The Gambler Part 23

The appeal came forth with volcanic suddenness. He had not meant to be precipitate; it was entirely alien to his slow, methodical nature to plunge headlong into any situation. But the occasion was unprecedented; circ.u.mstances overwhelmed him. For a long s.p.a.ce he stood as if transfixed, his eyes straining to catch the expression on Clodagh's face, his pale, ascetic features puckered with anxiety.

The pause was long--preternaturally long. Clodagh stood as motionless as he, her hand still resting pa.s.sive in his clasp, her clear eyes staring into his in stupefied amazement. It was plainly evident that no realisation of the declaration just made had penetrated her understanding. To her mind--unattuned, even vaguely, to the idea of love, and temporarily numbed by her grief--the thought that her father's friend could consider her in any light but that of a child was too preposterous, too unreal to come spontaneously. The belief that Milbanke's extraordinary words but needed some explanatory addition held her attentive and expectant. And under this conviction, she stood unconscious of his close regard and unembarra.s.sed by the pressure of his hand.

At last, as some shadowy perception of her thoughts obtruded itself upon him, he stirred nervously, and the flush upon his face deepened.

"Clodagh," he said, "have I made myself plain? Do you understand that I--that I wish to marry you? That I want you for my--my wife?"

The final word with its intense incongruity cut suddenly through the mist of her bewilderment. In a flash of comprehension the meaning of his declaration sprang to her mind. Her face turned red, then pale; with a sharp movement she drew away her hand.

"You want to marry me?" she said in a slow, amazed voice.

Before the note of blank, undisguised incredulity, Milbanke shrank into himself.

"Yes," he said hurriedly--"yes; that is my desire. I know that perhaps it may--may seem incongruous. You are very young; and I----"

He hesitated with a painful touch of embarra.s.sment. At the hesitation, Clodagh's voice broke forth.

"But I don't want to marry," she cried; "I don't want to marry--any one."

There was a sharp, half-frightened note audible in her voice. For the moment, her whole att.i.tude was that of the inexperienced being who clings instinctively to the rock of present things, and obstinately refuses to be cast into the sea of future possibilities. For the moment, she was blind to the instrument that was forcing her towards those possibilities. To her immature mind it was the choice between the known and the unknown. Then suddenly and accidentally her eyes came back to Milbanke's face, and the personal element in the choice a.s.sailed her abruptly.

"Oh, I couldn't!" she cried involuntarily--"I couldn't!--I couldn't!"

She did not intend to hurt him; but cruelty is the prerogative of the young, and she failed to see that he winced before the decisive honesty of her words.

"Am I so--so very distasteful?" he asked in a low, unsteady voice.

She looked at him in silence. It was the inevitable clash of youth and age. She was warm-hearted, she was capable of generous action; but before all else, she was young--the triumphant inheritor of the ages.

Life stretched before her, while it lay behind him. She looked at him; and as she looked a wave of revolt--a strong, sudden sense of her individual right to happiness--surged through her.

"Oh, I couldn't!" she cried again--"I couldn't!"

And before Milbanke could reply--before he had time to comprehend the purport of her words--she had turned and fled in the direction of the house, leaving him standing as he was, dazed and petrified.

Upward along the path, Clodagh ran. Her impulse towards flight had been childish, and her thoughts as she sped forward were as unreasonable and confused as a child's. She was vaguely, blindly filled with a desire to escape--from she knew not what; to evade--she knew not what. Her one clear thought was that the prop upon which she had leaned in these days of sorrow and despair had unaccountably and suddenly been withdrawn; and that she stood woefully alone and unprotected.

On she ran, until the archway of the courtyard broke into view; then, without a moment's hesitation, she swerved to the left, sped across the yard, and burst unceremoniously into the kitchen.

In the kitchen Hannah was busying herself over the fire that, in the confusion of the morning's event, had been suffered to die down. At the tempestuous opening of the door she turned sharply round, and for a second stood staring at the disturbed face of her young mistress; then, with the intuitive tact of her race, she suddenly opened her ample arms, and with a sob Clodagh rushed towards her.

For a long moment Hannah held her as if she had been a baby, patting her shoulder and smoothing her ruffled hair, while she cried out her grief and bewilderment. At last, with a slow sobbing breath, she raised her head.

"Oh, Hannah, I want father!" she said--"I want father!"

Hannah drew her closer to her broad shoulder.

"Whisht, now!" she murmured tenderly--"whisht, now! Sure, he's betther off--sure, he's betther off."

But Clodagh's mind was too agitated to take comfort. With a change of mental att.i.tude, she altered her physical position--freeing herself abruptly from Hannah's embrace.

"Hannah," she cried suddenly, "Mr. Milbanke wants me to marry him. And I won't! I can't! I won't!"

Hannah's eyes narrowed sharply. But whatever her emotion, she checked it, and bent over her charge with another caress.

"Sure you won't, of course, my lamb. Who'd be askin' you?"

"No one."

"Thin why would you be frettin' yourself?"

"I'm not fretting myself. Only----"

"Only what?"

"Only---- Oh! nothing, nothing." With a distressed movement Clodagh pushed back her hair from her forehead. Then she turned to the old servant afresh. "Hannah," she demanded, "why does he want to marry me?

Why does he want to?"

Hannah was silent for a s.p.a.ce; then her shrewd, ugly face puckered into an expression of profound wisdom.

"Men are quare," she said oracularly. "The oulder, the quarer. Maybe he's thinkin' of himself in the matther; but maybe"--her voice dropped impressively--"maybe, Miss Clodagh, 'tis the way he's thinkin' of you----"

She paused with deep significance.

The effort after effect was not wasted. Clodagh looked up sharply.

"What do you mean?" she asked.

"Mane?" Hannah turned away, and, picking up a poker, began softly to rake the ashes from the fire. "Sure, what would I be manin'?"

"But you do mean something. What is it?"

Hannah went on with her task.

Clodagh stamped her foot.

"Hannah, what is it?"

"Nothin'. Sure, nothin' at all. I'm only sayin' what quare notions men takes."

"But you mean something else. What is it?"

Hannah stolidly continued to rake out the remnants of the fire.

"I know nothin'," she said obstinately. "Ask Mrs. Laurence."

"But you do. I know by your voice. What is it?"