Читать книгу A Son of Ishmael - L. T. Meade - Страница 9

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Adrian Rowton kept his word to the letter. His iron will seemed to bend all things to his wishes. Nancy Follett forgot her father’s dying injunctions. Long John in his lair in London remained passive. Samson did not dare to utter a word. Rowton went backwards and forwards day by day from London to Andover. The special licence was procured—the rector was asked to come to church to perform his duty; and on a certain dull morning early in December, when the snow lay on the ground and the world was steeped in a winter’s fog, Nancy Follett stood by Adrian Rowton’s side and was made, with the full blessing of the Church, his lawful wedded wife.

The marriage was so unusual, so sudden and unexpected, that early as the hour was, the little church was filled. The men and women of the neighbourhood, who had noticed the girl in church with the interest people will always give to a mysterious, little known person, came to see her wedded. She made a very beautiful bride. Her white dress, perfectly simple and unbridal in its material, but enhanced the extreme fairness of her face; excitement had lent colour to her cheeks and made her dark grey eyes look almost black. Adrian Rowton’s height and magnificent physique were commented on by everyone. As he walked down the church with Nancy’s hand resting on his arm, he nodded to his friends, but Nancy kept her eyes lowered; she did not know anyone, and did not care to receive the smiles of strangers. The bridal pair went back to the Grange, where Nancy hastily changed her white dress for a somewhat shabby-looking travelling costume—it was the best she could make up at short notice—and in a carriage and pair the couple started for the railway station en route for Paris.

They arrived at their destination late that night and went straight to the Grand Hotel, where Rowton had telegraphed for rooms. They found a bedroom, dressing-room and a large salon at their service. Nancy felt intensely happy, but also queerly restless and excited. She walked about her salon and looked out of the window into the courtyard below. Large parties of smartly-dressed people were sitting there, a fountain playing in the middle; the place looked gay, very gay, and a splendid string band was playing martial music. Winter as it was, the night was clear and full of stars, the atmosphere was destitute of the faint suspicion of fog which almost always hangs over England in winter. Nancy opened the window and looked out; Rowton went and stood by her side.

“What do you think of Paris the gay?” he said.

Something in his tone made her start. She drew in her head, turned round and faced him.

“Why did you bring me to Paris for my honeymoon?” she asked suddenly.

“What do you mean, Nance?” he answered.

“What I say,” she replied. “Why did you bring me here? I had forgotten.”

She covered her face with her trembling hands; she shook from head to foot.

“My darling, what in the world is the matter?” asked Rowton in astonishment.

“I am oppressed by the strangest sensation,” replied the bride. “It will pass. Oh, yes, it will pass. Don’t speak to me for a minute.”

She left her bridegroom’s side and went over to the far end of the room. Sitting almost with her back to him, she gazed gloomily at the glowing hearth, where a pile of logs burned with cheerful blaze.

Rowton watched her with knitted brow and in some perplexity.

She felt that he was watching her. Suddenly she sprang to her feet and faced him.

“You wonder at me?” she said.

“I do,” he answered.

“The thing is past,” she said with a smile. “But I must tell you; I cannot keep a secret from you on our wedding night. For a moment, Adrian, I—I who love you with passion, with devotion, with a love which seems to me to pass the love of any ordinary woman, I felt that I hated you—for a moment you became intolerable to me; I shrank from your face—you reminded me in some incomprehensible way of Anthony.”

“Of Anthony!” exclaimed Rowton. “Who is Anthony?”

“My brother Anthony. Oh! we must not speak of him.”

“Had you a brother named Anthony?” asked Rowton.

“I had. He is dead. I never care to talk of him. You look queer, Adrian; did you ever know anyone of that name?”

“Yes, I once met a man of the name. He passed into my life and passed out of it; I have a somewhat disagreeable reminiscence of him. Let us go downstairs, Nance; why should we stay here alone?”

“But it is our wedding night,” she answered. She went to his side, put her arms round his neck and laid her fair soft head on his breast.

