Читать книгу The Two Carnations - Bowen Marjorie - Страница 6

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The Marquis de Champlain sat in his lodgings holding Sir Harry's letter in his hand, his untasted chocolate at his side, his face worn and his expression bitter.

Tumultuous and intense trouble and wrath surged in his heart; presently the anguish of his loss, the pain of his disappointment would be uppermost, but now the sense of outraged pride was predominant, and he felt a hot fury towards the woman he loved who had coquetted with him for a season only to so insultingly reject his offer of his name and heart.

How successfully she had done it! Though they had never had a moment alone, yet she had managed to especially distinguish him among the cavaliers who attended her, convey to him in a thousand subtle ways, by a glance, by an intonation, by a movement of her fan, that he was agreeable to her; nay more, that she understood his feelings and returned them.

So at least the Marquis had believed, and so firm was his conviction that she cared for him that even now with her brother's formal, even cruel, note in his hand, and the shrivelled carnation lying on the table at his side, he could scarcely credit her complete and contemptuous rejection of him. If it had not been for the gift of the carnation he would have believed that there had been trickery, but that she had sent him the flower convinced him that she had both received and read his note.

He writhed at the recollection of Mr. Wedderburn's face as he had handed him the fatal flower. Surely, he thought bitterly, she might have spared him that, cold coquette though she was, just as she might have sent him an answer in her own hand instead of showing his letter to her brother as she must have done.

She was an accomplished jilt indeed, he thought, as he reviewed those delicate but decided marks of her favour on which he had built such high hopes—and how like a fool he had fallen into the snare of her smiles and glances! She was no doubt at this very moment laughing over his discomfiture with her maid or her brother, ridiculing his presumption and his vanity. And she was "promised," her brother said, to someone else—Mr. Wedderburn, of course.

The Marquis found his chance to sneer in this reflection; he set his nobility, his old estates far above the vast wealth of Mr. Wedderburn. She was selling herself after all, for he was very sure that she did not love this man, and he could scorn her. He had played the finer part in this comedy of theirs—better to be a sincere fool than a false wit—and as such she had proved herself. He would not regret her. In his own country he would forget the fair deceptive face, the eyes of English hazel, the locks of English brown, the pale vermilion lips.

He rose up impetuously and tore Sir Harry's letter into a hundred fragments. Then his mood changed. "Oh, my darling, my darling, but I do love you!" he cried to himself, and wildly resolved to seek her out, to tell her that this thing could not be, that she cared for him, that she must care for him, that he would make her care, that neither her brother nor Mr. Wedderburn mattered in the least, and that only from her own lips would he take his dismissal.

Then his glance fell on the striped carnation, shrivelled now and brown, and his pride reasserted itself.

With an effort he pulled himself together. She had had her season's amusement, and both season and amusement were over now; he would play his part elegantly to the end, leaving her to retire in the blaze of her wealthy marriage. At least she should not see his wound; he could still show a smiling front—to Sir Harry and all of them.

He rang for his valet and his barber, and was splendidly attired, powdered, perfumed, curled and adorned.

Then, a proud figure in violet velvet encrusted with crystal and silver embroidery, with his black beaver at a martial cock, and his ebony cane under his arm, he went forth into the streets of Bath, and straight to the fashionable promenade where he knew he would find Miss Ursula Brent.

The day was mild and lovely; there were flowers everywhere, in the hats of the ladies, in their fichus, in the cravats of the gentlemen, in the flat rush baskets of the hawkers, in the windows and balconies; the sky was superbly blue and the mad golden sparkle of spring danced in the air.

But the Marquis de Champlain found it all blackness; he hated Bath, he hated England, he felt as if all these gay, smiling, well-dressed people were mocking and gibing at him; he longed fiercely to be away from them all, to be back in Paris or Versailles among his own nation.

But first he must see Ursula Brent, and show her that he could take her rebuff with a smile.

He had not walked far before he perceived her, and at the sight all his anger died, and his heart almost stopped with the sheer pain the thought of losing her brought, at the absolute anguish of the near parting that would be for ever.

In that moment he wished he had never put his fortune to the test, not for his pride's sake, but because if he had not he could still have remained near her; better her false glances than never to see her. He knew her now for a heartless coquette; but still he loved her—he could not disguise from himself that he loved her as much as ever.

She came on, unconscious of him. She wore a white muslin dress that flowed in frills and ruffles from her slender waist to her tiny sapphire-coloured shoes; she carried a mauve silk parasol with a heavy fringe, and the light and shade flickered all over her gently stepping beauty.

