April's Lady Part 75

Lady Baltimore, who has stood immoveable during the attack upon her, always with that cold, white, beautiful look upon her face, now points to the stricken child lying panting, laughing, and playing with the dog at his father's feet.

"There is a reason!" says she, almost inaudibly.

Baltimore shakes his head. "I have thought all that out. It is not enough," says he.

"Bertie!" says his mother, turning to the child. "Do you know this, that your father is going to leave you?"

"Going?" says the boy vaguely, forgetting the dog for a moment and glancing upward. "Where?"

"Away. Forever."

"Where?" says the boy again. He rises to his feet now, and looks anxiously at his father; then he smiles and flings himself into his arms. "Oh, no!" says he, in a little soft, happy, sure sort of a way.

"Forever! Forever!" repeals Isabel in a curious monotone.

"Take me up," says the child, tugging at his father's arms. "What does mamma mean? Where are you going?"

"To America, to shoot bears," returns Baltimore with an embarra.s.sed laugh. How near to tears it is.

"Real live bears?"

"Yes."

"Take me with you"? says the child, excitedly.

"And leave mamma?"

"Oh, she'll come, too," says Bertie, confidently. "She'll come where I go." Where he would go--the child! But would she go where the father went? Baltimore's brow darkens.

"I am afraid it is out of the question," he says, putting Bertie back again upon the carpet where the fox terrier is barking furiously and jumping up and down in a frenzied fashion as if desirous of devouring the child's legs. "The bears might eat you. When you are big and strong----"

"You will come back for me?" cries Bertie, eagerly.

"Perhaps."

"He will not," breaks in Lady Baltimore violently. "He will come back no more. When he goes you will never see him again. He has said so. He is going forever!" These last two terrible words seem to have sunk into her soul. She cannot cease from repeating them.

"Let the boy alone," says Baltimore angrily.

The child is looking from one parent to the other. He seems puzzled, expectant, but scarcely unhappy. Childhood can grasp a great deal, but not all. The more unhappy the childhood, the more it can understand of the sudden and larger ways of life. But children delicately brought up and clothed in love from their cradle find it hard to realize that an end to their happiness can ever come.

"Tell me, papa!" says he at last in a vague, sweet little way.

"What is there to tell?" replies his father with a most meagre laugh, "except that I saw Beecher bringing in some fresh oranges half an hour ago. Perhaps he hasn't eaten them all yet. If you were to ask him for one----"

"I'll find him," cries Bertie brightly, forgetting everything but the present moment. "Come, Trixy, come," to his dog, "you shall have some, too."

"You see there' won't be much trouble with him," says Baltimore, when the boy has run out of the room in pursuit of oranges. "It will take him a day, perhaps, and after that he will be quite your own. If you won't sign these papers to-day you will perhaps to-morrow. I had better go and tell Hansard that you would like to have a little time to look them over."

He walks quickly down the room, opens the door, and closes it after him.

CHAPTER LVII.

"This is that happy morn-- That day, long-wished day Of all my life so dark (If cruel stars have not my ruin sworn And fates my hopes betray) Which, purely white, deserves An everlasting diamond should it mark."

He has not, however, gone three yards down the corridor when the door is again opened, and Lady Baltimore's voice calls after him:

"Baltimore!" Her tone is sharp, high-agonized--the tone of one strung to the highest pitch of despair. It startles him. He turns to look at her.

She is standing, framed in by the doorway, and one hand is grasping the woodwork with a hold so firm that the knuckles are showing white. With the other hand she beckons him to approach her. He obeys her. He is even so frightened at the strange gray look in her face that he draws her bodily into the room again, shutting the door with a pressure of the hand he can best spare.

"What is it?" says he, looking down at her.

She has managed to so far overcome the faintness that has been threatening her as to shake him off and stand free, leaning against a chair behind her.

"Don't go," says she, hoa.r.s.ely.

It is impossible to misunderstand her meaning. It has nothing whatever to do with his interview with the lawyer waiting so patiently down below, but with that final wandering of his into regions unknown. She is as white as death.

"How is this, Isabel?" asks he. He is as white as she is now. "Do you know what you are saying? This is a moment of excitement; you do not comprehend what your words mean."

"Stay! Stay for his sake."

"Is that all?" says he, his eyes searching hers.

"For mine, then."

The words seem to scorch her. She covers her face with her hands and stands before him, stricken dumb, miserable--confessed.

"For yours!"

He goes closer to her, and ventures to take her hand. It is cold--cold as death. His is burning.

"You have given a reason for my staying, indeed," says he. "But what is the meaning of it?"

"This!" cried she, throwing up her head, and showing him her shamed and grief-stricken face. "I am a coward! In spite of everything I would not have you go--so far!"

"I see. I understand," he sighs, heavily. "And yet that story was a foul lie! It is all that stands between us, Isabel. Is it not so? But you will not believe."

There, is a long silence, during which neither of them stirs. They seem wrapt in thought--in silence--he still holding her hand.

"If it was a lie," says she at last, breaking the quiet around them by an effort, "would you so far forgive my distrust of you as to be holding my hand like this?"

"Yes. What is there I would not forgive you?" says he. "And it was a lie!"

"Cyril," cries she in great agitation, "take care! It is a last moment!