That Unfortunate Marriage Volume Iii Part 10

"I say," he said, with a curious look at Owen, "I'm going to marry May when I grow up."

"_Are_ you? That's a little awkward."

"Why is it a little awkward?" demanded Harold gravely.

"Well, because, to tell the truth, I was rather hoping to marry her myself."

The child had evidently intended to draw forth this explicit statement, for he looked full at Owen, and said doggedly, "I just thought you were!" Then he suddenly turned away and hid his face on May's lap. Upon which Wilfred, conscious of a cloud in the air, began to cry softly.

"Don't be angry with them, poor little fellows!" said May, checking some manifestation of impatience on Owen's part. Then she coaxed the children, and soothed them, and the childish emotion, brief though poignant, soon pa.s.sed. And at length Harold lifted up his face, and, after a short struggle, said--

"I will shake hands with him, if you like, but I won't love him--not if he kisses you."

"All right, old fellow," said Owen, taking the child's hand. "I sympathize with your feelings."

Wilfred, of course, put out his small paw to be shaken like his brother's, and peace once more reigned.

May then hurriedly--for she knew not how long they might remain uninterrupted--repeated what Clara Bertram had told her of her father's marriage; and, lastly, she spoke in terms of deep affection and grat.i.tude of "Granny's" generosity. But on this point, as we know, Owen was already informed.

All that he now heard strengthened and justified the strong inclination he already felt to abandon the idea of Buenos Ayres and to remain in England at all costs. With her father more completely cut off from his family than ever by this new marriage, her aunt hostile, her uncle, to say the least, dissatisfied, and sure to oppose her engagement when it should be announced, and no one friend in the world to rely upon except her grandmother, May's position would be very desolate if he, too, were far away on the other side of the world. Mrs. Dobbs was the trustiest and most devoted of parents, but she was old; and, moreover, she would have no power to insist on keeping May with her should her father take it into his head to decide otherwise. No; he must and would remain at hand to protect and watch over her. These were the sole considerations which decided him to come to this resolution then and there. But as soon as he had taken his resolution the thought arose pleasantly in his mind that it would bring some cheerfulness into the household at Collingwood Terrace, and he expressed it impulsively by saying all at once--

"I have made up my mind, darling, to stay in London. Poor Mrs. Bransby will be overjoyed. She is in such need of some one to stand by her."

May felt a little chill, like the breath of a cold wind. In the first warm delight of seeing her lover again, all the lurking jealousy, which she hated herself for feeling, but which was alive in spite of her hate, had been forgotten. But his words revived it. "Is she?" she answered.

"Oh yes; I have not had time to tell you--haven't even _begun_ to say the thousand things I want to say to you."

"You could not have written them, I suppose?" said May, withdrawing her chair slightly from its close proximity to his, and thereby allowing Harold, who had been watching for this opportunity, to wedge himself in between them.

"No; I could not have written all about _her_, because I have only just heard many of the details."

"All about '_her_'? You mean about Mrs. Bransby?"

"Of course. Poor soul, she has been so harshly, so cruelly treated!

Theodore's conduct is----"

"You know I have no partiality for him," interrupted May. "But I think you are a little unjust, or at least mistaken, in this instance.

Theodore Bransby has done a great deal for his stepmother."

"Done a great deal for her! Good Heavens, my dear child, you can't conceive with what meanness he treats her! It's dastardly. A woman who was so idolized, so tended, so petted----And what a sweet creature she is! And as lovely as ever! Her sorrows seem only to have spiritualized her beauty."

"Yes," said May. And the dry monosyllable cost her a painful effort to utter it. Perhaps the constraint of her tone, the deadness of her manner--naturally so warm and cordial--would have aroused Owen's surprise, and led to an explanation. But they were interrupted here by the door being thrown open, not violently, but very wide open, and the appearance of Mrs. Dormer-Smith on the threshold.

CHAPTER VI.

Even in the moment of her first dismay, that admirable woman Pauline Dormer-Smith was true to the great social duty of keeping up appearances. She turned her head over her shoulder to James, who was hovering uneasily in the background, and said softly, "Oh yes; it _is_ Mr. Owen Rivers. That is quite right"--as if Mr. Owen Rivers's presence were the most natural and welcome thing in the world. Then, shutting the door on James and on society, she advanced towards the two young people, who had risen on her entrance, and said, with a kind of reproachful feebleness, conveying the impression that she was reduced to the last stage of debility, and that it was entirely their fault, "I had scarcely credited the footman's statement that you were here having a private interview with my niece, Mr. Rivers. He tells me that he informed you of the family affliction which has befallen us. Under the circ.u.mstances, you must allow me to say that I think you have shown some want of delicacy in insisting on being admitted."

May glanced at Owen, but as he did not speak on the instant, she did.

She took her aunt's pa.s.sive fingers in her own, and said, "Aunt Pauline, he had a right to insist on seeing me, because----"

"Excuse me, May," interrupted Mrs. Dormer-Smith, waving the girl off, "I beg you will go to your own room; _I_ will speak with this gentleman."

