FENCING OFF CONFIDENCE.
The knowledge that, with the morning, her friend would look for a confidence as regarded the intrusion by a man into the grounds of Holmnest on the evening previous, unless, indeed, by fencing she could ward off such confidence, caused Mrs. Gower to pass an almost sleepless night; and so, with the natural desire to put off the evil day, she arose later than usual, lingering over bath and toilette. But now in warm morning robe of a pretty, red woollen material, with ecru lace rufflings, she is worth a second look; though her thoughts are sad, for under the dark hair on her brow, her eyes wear a wistful expression, and on her sensitive lips is almost a quiver of pain, as she stands at her window, looking mechanically on the familiar scene.
"He always looks up," she thought, as a gentleman passed, "and must now either reside in the neighborhood, or take it in in his morning outing. How a lonely woman notices any seeming interest taken in herself. I have not seen much of him since poor Charlie Cole went away, and strange; but I miss his face if I don't see him for some days. I remember telling Charlie of a dream I had of this very man, and his béte noir, Philip Cobbe. That reminds me again of my promised confidence to Mrs. Dale, it was weak in me to make any such promise—I, who have never had a confidant, even when a girl. I have met some who would have been staunch and true enough, I feel sure, but I never thought heart secrets were altogether one's own; and as to this chatter over men's kind or loving attentions to one, is just about the meanest thing a woman or girl can be guilty of. It is sufficient to deter men from being commonly civil. I have known women prate and boast by name of those who have paid them the highest compliment a man can, that is of asking them to be their wife; yes, I positively shrink from meeting my kind, little friend, Ella Dale, she has a positive craving for knowledge," she thought, with a half smile; "and had she been Eve she would have cut short the eloquence of the serpent's tongue, and have succumbed, merely out of curiosity. And yet she is a dear little woman, craving to be 'trusted all, or not at all,' and meaning good to me; and perhaps I should be less lonely did I empty my griefs into the lap of another's mind; but again, in confiding in a married woman one confides in her husband also. It is natural, but, at the same time, not altogether pleasant; but at that peremptory ring I must give up dreaming here, or my 'Madonna of the Tubs' will be giving me notice."
"Good morning, dear. Pardon my not having been down to welcome you," she said, warmly, finding her friend and the morning papers ensconced in a rocker by the grate, Tyr stretched on the rug.
"I have just come down, Elaine, and have had my mirrored reflection as company, and don't I look comical, encased in this dressing gown you lent me? Won't I have to eat a substantial breakfast to fill it out?"
"All right, dear, if my seraph of the frying pan condescended to fill my orders, we have bloaters on the menu."
"I am ready for them, Elaine, and feel bloated already," she said, as they seated themselves at table.
"I wonder what kind of a day we shall have for your review of the city schools? Old Sol does not seem to have made up his mind whether to laugh or weep," said Mrs. Gower, as she touched the bell to remove the fruit.
"I hope he will be good enough to weep over some other city, for I am sure Henry will not bring my waterproof."
"But Miss Crew will, she seems so really thoughtful. What do you intend doing with her when you place Garfield at school?"
"That's just what I am in a quandary about. I like her, for she puzzles me."
"What a droll little creature you are, Ella; you have a perfect craze for working out problems, even to a woman," she said, laughingly.
"Now you mustn't think, Elaine, that my interest in you has the remotest connection with the mystery at Holmnest," she said, opening her blue eyes in apparent innocence, but in reality her words being a reminder to her hostess.
"The mystery at Holmnest? What a tragic sound you give it, it makes one's flesh creep, but I have not forgotten how large-hearted you are, dear, when you do not forget, 'Share ye one another's burdens.'"
"Yes, you must tell me all, Elaine, and I feel sure that with, or without the advice of Henry, your trouble will either vanish or lighten by your sharing it with me."
"Yes, perhaps so," she said gravely; "but we must not spoil our breakfast, and the play of knife and fork. My little tragedy must be the afterpiece this time."
"As you will, Elaine, but don't bear it too long alone. Tragedy is heavy. How cozy and home-like breakfasting with you is after hotel life."
"I am glad you think so, Ella."
"Your dark leather chairs and handsome sideboard look well against the brown paper on the walls, and oh, you won't mind telling me who hung your drapings, portière hangings, and all that, they are in such good taste."
"Murray did them for me; it was a case of two heads being better than one, where I was at fault he set me right."
"Your home is small, but all so home-like, except for one great want, a man to hang his hat up in the hall as your husband, and a child to call you mother."
"Quite a tempting picture, Ella," she answered, a little sadly, "but 'l'homme propose Dieu dispose."
"Take the man, when he proposes, Elaine; I cannot bear to see you alone."
"That is my advice to my friends also, Ella; but, speaking of living alone, will you and Miss Crew come to me when you place Garfield at school, and during the absence of Mr. Dale north-east with Mr. Buckingham; say you will, it won't be for long."
