CHAPTER XXVIII.

For three months Mr. Everard puzzles over the flattering yet almost

incredible revelation of Miss Cicely's attachment to him, during which

time he leaves no stone unturned, no device unburied to lure the wily

damsel into some sign of self-betrayal. He haunts the Rectory night

and day, dropping in at most inopportune moments, until Lady Emily

Deane, a most energetic and methodical housewife, declares him a worse

infliction than half a dozen school-boys home for the holidays, and

sighs for the racing season that will take him away from Nutshire for a

time.

But all Jack's watchings, spyings, ruses, and maiden traps are of no

avail. Cicely shows him neither more nor less favor than she has done

all her life, treats him with the same careless sisterly regard, smiles

when she welcomes him, but does not sigh when she bids him good-by,

and betrays no annoyance, pain, or pettishness when he flirts in her

presence, any more than when his love for Pauline was at its fever

height. So at the end of the three months he has to acknowledge himself

just as puzzled and as excited as he was the first evening.

In the meantime, rather to his dismay, he begins to find many charms

and attractions in the demure brown-eyed little lady which were hidden

to him before. He finds a strange soothing pleasure in watching her,

as he lies stretched on the old fashioned school-room sofa, busy over

her endless household work, stitching, painting, making up accounts,

cutting out clothes for the poor, overlooking her young sister's

school-tasks, _et cætera_, as seemingly undisturbed, callously

unconscious of his presence, as if he had been a stone effigy of

idleness.

Her voice "grows" on him likewise; its music, which he has listened to

carelessly, mechanically for so many years, stirs his heart at last, as

it has stirred many men before him, who have been chilled by the cold

graciousness of the girl's face and manner--for, when Cicely sings, she

pours forth her whole soul, and speaks of love human and divine with an

unrestrained, an _entraînant_ passion which no art could have taught

her.

Many a time during the sweet chill nights of early spring, when Everard

hangs over her as she sits at the piano, her voice quivering through

the still room with harmonious pain, her eyes glowing, her whole sober

being startled into spiritual life, the young man thinks that the

supreme moment has come, that his presence has helped to awake the

sentimental tumult, only to be cruelly undeceived, when the last note

has vibrated, by some commonplace disenchanting remark that makes him

long to shake her.

"A pretty song, is it not, Jack?" she asks one night, while his every

nerve is thrilling with responsive fervor. "Do you like it in the

higher or lower key best? May Bennet sings it in sharps; but I like

flats best--don't you?"

"You sing of love almost as if you felt it, Cicely," he whispers

tentatively. "Sappho could not have put more expression into her dying

lay than you did just now into that 'Adieu.'"

"I like mournful music," she says, her fingers wandering silently over

the keys.

"Yes; your songs always tell of death and parting and broken

faith--blighted blossoms."

"'Our sweetest songs are those which tell of saddest thought.' So says

the poet, Jack; and, you see, my life is so full of bright and pleasant

things, so happy and commonplace, that, when I sing, I like to wander

in soul among the royally afflicted."

"You are happy, Cicely?" he asks wistfully, laying his hot hand with

a timid appealing touch on her straying fingers. "You want nothing in

your life?"

"Nothing, Jack--nothing. What could I want more than I have?" she

answers, in a mild Sunday-school tone of reproof. "Heaven has laden me

with benefits; I have had few crosses."

"Well, I have not the same complaint, goodness knows!" he says, moving

away sullenly.

Occasionally he meets Lady Saunderson in society, where she is now

beginning to take a prominent lead, the term of her sojourn in Coventry

having been summarily curtailed by the rumor that she is going to give

a big ball, which brings young ladies to their senses and fills the

dowagers' bosoms with Christian feelings toward the beautiful culprit;

but Jack and she do not speak to each other again until one evening,

riding home, his horse dead-beat after two hard runs, he hears a gay

clear voice address him in the gloom--a voice that brings the blood to

his face and sets his pulses throbbing.

"Is the road wide enough for you and me to walk abreast, Jack Everard?"