Her tone would have suited the announcement that she was prepared to undergo martyrdom; and she sank into a chair in an att.i.tude of graceful exhaustion.

"No, Aunt Pauline, I _cannot_ go away until I have spoken," cried May pleadingly. "Please to hear me. I wished to tell you the truth long ago, but I was bound by a promise; now we are both agreed that it is right to speak out, are we not?" she said, looking across at Owen. It seemed to her that he was less eager to claim her, less proud of her affection, less ardently loving, than her imagination had pictured him. There was something in the quietude of his att.i.tude which depressed and mortified her; it was like--almost like indifference. An insidious jealousy was discolouring everything which she looked on with her "mind's eye." It is not always a sufficient defence against a poison of that sort to have a n.o.ble, candid nature, any more than it is a sufficient defence against foul air to have sound, healthy lungs; it will fasten sometimes on the worthiest qualities: a humble opinion of ourselves, a high admiration for others. The hinted slanders which May had heard had aroused no baser suspicion in her than that Owen perhaps did not love her so entirely as he at first had fancied--that his sympathy and compa.s.sion and admiration for Louisa Bransby were strong enough to compete with his attachment for _her_. And she knew by her own heart that if this were so his love was not such a love as she had dreamed of--not such a love as she had given to him. And yet all the while she was struggling against the influence of this subtly-penetrating distrust, and trying to shake it off, like an ugly dream.

"I am engaged to marry Owen Rivers," she said abruptly, after a pause which lasted but an instant, but which had seemed long to her.

"No, no; I must beg you to retire. I cannot hear this sort of thing,"

returned her aunt, waving her hand again, and turning away her head.

"_You_, at least, must understand, Mr. Rivers, that it is entirely out of the question. How you can have entertained so preposterous an idea I cannot imagine. You must have seen something of the world, I presume?

You ought to be able to perceive that--but, in short, the thing is preposterous, and cannot be seriously discussed for a moment."

May Cheffington's blood was rising. "I do not intend to discuss it," she said haughtily.

"Dearest, since your aunt addresses me, let me reply to her," said Owen.

He spoke in a quiet tone, although inwardly he was excited and indignant enough. "I must tell you, Mrs. Dormer-Smith, that we are neither of us acting on a rash impulse. We have been parted for more than three months, during which time May has been free to give me up without breaking any pledge, or incurring--from me, at least--any reproaches. If she had wavered--if she had found that she had mistaken her own feelings--she was free as air. I should have made no claim, and laid no blame, on her."

"Made no claim on her!" repeated Mrs. Dormer-Smith. Then she laughed the low laugh which, with her, indicated the very extremity of provocation.

"Oh, really! Ha, ha, ha! This is too monstrous. The whole thing appears to me like insanity."

"To marry without loving--_that_ appears to me like insanity," said May scornfully.

"May! I beseech you! Really, in the mouth of a young girl of your breeding that sort of thing is inconceivable--I am tempted to use a harsher word. _This_ then, is the reason why you have rejected one of the most brilliant prospects! Are you aware, Mr. Rivers, that this school-girl nonsense has prevented----" She caught herself up hastily, and changed her phrase--"might have prevented Miss Cheffington from obtaining one of the most splendid establishments in England?"

"Aunt Pauline!" cried May with hot indignation. "How can you say so? I would never have thought of marrying Mr. Bragg, even if Owen had not existed!"

"But apart from that," pursued Mrs. Dormer-Smith, ignoring the interruption, "your pretensions would have been quite inadmissible. You have heard of the death of my poor cousin Lucius. You had probably calculated on it. I do not mean to bring any special accusation against you there. Of course, in the case of a person of poor dear Lucius's social importance all sorts of calculations were made by all sorts of people. My brother Augustus is now the next heir to the family t.i.tle and estates. Under these circ.u.mstances I leave it to your own good sense to determine whether he is likely to consent to his daughter's marrying--really I am ashamed to speak of it seriously!--a person who, in however praiseworthy a manner, is filling the position of a hired clerk!"

This shaft fell harmless, since both May and her lover were honestly free from any sense of humiliation in the fact of Owen's being a hired clerk, and sincerely willing to accept that position for him.

Owen answered calmly, "You can probably judge far better than I, as to what your brother is likely to think on that subject." Then turning towards May, he said, "I think, my dearest, that you had better leave your aunt and me to speak quietly together. You have been sufficiently pained and agitated already. You look quite pale! Go, darling, and leave me to speak with Mrs. Dormer-Smith."

"Agitated!" echoed that lady. "We have all been sufficiently agitated.

What I have endured from pressure on the brain is unspeakable. Certainly you had better go away, May, I have said so several times already."

May walked slowly to the door. "I will do as you wish," she said to Owen.

"You see I am right, dear, do you not?"

"Yes; I suppose so."

The listlessness of her tone, he interpreted as a sign of her being weary and over-wrought. And, in truth, it was partly due to that cause.

As she moved across the room, two little figures crept out from a dark corner, behind an armchair, and followed her.