England. Then she made room for him beside her--the rock was just wide enough for two--and he placed his arm round her waist, and for a minute or two she laid her head upon his shoulder, and they were very happy.
"You are early," he said at last.
"Yes; I wanted to get away from Florence and have a good think. You have no idea how unpleasant she is; she seems to know everything. For instance she knew that we went out sailing together last evening, for this morning at breakfast she said in the most cheerful way that she hoped that I enjoyed my moonlight sail last night."
"The deuce she did! and what did you say?"
"I said that I enjoyed it very much, and luckily my aunt did not take any notice."
"Why did you not say at once that we were engaged? We /are/ engaged, you know."
"Yes--that is, I suppose so."
"Suppose so! There is no supposition about it. At least, if we are not engaged, what are we?"
"Well, you see, Ernest, it sounds so absurd to say that one is engaged to a boy! I love you Ernest, love you dearly, but how can I say that I am engaged to you?"
Ernest rose in great wrath. "I tell you what it is, Eva, if I am not good enough to acknowledge, I am not good enough to have anything to do with. A boy, indeed! I am one-and-twenty; that is my full age. Confound it all! you are always talking about my being so young, just as though I should not get old fast enough. Can't you wait for me for a year or two?" he asked, with tears of mortification in his eyes.
"O, Ernest, Ernest, do be reasonable, there's a dear; what is the good of getting angry and making me wretched? Come and sit down here, dear, and tell me, am /I/ not worth a little patience? There is not the slightest possibility, so far as I can see, of our getting married at present; so the question is, if it is of any use to trumpet out an engagement that will only make us the object of a great deal of gossip, and which, perhaps, your uncle would not like?"
"O, by Jove!" he said, "that reminds me;" and sitting down beside her again, he told her the story of the interview with his uncle. She listened in silence.
"This is all very bad," she said, when he had finished.
"Yes, it is bad enough; but what is to be done?"
"There is nothing to be done at present."
"Shall I make a clean breast of it to him?"
"No, no, not now; it will only make matters worse. We must wait, dear. You must go abroad for a couple of months, as you had arranged, and then when you come back we will see what can be arranged."
"But, my dearest, I cannot bear to leave you; it makes my heart ache to think of it."
"Dear, I know that it is hard; but it must be done. You could not stop here now very well without speaking about--our engagement, and to do that would only be to bring your uncle's anger on you. No, you had better go away, Ernest, and meanwhile I will try to get into Mr. Cardus's good graces, and, if I fail, then when you come back we can agree upon some plan. Perhaps by that time you will take your uncle's view of the matter and want to marry Dorothy. She would make you a better wife than I shall, Ernest, my dear."
"Eva, how can you say such things! It is not kind of you!"
"O, why not? It is true. O yes, I know that I am better-looking, and that is what you men always think of; but she has more brains, more fixity of mind, and, perhaps, for all I know, more heart than I have, though, for the matter of that, I feel as if I was all heart just now. Really, Ernest, you had better transfer your allegiance. Give me up, and forget me, dear; it will save you much trouble. I know that there is trouble coming; it is in the air. Better marry Dorothy, and leave me to fight my sorrow out alone. I will release you, Ernest;" and she began to cry at the bare idea.
"I shall wait to give you up until you have given me up," said Ernest, when he had found means to stop her tears; "and as for forgetting you, I can never do that. Please, dear, don't talk so any more; it pains me."
"Very well, Ernest; then let us vow eternal fidelity instead; but, my dear, I /know/ that I shall bring you trouble."
"It is the price that men have always paid for the smiles of women like you," he answered. "Trouble may come--so be it, let it come; at any rate, I have the consciousness of your love. When I have lost that, then, and then only, will I think that I have bought you too dear."
In the course of his after life these words often came back to Ernest's mind.
CHAPTER XIV
GOOD-BYE
There are some scenes, trivial enough perhaps in themselves, that yet retain a peculiar power of standing out in sharp relief, as we cast our mind's eye down the long vista of our past. The group of events with which these particular scenes were connected may have long ago vanished from our mental sight, or faded into a dim and misty uniformity, and be as difficult to distinguish one from the other as the trees of a forest viewed from a height. But here and there an event, a sensation, or a face will stand out as perfectly clear as if it had been that moment experienced, felt, or seen. Perhaps it is only some scene of our childhood, such as a fish darting beneath a rustic bridge, and the ripple which its motion left upon the water. We have seen many larger fish dart in many fine rivers since then, and have forgotten them; but somehow that one little fish has kept awake in the storehouse of our brain, where most things sleep, though none are really obliterated.
It was in this clear and brilliant fashion that every little detail of the scene was indelibly photographed on Ernest's mind when, on the morning following their meeting in the cave, he said good-bye to Eva before he went abroad. It was a public good-bye, for, as it happened, there was no opportunity for the lovers to meet alone. They were all gathered in the little drawing-room at the Cottage: Miss Ceswick seated on a straight-backed chair in the bow-window; Ernest on one side of the round table, looking intensely uncomfortable; Eva on the other, a scrap-book in her hand, which she studiously kept before her; and in the background, leaning carelessly over the back of a chair in such a way that her own face could not be seen, though she could survey everybody else's, was Florence. Ernest, from where he sat, could just make out the outline of her olive face, and the quick glance of her brown eyes.
So they sat for a long time, but what was said he could not remember; it was only the scene that imprinted itself upon his memory.
Then at last the fatal moment came--he knew that it was time to go, and said good-bye to Miss Ceswick, who made some remark about his good fortune in going to France and Italy, and warned him to be careful not to lose his heart to a foreign girl. He crossed the room and shook hands with Florence, who smiled coolly in his face, and read him through with her piercing eyes; and last of all came to Eva, who dropped her album and a pocket-handkerchief in her confusion as she rose to give him her hand. He stooped and picked them up--the album he placed on the table, the little lace-edged handkerchief he crumpled up in the palm of his left hand and kept; it was almost the only souvenir he had of her. Then he took her hand, and for a moment looked into her face. It wore a smile, but beneath it the features were wan and troubled. It was so hard to part.
"Well, Ernest," said Miss Ceswick, "you two are taking leave of each other as solemnly as though you were never going to meet again."
"Perhaps they never will," said Florence, in her clear voice; and at that moment Ernest felt as though he hated her.
"You should not croak, Florence; it is unlucky," said Miss Ceswick.
Florence smiled.
Then Ernest dropped the cold hand, and turning, left the room. Florence followed him, and, snatching a hat from the pegs, passed into the garden before him. When he was halfway down the garden-walk, he found her ostensibly picking some carnations.
"I want to speak to you for a minute, Ernest," she said; "turn this way with me;" and she led him past the bow-window, down a small shrubbery-walk about