Leonie of the Jungle Part 16

"I shall be in the last cove to-morrow at eleven, waiting for you."

And naturally Leonie had responded to the mastery in the voice, as all women do respond when the voice is the right one; and a soft wave of colour swept from chin to brow as she turned from the gate, and walked through the doorway straight to her bedroom; while her future lord pranced furiously among the bric-a-brac, and her aunt's beads and bracelets clashed against the china as she wrung her hands over the tea things, and portending disaster.

Leonie sat down on her bed with her eyes s.h.i.+ning like stars.

The lid of her life's casket had opened wide, and from under a hideous heap of fear, disgust, lost illusions, and despair, hope had sprung, spreading her iridescent wings in the warmth of love.

She sat until the shadows crept about her, then got up from her bed with a little laugh, and descended to give battle for her life and freedom.

Think of every synonym connected with the word tumult and you will get a vague idea of the storm which crashed about the girl's defenceless head as she stood with her back to the door of the tiny sitting-room, with a perfectly gorgeous diamond ring sparkling and flas.h.i.+ng in front of her upon a table.

"I cannot marry you, Sir Walter, I simply cannot do it," she was saying, slowly and distinctly. "You must let me go. So please give the ring to somebody else, there are heaps of girls ever--oh, ever so much nicer than me!"

She smiled sweetly as she picked up the ring and held it out to the man, who s.n.a.t.c.hed it from her as he sprang to his feet, and hurled it through the window.

Then he moved to the other side of the table and leant both clenched fists upon it as he looked Leonie up and down.

"You needn't wear the ring, my girl," he said slowly, "but no one picks Walter Hickle up one day and throws him down the next. You're going to marry me this day month, you take that straight from me. Let's hear why you've changed your mind so sudden; willing to marry last night, unwilling to marry to-day.

"Come on, now, out with it!" he suddenly shouted, bringing his hand with a crash on the table as Leonie hesitated, blus.h.i.+ng divinely.

"Only--be-cause I--I don't love you, Sir Walter, and it's--it's _not_ right to marry without love!"

"Pos.h.!.+ There wasn't so much of this 'ere right to marry last night.

Fallen in love with that young feller-me-lad, I suppose. Where did you meet him? What were you doing? How--how----"

Leonie turned the handle of the door, but shrank back as the man, with a bound, flung himself at her and wrenched her hand free; and Susan Hetth clashed her bracelets and bits as she put her hands tightly over her face, in her fright forgetting the mixture of colours she heaped on it daily in the hope of stemming the neap tide of old age.

"Get out, you there!" snarled the man, lashed to fury by the whip of jealousy. "Get out, go away, wash your face--you look like a--a--like a d.a.m.ned fut'rist, get _out_!"

And not daring to pa.s.s the two near the door, she prepared to get, with a great loss of dignity, through the bow window; in fact, one foot was just over the sill when the man called her back.

"Come back," he bellowed, "I want you as witness to what I'm goin' to say to your niece, the young lady what plays fast and loose with honest men. Fast and loose, I _don't_ fink!"

Leonie shuddered as the veneer of refinement cracked under the strain of the man's rage, showing the brutality and grossness immediately underneath.

She pulled her hand free, and backed towards the mantelpiece, against which she leant, staring at him.

"I am not going to marry you!"

The voice was low but positive, and the quiet in the room was intense as Sir Walter bounced up within a foot of her and shook a fat forefinger in her face.

"Aren't you," he said, "aren't you! And I'll just tell you three things what'll make you change your tune, my girl.

"One," he placed the fat forefinger on the ill-bred thumb, "an' the least important, you'll marry me 'cos you're an 'etth, daughter of Colonel Bob Hetth, V.C., an' your fut'rist aunt ain't--hasn't half rubbed it in about the Hetths never breaking their word, I give you mine!"

"Please leave my father's name out of this," quietly replied Leonie, her face dead white from the sickening thudding of her heart.

"Well, if you don't keep your word, Miss tiger cat, I'll run you in for breach of promise, an' bring your father's name into court!"

"You couldn't!"

"_Couldn't_!--couldn't what?" stormed the man.

"Run," said Leonie gently, and added sweetly, and with great vulgarity, "you're too fat!"

"Two!" continued Sir Walter, purple in the face, but wisely ignoring the insult to his person. "You'll marry me 'cos no one else'll have you. You're batty, my gel--gone in the top storey--can't even go out to work for your living 'cause you ain't always to be trusted. I know all about yer, but I'm willin' to take the risk. There won't be any trapersin' round the 'ouse after dark once yer married to me, I give you my word. Course, if you like to go on spungin' on your aunt, obligin' her to live in a 'ole like this, well, that's your look h'out--'ardly up to mark tho', being an 'etth, daughter of a V.C."

His small eyes gleamed as they rested on Leonie's stricken face.

"Stop, please," she said hurriedly, "I can't stand any more just now.

I--I couldn't really. Will you give me a week to think it over?"

The man laughed contemptuously.

"A few days, a few hours, then?"

There was something horrible in the humiliation of the girl's pleading, but it made not the slightest impression on the ex-costermonger, who had at one time been accustomed to enforcing his commands with the buckle end of his waist-belt.

"Not a minute, not a second," he chortled, seeing the end of the chase in sight. "Think of the 'old I have on yer aunt. Lady Susan Hetth, sister of Colonel Bob 'etth, V.C., creeping out h'of a gentleman's rooms at three h'o'clock of the mornin' an' payin' me 'ush money--think of h'it. _Now_ what 'ev you got to say. Why don't you be sensible an'

quiet, gal? I've _got_ yer, it ain't no use kickin'. Be sensible an'

I'll smother you in di'monds, give yer two Rolls-Royce, yacht, Monty Carlo any time, Park Lane--make every other woman want ter scratch yer eyes out--what more _could_ yer want? Now what have yer got to say!"

What was there to say?

Aunt Susan tried to obliterate herself behind the window curtain; Sir Walter, thumbs in armholes, tilted himself backwards and forwards on toe and heel as Leonie came forward and leant with both hands the table, as she looked from one to the other without speaking.

In fact the silence became intolerable to Sir Walter, who had expected, and would have thoroughly enjoyed a heated altercation, in which he would have known exactly where he was.

"Well, what 'ev yer got to say, my gel?"

Leonie looked from one to the other.

"I will marry you this day month, Sir Walter." She threw up her hand as he laughed triumphantly. "Wait one moment! But until that day I will have nothing to do with you, _nothing_. I will not meet you nor go out with you, nor bother about a trousseau, nor the future in any way. I shall go out and come in when I like, and go where and how I like. I shall meet whom I like. I won't deceive you, I shall meet Jan Cuxson just as often as I like. And I should advise you not to interfere with me in any way. He is young and strong, and, as an old friend of the family, might resent it. You can trust him, he is a gentleman--which means--oh, well!--you will find the exact meaning in a French dictionary."

She crossed to the door, turned, and looked, slowly from one to the other.

"Is the bargain concluded?"

"Yes!--I'll take yer on those terms--but you'll pay a 'undred per cent interest on the month, I've lent yer--an' _then_ some I give yer _my_ word!"

The door shut quietly as the man sank into a chair.

"Batty!" he said as he mopped his bald head, "absolutely balmy. But it's worth while--it's worth while--let her have 'er month--let 'er--I shall have a whole lifetime to break 'er in."

CHAPTER XVIII