The Squire's Daughter Part 74

"Why do you tempt me? You must surely see how hard it is!"

"Then you do love me!" he cried; and he caught her in his arms and kissed her.

For a moment she struggled as if to free herself. Then her head dropped upon his shoulder.

"Oh, Ralph," she whispered, "let me love you for one brief minute; then we must say farewell for ever!"

CHAPTER XLI

THE TABLES TURNED

Three days later Ralph paused for a moment in front of a trim boarding-house or pension on the outskirts of Boulogne. It was here Sir John Hamblyn was "vegetating," as he told his friends--practising the strictest economy, and making a desperate and praiseworthy effort to recover somewhat his lost financial position.

Ralph told no one what he intended to do. Ruth supposed that he had gone no farther than London, and that it was business connected with Great St. Goram Mine that called him there. Dorothy, having for a moment capitulated, had been making a brave but futile effort to forget, and trying to persuade herself that she had done a weak and foolish thing in admitting to Ralph Penlogan that she cared for him.

Love and logic, however, were never meant to harmonise, and heart and head are often in hopeless antagonism. Dorothy pretended to herself that she was sorry, and yet all the time deep down in her heart there was a feeling of exultation. It was delightful to be loved, and it was no less delightful to love in return.

Almost unconsciously she found herself meditating on Ralph's many excellences. He was so genuine, so courageous, so unspoiled by the world. She was sure also that she liked him all the better for being a man of the people. He owed nothing to favour or patronage. He had fought his own way and made his own mark. He was not like Archie Temple, who had been pushed into a situation purely through favour, and who, if thrown upon the open market, would not earn thirty shillings a week.

It was an honour and a distinction to be loved by a man like Ralph Penlogan. He was one of Nature's aristocracy, clear-visioned, brave-hearted, fearless, indomitable. His handsome face was the index of his character. How he had developed since that day he refused to open the gate for her! Suffering had made him strong. Trial and persecution had called into play the best that was in him. The fearless, defiant youth had become a strong and resolute man. How could she help loving him when he offered her all the love of his own great heart?

Then she would come to herself with a little gasp, and tell herself that it was her duty to forget him, to tear his image out of her heart; that an attachment such as hers was hopeless and quixotic; that the sooner she mastered herself the better it would be; that her father would never approve, and that the society in which she moved would be aghast.

For two days she fought a fitful and unequal battle, and then she discovered that the more she fought the more helpless she seemed to become. She had kept in the house lest she should discover him straying in the plantation.

On the third day she went out again. She said to herself that she would suffocate if she remained any longer indoors. Her heart was aching for a sight of Ralph Penlogan's face. She told herself it was fresh air she was pining for, and a sight of the hills and the distant sea. She loitered through the plantation until she reached the far end. Then she sighed and pushed open the gate. She walked as far as the stile, and leaned against it. How long she remained there she did not know; but she turned away at length, and strolled out across the common and down into the high road, and so home by way of the south lodge.

The air had been fresh and sweet, and the blue of the sea peeped between the hills in the direction of Perranpool, and the woods and plantations looked their best in their summer attire, and the birds sang cheerily on every hand. But she heard nothing, and saw nothing. The footfall she had listened for all the time failed to come, and the face she was hungering to see kept out of sight.

He had evidently taken her at her word. She had told him that their parting must be for ever, that it would be worse than madness for them to meet, and she had meant it all at the time; and yet, three days later, she would have given all she possessed for one more glimpse of his face.

The following day her duties were more irksome than she had ever known them. The dowager wanted so many letters written, and so many articles read to her. Dorothy was impatient to get out of doors, and the more rapidly she tried to get through her work the more mistakes she made, with the result that it had to be done over again.

It was getting quite late in the afternoon when at length she hurried away through the plantation. Would he come to meet her? She need not let him make love to her, but they might at least be friends. Love and logic were in opposition again.

She lingered by the stile until the sun went down behind the hill, then, with a sigh, she turned away, and began to retrace her steps through the plantation.

"I ought to be thankful to him for taking me at my word," she said to herself, with a pathetic look in her eyes. "Oh, why did he ever love me?

Why was I ever born?"

Meanwhile Ralph Penlogan and Sir John Hamblyn had come face to face.

Ralph had refused to send up his name, hence, when he was ushered into the squire's presence, the latter simply stared at him for several moments in speechless rage and astonishment.

Ralph was the first to break the silence.

"I must apologise for this intrusion," he said quietly, "but----"

"I should think so, indeed," interrupted Sir John scornfully. "Will you state your business as quickly as possible?"

"I will certainly occupy no more of your time than I can help," Ralph replied, "though I fear you are not in the humour to consider any proposal from me."

"I should think not, indeed. Why should I be? Do you wish me to tell you what I think of you?"

"I am not anxious on that score, though I am not aware that I have given you any reason for thinking ill of me."

"You are not, eh? When you cheated me out of the most valuable bit of property I possessed?"

"Did we not pay the price you asked?"

"But you knew there was a valuable tin lode in it."

"What of that? The property was in the market. We did not induce you to sell it. We heard by accident that you wanted to dispose of it. If there had been no lode we should have made no effort to get it."

"It was a mean, dishonest trick, all the same."

"I do not see it. By every moral right the farm was more mine than yours. I helped my father to reclaim it. You spent nothing on it, never raised your finger to bring it under cultivation. Moreover, it was common land at the start. In league with a dishonest Parliament, you filched it from the people, and then, by the operation of an iniquitous law, you filched it a second time from my father."

Sir John listened to this speech with blazing eyes and clenched hands.

"By Heaven," he said, "if I were a younger man I would kick you down these stairs. Have you forced your way in here to insult me?"

"On the contrary, it was my desire rather to conciliate you; but you charged me with dishonesty at the outset."

"Conciliate me, indeed!" And Sir John turned away with a sneer upon his face.

"We neither of us gain anything by losing our tempers," Ralph said, after a pause. "Had we not better let bygones be bygones?"

Sir John faced him again and stared.

"It is no pleasure to me to rake up the past," Ralph went on. "Probably we should both be happier if we could forget. I don't deny that I vowed eternal enmity against you and yours."

"I am glad to hear it," Sir John snorted.

"Time, however, has taken the sting out of many things, and to-day I love one whom I would have hated."

"You love----?"

"It is of no use beating about the bush," Ralph went on. "I love your daughter, and I have come to ask your permission----"

He did not finish the sentence, however. With blazing eyes and clenched fist Sir John shrieked at the top of his voice--

"Silence! Silence! How dare you? You----"

"No, do not use hard words," Ralph interrupted. "You may regret it later."