Floyd Grandon's Honor, Amanda Minnie Douglas [you can read anyone .TXT] 📗

I was a dumb, blundering idiot, head over heels in an infatuation, and knew nothing about you, but it will be the regret of my whole life that I did _not_ come when Floyd sent for me. And I suppose he fell in love with you himself; he could not have cared for the fortune, he had enough of his own."

Violet draws a long, shivering breath, but her very soul seems icy cold with doubt.

"You did not--despise me?" she cries, with passionate entreaty.

"Despise you? Why, I didn't know anything about you." The young man's lethargic conscience gives him a severe prick. He should not have made light of it to Laura and madame, but he _did_ bind them to inviolate secrecy. "If I had seen you I should not have despised you, I should have married you," he says, triumphantly. "If you were free to-day, I should ask you to marry me. I think you the sweetest and most rarely honest girl I have ever met, and you _are_ beautiful, though I wouldn't own that at first. Despise you? Why, I would fight the whole world for you, and I will, if----"

"No," she interrupts. Even his spirited defence cannot restore what has been so rudely wrenched away. She feels so old, so weary, so desolate, that nothing matters. "It is not so bad----" and she looks up with piteous eyes.

"Why, there is nothing bad about it at all," he declares, impatiently. "Don't the English and the French plan marriages, and there are people here whose parents join fortunes, lots of them! Marcia was angry and wanted to mortify you. The idea of marrying Jasper Wilmarth and then lording it over everybody, is too good! And as for flirting--well, I wouldn't dare flirt with you," he says, laughingly. "Floyd would soon settle me. I like you too well, I honor you too much," he continues. "There, will you not be comforted with something? Oh, I have a letter from Floyd, and he will be home to-morrow night! I came to bring it to you."

He takes it from his pocket and hands it to her, but her fingers tremble, and no joy lights up her pale face. Eugene is so sincerely sorry that he holds himself in thorough contempt for his part in the early history of the affair, and he is very angry as well.

"Now," he says, "I am going away, and I shall not be home to luncheon, but I will meet you at the Latimers'. If Marcia dares to make another comment, it will be the worse for her, that's all. My poor child, are you going to keep that dreary face and those despairing eyes for Floyd to see?"

He has a very strong inclination to take her in his arms and shower tenderness upon her; but if he has been drifting that way for the past week, he is rudely awakened now. He looks at her helplessly. If she would only cry; the girls he has seen have been ready enough with their tears.

"Yes, you must go," she says, wearily. "Thank you for the letter, for _all_." Then she walks slowly out of the room.


CHAPTER XXIV.

What act of Legislature was there that thou shouldst be happy?--CARLYLE.

While Eugene Grandon's anger is at white heat he goes to Madame Lepelletier and taxes her with betrayed trust. He knows very well that Marcia could not long keep such a tidbit to herself. Laura is away, and his mother never has repeated the tale, though to him she has bemoaned his short-sightedness, the more since the fortune has been certain.

Madame is surprised, dignified, and puts down the young man with the steel hand in the velvet glove; explaining that Marcia had it from some other source. There really is nothing detrimental in it to Mrs. Grandon. A handsome young man of good family may be selected without insult to _any_ young woman, and to decline a lady you never saw cannot reflect on the _personale_ of the one under consideration. It seems rather silly at this late hour to take umbrage.

Eugene cools a little, and admits to himself there is nothing in it that ought to make Violet miserable, especially since he has confessed that he would be only too glad to marry her now; and as for the accusation of flirting, he can soon put an end to that by being sweet on Lucia Brade for a week or two. But he really _does_ care for Violet, and no one shall offer her any insult with impunity. He means to go at Marcia when opportunity offers. Ah! can it be her husband who gave her the delectable information?

Violet goes to her room and reads her letter, that is tender with the thought of return, and yet it does not move her. Floyd Grandon is fond of her; he pitied her desolate condition long ago, and since he did not need her fortune he took her simply to shield her from trouble and perplexity. She remembers his grave, fatherly conduct through all that time; his tenderness was not that of a lover, his consideration sprang from pity. Yet why was she satisfied then and so crushed now?

Ah! she has eaten of the tree of knowledge; she has grown wise in love's lore. She has been dreaming that she has had the love, when it is only a semblance, a counterfeit; not a base one, but still it has not the genuine ring. He did not esteem her so much at first but that he could offer her to another, and therein lies the bitter sting to her. It is not because Eugene cared so little. How could he regard a stranger he had not seen, if he who had seen her did not care, whose kindness was so tinctured with indifference? Even if he had wanted her fortune, she thinks she could forgive it more easily.

