CHAPTER XXIV.

She heard him pass through the Lilliputian hall, and down the garden path; heard the gate clang behind him, and at the sound a pang of pain shot through her.

She sat, where he had left her, looking out at the night with vacant eyes. Her life seemed to have come to a sudden stop; he had taken all the joy, the hope in it away with him.

She had tried to think, to realize her future; but it was hard work, for his voice was ringing in her ears, and his face—so white and haggard—came between her and the darkened window. She had promised not to go, not to leave him—to avoid the scandal; and he had promised to forget that she[191] was his wife. They would be friends, in outward seeming, at any rate. She sighed. She knew she could trust him, for in all else but in marrying her for her money, she felt that he was the soul of honor, and a promise would be sacred to him.

Not one word of Lady Ada had she said; shame for him, not herself, kept the name from her lips. He should never know she had heard Lady Ada’s shameful avowal or his words of love to her.

Life stretched before her grim and black; she thought of Three Star, of Varley Howard’s love, of the “boys’” protecting care of her, and her eyes grew moist, and a tear dropped upon the Worth dress, and shone beside the diamonds. If she could only go back, and forget that she had ever been anything but the pride of a diggers’ camp! Forget she was Miss Chetwynde, the millionairess—a crimson blush rose like a stain to her pale face; no, she was not Miss Chetwynde, but the Marchioness of Trafford. She was married to a man with whom she had quarreled on her wedding-night, a man to whom she was only to be “a friend in outward seeming!”

She scarcely gave a thought to Norman Druce, for Trafford and Lady Ada were the central figures in her mind, and no one else counted.

She did not know how long she sat in the darkened room, but she felt at last that it must be very late, and, with a dazed feeling, she rose, and went upstairs. Trafford had not come in, she knew, for she had not heard him. Where was he? Had he changed his mind and left her?

Barker was waiting for her, and being still full of the rustic charms of Deepdale, was eager to talk. Esmeralda let her chatter on, scarcely hearing a word, then sent her away as soon as possible. A strange feeling of loneliness took possession of her; and yet it was not strange, for until to-night she had always had friends near her. To-night she was utterly alone. The Marchioness of Trafford, the future Duchess of Belfayre, with a jewel-box crammed with gems, with a million of money to do as she pleased with, was, with it all, one of the unhappiest women in all England!

She sat up for hours listening; the little house grew still; she went to bed at last, but lay awake, listening still. But his footstep did not sound on the gravel path. The house remained as silent as the grave.

It was her wedding-night.

Trafford went out into the darkness, feeling like a man who had been smitten by a mortal illness. His brain was in a[192] whirl; the whole thing seemed like a hideous nightmare. He did not ask himself how Esmeralda had discovered the truth; it never occurred to him that she might have overheard Lady Ada’s wild words; he thought that, perhaps, some fool of a woman had been talking to her, and opening her eyes.

As he strode along the perfumed lanes he felt his love for her—the love which had been growing gradually for months past, but which he had only fully realized to-night—sharpening his misery. How beautifully she had looked as she stood before him, with her indignant accusation! Her face haunted and tortured him. There was no one like her in the wide world. The women of his set, with their selfishness and artificiality, seemed hateful to him beside her purity and true nobility. She was a waif of the wilds, no doubt, but all the same she was one of Nature’s gentlewomen.

How sweet she had looked, how exquisite, in her beautiful dress, with the diamonds which she wore so unconsciously! Any man might be proud of her—not only love her, but be proud of her. And he had lost her! Well, it served him right. For the first time in his life he had played a base part, and he was deservedly punished. Rather than deceive this girl who loved him, he should have let Belfayre, twenty Belfayres, go to the devil.

Now, what was he to do? Well, there was only one thing to do—to keep the promise he had made her. She had behaved nobly. If she had left him, and gone back to that place in Australia, he could scarcely have blamed her. She had sacrificed herself, had condemned herself to living in the same house with him, to avoid a scandal; he must do what he could to make her life at least endurable.

The thought brought him a grim kind of consolation. His life should be devoted to her; no woman in the world should be more surrounded by watchful care and attention than she should be. She should do exactly as she liked, should go where she pleased; her wish should be his law; he would be just a superior kind of servant to her.

He strode on, heedless of the direction he was taking, and as heedless of the time. His excitement gave place to a dull, hopeless weariness. Presently he felt that the air had grown cooler; it was the chill of early dawn. He stood in the center of the lonely heath, and looked round him, and its vague outlines seemed to symbolize his own life; for he felt as Esmeralda had done, that it had come to a sudden stop. He turned and walked slowly back to the cottage. The dawn was breaking, and a thrush was beginning to sing timidly and[193] sweetly as he went up the narrow path. Somehow, it reminded him of Esmeralda’s voice. He entered the house, and went upstairs very quietly, and he paused at the door and listened with knit brows, and his lips moved, shaping the words: “My love, my love!” Then he went into his own room, and threw himself, dressed as he was, upon the bed; and he, too, lay awake communing with his unhappiness.