"It's the thing above all others that will please me, Elaine. Excuse my Irish blood, but I must give vent to my feelings by giving you a hug," she said, merrily, as they rose from table.
"Angels and ministers of grace defend us, Elaine, here's a lady visitor; and now that her umbrella is down, I see Mrs. Smyth. But, fond as I am of her, I wish her back to her home, for I wanted the morning alone with you."
"You are both looking charming, it's a pity I am not a gentleman caller, but what lazy people you are," said lively Mrs. Smyth.
"Now that I have emerged from the under side of Fortune's wheel, I do believe I am growing epicurean," said Mrs. Gower, gaily.
"Don't I look too sweet for anything, Mrs. Smyth?" said Mrs. Dale, promenading up and down the room; "haven't I grown stout?"
"But you are all uneven," laughed Mrs. Smyth.
"Now, that is cruel, Mrs. Smyth; 'tis 'love's labor lost,' after having utilized all the mats, towels and pillow-shams in my bedroom as stuffing, to be simply told I am uneven."
"Stuffing never goes down with me, Mrs. Dale," laughed Mrs. Smyth.
"It's a good thing for us you are not a man," said Mrs. Dale, demurely.
"Women all angles would cry 'hear, hear!'" laughed Mrs. Gower.
"But you don't ask me what brought me in this morning."
"No, I am too glad to have you; but is it a call of a mouth full of news?"
"Yes, which I shall stuff you with 'as pigeons do their young.'"
"Me, too!" piped Mrs. Dale.
"Mr. King is in town, Mrs. Gower; there, I thought I should electrify you, but you don't seem to care."
"I do, for we shall now have news of the Coles."
"And is that all you will welcome him all the way from Ottawa for?"
"That is all, Lilian; these little flirtations, pour passez le temp, soon burn themselves out."
"What a funny woman you are, Elaine; sometimes I can't make you out at all."
"Don't try to, dear, when I puzzle you; life is too short for problem-solving, though our little friend here doesn't think so. But did Mr. King name the Coles?"
"He did."
"Thank you, Thomas," said Mrs. Gower, receiving her letters, which had been put in the letter-box by the letter-carrier.
"One moment, you will excuse me, dears, while I run my letters over." One marked "Immediate," she read to herself as follows:
"The Queen's, Wed. Eve., Nov. 9th.
"My Dear Mrs. Gower,—It is with extreme pleasure I again find myself in the same city with yourself, and am anticipating with intense eagerness an interview. I go west to-morrow p.m., so shall go up to Holmnest in the morning.
"As ever, yours devotedly,
"Cyril King."Mrs. Gower,
"Holmnest, West Toronto."
"Oh, dear! oh, dear! he may be here any moment, and I am in a quandary as to what I shall do with him. This little settling up of one's affaires de cœur is distasteful, but I have not been a bit to blame here," she thought, quietly tearing up the note, and making a holocaust of it.
"Oh, I can assure you, Mrs. Dale, she had scarcely any waist covering at all," said Mrs. Smyth, in disgust, "she looked simply dreadful."
"Who is the woman this time, dear?" asked Mrs. Gower, amusedly, as she fastened some camellias to her gown; "what fair one are you throwing mud at now, Lilian?"
"Oh, that Mrs. St. Clair. Miss Hall walked down with me as far as College Street this morning, and she says, or rather mouthed, for she is too full of affectation to speak plain, but managed to convey that Mrs. St. Clair's dress began too late during the Langtry season. Her dress was couleur de rose (what there was of it), no sleeves, well there was an invisible band, Miss Hall said (I wondered at her, the way she talked, as she is so thick there). Now, what do you think of Mrs. St. Clair, Elaine?"
"I think that she would be the cynosure of all eyes—men's, for she is very fair to look upon."
"But, Elaine, she is enamelled! Miss Hall's description reminded me of how an American paper describes such—as if they in their opera boxes sat in a bath tub."
"Oh, that's hard," said Mrs. Dale; "who was she with, and was the boy Noah ready with his pinchers?"
"No, it was that horrid boy's night off, I suppose, for his father was on duty; the little wretch nearly gave me cancer; the two Wilber girls and our Mr. Buckingham were the party; oh, Elaine, it's most absurd, but Mr. Buckingham is the 'foreign count' gossip said Mr. St. Clair is jealous of."
"I am not surprised; all Grundy's scandal brews are a froth of lies, Lilian."
"But it is true that Mrs. St. Clair flirts and enamels."
"If so, she is very pretty, and has a husband with an eagle eye—and," she added gaily, "a son with claws that even you speak feelingly of."
"Well, good-bye, it is getting near our dinner hour, I must off; and, as I live, here is the King from Ottawa; you are here opportunely to play gooseberry, Mrs. Dale; oh, I must tell you, you know, how quiet Mrs. Tremaine is. Well, she went back in the dark last Sunday evening for her dolman, it was so cold, but when she hung it over the front of the pew it proved to be the Captain's trousers!"
