Love Works Wonders Part 36

She was nearer to it now, and could see more plainly the exquisite refinement of the beautiful mouth, the clear, ardent expression of the bold, frank eyes, the gracious lines of the cl.u.s.tering hair. Her heart seemed almost to stand still--it was as though she had suddenly been brought face to face with a phantom.

He was bending over Lady St. Lawrence, talking eagerly to her--he was greeting Miss Hastings with much warmth and cordiality. Pauline had time to recover herself before Lady St. Lawrence remembered her. She had time to still the wild beating of her heart--to steady her trembling lips--but the flush was still on her beautiful face and the light in her eyes when he came up to her.

Lady St. Lawrence spoke, but the words sounded to Pauline as though they came from afar off; yet they were very simple.

"Miss Darrell," she said, "let me introduce my son to you."

Then she went back to Miss Hastings, eager to renew the conversation interrupted by the entrance of her son.

What did Sir Vane see in those dark eyes that held him captive? What was looking at him through that most beautiful face? What was it that seemed to draw his heart and soul from him, never to become his own again? To any other stranger he would have spoken indifferent words of greeting and welcome; to this dark-eyed girl he could say nothing. When souls have spoken, lips have not much to say.

They were both silent for some minutes; and then Sir Vane tried to recover himself. What had happened to him? What strange, magic influence was upon him? Ten minutes since he had entered that room heart-whole, fancy-free, with laughter on his lips, and no thought of coming fate.

Ten minutes had worked wonders of change; he was standing now in a kind of trance, looking into the grand depths of those dark eyes wherein he had lost himself.

They said but few words; the calm and silence that fell over them during that first interval was not to be broken; it was more eloquent than words. He sat down by her side; she still held the book open in her hands. He glanced at it.

"Elaine," he said, "do you like that story?"

She told him "Yes," and, taking the book from her hands, he read the n.o.ble words wherein Sir Lancelot tells the Lily Maid how he will dower her when she weds some worthy knight, but that he can do no more for her.

Was it a dream that she should sit there listening to those words from his lips--she had fancied him Sir Lancelot without stain, and herself Elaine? There was a sense of unreality about it; she would not have been surprised at any moment to awake and find herself in the pretty drawing-room at Marine Terrace--all this beautiful fairy tale a dream--only a dream. The musical voice ceased at last; and it was to her as though some charm had been broken.

"Do you like poetry, Miss Darrell?" inquired Sir Vane.

"Yes," she replied; "it seems to me part of myself. I cannot explain clearly what I mean, but when I hear such grand thoughts read, or when I read them for myself, it is to me as though they were my own."

"I understand," he responded--"indeed I believe that I should understand anything you said. I could almost fancy that I had lived before, and had known you in another life."

Then Lady St. Lawrence said something about Sea View, and they left fairy-land for a more commonplace sphere of existence.

CHAPTER x.x.xVI.

REDEEMED BY LOVE.

"If anything can redeem her, it will be love." So Miss Hastings had said of Pauline long months ago, when she had first seen her grand nature warped and soured by disappointment, shadowed by the fierce desire of revenge. Now she was to see the fulfillment of her words.

With a nature like Pauline's, love was no ordinary pa.s.sion; all the romance, the fervor, the poetry of her heart and soul were aroused. Her love took her out of herself, transformed and transfigured her, softened and beautified her. She was not of those who could love moderately, and, if one attachment was not satisfactory, take refuge in another. For such as her there was but one love, and it would make or mar her life.

Had Sir Vane St. Lawrence been merely a handsome man she would never have cared for him; but his soul and mind had mastered her. He was a n.o.ble gentleman, princely in his tastes and culture, generous, pure, gifted with an intellect magnificent in itself, and cultivated to the highest degree of perfection. The innate n.o.bility of his character at once influenced her. She acknowledged its superiority; she bowed her heart and soul before it, proud of the very chains that bound her.

How small and insignificant everything else now appeared! Even the loss of Darrell Court seemed trifling to her. Life had suddenly a.s.sumed another aspect. She was in an unknown land; she was happy beyond everything that she had ever conceived or imagined it possible to be. It was a quiet, subdued happiness, one that was dissolving her pride rapidly as the sunshine dissolves snow--happiness that was rounding off the angles of her character, that was taking away scorn and defiance, and bringing sweet and gracious humility, womanly grace and tenderness in their stead.

While Sir Vane was studying her as the most difficult problem he had ever met with, he heard from Miss Hastings the story of her life. He could understand how the innate strength and truth of the girl's character had rebelled against polite insincerities and conventional untruths; he could understand that a soul so gifted, pure, and eager could find no resting-place and no delight; he could understand, too, how the stately old baronet, the gentleman of the old school, had been frightened at his niece's originality, and scared by her uncompromising love of truth.

Miss Hastings, whose favorite theme in Pauline's absence was praise of her, had told both mother and son the story of Sir Oswald's project and its failure--how Pauline would have been mistress of Darrell Court and all her uncle's immense wealth if she would but have compromised matters and have married Aubrey Langton.

"Langton?" questioned Sir Vane. "I know him--that is, I have heard of him; but I cannot remember anything more than that he is a great _roue_, and a man whose word is never to be believed."

