JOAN HASTE, H. RIDER HAGGARD [free ereaders TXT] 📗

with you--I don't agree at all. You will be a great authority yet. And now let us go into the other room."

So they went into the drawing-room, where Emma sang a little, sweetly enough; and after she had bidden them good-night they adjourned to the study to smoke and drink weak whiskies-and-sodas. Here Mr. Levinger was the talker and Henry the listener, and it seemed to the latter that he had rarely met a man with so much knowledge and power of observation, or one who could bring these to bear in a more interesting manner upon whatever subject he chanced to be discussing. His intellect was keen, his knowledge of life and men large and varied, and he seemed to know every book worth reading, and, what is more, to remember its contents.

Thus Henry's first evening at Monk's Lodge passed very pleasantly, and as his visit began so it went on and ended. In the daytime he would take his gun, and accompanied by Mr. Levinger on a pony and by an old man, half bailiff and half gamekeeper, would limp through the bracken in search of partridges and rabbits, an occupation in which he took great delight, although he was still too lame to follow it for long at a time.

Failing the shooting, his host organised some expedition to visit a distant church or earthwork, and accompanied by Emma they drove for hours through the mellow September afternoon. Or sometimes they sat upon the beach beneath the cliff, chatting idly on everything under heaven; or, if it chanced to rain, they would take refuge in the study and examine Mr. Levinger's collection of coins, ancient weapons and other antiquities.

Then at last arrived the dinner-hour, and another delightful evening would be added to the number of those that had gone. Before he had been in the house a week, Henry felt a different man; indeed, had any one told him, when he came to Monk's Lodge, that he was about to enjoy himself so much, he would not have believed it. He could see also that both Mr. Levinger and his daughter were glad that he should be there. At first Emma was a little stiff in her manner towards him, but by degrees this wore off, and he found himself day by day growing more friendly with her.

The better they became acquainted, the greater grew their mutual liking, and the more complete their understanding of each other. There was now no question of love-making or even of flirtation between them; their footing was one of friendship, and both of them were glad that it should be so. Soon the sharpest sting of Emma's shame passed away, since she could not believe that the man who greeted her with such open fellowship had learned the confession which broke from her on that night of her despair, for if it were so, surely he would look down upon her and show it in his manner. Taking this for granted, in some dim and illogical fashion she was grateful to him for not having heard; or if by any chance he had heard, as she was bound to admit was possible, still more was she grateful in that he dissembled his knowledge so completely as to enable her to salve her pride with the thought that he was ignorant. Indeed, in this event, so deeply did she feel upon the point, she was prepared in her own mind to forgive any sins of omission or commission with which he stood charged, setting against them the generosity of his conduct in this particular. Of the future Emma did not think; she was content to live in the present, and to feel that she had never been so happy before. Neither did she think of the past, with its disquieting tales of Joan Haste, and its horrible suggestions that Henry was bring driven into marriage with herself for pecuniary reasons. If a day should ever come when he proposed to her, then it would be time enough to take all these matters into consideration, and to decide whether she should please her pride and do violence to her heart, or sacrifice her pride and satisfy her heart. There was no need to come to a decision now, for she could see well that, whatever might be his thoughts with reference to her, Henry had no immediate intention of asking her to be his wife.

Although of course he could not follow all the secret workings of Emma's mind, Henry grasped the outlines of the situation accurately enough. He knew that this was a time of truce, and that by a tacit agreement all burning questions were postponed to a more convenient season. Mr. Levinger said no word to him of his daughter, of Joan Haste, or even of the financial affairs connected with the Rosham mortgages, for all these subjects were tabooed under the conditions of their armistice. Tormented as he had been, and as he must shortly be again, he also was deeply grateful for this indulgence, and more than content to forget the past and let the future take care of itself. One thing grew clear to him, however; indeed, before he left Monk's Lodge he admitted it to himself in so many words: it was, that had there been no Joan Haste and no mortgages in the question, he would certainly ask Emma Levinger to be his wife.