"How do you do, dear Mrs. Gower?" he said with empressement, his strikingly handsome face aglow with pleasure.
"'Mrs. Dale, my friend, Mr. King,' from the tower-crowned city, dear."
"And you come to a spire-crowned one, at which, Mr. King, don't become unduly elevated."
"I am in the heights," he said, with a swift glance at Mrs. Gower.
"Then beware of the attraction of gravitation," laughed his hostess, thinking, "I shall have to do a little fencing, I can see by his face."
"Excuse me, Elaine, I see my family are arriving."
"Quite a cavalcade, Mr. King," she said, gaily.
"And mercy me, that young monkey is on horseback, while the driver is giving his attention to bell ringing; I must fly. May I bring them upstairs, Elaine?"
"Certainly, dear; and as your colony will want you all to themselves, send Miss Crew to the drawing-room; she will be happy with the piano."
"How handsome he is; I wonder if he thought me uneven," mused Mrs. Dale, as she left the library.
"Thank heaven, they are all despatched," he said, fervently, leaning over the back of her chair; "look around at me, dear, and tell me I am welcome."
"You are;" and turning her face, her cheek was brushed by his whiskers; "but I am going to be very proper, and tell you to take that very comfortable chair, at the other side of the room."
"Why, what have I done; don't send me away, when my heart is bursting to take you in my arms."
"With your temperament, how full, metaphorically speaking, your arms must be."
"No, no; you only, with your warm eyes and handsome mouth."
"Come, come; no more of this, Mr. King."
"Since when have you dropped Cyril; I cannot bear my surname from your lips."
"'Tis safer so; and you know I have tried to act up to this, since knowing you have a wife."
"Yes, yes, you have; but you magnetized me from the first, and had it not been for that meddling fellow, Dubois, telling you, I believe, dearest, you would have learned to love me, wholly, and alone."
"Thank heaven he did tell me, and in time."
"I think there has been every excuse for me, dearest; you are aware of the circumstances of my marriage; then, after fifteen years of such wedded bliss, I find you, my heart's mate. I often think how tame life is before the meeting with the one that is to fill one's being with rapturous content; well, if they come to one while one has one's freedom, if not, what miserable loneliness; what an array of jealous fears. Do not turn me out of some corner in your heart, Elaine," he pleaded, "just because the Church and the law come between us; it is no fault of mine that I have met you too late to offer you my name; therefore, pity my misfortune, be kind to me; give me a corner in your affections; you will, won't you, darling," he pleaded, earnestly, his winsome voice coming on the air like sweet notes of song to the accompaniment of 'Il Trovatore,' exquisitely rendered, by Miss Crew, across the hall.
"You must never again talk to me in this strain, Cyril," she says, putting her feelings aside, for she pities him intensely; "it is harmful for both of us; be a man, be brave. I, too, have trials; help me to bear them by seeing you at the post of duty; let us forget that we have hearts; let us harden ourselves by looking at life teeming with ill everywhere.
"Let us, from this moment, begin over again, and talk as though the room was full of a gaping crowd; let us talk of anything but ourselves. Of Chamberlain and the fisheries; of who will run for mayor; of how that hot pickle, the French cabinet, will be formed; of whether Bishop Cleary wishes he had been tongue-tied before his imagination went without bit or curb on our girls; anything but ourselves, Cyril, for pity sake."
"No, it will not do, dear; we can never be as common acquaintances, though you charm me in any mood."
"Very well; if that be so, you must go. Those songs, without words, by Miss Crew, with the scent of flowers, have been enough to intoxicate one; but you know that since the knowledge came to me of your having a wife, that I have told you, repeatedly, our acquaintance must end unless you always remember, in our intercourse, the fact of your being bound to another. If you care to meet Mr. and Mrs. Dale, and a young lady friend, stay to luncheon, if you will not more than look at me as a friend—for I will be that."
"I cannot face strangers now, and shall go, but shall write you from the west; and pray let me have a line in answer, saying you will see me on my return?" he said, beseechingly, his handsome face clouded.
"I see I must tell you something I had not intended," she said, nervously, "they are coming downstairs to luncheon; I have promised, nay, am under oath," she said, gravely, "to marry a man who would make trouble, did he hear your words."
"For heaven's sake, Elaine, don't be mad! you would be wretched, chained to a man like that; for the light has all left your dear face, even when you name him."
"Beg pardon, luncheon is served, ma'am," said Thomas.
"I must hasten to the dining-room, and I fear I don't look very calm. Good-bye; remember and be brave; others there are who have no more a bed of roses than yourself."
"God bless you, good-bye; and I implore you, say No to him. I speak, as you know, from experience," he whispers, with a tight hand-clasp.