“I am glad of your approval, George; but pray let that be an end to it.”
After that the two sat silent for a minute or two. She was waiting for him to go, but she could not bid him leave the house. She was angry with herself, in that she had allowed herself to tell him of her altered plans, and she was angry with him because he would not understand that she ought to be spared all conversation on the subject. So she sat looking through the window at the row of gaslights as they were being lit, and he remained in his chair with his elbow on the table and his head resting on his hand.
“Do you remember asking me whether I ever shivered,” he said at last; “—whether I ever thought of things that made me shiver? Don’t you remember; on the bridge at Basle?”
“Yes; I remember.”
“Well, Alice;—one cause for my shivering is over. I won’t say more than that now. Shall you remain long at Cheltenham?”
“Just a month.”
“And then you come back here?”
“I suppose so. Papa and I will probably go down to Vavasor Hall before Christmas. How much before I cannot say.”
“I shall see you at any rate after your return from Cheltenham? Of course Kate will know, and she will tell me.”
“Yes; Kate will know. I suppose she will stay here when she comes up from Norfolk. Goodbye.”
“Goodbye, Alice. I shall have fewer fits of that inward shivering that you spoke of—many less, on account of what I have now heard. God bless you, Alice; goodbye.”
“Goodbye, George.”
As he went he took her hand and pressed it closely between his own. In those days when they were lovers—engaged lovers, a close, long-continued pressure of her hand had been his most eloquent speech of love. He had not been given to many kisses—not even to many words of love. But he would take her hand and hold it, even as he looked away from her, and she remembered well the touch of his palm. It was ever cool—cool, and with a surface smooth as a woman’s—a small hand that had a firm grip. There had been days when she had loved to feel that her own was within it, when she trusted in it, and intended that it should be her staff through life. Now she distrusted it; and as the thoughts of the old days came upon her, and the remembrance of that touch was recalled, she drew her hand away rapidly. Not for that had she driven from her as honest a man as had ever wished to mate with a woman. He, George Vavasor, had never so held her hand since the day when they had parted, and now on this first occasion of her freedom she felt it again. What did he think of her? Did he suppose that she could transfer her love in that way, as a flower may be taken from one buttonhole and placed in another? He read it all, and knew that he was hurrying on too quickly. “I can understand well,” he said in a whisper, “what your present feelings are; but I do not think you will be really angry with me because I have been unable to repress my joy at what I cannot but regard as your release from a great misfortune.” Then he went.
“My release!” she said, seating herself on the chair from which he had risen. “My release from a misfortune! No;—but my fall from heaven! Oh, what a man he is! That he should have loved me, and that I should have driven him away from me!” Her thoughts travelled off to the sweetness of that home at Nethercoats, to the excellence of that master who might have been hers; and then in an agony of despair she told herself that she had been an idiot and a fool, as well as a traitor. What had she wanted in life that she should have thus quarrelled with as happy a lot as ever had been offered to a woman? Had she not been mad, when she sent from her side the only man that she loved—the only man that she had ever truly respected? For hours she sat there, all alone, putting out the candles which the servant had lighted for her, and leaving untasted the tea that was brought to her.
Poor Alice! I hope that she may be forgiven. It was her special fault, that when at Rome she longed for Tibur, and when at Tibur she regretted Rome. Not that her cousin George is to be taken as representing the joys of the great capital, though Mr. Grey may be presumed to form no inconsiderable part of the promised delights of the country. Now that she had sacrificed her Tibur, because it had seemed to her that the sunny quiet of its pastures lacked the excitement necessary for the happiness of life, she was again prepared to quarrel with the heartlessness of Rome, and already was again sighing for the tranquillity of the country.
Sitting there, full of these regrets, she declared to herself that she would wait for her father’s return, and then, throwing herself upon his love and upon his mercy, would beg him to go to Mr. Grey and ask for pardon for her. “I should be very humble to him,” she said; “but he is so good, that I may dare to be humble before him.” So she waited for her father. She
