Kitabı oku: «Thereby Hangs a Tale. Volume One», sayfa 17

A Proposal

Frank Pratt had no sooner gone than Richard began to stride hastily up and down the little room, to the great endangering of Mrs Fiddison’s furniture. As he neared the window he glanced across, to see Netta sitting there at work, and a faint smile and blush greeted him.

“Poor girl,” he muttered. “But, no, it’s nonsense. She can’t think it. Absurd! She’s so young – so ill. There, it’s childish, and I should be a vain fool if I thought so.”

He stood thinking for a few moments, and as he paused there was the rattle of wheels in the street, and Sam Jenkles drove his hansom to the door and stopped, gave the horse in charge of a boy, and went in.

The next minute Richard had crossed too, for a plan had been formed on the instant.

Mrs Jenkles met him at the door, and at his wish led him to where Sam was seated at a table, hurriedly discussing a hot meal.

“Drops in, sir, if ever I drives a fare in this direction, and the missus generally has a snack for me. Eh, sir? Oh no, sir. All right, I’ll wait,” he said, in answer to a question or two.

And then Richard ascended the stairs, knocked and entered, to find that mother and daughter had just risen from their needlework, Mrs Lane to look grave, Netta with a bright look in her eyes, and too vivid a red in either cheek.

“Ah, you busy people,” he said, cheerily, “what an example you do set me! How’s our little friend to-day?”

The bright look of joy in Netta’s face faded slightly as she heard their visitor speak of her as he would of some child, but there was a happy, contented aspect once more as she placed her hand in his, and felt his frank pressure.

“Mrs Lane,” said Richard, speaking gaily, “I’m like the little boy in the story – I’m idle, and want some one to come and play with me, but I hope for better luck than he.”

Mother and daughter looked at him wonderingly.

“I’ve come to tell you,” he said, “that the sun shines brightly overhead; there’s a deep blue sky, and silvery clouds floating across it; and six or seven miles out northward there are sweet-scented wild flowers, waving green trees, all delicious shade; the music of song-birds, the hum of insects, and views that will gladden your hearts after seeing nothing but smoke and chimneypots. I am Nature’s ambassador, and I am here to say ‘Come.’”

As he spoke the work fell from Netta’s hands, her eyes dilated, and a look of intense glad longing shone from her soft, oval face, while she hung upon her mother’s lips, till, hearing her words, the tears gathered in her eyes, and she bent her head to conceal them.

Mrs Lane’s words were very few; they were grateful, but they told of work to be done by a certain time, and she said it was impossible.

“But it would do you both good. Miss Netta there wants a change badly,” said Richard; “and you haven’t heard half my plan. Jenkles has his cab at the door, and I propose a drive right out into the country, and when we get back you will ask me to tea. It will be a squeeze, but you will forgive that.”

Poor Mrs Lane’s face looked drawn in its pitiful aspect. She felt that such a trip would be like so much new life to her child, but she could not go, and she shook her head.

“It may not be etiquette, perhaps,” said Richard, quietly, “but I shall ask you to waive that, and let me take Netta here. You know it will do her good, and she will have Mr Jenkles, as well as your humble servant, to take care of her.”

Mrs Lane looked him searchingly in the face, which was as open as the day, and then, glancing at Netta, she saw her parted lips and look of intense longing. The refusal that had been imminent passed away, and laying her hand upon the young man’s arm, she said, softly —

“I will trust you.”

There was something almost painful in the look of joy in Netta’s face as, with trembling eagerness, she threw her arms round her mother, and then, with the excitement of a child, hurried away to put on hat and mantle.

“I shall be back directly,” she exclaimed.

Richard’s heart gave one heavy painful throb as he turned for an instant at the door.

Mrs Lane laid her hand upon his arm as soon as they were alone, and once more looked searchingly into his face.

“I ought not to do this,” she said, pitifully. “You’re almost a stranger; but it is giving her what she has so little of – pleasure; more, it is like giving her life. You know – you see how ill she is?”

“Poor child, yes,” said Richard.

“Child!”

“Yes,” said Richard, gravely. “I have always looked upon her as a child – or, at least, as a young, innocent girl. Mrs Lane, I tell you frankly, for I think I can read your feelings – every look, every attention of mine towards that poor girl has been the result of pity. If you could read me, I think you would never suspect me of trifling.”

“I am ready to trust you,” she said. “You will not be late. The night air would be dangerous for her – hush!”

“I’m ready!” exclaimed Netta, joyfully.

As she appeared framed in the doorway of the inner room, her dark hair cast back, eyes sparkling, and the flush as of health upon her cheeks, and lips parted to show her pure white teeth, Richard’s heart gave another painful throb, and he thought of Frank Pratt’s words, for it was no child that stood before him, but a very beautiful woman.

