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Volume Three – Chapter Twelve.
Conscience Pricking

“It does seem so hard to think that we have been away all these months, Claudie,” said Mary the next morning. “Aren’t you glad to be back once more in the dear old home?”

“Yes, dear; and no,” said Claude sadly.

“Now, who is to understand what that means? But, Claude, dear, I did not speak last night – ”

“What about,” said Claude quickly.

“I don’t like to say. The subject is tabooed.”

Claude turned toward the window, so that her cousin should not see her face.

“The last time I mentioned his name you scolded me.”

Claude remained silent.

“Did you see him yesterday when we came up to the gate?”

“No.”

“He was there, and coming up to the carriage when he saw Mr Glyddyr get up to call for three cheers, and then he shrank away.”

Claude shivered, as if from a sudden chill, but she remained silent.

“May I say what I think?” asked Mary.

Claude turned upon her an agonised look.

“If you wish to give me pain,” she said, almost in a whisper; and at that moment Sarah Woodham entered the room.

“Mr Glyddyr, ma’am. He asks you to excuse his calling so early, but if you would see him for a few minutes he would be grateful.”

The shiver ran through Claude again, but she smothered her emotion.

“Show Mr Glyddyr in,” she said calmly, and Sarah Woodham’s face grew harder as she left the room.

“What are you going to say, Claude?” said Mary quickly.

“Say?”

“Yes. Why do you put on that air of ignorance? You know why he has come.”

“Mary!”

“Yes, I will speak. All these quiet calls have meant that, I am sure. He has only been waiting till you came home to ask you to be his wife.”

“Hush!”

The door opened, and Glyddyr entered, looking sallow and nervous; but he began to brighten a little, as if the presence of Mary were a reprieve from the task he had set himself to do.

It was only a short one, though, for, after the first greetings, Mary rose to go.

Claude looked at her wistfully.

“Don’t let me drive you away, Miss Dillon,” said Glyddyr quickly.

Claude uttered no word to stay her, but sat gazing straight before her at a large photograph of her father, her eyes wild and fixed with the emotion from which she suffered, and for a few moments after the door was closed neither spoke.

“Miss Gartram – Claude,” said Glyddyr, at last, in a husky voice, and at his words she started, as if from a dream.

Her look seemed to freeze him, but he had taken the step now, and he rose and crossed to her side, taking the hand she surrendered to him unresistingly.

“Claude, you know how all these weary months I have been silent,” he whispered; “how I have feared to intrude upon you in your grief, though all the while I have suffered painfully too.”

“Yes,” she said gently, “you have been very patient with me, I know.”

“Because I dared to hope that the time might come when I could speak to you as I do now. You know how I love you, and – forgive me for saying what I do – you know how my happiness is in your hands. Tell me to be patient even now, and I will wait.”

Her wild fixed look intensified as she listened to his impassioned prayer, for she saw only the face of her father as she had seen him last in life.

“I hardly dare to say the words,” he went on; “it seems like putting pressure on one whom I want to love me of herself, to make me happy by her own gentle confession; but I must speak now, even if it gives you pain. Claude, dearest, it was his wish. Tell me you will be my wife.”

He uttered his last sentence or two in a hesitating whisper.

“You heard what I said, dearest?” he whispered.

“Yes – yes,” said Claude dreamily.

“You will not hold me off longer. Claude, dearest, what can I say to move you? Is it to be always thus?”

She looked at him wildly for a few moments, and he was about to speak again, but her lips moved, and she said slowly —

“You say it would make you happy?”

“Happy?” he exclaimed passionately, “oh, if I had but words to tell you all.”

“Hush!” she said, slowly withdrawing her hand. “Six months ago I thought I saw my course marked out for me; but now all appears changed. You know how, long before we ever met – ”

“Yes,” he cried eagerly, “I know everything you would say, but, Claude, dearest, it is impossible. If that was to make you happy, I would have gone away, and patiently borne all, but it is impossible.”

“Yes,” she said, shuddering slightly, “it is impossible.”

“Then you will let me hope?” he cried quickly.

“It was my dear father’s wish,” she said dreamily; “I have thought of this, and what was my duty, left as I am, his child and the steward of his great wealth.”

“Yes – yes!” he cried excitedly.

“It was all darkness – black, black darkness for a time, but by slow degrees the light has come.”

“Claude, my love!”

“Oh, hush: pray hush!” she said with a slight shiver as she gazed straight past her wooer at the photograph upon the table. “It was his wish; and if you desire this, Parry Glyddyr, I will try to be your true and faithful wife.”

“My own!” he whispered, and he tried to pass his arm around her, but she shrank back with so pained a look that he forbore. “There,” he said, “I will be patient. I have waited all these long months, and I know now how your love for me will come. I can wait. But, Claude, let me go away quite happy. How soon?”

