Faithful Margaret Part 29

"She's shy yet--she's shy," said the doctor, in a prompting tone.

"Ar'n't you, dear?"

It was utterly out of Margaret's power to do anything but look at St.

Udo Brand, as represented by the man among the withered leaves, with a cold stare of scorn.

"The bleak wind is injuring Miss Walsingham's complexion," said the sneering voice again. "I will release her from the freezing process, and myself from Paradise. Good-evening."

Dr. Gay drove his impa.s.sive ward up to the steps of Castle Brand, and set her down between the griffiths couchant, and she stood forlornly there clinging to his hand.

"I am afraid to stay here alone," she whispered. "Do come and stay with me, dear doctor, until that terrible man is taken away."

"I--I'm afraid Mrs. Gay might object to such an arrangement, dear; she is a person who--who generally objects--who is opposed to leaving her own home under any circ.u.mstances."

"I did not think of Mrs. Gay. Well will you please ask Mr. Davenport to come? Will you implore him to come? He has nothing to keep him, and I am so defenseless here."

"I will mention your request, but I think he will say what I feel without saying--it is a pity you left my house the way you did."

With that parting shot, the little doctor bade his adieu, stepped into his gig, and cheerfully drove away.

Oh, this horrible Waaste! Listen how the harsh wind moans over it, and rises into savage shrieks.

The old trees creak and sigh like the surge of an angry sea; the ancient windows rattle in their stone sockets; the ghostly Brands all down the gallery seem to shudder in their ma.s.sive frames, as if an ominous Present were casting its shadows back to their centuried Past: the face of Ethel, the beautiful, looks down upon the companion she once loved and cherished as if she would say, in the limitless pride of her heart:

"I trust to you, Margaret Walsingham; keep my name pure, or let it die."

The candles flicker and wave in phantom gusts of wind; long shadows flit about with wide-spreading wings; the brain of the lonely girl is peopled with visions of horror.

Let her double-lock her chamber door, or pace in restlessness the echoing halls, Ethel Brand's bequest has come like a curse to poor Margaret.

A note arrived at the castle next morning from Dr. Gay, which stirred her up to feverish excitement, and showed her a speedy crisis.

"MY DEAR WARD:--I write more for the purpose of giving you time to prepare your answer, and (may I presume it?) to give you a little timely advice as to the nature of your answer, than for the sake of the communication itself.

"Yesterday, upon leaving you, I had a very momentous interview with Colonel Brand (he returned to Regis with me in the gig), in which he placed himself in the most candid and open manner upon my friendship, and explained to me what he wished to be his future course.

"After commenting with a great deal of proper feeling upon his former extravagances of life, he said that it was little wonder that a highly organized young lady like Miss Walsingham should feel a distrust of him, and that he was quite conscious of a revulsion of feeling on Miss Walsingham's part which his most heartfelt apologies for his former rudeness could not remove.

He then implored me to put him upon a way to do away with the bad impression he had created, so that he might win your affection.

"'For,' he declared, with tears in his eyes, 'I have learned to love her to distraction: and if I am ever to be anything, her hand must beckon me on.'

"His sincerity so invited my sympathy that I was within an ace of disclosing to him your ridiculous suspicion, but upon second thoughts concluded that it would wound him too much. However, I proposed to stand his friend with you; so henceforth look upon me in that light.

"He then informed me that he desired to win your consent to marry him purely from personal affection, and that if you would only be his wife, he should insist upon having the whole of the Brand estates settled upon you, in case any one might accuse him of mercenary motives. And, in short, he concluded by disclosing to me his determination to end his suspense by proposing to you this evening. I urged upon him that it would be too premature, but he answered, with deep emotion:

"'She hates me more and more every day. Let me touch her n.o.ble heart by my great love, and she will pity, and in time endure me.'

"I don't know whether the course he has marked out will have that effect or not, but this I hope--that you will not turn away your co-heir without due reason.

"And now for my bit of advice.

"Weigh well before the evening the possibility of your having been unjust in your suspicions of the man who is going to offer you his hand; if you do conscientiously, you will come to the conclusion that you _have_ been unjust.

"Then ask yourself if it will be right, or generous, or honorable to dismiss St. Udo Brand from his rightful home and fortune, now that he is willing to bestow it upon you, and only for your love.

"Hoping that the next occasion of our meeting will be more pleasing than the last, I remain your obedient servant,

"R. GAY.

"P.S.--I mentioned last night to Davenport your desire to have him move into the castle for a while, and he utterly refuses to do anything so absurd and extraordinary.

"R. G."

Thus plainly showing that they washed their hands of their ward's vagaries, the executors not only refused her their countenance, but seemed inclined to go over to the enemy.

With what indignant scorn Margaret read the account of his presumed love for herself!

"He has taken his measures," she mused, "to force me into showing my hand, before I have taken one move against him. He is too clever for me.

What shall I do?"

Pondering hour after hour, at length she made up her little plan with doubt and misgiving.

"Colonel Brand is coming here this evening, Mrs. Chetwode," she said, as the dusk slowly deepened on stone parapet and spiked rail, "and I wish you to bear me company in the library. You know I do not like the colonel, so you must be my chaperon."

When the suitor came to his lady's bower, on a horse which smoked with hard and furious riding, and when he followed the servant to the library, he found the lady of his heart standing with a demeanor in every way proper for the occasion, while the old housekeeper, in her best black satin, sat behind the statue of St. George, sedately knitting.

"May I entreat the honor of a private interview?" asked the smooth voice.

"We can be as private here as you wish," was the polite reply. "My housekeeper cannot hear anything unless you specially address her."

The colonel bowed and expressed himself satisfied, but if the angry glance which he cast among the murky shadows, where the bright needles clicked, meant anything, the colonel lied.

He took the chair a.s.signed him, but evidently his proposed form of declaration was routed by this unexpected arrangement.

His fingers plucked at his dark mustache in a nervous and undecided manner, and he took a long time to deliberate before he could trust himself to launch upon the momentous subject.

"I am aware," at length began the lover, in a constrained voice, "that Miss Walsingham has conceived very unfriendly feelings toward me--an enmity, I might almost call it--for has she not expressed as much? And I have come here this evening with the hope of making a successful effort to come to an amicable understanding with her, and it will be my last trial."

Always sinking his tones a little lower, and bending to his listener, a little nearer, and casting watchful glances toward the corner where the bright needles clicked, the last word came to sound like a muttered threat, far more than the appeal of a lovesick adorer.

"If," continued he, "Miss Walsingham thinks better of these unfriendly feelings, and expresses herself willing to listen to reason, I will most gladly offer her my hand, if she will deign to accept it as the hand of her husband, and will do all in my power to make her not repent her choice; and if she acts faithfully by me, I will act faithfully by her.

Does she consider it possible to say 'yes' to this proposal?"

Coldly avoiding the chance of coming to that mutual understanding which his dropped tones and significant looks insisted upon, Margaret answered in measured accents thus, decorously:

"I am not sufficiently acquainted with Colonel Brand to feel able to give him a decided answer with due appreciation of his virtues. If he will be kind enough to wait four weeks, by that time I shall have made up my mind."

The suitor tapped his heel with his cane and meditated. If his frowning brow and furious eyes did not belie him, this response was an unexpected one, and routed his previous plans.