she said after a while, with a sudden proud uplifting of her head. "I have known from almost the first of our acquaintance that Philip Wentworth is a weak and selfish man; but he is a handsome fellow, entertaining, and well versed in all the little courtesies of life and possessing strong mesmeric power, and I believe that he was fond of me. I foolishly imagined that, because of this supposed fondness, I might be able to help him overcome his faults and arouse within him an ambition to cultivate the best there is in him; but I know him now for a treacherous villain--for a coward, and almost a murderer. Oh, yes; I am glad that I am free, and I shall not grieve for him; though, of course, any woman would naturally be keenly stung to discover that she has only been made a tool of--simply held in reserve in the event of the failure of other plans!"
Her cheeks grew crimson, and her eyes flashed indignantly at the thought, while two tears fell upon her jeweled hands. She flung them off with an impatient gesture.
"They are not for him!" she cried scornfully; "they fell only for my own wounded pride; and they are the last I shall ever shed for that. The hurt is not so very deep, thank Heaven! and will soon heal. So he has been in love with Mollie Heatherford "all his life?" Well, she certainly is one of the dearest and loveliest girls I have ever met, and she has shown good judgment in her choice of a husband, for Clifford Faxon is worth a dozen men like Philip Wentworth."
A little later, after her acquaintance with Mollie had ripened into a strong and enduring friendship--when she learned how Philip had played fast and loose with her, according to the changes in her circ.u.mstances--her contempt merged into positive repulsion for the young man; and before the season was over her acquaintance with a son of the British amba.s.sador, whom she met that evening for the first time, developed into a strong mutual attachment which bade fair to result in an early marriage.
Upon their return from the reception, Clifford lingered a while with Mollie before proceeding to his lodgings, and it was, therefore, quite late when he reached home. He was somewhat surprised to find a carriage standing before the house where Squire Talford boarded, while the coachman was a.s.sisting his former employer up to the door, the man groaning at every step.
"Here, sir!" called the cabman, as he espied Clifford, "will you lend a hand here, please? The gentleman has sprained his ankle, and he is more than I can manage."
"Certainly," Clifford cheerfully responded, as he sprang forward with alacrity to render what a.s.sistance he could.
"Here is his latch-key, sir," the driver continued, pa.s.sing it to the young man, "If you"ll open the door, we"ll make an armchair and carry him up to his room, as easy as snapping your thumb and finger."
Clifford did as he was requested, and then the two clasped hands, making the squire sit upon them, with an arm around the neck of each of his helpers, and in this way he was borne up two flights of stairs and deposited upon a chair in his own room, which was little better than a closet at the back of a hall.
CHAPTER XVII.
SQUIRE TALFORD"S ACCIDENT.
It was evident that the man was suffering intensely; but resolutely repressing, as far as he was able, outward manifestations of the fact, he turned to the cabman and briefly inquired:
"What"s to pay for this?"
The man named his price, and, with a grunt of disapprobation, the squire drew forth his wallet--the same that Mollie had restored to him only a few hours previous--and paid the amount, whereupon the driver hurried away to his team below.
Squire Talford had not taken the slightest notice of Clifford, but the young man, although he found himself in an awkward position, felt that he had a duty to perform, and courteously inquired if he should go for a surgeon to attend to the injured limb.
"No," was the gruff response, "the leg has already been attended to at the drug-store, where I made the mis-step."
Cliff glanced down and observed for the first time that his boot had been removed and the ankle bandaged.
"But you will have to get to bed, sir; let me a.s.sist you," he remarked.
"No--I can do well enough by myself--I don"t want any help," the squire returned ungraciously.
Cliff flushed and stood irresolute for a moment. Then a look of determination flashed into his eyes, and he deliberately unb.u.t.toned and removed his overcoat.
"Excuse me, Squire Talford, but you do need help," he calmly observed.
"I know that you are not at all fond of me; that my presence is disagreeable to you; but suppose, for this once, you ignore those facts and accept the aid you require. You cannot stir from your chair without great suffering if I leave you, and will probably have to sit in it all night, unless you call some one in the house, and everybody appears to be in bed. Here, let me have your hat," and without more ado he removed it from the man"s head and placed it on a table.
"Now the coat," he added. "I am sure I can help you undress without disturbing you very much, and when I get you comfortably settled in bed I will leave you."
Squire Talford was beginning to realize his helplessness, and submitted to the disrobing without further objection, although not with the best grace in the world, and he never once met Clifford"s eyes during the operation.
"Now," said the young man, when that task was over, "the next move will be to try to get you into bed without hurting this crippled foot if possible. I will move your chair close beside it, then I think I can easily lift you on."
He swung the chair around, while he was speaking, and, it being a rocker without arms, it was not difficult to place it just where he wanted it, when, almost before he had time to dread the change, the squire found himself reclining in a comparatively comfortable position, although the pain in his ankle seemed unbearable.
"Is there anything else I can do for you?" Clifford inquired, with a great pity in his heart for the lonely man, as he saw how deathly white he was and noted the lines of pain about his mouth.
"I don"t think of anything," said the squire, in a more subdued tone than he had yet used.
Clifford hung his clothing in the closet, and straightened things generally in the room, then found his way to the bath-room, where he procured a gla.s.s of water, which he placed on a chair beside the patient, in case he should be thirsty during the night.