Guy Livingstone Part 25

I saw Lady Catharine tremble, and bend her head down low when she heard the news, as if herself crushed by the blow which would fall so heavily on her son. She had known but very little of Constance; that little had made her love her dearly--who could help doing that? Yet it was not Constance she was regretting then. I could see the same thought was in her mind as in mine--who will tell Guy this if he recovers? I did all I could to spare her; but the anxiety she felt when out of the sick-room tried her almost more than the bodily fatigue. It was best to let her have her way. I never guessed, till then, the extent of a weak woman's endurance.

It was a close struggle, indeed, between life and death. The fire of the fever died out when there was little left for it to feed on. The arm which, a month ago, was fatal as old Front-de-Boeuf's, had not strength enough in its loosened sinews to lift itself three inches from the coverlet.

Guy had fallen at last into a heavy sleep. The doctors said it was the turning-point. If he woke quite calm and sane, the immense power of his const.i.tution would probably enable him to rally; if not, the worst that could be feared was certain.

He woke after many hours. There was such a stillness in the room as he unclosed his eyes that you might have heard his mother's heart beat as she sat motionless by his bedside. They recognized her at once--heavy and dim as they were--for he tried to turn his head to kiss her hand that lay on the pillow beside him. Then we knew that he was saved; and I saw, for the first time, tears stream down Lady Catharine's worn cheeks.

She could check the evidence of her grief better than that of her joy.

He saw me, too, as I came forward out of the shadow. "Is that you, Frank?" he said, faintly. "How very good of you to come." We would not let him speak any more.

On the third day after the change for the better, I was alone with the invalid. He turned to me suddenly, and spoke in a low voice, but so steady that it surprised me. "Frank, what have you heard of Constance?"

Had I been arming myself to meet that question--disciplining my voice and countenance for days, only to fail so miserably at last? I felt unspeakably angry and self-reproachful when I saw that my face had told him all.

"When did she die?" He went on in the same measured tone, without taking his eyes off me. I think he had nerved himself just enough for the effort, and was afraid of breaking down if he paused.

I could speak now, and told him. I was going on to tell him, too, how calmly and happily her life had ended (her aunt had written all this to Lady Catharine), when Guy stopped me--not coldly, but with a hopeless sadness in his accent very painful to hear. "Thank you; it is meant kindly, but I would rather not speak of this, even to you--at least for some time."

His self-command carried him through bravely, but it only just lasted out. Then he turned his head aside and threw his arm across it. As I drew back to the window, I saw the quivering of the long, emaciated fingers that veiled his face. I did not look again till Guy's voice called to me, quite composedly, for I did not dare to pry into or meddle with the secrets of the strong heart that knew its own bitterness so well.

I told Lady Catharine what had pa.s.sed. She was very much relieved to hear that it was all over. She never opened her lips on the subject to her son; indeed, though those two understood each other thoroughly, there were wonderfully few confidences between them.

Guy's convalescence was slow--far slower than we had hoped for. It seemed as if some spring was broken in his being not easily to be replaced. He was moody and listless always, speaking very seldom; but his words and manner, when he did talk, were gentler and more kindly than I ever remembered them.

One of his first visitors was Colonel Mohun. He had been incessant in his inquiries, and had offered to share our watching, but Lady Catharine would not hear of it. She had a sort of dread at the idea of that grim face lowering over the sick man's bed.

No one was present at their first interview. Ralph was more moved than he cared to show at his old friend's altered looks and ways; but he gave him the account of his search after the lost letter conscientiously, without sparing a single detail. "It must have gone hard with Guy," he remarked to me, thoughtfully, as he came away. "He's very far from right yet. When I told him what Willis had done, I made sure he would be very angry. He only said, 'Poor wretch! He acted under orders, and did not know what mischief he was doing.' He wants rousing; but I am sure I don't know what is to do it."

Forgiveness and forgetfulness of injuries seemed to that hard old heathen the most dangerous sign of bodily and mental debility.

He came almost daily after that, and I think his rough ways, and sharp, sarcastic remarks acted on Livingstone as a sort of tonic--bitter, but strengthening.

A few days later Mrs. Vavasour called. She, too, saw Guy alone. She surely had a message to deliver, or she would not have ventured on an interview which must have been so painful to both. It did not last long; but when she came down, her thick black veil was drawn closely over her face, and that evening Guy was denied to Ralph Mohun.

One afternoon Livingstone was quite by himself. The colonel had gone into Warwicks.h.i.+re for a few days' hunting; Lady Catharine had paid her usual visit and had gone back to her hotel, and I was out for an hour or two. We did not mind leaving him a good deal alone; indeed, he preferred it very often, and said so.

