Only a Girl's Love
"Yes, he is hard at work. I did not think I should have won him. It was my sister's name that worked the magic charm."
"He is fond of your sister," said Stella, thoughtfully.
His eyes were on her in an instant.
"He has spoken of her?" he said.
Stella could have bitten her tongue out for the slip.
"Yes," she said. "He – he told me about her – I asked him whose house it was upon the hills."
"Meaning the Hall?" he said, pointing with his whip.
"Yes, and he told me. I knew by the way he spoke of your sister that he was fond of her. Her name is Lilian, is it not?"
"Yes," he said, "Lilian," and the name left his lips with soft tenderness. "I think every one who knows her loves her. This picture is for her."
Stella glanced up at his face; anything less imperious at that moment it would be impossible to imagine.
"Lady Lilian is fond of pictures?" she said.
"Yes," he said; "she is devoted to art in all its forms. Yes, that little sketch will give her more pleasure than – than – I scarcely know what to say. What are women most fond of?"
Stella laughed.
"Diamonds, are they not?"
"Are you fond of them?" he said. "I think not."
"Why not?" she retorted. "Why should I not have the attributes of my sex? Yes, I am fond of diamonds. I am fond of everything that is beautiful and costly and rare. I remember once going to a ball at Florence."
He looked at her.
"Only to see it!" she exclaimed. "I was too young to be seen, and they took me in a gallery overlooking the great salon; and I watched the great ladies in their beautiful dresses and shining gems, and I thought that I would give all the world to be like one of them; and the thought spoiled my enjoyment. I remember coming away crying; you see it was so dark and solitary in the great gallery, and I felt so mean and insignificant." And she laughed.
He was listening with earnest interest. Every word she said had a charm for him; he had never met any girl – any woman – like her, so frank and open-minded. Listening to her was like looking into a crystal lake, in which everything is revealed and all is bright and pure.
"And are you wiser now?" he asked.
"Not one whit!" she replied. "I should like now, less than then, to be shut up in a dark gallery and look on at others enjoying themselves. Isn't that a confession of an envious and altogether wicked disposition?"
"Yes," he assented, with a strange smile barely escaping from under his tawny mustache. "I should be right in prophesying all sorts of bad endings to you."
As he spoke he opened the gate for her, driving the dogs back with a crack of his whip so that she might pass first – a small thing, but characteristic of him.
The painter looked up.
"Keep those dogs off my back, Leycester," he said. "Well, Stella, have you concocted your poison?"
Stella went and looked over his shoulder.
"Yes, uncle," she said.
"You have been long enough to make twenty indigestible compounds," he said, gazing at the view he was sketching.
Stella bent her head, to hide the blush which rose as she remembered how slowly they had walked across the meadows.
"How are you getting on?" said Lord Leycester.
The old man grunted.
"Pretty well; better than I shall now you have come to fidget about."
Lord Leycester laughed.
"A pretty plain hint that our room is desired more than our company, Miss Etheridge. Can we not vanish into space?"
Stella laughed and sank down on the grass.
"It is uncle's way of begging us to stay," she said.
Lord Leycester laughed, and sending the dogs off, flung himself down almost at her feet.
"Did I exaggerate?" he said, pointing his whip at the view.
"Not an atom," replied Stella. "It is beautiful – beautiful, and that is all that one can find to say."
"I wish you would be content to say it and not insist upon my painting it," replied Mr. Etheridge.
Lord Leycester sprang to his feet.
"That is the last straw. We will not remain to be abused, Miss Etheridge," he said.
Stella remained immovable. He came and stood over her, looking down at her with wistful eagerness in silence.
"What lovely woods," she said. "You were right; they are carpeted with primroses. We have none in our meadow."
"Would you like to go and get some?" he asked.
Stella turned her face up to him.
"Yes, but I don't care to swim across."
He smiled, and went down to the bank, unfastened a boat, and leaping into it, called to her.
Stella sprang to her feet with the impulsive delight of a girl at the sight of a boat, when she had expected nothing better than rushes.
"Is it a boat – really?" she exclaimed.
"Come and see," he said.
She went down to the water's edge and looked at it.
"How did it come there?" she asked.
