Part 69 (2/2)
”To-morrow! I could almost wish there was no to-morrow for either you or me,” replies he.
”Cyril,” she says, with sudden fear, ”you will take care of yourself, you will not go into any danger? Darling,”--with a sob,--”you will always remember that some day, when this is quite forgotten, I shall want to see again the face of my dearest friend.”
”I shall come back to you,” he says quietly. He is so quiet that she tells herself now is a fitting time to break away from him; she forces herself to take the first step that shall part them remorselessly.
”Good-bye,” she says, in faltering tones.
”Good-bye,” returns he, mechanically. With the slow reluctant tears that spring from a broken heart running down her pale cheeks, she presses her lips fervently to his hands, and moves slowly away. When she has gone a few steps, frightened at the terrible silence that seems to have enwrapped him, benumbing his very senses, she turns to regard him once more.
He has never stirred; he scarcely seems to breathe, so motionless is his att.i.tude; as though some spell were on him, he stands silently gazing after her, his eyes full of dumb agony. There is something so utterly lonely in the whole scene that Cecilia bursts into tears. Her sobs rouse him.
”Cecilia!” he cries, in a voice of mingled pa.s.sion and despair that thrills through her. Once more he holds out to her his arms. She runs to him, and flings herself for the time into his embrace. He strains her pa.s.sionately to his heart. Her sobs break upon the silent air. Once again their white lips form the word ”farewell.” There is a last embrace, a last lingering kiss.
All is over.
CHAPTER XXIX.
”The flower that smiles to-day To-morrow dies; All that we wish to stay Tempts and then flies.
What is this world's delight?
Lightning that mocks the night, Brief even as bright.”--Sh.e.l.lEY.
At Chetwoode they are all a.s.sembled in the drawing-room,--except Archibald, who is still confined to his room,--waiting for dinner: Cyril alone is absent.
”What can be keeping him?” says his mother, at last, losing patience as she pictures him dallying with his betrothed at The Cottage while the soup is spoiling and the cook is gradually verging toward hysterics. She suffers an aggrieved expression to grow within her eyes as she speaks from the depths of the softest arm-chair the room contains, in which it is her custom to ensconce herself.
”Nothing very dreadful, I dare say,” replies Florence, in tones a degree less even than usual, her appet.i.te having got the better of her self-control.
Almost as she says the words the door is thrown open, and Cyril enters.
He is in morning costume, his hair is a little rough, his face pale, his lips bloodless. Walking straight up to his mother, without looking either to the right or to the left, he says, in a low constrained voice that betrays a desperate effort to be calm:
”Be satisfied, mother: you have won the day. Your wish is fulfilled: I shall never marry Mrs. Arlington: you need not have made such a difficulty about giving your consent this morning, as now it is useless.”
”Cyril, what has happened?” says Lady Chetwoode, rising to her feet alarmed, a distinct pallor overspreading her features. She puts out one jeweled hand as though to draw him nearer to her, but for the first time in all his life he shrinks from her gentle touch, and moving backward, stands in the middle of the room. Lilian, going up to him, compels him with loving violence to turn toward her.
”Why don't you speak?” she asks, sharply. ”Have you and Cecilia quarreled?”
”No: it is no lovers' quarrel,” with an odd change of expression: ”we have had little time for quarreling, she and I: our days for love-making were so short, so sweet!”
There is a pause: then in a clear harsh voice, in which no faintest particle of feeling can be traced, he goes on: ”Her husband is alive; he is coming home. After all,”--with a short unlovely laugh, sad through its very bitterness,--”we worried ourselves unnecessarily, as she was not, what we so feared, a widow.”
”Cyril!” exclaims Lilian; she is trembling visibly, and gazes at him as though fearing he may have lost his senses.
”I would not have troubled you about this matter,” continues Cyril, not heeding the interruption, and addressing the room generally, without permitting himself to look at any one, ”but that it is a fact that must be known sooner or later; I thought the sooner the better, as it will end your anxiety and convince you that this _mesalliance_ you so dreaded,”--with a sneer,--”can never take place.”
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