A Life For a Love Part 13

"The work is heavy, Val, and it will grow more so. I don't complain, however--I have not the shadow of a right to complain. I am sorry I spoke to your father so as to vex you, dearest----I won't do so again."

"I want you to love him, Gerry; I want you to feel for him a little bit, as I do, as if he were the first of men, you understand. Don't you think you could try. I wish you would."

"You see I have my own father, darling."

"Oh yes, but really now--the rector is a nice old man, but, Gerry, if you were to speak from your inmost heart, without any prejudice, you know; if you could detach from your mind the fact that you are the son of the rector, you would not compare them, Gerry, you could not."

"As you say, Valentine, I could not. They stand on different pedestals.

Now let us change the subject. So you are the happy possessor of a thousand a year."

"We both possess that income, Gerry. Is not it sweet of father--he felt for me at once. He said he was proud of me, that I was going to make a capital wife--he said you were a lucky fellow, Gerry."

"Yes, darling, so I am, so I am."

"Then he spoke of a thousand a year to begin with. He mentioned a lot more, but he said a thousand was an income on which I might begin to learn to save. And he gave me a cheque for the first quarter to-night.

He said we had better open a banking account. As soon as we get in, I'm going to give you the cheque, I'm afraid to keep it. Father said we might open a separate account in his bank."

"My father has always banked at the Westminster," said Gerald. "It would suit me best to take the money there."

They had reached the house by this time. Gerald opened the door with a latch-key, and the two went into the pretty, cosy drawing-room.

Valentine threw off her white fur wrap, and sank down into an easy-chair. Her dinner dress was white, and made in a very simple girlish fashion--her hair, which was always short and curled in little rings about her head and face, added to the extreme youth of her appearance. She raised her eyes to her husband, who stood by the mantel-piece. The expression she wore was that of a happy, excited, half-spoiled child, a creature who had been somebody's darling from her birth. This was the predominating expression of her face, and yet--and yet--Gerald seemed to read something more in the gaze of the sweet eyes to-night; a question was half coming into them, the dawn of a possible awakening might even be discerned in them.

"My darling," he said, suddenly coming up to her, putting his arm about her, and kissing her with pa.s.sion, "I love you better than my life--better--better than my hope of heaven. Can you love me a little, Valentine--just a little?"

"I do love you, Gerald." But she spoke quietly, and without any answering fire.

His arms dropped, the enthusiasm went out of his face; he went back again to his old position with his back to the fire.

"What kind of girl is Esther Helps, Gerald?"

"A beautiful girl."

"As beautiful as I am?"

"In her way quite as beautiful."

"Why do you say 'in her way?' Beauty must always be beauty."

"It has degrees, Esther Helps is not a lady."

Valentine was silent for half a minute.

"I should like to know her," she said then. "I wonder how much she cares for old Helps."

"Look here, Valentine, Esther Helps is not the least like you. I don't know that she has any romantic attachment for that old man. She is a very ordinary girl--a most commonplace person with just a beautiful face."

"How queerly you speak, Gerald. As if it were something strange for an only daughter to be attached to her father."

"The amount of attachment you feel, darling, is uncommon."

"Is it? Well, I have got a very uncommon father."

"My dear Valentine, G.o.d knows you have."

Gerald sank down into a chair by the fire. He turned his face, dreary, white and worn, to the blaze. Valentine detected no hidden sarcasm in his tones. After a time she took the cheque out of her purse and handed it to him.

"Here, Gerry, you will put this into your bank to-morrow, won't you? We will open an account in our joint names, won't we? And then we can calculate how much we are to spend weekly and monthly. Oh, won't it be interesting and exciting. So much for my clothes, so much for yours, so much for servants, so much for food--we need not spend so much on food, need we? So much for pleasures--I want to go to the theatre at least twice a week--oh, we can manage it all and have something to spare. And no debts, remember, Gerry--ready money will be our system. We'll go in omnibuses, too, to save cabs--I shall love to feel that I am doing for a penny what might cost a shilling. Gerald darling, do you know that just in one way you have vexed my father a little?"

"Vexed him--how, Valentine?"

"He says it is very wrong of you to croak, and have gloomy prognostications. You know you said it was not worth while for me to learn to housekeep. Just as if you were going to die, or I were going to die. Father was quite vexed when I told him. Now you look vexed, Gerry. Really between such a husband and such a father, a poor girl may sometimes feel puzzled. Well, have you nothing to say?"

"I'm afraid I have nothing to say, Valentine."

"Then you won't croak any more."

"Not for you--I have never croaked for you."

"Nor for yourself."

"I cannot promise. Sometimes fits of depression come over me. There, good-night, sweet. Go to bed. I am not sleepy. I shall read for a time.

Your future is all right, Valentine."

CHAPTER XVIII.

"I don't like it," said Lilias.

She was sitting in the sunny front parlor, the room which was known as the children's room at the rectory. An open letter lay on her dark winter dress; her sunny hair was piled up high on her shapely head, and her eyes, wistful and questioning, were raised to Marjory's brisker, brighter face, with a world of trouble in them.

The snow lay thick outside, covering the flower beds and the gra.s.sy lawn, and laying in piles against the low rectory windows. Marjory was standing by a piled up fire, one of those perfect fires composed of great k.n.o.bs of sparkling coal and well dried logs of wood. She, too, had on a dark dress, but it was nearly covered by a large holland ap.r.o.n with a bib. Her sleeves were protected by cuffs of the same, on her hands she wore chamois leather gloves with the tips cut off. She looked all bright, and active, and sparkling, and round her on the table and on the floor lay piles and bales of unbleached calico, of coa.r.s.e red flannel, of bright dark blue and crimson merino. In one of Marjory's capable hands was a large pair of cutting-out scissors, and she paused, holding this implement slightly open, to listen to Lilias' lugubrious words.

"If you must croak to-day," she said, "get it over quickly, and come and help me. Twenty-four blue frocks and twenty-four red to be ready by the time the girls come at four o'clock, besides the old women's flannel and this unlimited supply of unbleached calico. If there is a thing which ruffles my equanimity it is unbleached calico, it fluffs so, and makes one so messy. Now, what do you want to say, Lilias?"

"I'm troubled," said Lilias, "it's about Gerald. I've the queerest feeling about him--three times lately I've dreamt--intangible dreams, of course, but all dark and foreboding."

"Is that a letter from Gerry in your lap, Lilias?"

"No, it is from Val--a nice little letter, too, poor child. I am sure she is doing her best to be a good wife to Gerald. Do you know that she has taken up housekeeping in real earnest."

"Does she say that Gerald is ill?"

"No, she scarcely mentions his name at all."

"Then what in the name of goodness are you going into the dismals for on this morning of all mornings. Twenty-four blue frocks and twenty-four red between noon and four o'clock, and the old women coming for them to the moment. Really, Lilias, you are too provoking. You are not half the girl you were before Gerald's marriage. I don't know what has come to you. Oh, there's Mr. Carr pa.s.sing the window, I'll get him to come in and help us. Forgive me, Lil, I'll just open this window a tiny bit and speak to him. How do you do, Mr. Carr? You can step in this way--you need not go round through all the slush to the front door. There, you can wipe your feet on that mat. Lilias, say 'how do you do' to Mr. Carr, that is if you are not too dazed."