Chapter VI · TWO LOVERS.

"Been fishing to-day, Cyril?" asked Robert Wedderburn, with a quizzical expression in his face, as his brother assumed his hat, gloves, and whip in the hall prior to riding out.

"No," replied Cyril, curtly, and colouring with some reason, as he had gone forth for four consecutive days with his rod, and returned with his basket empty; the fishing was merely a pretext to be alone, for he would have been clever indeed to have found trout or perch on the upland slopes of the Lammermuir, where Horace and Robert had seen him, while shooting hares and rabbits near Lonewoodlee. "I dine with Chesters to-day," he added.

"You go betimes?" said Robert, suspiciously.

"I want to give my new bay nag a breather—to have a few miles' gallop ere I go to Chesterhaugh," replied Cyril, as he rode off.

It was one of those dull March evenings when the sun sets at six o'clock, as Captain Wedderburn dashed on at a rapid pace towards Lonewoodlee. The more fertile part of the Merse was soon left behind, and after a ride of three or four miles among heathy and grassy slopes, striped here and there with bright green where the track of the Lammas floods had run towards the Leader or the Whitadder rivers, he saw the old grey Tower, whose four round turrets, cope-house, and chimneys stood clearly defined against the evening sky, overtopping even the ancient timber that grew around it.

Thatched cottages with whitewashed walls, and the ruddy firelight glowing through their small square windows; hedgerows that were in process of being lopped and trimmed; gardens where the fragrant earth had been newly turned up, and where tufts of the white snowdrop and rows of the yellow crocus or purple violets were appearing, had all gradually vanished, and Cyril found himself amid a voiceless and pastoral solitude, dotted only by black-faced sheep, or huge round boulder-stones, and where here and there a sable gled or raven hung aloft in mid air—a black speck amid the amber glory of the twilight sky—as if on the outlook for the dead wedder or other carrion that might be lying in some moss-hole or mountain burn.

"By Jove, this place is well named the Lonewoodlee, for it could not well be lonelier!" thought Cyril, as he rode into the thicket of trees. There was no obstruction, for the enclosure or boundary, once a dry stone dyke, had fallen down, and all the place was bare and open. He threw the bridle of his horse over a branch, and, as the twilight deepened, he turned very deliberately towards the mansion on foot, and as he did so, the rabbits and hares flitted before him from among the deep rank grass.

In spite of the coldness—almost amounting to hostility—between their families, Cyril Wedderburn and Mary Lennox loved each other dearly. He had met her from time to time at races and country balls, occasionally in the houses of mutual friends. These meetings had not always been pleasant, for latterly they were at times the result of contrivance, as Mr. Lennox, from the peculiarities of his temper, would not have heard of this intimacy with patience.

On the other hand, Cyril was dependent on his father for his allowance—no man can live on his pay in any regiment now, so least of all was it possible in the Royal Fusileers;—and while her father lived, Mary, under any circumstances, could not think of marriage, and so some three years of a secret and undecided engagement between these young people had slipped away at the period when this story opens.

Cyril did not enter the desolate looking courtyard, lest he might be seen by either of the two female domestics who now composed the sorely reduced household of Oliver Lennox. All was silent in the empty stables and ruined coachhouse, and the entire place looked gloomy in the extreme to the eyes of the young officer, accustomed to his father's more spacious and magnificent mansion, with its great oriels of plate-glass, and he sighed when he thought of Mary.

Suddenly, through an open window on the second story, there came the swelling notes of a beautiful and tender soprano voice—a girl's—as she sang the grand old Christmas hymn, accompanying herself upon a piano, which, though a fine one, was nevertheless somewhat old-fashioned and not exactly a grand trichord.

"Poor thing! God bless her kind heart! she is singing to the old man," said Cyril, while he listened intently, with his head reclined against the wall, as if to absorb every sound. "So my little fairy sings in Latin!"