He looks up and sees that she has reined in at a cross-road, and is

waiting to join him.

"May I ride by your side as far as the Park gates? I am quite alone--my

husband is dining with the Hussars at Kelvick."

"I shall be happy to escort you, Lady Saunderson," he answers stiffly.

"Dear, dear!" cries Pauline, with a free careless laugh. "So we are

riding the high horse still! Get down, Jack, get down; the animal does

not suit you in the least. Get down, and let us be friends again. I

always liked you, Jack--always."

"We need not try to analyze the nature of your attachment, Lady

Saunderson. I think I ought to understand it perfectly now."

"I doubt if you do," she says, with a slight break in her voice, her

small gloved hand caressing his horse's steaming shoulder. "You never

judged me fairly, Everard. With you I was always either an angel or an

offspring of Jezebel, whereas I am but just something of an ambitious,

selfish, yet not wholly heartless woman. It--it cost me a pang, I can

tell you, to treat you as I did. But something told me I should not

make you happy, or you me; and I am more sure of it even now than I

was then. And you, dear boy, is it not so with you?" she asks, leaning

forward until her breath fans his face, her great dark eyes, half

wistful, half contemptuous, lifted to his averted ones. "Have you not

learned to thank Providence for your escape?"

"Yes, Pauline," he answers gravely, "I have indeed--and from my heart."

"Good boy, good boy. So we can cry quits. Give me your hand. What? Are

you afraid to touch me? What harm can I do you, Jack? You have sowed

your wild oats, and I am a respectable British matron; we--we couldn't

flirt now even if we tried, could we? But we could be friends and

comforting neighbors, and sometimes, in the long winter evenings ahead,

if you should feel the sanctity of your fireside a little overpowering,

if the flannel petticoats, the soup-societies, the cardinal virtues,

should prove a little oppressive, why, you could steal up to me and

distend your lungs with the breath of frivolity, freedom, and--"

"Lady Saunderson," he says huskily, struggling to resist the spell she

is weaving about him, "I--I do not understand what you mean."

"No? Then come up to the Park and dine with me to-night, and I'll tell

you. We--we can't flirt, you know; but we can sit and watch the young

moon rise from behind Broom Hill while we talk over the giddy days of

our youth. My husband will be so glad to see you; he is most anxious

that we should be friends, and would even go the length of offering you

an apology for past unpleasantness, only he does not know how you would

receive it. Come, Jack--come!"

They are just outside the Rectory gates, from which a party are issuing

for a late practice--Cicely, with a roll of music, two or three of

her sisters, and a tall curate carrying a lantern, which he suddenly

lifts, hearing the horses hoofs, thus revealing to the astonished group

Everard's disturbed face within a foot of Lady Saunderson's, cool and

undaunted, her hand still resting familiarly on the pommel of his

saddle. The curate looks away hastily from the evil tableau, but Cicely

bows gravely, and then moves on up the winding hill at the top of which

her father's church is picturesquely situated.

Everard reins in, and looks after them with frowning brow; his

companion also turns round in her saddle, laughing tantalizingly.

"Which is it to be, Jack? The broad smooth road that leads to

destruction and the Park, or the narrow briery path--"

"I'll follow the light. Good-night, Lady Saunderson," he says quickly,

wheeling his horse round.

"The light!"--her voice comes back to him mockingly through the gloom.

"Take care, _mon cher_; the curate is swinging it rather knowingly

to-night."

* * * * *

On the following morning, when Everard appears at the Rectory, he finds

the household in a state of anxious commotion. The bishop is coming the

next day, and Lady Emily has been called upon to provide an elaborate

breakfast for thirty guests at desperately short notice.

Jack is in every one's way, of course--in the way of the rector,

receiving a deputation of church-wardens in his study, in the way

of the servants' brooms and dusters, in the way of his hostess,

sorting out her best glass and china, superintending _soufflés_, and

_mayonnaises_.

