Читать книгу: «Airy Fairy Lilian», страница 21

CHAPTER XXVI

 
"For now she knows it is no gentle chase.
 

* * * * * * *

 
She looks upon his lips, and they are pale;
She takes him by the hand, and that is cold;
She whispers in his ears a heavy tale,
As if they heard the woful words she told:
She lifts the coffer-lids that close his eyes,
Where lo! two lamps, burnt out, in darkness lies.
 

* * * * * * *

 
Two glasses, where herself, herself beheld
A thousand times, and now no more reflect;
Their virtue lost, wherein they late excell'd,
And every beauty robb'd of his effect." – Shakespeare.
 

"'A southern wind and a cloudy sky proclaim it a hunting morning,'" quotes Miss Chesney, gayly, entering the breakfast-room at nine o'clock next morning, looking, if anything, a degree more bewitching than usual in her hat and habit: in her hand is a little gold-mounted riding-whip, upon her lovable lips a warm, eager smile. "No one down but me!" she says, "at least of the gentler sex. And Sir Guy presiding! what fun! Archie, may I trouble you to get me some breakfast? Sir Guy, some tea, please: I am as hungry as a hawk."

Sir Guy pours her out a cup of tea, carefully, but silently. Archie, gloomy, but attentive, places before her what she most fancies: Cyril gets her a chair; Taffy brings her some toast: all are fondly dancing attendance on the little spoiled fairy.

"What are you looking at, Taffy?" asks she, presently, meeting her cousin's blue eyes, that so oddly resemble her own, fixed upon her immovably.

"At you. There is something wrong with your hair," replies he, unabashed: "some of the pins are coming out. Stay steady, and I'll wheel you into line in no time." So saying, he adjusts the disorderly hair-pin; while Chetwoode and Chesney, looking on, are consumed with envy.

"Thank you, dear," says Lilian, demurely, giving his hand a little loving pat: "you are worth your weight in gold. Be sure you push it in again during the day, if you see it growing unruly. What a delicious morning it is!" glancing out of the window; "too desirable perhaps. I hope none of us will break our necks."

"Funky already, Lil?" says Taffy, with unpardonable impertinence. "Never mind, darling, keep up your heart; I'm fit as a fiddle myself, and will so far sacrifice my life as to promise you a lead whenever a copper brings me in your vicinity. I shall keep you in mind, never fear."

"I consider your remarks beneath notice, presumptuous boy," says Miss Chesney, with such a scornful uplifting of her delicate face as satisfies Taffy, who, being full of mischief, passes on to bestow his pleasing attentions on the others of the party. Chesney first attracts his notice. He is standing with his back to a screen, and has his eyes fixed in moody contemplation on the floor. Melancholy on this occasion has evidently marked him for her own.

"What's up with you, old man? you look suicidal," says Mr. Musgrave, stopping close to him, and giving him a rattling slap on the shoulder that rather takes the curl out of him, leaving him limp, but full of indignation.

"Look here," he says, in an aggrieved tone, "I wish you wouldn't do that, you know. Your hands, small and delicate as they are," – Taffy's hands, though shapely, are decidedly large, – "can hurt. If you go about the world with such habits you will infallibly commit murder sooner or later: I should bet on the sooner. One can never be sure, my dear fellow, who has heart-disease and who has not."

"Heart-disease means love with most fellows," says the irrepressible Taffy, "and I have noticed you aren't half a one since your return from London." At this mal à propos speech both Lilian and Chesney change color, and Guy, seeing their confusion, becomes miserable in turn, so that breakfast is a distinct failure, Cyril and Musgrave alone being capable of animated conversation.

Half an hour later they are all in the saddle and are riding leisurely toward Bellairs, which is some miles distant, through as keen a scenting wind as any one could desire.

At Grantley Farm they find every one before them, the hounds sniffing and whimpering, the ancient M. F. H. cheery as is his wont, and a very fair field.