“You’ll be back before dark, my darling?” said Mrs Lane, tenderly.

“Oh yes,” cried Netta, excitedly. “Mr Lloyd will take such care of me; but – ”

The joy faded out of her countenance, and she clung to her mother, looking from her to the work.

“What is it, my dear?” said Mrs Lane, stroking her soft dark hair.

“It’s cruel to go and leave you here at work,” sobbed the girl.

“What! when you are going to get strength, and coming back more ready to help me?” said Mrs Lane, cheerfully. “There, go along! Take care of her, Mr Lloyd.”

Richard had been to the head of the stairs, and spoken to Sam, who was already on his box; and as the young man offered his arm, Netta took it, with the warm, soft blush returning, and she stole a look of timid love at the tall, handsome man who was to be her protector.

The next minute she was in the cab, Richard had taken his place at her side, and Sam essayed to start as the good-bye nods were given.

“Lor!” said Mrs Jenkles, her woman’s instinct coming to the fore, “what a lovely pair they do make!”

At the same moment, on the opposite side of the way, a lady with a widow’s cap cocked back on her head, gazed from behind a curtain, wiped her eyes on a piece of crape, and said, with a sigh —

“And him the handsomest and quietest lodger I ever had!”

Meanwhile, in answer to every appeal from Sam Jenkles, Ratty was laying his ears back, wagging his tail, and biting at nothing.

“Don’t you be skeared, Miss,” said Sam, through the little roof-trap, “it’s on’y his fun. Get on with yer, Ratty – I’m blowed if I aint ashamed on yer. Jest ketch hold of his head, and lead him arf a dozen yards, will yer, mate?” he continued, addressing a man, after they had struggled to the end of the street. “Thanky.”

For the leading had the desired effect, and Ratty went off at a trot to Pentonville Hill.

“Blest if I don’t believe that was Barney,” said Sam to himself, looking back, and he was quite right, for that gentleman it was; and as soon as the cab was out of sight he had taken a puppy out of one pocket of his velveteen coat, looked at it, put it back, and then slouched off to where he could take an omnibus, on whose roof he rode to Piccadilly, where he descended, made his way into Jermyn Street, and then stopping at a private house, rang softly, took the puppy out of his pocket, a dirty card from another, and waited till the door was answered.

“Tell the captain as I’ve brought the dawg,” he said to the servant, who left him standing outside; but returned soon after, to usher him into the presence of Captain Vanleigh, who smiled and rubbed his hands softly, as he wished Tiny Rea could have been witness of that which had been brought to him as news.

In the Woods

The captain would have been more elate if he had been able to follow the fortunes of Sam Jenkles’s cab; for having received his instructions, Sam bowled along by Euston Square in the direction of the Hampstead Road, till he had to go at a foot’s pace on account of some alteration to the roadway, the result being that for a few moments the cab was abreast of a barouche containing four ladies, one of whom started, and said, in a quick whisper —

“Oh, look, Tiny, that’s the church with the figures I told you about.”

But Fin Rea was too late, her sister was leaning over the side of the carriage, gazing intently at Sam Jenkles’s cab, and the dark-haired girl, with the wondrous colour and look of animation, looking so lovingly in her companion’s face; and as the carriage swept on, unseen by the occupants of the cab, poor Tiny sank back, not fainting, but with a pitiful sigh and a look of stony despair that made Fin clasp her hands, as she set her little white teeth together, and muttered —

“The wretch!”

Lady Rea saw nothing of this; but Aunt Matty, who was beside her, did, and a look of quiet triumph came into her withered features. But nothing was said, and as for the cab, it rolled on and on quickly, till it came to the tree-shadowed hill beneath Lady Coutts’ park, and then, after a long walk up to the top of Highgate Hill, on and on again, till London was far behind, the soft green meads and the sheltered lanes reached; and while Sam pulled up at a roadside public-house, amongst half a dozen fragrant, high-laden hay carts, Richard led off his charge, with sinking heart, over a stile, and away midst waving cornfields, bright with poppy and bugloss; and by hedges wreathed with great white convolvuli, and the twining, tendrilled bryonies, or wild clematis.

Richard was grave, and his heart sank as he saw the joyous air of the young girl by his side, felt the light touch of her little hand, and when he met her eyes read in them so much gentle, trusting love, that he felt as if he had been a scoundrel to her, and that he was about to blight her life.

He was not a vain man, and he had used no arts to gain the sympathy that it was easy to read in the sweet face beside him but he could not help telling himself that it was but too plain; and he groaned in his heart as he thought of that which he had determined to say.

“Hark, listen!” cried the girl, as a lark rose from the corn close by. “Isn’t it beautiful? How different to those poor caged things in our street. Look, too, at the green there – four, five, twenty different tints upon those trees. Oh, you are losing half the beauties of those banks! Look at them, scarlet with poppies! There, too, the crimson valerian. How beautiful the foxgloves are! Why, there’s a white one. Who’d ever think that London could be so near!”