"I pay a fairy to drop a boat from the skies whenever I want it."
"I see," said Stella, gravely.
He laughed.
"How did you think I came across? Did you think I swam?" and he arranged a cushion.
She laughed.
"I forgot that; how stupid of me."
"Will you step in?" he said.
Stella looked back at her uncle, and hesitated a moment.
"He will assure you that I shall not drown you," he said.
"I am not afraid – do you think I am afraid?" she said, scornfully.
"Yes, I think that at this moment you are trembling with nervousness and dread."
She put her foot – he could not help seeing how small and shapely it was – on the gunwale, and he held out his hand and took hers; it was well he did so, for the boat was only a small, lightly built gig, and her sudden movement had made it rock.
As it was, she staggered slightly, and he had to take her by the arm. So, with one hand grasping her hand and the other her arm, he held her for a moment – for longer than a moment. Then he placed her on the cushion, and seating himself, took up the sculls and pushed off.
Stella leant back, and of course dropped one hand in the water. Not one woman out of twenty who ever sat in a boat can resist that impulse to have closer communion with the water; and he pulled slowly across the stream.
The sun shone full upon them, making their way a path of rippling gold, and turning Stella's hair into a rich brown.
Little wonder that, as he sat opposite her, his eyes should rest on her face, and less that, thus resting, its exquisite beauty and freshness and purity should sink into the soul of him to whom beauty was the one thing worth living for.
Unconscious of his rapt gaze, Stella leant back, her eyes fixed on the water, her whole attention absorbed by its musical ripple as it ran through her fingers.
In silence he pulled the sculls, slowly and noiselessly; he would not have spoken and broken the spell for worlds. Before him, as he looked upon her, rose the picture of which he had spoken to his sister last night.
"But more beautiful," he mused – "more beautiful! How lost she is! She has forgotten me – forgotten everything. Oh, Heaven! if one were to waken her into love!"
For an instant, at the thought, the color came into his face and the fire to his eyes; then a half guilty, half repentful feeling struck through him.
"No, it would be cruel – cruel: and yet to see the azure light shining in those eyes – to see those lips half parted with the breath of a great passion, would be worth – what? It would make amends for all that a man might suffer, though he died the next moment, if those eyes smiled, if those lips were upturned, for love of him!"
So lost were they that the touching of the boat and the bank made them start.
"So soon," murmured Stella. "How beautiful it is! I think I was dreaming."
"And I know that I was," he said, with a subtle significance, as he rose and held out his hand. But Stella sprang lightly on shore without accepting it. He tied up the boat and followed her; she was already on her knee, picking the yellow primroses.
Without a word, he followed her example. Sometimes they were so near together that she could feel his breath stirring her hair – so near that their hands almost met.
At last she sank on to the mossy ground with a laugh, and, pointing to her hat, which was full of the spring earth-stars, said laughingly:
"What ruthless pillage! Do not pick any more; it is wanton waste!"
"Are you sure you have plenty?" he said. "Why hesitate when there are such millions?"
"No, no more!" she said. "I feel guilty already!"
He glanced at the handful he had gathered, and she saw the glance and laughed.
"You do not know what to do with those you have, and still want more. See, you must tie them in bundles.
"Show me," he said, and he threw himself down beside her.
She gathered them up into bundles, and tied them with a long stem of fern, and he tried to do the same, but his hands, white and slender as they were, were not so deft as hers, and he held the huge bundle to her.
"You must tie it," he said.
She laughed and put the fern round, but it broke, and the primroses fell in a golden shower over their hands. They both made a grasp at them, and their hands met.
For a moment Stella laughed, then the laugh died away, for he still held her hand, and the warmth of his grasp seemed stealing upward to her heart. With something like an effort she drew her hand away, and sprang to her feet.
"I – I must go," she said. "Uncle will wonder where I have gone," and she looked down at the water with almost frightened eagerness.
"He will know you are here, quite safe," he said. "Wait, do not go this moment. Up there, above our heads, we can see the river stretching away for miles. It is not a step; will you come?"
She hesitated a moment, then she turned and walked beside him between the trees.
