"She is far too good for me," returned Erle, with a touch of real feeling, for his _fiancee"s_ unselfish devotion was a daily reproach to him. Could any girl be sweeter or more loving, he thought.
Fay sighed as she watched him. Erle had changed too, she said to herself; he was nicer, but he had lost his old careless merriment; he looked graver, and a little thin, and there was not always a happy look in his eyes. Fay sometimes feared that the other girl with the fair hair had not been forgotten; she wanted to tell him that she hoped Evelyn knew all about her, but she lacked the courage, and somehow it was not so easy to talk to Erle this time.
But there was one subject on which he dilated without reserve, and that was on Mr. Ferrers"s search for Crystal. He was in New York now, he told Fay, with his sister, and he was waiting for further intelligence before he followed Miss Davenport. "Miss Trafford corresponds with him," he continued, with an effort; "but it seems the travelers have little time for writing." But he wondered, as he talked about the Ferrers, why Fay changed color so often--he had heard it was a sign of delicacy.
"I am tiring you," he said, hastily; "you are looking quite pale; you want a change sadly yourself, my Fairy Queen." And Hugh, entering the room at that moment, caught at the word and came up quickly to the couch.
"Don"t you feel so well to-day, pet?" he asked, kindly; "why are you talking about a change?"
"It was only Erle"s nonsense, dear," she said, hurriedly. She never could speak to him without a painful blush, and it always deepened if he looked at her long, as he did now.
"I never saw you look better than you do to-day," returned her husband; "she is quite rosy, is she not, Erle? But you are right, and a change will do her and the boy good. I was thinking how you would like to go down to Devonshire, Fay, while I am away?"
"Away?" she said, very quietly; "where are you going, Hugh?"--but there was no surprise in her face.
"Oh, you can not forget," returned Hugh, impatiently, "unless that baby puts everything out of your head. Do you not remember that I told you that Fitzclarence was coming down this week to arrange about our trip to Cairo."
"No," she replied, "you never said anything about it, Hugh;" which was the truth, for he had never taken the trouble to inform her, though Mrs. Heron had had orders to prepare a room for the expected guest.
"Well, well," rather irritably, "I meant to tell you, but one"s memory is treacherous sometimes. He will be down here about Wednesday or Thursday, for in another week we hope to start."
"Indeed," returned Fay, in a tired voice, pulling off her baby"s shoe; but, to Erle"s astonishment, she manifested no emotion. As for Sir Hugh, he was relieved to find his Wee Wifie was becoming such a reasonable woman. Why, he could talk to her quite comfortably without fear of a scene.
"What will you do with yourself, dear," he continued, briskly. "Don"t you think it would be the best thing to go down to Daintree and show your baby to Aunt Griselda?"
"Just as you like," was the indifferent answer. But Erle interrupted her.
"How long do you mean to absent yourself from the bosom of your family, Hugh?"
"Oh, two or three months; we can not follow out the route Fitzclarence proposed under that time--about ten or eleven weeks, I should say."
"Three months? Well, all I can say is, marriage is not the fettered state we bachelors imagine it to be. I had no idea one could get leave of absence for half that time. I hope my wife will be as accommodating as Fay."
There was a concealed sarcasm in Erle"s careless speech that jarred upon Hugh, and he answered, angrily:
"I wish you would not talk such nonsense, Erle. Fay has the sense to know that my health requires complete change, and I shall not be the man I was without it. I ought to have had three months last time, only her illness recalled me. But now I can leave her more happily."
"And you expect to do the trip in eleven weeks with Fitzclarence as the leader of the expedition. Fitzclarence, so renowned for his punctuality--so celebrated for never altering a given route at a minute"s notice."
Erle was going too far, and Sir Hugh answered him with decided impatience.
"I did not know Fitzclarence was a friend of yours, Erle; but I never listen to the idle gossip one picks up at one"s club. I am perfectly satisfied with his arrangements, and so are the other men--we have two other fellows going with us. Fay, my dear, I should like you to write at once to your aunt, and ask her if she can have you and the boy. The cottage is rather small; do you think you could do without Janet, and only take nurse?"
"Oh, yes," replied Fay, in the same constrained voice; but Erle saw that she had become very pale. But just then Ellerton entered and told his master that some one was waiting to speak to him on business; so the subject was dropped.
