Nor was she obeying an impulse merely of jealousy or vengeance. It was an impulse of mercy to this poor child he had befooled for his entertainment. Better a thousand times for Lucy that Vallancey should be taken and hanged; better a thousand times than that he should ride gaily away, leaving a heart-breaking disillusion behind him. To mourn him dead would be a small sorrow by comparison.
Within a pace of the door her ladyship checked suddenly, smitten by a fresh notion; and Lucy, watching her, marvelled at the oddness of a bearing, which at last she noticed. Her ladyship's next words, she fancied, explained it.
'They are very long in coming.'
'He may have gone some way downstream,' Lucy explained, and added fearfully the question: 'Is there danger in his delaying?'
'Why, no, child,' said her ladyship.
She came slowly back to the table, sat down again, and engaged Lucy in talk of this fine lover.
Gradually and skillfully she drew out the tale of it?her manifest sympathy and the relationship in which Lucy believed her to stand to Vallancey, effectively inducing the girl to speak upon a topic that filled her soul.
She found it all precisely as she had feared. The child's love for Vallancey amounted to worship; her trust in him had become the very breath of her life. In her pity for Lucy Lady Mary almost forgot to be sorry for herself. Her resolve to act upon the inspiration that had come to her gathered strength with every word that Lucy uttered. For the child's frank and artless nature made no attempt to use dissimulation with Vallancey's 'dear cousin.'
Presently came a sound of steps and voices. Through the long latticed window they saw Vallancey crossing the bridge with Leigh and the shock-headed lad. He was shouldering a long rod, and a brace of golden trout swung from the butt of it.
Lady Mary stood up.
'Go child,' she said. 'Let me speak to?to Mr. Vallancey alone a moment. I will call you.'
Lucy hesitated. It was clearly in her mind to protest against this. But overawed by her ladyship's manner, she ended by obeying her, though with obvious reluctance.
A moment later, when the door opened, and Vallancey, tall, lean and bronzed, appeared in the doorway, his betrothed was alone to receive him.
He greeted her with a joyous cry; a glad smile suffused his handsome face; his bold, dark eyes beamed upon her.
'Why, Mary, dear!' he cried. 'What is't I'm told?that you're the bearer of great tidings?'
He advanced towards her, and she was conscious, with a pang, of the melody of his voice, the grace and ease of his carriage, which not even the rough garb he bore could dissemble. Within a pace of her he halted, perplexed by the stiffness of her attitude, the coldness of her face.
'Mary?Mary!' said he. Then, a sudden alarm gripping him?'What is't? Was it not true?your message? Is there danger from the troopers at St. Mary?'
Her answer increased his perplexity.
'That shall be as you decide.'
'As I decide?' he stared at her, frowning. Then he forced a laugh. 'You greet me oddly, faith! monstrous oddly!'
''Tis that I find you monstrous odd,' said she; and the fool conceived her words to concern his clumsy apparel, and began to explain its expediency.
She cut him short.
'I have seen your host's daughter what time I waited for you,' she announced.
'A sweet chit,' he flung in.
'I have talked with her,' said her ladyship, a thought more sternly.
'Have you so?' said he, beginning at last to take her meaning. 'Odds my life!'
'And she tells me that you are to be wed?you and she.'
He clucked impatiently.
'The little fool!' Then he checked her anger, and laughed. 'Faith! It cannot be that the Lady Mary Ormington is jealous?'
'Jealous!'
She hurled the word at him as though it were a missile. Then a smile of scorn twisted her lovely mouth. 'Could I be jealous seeing that this morning I discovered you to be a stranger to me?a man whose acquaintance I had never made? For that Stephen Vallancey to whom I was betrothed was surely not the gentleman who stands before me. He never had life save in my fancy, and with that fancy he perished in this room a little while ago.'
Consternation overspread his face.
'Stay, Mary?stay! You go too fast. You do not know.'
'I know how you have beguiled the weariness of your sojourn here. I have it all from Lucy, who trusted me, believing me your good friend and cousin, as you had falsely told her.'
Still he sought to carry it with a high hand.
'Pshaw! Listen, Mary. Am I to blame in that the little fool should come to rash conclusions?'
'It is quite as I supposed,' said she.
But he swept on.
'What harm has come to her? She is a sweet child, a sweet playmate. But no more, believe me, Mary. I may have wandered with her by the stream, and talked of love and moonshine, and haply snatched a kiss or two. But, on my soul, 'twas all in play.'
'I nothing doubt it, sir. And you would break her heart, and that would be in play; and your fine gentleman's conscience would have nought wherewith to reproach you. But break her heart you shall not. It is my good fortune to prevent it.'
He stared, crestfallen. She explained.
'The King's Dragoon are at St. Mary Ottery, seeking, ferreting, inquiring. Within the hour they will be here. Depend on't. They will find you, and it will be best so. Better for her?less anguishing a thousand times that she should mourn you dead than mourn you faithless. You'll leastways leave a fragrant memory behind you.'
His face had paled under its healthy tan.
'God!' he gasped. 'Did ye not send me word that I no longer stand in danger?'
She looked him straight between the eyes, her face merciless.
'I was mistook,' said she. 'Ye stand in imminent danger. Yet if you love your life it shall be yours so that you swear to use it for that child's happiness, and fulfil the promise you have made her.'
'I have made her none,' he thundered, angry now.
'Not in words, perhaps?though even that I doubt. But you have made her believe that you love her and that you are sincere.'
'And so I do, faith! But if all love is to lead to marriage a man would?'
She cut him short.
'Your philosophy needs no expounding, sir. I know its shamelessness. You stand 'twixt life and death, Stephen. I await your choice.'
For the first time in his shallow, amiably irresponsible existence he was conscious of guilt, stung by the shame of detection; and he stood sullenly silent a moment. Then with a shrug that was boyish in its petulance he turned aside and moved towards the window. Then he faced her again, his countenance in shadow.
'Are you bidding me to marry her?' he asked, his voice charged with incredulity.
'I am bidding you do no more than fulfil your undertaking.'
'But it is monstrous!' he protested.
'It is,' she agreed.
'Besides, are we not betrothed, Mary, you and I?'
'I thought I had made it clear that you are free of that.'
'But I do not want my freedom. Mary,' he cried petulantly, 'I love you. You are the wife for me. I have never ceased to love you. As for this little rustic child. Oh, sink me! Can't you understand?' he ended impatiently.
'I think I can,' said she, her voice ice-cold.
'But consider,' he begged her. 'How could I marry her? How could I? Why, you must see 'twere midsummer madness.'
