LITMIR.BIZ

Скачать книгу

be punished by imprisonment for life. Imprisonment, hopeless.’

      ‘Nay,’ he replied. ‘Not hopeless, because one could always hope in the power of friends. Have I not Constance? And then, you see, Professor, I am two-and-twenty, while the Chancellor and the Duchess are both sixty-five. Perhaps they may join the majority.’

      The Professor shook her head. Even to speak of the age of so great a lady, even to hint at her death as an event likely to happen soon, was an outrage against propriety—which is religion.

      ‘My determination is this,’ he went on, ‘whatever the consequence, I will never marry the Duchess. Law or no law, I will never marry a woman unless I love her.’ His eye rested for a moment on his cousin, and he reddened. ‘I may be imprisoned, but I shall carry with me the sympathy of every woman—that is, of every young woman—in the country.’

      ‘That will not help you, poor boy,’ said the Professor. ‘Hundreds of men are lying in our prisons who would have the sympathies of young women, were their histories known. But they lie there still, and will lie there till they die.’

      ‘Then I,’ said the Earl proudly, ‘will lie with them.’

      There were moments when this young man seemed to forget the lessons of his early training, and the examples of his fellows. The meekness, modesty, submission, and docility which should mark the perfect man sometimes disappeared, and gave place to an assumption of the authority which should only belong to woman. At such times, in his own castle, his servants trembled before him; the stoutest woman’s heart failed for fear: even his guardian, the Dowager Lady Boltons, selected carefully by the Chancellor on account of her inflexible character, and because she had already reduced to complete submission a young heir of the most obstinate disposition, and the rudest and most uncompromising material, quailed before him. He rode over her, so to speak. His will conquered hers. She was ashamed to own it; she did not acquaint the Chancellor with her ward’s masterful character, but she knew, in her own mind, that her guardianship had been a failure. Nay, so strange was the personal influence of the young man, so infectious among the men were such assertions of will, that any husband who happened to witness one of them, would go home and carry on in fashion so masterful, so independent, and so self-willed, even those who had previously been the most submissive, that they were only brought to reason and proper submission by threats, remonstrances, and visits of admonition from the vicar—who, poor woman, was always occupied in the pulpit, owing to the Earl’s bad example, with the disobedience of man and its awful consequences here and hereafter. Sometimes these failed. Then they became acquainted with the inside of a prison and with bread and water.

      ‘Let us get time,’ said the Professor. ‘My lord, I hope,’—here she sunk her voice to a whisper—‘that you will neither lie in a prison nor marry any but the woman you love.’

      Again the young man’s eyes boldly fell upon Constance, who blushed without knowing why.

      Then the Professor, without any excuse, left them alone.

      ‘You have,’ said Lord Chester, ‘something to say to me, Constance.’

      She hesitated. What use to say now what should have been said at another time and at a more fitting opportunity?

      ‘I am no milky, modest, obedient youth, Constance. You know me well. Have you nothing to say to me?’

      In the novels, the young man who hears the first word of love generally sinks on his knees, and with downcast eyes and blushing face reverentially kisses the hand so graciously offered to him. In ordinary life they had to wait until they were asked. Yet this young man was actually asking—boldly asking—for the word of love—what else could he mean?—and instead of blushing, was fixedly regarding Constance with fearless eyes.

      ‘It seems idle now to say it,’ she replied, stammering and hesitating—though in novels the woman always spoke up in a clear, calm, and resolute accents; ‘but, Edward, had the Chancellor not been notoriously the personal friend and creature of the Duchess, I should have gone to her long ago. They were schoolfellows; she owes her promotion to the Duchess; she would most certainly have rewarded her Grace by refusing my request.’

      ‘Yet you are a Carlyon and I am a Chester. On what plea?’

      ‘Cousinship, incompatibility of temper, some legal quibble—who knows? However, that is past; forget, my poor Edward, that I have told what should have been a secret. You will marry the Duchess—you——’

      He interrupted her by laughing—a cheerfully sarcastic laugh, as of one who holds the winning cards and means to play them.

      ‘Fair cousin,’ he said, ‘I have something to say to you of far more importance than that. You have retired before an imaginary difficulty. I am going to face a real difficulty, a real danger. Constance,’ he went on, ‘you and I are such old friends and playfellows, that you know me as well as a woman can ever know a man who is not her husband. We played together when you were three and I was five. When you were ten and I was twelve, we read out of the same book until the stupidity and absurdity of modern custom tried to stop me from reading any more. Since then we have read separately, and you have done your best to addle your pretty head with political economy, in the name and by the aid of which you and your House of Lawmakers have ruined this once great country.’

      ‘Edward! this is the wildest treason. Where, oh, where, did you learn to talk—to think—to dare such dreadful things?’

      ‘Never mind where, Constance. In those days—in those years of daily companionship—a hope grew up in my heart—a flame of fire which kept me alive, I think, amidst the depression and gloom of my fellow men. Can you doubt what was that hope?’

      Constance trembled—the Countess of Carlyon, the Home Secretary, trembled. Had she ever before, in all her life, trembled? She was afraid. In the novels, it was true, many a young man, greatly daring, by a bold word swept away a cloud of misunderstanding and reserve. But this was in novels written by women of the middle class, who can never hope to marry young, for the solace of people of their own rank. It was not to be expected that in such works there should be any basis of reality—they were in no sense pictures of life; for, in reality, as was deplored almost openly, when these elderly ladies were rich enough to take a husband and face the possibilities of marriage, though they always chose the young men, it was rare indeed that they met with more than a respectful acquiescence. Nothing, ladies complained, among each other, was more difficult to win and retain a young man’s love. But here was this headstrong youth, with love in his eyes—bold, passionate, masterful love—overpowering love—love in his attitude as he bent over the girl, and love upon his lips. Oh, dignity of a Home Secretary! Oh, rules and conventions of life! Oh, restraints of religion! Where were they all at this most fatal moment?

      ‘Constance,’ he said taking her hand, ‘all the rubbish about manly modesty is outside the door: and that is closed. I am descended from a race who in the good old days wooed their brides for themselves, and fought for them too, if necessary. Not toothless, hoary old women, but young, sunny, blooming girls, like yourself. And they wooed them thus, my sweet.’ He seized her in his strong arms and kissed her on the lips, on the cheeks, on the forehead. Constance, frightened and moved, made no resistance, and answered nothing. Once she looked up and met his eyes, but they were so strong, so burning, so determined, that she was fain to look no longer. ‘I love you, my dear,’ the shameless young man went on—‘I love you. I have always loved you, and shall never love any other woman; and if I may not marry you, I will never marry at all. Kiss me yourself, my sweet; tell me that you love me.’

      Had he a spell? was he a wizard, this lover of hers? Could Constance, she thought afterwards, trying to recall the scene, have dreamed the thing, or did she throw her arms about his neck and murmur in his ears that she too loved him, and that if she could not marry him, there was no other man in all the world for her?

      To recall those five precious minutes, indeed, was afterwards to experience a sense of humiliation which, while it crimsoned her cheek, made her heart and pulse to beat, and sent the blood coursing through her veins. She felt so feeble and so small,

Скачать книгу