She went downstairs, knowing that she was the first up in the house—the first, excepting the servants. She went into Mabel’s room, and kissing her sister, who was only half awake, wished her many, many, many happy Christmases.
“Oh, Bell,” said Mabel, “I do so hope you are better!”
“Of course I am better. Of course I am well. There is nothing for a headache like having twelve hours round of sleep. I don’t know what made me so tired and so bad.”
“I thought it was something Maurice said,” suggested Mabel.
“Oh, dear, no. I think Barty had more to do with it than Mr. Archer. The old fellow frightened me so when he made me think I was falling down. But get up, dear. Papa is in his room, and he’ll be ready for prayers before you.”
Then she descended to the kitchen, and offered her good wishes to all the servants. To Barty, who always breakfasted there on Christmas mornings, she was especially kind, and said something civil about his work in the church.
“She’ll ’bout brek her little heart for t’ young mon there, an’ he’s naa true t’ her,” said Barty, as soon as Miss Lownd had closed the kitchen door; showing, perhaps, that he knew more of the matter concerning herself than she did.
She then went into the parlour to prepare the breakfast, and to put a little present, which she had made for her father, on his plate;—when, whom should she see but Maurice Archer!
It was a fact known to all the household, and a fact that had not recommended him at all to Isabel, that Maurice never did come downstairs in time for morning prayers. He was always the last; and, though in most respects a very active man, seemed to be almost a sluggard in regard to lying in bed late. As far as she could remember at the moment, he had never been present at prayers a single morning since the first after his arrival at the parsonage, when shame, and a natural feeling of strangeness in the house, had brought him out of his bed. Now he was there half an hour before the appointed time, and during that half-hour she was doomed to be alone with him. But her courage did not for a moment desert her.
“This is a wonder!” she said, as she took his hand. “You will have a long Christmas Day, but I sincerely hope that it may be a happy one.”
“That depends on you,” said he.
“I’ll do everything I can,” she answered. “You shall only have a very little bit of roast beef, and the unfortunate pudding shan’t be brought near you.” Then she looked in his face, and saw that his manner was very serious—almost solemn—and quite unlike his usual ways. “Is anything wrong?” she asked.
“I don’t know; I hope not. There are things which one has to say which seem to be so very difficult when the time comes. Miss Lownd, I want you to love me.”
“What!” She started back as she made the exclamation, as though some terrible proposition had wounded her ears. If she had ever dreamed of his asking for her love, she had dreamed of it as a thing that future days might possibly produce;—when he should be altogether settled at Hundlewick, and when they should have got to know each other intimately by the association of years.
“Yes, I want you to love me, and to be my wife. I don’t know how to tell you; but I love you better than anything and everything in the world—better than all the world put together. I have done so from the first moment that I saw you; I have. I knew how it would be the very first instant I saw your dear face, and every word you have spoken, and every look out of you look out of your eyes, has made me love you more and more. If I offended you yesterday, I will beg your pardon.”
“Oh, no,” she said.
“I wish I had bitten my tongue out before I had said what I did about Christmas Day. I do, indeed. I only meant, in a half-joking way, to—to—to—. But I ought to have known you wouldn’t like it, and I beg your pardon. Tell me, Isabel, do you think that you can love me?”
Not half an hour since she had made up her mind that, even were he to propose to her—which she then knew to be absolutely impossible, she would certainly refuse him. He was not the sort of man for whom she would be a fitting wife; and she had made up her mind also, at the same time, that she did not at all care for him, and that he certainly did not in the least care for her. And now the offer had absolutely been made to her! Then came across her mind an idea that he ought in the first place to have gone to her father; but as to that she was not quite sure. Be that as it might, there he was, and she must give him some answer. As for thinking about it, that was altogether beyond her. The shock to her was too great to allow of her thinking. After some fashion, which afterwards was quite unintelligible to herself, it seemed to her, at that moment, that duty, and maidenly reserve, and filial obedience, all required her to reject him instantly. Indeed, to have accepted him would have been quite beyond her power. “Dear Isabel,” said he, “may I hope that some day you will love me?”
“Oh! Mr. Archer, don’t,” she said. “Do not ask me.”
“Why should I not ask you?”
“It can never be.” This she said quite plainly, and in a voice that seemed to him to settle his fate forever; and yet