She stopped, panting, and held her hand to her side.

“You are tired?” he said, anxiously.

“Oh no,” she said, darting a grateful look in return for his sympathy – “it is nothing. I feel as if I should like to set off and run, but I think sometimes I am not so strong as I used to be. Mamma says I have outgrown my strength; but it is my cough.”

She said these last words plaintively, and there was a sad, pinched look in her face as she gazed up at him; but it lit up again directly as she met his eager, earnest eyes fixed upon her, and her trembling little hand stole farther through his arm.

“That’s right,” he said, patting it – “lean on me. I’m big and strong.”

“May I?” she said, softly.

“To be sure,” he answered.

“It’s very kind of you,” she whispered, “and I like it. I go out so little, and yet I long to; and if I don’t stay here long, I shall have seen so little of the world.”

“Netta, my child,” he exclaimed, “what are you saying?”

The girl’s other hand was laid upon his arm, as they stood beneath a shady tree, and she looked up at him in a dreamy way.

“I think sometimes,” she said, slowly, “that I shall not be here long. It’s my cough, I suppose. It’s so pleasant to feel, though, that people – some one cares for me; only it makes me feel that I shall not want to go.”

“Come, come, this is nonsense,” he said, cheerily. “Why, you’re not an invalid.”

“I should be, I think, if we were rich,” she said, sadly. “But let’s go on along by that high sand bank, where the flowers are growing; and here is a wood all deep shades of green.”

“But you will be tired?”

“No, no; you said I might rest on you. I should not be weak if I could live out here, and dear mamma were not compelled to work. Poor mamma!”

They walked on in silence, and she leaned more heavily upon his arm. Twice their eyes met, and as Netta’s fell before those of her companion it was not until they had told the sweet, pure love of her young heart. They were no fiery, rapturous glances – no looks of passionate ecstasy; but the soft, beaming maiden love of an innocent, trusting girl, whose young heart was opening, like a flower, to offer its fragrant sweets to the man who had first spoken gentle words to her – words that had seemed to her, who had not had girlhood’s joys, like the words of love. And that young heart had opened under the influence, like the scented rosebud in the sun; but there was a fatal canker there, and as the flower bloomed, the withering was at hand.

“Let us stop here,” cried Netta, drinking in the beauty of the scene; “it is like being young again, when we were so happy – when mamma watched for papa’s coming, and there seemed no trouble in life. Oh, it has been a cruel time!”

She shuddered, and clung to the arm which supported her.

“This is very wrong of me,” she said, looking up, and smiling the next moment. “I ought not to talk of the past like that.”

“Shall we sit down here?” he said, pointing to a fallen tree trunk.

Then, with the low hum of the insects round them, they entered the edge of the wood.

He sat looking at her in silence for a few moments, and twice her eyes were raised to his with so appealing and tender a look that he felt unmanned. He had brought her there to tell her something, and her love disarmed him; so that he snatched at a chance to put off that which he wished to say.

“You were telling me of the happy past,” he said. “Your were well off once?”

“Yes, and so happy,” said the girl, her eyes filling with tears. “I ought not, perhaps, to tell you, though.”

“You may trust me, Netta,” he said, taking her hand.

“I always felt that I could,” she cried, eagerly, as her face flushed more deeply, and her hand trembled in his; for he had again called her Netta, and her heart throbbed with joy, even though he was so grave. “Shall I tell you?”

“Yes – tell me; but are you weary?”

“Oh, no, no,” she said, excitedly. “But I must not mention names. Mamma wishes ours kept secret, for she is very proud. Papa is an officer, and as I remember him first, he was so handsome, even as mamma was beautiful. We used to live in a pretty cottage, just outside town, and papa was so kind. But how it came about I never knew, he gradually grew cold, and hard, and stern, so that I was afraid of him when he came to see us, and he used to be angry to mamma, and then stay away for weeks together, then months, till at last we rarely saw him. The pretty cottage was sold, with everything in it – even my presents; and mamma and I lived in lodgings. And then trouble used to come about money; for poor mamma would be half distracted when none was sent her, and this dreadful neglected state went on, till mamma said she could bear it no more. Then she used to go out and give lessons; but that was terribly precarious work, and soon after she used to work with her needle.”

“And your father?” said Richard.

“Never came,” said Netta – “at least, very rarely. But I ought not to tell you more.”

“Can you not trust me?” he said, with a smile.

“Oh, yes, yes, yes,” cried the girl, impetuously, and she nestled closer to him. “I can trust you. It was like this: – Papa was a Roman Catholic, and mamma had always brought me up in her own Protestant religion; and by degrees I found out he had made a point of that, and had told mamma that their marriage was void, as it had only been performed according to one church. He used to write and tell her that he was free, and that if she would give up every claim on him, and promise to write to that effect, he would settle a regular income upon her.”

