Johnny Ludlow Second Series Part 45

"I have liked her as my servant," said Lady Chava.s.se, scornfully.

"Pardon me, you have liked her as a lady. Do you remember once saying--it was when she first came--that if you had had a daughter you could have wished her to be just like Mary Layne. Before I ever saw her, you told me she was a sweet, elegant young woman; and--mother--she is nothing less. Oh, mother, mother!" continued Sir Geoffry, with emotion, "if you will but forget your prejudices for my sake, and consent to what I ask, we would endeavour to be ever repaying you in love and services during our after-life. I know what a great sacrifice it will be; but for my sake I venture to crave it of you--for my sake."

A great fear lay upon Lady Chava.s.se: it had lain on her ever since the previous day--that he might carry this marriage out of his own will. So that she dared not answer too imperatively. She was bitterly hurt, and caught her breath with a sob.

"Do you want to kill me, Geoffry?"

"Heaven knows that I wish I had been killed, before I brought this distress upon you," was his rejoinder.

"I _am_ distressed. I have never felt anything like it since your father died. No; not once when you, a child of seven, were given over in illness, and it was thought you would not live till morning."

Sir Geoffry pa.s.sed his hand hastily across his eyes, in which stood the hot tears. His heart was sore, nearly unto breaking; his ingrat.i.tude to his mother seemed fearfully great. He longed to throw himself at her feet, and clasp her knees, and tell how deep for her was his love, how true and deep it always would be.

"Though the whole world had united to deceive me, Geoffry, I could never have believed that you would do so. Why did you pretend to be fond of Rachel?"

"I never pretended to be fonder of Rachel than I was. I liked her as a cousin, nothing more. I know it now. And--mother"--he added, with a flush upon his face, and a lowering of the voice, "it is better and safer that the knowledge should have come to me before our marriage than after it."

"Nonsense," said Lady Chava.s.se. "Once married, a man of right principles is always safe in them."

Sir Geoffry was silent. Not very long ago, he had thought himself safe in his. With every word, it seemed that his shame and his sin came more glaringly home to him.

"Then you mean to tell me that you do not like Rachel----"

"That I have no love for her. If--if there be any one plea that I can put forth as a faint shadow of excuse for what has happened, it lies in my love for another. Faint it is, Heaven knows: the excuse, not the love. _That_ is deep enough: but I would rather not speak of it to you--my mother."

"And that you never will love Rachel?" continued Lady Chava.s.se, as though he had not interposed.

"Never. It is impossible that I can ever love any one but Mary Layne. I am grateful, as things have turned out, that I did not deceive Rachel by feigning what I could not feel. Neither does she love me. We were told to consider ourselves betrothed, and did so accordingly; but, so far as love goes, it has not been so much as mentioned between us."

"What else have you to say?" asked Lady Chava.s.se.

"I might say a great deal, but it would all come round to the same point: to the one pet.i.tion that I am beseeching you to grant--that you will sanction the marriage."

Lady Chava.s.se's hands trembled visibly within their rich lace frills, as they lay pa.s.sive on her soft dress of fine geranium cashmere. Her lips grew white with agitation.

"Geoffry!"

"My darling mother."

"I have heard you. Will you hear me?"

"You know I will."

"More than one-and-twenty years ago, my husband died within these walls; and I--I was not eighteen, Geoffry--felt utterly desolate. But, as the weeks went on, I said my child will be born, if G.o.d permit, and he will bring me comfort. You were born, Geoffry; you did bring me comfort: such comfort that I thought Heaven had come again. You best know, my son, what our life has been; how we have loved each other: how pleasantly time has flown in uninterrupted happiness. I have devoted myself, my time, my energies, everything I possessed, to you, my best treasure; I have given up the world for you, Geoffry; I had only you left in it. Is it fitting that you should fling me from you now; that you should blight my remaining days with misery; that you should ignore me just as though I were already dead--and all for the sake of a stranger?"

"But----"

"I have not finished, Geoffry. For the sake of a stranger, whom a few months ago neither you nor I had ever seen? If you think this--if you deem that you would be acting rightly, and can find in your heart to treat me so, why, you must do it."

"But what I wish and propose is quite different!" he exclaimed in agony.

"Oh, mother, surely you can understand me--and the dilemma I am placed in?"

"I understand all perfectly."

"Ah yes!"

"Geoffry, there is no middle course. You must choose between me and--_her_. Once she and I separate--it will be to-day--we can never meet again. I will not tolerate her memory; I will never submit to the degradation of hearing her named in my presence. Our paths lie asunder, Geoffry, far as the poles: hers lies one way, mine another. You must decide for yourself which of them you will follow. If it be mine, you shall be, as ever, my dear and honoured son, and I will never, never reproach you with your folly: never revert to it; never think of it.

If it be hers, why, then--I will go away somewhere and hide myself, and leave the Grange free for you. And I--I dare say--shall not live long to be a thorn in your remembrance."

