Part 10 (1/2)
Lady Fermanagh listened in grave--almost grim--silence, and with a troubled look in her fine eyes.
”My dear, do you realise that you have brought this on yourself?” she asked quietly, when she had heard Myra out. ”I warned you at Auchinleven that you would be playing with fire, and that it was extremely dangerous to trifle with a Spaniard. You deliberately set yourself out to play the part of siren, to make Don Carlos fall in love with you, and----”
”He had deliberately laid himself out before that to make me fall in love with him, and pleaded that he was only amusing himself when he was challenged,” interrupted Myra. ”That was an insult, and I wanted my revenge. If he did not expect me to take him seriously, he had no right to take me seriously, no right to take advantage and to kiss me as he did this afternoon. Now you are throwing the blame on me, just as he did himself! Why should there be one law for the man and another for the woman? It isn't fair!”
”My dear Myra, do try to preserve some sense of proportion,” said Lady Fermanagh gently. ”Admittedly it was quite wrong of Don Carlos to make pa.s.sionate love to you, knowing you were betrothed to Tony, but, as I have told you repeatedly, he was probably only following the custom of his race and did not expect to be taken seriously in the first instance.”
”And is it an unheard-of thing in Spain for a betrothed girl to play the part of coquette, and to flirt with the men who make love to her?”
interposed Myra again.
”No, no, not at all, but I need hardly remind you, Myra, that in England that sort of thing simply 'isn't done.' Besides, yours was no mere flirtation. You set out to fascinate and captivate Don Carlos, to make him fall madly in love with you, and you seem to have succeeded.
You admit you challenged him to kiss you----”
”He had no right to take what I said to Tony as a challenge, although I confess I said it to tantalise him.”
”Humph! If I were your age, as beautiful and attractive as you, and I had dared a man to kiss me, I should feel slighted, to say the least of it, and regard him as a poltroon, if he failed to take up my challenge,” commented Lady Fermanagh drily. ”You can't mean to say you did not expect Don Carlos to carry out the threat or promise he made in his note, particularly as you made no protest against his having entered your bedroom?”
”I--er--I don't know what I expected,” answered Myra, rather weakly.
”I mean, I did not intend to give him the opportunity to carry out his threat. And I thought it best to say nothing about the note, because I was afraid to risk a scandal, and I was somehow afraid that Don Carlos would turn the tables on me. Now I have a good mind to tell Tony, and to tell him what happened to-day, and leave him to deal with Don Carlos.”
”Do, by all means, my dear--if you want to make s.h.i.+pwreck of your life,” retorted Lady Fermanagh, sardonically. ”Tony will be flattered to find you were playing him off against Don Carlos at Auchinleven.
And perhaps not! He may decide, on reflection, that a girl who makes love to another man, or, if you prefer it, encourages another man to make love to her, during her engagement and in the house of her fiance, might do something of the same sort after marriage in the house of her husband.”
”Tony wouldn't be such a beast,” exclaimed Myra. ”If he dared to blame me, I'd break off my engagement and marry Don Carlos, if only to spite him.”
”Humph! And supposing, after breaking off your engagement, you found that Don Carlos did not want to marry you, what a fool you'd look and feel!” responded her aunt. ”My dear Myra, don't you realise that if the facts were known the world would condemn you for attempting to play fast and loose with both Tony Standish and Don Carlos de Ruiz, and the general verdict would be that it served you right to be left in the lurch. Tony would be quite justified in throwing you over, and by the time the gossips had finished your reputation would be--well, rather the worse for wear.”
”Aunt Clarissa, you don't really think Tony would throw me over if he knew?” asked Myra anxiously, after a thoughtful pause. ”Why, I told Tony at Auchinleven that I intended to flirt with Don Carlos and make him fall in love with me, but he would not take me seriously. I told him I meant it and was in earnest, but he only laughed. It is really all his fault. And he was so obtuse this afternoon. Surely he might have guessed what had happened.”
Lady Fermanagh sat silent for a full minute, then suddenly she rose and laid her hands on Myra's shoulders.
”Myra Rostrevor, answer me truthfully,” she commanded, with a searching glance. ”Are you, or are you not, in love with Don Carlos?”
”I--I don't know,” Myra answered, shaking her head distractedly. ”I think I hate him, but if I could believe he was really sincere and in earnest I think I should love him. If I had been tempting, teasing, and tantalising him to-day, as I did when we were at Auchinleven, I could excuse him for losing his head and kissing me. To-day I didn't give him the slightest encouragement. He had shown his indifference by going away without even a word of farewell, and I suppose he kissed me in cold blood merely to fulfil his threat and his boast that he always keeps a promise.”
”Cold-blooded kisses can hardly be very shocking, I should imagine,”
remarked Lady Fermanagh drily.
”They were not cold-blooded. He kissed me ravenously, pa.s.sionately, and almost stifled me. I felt as if he were drinking the heart out of me,” said Myra. ”If I was sure he is as frantically in love with me as he professes to be, I could excuse him, and I might find myself falling in love with him. It is the thought that he may still only be amusing himself, gratifying his vanity and trying to make good his boast that no woman can resist him, that galls me. If I confessed myself in love with him, and he then told me he had merely been amusing himself and proving his power, I should die of shame.”
”Why take the risk, Myra? You have been playing with fire, and the dice are loaded against you. That is an Iris.h.i.+sm and a mixed metaphor, I suppose, but you know what I mean. If you lose your heart to Don Carlos de Ruiz, you lose Antony Standish, and if you subsequently discover Don Carlos is not in earnest you will be left broken-hearted, humiliated, and with your matrimonial prospects ruined.”
”I have no intention of breaking my heart about Don Carlos, and don't intend to make a fool of myself, if that is what you mean,” said Myra, with a sudden change of manner. ”I said I'd fool Don Carlos to pay him out for a.s.serting he had only been amusing himself with me, and I'll do it yet--if I have not already done it. If he is actually in love with me, I have the laugh on him now, in spite of what has happened.”
”Myra, for goodness sake be sensible!” counselled Lady Fermanagh. ”If Don Carlos is actually in love with you and you make mock of him, his love may turn to hate. And I warn you that the hatred of a Spaniard is even more dangerous than his love.”
”Pooh! I'm not afraid of him, and I don't understand why I have been upsetting myself so much,” exclaimed Myra, impulsively starting to her feet. ”I'll get even with him. I'll go to the Cavendish's dance after all. Don Carlos is almost sure to be there, and I may get an opportunity to punish him for his impertinence.”
”Myra, I do wish you would drop this folly,” said her aunt. ”You must realise you are running grave risks and imperilling your own happiness.