When Esmeralda went down to the breakfast-room the next morning—the dainty room redolent with the perfume of the roses which stood in great bowls on the table and sideboard—she saw him outside in the garden, and a faint blush rose to her pale face. How should she greet him? What should she say to him? When he came in, they were alone, and he stood in the door-way for a second or two, looking at her. She just glanced at him, and was busy with the coffee cups.

“What a lovely morning!” he said. His voice was grave and weary, though he tried to make it light, and she had noticed that he was pale and haggard.

“Yes,” she said, without looking up.

He went to his place at the other end of the table, and, to their mutual relief, the neat parlor-maid came in to wait upon them.

“What are you going to do to-day?” he asked.

She crumbled her toast nervously, just glancing at him. “I do not know,” she said. “Anything you like.”

“Will you have the ponies, and go for a drive?” he said. “The country round here is very beautiful, and it will not be very dusty; there was a shower this morning.”

“Yes, that will be very nice,” she said, trying to speak as if it did not matter what she did or where she went.

“I must get a map of the country,” he said, “and plan out some excursions.”

He went on talking, and she responded now and again—they were acting for the benefit of the parlor-maid. When the girl had left the room, they fell into a silence; but Trafford struggled against it. They could not go through the whole of their lives sitting mum-chance opposite each other.

“Esmeralda,” he said, “I want you to do, to go wherever you please. Whatever you do will seem right in my eyes. If this idea of the drive doesn’t suit you, you will say so, will you not?”

“Yes,” she said in a low voice; “I should like to go.”

“Would you like to have me with you?” he asked, paying great attention to his plate. “Don’t say ‘yes’ if you’d rather be alone.”

[194]

She considered for a moment, then the thought that the fact of her driving about the country without him on the day after her marriage would excite surprise, flashed upon her, and she said:

“I think it would be better if you came.”

He had hoped that she would have said: “I should like you to come,” and his face fell.

“Better?” he said. “Ah, yes; I see. I will order the ponies. Would you like to come round the garden?”

She arose at once with wifely obedience. The garden was flooded with sunlight, the flowers shone like so many gems, the full concert of birds was in progress. These two mortals looked round with aching hearts.

“It is an earthly paradise,” he said; and he sighed.

“Yes,” she assented; and both of them thought of that other paradise into which the eating of the Tree of Knowledge had brought so much misery.

He cut a blush-rose and held it in his hand for a minute or two, then with an affectation of carelessness, he held it out to her. She took it with a little feeling of surprise which she carefully concealed, and put the blossom in the bosom of her dress. He looked at it for a moment, and then turned his eyes away.

The ponies came round with the diminutive groom in attendance, and Trafford was just on the point of dismissing him, when he reflected that perhaps Esmeralda would prefer to have the lad with them, and the boy got up in the rumble behind. She took her seat in the place beside the driver’s, but Trafford shook his head with a smile and gave her the reins.

“You must drive your own ponies,” he said; and then he grew red, for it seemed to him an unlucky speech, as if he wished to remind her that in reality her money had bought them; but Esmeralda was not thinking of money, of her wealth and his poverty, at that moment, and did not notice his embarrassment. The ponies were fresh, and her whole attention was taken up by them at the time. A faint tinge of color came to her face, as it always did when she was riding or driving, and she seemed to forget for the moment the cloud that hung over her life. Trafford watched her management of the ponies with admiration, which was shared by the boy behind, who talked about it for an hour when he got back to the stables.

There is no lovelier county than Surrey, and Deepdale lies in one of the prettiest parts of it. Trafford thought how[195] happy they would have been under other circumstances, if only Esmeralda had not made her fatal discovery. He remembered their drive to Shirley, and how he had put his arm round her and proposed to her. Why, he must have been in love with her then. What a double-dyed idiot and fool he must have been not to have known it! They were almost silent during the drive. They stopped at the nearest town.

“Don’t you want to buy something?” Trafford asked. “I’ve never known a woman go into a town without wanting to buy something.”

She looked round the drowsy place, with its shops prettily affecting a London air, and shook her head.

“I suppose I’m not so fond of buying things as most women,” she said. “Lady Wyndover used to say that I was uncanny and unnatural. I never seem to want anything.”

“Not some ribbon?” he said. “I thought women wanted ribbon every hour of the day.”

“I’ll buy some if you like,” she said; and she pulled up at the linen draper’s.

The shop-keeper and one of his assistants came out hurriedly to wait upon the great folk. Of course every one in the little place had heard and read of the great Marquis of Trafford, and of his rich and lovely bride, and felt that their presence in the county shed a luster upon it. Some ribbons were brought out and Esmeralda purchased some.

“I haven’t any money,” she said. The shop-keeper almost bowed himself to the ground.

“Certainly not, my lady,” he said. “We will put it down. If at any time your ladyship should want anything, we shall be happy to send one of our young men down to Deepdale.”

People came to their doors to look at the illustrious pair in a covertly respectful way, which had been familiar to Traffords all his life, but to which Esmeralda was not even yet quite used. The shopman’s “my lady” had somewhat startled her.