A step or two, as he said, and they reached a sort of plateau, crowned by a moss-grown rock, in which some rough steps were hewn. He sprang up the steps and reached the top, then bent down and held out his hand.
Stella hesitated a moment.
"It will repay your trouble; come," he said, and she put her hand in his and her foot on the first step, and he drew her up beside him.
"Look!" he said.
An exclamation of delight broke from Stella's lips.
"You are not sorry you came?"
"I did not think it would be so lovely," she said.
He stood beside her, not looking at the view, but at her dark eyes dilating with dreamy rapture – at her half-parted lips, and the sweet, clear-cut profile presented to him.
She turned suddenly, and to hide the look of admiration he raised his hand and pointed out the objects in the view.
"And what is that little house there?" asked Stella.
"That is one of the lodges," he said.
"One of the lodges – one of your own lodges, you mean?" she asked.
He nodded lightly, "Yes."
"And all this between here and that lodge belongs to you?"
"No, not an inch," he said, laughing. "To my father."
"It is a great deal," she said.
"Too much for one man, you think?" he said, with a smile. "A great many other people think so too. I don't know what you would think if you knew how much we Wyndwards have managed at one time or the other to lay our acquiring grasp on. This is one of our smallest estates," he said, simply.
Stella looked at the view dreamily.
"One of the smallest? Yes, I have heard that you are very rich. It must be very nice."
"I don't know," he said. "You see one cannot tell until one has been poor. I don't think there is anything in it. I don't think one is any the happier. There is always something left to long for."
She turned her dark eyes on him with a smile of incredulity.
"What can you possibly have to long for?" she said.
He looked at her with a strange smile; then suddenly his face grew grave and wistful – almost sad, as it seemed to her.
"You cannot guess, and I cannot tell you; but believe me that, as I stand here, there is an aching void in my heart, and I do long for something very earnestly."
The voice was like music, deep and thrilling; she listened and wondered.
"And you should be so happy," she said, almost unconsciously.
"Happy!" he echoed, and his dark eyes rested on hers with a strange expression that was half-mocking, half-sad. "Do you know what the poets say?"
"'Count no man happy till he dies,' do you mean?" said Stella.
"Yes," he said. "I do not think I know what happiness means. I have been pursuing it all my life; sometimes have been within reach of it but it has always evaded me – always slipped from my grasp. Sometimes I have resolved to let it go – to pursue it no longer; but fate has decreed that man shall always be seeking for the unattainable – that he who once looks upon happiness with the eyes of desire, who stretches out his hands toward her, shall pursue her to the end."
"And – but surely some get their desire."
"Some," he said, "to find that the prize is not worth the race they have run for it; to find that they have wearied of it when it is gained; to find that it is no prize at all, but a delusive blank; all dead sea fruit that turns to dust upon the lips."
"Not all; surely not all!" she murmured, strangely moved by his words.
"No; not all," he said, with a hidden light in his eyes that she did not see. "To some there comes a moment when they know that happiness – real true happiness – lies just beyond their grasp. And the case of rich men is more to be pitied than all others. What would you say if I told you that it was mine?"
She looked up at him with a gentle smile, not on her lips but in her eyes.
"I should say that I was very sorry," she murmured. "I should say that you deserved – " she stopped short, smitten by sudden remembrance of all she had heard of him.
He filled up the pause with a laugh: a laugh such as she had not heard upon his lips till now.
"You were right to stop," he said. "If I get all the happiness I deserve – well, no man will envy me."
"Let us go down now," said Stella, gently; "my uncle – "
He leapt down, and held up his hand.
CHAPTER VIII
Stella put hers into it, but reluctantly, and tried to spring, but her dress caught and she slipped forward.
She would have fallen but that he was on the alert to save her. Quite simply and naturally he put his arms round her and lifted her down.
Only for a moment he held her in his embrace, her panting form close to his, her face almost resting on his shoulders, but that moment roused the blood in his fiery heart, and her face went pale.
"Are you hurt?" he murmured.
"No, no!" she said, and she slipped out of his arms and stood a little away from him, the color coming and going in her face; it was the first time that any man's arms, save her father's, had ever encircled her.
"Are you quite sure?" he repeated.
