Brooke's Daughter Part 29

But his frame of mind was anything but peaceful. He had been troubled for some days, and he did not know what troubled him. He was now beginning to find out.

"What are my plans, I wonder?" he reflected. "To make Lesley fall in love with me?--I wish I could! She is as cold as ice; as innocent as a child: and yet I think there is a tremendous capacity for pa.s.sion in those dark eyes of hers, those mobile, sensitive lips! What lips to kiss! what eyes to flash back fire and feeling! what a splendid woman to win and show the world! It would be like loving a G.o.ddess--as if Diana herself had stooped from Olympus to grace Endymion!"

And then he laughed aloud.

"What a fool I am! Poetizing like a boy; and all about a girl who never can be my wife at all. That's the worst part of it. I am engaged--engaged! unutterably ridiculous word!--to marry little Ethel Kenyon, the pretty actress at the Novelty. The respectable, wealthy, well-connected actress, moreover--the product of modern civilization: the young woman of our day who aspires to purify the drama and vindicate the claims of histrionic art--what rubbish it all is! If Ethel were a ballet-dancer, or had taken to opera bouffe, she would be much more entertaining! But her enthusiasms, and her belief in herself and her mission, along with that _mignonne_, provoking, pretty, little face of hers, are altogether too incongruous! No, Ethel bores me, it must be confessed; and I have got to marry her--all for a paltry twenty thousand pounds! What a fool I was to propose before I had seen Brooke's daughter.

"If it weren't for Francis, I would break it off. But how else am I to pay that two thousand? And what won't he do if I fail to pay it? No, that would be ruin--unless I choke him off in some other way, and I don't see how I can do that. No, I must marry Ethel, I suppose, or go to the devil. And unless I could take bonny Lesley with me, that would not mend matters."

He threw his cigar into the fire, and stood for some minutes looking down at it, with gloom imprinted upon his brow.

"I must do something," he said at last. "It's getting too much for me: I shall have to stop going to Brooke's house. I suppose this is what people call falling in love! Well, I can honestly say I have never done it in this fas.h.i.+on before! I have flirted, I have made love scores of times, but I never wanted a woman for my own as I want _her_! And I think I had better keep out of her way--for her eyes will send me mad!"

So he soliloquized: so he resolved; but inclination was stronger than will or judgment. Day after day saw him at the Brookes' house; and day after day saw the shadows deepen on Ethel's face, and the fold of perplexity grow more distinct between Lesley's tender brows.

Kingston had been looking ill and uneasy for some days past, and one afternoon she begged leave to go out for an hour or two to see a friend.

Miss Brooke let her go, and went out to a meeting with a perfectly contented mind. Even if Oliver Trent came to the house that afternoon it would not matter: it would be only "once in a way." And Lesley secretly hoped that he would not come.

But he came. A little later than usual--about four o'clock in the afternoon, when there was no light in the drawing-room but that of the ruddy blaze, and the tea-tray had not yet been brought up. When Lesley saw him she wished that she had sent down word that she was engaged, that she had a headache, or even that she was--conventionally--not at home. Anything rather than a tete-a-tete with Oliver Trent! And yet she would have been puzzled to say why.

His quick eye told him almost at once that she was alone. It told him also that she was decidedly nervous and ill-at-ease.

"We must have lights," she said. "Then you can see my new song. I had a fresh one this morning."

"Never mind the lights: never mind your song," he said, his voice vibrating strangely. "If you are like me, you love this delightful twilight."

"I don't like it," said Lesley, with decision. "I will ring for the lamps, please."

She moved a step, but by a dexterous movement he interposed himself between her and the mantelpiece, beside which hung the bell-handle.

"Shall I ring?" he asked, coolly. It seemed to him that he wanted to gain time. And yet--time for what? He had nothing to get by gaining time.

"Yes, if you please," Lesley said. She could not get past him without seeming rude. A slight tremor shook her frame; she shrank away from him, towards the open piano and leaned against it as if for support. The flickering firelight showed her that his face was very pale, the lips were tightly closed, the brows knitted above his fiercely flaming eye.

He did not look like himself.

"Lesley," he said, hoa.r.s.ely, and stretching forward, he put one hand upon her arm. But the touch gave the girl strength. She drew her arm away, as sharply as if a noxious animal had touched her.

"Mr. Trent, you forget yourself."