Erle looked rather wistfully at Fay when they were left alone together. "I am afraid you will be very lonely when Hugh goes away,"
he said, kindly. "Why need you go to Daintree; you will be dreadfully dull there with only your aunt. I do not see why you should not come to Belgrave house first, while Mrs. Montague is there. She is a very pleasant woman, Fay; and you could do just as you like, and you would see Evelyn, and I am sure you two would soon be great friends. Do come, Fay; and you can go to Daintree afterward."
Fay shook her head with a faint, dissenting smile; but she was touched by his kind thought for her.
"No, Erle," she said, decidedly, "it would not do at all. Hugh would not like it. He wishes me to go to Aunt Griselda."
"What does it matter to him where you go, so long as he is enjoying himself," burst from Erle"s impatient lips; her meekness really provoked him. But he regretted the rash speech as soon as it was uttered, especially when a soft little hand touched his.
"Hush! Erle," she said, gently, "you should not speak like that; not to me at least. Do you not know that I have no greater pleasure in the world than to obey my husband"s wishes. No," she continued, and her eyes grew misty, "I have no other happiness but that--no other happiness but that."
"But Fay," interrupted Erle, eagerly, "what possible objection could Hugh have to your staying at our house while Mrs. Montague is there?
We would wait on you, and watch over you, as though you were a queen."
"Yes, yes! I know that--you are always so kind to me, Erle; but it would never do for me to come to Belgrave House. Hugh does not like Mr. Huntingdon."
"Very few people do," muttered Erle; "but he has always been a good friend to my mother and to me."
"Yes, I know; and he is your uncle, so of course you make allowances for him. But Hugh has told me the story of poor Nea Huntingdon; and, somehow, I feel as though I could never visit at Belgrave House until you are master there."
Erle smiled. "When that day comes, Mrs. Trafford shall reap a golden harvest after all her hard work. You do not know how I long to help her, and make life easier for them all. Think of such women living in a place like the Elysian Fields--over that shop too; and yet, if I were to take up their cause now, I should only forfeit my own chances, and do no good. So you mean to be obdurate, my Fairy Queen, and not come to us."
"No, dear," she said, quietly, "I could not come." But she never told him that one of her reasons was that she might possibly meet the Ferrers there, if they were coming back from America; and she felt just now as though she could not have borne such an encounter.
Erle had to go up to London the next day, but the Hon. Algernon Fitzclarence took his place the following evening, and after that Fay had a miserable time; for all day long Hugh and his guest were planning the route for their trip, or talking over previous tours.
Either Fay"s knowledge of geography was very limited or her head got confused; but as she listened to them, she felt as though Egypt were thousands of miles away, and as though Hugh would certainly get lost in those trackless deserts, and die of thirst like the poor travelers of whom she had read. It was cruel to leave her for such dangers, she thought. And sometimes she got so nervous that she would make an excuse and leave the room, that she might not hear any more. And then she would wander about the grounds in an aimless way, trying to throw off the oppression that was growing greater as the days went on. It was not that she did not want her husband to leave her. Her loneliness could not be greater if he went away--so she believed in her wretchedness; but she was so terrified for him. And she had taken a dislike to the Hon. Algernon Fitzclarence. He might be a great traveler, as Hugh told her, and a very amusing companion, but his manners were not to her taste. Fay"s innocence instinctively took alarm at the covert admiration conveyed in her guest"s looks and words. He was too much a man of the world to pay her open compliments; and indeed her gentle dignity repelled him; but he made her understand that he thought his hostess very charming.
Hugh noticed nothing; he was rather pleased than otherwise that a fastidious man like Fitzclarence should admire his little wife. Fay was certainly very pretty, even in her husband"s eyes, and she was so much improved--not half so childish. But it was a relief to Fay when the Hon. Algernon departed. Hugh was to join him in town for a day or two to procure his outfit, and then come back to the Hall to bid Fay good-bye. It was on the second day after their guest had left Redmond Hall that Fay went into her husband"s study to dust and arrange his papers as usual.
It was a duty she had taken upon herself from the first. Sir Hugh had a masculine horror of what he called servants" interference--he never allowed them to touch the papers on his writing-table or bureau; and his strictures on the feminine duster were so severe that no one but Mrs. Heron ever ventured even to remove the overflowing wastepaper baskets.
