"Yes, yes," says t.i.ta, trying to hurry past him.
If Tom has come up from the smoking-room, of course the others will be coming too, and, on the whole, she is not as well got up as usual. It is with a sort of contempt she treats the charming gown in which she is now clothed. And yet she has hardly ever looked lovelier than now, with her eyes a little widened by her late grief, and her hair so sweetly disturbed, and her little slender form showing through the open folds of the long white gown that covers her.
"Don"t go. Don"t!" says Tom Hescott; his tone is so full of poignant anguish that she stops short. "Stay a moment." In his despair he has caught a fold of her gown. To do him fair justice, he honestly believes that she hates her husband, and that she is thoroughly unhappy with him. Unhappy with great cause. "I am going--you know that, and--I have a last word to say. I tried to say it this afternoon--out there--you know--in the shrubberies, and when you wouldn"t listen--I--I respected that. I respected you. But--a time may come when you"--hurriedly--"may not always choose to live this wretched life. There will be a way out of it, t.i.ta--a way not made by _you!"_
t.i.ta suddenly feels very cold, chilled to her heart"s core. She had listened so far as if stunned; but now she wakes, and the face of Marian Bethune seems to look with a cold sneer into hers.
"And after that," goes on Hescott, "if--if----" He breaks down.
"Well, if _that_ comes, you know I--_love_ you, t.i.ta."
He tries to take her hand.
"Don"t touch me!" says t.i.ta vehemently. She pushes his hand from her; such a disdainful little push. "Oh, I thought you really _did_ love me," says she, "but not like _this!"_ Suddenly a sort of rage and of anger springs to life within her. She turns a face, singularly childish, yet with the sad first break of womanhood upon it, to his. "How _dare_ you love me like this?" says she.
"t.i.ta, listen to me----"
"No. Not I! You must be a _fool_ to talk to me like this. Of what use is it? What good? If you loved me for ever, what good could come of it? I don"t love you! Ah!"--she catches her breath and looks straight at him with an undying sense of indignation--"Maurice was right about you, and I was wrong. He saw through you, I didn"t.
I"--with a little inward glance into her own feelings--"I shan"t forgive you for _that,_ either!"
"You mean----"
"It really doesn"t matter," says t.i.ta, cruel for the first time in all her sweet young life. The light is so dim that she cannot see his face distinctly. Perhaps if she had, she would have been kinder.
"I mean nothing. Only go; go at once! Do you _hear?"_
Her childish voice grows imperious.
"I am going," says Hescott dully--"in the morning."
"Oh! I"m glad"--smiting her hands together--"by the _early_ train?"
"The earliest!"
Hescott"s soul seems dying within him. All at once the truth is clear to him, or, at least, half of it. She may not love her husband, but, beyond all question, love for him--Hescott--has never entered into her mind.
"And a good thing too!" says t.i.ta wrathfully. "I hope I shall never see you here again. I could never bear to look at you after this!"
She is standing trembling with agitation before him, like one full-filled with wrath. "To-day--I shall not forget _that._ To-day--and that story"--she stops as if choking--"what did you _mean_ by telling that story?" demands she, almost violently.
"Everyone there knew what you meant. It dragged me down to the ground. I hated you for it! You invented it. You _know_ you did, just to humiliate _him!_ You think Maurice hates me, but he doesn"t.
It is a lie!" She pauses, her lovely eyes aflame. "It is a lie!" she repeats pa.s.sionately.
"If so----" begins Hescott, but in so low a tone, and so dead, that she scarcely heeds it.
"And to call me an angel before them all. Ah! I could read through you. So could everyone. It was an insult! I _won"t_ be called an angel. I am just what Maurice is, and no more. I wonder Maurice didn"t _kill_ you--and he would, only you were his guest. So would I--only----"
She breaks off. The tears are running down her cheeks. She makes a little swift turn of her body towards him.
"Oh, Tom! and I did so believe in _you!"_
There is a short silence fraught with misery for one soul, at all events.
"Believe in me still," says Tom Hescott, in a queer, low tone.
"Believe in me now--and for ever--to"--with pa.s.sionate fondness--"the last moment of your life." He draws his breath sharply. "And now good-bye."
He struggles with himself, and, failing in the struggle, catches her suddenly to his breast, and there holds her to his heart for half a minute, perhaps.
Then he releases her. It is all over. He had not even tried to kiss her. He goes swiftly past her into the gloom beyond the dying lamp, and is lost.
t.i.ta stands as if stricken dumb. For a second only. _Then_ she is conscious of a hand being laid on her arm, of her being forcibly led forward to her own room, of the door being closed behind her.
She turns and looks up at Rylton. His eyes are blazing. He is dangerously white across cheeks and nose.
"There shall be an end of this!" says he.
CHAPTER XV.
HOW JEALOUSY RUNS RIOT IN OAKDEAN; AND HOW MARGARET TRIES TO THROW OIL UPON THE WATERS; AND HOW A GREAT CRASH COMES, WITH MANY WORDS AND ONE SURPRISE.
t.i.ta has wrenched herself from his grasp.
"Of _what?"_ demands she.
"Do you think you can hoodwink me any longer? There shall be an end of it--do you hear?" Rylton"s face, as she now sees it in the light of the lamps in her room, almost frightens her. "I"ve had enough of it!"
"I don"t understand you!" says t.i.ta, standing well away from him, her face as white as ashes.
As for _his_ face----
"Don"t you?" violently. "Then I shall explain. I"ve had enough of what ruins men"s lives and honours--of what leads to----"
"To?" says the girl, shrinking, yet leaning forward.
"To the devil--to the Divorce Court!" says Rylton, with increasing violence. "Do you think I did not see you and him just now--you--_in his arms!_ Look here!"
He seizes her arm. There is a quick, sudden movement, and she is once again free. Such a little, fragile creature! She seems to have grown a woman during this encounter, and to be now tall to him, and strong and imperious.
"Don"t!" says she, in a curious tone, so low as to be almost unheard, yet clear to him. "Don"t come near me. _Don"t!_ What do you accuse me of?"
"You know right well. Do you think the whole world--_our_ world, at all events--has not seen how it has been with you and----"
He cannot go on. He pauses, looking at her. He had meant to spare her feelings; but, to his surprise, she meets his gaze fully, and says, "Well?" in a questioning way.
At this his rage bursts forth.
"Are you _quite_ shameless that you talk to me like this?" cries he.
"Are you mad?" As he speaks, his fingers tighten on a piece of paper--evidently a letter--that he is holding in his right hand.
"You _must_ know that I saw you with him to-night--you--in his arms--_you_----"