Having ascertained positively not only from her mother's lips, but also from those of Mr. Ingram, that the young girl could claim as her portion twenty thousand pounds on her wedding day, Mrs. Bertram felt there was no longer need to hesitate. Beatrice was quite presentable in herself; she was handsome, she was well-bred, she had a gracious and even careless repose of manner which would pass muster anywhere for the highest breeding. It would be quite possible to crush that fat and hopelessly vulgar mother, and it would be easy, more than easy, to talk of the wealthy merchant's office instead of the obnoxious draper's shop.
Bertram, who had just moved with the dépot of his regiment to Chatham, on returning to his quarters one evening from mess saw lying on his table a thick letter in his mother's handwriting. He took it up carelessly, and, as he opened it, he yawned. Mother's letters are not particularly sacred things to idolized sons of Bertram's type.
"I wonder what the old lady has got to say for herself," he murmured. "Can she have seen Nina? And has Nina said anything. Not that she can seriously injure me in the mater's eyes. No one would be more lenient to a little harmless flirtation which was never meant to lead anywhere than my good mother. Still it was a great bore for Josephine to turn up when she did. Obliged me to shorten my leave abruptly, and see less of Miss Beatrice. What a little tiger Nina would be if her jealousy was aroused—no help for me but flight. Yes, Saunders, you needn't wait."
Bertram's servant withdrew; and taking his mother's letter out of its envelope, the young man proceeded to acquaint himself with its contents. They interested him, not a little, but deeply. The color flushed up into his face as he read. He made one or two strong exclamations, finally he laughed aloud. His laugh was excited and full of good humor.
"By Jove! the mother never thought of a better plot. Beatrice—and fortune. Beatrice, and an escape into the bargain from all my worries. Poor mater! She does not know that that six hundred of hers has only just scraped me through my most pressing liabilities. But a small dip out of Beatrice Meadowsweet's fortune will soon set me on my feet. The mater's wishes and mine never so thoroughly chimed together as now. Of course I'll do it. No fear on that point. I'll write off to the dear old lady, and set her heart at rest, by this very post. As to leave, I must manage that somehow. The mother is quite right. With a girl like Beatrice there is no time to be lost. Any fellow might come over to Northbury and pick her up. Why, she's perfectly splendid. I knew I was in love with her—felt it all along. Just think of my patrician mother giving in, though. Well, nothing could suit me better."
Bertram felt so excited that he paced up and down his room, and even drank off a brandy and soda, which was not in his usual line, for he was a sober young fellow enough.
As he walked up and down he thought again of that night when he had last seen Beatrice. How splendid she had looked in her boat on the water; how unreserved, and yet how reticent she was; how beautiful, and yet how unconscious of her beauty. What a foil she made to that dreadful little Matty Bell!
Bertram laughed as he remembered Matty's blushes and affected giggles and simpers. He conjured up the whole scene, and when he recalled poor Mrs. Bell's frantic efforts to get the white boat away from the green, his sense of hilarity doubled. Finally he thought of his walk home, of the meditations which had occupied his mind, and last of all of the girl in the gray dress who had put her arms round his neck, laid her head on his breast, and whose lips he had passionately kissed. That head! He felt a thrill now as he remembered the sheen of its golden locks, and he knew that the kisses he had given this girl had been full of the passion of his manhood. He ceased to laugh as he thought of her. A growing sense of uneasiness, of even fear, took possession of him, and chased away the high spirits which his mother's acceptable proposal had given rise to.
He sat down again in his easy chair and began to think.
"It is not," he said to himself, "that I have got into any real scrape with Nina. I have promised to marry her, of course, and I have made love to her scores and scores of times, but I don't think she has any letters of mine, and in any case, she is not the sort of girl to go to law with a fellow. No, I have nothing really to fear on that score. But what perplexes and troubles me is this: she has got a great power over me. When I am with her I can't think of any one else. She has an influence over me which I can't withstand. I want her, and her only. I know it would ruin me to marry her. She has not a penny; she is an uneducated poor waif, brought up anyhow. My God, when I think of how I first saw you, Nina! That London street, that crowd looking on, and the pure young voice rising up as it were into the very sky. And then the sound stopping, and the shout from the mob. I got into the middle of the ring somehow, and I saw you, I saw you, my little darling. Your hand was clenched, and the fellow who had dared to insult you went down with that blow you gave him to the ground. Didn't your eyes flash fire, and the flickering light from that fishmonger's shop opposite lit up your hair and your pale face. You looked half like a devil, but you were beautiful, you were superb. Then you saw me, and you must have guessed that I felt with you and for you. Our souls seemed to leap out to meet one another, and you were by my side in an instant, kissing my hand, and raining tears on it. We loved each other from that night; our love began from the moment we looked at each other, and I love you still—but I mustn't marry you, little wild, desperate, bewitching Nina, for that would ruin us both. My God! I wish I had never met you; I am afraid of you, and that is the fact."