A Mad Love, Charlotte Mary Brame [read this if txt] 📗

that Leone was near him, yet not see or speak to her.

It was all for the best, painful as it was. If for these long months they must be parted, it was better for him to be abroad--he dare not have trusted himself at home. He loved Leone so well that he knew his love would have broken down the barriers which the law had placed between them. He would go to River View, and, let it pain him as it would, he would tell her all, he would leave her as happy as was possible under the circumstances. He would stay away until the time was over; then, the very day he came of age, he would return and remarry her. He laughed to scorn his mother's prophecy. He prove untrue to his darling! The heavens must fall first. Not for him the mill-wheel story--not for him the broken ring.

How happy they would be, then, when the time had passed, and he could introduce Leone as his beloved wife to the whole world. He would try and think of that time without dwelling more than he could help on the wretched present. He went home to River View, but the first glance at Leone's face told him that she knew all.

It was not so much that the beauty had gone from it, that the beautiful eyes were dim with long, passionate weeping, or that the lips trembled as she tried to smile. Her whole face had changed so completely; its tragic intensity, the power of its despair, overmastered him.

Lord Chandos clasped her in his arms, and covered the sad young face with kisses and tears.

"My darling," he said, "you know all; I can see you know all."

The ring of happy music had quite died from her voice--he hardly recognized it.

"Yes," she answered him, "I know all."

"My darling," he cried, "it is not my fault. You will think I ought to have known it; but I swear to Heaven that I never even thought or suspected it. I would rather have been dead than have put you in a false position, Leone--you know that."

She laid her fair arms on his neck, and hid her white face on his breast.

"I am sure of it," she said, gently; "I have never thought of that: I know that you intended to make me your wife."

"So you are my wife, let who will say to the contrary--you are my beloved, revered, honored wife, Leone. Why, my darling, all the strength has left you! Look up, Leone. They have done the worst they can do, and what is it? They have parted us for a few months. When the parting is ended we shall be together for life."

She tightened the clasp of her fair arms around his neck.

"I know; I have faith in you, but it is so hard to bear, Lance. We were so happy, and you were all the world to me. How shall I live through the long months to come? Lance, perhaps you will be angry with me--I have done something that perhaps you will not like."

"That would not be possible, Leone. I must always like everything you do. Why, my darling, how you tremble! Sit down, there is nothing in all the world to fear."

"No; let me tell you what I have to say with my head here on your breast. You must not be angry with me, Lance. When I had seen Mr. Sewell, I felt that I could not bear it. I went down to Cawdor and saw Lady Lanswell."

He started with surprise. She raised her face to his, longing to see if he were angry, yet half afraid.

"You went to Cawdor to see my mother," he repeated. "My darling, it was a strong measure. What did she say or do?"

"You are not angry with me for it, Lance?" she asked, gently.

"I angry, my darling? No, a thousand times no. I could not be angry with you. Why did you go--for what purpose?"

"I went to ask her to have pity on us; not to enforce this cruel sentence; to be pitiful to me, because I love you so dearly."

"And her answer?" asked Lord Chandos, eagerly.

"Her answer was everything that was cruel and wicked. Ah, forgive me, Lance, she is your mother, I know, but she has taken in her cruel hands a divine power. She has parted us and I prayed her to be merciful. I told her how dearly we loved each other, but she had no pity--no mercy--no woman's kindness, no sympathy. She was cold, cruel, proud, haughty. She insulted, humiliated and outraged me. She refused to hear one word, and when I left her, I swore to be revenged on her."

The slender form trembled with passion. He drew her even more closely to his breast.

"My darling, you need not think of vengeance," he said. "I am grieved that my mother was unkind to you. Had you consulted me, I should most certainly have said do not go. Mind, I am not angry or annoyed, only so far as this, that I would not have you irritated for the world. I must say that I had always felt that if my mother could see you our cause was won. I did not believe that any creature living could resist that face."

She looked up at him with unutterable love.

"Do you really care so much for it, Lance? Have you never seen a face you like as well?"

"No, and never shall see one, my darling; when we are parted it will live in my heart bright and fair until we meet again."

Then the tender arms clung more tightly to him.