But when Fay came to the Hall she a.s.sumed the duty as her right, and took a great pride and pleasure in her task; and Hugh"s first marital praise was bestowed on the clever little fingers that tidied without disarranging his cherished papers, and after that the work became her daily pleasure. But this morning there was an unusual amount of disorder and confusion. Sir Hugh had sat up late the previous night sorting and destroying his letters; and not only the baskets but the floor was heaped with a profusion of torn paper. Fay felt weak and tired, and she went about her work slowly; but she would not ring for a servant to help her; it would be a long time before she tidied Hugh"s papers again, she thought. And then her attention was attracted by an unfinished letter lying at the bottom of the _debris_ which she first believed had been thrown away by mistake--but on a closer inspection she found it was torn across. But it was in her husband"s handwriting. Fay never knew why the temptation came to her to read that letter. A sentence had caught her eye, and an intense wish suddenly seized her to read the whole and know what it meant.
Afterward she owned that her fault had been a great one; but she was to pay dearly for her girlish curiosity.
It was a mere fragment, and was apparently the concluding portion of a long explanatory letter.
"--And now I have told you all frankly, and however much you may condemn me, at least you will be sorry for me.
"For, indeed, I have done all that a man can do, or at least the best that is in me, and have only been beaten and humiliated at every turn.
I can do no more. My illness has exhausted me, and taken away all strength of resistance; and though it may seem cowardly to you, I am forced to run away, for my present life is unendurable. Just put yourself in my place, and think what I must suffer.
"So you must not blame me, dear, if I have come to the conclusion that the same place can not hold us both--at least, not for a time. One or other of us must leave; and of course it must be I. The misery of it is too great for my endurance, until I can learn to forget the past; and, as I have told you before, Margaret"--the word lightly scratched through and "I" subst.i.tuted, only Fay never noticed this--"I think it right to go; and time and absence will help us both. She is so good and gentle; if she knew all, she would own that this is my duty; but--" here the letter was torn across, and Fay read no more. But as she stood there her fingers stiffened over the paper, and an icy chill seemed to rob her of all feeling. She thought that letter was written to Margaret, and now her despair had reached its climax.
Poor, unhappy Wee Wifie; it was a most fatal mistake. That letter had been written by Hugh one night when he could not sleep, and it was addressed to his wife. He had come to the conclusion that he had lived the life of a hypocrite long enough, and that it would be wiser and more honest if he unburdened himself of his unhappy secret and told Fay why he thought it better to go way. He had tried to speak to her once, but she did not seem to understand, and he had grown irritable and impatient; it would be easier to make excuses for himself on paper. He could tell her truly that he was very fond of her, and that he wanted to make her happy. "I mean to make you a good husband," he had said in a previous portion; "one of these days, if you are patient with me, you shall be the happiest little woman in the world."
Hugh never finished this letter; something happened to distract his attention, and he never found an opportunity of completing it. The night before he had read it over, and the beginning had not pleased him. "I will write another when I am away," he said to himself; "I am afraid she will feel herself hurt if she reads this, poor little thing. I have not been sufficiently considerate." Unfortunately, Fay had come to a different conclusion. She thought the letter had been written to Margaret, and that the "she" who was mentioned was Hugh"s wife. Yes, it was his wife of whom Hugh spoke, when he said the same place could not hold them both, and for "place" the unhappy girl subst.i.tuted "house." Hugh could not remain in the same house with her.
"She was good and gentle; if she knew all"--ah! and she did know all--"she would own that it was his duty; his present life was unendurable," and therefore--therefore he was going to Egypt with that dreadful man who would lead him into danger. "One or other of us must leave, and of course it must be I."
"No, no, my bonny Hugh," she said at last, with a dim smile, as she lifted up her eyes to his portrait; "if one must be sacrificed it shall not be you--no, my dearest, it shall not be you." And then, in her childish ignorance, she made up her mind that Hugh should not go to Egypt.
"You are very unhappy, darling," she went on, pressing the letter in her hands; "you are terribly unhappy because you can not love me and care for your boy; but you shall not be troubled with us any longer; and, indeed, I could not stop--" and here a flush of shame came to her sweet face--"knowing what I know now. No, baby and I will go, and you shall not leave your beautiful home and get lost in those horrible deserts; you shall stay here and learn to forget all your troubles, and presently you will be happy; and it is I who will go, my dearest."