The Merivale banks

by Mary Jane Holmes

Herbert went in, with a presentiment that something was going to happen deleterious to himself.

Leaving him a moment, Louie went to her father’s room. Both he and her mother were asleep; and, assured of that, she returned to Herbert and told him very briefly what was in her mind. She did not say that anything in his conduct had influenced her. She spoke at first only of her own changed position, and her wish to shield him from what he would regret.

“They call my father bad names,” she said, “and perhaps he deserves them; but he is my father, and I shall stand by him. With you it is different, and you must not be bound to the daughter of a speculator—a thief—a gambler—and they say my father is all three, and they have threatened to tar and feather him if he appeared in the street, and have talked of arrest and State’s prison. I cannot expect you to bear that disgrace, together with your father’s anger, when he knows, as he must know some time. I told you you were free when the crash first came, and you would not accept your freedom, but you must now, I am in earnest. And then—” She hesitated, breathing hard before she continued, “I have promised to pay his debts, and if I live I shall keep my word.”

“How?” Herbert asked.

“By my voice,” she answered. “You remember what Miss Percy said of it. She may be right—she may be wrong. I believe she was right. At all events I shall try. She has not forgotten me. I had a letter from her to-day after you left me. God moved her to write, I am sure, when my need was greatest, for she has never written before since she went abroad last fall. She is in Paris, and still has Marchesi in mind for me, and offered to bear the expense of my lessons if father would send me there. I think, if we sell everything, the creditors will not care if I keep enough for us to live on, and take me to Paris, when father and mother get well.”

She paused and Herbert said, “You mean the stage, of course; opera, perhaps?”

“Yes, if that brings the most money,” Louie answered. “It will take years to pay the debts, and I may be old—thirty perhaps—before it is done. You cannot wait all that time, and it is better to end the relations between us now. They have always been rather peculiar, and I have never liked the secrecy which put me in a false position. Hush!” she continued, as she saw how white Herbert turned as he tried to speak. “I do not say you have not loved me, but the chain has fretted you at times, and fettered your actions, as it has mine; and it is better for us both to be free—friends always, but free. There will then be no more fear of your father; and if you wish to call upon me sometimes, you will not have to come by stealth as if afraid some one would know it. Don’t interrupt me, please,” she continued, warming up to the subject. “I have seen it, and felt it, and it has hurt me a little; and only the belief that you really loved me has kept me from telling you that I must be one thing or the other—either acknowledged as your promised wife, or nothing more to you than a friend. Father’s failure has precipitated matters, and I give you your freedom, and your ring. I will get it.”

She left the room, while Herbert sat unable to realize what had befallen him, or that Louie could mean what she said. He could hear her moving in the chamber overhead, but he could not see her holding the ring to the light, and kissing it once as she had never kissed him.

She did not cry, but was dangerously near it when she at last returned to the room where Herbert was walking up and down, nervous and excited, and shaking as if he were cold.

“Here it is,” she said, offering it to him. “I have never worn it except in my room, where it seemed a mockery rather than a symbol of the tie between us. Take it,” she persisted, as he made no sign that he heard her.