Nell, of Shorne Mills Part 26

Drake smoked in silence for a moment or two. Most men would have said at once that Lady Lucille Turfleigh had, on his change of prospects, jilted him; but Drake had some old-world notions of honor in respect to women, and he could not give Lady Luce away.

"I'm afraid I can't marry Luce," he said. "Our engagement is broken off."

The earl swore a good old Tory oath.

"Then you ought to be ashamed of yourself!" he said. "One of the nicest girls I know, and--devoted to you. More devoted to you than you deserve.

And you don't mean to marry her? I suppose you've seen some one else?"

Drake grew hot, but he still clung to his notion of honor.

"I tell you what it is, Drake," said the earl, bringing down his port gla.s.s on the table so violently that it snapped off at the stem, "you young fellows of the present day haven't any idea of honor. Here's a girl, a beautiful girl, and nice in every way, simply devoted to you, and you go and throw her over. For some insane fancy, I suppose! Well, see here, I'm d----d if I'll countenance it. I abide by my condition.

You make it up with Luce and marry her, and I'll settle this money on you, as I've said. If not----"

Drake knocked the ash off his cigarette and looked straight before him.

He could still save himself by telling the truth and sacrificing Lady Luce. But that was not his way.

"I'm sorry, sir----" he began.

"Sorry be d----d!" broke in the earl tempestuously. "Will you, or will you not?"

"I can't," said Drake quietly.

The old man rose to his feet, flinging his serviette aside.

"Then, by Heaven! I've done with you!" he exclaimed. "I made you a fair offer. I've only asked you to act like a gentleman, a man of honor. Am I to understand that you refuse?"

Drake had also risen slowly.

"I'm afraid I must, sir," he said.

"All right," said the earl, red with anger. "Then there's nothing more to be said. You can go your own way. But permit me to tell you----"

"Oh, don't, sir!" said Drake, rather sadly. "I can't do what you ask.

G.o.d knows I would if I could, but--it's impossible. For Heaven's sake, don't let us quarrel----"

"Quarrel! I am as cool as a cuc.u.mber!" exclaimed the earl, his face the color of beetroot. "All I say is"--here a twinge of the gout checked his utterance--"that you're behaving shamefully--shamefully! We'd better join the ladies--I mean Lady Angleford----"

"I think I'll get you to excuse me, sir," said Drake. "There is no need to upset Lady Angleford. She asked me here with the very best intentions, and she would be disappointed if she knew we had--quarreled.

There is no need to tell her. I'll clear out. Make my excuse to her."

"As you like," said the earl shortly. "But let me tell you that I think you are----"

"No end of a fool, I've no doubt," said Drake, with a rather weary smile. "I dare say I am. But I can't help it. Good night, sir."

The earl muttered something that sounded like "good night," and Drake left the house. He ought to have said good night to Lady Angleford, but he s.h.i.+rked it. He bore her no animosity; indeed, he liked her very much--so much that he shrank from telling her about this quarrel with his uncle; and he knew that if he went to her she would get it out of him.

He walked home, feeling very miserable and down on his luck. How he hated London, and all that belonged to it! Like a whiff of fresh air the memory of Shorne Mills wafted across his mind. He let himself in with his latchkey, and, taking a sheet of note paper, made some calculations upon it. There was still something remaining of his mother's fortune to him. If he were not Lord Drake Selbie, but simply Mr. Drake Vernon, he could manage to live upon it. The vision of a slim and graceful girl, with soft black hair and violet-gray eyes, rose before him. It seemed to beckon him, to beckon him away from the hollow, heartless world in which he had hitherto lived. He rose and flung open wide the window of his sitting room, and the breath of air which came through the London streets seemed fragrant with the air which wafted over Shorne Mills.

No pen, however eloquent, can describe the weariness of the hours for Nell which had pa.s.sed since "Mr. Drake Vernon" had left Shorne Mills.

Something had seemed to have gone out of her life. The sun was s.h.i.+ning as brightly, there was the same light on the sea, the same incoming and outgoing tide; every one was as kind to her as they had been before he left, and yet all life seemed a blank. When she was not waiting upon mamma she wandered about Shorne Mills, sailed in the _Annie Laurie_, and sometimes rode across the moor. But there was something wanting, and the lack of it made happiness impossible. She thought of him all day, and at night she tossed in her little bed sleeplessly, recalling the happy hours she had spent with him. G.o.d knows she tried hard to forget him, to be just the same, to feel just the same, as she had been before he had been thrown at her feet. But she could not. He had entered into her life and become a princ.i.p.al part of it, absorbed it. She found herself thinking of him all through the day. She grew thin and pale in an incredibly short time. Even d.i.c.k himself could not rouse her; and Mrs.

Lorton read her a severe lecture upon the apathy of indolence.

Life had been so joyous and so all-sufficing a thing for her; but now nothing seemed to interest her. There was a dull, aching pain in her heart which she could not understand, and which she could not get rid of. She longed for solitude. She often walked up to the top of the hill, to the purple moor over which she had ridden with Drake Vernon; and there she would sit, recalling every word she had said, every tone of his voice. She tried to forget him, but it was impossible.

One evening she walked up the hill slowly and thoughtfully, and seated herself on a mossy bank, and gave herself up to that reverie in which we dream dreams which are more of heaven than of earth.

Suddenly she heard the sound of footsteps. She looked up listlessly and with a slight feeling of impatience, seeing that her reverie was disturbed.

The footsteps came nearer, a tall figure appeared against the sunset.

She rose to her feet, trembling and filled with the hope that seemed to her too wild for hope.

In another moment he was beside her. She rose, quivering in every nerve.

Was it only a dream, or was it he? He held her hand and looked down at her with an expression in his eyes and face which made her tremble, and yet which made her heart leap.

"Nell!" he said.

CHAPTER XII.

They stood and looked at each other in silence for a moment; but what a silence!

It almost seemed to Nell as if it were not he himself who stood before her, but just a vision of her imagination, called up by the intensity of her thoughts of him. The color came and went in her face, leaving it, at last, pale and startled. And he, too, stood, as incapable of speech as any of the shy and bashful young fishermen on the quay; he, the man of the world, who had faced so many "situations" with women--women of the world armed with the weapons of experience, and the "higher culture." At that moment, intense as it was, the strength of the emotion which swept over him and mastered him, amazed him.

He knew, now that he was face to face with her, how he had missed this girl, how keen and intolerable had been his longing for her.

He remembered to hold out his hand. Had he done so yet? For the life of him, he could not have told. The sight of the sweet face had cast a spell over him, and he did not know whether he was standing or sitting.

As she put her small hand in his, Nell recovered something of her self-possession; but not all, for her heart was beating furiously, her bosom heaving, and she was in agony lest he should see the mist of dew which seemed to cover her eyes.

"I'm afraid I startled you," he said.

Nell smiled faintly, and drew her hand away--for he had held it half unconsciously.

"I think you did--a little," she admitted. "You see, I--we did not expect you. And"--she laughed the laugh he had heard in his dreams, though it had not always been so tremulous, so like the flutelike quaver of this laugh--"and even now I am not quite sure it is you."

"It is I--believe me," he said. "It is the same bad penny come back."

Then it flashed upon him he must give some reason for his return.

Incredible as it may seem, he was not prepared with one. He had made up his mind to come; he would have gone through fire and water to get back to Shorne Mills, but he had quite forgotten that some excuse would be necessary.

But she did not seem to see the necessity.

"Are you quite well now?" she asked, just glancing up at him.