It was a strange song for a young girl; but, in fancy, Cyril could see the old man listening, and perhaps beating time with his fingers on the coverlet or pillow of his bed, as he was soothed away to sleep. The notes pealed out on the calm evening air with a startling effect, each one stirring a chord in the loving heart of the listener without; for as his own soul—yea, and dearer than his own soul—did he love the singer, who, after a pause, dashed into a plaintive little Scottish song, and then, quite as suddenly, into the beautiful solo, Cujus animam, from the "Stabat Mater" of Rossini.

At last she ceased. He heard, or thought he heard, the piano closed softly; and in a minute more, with her eyes beaming, her damask cheek glowing with pleasure, as she threw up the veil of her smart little hat, Mary Lennox glided round the corner of the Tower, with her cloak on and her little hands in her muff.

"At last, my darling—at last we meet!" said Cyril, as he drew one of her hands through his arm, and believing that no human eye saw or ear heard them, led her into a denser and darker portion of the grove that grew about her old paternal home.

"I have been singing to poor papa."

"So I thought, Mary; and he is now asleep?"

"Yes," replied Mary Lennox, with a bright smile; for her meetings with Cyril, though stolen and hasty, were the only bright spots in the usually dreary tenor of her life, and she looked up at her lover admiringly and tenderly. His rough suit of tweed, his grey round felt hat, and scarlet shirt, very open at the neck, became his style of manly beauty well, and showed that he belonged to the class of society which can affect and afford so simple and careless a mode of costume.

"There is no word of your leave being cancelled?"

"None, dearest."

"Thank God for that!" exclaimed the girl, as she clasped her hands.

"Four whole days have passed, my Mary, and yet I have not seen you!" said Cyril, half reproachfully, while he drew her close to him, gathering her fondly and gracefully to his breast.

"My poor papa has been so ill," she urged, as her eyes filled with tears, and her head sank wearily, yet confidently, on his shoulder.

"I regret to hear it. Poor old man! I wonder if he will ever receive me?"

"It would madden him, the very thought of doing so, Cecil."

"This sentiment is very foolish."

"He has neither forgotten nor forgiven that last unhappy dispute about your claim of pasturage on the lower part of the Lee."

"Bother the Lee! The basket of grapes and peaches I sent from the hothouse——"

"They came; thanks, darling Cyril; but papa suspected some friend's kindness—pity he called it—and the fruit was thrown to the dog in the yard."

"Folly again!"

"It is restless pride, Cecil; the pride that fights with poverty," pleaded Mary, with a sigh.

Cyril regarded her anxiously. He could perceive that much of her girlish simplicity was passing away; that there was a sadness in her eyes, and about her whole demeanour a more womanly grace perhaps; but she was growing paler and thinner in her battle with life—a life that would have been utterly cold, hard, and cheerless, but for the ray of light his love was shedding on it.

"Our households imagine us to be but cold and distant acquaintances, if even so much as that. Could they but peep in here and see us now," said he, as he covered her little face with kisses; for Cyril was merely supposed to lift his hat in the simplest courtesy to Mary, if he passed her on the highway or at church, where she could go but seldom now, in consequence of her father's ill-health, and as for their carriage and horses, they had long become things of the past.

"Oh, it is a great horror to me, Cyril, to be separated as we are," she began.

"As we are supposed to be, you mean, Mary dear."

"And to meet as we do by stealth, practising such dissimulation."

"It is intensely absurd that I, a Captain in the Line, a fellow who has been eight years in the service, should stoop to it."

"Unless for my sake, love?"

"True, Mary, true. What would I not do for your sake, my sweet pet?"

"But it is degrading to us both, and where will it end?" she said, plaintively.

"It shall end when we are married, darling. Oh, Mary! nightly my dreams are of you, and daily my thoughts. You seem thus to be ever near me, with me, and by me!"

"Oh, Cyril, it is very good of you to love me so."

"Who could help loving you?" was the enthusiastic response.

"Your mamma does not," said she, smiling; "and neither does Sir John; so how much would they hate me did they really know all."