They drove home at a rattling pace, and once or twice the ponies evinced an ardent desire to bolt, but Esmeralda’s slim wrists were like steel, and she kept them in hand “like a stunner,” as the boys said in the stable afterward. When they got home there was lunch, and she and Trafford again sat opposite each other, and again played the farce for the benefit of the parlor-maid; and he felt, while he was playing his part, that it would be impossible for him to continue to do so for very long. To sit and calmly utter commonplaces to a[196] lovely girl whom you longed to crush to your heart was more than any man could be expected to accomplish.

He went out after lunch and did not appear until dinner-time. Their dinner was as elaborate a farce as the breakfast and the luncheon, but, alas and alas! they found themselves playing it more easily.

A box of books had been sent down from Mudie’s, and Esmeralda sat in the drawing-room with one of them in her hand. It was a love story, in which the love ran roughly through two volumes and a half, and then glided smoothly through the concluding chapters. She read it with a kind of bitterness. Her love had run smoothly enough through its first chapters, and now only in the concluding ones had the roughness come in. She could hear Trafford pacing up and down outside with his cigarette. Once he paused at the open French window and looked at her. She could feel his eyes upon her, though she did not look up from the book.

“It is very warm,” he said; and she answered:

“Yes, it is.”

So the days wore on, one day like another. No one could have been more devoted to her than he was. He seemed to study her every wish, and his attentions to her were rather those of a lover than a husband. He appeared to have no will but hers. The little household was eloquent in praise of him, and declared that they had never heard or read of any one so much in love with his wife as was the marquis.

If Esmeralda wanted to ride or drive, he himself went down to the stable and saw to the harnessing of the horse; if she wanted to walk, he got her sunshade or umbrella, and guarded her from the rays of kingly Sol, or Jupiter Pluvius, as if she were something so precious that heat or rain might melt. He would rise from the table to carry to her some trifle that he thought she might want, and every morning he gathered with his own hand a little bunch of flowers which, with his own hand, he placed beside her plate.

All this would have broken down Esmeralda’s pride and resolution, but for her memory of his parting with Lady Ada. Never for a moment did she forget it. She saw him grow more pale and haggard day by day, but she thought that he was pining for the love and sympathy of the woman he had not been able to marry.

At the end of the week Trafford found the strain tighter than he could endure. He felt that if he remained by her side another day, his love would break the bounds of restraint[197] and force him beyond himself; so he said that he must go up to town on business; and he went.

The day seemed very long and dreary to Esmeralda after he had gone, and she could have found in her heart to welcome his return by throwing her arms round him; but she restrained herself, and said only, with a smile.

“I suppose London is very hot?”

“Yes,” he said; “very hot.”

He had sat in the smoking-room of the Marlborough nearly all the time—sat and thought of the wife he loved, the woman who was wife to him only in name, and who would never be anything more.

One or two men had approached him with greetings of welcome, but had been frightened away by his grim coldness.

“Trafford doesn’t seem to have been improved by his marriage,” said one. “It’s always the way; the best fellow in the world is spoiled by marrying. You can go as far as you like with women, if you stop short of that.”

Trafford began to hate the prettiness of Deepdale, its rustic garden and the sunny country around it, and when there came a letter from Lilias to Esmeralda inviting them, if they were tired of Deepdale, to Belfayre, he breathed a sigh of relief.

“Would you like to go?” asked Esmeralda, as she threw the letter across to him.

He kept his eyes on it long after he had read it.

“It is for you to decide,” he said.

Esmeralda looked at her plate and sighed also. The strain was beginning to tell upon her, too. Anything would be better than this daily, hourly companionship with a man for whom she dared not show her love.

“We will go if you like,” she said.

“It is for you to say,” he said.

“Then let us go,” she said. “You must be tired of this small place, and want to see the duke and Lilias and—other people.”

“I do not want to see any one,” he responded, grimly; “but you must be dull. We will go.”

They started two mornings afterward, and all the way down his attention to her was exemplary. As they drove from the station to Belfayre, they saw several small crowds on the road, and presently the carriage passed under a triumphal arch. Trafford looked up and saw “Welcome to the happy pair!” upon it, and he glanced at Esmeralda and then looked aside.

Esmeralda looked straight before her; she, too, had seen[198] the inscription. When they drove up the terrace they were aware of a mob which had gathered to welcome them. The servants were ranged in double file, the duke, and Lilias, and Lord Selvaine were standing under the famous peristyle.

“It is evidently a gala day,” said Trafford, grimly. As he assisted her out of the carriage a hearty cheer rose from the crowd, the duke came hobbling down the steps, bare-headed and with one hand extended, and he took Esmeralda’s hand and drew her toward him and kissed her.

“Welcome home, my dear!” he said in his thin, quavering voice. “It is very good of you to come so soon.”

Esmeralda, with dry eyes, looked round her. Lilias came and kissed her; then some one came forward and took her hand.

It was Norman Druce. He looked at her earnestly, noted the pallor of her face, the sadness in her eyes. He flushed, then went pale, and he glanced quickly from her to Trafford with a puzzled, startled look. Esmeralda, suddenly made aware of his presence, started too.

“Are—are you here?” she said.

“Yes,” said Lilias, with a smile; “Norman is here, and Ada Lancing, and one or two others. We thought you might be dull!”