“It was his wish.”

“In a month from now?” he whispered tenderly.

“Yes,” she said, still gazing past him at the photograph.

“My own!” he cried, “I had not dared to hope for this. But, Claude, dearest, why do you look so strange?”

He felt as if a hand of ice had touched him, and his own closed upon hers with a spasmodic grip, as he looked sharply round and saw the photograph, the counterfeit presentment gazing sternly in his eyes.

But Claude was too intent upon her own thoughts to notice his ghastly pallor, and, uttering a low sigh, she at last withdrew her hand.

“Do not say more to me now, Mr Glyddyr,” she sighed faintly. “I am weak. The shock of coming back here has been almost more than I can bear. You will go now. Do not think me unkind and cold, but you will leave me till to-morrow.”

“Yes, yes,” he cried huskily, as he forced himself to take her hand which felt like ice, and, bending over it, he pressed his lips upon the clear transparent skin. “Yes, till to-morrow,” he said; and, carefully keeping his eyes averted from the photograph, he walked quickly from the room.

“Claude! Claude!” cried Mary entering, but there was no reply. “Claude!” and she laid her hand upon the girl’s shoulder, to start back in alarm at the waxen face that was slowly turned towards her. “Claude, darling, don’t look like that. Tell me. He did ask you?”

Claude nodded.

“And you refused him?”

She shook her head sadly.

“Oh, Claude!” cried Mary reproachfully. “And poor Chris!”

“Silence!” said Claude excitedly. “Never mention his name again.”

“But you can’t – you don’t think that horrible charge was true?”

“I think it was, my dear – my dead father’s wish that I should wed Mr Glyddyr. I have prayed for strength to carry out his will.”

“And you have accepted him!”

“Mary, a woman cannot live for herself. It was my duty. In a month I shall be Parry Glyddyr’s wife.”

Volume Three – Chapter Thirteen.
A Strange Wooing

Chris Lisle heard the news without showing the slightest emotion, and as soon as he was alone he sat down and wrote as follows: —

“I pray God that you may be happy.

“Chris Lisle.”

That was all, and he dropped it into the post-box himself, turned back to meet Trevithick on his way to the Fort, nodded to him and went straight to his room, where he stood for a few moments in silence.

“Yes,” he said slowly and solemnly, “I pray God that you may be happy.”

Then, after a pause:

“But,” he cried, with terrible earnestness, “if – ”

There was another pause in which he silently continued that which he might have said. Then, with a fierce light flashing from his eyes, he clenched his hands and said in a whisper more startling than the loudest words —

“I’ll kill him as I would some venomous beast.”

He threw himself into a chair and sat looking white and changed for quite an hour before he rose up and drew a long deep breath.

“Dead!” he said softly; “dead! Now, then, to bear it – like a man – and show no sign.”

There was a gentle tap at the door.

“May I come in, sir, please?”

“Eh? Oh yes, Mrs Sarson. What is it?”

“I was going to – Oh my dear, dear boy!”

The poor woman caught his hand in hers, and kissed it, as her tears fell fast.

“Why, Mrs Sarson,” he said, smiling, “what’s the matter?”

“Oh, my dear,” she said; “you haven’t lived here with me all these years from quite a boy as you were, without me feeling just like a mother to you. And you so alone in the world. I know what trouble you’re in, and what you must feel; and it hurts me too.”

“There, there. You’re a good soul,” he said. “But that’s all over. Why, I’ve had the aching tooth taken out, and I’m quite a new man now.”

“Oh, my dear – my dear!”

“I’m off for a few hours’ fishing, and I shall want a good meat tea about six. I sha’n’t be later.”

He nodded cheerfully, and took his creel and rod from the passage, Mrs Sarson hurrying to the window, and watching till he was out of sight, “Ah!” she said, shaking her head; “but it don’t deceive me. I’ve read of them as held their hands in the fire till they were burned away; and he’s a martyr, too, as would do it, without making a sign. But he can’t deceive me.”

Meanwhile Trevithick had gone up to the Fort to see Claude about certain business matters connected with the quarry, and with the full intent to ask her a few questions about the missing money in spite of her former words; but on his way that morning he had heard startling news, which made his face look peculiarly serious, and he said to himself —

“Well, it was her father’s wish, but if I don’t make the tightest marriage settlements ever drawn up I’m not an honest man.”

He was admitted by Sarah Woodham, and shown into the library, where, quite at home, he took his seat, unlocked his black bag, and began to arrange a number of endorsed papers, tied up with red tape.

“Mrs Woodham does not seem to approve of the wedding,” he said to himself. “Not a cheerful woman.”

