Only an Irish Girl Part 12

The tears come into her eyes as she thinks of him. It grows more bitter to her every moment, the thought of this meeting that is so close at hand now.

"Honor," Brian says gently, "will you not let me help you? You are in some trouble, I know." He has crossed the room and is standing beside her. "You can trust me, surely?"

"I could trust you with my life; but this secret is not my own."

"I know it is not; nevertheless you might trust it to me."

She raises her head and looks at him, and something in his face brings the color into her own. He is very brave and true, a safe shelter in trouble--she has proved that--and her heart yearns for the help he could give her. But it may not be. His sympathies are all on the side of law and order, and she has ranged herself, for this one night at least, among the opposite ranks.

"Don't think me curious, Honor," he says earnestly; "but I am sure you are in need of a friend's help, and I would like you to let me give it."

"No one can help me--not even you," she answers gently, getting up and looking at him with those troubled eyes that move him so strangely.

"And yet you are so good to me always that I should like to tell you my trouble if I might. But it is better not, perhaps."

"Let me say one thing, Honor. If this trouble of yours is connected with Power Magill--and I believe it is--you will not forget that he is a dangerous man, a man not to be trusted."

"I will not forget," she answers with a shiver, as she thinks of the meeting that is drawing nigh so rapidly.

The sun has set, and a cold mist is rising. It is very peaceful but rather dreary outside; and inside, in the familiar pretty room, the shadows are gathering.

Brian Beresford draws a step nearer. He had not meant to say one word of love to her--this willful girl who makes so light of him and his devotion; but, standing so close beside her in this tender gray twilight, impulse masters his judgment.

"Honor, has my love no power to touch you? Must this man forever stand between us even in his----" He is going to say disgrace, but the piteous look on the girl's face stays him.

"Oh, Brian, don't talk to me of love now--I cannot bear it!"

It is the first time she has ever called him Brian, and in her face, as she turns it from him, crimson from brow to chin, in her very att.i.tude, as she stands with clasped hands before him, there is some subtle change that chills him.

"Then promise me that when times are brighter and you are happier you will listen to me, Honor."

"Perhaps," she stammers; and then, with tears in her eyes: "Oh, how cruel I am! I'm not worth loving!" And she is gone before he can say another word.

For so stoical a man, Brian Beresford is strangely excited to-night.

Long after Honor has left him he walks up and down the darkening room, and, when the old butler comes in to light the lamps, he goes out on to the terrace and continues his measured tramp to and fro, smoking and thinking, and watching he scarcely knows for what.

Ever since he saw Honor hide away that sc.r.a.p of paper in her dress he has been tormented with jealous fears.

"If the fellow were once out of the country I should feel all right,"

he tells himself. But the fellow is not out of the country--nay, may be in the immediate neighborhood for all he can tell, and in consequence he is racked with anxiety.

From the terrace he can see the ruins clearly at first; then the mist partly blots them out, and presently he can only guess at their position. But he has no interest in the ruins. He is not in the least superst.i.tious; and certainly he does not believe in the old abbot.

He has reached the end of the walk and turned to go back, when the sight of a tall slight figure, coming rapidly down the steps not many yards away, brings him to a sudden halt.

"Ah!" he says, as he recognizes Honor. "Then it was not without cause that I've been so uneasy! A warning, these people would call it, I suppose."

It is a terrible blow to him, striking to the very root of his love. He hates mystery; and to find this girl, whom he had thought perfect in her maidenly pride and purity, stealing out in the dark from her father's house fills him with dismay.

For an instant he feels tempted to follow and speak to her, then he turns back. He can hardly control himself so far as to speak calmly, and every faint far-away noise makes him start.

"She is safe enough," he tells himself a dozen times; but he finds no comfort in his own a.s.sertions.

In his heart he feels convinced that she has gone to meet Power Magill; and in his jealous fury he almost hates her for it.

