A Mad Marriage, May Agnes Fleming [best big ereader .TXT] 📗

her final

answer; that if that answer be favorable they are to be married next

spring in London. His mother told me. Whatever he told you last night,

Crystal, I am quite sure he did not tell you this.”

 

“No,” she said, in a voice like a whisper, her very lips blanched—“he

did not tell me this.”

 

“There is one fortunate circumstance about it,” the young man went on;

“he is a villain, but he won’t break her heart. Incredible it may seem

to you, but all the beauty and attraction of your demi-god are quite

thrown away upon her. She doesn’t care for him. She knows him to be

weaker and more unstable than water—the frailest of all broken reeds

for any woman to lean on—and will rejoice accordingly at being rid of

him. But for you, Crystal—you’re not the first, nor the

hundred-and-first, he has sworn undying love to; and you’ll not be the

last, that I swear, if you give him a chance. If you care for Lord

Eric Dynely, and want to keep him, why, then, marry him out of

hand—strike while the iron is hot.”

 

She said not a word. White and still she stood, all life and color

stricken out of eyes and face by his words.

 

As he looked at her the bitterness died out of his own soul in

compassion and remorse.

 

“Oh, Crystal, forgive me!” he said. “I am a brute! I ought not to say

such things to you. But—I loved you so—I have loved you all my life. I

trusted you, and I trusted him.”

 

It was more than she could bear—her own pain and his. She turned

hastily away, down one of the garden paths, and vanished.

 

The day was six hours older—the vicarage clocks were striking

eleven—as Lord Dynely dismounted from “his red roan steed” at the

vicarage gate, and flung his horse’s bridle over that very gate-post.

Before he could reach the house, a slim, white figure came gliding out

of one of the garden paths and beckoned him to approach.

 

“You, my darling,” he said, gayly, “and on the watch for your devoted

knight’s coming. I’m not late, am I? But early rising, as you understand

the term in this primitive wilderness, is not my most prominent

perfection.”

 

“Eric,” she said, faintly. “I have something to say to you. Last night

when we were talking—when you told me you cared for me, you—you said

nothing of Miss Forrester.”

 

His face flushed, his blue eyes flashed with the quick angry light ever

so ready to rise.

 

“Who has been talking to you?” he demanded. “But I need hardly ask. Mr.

Terrence Dennison, of course.”

 

“I have known it this long time,” she returned, shrinking from his angry

looks, trembling like a nervous child, yet resolute to go on, “only I

forgot it yesterday. Oh, Lord Dynely! You were very cruel to say such

things to me, and all the time engaged to marry her.”

 

She broke down utterly for the first time with the words, and covering

her face with her hands, sobbed hysterically.

 

“Why did you ever come here—why did you make me love you—how could you

deceive me so? I knew I was not worthy of you. I was happy before you

came; I—”

 

“You would have married Dennison, and lived happy for ever after? Is

that what you are trying to say, Miss Higgins? Terry has been pleading

his own cause this morning, I see, and slandering me. Common gratitude

from the dependant of my mother’s bounty might have kept him silent, if

nothing else; but gratitude is an obsolete virtue. Since you are so

easily influenced by him, it would be a pity to take you from him. Here

is his ring—let me replace it on your finger, and take back all the

nonsensical things I said to you last evening.”

 

She uttered a cry like a child under the lash. At that sound all anger

died out within him, he caught her hands and held them in a fierce,

close clasp.

 

“I will never let you go,” he said. “I swear it. My wife you shall be,

and no other’s. You are mine—mine alone, and as mine I claim you. I

deny all Dennison’s slanders. I am not engaged to Miss Forrester or any

other living woman. Miss Forrester is no more anxious to marry me than I

am to marry her. It is all my mother’s doing and her guardian’s—they

made the compact, but we will not ratify it. You I love, and you I will

make my wife. Where is your father?—in his study? Then I will go to him

at once, and make an end of all doubt.”

 

He strode away, and, looking handsome and haughty, was admitted into Mr.

Higgins’ private sanctum. In few and somewhat insolently authoritative

words he made known his errand. He loved his daughter Crystal, he wished

to make her his wife. Then he sat still, and looked at the clergyman. If

he expected the Vicar of Starling to be overpowered by the honor he was

doing him, he was mistaken.

 

Mr. Higgins sat aghast, literally aghast, and pushing his spectacles up

his forehead sat helplessly staring at the young wooer.

 

“My daughter! My daughter Crystal. You want to marry her, Lord Dynely.

Oh, impossible! impossible!”

 

“And why impossible, sir, may I ask?” haughtily and angrily.

 

“Because—Lord bless my soul! because she’s too young to marry any one;

because when she’s two or three years older we’re going to marry her to

Terry Dennison. It’s been an understood thing always, always, that

Christabel was to marry Terry.”

 

“And may I ask again, Mr. Higgins,” cried Lord Dynely, still more

angrily, still more haughtily, “if you prefer Dennison to me?”

 

“Well—well—well, don’t be angry, my dear young gentleman, don’t be

angry. Bless my soul! you marry Crystal! Upon my word and honor, I

never thought of such a thing—never! Prefer Dennison! well, in a

worldly point of view, you’re the best match of course, but, then, we

know Terry, and he’s one of the family, and he’s a good lad—oh, a very

good lad! and I shouldn’t be afraid to trust my little one to his

keeping.”