"You are not hunting to-day, are you, Jack?" she says, with a sigh

of irritation which she cannot repress, when a handsome cut-glass

decanter slips from his meddlesome fingers to the floor. "What a pity!

The day is perfect, is it not?"

"I dare say you wish I were, Lady Emily," he answers, with an awkward

laugh; "but, unfortunately for you, it's a blind day. I wonder where

Cicely is; I have been looking for her everywhere. She asked me to get

her some ferns a few days ago; and I don't know if they're the right

sort."

"Cicely?"--briskly. "I think she's gone down to the church to practice

the new _Te Deum_. I have not seen her for some time; you'll surely

find her there, or up at the school-house."

"No; I've tried both unsuccessfully. Old Crofts said she had returned

home. I can't imagine where she has hidden herself."

However, some five minutes later he runs her to earth in the old

day-nursery, where she has taken refuge from the prevailing bustle to

copy some music.

"May I come in?" he asks wistfully. "Shall I be as much in the way here

as I seem to be everywhere else, Cicely?"

"Not it you sit quite still and do not expect to be entertained," she

answers composedly. "I have to make out five copies of this wretched

_Te Deum_ before afternoon practice. Oh, dear, I do wish amateur

organists would be content with Mozart, Haydn, and Co., and not force

their compositions on the public! It is weary work."

"How neatly you do it! What clever fingers you have, Miss Deane!" he

says, throwing himself into a chair, and leaning his arms on the table.

She puts a slim finger to her lips in warning reply.

Twenty minutes pass by in profound silence. Everard takes up a pen, for

which he finds swift employment. To his horror, the young man becomes

aware that he has been illustrating the margin of one of Miss Deane's

finished copies with skeleton hunting-sketches, adding arms and legs to

the crotchets and quavers, giving features to the open notes.

"What are you trying to do, Jack?" she asks, leaning across the table

to reach a book, and steadying herself with the help of his bent

shoulder.

"Trying to do?" he repeats, one hand quickly veiling the work of

desecration, the other imprisoning his companion's. "I am trying to

make love to you, Cicely. Is it any good?"

For an instant she remains motionless; then she snatches her hand from

his shoulder as if it had been stung, crimsons to the roots of her

hair, and says, her voice quivering with pain and anger--

"Jack Everard, how--how dare you make me an answer like that? You know

how I dislike flippant speeches of the kind."

"Flippant!" he answers hotly. "I did not mean it to be so. Nobody as

much in earnest as I am could be flippant. I love you, Cicely Deane,

and, though I know I am not worthy of you, I ask you to be my wife on

my knees, if you like. Do you think I am in earnest now?"

"Yes," she says, panting a little, and raising her eyes, gleaming,

wrathful, defiant, to his eager face. "I believe you are in earnest;

and I wish you to understand that I am in earnest too, thoroughly in

earnest, when I beg of you, Jack Everard, if you value my esteem, my

friendship, never to speak to me on such a subject or in that tone.

It--it is eminently painful and distasteful to me."

"Thank you, Miss Deane; you--you speak to the point. I will not incur

the risk of losing your esteem and friendship ever again, you may be

sure. Good-morning."

He walks from the room without another word, down the stairs and out

of the house, forgetting to take his hat and stick from the hall. He

stands for a moment leaning against the garden gate, his blue eyes

moist, his lips quivering with pain and cruel disappointment, a heavy

shower falling on his uncovered head.

At that moment Lady Saunderson's brougham flashes past. She looks out

and gives him a brilliant smile, half questioning, half pitying, a

smile that goads him to a feeling of impotent desperation.

"I am a lucky fellow--by the powers I am!" he mutters fiercely, with

clinched fists.

"Jack, Jack, where are you going? Where's your hat? What's the matter?"

Little Emily Deane's astonished voice recalls him to his senses. He

puts up his hand to his sleek dripping head and retraces his steps

mechanically, Emily trotting by his side.

"Is there anything the matter with you, Jack? You look so hot and

funny! Have you been fighting with Cissy?--for she looks so funny too.