Mabel Steyne is here, mounted on a handsome bay mare that rather chafes and rages under her mistress's detaining hand, while at some few yards' distance from her is Tom, carefully got up, but sleepy as is his wont. One can hardly credit that his indolent blue eyes a little later will grow dark and eager as he scents the fray, and, steadying himself in his saddle, makes up his mind to "do or die."

Old General Newsance is plodding in and out among the latest arrivals, prognosticating evil, and relating the "wondrous adventures" of half a century ago, when (if he is to be believed) hounds had wings, and hunters never knew fatigue. With him is old Lord Farnham, who has one leg in his grave, literally speaking, having lost it in battle more years ago than one cares to count, but who rides wonderfully nevertheless, and is as young to speak to, or rather younger, than any nineteenth-century man.

Mabel Steyne is dividing her attentions between him and Taffy, when a prolonged note from the hounds, and a quick cry of "gone away," startles her into silence. Talkers are scattered, conversation forgotten, and every one settles down into his or her saddle, ready and eager for the day's work.

Down the hill like a flash goes a good dog fox, past the small wood to the right, through the spinnies, straight into the open beyond. The scent is good, the pack lively: Lilian and Sir Guy are well to the front; Archibald close beside them. Cyril to the left is even farther ahead; while Taffy and Mabel Steyne can be seen a little lower down, holding well together, Mabel, with her eyes bright and glowing with excitement, sailing gallantly along on her handsome bay.

After a time – the fox showing no signs of giving in – hedges and doubles throw spaces in between the riders. Sir Guy is far away in the distance, Taffy somewhat in the background; Cyril is out of sight; while Miss Chesney finds herself now side by side with Archibald, who is riding recklessly, and rather badly. They have just cleared a very uncomfortable wall, that in cold blood would have damped their ardor, only to find a more treacherous one awaiting them farther on, and Lilian, turning her mare's head a little to the left, makes for a quieter spot, and presently lands in the next field safe and sound.

Archibald, however, holds on his original course, and Lilian, turning in her saddle, watches with real terror his next movement. His horse, a good one, rises gallantly, springs, and cleverly, though barely, brings himself clear to the other side. Both he and his master are uninjured, but it was a near thing, and makes Miss Chesney's heart beat with unpleasant rapidity.

"Archibald," she says, bringing herself close up to his side as they gallop across the field, and turning a very white face to his, "I wish you would not ride so recklessly: you will end by killing yourself if you go on in this foolish fashion."

Her late fear has added a little sharpness to her tone.

"The sooner the better," replies he, bitterly. "What have I got to live for? My life is of no use, either to myself or to any one else, as far as I can see."

"It is very wicked of you to talk so!" angrily.

"Is it? You should have thought of that before you made me think so. As it is, I am not in the humor for lecturing to do me much good. If I am killed, blame yourself. Meantime, I like hunting: it is the only joy left me. When I am riding madly like this, I feel again almost happy – almost," with a quickly suppressed sigh.

"Still, I ask you, for my sake, to be more careful," says Lilian, anxiously, partly frightened, partly filled with remorse at his words, though in her heart she is vexed with him for having used them. "Her fault if he gets killed." It is really too much!

"Do you pretend to care?" asks he, with a sneer. "Your manner is indeed perfect, but how much of it do you mean? Give me the hope I asked for last night, – say only two kind words to me, – and I will be more careful of my life than any man in the field to-day."

"I think I am always saying kind things to you," returns she, rather indignant; "I am only too kind. And one so foolishly bent on being miserable as you are, all for nothing, deserves only harsh treatment. You are not even civil to me. I regret I addressed you just now, and beg you will not speak to me any more."

"Be assured I shan't disobey this your last command," says Archibald, in a low, and what afterward appears to her a prophetic tone, turning away.

The field is growing thin. Already many are lying scattered broadcast in the ditches, or else are wandering hopelessly about on foot, in search of their lost chargers. The hounds are going at a tremendous pace; a good many horses show signs of flagging; while the brave old fox still holds well his own.

