The Hoyden Part 44

She leans forward, and pulling some hairpins out of her short, curly hair, pushes it into another shape, a little lower down on the neck, to see if that would suit her better. No, it wouldn't.

After all, Maurice _might_ have asked her again. He danced a great deal with Mrs. Bethune towards the end of the evening, and how charming he looked when dancing!

She rests her arms--soft, naked arms, round and white as a child's--upon the dressing-table and wonders. Wonders if that old story--the story her mother-in-law had told her of Maurice and Mrs.

Bethune--was really true. Maurice did not look like that--like a man who would be dishonest. Oh no! It is not true--that horrid story!

Her eyes light up again; she goes back again to her hair, the arrangement of which, on account of its length, is difficult. She piles it now far up on her head, and sticks little diamond pins into it. She almost laughs aloud. She looks like a j.a.panese young woman.

And it's very pretty, too--she _does_ look nice in this way. What a pity n.o.body can see her! And with this little new white dressing-gown, too! Such a little dream of a thing!

Where's Maurice? Surely he must have come up by this time. Some of the men had gone into the smoking-room on their return; but it is so late--with the dawn breaking; perhaps Maurice _has_ come up.

She crosses a little pa.s.sage and goes to the door leading into his room, and knocks lightly; no answer. She knocks again, more impatiently this time, and as still only silence follows her attempt, she opens the door and steps on tiptoe into the room.

It is lit by two or more lamps, and at the end of it, close to a hanging curtain, stands Maurice in his trousers and s.h.i.+rt, having evidently just flung off his evening coat.

"Oh, here you are!" cries she with open delight. "I was afraid you hadn't come up yet, and I wanted to show myself to you. Look at my hair!" She pulls out the skirts of her dainty loose gown and dances merrily up to him. "Don't I look lovely?" cries she, laughing.

Rylton has turned; he is looking at her; his eyes seem to devour her--more with anger than delight, however. And yet the beauty of her, in spite of him, enters into his heart. How sweet she is, standing there with her loose gown in her pretty uplifted hands, and the lace flounces of her petticoat showing in front! She had not fastened this new delight in robes across her neck, and now the whiteness of her throat and neck vies with the purity of the gown itself.

"He looked on her and found her fair, For all he had been told."

Yet a very rage of anger against her still grows within his heart.

"What brought you here?" asks he sharply, brutally.

She drops her pretty gown. She looks at him as if astonished.

"Why--because"--she is moving backwards towards the door, her large eyes fixed on him--"because I wanted you to look at me--to see how nice I am."

"Others have looked too," says he. "There, go. Do you think I am a fool?"

At that t.i.ta's old spirit returns to her. She stands still and gives him a quick glance.

"Well, I never thought so till now," says she. She nods at him.

"Good-night."

"No, stop!" says Rylton. "I will have this out with you. You pretend to misunderstand me; but I shall make it clear. Do you think I have not seen your conduct of this evening?"

"Mine?"

"Yes, with your cousin--with Hescott." He draws nearer to her. His eyes are on fire, his face white. "Do you think I saw nothing?"

"I don't know what you saw," says she slowly.

All her lovely mirth has died away, as if killed by a cruel death.

"Don't you?" tauntingly. "Then I will tell you. I saw you"--he pauses as if to watch the changes of her face, to see when fear arises, but none does--"in the arbour"--he pauses again, but again no fear arises--"with your cousin."

He grows silent, studying her with eager eyes, as if expecting something; but nothing comes of all his scrutiny, except surprise.

Surprise, indeed, marks all her charming features.

"Well?" says she, as he stops, as if expecting more.

She waits, indeed, as one at a loss.

"Well?" He repeats the word with a wild mockery. Could there be under heaven another woman so dead to all honesty? Does she dare to think she can deceive him to the end? In what a lovely form the evil can dwell! "Well!" He brings down his hand with a little crash upon the table near her. "I was there--near that arbour. I heard--I heard all."

"Well, I'm sorry," says t.i.ta slowly, colouring faintly.

"Sorry! Is that all? Do you know what it means--what I can do?"

"I don't see that you can do anything," says she, thinking of her revelation to Hescott about Margaret. "It is Colonel Neilson who might do something."

"Neilson?"

"Yes, Colonel Neilson."

"Are you mad?" says Sir Maurice, in a low tone, "to think you can thus deceive me over and over again?"

He draws back from her. Disgust is in his heart. Does she dream that she can pa.s.s off Neilson as her lover, instead of Hescott? He draws a sharp breath. How she must love Hescott, to seek thus to s.h.i.+eld him, when ruin is waiting for herself!

"I am not mad," says t.i.ta, throwing up her head. "And as to deceiving you--Of course I can see that you are very angry with me for betraying Margaret's secret to Tom; but, then, Tom is a great friend, and when he said something about Margaret's being an old maid, I couldn't bear it any longer. You _know_ how I love Margaret!--and I told him all about Colonel Neilson's love for her, and that she _needn't_ be an old maid unless she liked. But as to deceiving you----"

Rylton, standing staring at her, feels that it is the truth--the truth only--to which he is listening. Not for a moment does he disbelieve her. Who could, gazing on that small, earnest face? And yet his silence breathes of disbelief to her. She steps backwards, and raises her little hand--a little hand very tightly clenched.

"What! Do you not believe me?" asks she, her eyes blazing.

"I believe you? Yes," returns her quickly. "But there is this----"

"There is this, too," interrupting him pa.s.sionately. "You accuse me of deception most wrongfully, and I--I accuse you of the worst thing of all, of listening behind my back--of listening deliberately to what was never meant for you to hear."

"I did not listen," says Rylton, who is now very white. "It so chanced that I stood near the arbour; but I heard only one word, and it was about some secret. I came away then. I did not stay."

t.i.ta turns to him with a vehemence that arrests him.

"Who brought you to the arbour?" asks she.

"Brought me?"

"Yes. Who brought you?"

"What do you mean?" asks Rylton, calmly enough, but with a change of colour.

"Ah! you will not betray her, but I know. It was Mrs. Bethune.

Now"--she goes nearer to him, her pretty, childish face transformed by grief and anger--"now, confess, it _was!"_ She draws back again.

"No," says she, sighing disconsolately. "No, of course you would not tell. But I," looking back at him reproachfully, _"I_--told _you--_things."

"Many things," returns he coldly--unreasonably angry with her because of her allusion to Mrs. Bethune; "and hardly to your credit.