Only One Love, or Who Was the Heir Part 7

"Then how--how did you learn to read? and--it's awfully rude of me, you know, but you speak so nicely; such grammar, and all that."

"Do I?" she said, thoughtfully. "I didn't know that I did. My father taught me."

"It's hard to believe," he said, as if he were giving up a conundrum. "I beg your pardon. I mean that your father would have made a jolly good schoolmaster, and I must be an awful dunce, for I've been to Oxford, and I'll wager I don't know half what you do, and as to talking--I am not in it."

"Yes, my father is very clever," she said; "he is not like the other woodmen and burners."

"No, if he is, they must be a learned lot," a.s.sented Jack; "yes, I think I had better come and live here, and get him to teach me. I'm afraid he wouldn't undertake the job."

"Father does not like strangers," she said, blushing as she thought of the inhospitable scene of the preceding night. "He says that the world is a cruel, wicked place, and that everybody is unhappy there. But I think he must be wrong. You don't look unhappy."

"I am not unhappy now," said Jack.

"I am so glad," she said; "why are you not?"

"Because I am with you."

"Are you?" she said, gently. "Then it must be because I am with you that I feel so happy."

The Savage flushed and he looked down, striving to still the sudden throb of pleasure with which his heart beat.

"Confound it," he muttered, "I must go! I can't be such a cad as to stop any longer; she oughtn't to say this sort of thing, and yet I--I can't tell her so! No! I must go!" and he rose and took out his watch.

"I am afraid I must be on the tramp."

"Yes," she a.s.sented; "you have stayed too long. I hope you will find that the Squire Davenant has forgiven you. I think he cannot help it.

And you will have your fortune and will go back into the world, and will quite forget that you lost your way in Warden Forest. But I shall not forget it; I shall often think of it."

"No," he said, "I shan't forget it. But in case I should, will you give me something--no, I won't ask it."

"Why not?" she said, wonderingly. "Were you going to say, will I give you something to help you to remember?"

"Yes, I will. What shall I give you?" and she looked around.

Jack looked at her. His bad angel whispered in his ear, "Ask her to give you a kiss," but Jack metaphorically kicked him out of hearing.

"Give me a flower," he said, and his voice was as gentle as its deep ringing ba.s.s could be.

Una nodded, and plucking a dog rose held it out to him.

"There," she said; "at least you will remember it as long as the rose lasts. But it soon dies," and she sighed.

Jack took it and looked at it hard. Then he put it to his lips.

"There is no smell to a dog rose," said Una.

"Ah no! I forgot. Just so. Well, good-by. We may shake hands, Una. That is your name, isn't it? How do you spell it?"

"U--n--a," she said, giving him her hand.

"It's a pretty name," he said, looking at her.

"Is it?" she said, dreamily. "Yes, I think it is, now. Say it again."

"Una, good-by. We shall meet again."

"Do you think so? Then you will have to come to Warden again."

"And I will. I will come soon. Oh, yes, we shall meet again. Good-by,"

and, yielding to the temptation, he bent and touched her hand--Heaven knows, reverently enough--with his lips.

A warm flush spread over the girl's face and neck, and she quivered from head to foot. It was the first kiss--except those of her father and mother--that she had ever received.

"Good-by," he repeated, and was slowly relinquishing her hand, the hand that clung to his, when a hand of firmer texture was laid on his arm and swung him round.

It was Gideon Rolfe, his face white with pa.s.sion, his eyes ablaze, and a heavy stick upraised.

The Savage had just time to step back to avoid the blow and plant his feet firmly to receive a renewed attack; but with an effort the old man restrained himself, and struggling for speech, motioned the girl away with one hand and pointed with the other to Jack.

"You scoundrel!" he gasped, hoa.r.s.ely. "Go, Una, go. You scoundrel! I warmed you at my hearth, you viper! and you turn to sting me. Go, Una--go at once. Do you disobey me?"

White and trembling, the girl shrank into the shade.

"You villain!" went on the old man, struggling with his pa.s.sion.

"Stop!" exclaimed Jack, the veins in his forehead swelling ominously.

"You must be mad! Don't strike me!--you are an old man!"

"Strike you! No, no; blows are of no avail with such as you! Curs take no heed of blows! What other way can one punish the scoundrel who repays hospitality by treachery? Was it not enough that you forced your way into my house, broke my bread, but you must waylay a credulous girl and lead her in the first step to ruin. Oh, spare your breath, viper! I know you and your race too well. Ruin and desolation walk hand in hand with you; but you have reckoned without your host here. My knowledge of you arms me with power to protect a weak, innocent girl from your wiles.

Scoundrel!"

"You use strong words," he said, and his voice was low and hoa.r.s.e. "You are an old man and--you are her father. You call me a scoundrel; I call you a fool, for if I were half the scoundrel you think me, you'd be to blame for any harm I might have done. I've done none. But that's no thanks to you, who keep such a girl as she is shut up as you do, and leave her to wander about unprotected. You know me, you say, and you know no good of me; that's as it may be, but I say when you call me a scoundrel, you lie!"

"Yes, I know you. I know the stock from whence you sprung, villains all!

I thought that here, at least, I was safe from your kind; but Fate led you here--thank Fate that I let you go unhurt. Take an old man's advice, and, unlike your race, for once leave the prey which you thought so easy to destroy. Go!"

"I am going," he said, grimly. "I shall go, because if I stayed all night I should not convince you that I am not the scoundrel you suppose me. But, if you think that I am to be frightened by these sort of threats, you are mistaken. I have said that I will come back, and I _will_!" and with a curt nod he strode off.

CHAPTER V.

It was the evening of the day on which Jack Newcombe had parted from Gideon and Una, and the young moon fell peacefully on the irregular pile of the ancient mansion known familiarly for twenty miles of its neighborhood as The Hurst.

The present owner was one Ralph Davenant, or Squire Davenant, as Jack Newcombe had called him, and as he was called by the county generally.