This Man's Wife Part 17

She laid her cheek upon his breast, and remained silent for a few moments, with half-closed eyes. Then, raising her head, she kissed him lovingly.

"I am, father dear," she said in a low voice, full of the calm and peaceful joy that filled her breast. "I am, father, I am, mother--so happy!" She paused, and then, laughing gently, added: "So happy I feel ready to cry."

It was to be a quiet evening, to which a few friends were invited; but it was understood as being an open acknowledgment of Millicent's engagement to Robert Hallam, and in this spirit the visitors came.

Miss Heathery generally arrived last at the social gatherings. It gave her entry more importance, and, at her time of life, she could not afford to dispense with advent.i.tious aids. But there was the scent of matrimony in this little party, and she was dressed an hour too soon, and arrived first in the well-lit drawing-room.

"My darling!" she whispered, as she kissed Millicent.

That was all; but her voice and look were full of pity for the victim chosen for the next sacrifice, and she turned away towards the piano to get out her handkerchief, and drop a parting tear.

It was a big tear, one of so real and emotional a character that it brimmed over, fell on her cheekbone, and hopped into her reticule just as she was drawing open the top, and was lost in the depths within.

There was as much sorrow for herself as emotion on Millicent Luttrell's behalf. Had not Millicent robbed her of the chance of an offer? Mr Hallam might never have proposed: but still he might.

Suddenly her heart throbbed, for the next guest arrived also unusually early, and as Thisbe held open the door for him to pa.s.s, hope told again her flattering tale to the tune that Sir Gordon might have known that she, Miss Heathery, was coming early, and had followed.

The hopeful feeling did not die at once, but it received a shock as Sir Gordon entered, looking very bright and young, to shake hands warmly with the doctor and Mrs Luttrell, to bow to Miss Heathery, and then turn to Millicent, who, in spite of her natural firmness, was a good deal agitated. She had nerved herself for these meetings, and striven to keep down their importance; but now the night had arrived, she was fain to confess that hers was a difficult task, to meet two rejected lovers, and bear herself easily before them with the husband of her choice. First there was Sir Gordon, from whom she was prepared for reproachful looks, and perhaps others marked by disappointment; while from Christie Bayle--ah, how would he behave towards her? He was so young that she trembled lest he should make himself ridiculous in his loving despair.

And now here was the first shock to be sustained, so, forcing herself to be calm, she advanced with extended hand.

"Oh," whispered Sir Gordon, in tones that only reached Millicent's ear, "too bad--too bad. Supplanted twice. But there, I accept my fate." As he spoke he drew Millicent towards him, and kissed her forehead with tender reverence. "An old man's kiss, my dear, to the child of his very dear friends. G.o.d bless you! May you be very happy with the man of your choice. May I?" He dropped her hand to draw from his breast a string of large single pearls, so regular and perfect a match that they must have cost a goodly sum. For answer Millicent turned pale as she bent towards him and he clasped the string about her neck. "There," he said smiling, "I should have made a different choice if I had known."

Millicent would have spoken, but her voice failed, and to add to her agony at that moment, Bayle came in, looking, as she saw at a glance, pale and somehow changed.

"He will do or say something absurd," she said to herself as she bit her lip, and strove for composure. Then the blood seemed to rush to her heart and a pang shot through her as she realised more than if he had said a thousand things, how deeply her refusal had influenced his life.

Only four months since that day, when she had told him that they could be true friends, she speaking as an elder sister to one she looked upon as a boy. And now she felt ready to ask herself, who was this calm, grave man, who took her hand without hesitation, so perfectly at ease in his gentlemanly courtesy, and who had so thoroughly fallen into the place she had bidden him take?

"I see," he said with a smile, "I shall not be out of order, my dear Miss Luttrell. Will you accept this little offering too?"

He was holding a brilliant diamond ring in his hand.

For answer Millicent drew her long glove from her soft, white hand, and he took it gravely, and, in the presence of all, slipped on the ring, bending over it afterwards to kiss that hand, with the chivalrous delicacy of some courtier of a bygone school, then, raising his eyes to hers, he said softly, "Millicent Luttrell, our friends.h.i.+p must never fail."

Before she could say a word of thanks he had turned to speak to Mrs Luttrell, giving way to Sir Gordon Bourne, who began chatting to her pleasantly, while her eyes followed Christie Bayle's easy gestures, as she wondered the while at the change in his manner, unable to realise the agony of soul that he had suffered in this his first great battle with self before he had obtained the mastery, wounded and changed, stepping at once, as it were, from boyhood to the position of a thoughtful man.