Her face is like fire, she would scarcely speak to me, and, when I

leaned over her, I saw she was crying like anything."

"Crying?" he says quickly. "Are you sure?"

"Yes. She didn't want me to notice, and pushed me away quite crossly;

but I saw great fat tears splashing down on the music she was copying,

and swelling out the notes. Did you say anything to annoy her? Cissy

never cries, you know--not even when she had two big teeth pulled out,

or when she was reading the death of Little Nell. Bill says she's the

dryest girl he ever met."

Everard stands for a moment hesitating, hat in hand; then he walks back

quickly and stealthily to the room where Cicely sits, her face hidden

on her outstretched arms, shedding the bitterest, most shamefaced tears

of her life. The poor child does not doubt but that she betrayed her

secret to him from whom she would have guarded it at the cost of her

life, and that he, actuated by a sense of pitiful kindness, resolved to

assure her happiness at the expense of his own.

She feels sore, wounded, insulted, all the sunshine gone from her sky.

She knows that she can never again look with anything but shame and

pain into the bright face she loves so well, never again listen in

peace to the only voice that can ever reach her heart. She knows she

has lost her lover, her friend, her self-respect, at one blow; and the

cross she is called upon thus suddenly to bear seems too heavy for her

slight shoulders.

At this crisis Everard steals in softly, closing the door, drops upon

his knees by her side, put his arms round her neck, his face close

to hers, and whispers eagerly, before she can repulse him--

"Don't cry, don't cry, Cissy darling! I was a fool, a presumptuous

fool, to think you could ever learn to--to care for me. What woman

could love me, I should like to know? Forget my presumption, dear,

and, when I am gone, remember me only as the friend of your childhood,

the boy whom you loved as a brother--nothing more."

"You are--are going--where?" she asks, weakly trying to free herself

from his clasp.

"I do not know yet--anywhere--anywhere far away from you. Will you

give me a kiss, Cissy, to let me know you bear me no ill-will--a

farewell kiss, dear? 'It may be for years, and it may be forever,' _et

cætera_--you can not grudge me that."

He gently lifts the shielding arm and puts his lips to her shrinking

face. She shivers slightly, and raises her heavy eyes with a sort of

piteous protest to his. He kisses away the tears from her eyelashes,

whispering mournfully the single word--

"Farewell."

They remain for a few moments locked in each other's arms.

"Love," he says, at last, "won't you say farewell?"

Her lips part, her breath comes quickly, she tries to speak, but all

sound dies in her throat.

"Cissy, Cissy, can't you speak? I am waiting. Is it so hard to say the

word 'Farewell,' little friend?"

"Yes, yes," she stammers, "it is hard. Let me go, Jack--let me go! I--I

will say it presently--presently--presently."

"I am in no great hurry to hear it, dear; it is such a wailing sort of

word--it has the ring of death. Yet I can not go until you say it."

"You are stifling me!" she says passionately. "Let me go, let me go; I

can not breathe!"

"Say 'Farewell!'"

He waits, waits on patiently; but she never says it.

* * * * *

"Six for me--all Christmas-cards--hurrah, hurrah! Three for you, Aunt

Jo; two for you, Robert; none for you, Mr. Armstrong; none for you,

Hal."

It is Christmas-time, nearly two years since the Lefroys have left

Nutsgrove. The boys are spending the festive season at Leamington.

Mr. Armstrong has also reluctantly accepted Miles Darcy's pressing

invitation, for these meetings are painful to him. Although his lost

wife's name is never mentioned, yet there is always a suggestion of

her existence in the old lady's depressed flurried manner, and in her

anxiety to propitiate him and seem at ease in his presence; moreover,

Lottie, who has cast aside all her delicacy and is growing up a plump

rosy-cheeked lass, at times is so like her unfortunate sister that he

turns away his eyes from her with a sense of sore repugnance.

"Two letters for me, Goggles? Then hand them over at once."

"Here they are, Bob. One of them is a bill, and the other is from

foreign parts. What a lot of postmarks it has, to be sure! Whom is it

from, Bob?"

