Westways: A Village Chronicle Part 86

She knelt beside him, saw the one great beauty of the hardy bronzed face, the mouth now relaxed, with the perfect lip lines of a young Antinous. She bent over him intent, reading his face as a child reads some forbidden book, reading it feature by feature as a woman reads for the first time with understanding a pa.s.sionate love-poem. Ah, if he would but open his eyes and then sleep again and never know. He moved, and she drew back ready for flight, shy and startled. And now he was quiet. "I must-I must," she murmured. "His lips? Ah! would they forgive?-and-if, if he wakens, I shall die of shame. Oh, naughty love of mine that was so cruel yesterday, I forgive you!" What would he do-must he do-if he wakened? The risk, the urgent pa.s.sion of appealing love, gave her approach the quality of a sacred ceremonial. She bent lower, not breathing, fearful, helpless, and dropt on his forehead a kiss, light as the touch a honey-seeking b.u.t.terfly leaves on an unstirred flower. He moved a little; she rose in alarm and backed to the door. "Oh! why did I?" she said to herself, reproachful for a moment's delicious weakness. She looked back at the motionless sleeper, as she stood in the doorway. "Why did I?-but then he does look so young-and innocent."

Once more in the world of custom, she fled through the forest shadows, and far away sank down panting. She caught up the tumbled downfall of hair, and suddenly another Leila, laughed as she remembered that he would miss the game-bag he had set at his side. How puzzled he would be when he missed it. Amused delight in his wondering search captured her. She saw again the beauty of his mouth and the face above it as she recalled what her Aunt Margaret Grey had mischievously said to her, a girl, of James Penhallow. "He has the one Penhallow beauty-the mouth, but then he has that monumental Penhallow nose-it might be in the way." She had not understood, but now she did, and again laughing went away homeward, not at all unhappy or repentant, for who would ever know, and love is a priest who gives absolution easily.

CHAPTER x.x.xIV

In her room she went straight to the long cheval gla.s.s and looked at Leila Grey. "So, he will never ask me again?" The mirror reported a quite other answer. "Mark Rivers once said conscience runs down at times like a watch. I must have forgotten to wind up mine. How could I have done it!" She blushed a little at the remembrance. "Well, he will never know." She dressed in white summer garb with unusual care and went down the stairs smiling.

"The Captain is not in yet," said the maid.

She waited long for John Penhallow, who had gone up the back stairs, and now at last came down to dinner.

"Excuse me, Leila. I was so very tired that I fell asleep in the old cabin, but I had a n.o.ble tramp, and there are some birds, not many; I shot badly." He said no word of the displaced game-bag, which made her uneasy, but talked of the mills and of some trouble at the mines about wages. She pretended to be interested.

After dinner, she said, "You will want to smoke-come into Uncle Jim's library. I like the pipe smell. How Aunt Ann detests it!"

"Has Uncle Jim gone back to his pipe?" he inquired, as she sat down.

"Yes, and Aunt Ann declares that she likes it now."

"How pleasantly you women can fib," remarked John.

She made no reply except, "Well, sometimes." He did not fill his pipe although he lighted in succession two matches and let them burn out.

"Why don't you smoke, John?" This was a vague effort at the self-defence which she felt might be needed, the mood of the hour not being at all like the mood of two hours ago.

"No," he replied, "not yet. Where did you walk-or did you walk?"

"Oh, I took a little stroll through the woods."

"Did you chance to go by the old cabin?" This was very dreadful.

"Oh, one hardly remembers if one pa.s.ses places seen every day. Why do you ask, John?"-and then knew she was fatally blundering.

"Why? Oh, I fell asleep, and when I woke up my game-bag had mysteriously hung itself on the wall."

"You might have put it there and forgotten it."

"No, some one must have been in the cabin."

"Oh, John, how stupid of us! Why, of course, it was Josiah."

John was in a state of mind to enjoy the game, and shaking his head in negation said, "No, Josiah pa.s.sed me long before. He had a lot of frogs he caught in Lonesome Man's Swamp."