Taffy came to signal grief half an hour ago, but now reappears triumphant and unplucked, splashed from head to heel, but game for any amount still. Mrs. Steyne in front a-fighting hard for the brush, while Lilian every moment is creeping closer to her on the bonny brown mare that carries her like a bird over hedges and rails. Sir Guy is out of sight, having just vanished down the slope of the hill, only to reappear again a second later. Archibald is apparently nowhere, and Miss Chesney is almost beginning to picture him to herself bathed in his own gore, when raising her head she sees him coming toward her at a rattling pace, his horse, which is scarcely up to his weight, well in hand.

Before him rises an enormous fence, beneath which gleams like a silver streak a good bit of running water. It is an awkward jump, the more so that from the other side it is almost impossible for the rider to gauge its dangers properly.

Lilian makes a faint sign to him to hold back, which he either does not or will not see. Bringing his horse up to the fence at a rather wild pace, he lifts him. The good brute rises obediently, springs forward, but jumps too short, and in another second horse and rider are rolling together in a confused mass upon the sward beyond.

The horse, half in and half out of the water, recovers himself quickly, and, scrambling to his feet, stands quietly ashamed, trembling in every limb, at a little distance from his master.

But Archibald never stirs; he lies motionless, with his arms flung carelessly above his head, and his face turned upward to the clouded sky, – a brilliant speck of crimson upon the green grass.

Lilian, with a sickening feeling of fear, and a suppressed scream, gallops to his side, and, springing to the ground, kneels down close to him, and lifts his head upon her knee.

His face is deadly pale, a small spot of blood upon his right cheek rendering even more ghastly its excessive pallor. A frantic horror lest he be dead fills her mind and heart. Like funeral bells his words return and smite cruelly upon her brain: "If I am killed blame yourself." Is she to blame? Oh, how harshly she spoke to him! With what bitterness did she rebuke – when he – when he was only telling her of his great love for her!

Was ever woman so devoid of tender feeling? to goad and rail at a man only because she had made conquest of his heart! And to choose this day of all others to slight and wound him, when, had she not been hatefully, unpardonably blind, she might have seen he was bent upon his own destruction.

How awfully white he is! Has death indeed sealed his lips forever? Oh, that he might say one word, if only to forgive her! With one hand she smooths back his dark crisp hair from his forehead, and tries to wipe away with her handkerchief the terrible blood-stain from his poor cheek.

"Archie, Archie," she whispers to him, piteously, bending her face so close to his that any one might deem the action a caress, "speak to me: will you not hear me, when I tell you how passionately I regret my words?"

But no faintest flicker of intelligence crosses the face lying so mute and cold upon her knees. For the first time he is stone deaf to the voice of her entreaty.

Perhaps some foolish hope that her call might rouse him had taken possession of her; for now, seeing how nothing but deepest silence answers her, she lets a groan escape her. Will nobody ever come? Lifting in fierce impatience a face white as the senseless man's beneath her, she encounters Guy's eyes fixed upon her, who has by chance seen the catastrophe, and has hastened to her aid.

"Do something for him, – something," she cries, trembling; "give him brandy! it will, it must do him good."

Guy, kneeling down beside Chesney, places his hand beneath his coat, and feels for his heart intently.

"He is not dead!" murmurs Lilian, in an almost inaudible tone: "say he is alive. I told him never to speak to me again: but I did not dream I should be so terribly obeyed. Archie, Archie!"

Her manner is impassioned. Remorse and terror, working together, produce in her all the appearance, of despairing anguish. She bears herself as a woman might who gazes at the dead body of him she holds dearest on earth; and Guy, looking silently upon her, lets a fear greater than her own, a more intolerable anguish, enter his heart even then.

"He is not dead," he says, quietly, forcing himself to be calm. Whereupon Lilian bursts into a storm of tears.

"Are you sure?" cries she; "is there no mistake? He looks so – so —like death," with a shuddering sigh. "Oh, what should I have done had he been killed?"

