CHAPTER XIV.
SEVERAL SECRETS.
“Like one who trusts to summer skies
And puts his little bark to sea,
Is he who, lured by smiling eyes,
Consigns his simple heart to thee.”
“I will be your wife, dear Philip, but no one must know of our engagement just yet. You must keep it a secret until I give you leave to tell.”
Viola whispered those words against her lover’s cheek before they returned to the drawing-room, and they gave him a keen pang of disappointment.
He was so madly in love and so proud of having captured Viola’s illusive heart that he would have liked to publish his engagement at once to the whole astonished world.
Viola, now that she had foresworn flirting, would not have objected to his doing so, but in the midst of her keen happiness at having won her lover, a blasting memory had coldly shaken her heart—the thought of her engagement to Florian Gay.
She almost fainted with fear when she remembered that she was not free to accept Philip Desha, since her hand was promised to another.
She thought quickly:
“I will write to Florian and take back my promise, but Philip must never, never know the truth about it, for he has such high ideals, and might blame me for appearing so fickle.”
Her mind ran rapidly over the obstacles in her way, and she decided that her new engagement must not be announced till her old one was broken off—in other words, it was best to be off with the old love before she was on with the new.
So she bound her betrothed by the promise to keep their engagement secret, though he chafed against it, saying:
“I shall not like for people to be saying you are flirting with me as you did with others, my darling.”
The words had a sting for Viola’s heart, and tears flashed into her eyes.
She cried, hastily:
“Oh, I shall never flirt again, never! I am quite cured of that since—” She paused, bit her rosy lip, and added: “I understand how you feel. I—I will not make you keep the secret long—only until—” She paused again in dismay, finding she had almost uttered aloud her thought that she would only keep him silent until Florian granted her her freedom.
“Until—when?” asked Desha, gravely, with his large, frank blue eyes on her face.
Viola blushed, and answered, evasively:
“Oh, until two or three weeks,” adding to herself that she would write to Florian tomorrow, and tell him she could not marry him, because she had learned to love his friend, Professor Desha, better, and that she must take back her promise. Of course he would write back and say that under the circumstances he released her and wished her much happiness. Then she would be free to have her engagement announced.
But even in the midst of her little scheming came a remorseful thought.
“Poor Florian! It will make him very sad. He loved me dearly.”
And the next day she could not bring herself to write the words that should strike down his happy dream of love.
Keen remorse seized on her heart for having been so fickle in her love that the fancy had not outlived Florian’s absence.
“It seems so cruel to sadden his heart just now when he is in trouble over his sick father. I will wait till tomorrow,” she decided.
When tomorrow came she found herself too cowardly still to give Florian pain. She kept putting off her duty from day to day, and almost forgetting Florian as she basked in the smiles of her new lover.
But when three weeks had passed, and society was loudly whispering that Congressman Desha was Miss Van Lew’s latest victim, succeeding George Merrington in her good graces, the lover began to chafe under the gossip, and reminded his idol that she had promised to end his probation in three weeks.
Viola turned pale and pleaded for more time. She saw a shadow cross his face, and he asked, abruptly:
“Viola, can I trust you? Do you really love me, or are you simply trifling with my honest, manly love?”
The sternness of his voice frightened Viola, who was always in terror lest he might find out the truth about Florian or George Merrington, and hate her for her coquetry.
She faltered:
“I will give you such a proof of my love that you can not doubt me any longer. If you will keep the secret of our engagement until I give you leave to speak, you may ask papa for me at any time you wish and name the wedding-day.”
He caught her little velvety soft hands and covered them with ardent kisses.
“Oh, my dearest one, my beautiful love, how I thank you for these sweet concessions!” he cried, rapturously, and added, happily: “I shall speak to your father tomorrow, and with your permission I shall name an early date for the wedding. I am too impatient to wait long for my happiness!”
“Very well,” she answered, meekly and willingly, for with every day her reluctance to write the truth to Florian grew greater. Part of it was pity for the pain she must inflict on the true heart that loved her so, and part of it was something like fear.