A gesture of impatience escaped Cyril.

"I must and shall end all this by declaring our engagement; and should my allowance be cut off, which I can scarcely anticipate, I can exchange into an Indian regiment, and maintain my wife as other men do."

"But my poor papa?"

"True; and then, I am under orders now for the East!"

"We are very unfortunate," said Mary, while her tears fell fast.

"How unlucky that Mr. Lennox and Sir John have been at cross-purposes so often, in courts of law, at public meetings, elections, and county matters, actually about the very mode of hunting with the county pack. Never were two men more antagonistic; yet is it not strange that—that——"

"We should love each other so tenderly. Is that what you were about to say, Cyril?"

"Yes, Mary darling."

"But what would they say if they knew of our meeting thus?"

"Why torment yourself by thinking of it? Your father would storm finely, I doubt not; mine be loftily indignant; and as for my lady mother, it would be a case of hysterics and sal-volatile. But I do not see why their silly views should ruin our peace, Mary."

"Ah, did Sir John but know how weak and feeble my poor papa is now, that his ebbing life is only a matter of time, he would surely come over and forgive him all."

Cyril scarcely thought so, all the more when he remembered the rich young cousin who was to arrive so shortly at Willowdean; but he looked silently into Mary's eyes of violet-blue, they were brimming with tears, and her face wore a sad and wistful expression. Perhaps she was marvelling how it would be with her when all was over—when Cyril was before the enemy, and that parent, so beloved, had passed away.

"Our engagement seems wrong without the consent of our parents," she murmured, in a low voice; "and times there are, Cyril, when—when I seek to school myself to the task of releasing you."

A dark and startled expression shot over the fine face of Captain Wedderburn for a moment, for somehow he connected this innocent speech with the idea of Chesters; but shrinking from putting his thoughts in words, he merely said—

"Your father might well forgive me for loving you, Mary, if he would remember how I carried off your brother's body in the face of the enemy, after making a rally and charge with the bayonet at the head of my own company, or rather the survivors of it, at a terrible risk and under a fire of grape from the brass guns of the Sikhs. He might remember, too, how I laid the poor lad in his last home, a lonely grave under a palm tree, near the banks of the Sutledge."

"Alas! he remembers nothing coherently; and there are periods when he actually thinks that Harry yet lives, and in moaning terms he entreats him to approach the bed and take his hand."

"And you have neither seen nor met any of my family during my last absence with the regiment, Mary?"

"No; and it is better that I have not done so."

"Oh! why, Mary?"

"Fearing your return, I suppose, or that your brother Robert might fall in love with me——"

"Why, Mary, Robert is a mere boy!"

"He is about nineteen; and boys of nineteen fall in love sometimes," said Mary, smiling.

"Well, darling, well?"

"Fearing the result of these contingencies, your mother has slighted and put many an affront on me. Pardon me for saying so, dearest Cyril, but I cannot forget that my father, though poor, is Lennox of Lonewoodlee."

Cyril Wedderburn struck his heel upon the ground angrily.

"My own Mary," said he, "this style of thing is utterly absurd; it is like the romance of a family feud, Romeo and Juliet—Montague and Capulet, reproduced by an irritable old gentleman and a match-making woman who thinks no woman good enough for her eldest son.

"You don't know my papa," said Mary, plaintively, and yet resentfully.

"I do. I know him to be rash, extravagant, fiery, and passionate; but pardon me, dearest, I must not forget how dearly I love his daughter."

"Cyril," said the girl, earnestly, "reared as you have happily been amid the ease and affluence of your own family, you know not the curse of being a poor gentleman."

"Don't I, by Jove! when bits of blue paper come back, protested or unaccepted, and the Colonel and Paymaster look grave!"

"As I said before, I know not how all this will end. I only know, that irritated by losses, by poverty, and quarrels, how unforgiving my poor papa has become; how implacable; and that without some reconciliation with Sir John, I never could dare to speak of—of——"

"Of me?"