Miss Leila having exhausted all the possible explanations, said with sweet simplicity, "Did you ever find out the origin of that name? Who was the lonesome man? You see, John, lonesome seems to stand for lonely and sad, as Mr. Rivers said." This was rather too clever, but the young woman was so near detection as not to think wisely.

John repeated her words, "Lonely and sad." He had been humorously sure of his prey, but the words she used had the effect of bringing into direct speech the appeal she had been trying to evade and knew was near at hand.

He stood leaning against the mantel, his crippled arm caught in his waistcoat. Repeating her word "lonesome" "more than merely alone"-he put aside his pipe, the companion of many camp-fires. His moment of after-silence caused the blue eyes to question timidly with upward glance as their owner sat below him. He was very grave as he said, "I have come, Leila, to a critical time in my life. I loved you in a boy's unmeaning way; I loved you as a lad and a man. I have said so often in one way or another. You told me at West Point pretty plainly that-oh, you made it clear-that I was a boy asking a woman for her heart. It was years ago."

"John, I-want to-"

"Well-later-now I mean to have my say. You were not altogether wrong. I told you that I should ask again when I had more to offer than a boy cadet. Since then I have held my tongue, or said enough to be sure that your reply made clear that my time had not yet come.

"You cannot know how much you have been a part of my life. I went gladly into the war because it was a righteous cause. No man thinks as he goes into action, this is for my country, but-well, Leila, many times when men were falling around me, you have been with me. If a fatal ball had found me, I should have carried with me to another world a thought of you. This is not mere lover's talk. I believe in you-you are a n.o.ble-minded woman, worthy of any man's love, but"-and he smiled-"as Josiah put it, you are rather numerous."

"Am I?-I am much obliged by Josiah's study of my character."

"Don't, please, Leila! It is true. I have been as good as my word. I have been through all that can tempt in camps and cities. I was only a young officer, but I have won praise from men whose praise is history. Did you ever think that an honest love may be to a man like a second-an angelic-conscience? By Heaven! Leila, it should make a woman careful."

The woman's eyes had long since been lost to the man's, as with bent head she listened intently, for the first time amazed at what she had been to a man whose ideals were of the highest and his ways beyond reproach. A coy upward lift of the proudly carried head-a mere glance of transient reply-too brief for the man to read-might have meant, "Have not I too been careful of my life!"

He went on slowly. "You and I have not been spared the discipline of responsibility. Action, danger-helps a man. You at home have had the worst of it-you dear, sweet, beautiful thing. It would have made some women peevish or rebellious. You have grown under it in mind and heart, and I think the soul has fed the dear body. To have set you free from Aunt Ann's morbid unreason and the sorrow of Uncle Jim's condition would have been enough to repay my taking over responsibilities which Aunt Ann should have borne."

"John-I-"

"No, dear, let me say a word more. I have at last talked myself out-or almost. It is vain to put me aside again. You do not dare to say you do not love me-"

"You have not asked me," she murmured.

"No, I said I would not yesterday. A tender word would have brought me to your feet-and I was very sore."

"If you were a woman, you would have understood and-"

"Oh, wait a little," he said. "You are going to ask me to marry you, Leila Grey-" She was on her feet. "Take care," he cried, and a smile on the strong battle-tried face arrested her angry outburst.

She said only, "Why?-I ask-you-why indeed?"

"Because, Leila, you owe it to my self-respect-because you have given that which implies love, and all I ask-"

She looked up at him with eyes that implored pity, but all she found herself able to say was, "I don't understand."

"You kissed me in the cabin this afternoon-I was not asleep-I had half risen when I heard you, and I fell back in wondering quiet to see what you would do or say when you should wake me up."

She was silent.

"And then you kissed me-"

"Oh, John! how wicked of you-why did you keep so still?"

"I waited-longing."

"For what?"

"Hoping you would kiss me again."

"What! twice?" she cried. "How could you think I would kiss you twice-I was so ashamed-"

"Well, Leila?"