The White Virgin Part 58

He smiled pleasantly and went out to join Jessop, who was waiting impatiently, but with his eyes fixed upon Dinah's open window all the time.

"A smooth, deceitful scoundrel!" said Clive contemptuously, and he held out a hand to the Doctor, who laid a finger upon his pulse. "Quite calm, Doctor," he continued. "Yes, I'm about well now. I only want rest and peace. As soon as you will let me, I will go right away. On the Continent, I think."

"Yes; do you a great deal of good, my dear boy," said the Major. "We must have a change too. Poor Dinah is very pale."

Clive was silent for a few moments, and then said coldly--

"Yes, Miss Gurdon looks very white. I am most grateful to you, Major Gurdon, for the care and attention I have received in this house."

"Then prove it, sir," said the Major sternly.

"I will," said Clive, with not a muscle moving. "I will do so by releasing your daughter from an engagement which has become irksome and painful to her."

"What!"

"From any ties which held her to a kind of bankrupt--to a man broken in health, pocket, and his belief in human nature."

"Mr Clive Reed," began the Major haughtily. "No: Clive, my dear boy, you are sick and look at things from a jaundiced point of view. Don't talk nonsense. You will think differently in a week."

"Never," said Clive firmly. "All that, sir, is at an end."

"And pray why?" cried the Major. "When that attachment sprang up we believed you to be a poor man. Do you suppose Dinah's love for you came from the idea that you were well-to-do?"

"We will not argue that, sir. Your daughter wishes the engagement to be broken off."

"Indeed! I'll soon prove that to be false," cried the Major, springing up.

"No, sir," cried the Doctor; "there has been enough for one day."

But he was too late, for the Major had flung open the door, called "Dinah," loudly, and her foot was already upon the stairs.

"You want me, father?" she said as she entered, looking wan and thin, but perfectly quiet and self-contained.

"Yes, my child," cried the Major, taking her hand. "Our patient is better, and wants to go away for a change."

"Yes, father dear," she said, without glancing at Clive, who kept his eyes averted; "it would be better as soon as he can bear a journey."

"But he says that you wish the engagement to be at an end."

She bowed her head.

"Yes, dear," she said gently, "it is better so."

"For the present," cried the Doctor quickly.

"For the present that lasts till death," said Clive sternly.

And Dinah in acquiescence bowed her head without uttering sob or sigh, but to herself--

"It is the end."

CHAPTER FORTY.

THE TELEGRAM.

"Go on, Doctor, say what you like. I cannot defend myself."

"I will go on, sir; I will say what I like, and I will risk its hurting you, for I feel towards you as a father, and it maddens me to see my old friend Grantham's son behaving like a scoundrel towards as sweet and lovable a girl as ever lived."

Clive drew a deep breath as they walked slowly along the shelf path towards the mine.

"Yes, sir, you may well shrink. I brought you out here for a walk to make you wince. I can talk to you, and say what I like out here without expecting the poor girl and her father to come back and interrupt. Look here, Clive; I'm a cleverish sort of old fellow in my way, and experience has put me up to a good many wrinkles in the treatment of disease, but I tell you frankly it was not I, but Dinah Gurdon, who saved your life by her nursing."

"I suppose so," said Clive, with a sigh.

"Then why the deuce, sir, do you go on like this and break the poor girl's heart?"

"I cannot explain matters," said Clive sadly. "You saw for yourself that Miss Gurdon accepted the position."

"Of course she did, sir; so would any girl of spirit if she found a man playing fast and loose with her. Now look here, Clive, my boy, surely you are not throwing her over because you have lost all this money?

Hang it, man! she would be just as happy if you hadn't a penny. Now, then, out with it; was it because of the money?"

"The money! Absurd!" cried Clive, with an angry gesture.

"Then it must be due to some silly love quarrel. Look here, Clive, my boy, for your honour and your father's honour, I'm going to take you back to the cottage, and when they return this evening, you will have to show them by your apology that if there is a scoundrel in the Reed family his name is not Clive. What do you say to that?"

"Impossible, sir. Doctor, you do not know, and I cannot tell you, the reasons why I act as I do."

"You're mad; that's what's the matter with you."

"I wish your words were true, sir," said Clive despondently, and stretching out his hand, he rested against the rock, and then let himself down to sit upon a rough stone. "I'm very weak, I find," he continued apologetically; and then he shuddered as he noted that they were in the spot where Dinah had turned upon him and handed him the paper which he struck from her hand.

"Yes, my boy, you are weak, and I oughtn't to press you; but I cannot stand it. Come, be frank to me. What have you done to make that poor girl throw you over?"

"I? nothing," said Clive sternly.

"What! then you accuse her? Hang it, I won't believe a word of it, sir.

That girl could no more do anything to justify your conduct than an angel could out of heaven. Look here, sir, I const.i.tute myself her champion.--What's that noise?"

"I don't know. I heard it twice before. Some shepherd calling his sheep, I suppose."

The Doctor looked up at the bold precipitous bulwark of rock above their heads, and then downward toward the far-stretching vale below the shelf-like path, where a flock of sheep dotting the bottom by the river, endorsed the suggestion that the sound might be a call.

"Never mind that," said the Doctor. "Come, I say that Dinah has given you no reason for behaving as you have."

"Doctor, I resent all this," cried Clive angrily. "I make no charge against Miss Gurdon, and I tell you that you have no right to attack me as you do. A man is helpless in such a case. Hush! No more.--Major Gurdon."

For the old officer came round an angle of the steeply-scarped rock above them, walking fast, and descended agilely to where they stood.