King of the Castle Part 92

"Well--no," he answered softly, as he kept on taking up and laying down his papers in different order.

"Mr Trevithick!"

"Pray, give me time, Miss Dillon," he protested. "The fact is I have heard very important news this morning."

"Of course you have. You mean about my cousin's approaching marriage."

"Then it is true?"

"Of course it is."

Trevithick sighed.

"Well, Mr Trevithick, is that all?"

"No, madam, I may say that I am very sorry."

"Well, is that all?" cried Mary, impatiently.

"No. As the late Mr Gartram's trusted, confidential adviser, I was aware that this was his wish, but, all the same, I am deeply grieved."

"Of course, and so is everybody else," said Mary pa.s.sionately. "I mean," she said, checking herself, "it seems sad for it to be so soon.

That is all, I suppose."

"No, Miss Dillon; this being so I should have liked to discuss with Miss Gartram the question of the settlements. I presume, as she has continued to trust me as her father trusted me, that she would wish me to see to all the legal matters connected with her fortune."

"What a stupid question. Why, of course."

"Well, forgive me; hardly a stupid question. Perhaps too retiring--for a lawyer."

"Mr Trevithick, you are not half decided and prompt enough. Well, then; my cousin antic.i.p.ated all this, and said, 'tell Mr Trevithick to do what is right and just, and that I leave myself entirely in his hands. Tell him to do what he would have done had my father been alive.'"

"Ah!" said the lawyer slowly. "Yes; then I will proceed at once. It is a great responsibility, as Miss Gartram has neither relative nor executor to whom she could appeal. A very great responsibility, but I will do what is just and right in her interest, tying down her property as under the circ.u.mstances should be done."

"Do--do Mr Trevithick--dear Mr Trevithick, pray do," cried Mary, starting from her seat, and advancing to the table--her old, sharp manner gone, and an intense desire to hasten the lawyer's proposals flas.h.i.+ng from her eyes.

"I will," he said firmly; and he held out his hand. "You will trust me, Mary Dillon, as your cousin trusts me?"

"Indeed, I will," she said eagerly, and she placed her thin little white hand in his.

"Hah!" he e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed with a long expiration of the breath; and his great hand closed and prisoned the little one laid therein. "You told me just now that I was not decided and prompt enough."

"Yes, I did. But you are holding my hand very tightly, Mr Trevithick."

"Yes," he said quietly, "I am. That is because you are wrong. I am very decided and prompt sometimes, and I am going to be now. Mary Dillon, will you be my wife?"

"What!" she cried, flus.h.i.+ng scarlet, and struggling to release her hand, as her eyes flashed and seemed to be reading him through and through.

"Absurd!"

"No--no," he said gravely; "don't say that, even if my way and manner are absurd."

"I did not mean that," she cried quickly. "I meant to--Oh, it is absurd!" she said again, though her heart was throbbing violently, and she struggled vainly to withdraw her hand. "Look at me--weak, misshapen, pitiful. Mr Trevithick, you are mad."

"Don't try to take your hand away," he said slowly; it makes me afraid of hurting you; and don't speak again like that--you hurt me very--very much.

"But, Mr Trevithick! It is too dreadful. I cannot--I must not listen to you."

"Why? You are quite free; and you are not an heiress."

"I!" she cried bitterly. "No; I have nothing but a pitiful few hundred pounds. Now you know the truth. Do you hear me? I am a pauper, dependent on my cousin's charity."

"I am very glad," he said, gazing at her thoughtfully, and still speaking in his slow and deliberate way. "I was afraid that perhaps you had money of which I did not know. But you will say 'yes'?"

"No; impossible. Are you blind? Look at me."

"I might say, 'Look at me,'" he retorted, with a frank, honest laugh, which lit up his countenance pleasantly. "I wish you could look at me as I do at you, and see there something that you could love. Yes," he said, his genuine pa.s.sion making him speak fluently and well; "for all these long, long months, Mary, I have always had your sweet, earnest eyes before me, and your clever, bright face. I have seemed to listen to your voice, and sometimes I have been sad as I have asked myself what a woman could find in me to love."

"Ah!" e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed the trembling girl.

"And I've felt that, when you have said all those many sharp, hard things to me, that they were not quite real, and when your words have been most cruel, I've dared to fancy that your eyes seemed to be sorry that your tongue could be so bitter."

"Mr Trevithick, pray!"

"And then I've hoped and waited, and thought of what you were."

"Yes," said Mary bitterly, as she made a gesture with one hand.

"Bah!" he cried, "what of that? An accident when you were a child. I would not have you different for worlds. I want those two dear eyes to look into mine, true and trustful and clever. You, to whom I can come home from my work for help and counsel, to be everything to me--my wife.

Mary dear, in my slow and clumsy way I love you very dearly, and your cousin's wedding has brought it all out. I didn't think I could make love like that."

He took her other hand, and gazed at her very fondly as she stood by his side, with the tears streaming down her cheeks.

"You are not angry with me, dear?"

"No," she said gently; "I am sorry."

"Why?"

"For you. See how the world will sneer."

"What!" he cried eagerly. "Then you will?"

She looked at him searchingly, as if a lingering doubt were there, and a shadow of suspicion were making her try to see if he was truly in earnest.

"No, no," she said, as a sob burst from her lips; "it is impossible."

And she struggled hard to get away.

"Impossible!" he said, as he tightened his grasp. "Tell me one thing, Mary. You knew I loved you?"