“Look me in the face, little girl,” said her husband. He placed his hand under her chin and raised her charming face, gazing full into the lovely eyes which she raised to his. “You don’t hate your husband now, do you?”

“No, no, no!” she reiterated. “It was a passing sensation, just a momentary queer stirring in my heart; it came when I suddenly remembered that we were in Paris for our honeymoon. The fact is this, Adrian. Since father’s death I have been in a whirl, and it was only a few minutes ago that I suddenly remembered Paris in connection with⸺ Oh! there is something I must never say to you—the thought rather overpowered me for a moment, and I remembered poor dead Anthony. I won’t speak of him again. Yes, I love you, my darling, my best, my noblest. Adrian, I mean to be a good wife to you.”

“Just go on loving me, Nance, and I shall want nothing further,” he replied. “No one else loves me, and although I am a hard, dare-devil sort of chap, I hunger for love—the soft beautiful love of a good woman. You are a good woman, my angel, and you are mine; you love me and I love you; just bathe me in your love, sweetheart, and I ask for nothing further. A perfect wife I do not want—I do not look for a perfect wife, but I do want a wife whose whole heart is mine, who is mine absolutely.”

“And I am yours, absolutely,” she answered.

“I can be fiercely jealous,” he continued. “If I thought you gave any part of yourself to anybody or anything but me, I don’t know what I wouldn’t do. Even if you gave your love to a dead man, Nance, I should be jealous—and jealousy with me would be fierce—I am all fierce passion. The side I turn to you, my darling, is almost angel, for you make it so, but all the rest of me is demon; you must keep that little angel bit of me alive, and you will, if you love me with your whole complete entire heart.”

“I do, I do,” she replied. “You are all in all to me. Would I have disobeyed my father’s dying wish if I had not loved you best of all? I love no one else, Adrian.”

“And I love no one else,” he answered with a laugh. “Come, Nancy, we have a whole month to make merry in. We will make merry—we’ll have a royal good time. Do you hear that music in the courtyard? Does it not seem to draw you?”

“It does,” she replied, “it is wonderful.”

“We’ll go and sit there, and listen to it.”

“But there are strangers there, and I am shy.”

“You shan’t be shy long, my beauty—you shall meet fresh faces daily, and fresh lives will touch your life, and your time will be gay, very gay. We will go out shopping to-morrow and you shall buy lovely things—wonderful raiment of all sorts to make a fit setting for that grave, soft, magical loveliness of yours. I shall take delight in choosing things for you. You don’t know yourself yet, Nance; you don’t know what a great gift is yours, what a power you have in your face; but your beauty will be acknowledged by all when you wear the things which I shall buy for you. Yes, we will have a fine time to-morrow, just the time which they say a woman loves. But now, come downstairs with me and sit in the court.”

“They are all wearing wraps of some sort, and I have nothing pretty,” said Nancy. “You know that I came to you without a trousseau, Adrian.”

“What is a trousseau?” asked Rowton.

“Oh! all the pretty things that brides bring to the men they love—they are called by the collective name ‘trousseau.’”

“Then this right loyal lover will give his bride the pretty things himself, and—stay a moment, a recollection comes to me. I believe I stuffed something into my portmanteau, something which I thought would suit you. Wait a moment.”

Rowton went into the adjoining bedroom. He returned in a few moments with a thin parcel wrapped in tissue paper.

“There,” he said, “you can wrap that round you. I don’t believe a lady down there will have anything more radiant to sun herself in.”

Nancy took the pins out of the paper and the next moment a gossamer shawl woven with what appeared like every thread of the rainbow—as light as a feather, as fine as a cobweb—was extended on her arm.

“This is wonderful!” she exclaimed. “I never saw anything so like a bit of the sun itself.”

“It came from Persia, it is only a trifle,” said Rowton. “I thought of you when I put it away; let me wrap it round you; now come down stairs.”