"Be happy, he is alive," says Guy, between his dry lips, misery making his tones cold. All his worst fears are realized. In spite of pretended indifference, it is plain to him that all her wayward heart has been given to her cousin. Her intense agitation, her pale agonized face, seem to him easy to read, impossible to misunderstand. As he rises from his knees, he leaves all hope behind him in possession of his wounded rival.

"Stay with him until I bring help: I shan't be a minute," he says, not looking at her, and presently returning with some rough contrivance that does duty for a stretcher, and a couple of laborers. They convey him home to Chetwoode, where they lay him, still insensible, upon his bed, quiet and cold as one utterly bereft of life.

Then the little doctor arrives, and the door of Chesney's chamber is closed upon him and Guy, and for the next half-hour those outside – listening, watching, hoping, fearing – have a very bad time of it.

At last, as the sick-room door opens, and Guy comes into the corridor, a little figure, that for all those miserable thirty minutes has sat crouching in a dark corner, rises and runs swiftly toward him.

It is Lilian: she is trembling visibly, and the face she upraises to his is pale – nay, gray – with dread suspense. Her white lips try to form a syllable, but fail. She lays one hand upon his arm beseechingly, and gazes at him in eloquent silence.

"Do not look like that," says Guy, shocked at her expression. He speaks more warmly than he feels, but he quietly removes his arm so that her hand perforce drops from it. "He is better; much better than at first we dared hope. He will get well. There is no immediate danger. Do you understand, Lilian?"

A little dry sob breaks from her. The relief is almost too intense; all through her dreary waiting she had expected to hear nothing but that he was in truth – as he appeared in her eyes – dead. She staggers slightly, and would have fallen but that Chetwoode most unwillingly places his arm round her.

"There is no occasion for all this – nervousness," he says, half savagely, as she lays her head against his shoulder and cries as though her heart would break. At this supreme moment she scarcely remembers Guy's presence, and would have cried just as comfortably with her head upon old Parkins's shoulder. Perhaps he understands this, and therefore fails to realize the rapture he should know at having her so unresistingly within his arms. As it is, his expression is bored to the last degree: his eyebrows are drawn upward until all his forehead lies in little wrinkles. With a determination worthy of a better cause he has fixed his eyes upon the wall opposite, and refuses to notice the lovely golden head of her who is weeping so confidingly upon his breast.

It is a touching scene, but fails to impress Guy, who cannot blind himself to (what he believes to be) the fact that all these pearly tears are flowing for another, – and that a rival. With his tall figure drawn to its fullest height, so as to preclude all idea of tenderness, he says, sharply:

"One would imagine I had brought you bad news. You could not possibly appear more inconsolable if you had heard of his death. Do try to rouse yourself, and be reasonable: he is all right, and as likely to live as you are."

At this he gives her a mild but undeniable shake, that has the desired effect of reducing her to calmness. She checks her sobs, and, moving away from him, prepares to wipe away all remaining signs of her agitation.

"You certainly are not very sympathetic," she says, with a last faint sob, casting a reproachful glance at him out of two drowned but still beautiful eyes.

"I certainly am not," stiffly: "I can't 'weep my spirit from my eyes' because I hear a fellow is better, if you mean that."

"You seem to be absolutely grieved at his chance of recovery," viciously.

"I have no doubt I seem to you all that is vilest and worst. I learned your opinion of me long ago."

"Well," – scornfully – "I think you need scarcely choose either this time, or place, for one of your stand-up fights. When you remember what you have just said, – that you are actually sorry poor dear Archie is alive, – I think you ought to go away and feel very much ashamed of yourself."

"Did I say that?" indignantly.

"Oh, I don't know," indifferently, – as though his denial now cannot possibly alter the original fact; "something very like it, at all events."

"How can you so malign me, Lilian?" angrily. "No one can be more heartily sorry for poor Chesney than I am, or more pleased at his escape from death. You willfully misunderstand every word I utter. For the future, – as all I say seems to annoy, – I beg you will not trouble yourself to address me at all."