The more he saw of this lady, the more attached he grew to her. She attracted him in a hundred ways--by her gentleness, her delicacy of thought, her ever-present sympathy with distress and with all that was good and noble, and by the quaintness and culture of her mind. For these and many other reasons he could imagine no woman whom he should prefer to marry were he fortunate enough to win her. But always when he thought of it two spectres seemed to rise and stand before him--one of Joan, passionate, lovely and loving, and the other shaped like a roll of parchment and labelled "Mortgages, Sixty thousand pounds!"

At length the ten days of his stay came to an end, and upon a certain morning the old Rosham coachman appeared at the door of Monk's Lodge to drive him home again.

"I don't know how to thank you, Levinger," he said, "for your kindness and hospitality to me here. I have not had such a good time for many a long day. It has been a rest to me, and I have come to the conclusion that rest is the best thing in the whole world. Now I must go back to face my anxieties."

"Meaning the eleventh of October?" said Mr. Levinger.

"Yes, meaning the eleventh of October and other things. I am sure I do not know what on earth I am to do about those farms. But I won't begin to bore you with business now. Good-bye, and again, many thanks."

"Good-bye, Graves, and don't fret. I dare say that something will turn up. My experience is that something generally does turn up--that is to say, when one is the right side of forty."

"Oh, Sir Henry!" said Emma, appearing at the door of the drawing-room, "will you take a note to your sister for me? It is just ready."

"Certainly," he answered, following her to the writing-table.

"It is about my going to town with her next month," she went on. "I have been speaking to my father, and he says that I may if I like. It is a question of trousseau--not that I know anything about such matters, but I am glad of the excuse for a change. Are you going with her?"

"I don't know. An old messmate of mine always gives a dinner at the Rag on the twentieth, to celebrate an adventure in which we were concerned together. I had a letter from him the other day asking me to come. I haven't answered it yet, but if you like I will accept. I believe you go up on the eighteenth, don't you?"

Emma coloured faintly. "Of course it would be pleasant if you came," she answered. "We might go to some picture galleries, and to the British Museum to look at those Egyptian things."

"All right," said Henry; "we've got to get there first. And now good-bye. I can assure you that I shall never forget your goodness to me."

"The goodness is on your side, Sir Henry: it is very kind of you to have come to see us."

"And it is very nice of you to say so, Miss Levinger. Again good-bye, or rather /au revoir/."

CHAPTER XXIII(A NEW DEPARTURE)

 

Joan reached town in safety. Willie Hood called for her box as he had promised, and conveyed it to the station before anybody at the inn was up, whither she followed after breakfast. It gave Joan a new and strange sensation to sit opposite her aunt, who took the opportunity of a /tête-à-tête/ to scold and grumble at her from one end of the meal to the other, and to reflect that they were about to separate, for aught she knew, never to meet again. She could not pretend any affection for Mrs. Gillingwater, and yet the thought moved her, for after all she belonged to the familiar round of daily life from which Joan was about to cut herself adrift. Still more did it move her, yes, even to silent tears, when for the last time she looked upon the ancient room that had been hers, and in which she had nursed Henry back to health. Here every chair and picture was an old friend, and, what is more, connected with his presence, the presence which to-day she finally refused.

In turning her back upon that room she forsook all hope of seeing him again, and not till she had closed the door behind her did she learn how bitter was this renunciation.

Finding her luggage at the station, she saw it labelled, and took her seat in the train. Just as it was about to start Willie Hood sauntered up.

"Oh! there you are, Joan Haste," he said. "I thought that you would be following your box, so I've just dropped round to say good-bye to you. Good-bye, Joan: I hope that you will have a pleasant time up in London. Let me know your address, and I shouldn't wonder if I looked you up there one day, for somehow I don't feel as though there were room for another smart young man in Bradmouth, and the old place won't seem the same without you. Perhaps, if you ain't going to marry him after all," and Willie jerked his red head in the direction of Rosham, "if you'll have the patience to wait a year or two, we might set up together yonder in the grocery line."

"You impudent young monkey!" said Joan, laughing in spite of herself; and then the train steamed off, leaving Master Willie on the platform, kissing his hand in the direction of her carriage.

On arriving at Liverpool Street, Joan took a cab and directed the man to Kent Street, Paddington, whither she came after a drive that seemed interminable.

Kent Street, Paddington, was a shabby little place in the neighbourhood of the Edgware Road. The street itself ended