Then he looked round the room, and in imagination searched Gartram’s safe and cash receptacles for the hundredth time.

“No,” he said, giving one ear a vicious rub, “I can’t get it that way. It was someone who knew him and his ways pretty well stole that money, or there would have been some record left. All those thousands short. He never omitted keeping account of even trifling sums.”

“And Miss Dillon does not approve of the wedding,” he said to himself as Mary entered, her eyes plainly showing that she had been weeping.

“Good-morning,” she said, taking the chair placed for her with heavy courtesy. “My cousin is unwell, Mr Trevithick, and cannot see you. Will you either come over again or state your business to me?”

“I shall be only too glad,” he said, smiling.

“I thought you would,” replied Mary. “Of course you will make a charge for this journey.”

Trevithick looked at her aghast; and then flushed and perspired.

“I said I should be only too glad to discuss the business with you, Miss Dillon,” he said stiffly.

“No, you did not, Mr Trevithick.”

“I beg pardon. That is what I meant.”

“Oh! then please go on.”

“Why will she always be so sharp with me?” thought the lawyer, as he looked across the table wistfully.

“Yes, Mr Trevithick? I am all attention.”

“Yes; of course,” he said, suddenly becoming very business-like, for he could deal with her then. “The little matters of business can wait, or perhaps you could take the papers up for Miss Gartram’s signature.”

“Yes; of course,” said Mary, sharply. “Where are they?”

“Here,” he said, quietly; “but there is one, I might say two things, I should like Miss Gartram’s opinion upon. Will you tell her, please?”

“Do speak a little faster, Mr Trevithick, I have a great deal to do this morning.”

“I beg your pardon. Will you please tell Miss Gartram that I am, in spite of her commands, much exercised in mind about that missing money. Tell her, please, that I have studied it from every point of view, and I am compelled to say that it is her duty to Mr Gartram deceased – that most exact of business men – to instruct me to make further inquiries into the matter.”

“It would be of no use, Mr Trevithick. I am sure your cousin would not allow it. Is that all?”

“Will you not appeal to her from me?”

“No. I am sure she would not listen to any such suggestion. Now, is that all?”

Mary spoke in a quick, excited way, as if she wanted to get out of the room, and yet wished to stay.

“Well – no,” he answered softly, as he kept on taking up and laying down his papers in different order.

“Mr Trevithick!”

“Pray, give me time, Miss Dillon,” he protested. “The fact is I have heard very important news this morning.”

“Of course you have. You mean about my cousin’s approaching marriage.”

“Then it is true?”

“Of course it is.”

Trevithick sighed.

“Well, Mr Trevithick, is that all?”

“No, madam, I may say that I am very sorry.”

“Well, is that all?” cried Mary, impatiently.

“No. As the late Mr Gartram’s trusted, confidential adviser, I was aware that this was his wish, but, all the same, I am deeply grieved.”

“Of course, and so is everybody else,” said Mary passionately. “I mean,” she said, checking herself, “it seems sad for it to be so soon. That is all, I suppose.”

“No, Miss Dillon; this being so I should have liked to discuss with Miss Gartram the question of the settlements. I presume, as she has continued to trust me as her father trusted me, that she would wish me to see to all the legal matters connected with her fortune.”

“What a stupid question. Why, of course.”

“Well, forgive me; hardly a stupid question. Perhaps too retiring – for a lawyer.”

“Mr Trevithick, you are not half decided and prompt enough. Well, then; my cousin anticipated all this, and said, ‘tell Mr Trevithick to do what is right and just, and that I leave myself entirely in his hands. Tell him to do what he would have done had my father been alive.’”

“Ah!” said the lawyer slowly. “Yes; then I will proceed at once. It is a great responsibility, as Miss Gartram has neither relative nor executor to whom she could appeal. A very great responsibility, but I will do what is just and right in her interest, tying down her property as under the circumstances should be done.”

“Do – do Mr Trevithick – dear Mr Trevithick, pray do,” cried Mary, starting from her seat, and advancing to the table – her old, sharp manner gone, and an intense desire to hasten the lawyer’s proposals flashing from her eyes.

“I will,” he said firmly; and he held out his hand. “You will trust me, Mary Dillon, as your cousin trusts me?”

“Indeed, I will,” she said eagerly, and she placed her thin little white hand in his.

“Hah!” he ejaculated with a long expiration of the breath; and his great hand closed and prisoned the little one laid therein. “You told me just now that I was not decided and prompt enough.”

“Yes, I did. But you are holding my hand very tightly, Mr Trevithick.”

“Yes,” he said quietly, “I am. That is because you are wrong. I am very decided and prompt sometimes, and I am going to be now. Mary Dillon, will you be my wife?”