She had remembered with alarm her playful threats, that during his absence she might find some one she loved better than himself, and his quick exclamation:
“Woe be unto him!”
She who had been so gay and careless before, had become a changed girl since the affair of George Merrington. And when she remembered Florian’s devotion, and the cruel wound she was going to give his heart, she recalled with dismay her father’s words:
“A man’s heart is not simply a toy!”
Viola had always thought so till then, and now she was afraid of the consequences of her coquetry.
It dawned on her that Florian might possibly be very angry at her fickleness, perhaps seek revenge.
What if he should hasten home and denounce her, like George Merrington, for her fault? What if he should betray her to Professor Desha? She trembled at the very thought.
“I should lose him forever! He would sacrifice me to his high ideal of honor! And I can not give him up, he was too hard to win!” she sighed, recalling all her pangs at Desha’s coldness.
She became afraid to write the truth to Florian, but she replied to his fond love letters in the briefest, coldest fashion, hoping he would understand that her love was dead, and himself hasten in anger to release her from her promise.
So matters stood when Desha reminded her of her promise to let him announce their engagement, his manly pride chafing against the society chatter about their flirtation.
Viola’s sweet promises set all his fears at rest, and he hastened to avail himself of her permission to speak to her father.
Judge Van Lew gave a surprised and secretly reluctant consent.
It was not a pleasant thought for the ambitious father that his charming daughter, who had refused millionaires and men of the highest rank, should descend to a simple congressman who had not won his laurels yet, and was only moderately rich.
But he knew that Desha was well-born, high-minded, and intelligent. If Viola loved him and wanted him, there was really no valid objection he could raise, so he gave his cold approval.
Then the eager lover startled Viola very much by asking her if she would set the wedding for March.
“But it is the last of January now. I should have but one month to get ready,” she cried, blushingly; but, with a little urging, she consented.
Perhaps they were mutually afraid of losing each other, Desha dreading her coquetry, she afraid he might find out the secrets she was hiding from him.
When she had given her consent, he said, seriously:
“We ought to take the public into our confidence now.”
“They do not deserve it; they have gossiped about me too much already,” Viola pouted, prettily.
He remained silent, thinking her very unreasonable, and then she smiled at his gravity, saying, coaxingly:
“Well, then, I want to give them a grand sensation. What do you say to keeping our secret until we send out our wedding-cards? Will not that give everybody a great surprise?” laughingly.
“I should think so,” he replied.
“Well, then, let us have it so. I have given up to you in everything else. Let me have my own way in this,” pleaded Viola so sweetly that he could not refuse, though he was eager to have the truth known so that people would stop referring to him as Miss Van Lew’s latest distinguished conquest.
Most especially would he have liked to tell the real truth to his cousin, Mrs. Wellford, who badgered him not a little about his attentions to Viola.
Her cousinly pride was up in arms for his sake, hating for his true heart to be played with and cast aside like others that she knew.
“It is perfectly abominable!” she complained to her husband. “I thought Philip had more sense than to run after such a wicked little coquette.”
“I thought you were fond of Viola,” he replied.
“So I am—at least I used to be, till she began to entangle my cousin in her toils. But now I almost hate her, for Phil is too good and true to break his heart for her sake. She has bewitched him so that he has lost the use of his brains!” she replied, petulantly.
“I do not see how you can help it,” he replied, thoughtfully.
“That is what makes me so angry. I have warned him, and he treats my warnings with contempt. Oh, if I had my way I should like to make him draw back, even now, and foil her in her little game of adding his name to the list of one hundred rejections she is so busily making!” she exclaimed, excitedly.
Her husband looked at her thoughtfully, replying:
“Ruby, I wonder if you could keep a secret.”
“Yes, indeed, John. Only try me and see,” she replied, eagerly.
Hesitating a moment, he continued:
“Since you are so anxious over Desha, there is something you could tell him that would no doubt disgust him with the lovely coquette, if anything in the world could do it.”
“Oh, what is it? Tell me quickly, John!”
“I will tell you; but remember, Ruby, dear, that it must never go out of the keeping of yourself and Desha!” earnestly.