She sends word down-stairs presently that there need be no lunch, but she will have a cup of tea. She throws herself on the bed and shivers as if it were midwinter. To-night, why even now, he is on his way home; to-morrow morning she ought to give him a glad welcome. She will be glad, but not with the light-hearted joy of yesterday; that can never be hers again. It seems as if she had been tramping along the sea-shore, gathering at intervals choice pearls for a gift, and now, when she has them, no friend stands with outstretched hands to take, and all her labor has been vain. She is so tired, so tired! Her little hands drop down heavily and the pearls fall out, that is all.

She does not go over to the cottage until quite late, and walks hurriedly, that it may bring some color to her pale cheeks. Cecil and Elsie Latimer have come to meet her, and upbraid her for being so tardy. They have swung in the hammock, they have run and danced and played, and now Denise has the most magnificent supper on the great porch outside the kitchen door. But if _she_ could have danced and ran and played with them!

Mrs. Latimer has a cordial welcome, and Eugene makes his appearance. To do the young man justice, he is utterly fascinating to the small host. Violet watches him with a curiously grateful emotion. There is nothing for her to do, he does it all.

"You are in a new character to-night," declares Mrs. Latimer. "It never seemed to me that entertaining children was your forte."

"I think you have all undervalued me," he answers, with plaintive audacity, while a merry light shines in his dark eyes. He _is_ very handsome, and so jolly and joyous that the children are convulsed with laughter. They lure him down in the garden afterward for a game of romps.

"How Eugene Grandon has changed!" says Mrs. Latimer. "He was extremely moody when Madame Lepelletier first fenced him out a little," and she smiles. "How odd that so many young men should take their first fancy to a woman older than themselves!"

"Do they?" says Violet, simply. Somehow she cannot get back to the world wherein she dwelt yesterday.

"Yes, I have seen numberless instances. Sometimes it makes a good friendship for after life, but I fancy it will not in this case. Indeed, I do not believe a man could have a friendship with her, for there is no middle ground. It is admiration and love. She is the most fascinating woman I have ever met, and always makes me think of the queens of the old French _salons_."

Violet answers briefly to the talk. "She is thinking of her husband," ruminates Mrs. Latimer. "She is very much in love with him, which is a good thing, seeing that the young man is disenchanted, and ready to lay his homage at the feet of another."

It is quite dusk when they start for home. Cecil nestles close to Violet, who kisses her tenderly. The child's love is above suspicion or doubt, and very grateful to her aching heart.

"You see," exclaims Eugene, as he hands her out, "that I have begun a new _role_. I love you so sincerely that no idle gossip shall touch you through me."

The tears come into her eyes for the first time. She longs to cling to him, to weep as one might on the shoulder of a brother.

The drawing-room is lighted up, and there are two figures within.

"Oh, you are come at last!" says the rather tart voice of Mrs. Grandon, who has telegraphed to Briggs to meet her at the early evening train, finding that she has made some earlier connections on her journey. "I was amazed to find every one away. Ah, my dear Eugene! Cecil, how do you do?" And she stoops to kiss the child.

"Mrs. Latimer gave a nursery tea-party," explains Eugene, "or garden party, was it not?"

"Here is my old friend, Mrs. Wilbur," she says. "Tomorrow Mrs. Dayre and her daughter will be here. Is not Floyd home yet?"

Violet answers the last as she is introduced to Mrs. Wilbur, a pleasant old lady with a rosy face surrounded by silvery curls.

"What a lovely child!" exclaims Mrs. Wilbur. "Why, she looks something as Gertrude used, and I thought Gertrude a perfect blond fairy. Have you not a kiss for me, my dear?"

Cecil is amiable as an angel, won by the mellow, persuasive voice.

Violet excuses herself as soon as possible. She has a headache and does look deathly pale. Eugene makes himself supremely entertaining, to the great delight of his mother. It is so new a phase for him to do anything with direct reference to another person's happiness or well-being, that he feels comfortably virtuous and heroic. No one shall make Violet suffer for his sake. What an awful blunder it was _not_ to marry her, for, after all, Floyd is not really in love with her!

Violet cannot sleep. A strange impulse haunts her, a desire to escape from the chain, to fly to the bounds of the earth, to bury herself out of sight, to give up, worsted and discomfited, for there can be no fight. There is no enemy to attack. It is kindest, tenderest friend who has offered her a stone for bread, when she did not know the difference. She recalls her old talks with Denise concerning a wife's duty and obedience and respect. Ah, how could she have been so ignorant, or having been blind, why should she see now? That old life was satisfactory! She never dreamed of anything