“What!” she cried, flushing scarlet, and struggling to release her hand, as her eyes flashed and seemed to be reading him through and through. “Absurd!”

“No – no,” he said gravely; “don’t say that, even if my way and manner are absurd.”

“I did not mean that,” she cried quickly. “I meant to – Oh, it is absurd!” she said again, though her heart was throbbing violently, and she struggled vainly to withdraw her hand. “Look at me – weak, misshapen, pitiful. Mr Trevithick, you are mad.”

“Don’t try to take your hand away,” he said slowly; it makes me afraid of hurting you; and don’t speak again like that – you hurt me very – very much.

“But, Mr Trevithick! It is too dreadful. I cannot – I must not listen to you.”

“Why? You are quite free; and you are not an heiress.”

“I!” she cried bitterly. “No; I have nothing but a pitiful few hundred pounds. Now you know the truth. Do you hear me? I am a pauper, dependent on my cousin’s charity.”

“I am very glad,” he said, gazing at her thoughtfully, and still speaking in his slow and deliberate way. “I was afraid that perhaps you had money of which I did not know. But you will say ‘yes’?”

“No; impossible. Are you blind? Look at me.”

“I might say, ‘Look at me,’” he retorted, with a frank, honest laugh, which lit up his countenance pleasantly. “I wish you could look at me as I do at you, and see there something that you could love. Yes,” he said, his genuine passion making him speak fluently and well; “for all these long, long months, Mary, I have always had your sweet, earnest eyes before me, and your clever, bright face. I have seemed to listen to your voice, and sometimes I have been sad as I have asked myself what a woman could find in me to love.”

“Ah!” ejaculated the trembling girl.

“And I’ve felt that, when you have said all those many sharp, hard things to me, that they were not quite real, and when your words have been most cruel, I’ve dared to fancy that your eyes seemed to be sorry that your tongue could be so bitter.”

“Mr Trevithick, pray!”

“And then I’ve hoped and waited, and thought of what you were.”

“Yes,” said Mary bitterly, as she made a gesture with one hand.

“Bah!” he cried, “what of that? An accident when you were a child. I would not have you different for worlds. I want those two dear eyes to look into mine, true and trustful and clever. You, to whom I can come home from my work for help and counsel, to be everything to me – my wife. Mary dear, in my slow and clumsy way I love you very dearly, and your cousin’s wedding has brought it all out. I didn’t think I could make love like that.”

He took her other hand, and gazed at her very fondly as she stood by his side, with the tears streaming down her cheeks.

“You are not angry with me, dear?”

“No,” she said gently; “I am sorry.”

“Why?”

“For you. See how the world will sneer.”

“What!” he cried eagerly. “Then you will?”

She looked at him searchingly, as if a lingering doubt were there, and a shadow of suspicion were making her try to see if he was truly in earnest.

“No, no,” she said, as a sob burst from her lips; “it is impossible.” And she struggled hard to get away.

“Impossible!” he said, as he tightened his grasp. “Tell me one thing, Mary. You knew I loved you?”

She nodded quickly.

“And – you don’t think me ridiculous?”

“I think you the truest, most honest gentleman I ever saw,” she sobbed; “but – ”

“Ah!” he said, with a pleasant little satisfied laugh, “that settles it, then. The impossibility has gone like smoke. Mary dear, I never hoped to be so happy as you have made me now.”

His great arms enfolded her for a moment, during which she lay panting on his breast, then, struggling to free herself, she caught and kissed one of his hands.

“Hah!” he ejaculated, “now we must think of some one else.”

He led her gently back to her chair, and bent down to kiss her forehead. Then, returning to his seat as calmly as if nothing had happened —

“I can talk freely to you now, Mary,” he said. “Is not this a great mistake?”

“Yes,” she said, with an arch look, full of her newly-found joy.

“No, no; you know what I mean. We must be very serious now. I don’t like this Mr Glyddyr.”

“I hate him,” cried Mary.

“Well, that’s honest,” he said, smiling. “But it was her father’s wish, and I suppose it is to be.”

“Yes; it is to be. Nothing would turn her now.”

John Trevithick did not say, “And is this to be soon?” but he thought it, and set the idea aside.

“No,” he said to himself; “we must wait.” And soon after, calm, quiet and business-like, he went away to draw up the marriage settlements tightly on Claude’s behalf, and wandered whether he could ever manage to trace that missing cash.

He took out a pocket-book, and turned to a certain page covered with figures, and ran it down.

“Only a few of these notes have reached the bank. Well, some day I may come upon a clue in a way I least expect.

“Impossible, eh?” he said, with a smile of content. “Bless her sweet eyes! I won’t believe in the impossible now.”