 

“And you are afraid to trust her to mine!” said lordly Eric, pale with

passion.

 

“No, no, not that either! Bless my soul, don’t be so quick to jump at

conclusions. It’s only this—I know him better than I do you—I trust

him entirely, and then it’s been an understood thing always. Crissy has

no right to play fast and loose with Terry. Besides, there’s your

cousin—no, she’s not your cousin, I suppose, but it’s all the same. I

mean, of course, Miss France Forrester.”

 

“Well, sir,” demands the exasperated young lord, “and what of Miss

France Forrester?”

 

“Why, this—you’ve been engaged to her, or so I have been told.”

 

“Then, Mr. Higgins, you’ve been told an infernal lie,” retorted Lord

Dynely, too utterly overcome with rage and exasperation to much mind

what he said; “I never was engaged to France Forrester or anyone else.

Am I to understand that you decline to accept me as the husband of your

daughter?”

 

“Oh, dear me,” said Mr. Higgins, in a troubled tone, “I don’t know what

to say, I’m sure. You’ve taken me so much by surprise—I always looked

upon her as belonging to Terry—”

 

This was growing more than Lord Dynely could bear. He rose to his feet,

exasperated beyond endurance.

 

“Oh, don’t,” said the vicar, piteously; “wait a little, my lord. What

does Christabel say? She is in love with you, I suppose?”

 

“She does me that honor, Mr. Higgins.”

 

“It’s a brilliant match for her, and yet,” in that troubled tone, “I do

believe she would be happier married to–-”

 

“Mr. Higgins, you insult me! I decline to listen longer. Good-morning.”

 

“I beg your pardon, Lord Dynely. I had no intention of insulting you, I

am sure. If Crystal wishes it, and you wish it, why then—why then I

have no more to say. Only this, obtain your mother’s consent. No

daughter of mine shall enter any family that considers her beneath them

or is unwilling to receive her. Obtain your mother’s consent and you

shall have mine. Only”—this in a low voice and with a sorrowful shake

of the head—“I would rather it had been Terry.”

 

Lord Dynely, quite pale with haughty surprise and anger, bowed himself

out. Opposition was crowding upon him, and he set his teeth, and swore

he would have her in spite of a thousand imbecile vicars, a thousand

match-making mothers. And Mr. Higgins sat blinking in a dazed way in the

sunshine, full of vague, apprehensive regrets.

 

“He’s a fine young man—a handsome young man, well-born, well-bred,

titled and rich; and yet I am afraid of him. It’s these brilliant young

men who break their wives’ hearts as easily as I could my pipe-stem. It

will be a great match for one of my girls, but I would rather it were

Terry.”

 

Leaning against the vine-clad porch, Lord Dynely came face to face with

Terry himself. He paused and looked at him, his blue eyes lurid with

anger and defiance.

 

“Well, little ‘un,” he said, with an insolent laugh, “you’ve heard the

news, I suppose? I’m to marry Crystal. Congratulate me, won’t you? I’ve

been rather poaching on your manor, you see; but, if the dear little

girl has the bad taste to prefer me to you, what then? And all’s fair in

love and war.”

 

He turned to go before Dennison could speak, that defiant ring still in

eyes, and voice, and laugh.

 

“Can you tell me where I’ll find her, Terry? Ah, I see her in the arbor

yonder. Don’t look so seedy, dear old man—you know the adage that has

held good ever since the world began, that—

 

“They shall take who have the power,

And they shall keep who can.”

 

His mocking laugh came back as he struck a Vesuvian, lit a cigarette,

and sauntered down the path to join Crystal.

 

CHAPTER XIII.

 

LIGHTLY WON, LIGHTLY LOST.

 

“Norton?”

 

“Yes, my lord.”

 

“Pack my portmanteau, and hold yourself in readiness to accompany me by

the 9:50 train. I return to Devonshire.”

 

“Yes, my lord.”

 

“Tell them to have the trap round in fifteen minutes. Train starts in

half an hour. Can do the distance in the odd quarter.”

 

“Yes, my lord.”

 

“Hand me that tobacco pouch, Norton, that book of cigarette paper,

and–-Come in.”

 

All this multiplicity of directions Lord Dynely murmured in the

sleepiest, laziest of tones, his long, slender length stretched out upon

a sofa. His orders had been cut short by a tap at the door, and, in

answer to his invitation, Terry Dennison entered.

 

It was nine o’clock of the morning following that interview in the Vicar

of Starling’s study. Only nine o’clock, and Lord Dynely, whose usual

hour of rising and calling for chocolate in bed was twelve, was up and

dressed. Not only dressed, but dressed for travelling, in most

unexceptional get up. He was, as has been said, a dandy of the first

water, as difficult to please in the fit of a coat as any young duchess

about her wedding robe. He found fault with Poole’s most faultless works

of art, and the peculiar shade of necktie most becoming his complexion

had been known to painfully exercise his manly mind for hours.

 

As he lay now, every garment he wore, in make, and coloring, and

texture, was above reproach. To do him justice, his efforts were not