Part 82 (1/2)

”Mr Vine,” said Leslie hotly, ”I cannot stay here to discuss this matter with Miss Vine.”

”Miss Marguerite Vine,” said the old lady with an aggravating smile.

Leslie gave an impatient stamp with one foot, essayed to speak, and choking with disappointment and anger, failed, and hurried out of the house.

”Such insufferable insolence! And at a time like this,” cried Aunt Marguerite, contemptuously, as her brother with a curiously absorbed look upon his face began to pace the room. ”He has sent the poor girl sobbing to her room.”

”Louise has not engaged herself to this man, Marguerite?”

”Engaged herself. Pah! You should have been here. Am I to sit still and witness another wreck in our unhappy family through your weakness and imbecility? Mr Leslie has had his answer, however. He will not come again.”

She swept out of the room, leaving her brother gazing vacantly before him.

”She seems almost to have forgotten poor Harry. I thought she would have taken it more to heart. But Monsieur De Ligny--Monsieur De Ligny?

I cannot think. Another time I shall remember all, I dare say. Ah, my darling,” he cried eagerly, as Louise re-entered the room. ”You heard what Mr Leslie said?”

”Yes, father.”

”And refused him?”

”Yes.”

Her father took her hand, and stood trying to collect his thoughts, which, as the result of the agony from which he had suffered, seemed now to be beyond control.

”Yes,” he said at last, ”it was right. You could not accept Mr Leslie now. But your aunt said--”

He looked at her vacantly with his hand to his head.

”What did your aunt say about your being engaged?”

”Pray, pray, do not speak to me about it, dear,” said Louise, piteously.

”I cannot bear it. Father, I wish to be with you--to help and comfort, and to find help and comfort in your arms.”

”Yes,” he said, folding her to his breast; ”and you are suffering and ill. It is not the first time that our people have been called upon to suffer, my child. But your aunt--”

”Pray, dearest, not now--not now,” whispered Louise, laying her brow against his cheek.

”I will say no more,” he said tenderly. ”Yes, to be my help and comfort in all this trouble and distress. You are right, it is no time for thinking of such things as that.”

Volume 2, Chapter XXII.

AUNT MARGUERITE MAKES PLANS.

”I could not--I could not. A wife should accept her husband, proud of him, proud of herself, the gift she gives him with her love; and I should have been his disgrace. Impossible! How could I have ever looked him bravely in the face? I should have felt that he must recall the past, and repented when it was too late.”

So mused Louise Vine as she sat trying to work that same evening after a wearisome meal, at which Aunt Marguerite had taken her place to rouse them from their despondent state. So she expressed it, and the result had been painful in the extreme.

Aunt Marguerite's remedy was change, and she proposed that they should all go for a tour to the south of France.

”Don't shake your head, George,” she said. ”You are not a common person. The lower cla.s.ses--the uneducated of course--go on nursing their troubles, but it is a duty with people of our position to suffer and be strong. So put the trouble behind us, and show a brave face to the world. You hear this, Louise?”