The Marquis stood still, waiting for her. The impetuous rush of his romantic passion towards her was checked by the sight of her two companions, Sir Harry and Mr. Wedderburn. He hated them in the same measure that he loved her, and this hate nerved him to await them calmly.

When she was only a few paces away she saw him, and the colour flew into her face.

He bowed very low; the two gentlemen saluted him. Mr. Wedderburn's greeting was pleasant and careless, but Sir Harry blushed almost as deeply as his sister. Ursula was the first to speak.

"Ah, my lord," she said, "why did you not take leave of me last night?"

He looked at her straightly. Did she then still intend to mock him?

His gaze seemed to discompose her. She added hurriedly:

"Are you coming to Lady Grantham's fête this afternoon? Of course you are."

"No, madame," he answered quietly.

Ursula paled, but smiled and said gently: "Please, do—it will increase my pleasure."

The Marquis felt the blood rush angrily to his heart. So she thought that he was still her plaything, that he would still loiter at her side and allow her to exhibit him to all Bath as a hopeless admirer of her beauty.

"Madame, I am returning to London to-day," he answered sternly.

"So soon?" remarked Mr. Wedderburn, putting up his glass.

Ursula took no notice of him; her eyes were fixed on the Marquis; it seemed to her that a great disaster was about to befall.

"To London?" she repeated.

"To-morrow I leave for Paris," he answered gravely. "I will therefore make my adieux now...messieurs...madame."

He bowed again, once to the gentlemen, once to her, and turned on his heel, and so left her before all Bath.

"A mighty cool leave-taking," remarked Mr. Wedderburn; but Sir Harry was dumb with shame.

Ursula noticed neither the comment nor her brother's silence; the world was suddenly blotted with black, hideous, grotesque. He had then meant to slight, nay more than slight, to insult her!

First by his bouquet of over-blown roses and his message, now by this unheard of farewell. This sudden departure for his own country was to humiliate and mortify her.

And there is no more cruel humiliation for a proud and sensitive nature than to find one whom they have trusted and believed in prove himself unworthy before those who have always vowed that belief and trust were misplaced.

This had happened; before her brother and his friend the Marquis had proved himself the very man they had always declared he was—a trifler, a heartless man of fashion who had been amusing himself—one who, perhaps (and this was the most terrible thought of all), had discovered that she was no heiress, was indeed without any dower.

Ursula raged inwardly; she persuaded herself that she had never cared for him, that now she hated him; she resolved fiercely that she would so play her part that no one should guess that it was she who had been jilted.

How she contrived to get through the morning she never knew; she heard her own voice as if it were a stranger's voice very far away; she saw the moving figures about her through a blur and a mist; the sunshine was dark, and she could not see the flowers.

At last she reached home, at last gained her own room, dismissed her maid, and was alone.

She flung off her hat and fichu and cast herself on the floor, hiding her face in her hands, and, resting them against a frail little satin chair, she broke into a storm of bitter weeping.

She felt that life was over for her; that nothing that happened now could matter at all. If it had not been for her outraged pride that cried aloud to her for help and healing she would willingly have contemplated death.

As it was, she felt that the only object in living was to hide her wound from the world and disguise her humiliation from the curious.

"After to-day," she moaned between her sobs, "I will never weep again—what is there to weep for? My heart is dead and empty; these are the last tears I shall ever shed; alas, that they should be for a worthless man!"

Then her love began to show its head again and to justify him. Was he worthless? The fact that he did not love her did not show him so—perhaps he had never credited her with being so simple as to be sincere—he came from a different country that had a different code—had she not been warned against foreigners?

What right had she to assume that because he had been her cavalier of the season he wanted her as his love and wife for ever? Was it his fault if she had misread his glances? Yet the cruelty of his final rejection of her, the curt farewell before all Bath, his message last night!

He was vain and a trifler, she could not disguise that from herself, but in the generosity of her love she absolved him from all other charges. It was her fault if she had given all her heart for nothing and she must pay the penalty, and bear the penalty silently—yes, even if she killed herself in the so doing.

With a tremendous effort she rose and forced back her tears and checked her sobs, mechanically arranged her crumpled gown and smoothed her disordered hair.

She had scarcely done so before Timor, the black page, was at her door with a message from her brother that he would like to speak to her at once.