His servant came in, looking rather puzzled, to say that a lady wished to see him. She would not give her name, but said that she would not detain him many minutes.

Guy had not time to refuse admittance to the visitor, she followed so close upon her message. Though she was closely-wrapped in her mantle, and her veil fell in triple folds, there was no mistaking the turn of the haughty head, the smooth, elastic step, and the lithe undulations of a figure matchless between the four seas. No wonder that he drew his breath hard as he recognized Flora Bellasys.

CHAPTER x.x.x.

Treu und fest.

As the door closed, Flora advanced quickly. "Confess you are surprised to see me," she said, holding out her little gloved hand. The courtesy toward the s.e.x, which was hereditary with the Livingstones, contrasting strangely with their fierce, ungovernable tempers, made him not reject it; but his lay pa.s.sive and nerveless in her slender fingers, never answering their eager pressure; it had no longer the elastic quiver of repressed strength that she remembered and liked so well.

"I am surprised to see you here, and so soon," he answered, coldly; "but I knew we should meet before long."

"The surprise does not seem too charming," Miss Bellasys said, pouting her scarlet lip as she threw herself into a deep _bergere_ opposite to the couch on which Livingstone had already sunk down again--he was very weak and unsteady in his movements still.

Was it by chance or calculation that a fold of her dress disarranged displayed the slender foot, with its arched instep--set off by the delicate _brodequin_, a labor of love to the Parisian Crispin--and the straight, beautifully-turned ankle, cased in dead-white silk? The latter, I think; for Flora knew how to fall as well as Caesar or Polyxena, and had studied her part to its minutest shade. It was by the senses that she had always been most successful in attacking Guy, and she knew that, in old days, no point of feminine perfection had a greater attraction for him.

The temptation, if so it was intended, had about as much effect upon him now as it might have had on weather-beaten St. Simeon Stylites when his penances had lasted twenty years.

After a minute's silence, during which Flora was gazing intently on her companion, leaning her chin upon her hand, she spoke again.

"I fear you must have been very ill. How--how changed you are!"

Livingstone was, indeed, fearfully altered. The healthy brown of his complexion had given place to a dull, opaque pallor; there were great hollows under the prominent cheek-bones, and his loose dressing-robe of black velvet hung straight down from the gaunt angles of the immense joints and bones. His voice sounded deeper than ever as he replied,

"Yes, I have been very ill, and I am utterly changed. But you must have had something more important to say to me, or you would hardly have ventured on this step."

She was getting very nervous--inexplicably so for her, who generally kept her head, while she made others lose theirs,

"No. I only wished--" she hesitated, trying to force a smile, and then broke off suddenly--"Guy, do speak kindly to me. Don't look at me so strangely."

His answer came, brief and stern.

"I will speak, then. Miss Bellasys, on what authority from me did you venture to interfere in my concerns so far as to intercept my correspondence?"

She tried denial still; it was her way; she always _would_ do it, even when it could avail nothing--perhaps to gain time.

"I don't know what you mean. I never--"

Livingstone interrupted her, with a curl of contempt on his lip.

"Stop, I beg of you. It is useless to stoop lower than you have done already. I have Willis's written confession here. Ah! I know your talents too well to accuse you without material proof."

She raised her head, haughtily enough now. There was something Spartan about that girl. She had such an utter recklessness of exposure--it was in failure that she felt the shame.

"At least _you_ ought not to reproach me. You might guess my motive--my only one--without forcing me to confess it. Have I not gratified your pride enough already?"

"You know that is not the question," Guy answered, gravely. "Yet you are half right. I could not reproach you for any fair, honest move. In much, I own myself more guilty than you. But this is very different. Miss Bellasys, you must have distrusted greatly your own powers of fascination before you stooped to such cruel treachery."

"I did not know what I was doing," she whispered; "I did not know she was dying. Ah! Guy, have pity!"

"But you knew it might kill her to find her letter--such a letter--unanswered. You knew what she must have suffered before she wrote it. You did all this in cold blood, and now you say to me, 'Have pity!' If an accountable being--not a woman and her miserable instrument--had wronged me so, I would have risked my soul to have revenge; and, because that is impossible, you think that I feel less bitterly? You might have known me better by this time."

Instead of being softened by her appeal, his heart, features, and tone were hardening more and more.

The sting of defeat, imminent and unavoidable, that, ere this, has driven strong and wise men headlong into the thickest of the battle to hunt for death there, proved too much for a temper never well regulated.

"You have decided, then?" she cried, pa.s.sionately, her eyes flas.h.i.+ng and her lip quivering. "After all I have risked and borne for you, I am to be sacrificed to a shadow--a memory--the memory of that cold, pale statue of propriety?" She checked herself suddenly, only just in time.