Part 14 (1/2)

He dropped her arm. ”By Jupiter, she _does_ mean it!”

With that conviction in him, he pushed one of the chairs in the summer-house to her with his foot, and signed to her to take it. ”Sit down!” he said, roughly. She had frightened him--and fear comes seldom to men of his type. They feel it, when it does come, with an angry distrust; they grow loud and brutal, in instinctive protest against it.

”Sit down!” he repeated. She obeyed him. ”Haven't you got a word to say to me?” he asked, with an oath. No! there she sat, immovable, reckless how it ended--as only women can be, when women's minds are made up.

He took a turn in the summer-house and came back, and struck his hand angrily on the rail of her chair. ”What do you want?”

”You know what I want.”

He took another turn. There was nothing for it but to give way on his side, or run the risk of something happening which might cause an awkward scandal, and come to his father's ears.

”Look here, Anne,” he began, abruptly. ”I have got something to propose.”

She looked up at him.

”What do you say to a private marriage?”

Without asking a single question, without making objections, she answered him, speaking as bluntly as he had spoken himself:

”I consent to a private marriage.”

He began to temporize directly.

”I own I don't see how it's to be managed--”

She stopped him there.

”I do!”

”What!” he cried out, suspiciously. ”You have thought of it yourself, have you?”

”Yes.”

”And planned for it?”

”And planned for it!”

”Why didn't you tell me so before?”

She answered haughtily; insisting on the respect which is due to women--the respect which was doubly due from _him,_ in her position.

”Because _you_ owed it to _me,_ Sir, to speak first.”

”Very well. I've spoken first. Will you wait a little?”

”Not a day!”

The tone was positive. There was no mistaking it. Her mind was made up.

”Where's the hurry?”

”Have you eyes?” she asked, vehemently. ”Have you ears? Do you see how Lady Lundie looks at me? Do you hear how Lady Lundie speaks to me? I am suspected by that woman. My shameful dismissal from this house may be a question of a few hours.” Her head sunk on her bosom; she wrung her clasped hands as they rested on her lap. ”And, oh, Blanche!” she moaned to herself, the tears gathering again, and falling, this time, unchecked. ”Blanche, who looks up to me! Blanche, who loves me! Blanche, who told me, in this very place, that I was to live with her when she was married!” She started up from the chair; the tears dried suddenly; the hard despair settled again, wan and white, on her face. ”Let me go! What is death, compared to such a life as is waiting for _me?_” She looked him over, in one disdainful glance from head to foot; her voice rose to its loudest and firmest tones. ”Why, even _you_; would have the courage to die if you were in my place!”