Part 73 (1/2)
See him she must. People cannot live in the same village without meeting. If she pa.s.sed him at the church-door, as she often pa.s.sed Lady Arabella, what should she do? Lady Arabella always smiled a peculiar, little, bitter smile, and this, with half a nod of recognition, carried off the meeting. Should she try the bitter smile, the half-nod with Frank? Alas! she knew it was not in her to be so much mistress of her own heart's blood.
As she thus thought, she stood at the drawing-room window, looking out into her garden; and, as she leant against the sill, her head was surrounded by the sweet creepers. ”At any rate, he won't come here,”
she said: and so, with a deep sigh, she turned from the window into the room.
There he was, Frank Gresham himself standing there in her immediate presence, beautiful as Apollo. Her next thought was how she might escape from out of his arms. How it happened that she had fallen into them, she never knew.
”Mary! my own, own love! my own one! sweetest! dearest! best! Mary!
dear Mary! have you not a word to say to me?”
No; she had not a word, though her life had depended on it. The exertion necessary for not crying was quite enough for her. This, then, was the bitter smile and the half-nod that was to pa.s.s between them; this was the manner in which estrangement was to grow into indifference; this was the mode of meeting by which she was to prove that she was mistress of her conduct, if not her heart! There he held her close bound to his breast, and she could only protect her face, and that all ineffectually, with her hands. ”He loves another,”
Beatrice had said. ”At any rate, he will not love me,” her own heart had said also. Here was now the answer.
”You know you cannot marry him,” Beatrice had said, also. Ah! if that really were so, was not this embrace deplorable for them both? And yet how could she not be happy? She endeavoured to repel him; but with what a weak endeavour! Her pride had been wounded to the core, not by Lady Arabella's scorn, but by the conviction which had grown on her, that though she had given her own heart absolutely away, had parted with it wholly and for ever, she had received nothing in return. The world, her world, would know that she had loved, and loved in vain. But here now was the loved one at her feet; the first moment that his enforced banishment was over, had brought him there.
How could she not be happy?
They all said that she could not marry him. Well, perhaps it might be so; nay, when she thought of it, must not that edict too probably be true? But if so, it would not be his fault. He was true to her, and that satisfied her pride. He had taken from her, by surprise, a confession of her love. She had often regretted her weakness in allowing him to do so; but she could not regret it now. She could endure to suffer; nay, it would not be suffering while he suffered with her.
”Not one word, Mary? Then after all my dreams, after all my patience, you do not love me at last?”
Oh, Frank! notwithstanding what has been said in thy praise, what a fool thou art! Was any word necessary for thee? Had not her heart beat against thine? Had she not borne thy caresses? Had there been one touch of anger when she warded off thy threatened kisses?
Bridget, in the kitchen, when Jonah became amorous, smashed his nose with the rolling-pin. But when Thomas sinned, perhaps as deeply, she only talked of doing so. Miss Thorne, in the drawing-room, had she needed self-protection, could doubtless have found the means, though the process would probably have been less violent.
At last Mary succeeded in her efforts at enfranchis.e.m.e.nt, and she and Frank stood at some little distance from each other. She could not but marvel at him. That long, soft beard, which just now had been so close to her face, was all new; his whole look was altered; his mien, and gait, and very voice were not the same. Was this, indeed, the very Frank who had chattered of his boyish love, two years since, in the gardens at Greshamsbury?
”Not one word of welcome, Mary?”
”Indeed, Mr Gresham, you are welcome home.”
”Mr Gresham! Tell me, Mary--tell me, at once--has anything happened?
I could not ask up there.”
”Frank,” she said, and then stopped; not being able at the moment to get any further.
”Speak to me honestly, Mary; honestly and bravely. I offered you my hand once before; there it is again. Will you take it?”
She looked wistfully up in his eyes; she would fain have taken it.
But though a girl may be honest in such a case, it is so hard for her to be brave.
He still held out his hand. ”Mary,” said he, ”if you can value it, it shall be yours through good fortune or ill fortune. There may be difficulties; but if you can love me, we will get over them. I am a free man; free to do as I please with myself, except so far as I am bound to you. There is my hand. Will you have it?” And then he, too, looked into her eyes, and waited composedly, as though determined to have an answer.
She slowly raised her hand, and, as she did so, her eyes fell to the ground. It then drooped again, and was again raised; and, at last, her light tapering fingers rested on his broad open palm.
They were soon clutched, and the whole hand brought absolutely within his grasp. ”There, now you are my own!” he said, ”and none of them shall part us; my own Mary, my own wife.”
”Oh, Frank, is not this imprudent? Is it not wrong?”
”Imprudent! I am sick of prudence. I hate prudence. And as for wrong--no. I say it is not wrong; certainly not wrong if we love each other. And you do love me, Mary--eh? You do! don't you?”
He would not excuse her, or allow her to escape from saying it in so many words; and when the words did come at last, they came freely.