Miss Mackenzie Part 45

"Margaret," exclaimed Mr Maguire, "will you not come to me?"

"What do you mean, Mr Maguire?" said she, still standing aloof from him, and retreating somewhat nearer to the door.

"The gentleman says that you are engaged to marry him," said Lady Ball.

Margaret, looking again into her aunt's face, saw the smile of triumph that sat there, and resolved at once to make good her ground.

"If he has said that, he has told an untruth,--an untruth both unmanly and unmannerly. You hear, sir, what Lady Ball has stated. Is it true that you have made such an a.s.sertion?"

"And will you contradict it, Margaret? Oh, Margaret! Margaret! you cannot contradict it."

The reader must remember that this clergyman no doubt thought and felt that he had a good deal of truth on his side. Gentlemen when they make offers to ladies, and are told by ladies that they may come again, and that time is required for consideration, are always disposed to think that the difficulties of the siege are over. And in nine cases out of ten it is so. Mr Maguire, no doubt, since the interview in question, had received letters from the lady which should at any rate have prevented him from uttering any such a.s.sertion as that which he had now made; but he looked upon those letters as the work of the enemy, and chose to go back for his authority to the last words which Margaret had spoken to him. He knew that he was playing an intricate game,--that all was not quite on the square; but he thought that the enemy was playing him false, and that falsehood in return was therefore fair. This that was going on was a robbery of the Church, a spoiling of Israel, a touching with profane hands of things that had already been made sacred.

"But I do contradict it," said Margaret, stepping forward into the room, and almost exciting admiration in Lady Ball's breast by her demeanour. "Aunt," said she, "as this gentleman has chosen to come here with such a story as this, I must tell you all the facts."

"Has he ever been engaged to you?" asked Lady Ball.

"Never."

"Oh, Margaret!" again exclaimed Mr Maguire.

"Sir, I will ask you to let me tell my aunt the truth. When I was at Littlebath, before I knew that my fortune was not my own,"--as she said this she looked hard into Mr Maguire's face--"before I had become penniless, as I am now,"--then she paused again, and still looking at him, saw with inward pleasure the elongation of her suitor's face, "this gentleman asked me to marry him."

"He did ask you?" said Lady Ball.

"Of course I asked her," urged Mr Maguire. "There can be no denying that on either side."

He did not now quite know what to do. He certainly did not wish to impoverish the Church by marrying Miss Mackenzie without any fortune.

But might it not all be a trick? That she had been rich he knew, and how could she have become poor so quickly?

"He did ask me, and I told him that I must take a fortnight to consider of it."

"You did not refuse him, then?" said Lady Ball.

"Not then, but I have done so since by letter. Twice I have written to him, telling him that I had nothing of my own, and that there could be nothing between us."

"I got her letters," said Mr Maguire, turning round to Lady Ball. "I certainly got her letters. But such letters as those, if they are written under dictation--"

He was rather anxious that Lady Bell should quarrel with him. In the programme which he had made for himself when he came to the house, a quarrel to the knife with the Ball family was a part of his tactics.

His programme, no doubt, was disturbed by the course which events had taken, but still a quarrel with Lady Ball might be the best for him.

If she were to quarrel with him, it would give him some evidence that this story about the loss of the money was untrue. But Lady Ball would not quarrel with him. She sat still and said nothing. "n.o.body dictated them," said Margaret. "But now you are here, I will tell you the facts. The money which I thought was mine, in truth belongs to my cousin, Mr John Ball, and I--"

So far she spoke loudly, With her face raised, and her eyes fixed upon him. Then as she concluded, she dropped her voice and eyes together. "And I am now engaged to him as his wife."

"Oh, indeed!" said Mr Maguire.

"That statement must be taken for what it is worth," said Lady Ball, rising from her seat. "Of what Miss Mackenzie says now, I know nothing. I sincerely hope that she may find that she is mistaken."

"And now, Margaret," said Mr Maguire, "may I ask to see you for one minute alone?"

"Certainly not," said she. "If you have anything more to say I will hear it in my aunt's presence." She waited a few moments, but as he did not speak, she took herself back to the door and made her escape to her own room.

How Mr Maguire took himself out of the house we need not stop to inquire. There must, I should think, have been some difficulty in the manoeuvre. It was considerably past three when Sir John was taken out for his drive, and while he was in the carriage his wife told him what had occurred.

CHAPTER XXII

Still at the Cedars

Margaret, when she had reached her own room, and seated herself so that she could consider all that had occurred in quietness, immediately knew her own difficulty. Of course Lady Ball would give her account of what had occurred to her son, and of course John would be angry when he learned that there had been any purpose of marriage between her and Mr Maguire. She herself took a different view of the matter now than that which had hitherto presented itself. She had not thought much of Mr Maguire or his proposal. It had been made under a state of things differing much from that now existing, and the change that had come upon her affairs had seemed to her to annul the offer.