"Rather say that I remember myself--that I found myself when I found you! Lesley, I love you!"

"This is shameful--intolerable! You are pledged to my friend--you have said all this to her before," cried Lesley, in bitter wrath and indignation.

"I have said it, but I never knew the meaning of love till I knew you.

Lesley, you love me in return! Let us leave the world together--you and I. Nothing can give me the happiness that your love would bring. Lesley, Lesley, my darling!"

He threw his arm round her, and tried to kiss her cold cheek, her averted, half-open lips. She would have pushed him from her if she had had the strength; but it seemed as if her strength was failing her.

Suddenly, with a half-smothered oath, he let her go--so suddenly, indeed, that she almost fell against the piano near which she had been standing. For the door had opened, and the tall figure of Caspar Brooke stood on the threshold of the room.

CHAPTER XIX.

MAURICE KENYON'S VIEWS.

Mr. Brooke advanced quite quietly into the room. Perhaps he had not seen or heard so very much. Certainly he glanced very keenly--first at Lesley, who leaned half-fainting against the piano, and then at Oliver Trent, who had slunk backwards to the rug before the fire; but he said nothing, and for a minute or two an embarra.s.sed silence prevailed in the room. Lesley then raised herself up a little, and Oliver began to speak.

"I was just going," he said, with a nervous attempt at a laugh. "I haven't much time to-night, and was just hurrying away. I must come in another time."

Mr. Brooke took up a commanding position on the rug, put his hands in his pockets, and surveyed the room in silence. Perhaps Oliver felt the silence to be ominous, for he did not try to shake hands or to utter any commonplaces, but took his leave with a hurried "Good-afternoon" that neither father nor daughter returned. The door shut behind him: they heard the sound of his footsteps on the stairs and the closing of the hall door. Then Lesley bestirred herself with the sensation of a wounded animal that wishes to hide its hurt: she wanted to get away and seek the darkness and solitude of her room upstairs. But before she reached the door Mr. Brooke's voice arrested her.

"Lesley."

She stopped short, and looked at him. Her heart beat so suffocatingly loud and fast that she could not speak.

"I don't trust that young man, Lesley," was what her father said quite quietly.

Then there was a pause. Lesley was still tongue-tied, and Mr. Brooke did not seem to know what to do or say. He walked away from the fire and began to finger some papers on a table, although it was quite too dark to see any of these. Inwardly he was wondering how much or how little he ought to say.

"I wish he would not come quite so often," he remarked.

"Oh, so do I!" said Lesley, with heartfelt warmth.

"Do you? Why, child, I thought you liked him!"

"I never liked him much," said Lesley, faltering.

"And yet you have allowed him to come here day after day and practise with you? The ways of women are inscrutable," said Mr. Brooke, grimly, "and I can't profess to understand them. If you did not wish him to come, there was nothing to do but to close your doors against him."

"I shall be only too glad," said Lesley, eagerly.

"Oh--_now_? That is unnecessary: I shall do it myself," said her father, with the same dryness of tone that always made Lesley feel as if she were withering up to nothingness.

"I don't think he is very likely to come," she said, in a very low tone.

Then, with a quick impulse to clear herself, and an effort which brought the blood in a burning tide to her fair face, she went on, hurriedly--"Father, you don't think I forgot that he"--and then she almost broke down, and "Ethel" was the only word that struck distinctly upon his ear.

"You mean," said Mr. Brooke, "that you do not forget that he is going to marry Ethel Kenyon? Perhaps not; but I think that _he_ does."

"I am not to blame for that," said Lesley, with a flash of the hot temper that occasionally leaped to light when she was talking with her father.

Brooke made no immediate answer. He took a match box from his pocket, struck a match, and began to light the wax candles on the mantelpiece--partly by way of finding something to do, partly because he thought that he should like to see his daughter's face.

It was a very downcast face just then, but it was tinged with the hot flush of mingled pride and shame with which she had spoken, and never had it looked more lovely. The father considered it for a moment, less with admiration than with curiosity: this daughter of his was an unknown quant.i.ty: he never could predicate what she would do or say. Certainly she surprised him once more when she lifted her head, and said, quickly--

"I don't think I understand your English ways. I know what we should do at the convent; but I never know whether I am right or wrong here. And I have no one to ask."

"There is your Aunt Sophy."