"Of that which is the only happiness of my life—our engagement; and my heart bleeds and upbraids me for deceiving him, when lying thus on what may prove his deathbed!"

Cyril did not reply, for his lips were pressed to those of Mary, and her tears were mingled with their kisses.

"Situated as we are, Cyril, our engagement may be a long one; that I don't mind, as I could never leave papa in his present state; but then it may be a hopeless one for me—that is, papa and I are so poor, so very poor! You do not know the struggle we have with the world, for all his land is gone, save the patch the old Tower stands on."

"It is a cruel and bitter world," said Cyril (though he, a favourite of fortune, had not found it so), "and you, my tender Mary, are a deuced deal too good for it."

"All are not bad or bitter though; there, even Chesters of Chesterhaugh——"

"What of him?" asked Cyril, sharply.

"Finding me weeping one day about a bill of papa's that had become due when we had not a shilling to meet it, he—he——"

"Took it up, I suppose?"

"Yes, Cyril; he lifted a load off my heart by doing so; but I dislike being under an obligation to any one—to him least of all."

"And this bill, what was the amount?" asked Cyril, gloomily.

"A two hundred pounds bill, Cyril?"

"Why did you not write to me?"

"I did not like to do so," she replied, blushing.

"Had you not faith in me?" he asked, impetuously.

"Yes, love; but not in myself. What sound is that?" she added, starting from his arms.

"Only the hoofs of a horse on the highway," said he, and as they listened the sound died rapidly away on the evening air.

They had been quite unaware, so absorbed were they in each other, that in the twilight gloom and under the shadow of a great larch-tree, a third person had been lurking and listening; one who, when he saw their lips meet, had involuntarily raised his hand and loaded hunting-whip, and with an unuttered malediction—all the deeper for being voiceless, on his cruel white lips—had stolen away, mounted his horse, which, like Cyril's, was concealed in the thicket, and galloped off.

This lurker was no other than Ralph Rooke Chesters, who, intending to visit Mary in passing homeward from the county town, had been compelled to depart, with his heart full of jealousy and his head scheming vengeance.

And now, after a few more tendernesses, Cyril bethought him of his dinner engagement.

"I shall get that bill out of Chesters' hands, if I can," said he; "one never can tell the use to which he may put such a document, and now good-bye, my darling. At noon to-morrow look for me here; and at twelve to-night look at your ring and think of me, for at the same moment of time I shall turn to mine and think of you."

They separated, and Mary lingered by the Tower-gate till the last sound of the bay hunter's hoofs died away in the distance, and then she stole on tiptoe back to the bedside of her sleeping father. She had been with Cyril barely an hour, and as if it had been five minutes only, had that delightful hour sped away.

* * * * *

Punctually at twelve that night the girl looked at her ring and murmured the name of her lover, while a beautiful smile spread over her soft pale face, for she was full of romance and enthusiasm.

"The dear fellow; he is now thinking of me!" she whispered to herself, as she laid her tiny watch on the table in the dressing closet, one of the four little turrets, and proceeded to let down the masses of her rich brown hair prior to arranging it for the night; but ere the minute hand had gone many seconds beyond the hour of twelve a distant sound came to her ear—a sound that rapidly grew louder.

It was the clanking of hoofs, as a horse in mad career swept along the hard beaten pathway near the Tower. The heart of Mary beat faster, she scarcely knew why; she threw open the little window of the turret and looked out upon the starry but moonless night, and as she did so the cry of a man in distress or terror came plainly upward to her listening ear, and when dying away on the wind it sounded strangely like the voice of Cyril Wedderburn.

But after a time she put aside that idea as too absurd! Would he, a finished horseman, ride like a madcap at that break-neck pace, and utter a shout like a tipsy brawler on passing Lonewoodlee?

And yet, she knew not why, she felt unhappy about the circumstance; and this anxiety increased when the following day passed, and the subsequent evening; and yet she saw or heard nothing of Cyril Wedderburn.