“And your mamma?”

“I heard her say once to herself that it would be disgracing me, and that she would sooner we starved. That is why we have worked so hard, and had to live in such dreadful places,” said the girl, shuddering.

“My poor child!” he said, tenderly. “Yours has been a hard life, and you so delicate.”

“I shall grow strong now,” she said, half shyly; “but why do you call me child?”

She looked up in his face with a smile, half playful, half tender – a look that made him shiver.

“You are not cross with me?” she said, gazing at him piteously.

“Cross? No,” he said, gently.

And he once more took her hand, trying hard to begin that which he had brought her there to tell, but as far off as ever. At the end of a minute, though, she gave him the opportunity, by saying naïvely —

“You have never told me anything about yourself. Mamma wondered what you were – so different to everybody we meet.”

“Let me tell you, Netta,” he said, earnestly. “And promise me this – that we are still to be great friends.”

She looked at him wonderingly.

“Yes, of course,” she said. “Why should we not be? You have always been so kind.”

He paused for a moment or two; and then, there in the calm of that shadowy wood, with the sunbeams coming like golden arrows through the leafy boughs, and the distant twitter of some bird for interruption, he told her of his own life and troubles, watching her bright, animated face as she listened eagerly, sometimes laying her hand confidingly upon his arm, till his tale approached the chapters of his love; and now, impassioned in his earnestness, he half forgot the listener at his side, till, in the midst of his declaration of love and trust and fidelity to Valentina Rea, he became aware of a faint sigh, and he had just time to catch the poor girl as she was slipping from the tree trunk to the ground.

“Poor child!” he said, raising her in his arms, gazing in the pale face, and kissing her forehead. “It was a cruel kindness, for Heaven knows I never thought of this.”

He sat holding her for a few moments, as animation came slowly back, till at last her eyes opened, looking wonderingly in his; and then, as recollection returned, she put up her two hands as if in prayer, and said, piteously —

“Take me home – please, take me home.”

“Netta, my child,” cried Richard, sinking at her feet, “recollect your promise – that we were to be friends. I have hurt you – I have wounded you. I call God to witness that I never meant it!”

A sad smile quivered for a moment on her poor white lips, as he kissed her hands again and again; and then, as the full reality of all she had heard came upon her, she uttered a low, heart-breaking wail, and sank upon the ground amidst the ferns and grass, covered her face with her hands, and sobbed aloud.

“My God, what have I done?” exclaimed Richard, hoarsely. “Netta, my child, I tried to be kind to you, and it has all turned to gall and bitterness. For Heaven’s sake, tell me you forgive me – that you do not think me base and cruel. Netta, pray – pray speak to me.”

She dropped her hands in her lap, and raised her blank white face to his.

“You believe me?” he cried, hoarsely.

“Yes, yes,” she said, piteously. “It was my fault. I thought – I thought – ”

“Hush, my poor darling!” he whispered, “I know what you would say. I should have known better.”

“No,” she said, sweetly, and her trembling voice was so piteous that the tears rose to the strong man’s eyes. “It was I who should have known better, Richard – I, who have only a few short months to stay on earth.”

“Netta!” he cried, and his voice was wild and strange.

“Yes, it is true,” she said, simply – “it is quite true; but you came like sunshine to my poor dark life, and I could not help it – I thought you loved me.”

“And I do, my child, dearly, as I would a sister!” he exclaimed, passionately, as he raised her up, and kissed her forehead. “Netta, I would have given my right hand sooner than have caused you pain.”

“Don’t blame yourself,” she said, softly, extricating herself from his arms; “I should have known better. Take me home – take me home!”

She caught at his arm after trying to walk alone, and looked pitifully in his face.

“You see,” she whispered, “it was a dream – a dream; but so bright, and now – ”

She reeled, and would have fallen but for the strong arm flung round her; and Richard held her for a few moments till she recovered.

“Richard,” she whispered, sadly, “forgive me if I was unmaidenly and bold; but it seemed so short a time that I should be here, that I could not act as others do. But take me home – take me home.”

She seemed half fainting, and raised he handkerchief to her lips, to take it down stained with blood. Then, shuddering slightly, she turned her face to his, smile faintly, and laid one little thin hand upon his breast, before hanging almost inanimate upon his arm.

Richard uttered a groan as he raised her in his arms, and bore her rapidly into the lane, where, at the distance of a hundred yards, stood the cab, with Batty grazing comfortably, and Sam Jenkles dozing on his box.

“Taken ill – quick!” gasped Richard, as he lifted his burden into the vehicle. “Quick – London – the first doctor’s.”