"Where is Honor?" her father asks fretfully; and then, as time goes on and she does not come in, he says again, "Where can Honor be?"

"I will go and find her for you," Brian says at last--he can bear the suspense no longer. "She cannot have strayed very far. I was talking to her a while ago."

He speaks lightly enough, but his heart is not light. A curious depression has come upon him. It seems to him that his love for this girl has died, and that half the brightness of his life has died along with it. He has not the least idea in what direction to begin his search.

The heavy iron gates at the end of the avenue are closed, but not locked, and he opens them and walks out into the high-road. Once, as he pa.s.ses a narrow lane, he fancies he hears a slight rustle in the bushes that grow close and low at the side of the path; but, when he stops to listen, he can hear nothing, and so sets it down to fancy.

"Surely she has not gone into the village on a night like this," he says to himself at last, daunted by his want of success; and at the bare surmise he feels his face burn hotly.

Turning, he walks rapidly back--for the village lies in the opposite direction, past Donaghmore--and, as he comes near the gates, he is startled to see a car drawn up by the side of the high wall, and evidently waiting for somebody.

The driver has been standing beside his horse, and at the sound of Brian's step he leads the animal slowly forward. Apparently he does not wish to be seen; and indeed he might easily escape the notice of any one less quick of sight than Brian Beresford.

"Hallo!" Brian shouts; but he receives no answer; and, taking a stride or two, he gains the horse's side. The man walks on the other side of the animal, close by the wall; and, what with the darkness and the way his hat is pulled down over his eyes, his own mother might be pardoned for not recognizing him.

"Whose car is this?" Brian demands sternly, "and for whom are you waiting here?"

"Sorrer a sowl I'm waiting for, your honor! The best face in Derry wouldn't tempt me this minute. I'm just dead beat meself--and the baste! It's to Boyne Fair we've been this day, and a terrible time entoirely we've had of it."

Brian looks at the man and stops. He seems to be speaking the truth; and, if he is not, Brian knows the Irish peasant too well by this time to expect to force it from him.

With a short "Good-night," he turns away, and the man looks after him with a scowl.

"It's a bullet in yer skin that I'd give yez this blessed night if I dare take my own way," he mutters savagely.

Very slowly Brian Beresford walks back to Donaghmore. He is not so calm now, not so sure of Honor's safety. His fears are rising with every step he takes through the murky darkness. He feels that, if she is not in the house when he reaches it, he shall be able to keep silence no longer. Even at the risk of betraying her secret the squire must be told.

As he is pa.s.sing the ruins a faint sound reaches his ear. He stops instantly and listens, his head bent, every sense on the alert. He is not thinking of Honor now--not in his wildest dreams would he connect her in any way with these weird unholy old ruins; but he is anxious--as anxious as ever Launce was--to solve the mystery that attaches to the place. Again it comes, a long-drawn, gasping cry, with this time a ring of fear in it.

"Good heavens, it is a woman!" he says, and goes quickly, but very quietly and cautiously, in the direction of the sound.

He has gained the low-browed gateway leading into the great quadrangle, when a dark figure dashes past him, and the next instant there is a loud report. He feels a sharp pain in his shoulder, and knows that he has been hit; but he does not give a thought to that in his intense excitement. He is conscious of but one thing--Honor's voice calling his name.

"Brian--oh, Brian, come to me!" The shrill clear tones ring through the ghostly silence.

CHAPTER X., AND LAST.

Honor hastens down the avenue, looking neither to the right nor left.

Her head is dizzy, her heart beating heavily in this nervous dread that has come upon her. She starts at every shadow that crosses her path; the sound of the wind in the pine-trees almost makes her scream, and when, just as she reaches the ruins, a low whistle breaks the quiet, a sharp cry of terror escapes her lips.

"Whist, miss! It's a friend," a deep voice whispers close beside her, though she can see no one; and the next moment Power Magill comes out from the low doorway and calls her gently by name.