She broke down with a flood of bitter sobs. Geoffry Chava.s.se had never seen his mother shed such. The hour was as trying to her as to him. She had loved him with a strangely selfish love, as it is in the nature of mothers to do; and that she should have to bid him choose between her and another--and one so entirely beneath her as Lady Chava.s.se considered Mary Layne to be--was gall and wormwood. Never would she have stooped to put the choice before him, even in words, but for her dread that he might be intending to take it.

"It is a fitting end, Geoffry--that this worthless girl should supplant me in your home and heart," she was resuming when her emotion allowed; but Geoffry stood forward to face her, his agitation great as her own.

"An instant, mother: that you may fully understand me. The duty I owe you, the allegiance and the love, are paramount to all else on earth.

In communing with myself last night, as I tell you I was, my heart and my reason alike showed me this. If I must choose between you and Mary Layne, there cannot be a question in my mind on which side duty lies.

In all honour I am bound to make her my wife, and I should do it in all affection: but not in defiance of you; not to thrust rudely aside the love and obligations of the past one-and-twenty years. _You_ must choose for me. If you refuse your approval, I have no resource but to yield to your decision; if you consent, I shall thank you and bless you for ever."

A spasm of pain pa.s.sed across the mouth of Lady Chava.s.se. She could not help saying something that arose prominently in her mind though it interrupted the question.

"And you can deem the apothecary Layne's daughter fit to mate with Sir Geoffry Chava.s.se?"

"No, I do not. Under ordinary circ.u.mstances, I should never have thought of such a thing. This unhappy business has a sting for me, mother, on many sides. Will you give me your decision?" he added, after a pause.

"I have already given it, Geoffry--so far as I am concerned. You must choose between your mother, between all the hopes and the home-interests of one-and-twenty years, and this alien."

"Then I have no alternative."

She turned her gaze steadily upon him. A sob rose in his throat as he took her hands, his voice was hoa.r.s.e with emotion.

"To part from her will be like parting with life, mother. I can never know happiness again in this world."

But the decision was irrevocable. What further pa.s.sed between Sir Geoffry and his mother in the remaining half-hour they spent together, how much of entreaty and anguish was spoken on his side, how much of pa.s.sionate plaint and sorrow on hers, will never be known. But she was obdurate to the last letter: and Sir Geoffry's lot in life was fixed.

Mary Layne was to be sacrificed: and, in one sense of the word, himself also: and there might be no appeal.

Lady Chava.s.se exacted from him that he should quit the Grange at once without seeing Miss Layne, and not return to it until Mary had left it for ever. Anything he wished to say to her, he was to write. On Lady Chava.s.se's part, she voluntarily undertook to explain to Miss Layne their conversation faithfully, and its result; and to shield the young lady's good name from the censure of the world. She would keep her for some time longer at the Grange, be tender with her, honour her, drive out with her in the carriage so that they might be seen together, subdue her mother's anger, strive to persuade Mr. Luke Duffham that his opinion had been mistaken, and, in any case, bind him down to secrecy: in short, she would make future matters as easy as might be for Mary, as tenaciously as though she were her own daughter. That she promised this at the sacrifice of pride and of much feeling, was indisputable; but she meant to keep her word.

However miserable a night the others had pa.s.sed, it will readily be imagined that Mary Layne had spent a worse. She made no pretence of eating breakfast; and when it was taken away sat at her work in the garden-parlour, trying to do it; but her cold fingers dropped the needle every minute, her aching brow felt as though it were bursting.

Good-hearted Hester Picker was sorry to see her looking so ill, and wished the nasty trying spring, hot one day, cold the next, would just settle itself down.

Mary rose from her chair, and went upstairs to her own bedroom for a brief respite: in her state of mind it seemed impossible to stay long quiescent anywhere. This little incidental occurrence frustrated one part of the understanding between Sir Geoffry and his mother--that he should quit the house without seeing Miss Layne. In descending, she chanced to cross the end of the corridor just as he came out of his mother's room after bidding her farewell. The carriage waited at the door, his coat was on his arm. Mary would have shrunk back again, but he bade her wait.

"You must allow me to shake her hand, and say just a word of adieu, mother; I am not quite a brute," he whispered. And Lady Chava.s.se came out of her room, and tacitly sanctioned it.

But there was literally nothing more than a hand-shake. Miss Layne, standing still in all humility, turned a little white, for she guessed that he was being sent from his home through her. Sir Geoffry held her hand for a moment.

"I am going away, Mary. My mother will explain to you. I have done my best, and failed. Before Heaven, I have striven to the uttermost, for your sake and for mine, to make reparation; but it is not to be. I leave you to my mother; she is your friend; and you shall hear from me in a day or two. I am now going to see Mrs. Layne. Good-bye: G.o.d bless you always!"

But, ere Sir Geoffry reached the hall, Lady Chava.s.se had run swiftly down, caught him, and was drawing him into a room. The fear had returned to her face.