She had learned to regard it almost as though it had never been.

There had been no engagement; there had hardly been a purpose in her own mind; and the moment had never come in which she could have spoken of it to her cousin with propriety.

That last, in truth, was her valid excuse for not having told him the whole story. She had hardly been with him long enough to do more than accept the offer he had himself made. Of course she would have told him of Mr Maguire,--of Mr Maguire and of Mr Rubb also, when first an opportunity might come for her to do so. She had no desire to keep from his knowledge any t.i.ttle of what had occurred. There had been nothing of which she was ashamed. But not the less did she feel that it would have been well for her that she should have told her own story before that horrid man had come to the Cedars. The story would now first be told to him by her aunt, and she knew well the tone in which it would be told.

It occurred to her that she might even yet go and meet him at the station. But if so, she must tell him at once, and he would know that she had done so because she was afraid of her aunt, and she disliked the idea of excusing herself before she was accused. If he really loved her, he would listen to her, and believe her. If he did not--why then let Lady Ball have her own way. She had promised to be firm, and she would keep her promise; but she would not intrigue with the hope of making him firm. If he was infirm of purpose, let him go. So she sat in her room, even when she heard the door close after his entrance, and did not go down till it was time for her to show herself in the drawing-room before dinner. When she entered the room was full. He nodded at her with a pleasant smile, and she made up her mind that he had heard nothing as yet. Her uncle had excused himself from coming to table, and her aunt and John were talking together in apparent eagerness about him. For one moment her cousin spoke to her before dinner.

"I am afraid," he said, "that my father is sinking fast."

Then she felt quite sure that he had as yet heard nothing about Mr Maguire.

But it was late in the evening, when other people had gone to bed, that Lady Ball was in the habit of discussing family affairs with her son, and doubtless she would do so to-night. Margaret, before she went up to her room, strove hard to get from him a few words of kindness, but it seemed as though he was not thinking of her.

"He is full of his father," she said to herself.

When her bed-candle was in her hand she did make an opportunity to speak to him.

"Has Mr Slow settled anything more as yet?" she asked.

"Well, yes. Not that he has settled anything, but he has made a proposition to which I am willing to agree. I don't go up to town to-morrow, and we will talk it over. If you will agree to it, all the money difficulties will be settled."

"I will agree to anything that you tell me is right."

"I will explain it all to you to-morrow; and, Margaret, I have told Mr Slow what are my intentions,--our intentions, I ought to say." She smiled at him with that sweet smile of hers, as though she thanked him for speaking of himself and her together, and then she took herself away. Surely, after speaking to her in that way, he would not allow any words from his mother to dissuade him from his purpose?

She could not go to bed. She knew that her fate was being discussed, and she knew that her aunt at that very time was using every argument in her power to ruin her. She felt, moreover, that the story might be told in such a way as to be terribly prejudicial to her. And now, when his father was so ill, might it not be very natural that he should do almost anything to lessen his mother's troubles? But to her it would be absolute ruin; such ruin that nothing which she had yet endured would be in any way like it. The story of the loss of her money had stunned her, but it had not broken her spirit. Her misery from that had arisen chiefly from the wants of her brother's family.

But if he were now to tell her that all must be over between them, her very heart would be broken.

She could not go to bed while this was going on, so she sat listening, till she should hear the noise of feet about the house.

Silently she loosened the lock of her own door, so that the sound might more certainly come to her, and she sat thinking what she might best do. It had not been quite eleven when she came upstairs, and at twelve she did not hear anything. And yet she was almost sure that they must be still together in that small room downstairs, talking of her and of her conduct. It was past one before she heard the door of the room open. She heard it so plainly, that she wondered at herself for having supposed for a moment that they could have gone without her noticing them. Then she heard her cousin's heavy step coming upstairs. In pa.s.sing to his room he would not go actually by her door, but would be very near it. She looked through the c.h.i.n.k, having carefully put away her own candle, and could see his face as he came upon the top stair. It wore a look of trouble and of pain, but not, as she thought, of anger. Her aunt, she knew, would go to her room by the back stairs, and would go through the kitchen and over the whole of the lower house, before she would come out on the landing to which Margaret's room opened. Then, seeing her cousin, the idea occurred to her that she would have it all over on that very night. If he had heard that which changed his purpose, why should she be left in suspense? He should tell her at once, and at once she would prepare herself for her future life.

So she opened the door a little way, and called to him.

"John," she said, "is that you?"