"I shall speak to you just whenever I choose," replies Miss Chesney, with superb defiance.

At this thrilling instant Chesney's door is again opened wide, and Dr. Bland comes out, treading softly, and looking all importance.

"You, my dear Miss Chesney!" he says, approaching her lightly; "the very young lady of all others I most wished to see. Not that there is anything very curious about that fact," with his cozy chuckle; "but your cousin is asking for you, and really, you know, upon my word, he is so very excitable, I think perhaps – eh? – under the circumstances, you know, it would be well to gratify his pardonable desire to see you – eh?"

"The circumstances" refer to the rooted conviction, that for weeks has been planted in the doctor's breast, of Miss Chesney's engagement to her cousin.

"To see me?" says Lilian, shrinking away involuntarily, and turning very red. Both the tone and the blush are "confirmation strong" of the doctor's opinion. And Guy, watching her silently, feels, if possible, even more certain than before of her affection for Chesney.

"To be sure, my dear; and why not?" says the kindly little doctor, patting her encouragingly on the shoulder. He deals in pats and smiles. They are both part of his medicine. So, – under the circumstances, – through force of habit, would he have patted the Queen of England or a lowly milkmaid alike, – with perhaps an additional pat to the milkmaid, should she chance to be pretty. Lilian, being rich in nature's charms, is a special favorite of his.

"But – " says Lilian, still hesitating. To tell the truth, she is hardly ambitious of entering Archibald's room, considering their last stormy parting; and, besides, she is feeling sadly nervous and out of sorts. The ready tears spring again to her eyes; once more the tell-tale blood springs hotly to her cheeks. Guy's fixed gaze – he is watching her with a half sneer upon his face – disconcerts her still further. Good Dr. Bland entirely mistakes the meaning of her confusion.

"Now, my dear child, if I give you leave to see this reckless cousin, we must be cautious, very cautious, and quiet, extremely quiet, eh? That is essential, you know. And mind, no tears. There is nothing so injurious on these occasions as tears! Reminds one invariably of last farewells and funeral services, and coffins, and all such uncomfortable matters. I don't half like granting these interviews myself, but he appears bent on seeing you, and, as I have said before, he is impetuous, —very impetuous."

"You think, then," stammers Lilian, making one last faint effort at escape from the dreaded ordeal, – "you think – "

"I don't think," smiling good-naturedly, "I know you must not stay with him longer than five minutes."

"Good doctor, make it three," is on the point of Lilian's tongue, but, ashamed to refuse this small request of poor wounded Archibald, she follows Dr. Bland into his room.

On the bed, lying pale and exhausted, is Archibald, his lips white, his eyes supernaturally large and dark. They grow even larger and much brighter as they rest on Lilian, who slowly, but – now that she again sees him so weak and prostrate – full of pity, approaches his side.

"You have come, Lilian," he says, faintly: "it is very good of you, – more than I deserve. I vexed you terribly this morning, did I not? But you will forgive me now I have come to grief," with a wan smile.

"I have nothing to forgive," says Lilian, tremulously, gazing down upon him pityingly through two big violet eyes so overcharged with tears as makes one wonder how they can keep the kindly drops from running down her cheeks. "But you have. Oh, Archie, let me tell you how deeply I deplore having spoken so harshly to you to-day. If" – with a shudder – "you had indeed been killed, I should never have been happy again."

"I was unmanly," says Chesney, holding out his hand feebly for hers, which is instantly given. "I am afraid I almost threatened you. I am thoroughly ashamed of myself."

"Oh, hush! I am sure you are speaking too much; and Dr. Bland says you must not excite yourself. Are you suffering much pain?" very tenderly.

"Not much;" but the drawn expression of his face belies his assertion. "To look at you" – softly – "gives me ease."

