Part 41 (1/2)
”Ah!” said Lettice, sadly, ”it is the first time you have ever spoken sharply to me, and that is part of my punishment!”
Mrs. Hartley sank back in her chair, and looked as though she was about to take refuge in a quiet fit of weeping.
”I can't comprehend it,” she said; ”I thought we were going to be so happy; and I am sure you and Brooke would suit each other exactly.”
”Oh no, indeed; there are thousands of women who will make him a better wife than I could ever have done.”
”Now, do listen to me, and give yourself at least a week to think it over, before you say all this to Brooke! That cannot make things worse, either for him or for yourself. Why should you be so rash about it?”
”I wish I could see any other way out of it--but I cannot; and I have been thinking and thinking all the night long. It is a case of conscience with me now.”
”You cannot expect me to see it, dear,” said Mrs. Hartley, rising from her chair. ”It is simply incomprehensible, that you should first agree to wait a month, and then, after a few hours, insist on giving such a pointed refusal. Think, think, my darling!” she went on, laying a caressing hand on Lettice's shoulder. ”Suppose that Brooke should feel himself insulted by such treatment. Could you be surprised if he did?”
Lettice buried her face in her hands, mutely despairing. Her punishment was very hard to bear, and the tears which trickled through her fingers showed how much she felt it. With an effort she controlled herself, and looked up again.
”I will tell him all,” she said. ”He shall be the judge. If he still wishes to renew his question in a month, I will hold myself to that arrangement. I shall claim nothing and refuse nothing; but if he voluntarily withdraws his offer, then, dear, you will see that there could be no alternative.”
Mrs. Hartley bent to kiss her.
”I suppose that is all that can be done, Lettice. I am very sorry that my darling is in trouble; but if I could help you, you would tell me more.”
Then she left the room, and Lettice went to her desk and wrote her letter.
”DEAR MR. DALTON,--When you asked me yesterday if there was any one to whom I had given my love, I said there was no one. I ought to have thought at the time that this was a question which I could not fairly answer. I am obliged now to confess that my answer was not sincere. You cannot think worse of me than I think of myself; but I should be still more to blame if I allowed the mistake to continue after I have realized how impossible it is for me to give you the answer that you desire. I can only hope that you will forgive me for apparently deceiving you, and believe that I could not have done it if I had not deceived myself. Sincerely yours,
”LETTICE CAMPION.”
It was written; and without waiting to criticize her own phrases, she sent it to the Palazzo Serafini by a special messenger.
Brooke Dalton knew that he did not excel in letter writing. He could indite a good, clear, sensible business epistle easily enough; but to express love or sorrow or any of the more subtle emotions on paper would have been impossible to him. Therefore he did not attempt the task. He at once walked over to Mrs. Hartley's villa and asked to see Miss Campion.
He was almost sorry that he had done so when Lettice came down to him in the little shaded _salon_ where Mrs. Hartley generally received visitors, and he saw her face. It was white, and her eyes were red with weeping. Evidently that letter had cost her dear, and Brooke Dalton gathered a little courage from the sight.
She came up to him and tried to speak, but the words would not come.
Brooke was not a man of very quick intuitions, as a rule; but in this case love gave him sharpness of sight. He took her hand in both his own and held it tenderly while he spoke.
”There is no need for you to say anything,” he said; ”no need for you to distress yourself in this way. I have only come to say one thing to you, because I felt that I could say it better than I could write it. Of course, I was grieved by your note this morning--terribly grieved and--and--disappointed; but I don't think that it leaves me quite without hope, after all.”
”Oh,” Lettice was beginning in protest; but he hushed her with a pressure of his hand.
”Listen to me one moment. My last question yesterday was unwarrantable.
I never ought to have asked it; and I beg you to consider it and your answer unspoken. Of course, I should be filled with despair if I believed--but I don't believe--I don't conclude anything from the little you have said. I shall still come to you at the end of the month and ask for my answer then.”
”It will be of no use,” she said, sadly, with averted face and downcast eyes.
”Don't say so. Don't deprive me of every hope. Let me beg of you to say nothing more just now. In a month's time I will come to you, wherever you are, and ask for your _final_ decision.”
He saw that Lettice was about to speak, and so he went on hastily, ”I don't know if I am doing right, or wrong in handing you this letter from your brother. He gave it me before I left England, and bade me deliver it or hold it back as I saw fit.”
”He knew?” said Lettice, trembling a little as the thought of her brother's general att.i.tude towards her wishes for independence and her friends.h.i.+p for Alan Walcott. ”You had told him?”