“When youth and pleasure meet, To chase the glowing hours with flying feet!” she said to herself over and over again.
But why had he sent her the ring? She would certainly give him back the ring and bid him bestow it at once upon Miss Boncassen. Inconstant boy! Then she would get up and wander away for a time and rebuke herself. What right had she even to think of inconstancy? Could she be so irrational, so unjust, as to be sick for his love, as to be angry with him because he seemed to prefer another? Was she not well aware that she herself did not love him;—but that she did love another man? She had made up her mind to marry him in order that she might be a duchess, and because she could give herself to him without any of that horror which would be her fate in submitting to matrimony with one or another of the young men around her. There might be disappointment. If he escaped her there would be bitter disappointment. But seeing how it was, had she any further ground for hope? She certainly had no ground for anger!
It was thus, within her own bosom, she put questions to herself. And yet all this before her was simply a game of play in which the girl and the young man were as eager for victory as though they were children. They were thinking neither of love nor lovemaking. That the girl should be so lovely was no doubt a pleasure to him;—and perhaps to her also that he should be joyous to look at and sweet of voice. But he, could he have been made to tell all the truth within him, would have still owned that it was his purpose to make Mabel his wife.
When the game was over and the propositions made for further matches and the like—Miss Boncassen said that she would betake herself to her own room. “I never worked so hard in my life before,” she said. “And I feel like a navvie. I could drink beer out of a jug and eat bread and cheese. I won’t play with you any more, Lord Silverbridge, because I am beginning to think it is unladylike to exert myself.”
“Are you not glad you came over?” said Lady Mabel to him as he was going off the ground almost without seeing her.
“Pretty well,” he said.
“Is not that better than stalking?”
“Lawn-tennis?”
“Yes;—lawn-tennis—with Miss Boncassen.”
“She plays uncommonly well.”
“And so do you.”
“Ah, she has such an eye for distances.”
“And you—what have you an eye for? Will you answer me a question?”
“Well;—yes; I think so.”
“Truly.”
“Certainly; if I do answer it.”
“Do you not think her the most beautiful creature you ever saw in your life?” He pushed back his cap and looked at her without making any immediate answer. “I do. Now tell me what you think.”
“I think that perhaps she is.”
“I knew you would say so. You are so honest that you could not bring yourself to tell a fib—even to me about that. Come here and sit down for a moment.” Of course he sat down by her. “You know that Frank came to see me at Grex?”
“He never mentioned it.”
“Dear me;—how odd!”
“It was odd,” said he in a voice which showed that he was angry. She could hardly explain to herself why she told him this at the present moment. It came partly from jealousy, as though she had said to herself, “Though he may neglect me, he shall know that there is someone who does not;”—and partly from an eager half-angry feeling that she would have nothing concealed. There were moments with her in which she thought that she could arrange her future life in accordance with certain wise rules over which her heart should have no influence. There were others, many others, in which her feelings completely got the better of her. And now she told herself that she would be afraid of nothing. There should be no deceit, no lies!
“He went to see you at Grex!” said Silverbridge.
“Why should he not have come to me at Grex?”
“Only it is so odd that he did not mention it. It seems to me that he is always having secrets with you of some kind.”
“Poor Frank! There is no one else who would come to see me at that tumbledown old place. But I have another thing to say to you. You have behaved badly to me.”
“Have I?”
“Yes, sir. After my folly about that ring you should have known better than to send it to me. You must take it back again.”
“You shall do exactly what you said you would. You shall give it to my wife—when I have one.”
“That did very well for me to say in a note. I did not want to send my anger to you over a distance of two or three hundred miles by the postman. But now that we are together you must take it back.”
“I will do no such thing,” said he sturdily.
“You speak as though this were a matter in which you can have your own way.”
“I mean to have mine about that.”
“Any lady then must be forced to take any present that a gentleman may send her! Allow me to assure you that the usages of society do not run in that direction. Here is the ring. I knew that you would come over to see—well, to see someone here, and I have kept it ready in my pocket.”
“I came over to see you.”
“Lord Silverbridge! But we know that in certain employments all things are fair.” He looked at her not knowing what were the employments to which she alluded. “At any rate you will oblige me by—by—by not being troublesome, and putting
