The Amateur Gentleman Part 136

"And honor you most sincerely for--for--"

"Oh?" said the d.u.c.h.ess, softly.

"And most truly love and reverence you for your womanliness."

"Oh!" said the d.u.c.h.ess again, this time very softly indeed, and with her bright eyes more youthful than ever.

"Nevertheless," pursued Barnabas a little ponderously, "my father is my father, and I count it more honorable to be his son than to live an amateur gentleman and the friend of princes."

"Quite so," nodded the d.u.c.h.ess, "highly filial and very pious, oh, indeed, most righteous and laudable, but--there remains an eighthly, Barnabas."

"And pray, madam, what may that be?"

"What of Cleone?"

Now when the d.u.c.h.ess said this, Barnabas turned away to the window and leaning his head in his hands, was silent awhile.

"Cleone!" he sighed at last, "ah, yes--Cleone!"

"You love her, I suppose?"

"So much--so very much that she shall never marry an innkeeper's son, or a discredited--"

"Bah!" exclaimed the d.u.c.h.ess.

"Madam?"

"Don't be so hatefully proud, Barnabas."

"Proud, madam--I?"

"Cruelly, wickedly, hatefully proud! Oh, dear me! what a superbly virtuous, heroic fool you are, Barnabas. When you met her at the crossroads, for instance--oh, I know all about it--when you had her there--in your arms, why didn't you--run off with her and marry her, as any ordinary human man would have done? Dear heaven, it would have been so deliciously romantic! And--such an easy way out of it!"

"Yes," said Barnabas, beginning to frown, "so easy that it was--wrong!"

"Quite so and fiddlesticks!" sniffed the d.u.c.h.ess.

"Madam?"

"Oh, sir, pray remember that one wrong may sometimes make two right!

As it is, you will let your abominable pride--yes, pride! wreck and ruin two lives. Bah!" cried the d.u.c.h.ess very fiercely as she rose and turned to the door, "I've no patience with you!"

"Ah, d.u.c.h.ess," said Barnabas, staying her with pleading hands, "can't you see--don't you understand? Were she, this proud lady, my wife, I must needs be haunted, day and night, by the fear that some day, soon or late, she would find me to be--not of her world--not the man she would have me, but only--the publican's son, after all.

Now--don't you see why I dare not?"

"Oh, Pride! Pride!" exclaimed the d.u.c.h.ess. "Do you expect her to come to you, then--would you have her go down on her knees to you, and--beg you to marry her?"

Barnabas turned to the window again and stood there awhile staring blindly out beyond the swaying green of trees; when at last he spoke his voice was hoa.r.s.e and there was a bitter smile upon his lips.

"Yes, d.u.c.h.ess," said he slowly, "before such great happiness could be mine she must come to me, she must go down upon her knees--proud lady that she is--and beg this innkeeper's son to marry her. So you see, d.u.c.h.ess, I--shall never marry!"

Now when at last Barnabas looked round, the d.u.c.h.ess had her back to him, nor did she turn even when she spoke.

"Then you are going back--to your father?"

"Yes, madam."

"To-day?"

"Yes, madam."

"Then--good-by, Barnabas! And remember that even roses, like all things else, have a habit of fading, sooner or later." And thus, without even glancing at him, the d.u.c.h.ess went out of the room and closed the door softly behind her.

Then Barnabas sank into a chair, like one that is very tired, and sat there lost in frowning thought, and with one hand clasped down upon his breast where hidden away in a clumsily contrived hiding-place a certain rose, even at that moment, was fading away.

And in a while being summoned by Peterby, he sighed and, rising, went down to his solitary breakfast.

CHAPTER LXXV

WHICH TELLS WHY BARNABAS FORGOT HIS BREAKFAST

It was a slender little shoe, and solitary, for fellow it had none, and it lay exactly in the middle of the window-seat; moreover, to the casual observer, it was quite an ordinary little shoe, ordinary, be it understood, in all but its size.

Why, then, should Barnabas, chancing to catch sight of so ordinary an object, start up from his breakfast (ham and eggs, and fragrant coffee) and crossing the room with hasty step, pause to look down at this small and lonely object that lay so exactly in the middle of the long, deep window-seat? Why should his hand shake as he stooped and took it up? Why should the color deepen in his pale cheek?

And all this because of a solitary little shoe! A quite ordinary little shoe--to the casual observer! Oh, thou Casual Observer who seeing so much, yet notices and takes heed to so little beyond thy puny self! To whom the fairest prospect is but so much earth and so much timber! To whom music is but an arrangement of harmonious sounds, and man himself but a being erect upon two legs! Oh, thou Casual Observer, what a dull, gross, self-contented clod art thou, who, having eyes and ears, art blind and deaf to aught but things as concrete as--thyself!

But for this shoe, it, being something worn, yet preserved the mould of the little foot that had trodden it, a slender, coquettish little foot, a shapely, active little foot: a foot, perchance, to trip it gay and lightly to a melody, or hurry, swift, untiring, upon some errand of mercy.

All this, and more, Barnabas noted (since he, for one, was no casual observer) as he stood there in the sunlight with the little shoe upon his palm, while the ham and eggs languished forgotten and the coffee grew cold, for how might they hope to vie with this that had lain so lonely, so neglected and--so exactly in the middle of the window-seat?

Now presently, as Barnabas stood thus lost in contemplation of this shoe, he was aware of Peterby entering behind him, and instinctively made as if to hide the shoe in his bosom, but he checked the impulse, turned, and glancing at Peterby, saw that his usually grave lips were quivering oddly at the corners, and that he kept his gaze fixed pertinaciously upon the coffee-pot; whereat the pale cheek of Barnabas grew suffused again, and stepping forward, he laid the little shoe upon the table.

"John," said he, pointing to it, "have you ever seen this before?"

"Why, sir," replied Peterby, regarding the little shoe with brow of frowning portent, "I think I have."

"And pray," continued Barnabas (asking a perfectly unnecessary question), "whose is it, do you suppose?"

"Sir," answered John, still grave of mouth and solemn of eye, "to the best of my belief it belongs to the Lady Cleone Meredith."

"So she--really was here, John?"

"Sir, she came here the same night that you--were shot, and she brought Her Grace of Camberhurst with her."