"Quite," she said, then she laughed. "What would have happened if I had slipped?"
"You would have sprained your ankle," he said.
"Sprained my ankle, really?" she repeated, with open eyes.
"Yes, and I should have had to carry you down to the boat," he said, slowly.
She looked away from him.
"I am glad I did not slip."
"And I," he said, "am – glad also."
She stooped and picked up the primroses and ran down the slope, her cheeks aflame, a feeling that was something like shame, and yet too full of a strange, indefinable joy to be sullen shame, took possession of her.
With light feet, her hat swinging in her hand, she threaded her way between the trees and sprang on to the grassy road beside the river bank.
He did not follow so quickly, but stood for a moment looking at her, his face pale, his eyes full of a strange, wistful restlessness.
Then Stella heard his step, firm and masterful, behind her. A sudden impulse tempted her sorely to jump into the boat and push off – she could pull a pair of sculls – and her hand was on the edge of the boat, when she heard the sound of bells, and paused with astonishment. Looking up she saw a tiny phæton drawn by a pair of cream-white ponies coming along the road; it was the bells on their harness that she had heard.
They came along at a fair pace, and Stella saw that the phæton was being driven by a coachman in dark-brown livery, but the next moment all her attention was absorbed by the young girl who sat beside him.
She was so fair, so lovely, so ethereal looking, that Stella was spellbound.
A book was in her hand – ungloved and small and white as a child's – but she was not reading. She held it so loosely that as the phæton came along the top of the bank which hid Stella, the book dropped from the lax grasp of the white fingers.
The girl uttered an exclamation, and Stella, obeying one of her sudden impulses, sprang lightly up the bank, and picking up the book, held it toward her.
Her appearance was so sudden that Lady Lilian was startled and for a moment the pale face was dyed with a faint color; even after the moment had passed she sat speechless, and the surprise in her eyes gave place to a frank, generous admiration.
"Oh, thank you – thank you!" she said. "How kind of you. It was so stupid of me to drop it. But where did you come from – the clouds?" And there was a delicious hint of flattery in the look that accompanied the words.
"Quite the reverse," said Stella, with her open smile. "I was standing below there, by the boat."
And she pointed.
"Oh?" said Lady Lilian. "I did not see you."
"You were looking the other way," said Stella, drawing back to allow the carriage to proceed; but Lady Lilian seemed reluctant to go, and made no sign to the coachman, who sat holding the reins like an image of stone, apparently deaf and dumb.
For a few strokes of Time's scythe the two girls looked at each other – the one with the pale face and the blue eyes regarding the fresh, healthful beauty of the other with sad, wistful gaze. Then Lady Lilian spoke.
"What beautiful primroses! You have been gathering them on the slopes?" with a suggestion of a sigh.
"Yes," said Stella. "Will you take them?"
"Oh, no, no; I could not think of robbing you."
Stella smiled with her characteristic archness.
"It is I who have been the thief. I have been taking what did not belong to me. You will take these?"
Lady Lilian was too well bred to refuse; besides, she thirsted for them.
"If you will give them to me, and will not mind picking some more," she said.
Stella laid the bunch on the costly sables which wrapped the frail figure.
Lady Lilian put them to her face with a caressing gesture. "You are, like me, fond of flowers?" she said.
Stella nodded. "Yes."
Then there was a pause. Above them, unseen by Lilian, forgotten by Stella, stood Lord Leycester.
He was watching and waiting with a strange smile. He could read the meaning in his sister's eyes; she was longing to know more of the beautiful girl who had sprang like a fairy to her side.
With a faint flush, Lady Lilian said:
"You – you are a stranger, are you not? I mean you do not live here?"
"Yes," said Stella; "I live" – and she smiled and pointed to the cottage across the meadow – "there."
Lady Lilian started, and Lord Leycester seized the moment, and coming down, quietly stood by Stella's side.
"Leycester!" exclaimed Lilian, with a start of surprise.
He smiled into her eyes, his strange, masterful, irresistible smile. It was as if he had said, "Did I not tell you? Can you withstand her?"
But aloud he said:
"Let me make the introduction in due form. This is Miss Etheridge, Lilian. Miss Etheridge, this is my sister. As the French philosopher said, 'Know each other.'"