"Then my pupil was right in her estimate of his character," said Miss Hastings. "She seemed to guess it by instinct. She always treated him with the utmost contempt and scorn. I have often spoken to her about it."

"You may rely upon it, Miss Hastings, that the instinct of a good woman, in the opinion she forms of men, is never wrong," observed Sir Vane, gravely; and then he turned to Lady St. Lawrence with the sweet smile his face always wore for her.

"Mother," he said, gently, "after hearing of such heroism as that, you must not be angry about Lillith Davenant again."

"That is a very different matter," opposed Lady St. Lawrence; but it seemed to her son very much the same kind of thing.

Before he had known Pauline long he was not ashamed to own to himself that he loved her far better than all the world beside--that life for him, unless she would share it, was all blank and hopeless. She was to him as part of his own soul, the center of his existence; he knew she was beautiful beyond most women, he believed her n.o.bler and truer than most women had ever been. His faith in her was implicit; he loved her as only n.o.ble men are capable of loving.

As time pa.s.sed on his influence over her became unbounded. Quite unconsciously to herself she worshiped him; unconsciously to herself her thoughts, her ideas, all took their coloring from his. She who had delighted in cynicism, whose beautiful lips had uttered such hard and cruel words, now took from him a broader, clearer, kinder view of mankind and human nature. If at times the old habit was too strong for her, and some biting sarcasm would fall from her, some cold cynical sneer, he would reprove her quite fearlessly.

"You are wrong, Miss Darrell--quite wrong," he would say. "The n.o.blest men have not been those who sneered at their fellow-men, but those who have done their best to aid them. There is little n.o.bility in a deriding spirit."

And then her face would flush, her lips quiver, her eyes take the grieved expression of a child who has been hurt.

"Can I help it," she would say, "when I hear what is false?"

"Your ridicule will not remedy it," he would reply. "You must take a broader, more kindly view of matters. You think Mrs. Leigh deceitful, Mrs. Vernon worldly; but, my dear Miss Darrell, do you remember this, that in every woman and man there is something good, something to be admired, some grand or n.o.ble quality? It may be half-hidden by faults, but it is there, and for the sake of the good we must tolerate the bad.

No one is all bad. Men and women are, after all, created by G.o.d; and there is some trace of the Divine image left in every one."

This was a new and startling theory to the girl who had looked down with contempt not unmixed with scorn on her fellow-creatures--judging them by a standard to which few ever attain.

"And you really believe there is something good in every one?" she asked.

"Something not merely good, but n.o.ble. My secret conviction is that in every soul there is the germ of something n.o.ble, even though circ.u.mstances may never call it forth. As you grow older and see more of the world, you will know that I am right."

"I believe you!" she cried, eagerly. "I always believe every word you say!"

Her face flushed at the warmth of her words.

"You do me justice," he said. "I have faults by the million, but want of sincerity is not among them."

So, little by little, love redeemed Pauline, took away her faults, and placed virtues in their stead. It was almost marvelous to note how all sweet, womanly graces came to her, how the proud face cleared and grew tender, how pride died from the dark eyes, and a glorious love-light came in its stead, how she became patient and gentle, considerate and thoughtful, always anxious to avoid giving pain to others. It would have been difficult for any one to recognize the brilliant, willful Pauline Darrell in the loving, quiet, thoughtful girl whom love had transformed into something unlike herself.

There came a new world to her, a new life. Instead of problems difficult to solve, life became full of sweet and gracious harmonies, full of the very warmth and light of Heaven, full of unutterable beauty and happiness; her soul reveled in it, her heart was filled with it.

All the poetry, the romance, had come true--nay, more than true. Her girlish dreams had not shown her such happiness as that which dawned upon her now. She had done what she had always said she should do--recognized her superior, and yielded full reverence to him. If anything had happened to disenchant her, if it had been possible for her to find herself mistaken in him, the sun of the girl's life would have set forever, would have gone down in utter darkness, leaving her without hope.

This beautiful love-idyl did not remain a secret long; perhaps those most interested were the last to see it. Miss Hastings, however, had watched its progress, thankful that her prophecy about her favorite was to come true. Later on Lady St. Lawrence saw it, and, though she could not help mourning over Lillith Davenant's fortune, she owned that Pauline Darrell was the most beautiful, the most n.o.ble, the most accomplished girl she had ever met. She had a moderate fortune, too; not much, it was true; yet it was better than nothing.

"And, if dear Vane has made up his mind," said the lady, meekly, "it will, of course, be quite useless for me to interfere."

Sir Vane and Pauline were always together; but hitherto no word of love had been spoken between them. Sir Vane always went to Marine Terrace the first thing in the morning; he liked to see the beautiful face that had all the bloom and freshness of a flower. He always contrived to make such arrangements as would insure that Pauline and he spent the morning together. The afternoon was a privileged time; it was devoted by the elder ladies, who were both invalids, to rest. During that interval Sir Vane read to Pauline, or they sat under the shadow of the great cliffs, talking until the two souls were so firmly knit that they could never be severed again. In the evening they walked on the sands, and the waves sang to them of love that was immortal, of hope that would never die--sang of the sweet story that would never grow old.