A Practical Novelist Part 6

'But what am I to do if you won't marry me? All my friends know what I've come here for. It's absurd.'

'You had better desist.'

It is charitable to suppose that Dempster was utterly unaware of what he was doing. Anger nearly suffocated him. He twisted and squirmed at every word, writhing with the antic.i.p.ation of mockery.

'It's shameful,' he cried. 'Here have I been loving you like--like lava; and to be thrown overboard, ignominiously--yes, ignominiously'--he fancied he heard the word resounding in smoking-rooms--'for a poor n.o.body.'

Muriel started and glared at him. But he was 'fey,' and went on.

'You may well look! A foundling--a charity-boy! You love this sup--superfluous and probably illegitimate pauper, who----'

'O, you unmanly fool!'

'I say!' and he fell against the tree smitten by Muriel's thunder and lightning. The storm pealed on.

'I have read of men who spoke such cowardice, but I never thought to know one. How dare you talk of love? O the shame! Every wealthy fool can look at us, and love us, as they say, and whine to us--it _is_ a shame! What right have you to love me or think of me? If you ever wish to be worth a thought, or fit for his service whom you've slandered, go and found hospitals, endow scholars.h.i.+ps--fling your wealth in the sea--only get rid of it!

And plough the fields, break stones, dig ditches--some honest work your scanty brains are suited for; and when that has made you something of a man, go and beg his pardon. Go away from here, now, at once. He's waiting for me.'

Dempster limped away. His works were all run down. Youth is cruel, and Muriel had meant to wound; but she felt a little remorseful at the sight of the abject creature she had scorched and scotched with such crude severity, and wished that she had at least spared him the last savage cut. To be called a fool and a coward--to be told to get rid of one's personality, is bad; but to be dismissed in order to make instant room for the other, partakes too much of hacking and slas.h.i.+ng, and might even be put in the category with vitriol-throwing.

Muriel looked over the wall and called Frank. He was waiting somewhere near, she knew; and he came and climbed over and kissed her.

'Where were you hiding?' she asked.

'I sat on a stone by the side of the wall, and meant to sit there till the voices ceased, or you called me.'

'Did you hear what we said?'

'No.'

'Well, it doesn't matter just now. I'll tell you some other time.'

She sat down on the wall and bade him do the same. Dempster was forgotten: the stronger impression, that produced by Lee, came out through the more recent one like the original writing on a palimpsest.

'When one meets one's father,' she said, 'after a long absence, whether one knows him well or not, one's heart leaps, and a great thrill strikes through one.'

'Yes,' said Frank. 'I believe my nerves would ring to the sound of my father's voice if I were hearing it, though I've never seen him.'

'Don't imagine it for a moment, dear. When your father comes back after ten years you s.h.i.+ver in his presence--you feel as if you had jumped into a frosty sea out of the summer. I did when I went to him from you.'

She kicked her heels against the wall, and sat on her hands, looking round and up at Frank like a bird. Then she turned her gaze into the tree. In the mood that held her, to think was to resolve. She came to her feet, and stood before her lover.

'What would you think if I were to tell you that my father had chosen a husband for me?'

'I should think it the height of folly, unless I were his selection.'

'Come to him now. Say to him that you love me, and that I love you, and that he may kill me if he likes, but that I will never marry anybody else.'

'This is encouraging.'

'And you will need courage.'

'What is wrong?'

'You'll know soon enough. Come.' And she led him to the house. She danced along the path. Her eyes clashed against his.

'I'm in the major key,' she said.

No wonder she was in the major key. She had a vision of the encounter between her lover and her father; a wordy tournament in which the former bore off the honours. Her heart was fast melting down every feeling into a glowing rage at the man who, after ten years' absence, came to blight her life; and her body, the flames about that crucible, leapt and trembled. She could move only in bounds to a measure. Frank, mystified, but flushed by sympathy, followed her, admiring.

She took him straight to the library. Lee was not there.

'Wait here, and I shall find my father,' she said.

But Miss Jane came into the room.

'How in the name of all the proprieties dare you enter this house, sir?' she cried.

Frank, as the reader will surmise, had been forbidden the house.

Muriel sat down on the couch and pulled her lover to her side.

Then she rested her elbows on her knees and her chin in her hands, and looked at her aunt. It was grossly impertinent.

'For shame! What is the meaning of this folly, Muriel?' and the angry lady crossed the floor, and bristled before the couple with only a yard between.

Muriel became absolutely but serenely rabid.

'Mr. Hay is going to take supper with us to-night,' she said.

'Ring the bell please, aunt, and order supper to be hastened.'

Miss Jane towered, physically and morally.

'Muriel'--she spoke solemnly, as became her exaltation--'you wicked girl! You have much greater cause to keep your room and cry over your misdemeanours, than come here outraging all decency in this way. Have you no maidenly reserve at all?'

Then she leant towards Frank.

'Mr. Hay, I should think this exhibition of temper and impudence will make it needless to fear that you will aid further in thwarting our intentions with regard to Muriel. Indeed, I don't know at present how it will be possible for me to stand by quietly and see any young man, however eligible, throw himself away on such an incorrigible young woman.'

Thoroughly on fire at the imperturbable smile on Muriel's face, she leaned towards her again, a flaming tower of Pisa.

'Muriel, if ever you wish to regain the place you have lost in my esteem, you will tell Mr. Hay to leave this house at once, and never enter it again.'

Muriel fumbled in her pocket, and half-withdrew her hand, but thought better of it.

Miss Jane again menaced Frank.

'Mr. Hay, the cool effrontery you display in sitting quietly smiling--don't try to hide it, sir!--while the woman you profess to love throws to the winds all respect for herself and her betters, actually and openly defying her aunt----'