Hallam soon arrived, smiling and agreeable, and it was piteous to see Mrs Luttrell's efforts to be very warm and friendly to him.

Millicent noticed it, and also that her father was quiet towards his son-in-law elect. She watched, too, the meeting between Hallam and Bayle, the former being as nearly offensive as his gentlemanly manner would allow; the latter warm, grave, and friendly.

"Has Bayle been unwell?" said Hallam the first time he was alone with Millicent.

"_I_ have not heard," she replied, glancing at the curate, and wondering more and more, as the evening went on, at the change.

Among others, the Trampleasures arrived, and to Miss Heathery's grief, Mrs Trampleasure pretty well monopolised Bayle's remarks, or else made him listen to her own.

"And what do you think of this engagement, Mr Bayle?" she said, in so audible a voice that he was afraid it would be overheard.

"They make a very handsome couple," he replied.

"Ah, yes, handsome enough, I dare say; but good looks will not fill mouths. I wonder L. has allowed it. Mr Hallam is all very well, but he is, I may say, our servant, and if we, who are above him, find so much trouble to make both ends meet, I don't know what he'll do."

"But Mr Hallam has a very good salary, I presume?"

"I tell T. it is too much, and old Mr Dixon and Sir Gordon might have taken a hundred off, and let us draw it. I don't approve of the match at all."

"Indeed, Mrs Trampleasure," said Bayle, who felt hurt at hearing her speak like this.

"Yes; I'm Millicent's aunt, and I think I ought to have been consulted more--but there! it is of no use to speak to my brother; and as to Millicent--she always did just as she liked with her mother! Poor Kitty is very weak!"

"I always find Mrs Luttrell very sweet and motherly."

"Not so motherly as I am, Mr Bayle," said the lady bluntly. "Ah, it's a great stress on a woman--a large family--especially when the father takes things so coolly. I shouldn't speak to every one like this, you know, but one can talk to one's clergyman. Do you like Mr Hallam?"

"I find him very gentlemanly."

"Ah, yes, he's very gentlemanly. Well, I'm sure I hope they'll be happy; but there's always something in married life, and you do well to keep out of it; but, of course, you are so young yet."

"Yes," he said, with a grave, old-looking smile, "I am so young yet."

"You don't know what a family is, Mr Bayle. There's always something; when it isn't measles it's scarlatina, and when it isn't scarlatina it's boots and shoes."

"Oh, but children are a deal of comfort, Sophia," said the doctor, coming up after whispering to Mrs Luttrell that his sister looked grumpy.

"Some children may be, Joseph--mine are not," sighed Mrs Trampleasure, and the doctor went back to his wife. "Ah, Mr Bayle, if I were to tell you one-half of the troubles I've been through I should hara.s.s you."

"Kitty," said the doctor, "I want everything to go well to-night. Try and coax Sophia away, she's forcing her doldrums on Mr Bayle."

"But how am I to get her away, dear? You know what she is."

"Try to persuade her to taste the brandy cherries, or we shall be having her in tears. I'll come and help you." They walked back to where Mrs Trampleasure was still talking away hard in a querulous voice.

"Ah! you've come back, Joseph," she said, cutting short her remarks to the curate to return to her complaint to her brother. "I was saying that some children are a pleasure; but it did not seem as if you could listen to me."

"My dear Sophia, I'll listen to you all night, but Kitty wants you to give your opinion about some brandy cherries."

"My opinion?" said the lady loudly. "I have no opinion. I never taste such luxuries."

Millicent could not help hearing a portion of her aunt's querulous remarks, and, out of sheer pity for one of the recipients, she turned to her Uncle Trampleasure, who always kept on the other side of the room.

"Uncle, dear," she said, "aunt is murmuring so. Do try and stop it."

"Stop it, my dear?" he said smiling sadly. "Ah, if you knew your aunt as well as I do you would never check her murmurs; they carry off her ill-temper. No, no, my dear, it would be dangerous to stop it. I always let it go on."

There was no need to check Mrs Trampleasure after all. Mr Bayle threw himself into the breach, and made her forget her own troubles by consulting her about some changes that he proposed making in the parish.

That changed the course of her thoughts, and in the intervals of the music, and often during the progress of some song, she alluded to different matters that had given her annoyance ever since she had been a girl.