It was her wedding-night.
Trafford went out into the darkness, feeling like a man who had been smitten by a mortal illness. His brain was in a whirl; the whole thing seemed like a hideous nightmare. He did not ask himself how Esmeralda had discovered the truth; it never occurred to him that she might have overheard Lady Ada’s wild words; he thought that, perhaps, some fool of a woman had been talking to her, and opening her eyes.
As he strode along the perfumed lanes he felt his love for her—the love which had been growing gradually for months past, but which he had only fully realized to-night—sharpening his misery. How beautifully she had looked as she stood before him, with her indignant accusation! Her face haunted and tortured him. There was no one like her in the wide world. The women of his set, with their selfishness and artificiality, seemed hateful to him beside her purity and true nobility. She was a waif of the wilds, no doubt, but all the same she was one of Nature’s gentlewomen.
How sweet she had looked, how exquisite, in her beautiful dress, with the diamonds which she wore so unconsciously! Any man might be proud of her—not only love her, but be proud of her. And he had lost her! Well, it served him right. For the first time in his life he had played a base part, and he was deservedly punished. Rather than deceive this girl who loved him, he should have let Belfayre, twenty Belfayres, go to the devil.
Now, what was he to do? Well, there was only one thing to do—to keep the promise he had made her. She had behaved nobly. If she had left him, and gone back to that place in Australia, he could scarcely have blamed her. She had sacrificed herself, had condemned herself to living in the same house with him, to avoid a scandal; he must do what he could to make her life at least endurable.
The thought brought him a grim kind of consolation. His life should be devoted to her; no woman in the world should be more surrounded by watchful care and attention than she should be. She should do exactly as she liked, should go where she pleased; her wish should be his law; he would be just a superior kind of servant to her.
He strode on, heedless of the direction he was taking, and as heedless of the time. His excitement gave place to a dull, hopeless weariness. Presently he felt that the air had grown cooler; it was the chill of early dawn. He stood in the center of the lonely heath, and looked round him, and its vague outlines seemed to symbolize his own life; for he felt as Esmeralda had done, that it had come to a sudden stop. He turned and walked slowly back to the cottage. The dawn was breaking, and a thrush was beginning to sing timidly and sweetly as he went up the narrow path. Somehow, it reminded him of Esmeralda’s voice. He entered the house, and went upstairs very quietly, and he paused at the door and listened with knit brows, and his lips moved, shaping the words: “My love, my love!” Then he went into his own room, and threw himself, dressed as he was, upon the bed; and he, too, lay awake communing with his unhappiness.
When Esmeralda went down to the breakfast-room the next morning—the dainty room redolent with the perfume of the roses which stood in great bowls on the table and sideboard—she saw him outside in the garden, and a faint blush rose to her pale face. How should she greet him? What should she say to him? When he came in, they were alone, and he stood in the door-way for a second or two, looking at her. She just glanced at him, and was busy with the coffee cups.
“What a lovely morning!” he said. His voice was grave and weary, though he tried to make it light, and she had noticed that he was pale and haggard.
“Yes,” she said, without looking up.