With a heavy step, a heavier heart, but a composed demeanour, she descended to the magnificent withdrawing-room, where, not so many hours previously, her brother and Mr. Wedderburn had plotted against her happiness.

She found Sir Harry with his back to the window; he was considerably graver than his wont, but she was too preoccupied to notice it.

She seated herself at her little satinwood work-table, and picked up a pile of tangled silks that she began to unravel as an excuse for keeping her head down, and so hiding her red eyes.

"Well, my dear, what is it?" she asked languidly.

"Something serious," he answered, "something not pleasant."

"Serious? Not pleasant?" she echoed. Her heart sank; her brother was in debt again, no doubt; but why did he come to her? She could not help him.

Sir Harry paused a moment and then said:

"I thought that you were going to marry Monsieur de Champlain, therefore I have been silent—waiting for him to speak." Ursula shuddered strongly.

"What made you think that?" she asked dully.

"My dear, everyone thought it."

Everyone! She sat with her fingers still in the skeins of silk. So her humiliation was even greater than she had thought; she was a laughing-stock!

Sir Harry glanced at her bent head.

"But now this gallant has gone without speaking, Ursula."

She looked up now.

"I thought you disliked him! You gave him no chance to come near me, to see me alone; you were always speaking against him!"

"I did not wish him to make you ridiculous. I did not trust him, but I saw you cared for him and I hoped he would marry you."

The anguish of humiliation was almost more than she could endure.

"I shall faint before he has finished speaking," she thought.

"But he has gone," continued Sir Harry. "I suppose he could not afford to marry a poor wife—that is the brutal truth, my dear. Here are you, good, noble, beautiful, and a toast, but what offers have you had? None, while plain women with swinging fortunes marry every day. There is the truth you have got to face, Ursula."

"I don't wish to marry at all," she cried wildly.

He took no notice of that, but went on gravely:

"I did not like this fellow, but he was in some ways a good match, and I should have been glad to see you his wife if only because it would have saved you from my ruin."

She got somehow to her feet; the silks fell to the floor, and she stood clutching the back of the chair.

"Your—ruin?"

"It is that, my dear, no less."

She was as white as her muslin gown.

"I—I—never guessed!"

"No." Genuine emotion, genuine rage against circumstances, lent sincerity to his words. "I did not mean that you ever should, If you had married I could have let you go to France and never have spoken—as it is, I cannot disguise it any longer."

She tried to rally herself; his display of feeling, his obvious deep trouble touched her.

With a woman's instinct she thrust her anguish into the background to comfort the man's distress.

"What do you mean by ruin, Harry?" she asked. "Are you in debt? But everyone is."

"Not as I am—when they are they shoot themselves like young Charlton did at Tunbridge Wells last week."

"I never knew!" she murmured.

"Where did you think the money was coming from?" he demanded. "Did you think we were living like this"—he waved his hand round the room—"with a town house, and a glass coach, and ten servants apiece, on a few beggarly acres in Kent?"

Her common sense saw this at once; she blamed herself bitterly as a fool, and a wicked fool, not to have considered it before, but she had never thought; women never considered money.

"It did not occur to me," she faltered. "You were always so open-handed and gay, Harry, and we have always been well off; and there is the property in Scotland and the Manor in Devon."

"Those went long ago," he answered, "and Brent Hall"—he named their old home in Kent—"is mortgaged more than it can carry."

"Oh!" she gave a cry of bitter distress.

"This season sees the end of me," he continued. "I can do no more. We are done for, both of us. I have behaved like a knave to you, but I always let you spend the money as freely as I did myself, and I always hoped that you would make a good match."

"Oh, Harry!" she answered impulsively; "I am as much to blame as you. I have been as reckless and extravagant as you; I have—nay, when I think of it, I wonder that we have managed so long."

"We should not have been able to if it had not been for Steven Wedderburn."

"Ah, I knew you owed him money."

"I owe him everything."

"Everything?"

"Even honour. He redeemed some bonds of mine that were overdue in the City, he settled some bets, he has paid for everything we possess, Ursula—bah! why continue? I owe him everything."

"Dear Heaven!" said the girl, sickening at the thought.

The brother looked at her, and a guilty flush stole into his cheeks.

"Ursula, I am in this man's power," he said.

Her eyes widened.

"He wants something for what he has done for us?"

"Yes."

"What?"

"Ursula, he loves you."

"I know," she said coldly.

"Last night he asked me for your hand."

She flushed and winced as if she had been struck in the face.

"Oh, the knave!" she cried. "The low knave!"