He takes up the letter carelessly, then drops it with a quick

exclamation.

Miss Darcy, who is seated beside him at the breakfast-table, turns

suddenly. Her eyes fall on the upturned address; she springs to her

feet with a cry.

"At last--at last! Quick, Robert, quick--open it, my boy!"

But Robert rises deliberately, his face white and set, walks over to

the fire, and thrusts the unopened letter into the blazing coal. His

aunt stares for a second paralyzed, then rushes forward to snatch it

out; but she is stopped by Robert, whose strong young arms pinion hers

powerless to her side. She struggles fiercely, and then appeals to

Armstrong, who is staring in much astonishment at the extraordinary

scene.

"Tom--Tom Armstrong, save it, save it! For the love of Heaven, save it!

It's from her--from your unfortunate wife! Oh, save it!"

Without a moment's hesitation he thrusts his hand into the fire,

burning himself smartly; but he is too late--all that he rescues is a

quivering sheet that crumbles to ashes in his grasp. Miss Darcy bursts

into tears; she turns to Robert, her voice husky with bitterness and

anger.

"Heaven will punish you--oh, Heaven will punish you, you wicked,

heartless boy, for this morning's deed! Christmas morning, the morning

of peace on earth and love and forgiveness, when that poor wandering

sinner, probably weary of the ways of sin, thought she might reach your

heart of stone--she, Robert Lefroy, who crept to your bedside, when you

were thought to be dying of an infectious fever, and nursed you night

and day! Oh, Heaven will punish you for this!"

"I can not help it," Robert sullenly replies. "I have done this before,

and so has my sister Pauline, and I will do it again and again."

"Leave my house, leave my house, all of you! I will have no feasting

here. This to me is a day of mourning, not of rejoicing. Thomas

Armstrong, you came to me to-day against your will, I know. I thank you

for your goodness in so humoring an old woman; but you may go now. I

will not ask you to come here again. Good-by, good by! You are a just,

generous, and honest man, and have treated me and mine well; but I

wish I had never seen your face. I do not want to see it any more. The

object of my life is taken from me to-day. I have no further motive in

dragging out my weary life, or in struggling to--"

"My dear lady," breaks in Armstrong gently. "There is no reason for

you to take so hopeless a view of the case; the disaster is not

irretrievable. You will probably hear from--from your niece again."

But Miss Darcy, heedless of the interruption, goes on, in whining

soliloquy--

"I loved her, I loved her! She was to me as my own child; her first cry

was uttered in my arms, and I wanted to save her from eternal death,

to bring her here and on her knees to receive your pardon, Thomas

Armstrong, and then to take her away with me to some quiet corner

of the world, where she could live down the memory of her sin and

spend her days in preparation to meet her Judge. But my hope is gone.

Something tells me that we shall never hear of her again, that she will

sink too low for even a voice from heaven to reach her in the mist of

coming death. We shall never hear of her again--never! Go from me now,

all of you; you can say nothing, do nothing, to comfort me. Go and

leave me to my grief!"

They obey her silently. Robert takes his brother back with him to town,

where they dine with some military acquaintances. Lottie spends a merry

evening at the house of a neighboring school-friend, winding up with

snap-dragon and an impromptu dance. Armstrong, returning home to a

solitary dinner, is met at the station by Everard, who carries him off

to Broom Hill, where he is most heartily welcomed by its new mistress,

the late Miss Cicely Deane, who makes a most charming hostess, and

her husband the happiest man in the parish. The whole party from the

rectory spend the day with the bride and bridegroom; and late in the

evening, when the young people are tired of romping and laughing,

Cicely sings some sweet old-fashioned carols breathing of love and

fireside peace, and the music of her rare voice brings to Armstrong's

hardened heart a softening touch; he thinks with gentleness, almost

with pity, of her who has wronged him past retrieval.

But Miss Darcy's forebodings prove true; no other letter comes from

across the sea, and Adelaide's name is not mentioned again.