I was so sure of her, that I almost seemed to see Jervis Fanshawe standing before her, and asking his question; seemed to hear her laugh with me at the absurdity of it. What did this man know of love or a girlish heart?
He got up abruptly, and came and stood beside me; as I still laughed, he rapped sharply with his knuckles on the dressing-table, as though to call me to order. In that moment reserve was thrown aside, and the man blurted out what was in his mind.
"What were you doing in the wood to-day with her?" he asked, with his face so close to mine that I could feel his hot breath on my cheek. I faced round at him squarely.
"Why were you spying on me?" I demanded hotly; and at the look in his eyes I shrank back from him, a little afraid. For I had never seen on any face such a look of mingled fear and hopelessness, and longing and misery, as I saw in his face then.
"Why was I spying on you? Why do I spy on every one? Why do I feel, when I am near that child, like a weak and impotent child myself? I could crush the life out of her with that hand"—he shook it fiercely in the air before me as he spoke—"and yet she could make me do murder, with a word or a look. I want her—and I mean to have her; there's a passion in me that a boy such as you can't understand. Besides," he went on more calmly, "there are other reasons—reasons you know nothing about. I've gone too far to draw back—and yet I'm afraid to go on. Charlie"—he laid his hand on my arm, and I felt it shake—"you've got to help me somehow; we've got to get through this thing together. Unless I marry this girl—(and God knows I'd treat her well)—it means red ruin for me—and perhaps worse."
"She doesn't love you," I said coldly, urging the only argument I knew.
"I don't ask for that," he retorted bluntly, "because I don't understand it. I'm going to marry her. I think my influence is strong enough with her father for that; I am necessary to him."
"You don't know what you're talking about," I told him. "Do you think she'd turn to you, or have a word to say to you, if you tried to draw her with any other power save that of love? Women don't marry in that way," I added, with the deep wisdom that had come to me that day.
"I suppose you think she's in love with you?" he sneered.
I felt myself burning red all over the face I turned from him, yet I answered steadily. "I should like to think so," I replied; and in spite of his jeers I refused to say any more then.
He paced about the room for a time, stepping carefully over the pattern in the carpet, as though deep in thought. Presently he stopped almost behind me, and spoke in a tone that was half pleading and half threatening. "You mustn't be a fool over this matter, Charlie," he said. "Yours is calf love; you're not old enough to know anything about that sort of thing yet. Besides, old Patton would laugh at you."
"I'm not going to marry old Patton," I reminded him. "In any case, I don't want to discuss the matter, because there's nothing to discuss. Only for your own sake I would advise you to think twice before you suggest marrying Barbara Patton."
"How did you come to know her name?" he asked quickly.
"From her own lips," I replied, turning away from him, and beginning to finish my dressing.
I remember that before he hurried away he strove to patch up some sort of peace with me; held out his hand, with seeming frankness, and declared that I was a fine fellow, and that he meant to stand by me. What he meant by that I did not exactly know; I only understood that he was nervous and anxious, and although I chafed at the thought of his daring to raise eyes to my Barbara, I yet felt a sort of sneaking pity for him, as some one lower than myself, who did not understand this business of love, and had no real chance in the game.
Nevertheless I was troubled. I did not like the thought that this girl, who had suddenly become, in a matter of hours, so much to me, should be the centre of plots and intrigues; above all, I did not like to think that there might be a possibility that my guardian would be able to use a powerful lever to gain her father on his own side. I thought of her always among the trees in the sunlight—and alone with me; I could not bear to think of her then in any other way. Even while I longed for the moment to arrive when I should see her, I yet felt that insane jealousy of youth which resented the thought that others would be about her, and would claim her attention.
I walked in the gathering dusk to the house, being nearly run down in consequence by a dogcart, in which was seated a man whom I felt instinctively must be Gavin Hockley. I do not know why I thought so, except for his brutal method of driving, and for the fact that he shouted at me for daring to be on the same road with him. I wondered a little where he was going; I understood better when, on reaching the house, I saw him lounging with his hands in his pockets in the doorway of the drawing-room. I thought of my ruined painting, and of my escape from an accident but a few minutes before; but I said nothing. I could not quarrel with the fellow there, but I made up my mind that I would have something to say to him before we parted for the night.
The house was an old and roomy one—just the sort of country house that one would expect a substantial man of business to have. There were several guests besides myself: one elderly lady, whom I understood to be a sister to old Patton; a doctor from the neighbourhood and his wife; and a tall pleasant-faced young man, not very intelligent-looking, but with good-humour writ large all over him. For some reason our host was not there when we arrived, but he came in almost immediately afterwards, with Barbara on his arm, and closely followed by Jervis Fanshawe.
I cannot account for it even now, save by the suggestion that I was myself fully on the alert that night, and expectant of anything and everything that might happen; but the very air was stormy. The mere mutterings of that storm came, as it were, into the room with old Patton and his daughter; the menace of it was in the white watchful face of my guardian behind them. And yet there was nothing in the least stormy in the appearance of old Patton himself; indeed, he was quite a benevolent-looking gentleman, rather too old, I thought, to be the father of Barbara, for his hair was white, and he stooped a little as he walked. But he had a kindly face, with yet a certain strong note of determination in it.
Barbara raised her eyes to mine once, and once only; and in that flash I strove to read her thoughts and her heart. In the look I thought I detected that she mutely asked me something, or pleaded with me; so much I seemed to understand, but no more. She gave no sign of knowing me, and only bowed slightly when I was introduced; old Patton, on the other hand, greeted me warmly, and had a cordial word or two to say about my guardian. He shook hands, too, with Hockley, and seemed to know him; I gathered that Hockley had been there before.
I had had a wild dream that I might take Barbara in to dinner; but that was reserved for the young man of the good-humoured face. Somehow I felt I did not like him quite so well as I had at first, but, remembering our meeting in the wood, I felt that Barbara probably shared my feelings on the matter, and suffered as much as I did. I went in at the tail end of the little procession, and was consoled to find that Barbara was seated opposite me, and that I could watch her easily during the progress of the meal. Other eyes were watching her, too, with a curious intentness; my guardian's, with his nostrils distended, and his hands nervously gripping each other; Hockley's, with the brutal dull look that belonged to him. For her own part, she kept her eyes on her plate, and only now and then seemed to answer a remark addressed to her by the young man of the good-humoured face, whose name I heard was Lucas Savell.
I do not remember the dinner; it seemed all Barbara. I know I replied to words addressed to me, and I suppose I replied fairly intelligently; but all the time I seemed to see that face before me, and to see it, strangely enough, as the centre of that storm-cloud that was gathering. From that face I would glance for a moment to the face of Jervis Fanshawe, that never seemed to change, and that was like a white mask; and from that again to the face of old Patton, at the head of the table, watching the bent head of his daughter; or again to Hockley, lounging clumsily in his chair, with his shoulder turned towards the doctor's wife, the while he carelessly flung a remark or two over it at that lady. And so back to Barbara again.
I awoke to the consciousness that the doctor was telling a story, and telling it, as it seemed, rather well, to judge by the interested faces about him; even Barbara had raised her head a little,