"Must we be parted, Lance?" she whispered. "We were married in the sight of Heaven--must we leave each other? Oh, Lance, it cannot be true; no one can say that I am not your wife."

Quietly and calmly trying to command himself, he told her then how inevitable it was that they must submit to the voice of the law during the next few months, so as to insure their future happiness and fair name. And then he told her of the favor conferred upon him, and how he was compelled to accept it or never to hope for court favor again.

She listened with a face that seemed turned to stone. Slowly the tender arms unwound themselves and fell by her side; slowly the beautiful eyes left his and filled with despair. He tried to console her.

"You see, my darling," he said, "that in any case we must have parted. Though this appointment is a mark of royal regard, still it is quite imperative. I could not have refused it without ruin to my future career, and I could not have taken you with me, so that for a time we must have parted."

"I see," she said, gently, but her hands fell, and a shudder that she could not control passed over her.

"Leone," said Lord Chandos, "we have not long to be together, and we have much to arrange. Tell me, first, what you thought of my mother?"

"She is very beautiful, very proud, very haughty, cold and cruel--if not wicked," said the young girl, slowly.

"That is not very flattering," said Lord Chandos.

"I could have loved and worshiped her if she had been kind to me," said Leone; "but she was cruel, and some time or other I shall have my revenge."

He looked gravely at her.

"I do not like to hear that, my darling. How can you be revenged?"

A light came over her face.

"I do not know. I have a prophetic insight at times into the future. As I stand here, I know that a time will come when your mother will weep to me as bitterly as I wept to her, and just as much in vain."

"I hope not," he answered. "All will be well for us, Leone. But revenge, my darling, is a horrible word, and does not suit those sweet lips at all. Let me kiss away the sound of it."

He bent his handsome head and kissed her lips with love that seemed stronger than death and true as eternity.


CHAPTER XX.


THE PARTING.

They had been talking for more than an hour. He had given her the whole history of the royal wedding, of what his embassy consisted of, of the length of time he would be absent, how he should think of her continually, how he implored her to write to him every day, and she had given him every detail of her interview with Mr. Sewell and Lady Lanswell. Then he said to himself that it was time they made some arrangement over the future.

"So we are to live apart until next June, Leone," he said, gently. "It is a terrible sentence; but the time will soon pass. Tell me, my darling, where you would like to live until June comes?"

She looked at him with startled eyes.

"Need I leave home, Lance? Let me live here; I could not fancy any other place was home. I feel as though if I once left here I should never see you again."

"My darling, that is all fancy--nothing but fancy. No matter where you are, my birthday comes on the thirtieth day of June, and on that day I shall return to you to make you what I have always believed you to be--my wife."

"I am your wife, Lance; let others say what they will, you will not deny it."

"Not I, Leone. You are my wife; and the very first day the law permits you shall bear my name, just as you now share my heart and life."

"On the thirtieth day of June," she sighed. "I shall count every hour, every minute until then. I wish, Lance, I could sleep a long sleep from the hour of parting until the hour of meeting--if I could but turn my face from the light of day and not open my eyes until they rest on you again. I shall have to live through every hour and every minute, and they will be torture."

"The time will soon pass, Leone, my darling; it will be full of hope, not despair. When the green leaves spring and the sunshine warms the land, you will say to yourself, 'June is coming, and June brings back my love;' when the lark sings and the wood-pigeons make their nests, when the hawthorn blooms on the hedges and the lilac rears its tall plumes, you will say 'June is near.' When the roses laugh and the lilies bloom, when the brook sings in the wood, when the corn grows ripe in the meadows, you will say 'June is come, and it brings my love.'"

"My love--oh, my love," sighed the girl, and her voice had the passionate sweetness of a siren.

"I shall come back to you, Leone, with everything bright, smiling, and beautiful; every rose that blooms, every bird that sings, every green leaf that springs will be a message from me to you to say that I am coming; when the wind whispers, and the trees murmur, it will be the same story, that I am coming back to my darling. Let us picture the thirtieth of June, and your mind shall rest on that picture. It will be a bright day, I know, the sky all blue and clear, not a cloud in it; but