"I wonder you don't hate me," says Lilian, in a distressed tone, fighting hard to suppress the nervous sob that is rising so rebelliously in her throat. Almost at this moment – so sorry is she for his hopeless infatuation for her – she wishes he did hate her. "Yet I am not altogether to blame, and I have suffered more than I can tell you since you got that terrible fall!" This assurance is very sweet to him. "When I saw you lying motionless, – when I laid your head upon my knees and tried to call you back to life, and you never answered me, I thought – "

"You!" interrupts he, hastily; "did your hands succor me?"

"Yes," coloring warmly; "though it was very little good I could do you, I was so frightened. You looked so cold, – so still. I thought then, 'suppose it was my cross words had induced him to take that fence?' But" – nervously – "it wasn't: that was a foolish, a conceited thought, with no truth in it."

"Some little truth, I think," sadly. "When you told me 'never to speak to you again,' – you recollect? – there came a strange hard look into your usually kind eyes – " pressing her hand gently to take somewhat from the sting of his words – "that cut me to the heart. Your indifference seemed in that one moment to have turned to hatred, and I think I lost my head a little. Forgive me, sweetheart, if I could not then help thinking that death could not be much worse than life."

"Archie," – gravely, – "promise me you will never think that again."

"I promise."

There is a short pause. It is growing almost dark. The wintry day, sad and weakly from its birth, is dying fast. All the house is silent, hushed, full of expectancy; only a little irrepressible clock in the next room ticks its loudest, as though defying pain or sorrow to affect it in any way.

"Is it your arm?" asks Lilian, gently, his other hand being hidden beneath the sheet, "or – "

"No; two of my ribs, I believe, and my head aches a good deal."

"I am tormenting you with my foolish chatter," rising remorsefully, as though to quit the room.

"No, no," eagerly; "I tell you it makes me easier to see you; it dulls the pain." Slowly, painfully he draws her hand upward to his lips, and kisses it softly. "We are friends again?" he whispers.

"Yes, – always friends," tightening her fingers sympathetically over his. "If" – very earnestly – "you would only try to make up your mind never to speak to me again as you did – last night, I believe another unpleasant word would never pass between us."

"Do not fear," he says, slowly: "I have quite made up my mind. Rather than risk bringing again into your eyes the look I saw there to-day, I would keep silence forever."

Here Dr. Bland puts his head inside the door, and beckons Lilian to withdraw.

"The five minutes are up," he says, warningly, consulting the golden turnip he usually keeps concealed somewhere about his person, though where, so large is it, has been for years a matter of speculation with his numerous patients.

"I must go," says Lilian, rising: the door is open, and all that goes on within the chamber can be distinctly heard in the corridor outside. "Now try to sleep, will you not? and don't worry, and don't even think if you can help it."

"Must you go?" wistfully.

"I fear I must."

"You will come again to-morrow, very early?"

"I will come to-morrow, certainly, as early as I can. Good-night."

"Good-night."

Closing the door softly behind her, she advances into the corridor, where she still finds Guy and Dr. Bland conversing earnestly. Perhaps they have been waiting for her coming.

"So you have persuaded him to go to sleep?" asks the doctor, beaming kindly upon "pretty Miss Chesney," that being the title given to her long ago by the country generally.

"Yes. I think he will sleep now," Lilian answers. "He looks very white, poor, poor fellow, but not so badly as I expected."

"I suppose your presence did him good. Well, I will take a last look at him before leaving," moving toward the closed door.

"Can I do anything for you?" asks Guy, following him, glad of any excuse that makes him quit Lilian's side.

"Yes," – smiling, – "you can, indeed. Take your ward down-stairs and give her a glass of wine. She is too pale for my fancy. I shall be having her on my hands next if you don't take care." So saying, he disappears.

Guy turns coldly to Lilian.

"Will you come down, or shall I send something up to you?" he asks, icily.

Lilian's fears have subsided; consequently her spirits have risen to such a degree that they threaten to overflow every instant. A desire for mischief makes her heart glow.

"I shall go with you," she says, with a charming grimace. "I might blame myself in after years if I ever willingly failed to cultivate every second spent in your agreeable society."

So saying, she trips down-stairs gayly beside him, a lovely, though rather naughty, smile upon her lips.