Lady Lilian held out her hand.
"I am very glad," she said.
Stella took the thin, white hand, and held it for a moment; then Lady Lilian looked from one to the other.
Lord Leycester interpreted the glance at once.
"Miss Etheridge has intrusted herself on the watery deep with me," he said. "We came across to gather flowers, leaving Mr. Etheridge to paint there."
And he waved his hand across the river.
Lady Lilian looked.
"I see," she said – "I see. And he is painting. Is he not clever? How proud you must be of him!"
Stella's eyes grew dark. It was the one word wanting to draw them together. She said not a word.
"Your uncle and I are old friends," Lady Lilian continued. "Sometime when – when I am stronger, I am coming to see him – when the weather gets warmer – " Stella glanced at the frail form clad in sables, with a moistened eye – "I am going to spend a long afternoon among the pictures. He is always so kind and patient, and explains them all to me. But, as I am not able to come to you, you will come and see me, will you not?"
There was a moment's silence. Lord Leycester stood looking over the river as if waiting for Stella's reply.
Stella looked up.
"I shall be very glad," she said, and Lord Leycester drew a breath, almost of relief.
"You will, will you not?" said Lady Lilian, with a sweet smile.
"Yes, I will come," said Stella, almost solemnly.
"You will find me poor company," said the daughter of the great earl, with meek humility. "I see so little of the world that I grow dull and ignorant; but I shall be so glad to see you," and she held out her hand.
Stella took it in her warm, soft fingers.
"I will come," she said.
Lady Lilian looked at the coachman, who, though his eyes were fixed in quite another direction, seemed to see the glance, for he touched the horses with the whip.
"Good-bye," she said, "good-bye."
Then, as the phæton moved on, she called out, in her low, musical voice, that was a low echo of her brother's:
"Oh, Leycester, Lenore has come!"
Leycester raised his hat.
"Very well," he said. "Good-bye."
Stella stood a moment looking after her. Strangely enough the last words rang in her ears with a senseless kind of insistence and emphasis. "Lenore has come!" She found herself repeating them mentally.
Recalling herself she turned swiftly to Lord Leycester.
"How beautiful she is!" she said, almost in a whisper.
He looked at her with gratitude in his eloquent eyes.
"Yes."
"So beautiful and so kind!" Stella murmured, and the tears sprang to her eyes. "I can see her face now. I can hear her voice. I do not wonder that you love her as you do."
"How do you know that I love her?" he said. "Brothers, generally – "
Stella stopped him with a gesture.
"No man with a heart warmer than a stone could help loving her."
"And so you agree that my heart is warmer than a stone. Thank you for that, at least," he said, with a smile that was not at all unselfish.
Stella looked at him.
"Let us go now," she said. "See, uncle is getting his things together."
"Not without the primroses," he said; "Lilian will break her heart if you go without any. Let me get some," and he went up the slope.
Stella stood in thought. The sudden meeting with the fairy-like creatures, had filled her with strange thoughts. She understood now that rank and money are not all that is wanted for earthly happiness.
So lost in thought was she that she did not hear the sound of a horse coming along the mossy road, though the animal was coming at a great pace.
Lord Leycester's ears were freer or quicker however, for he caught the sound and turned round.
Turned round in time to see a huge bay horse ridden by a tall, thin, dark young man, almost upon the slim form, standing with its back to it.
With something like an oath on his lips, he dropped the flowers and with one spring stood between her and the horse, and seizing the bridle with both hands threw the beast, with sheer force, on to its haunches.
The rider had been staring at the river, and was taken by surprise so complete, that, as the horse rose on its legs, he was thrown from the saddle.
Stella, alarmed by the noise, turned and swerved out of the path. And so they were grouped. Lord Leycester, pale with furious passion, still holding the reins and forcing the horse in an iron grip, and the erstwhile rider lying huddled up on the mossy road.
He lay still, only for a moment, however; the next he was on his feet and advancing toward Lord Leycester. It was Jasper Adelstone.
His face was deadly pale, making, by contrast, his small eyes black as coals.
"What do you mean?" he exclaimed, furiously, and half-unconsciously he raised his whip.