‘You will understand, Cornel,’ said Andrew, who had drawn himself up indignantly, and sacrificed all the advantage of his self-possession in sudden discomposure and resentment, ‘that I ask nobody to plead for me. Joyce has been carried away with trying to please both parties. She is sacrificing me to soothe you down. Women will do such things; they will not learn. But for my part, I reject her excuses. I’ll have no forbearance on that score,’ cried Andrew, holding up his head and throwing back his shoulders. ‘I stand upon my own merits as between man and man.’
Then the Joyce of other days found words—not the tremulous girl, all strange in strange places, who was Colonel Hayward’s daughter, but the swift speaking, high-handed Joyce, the possible princess, the lady born of Janet’s cottage. ‘Oh,’ she cried, her words pouring forth on a sudden passionate breath, ‘how dare you bring up your merits here, and all your worldly thoughts! My old grandfather was but a ploughman, but he was a gentleman like my father. He would have put you to the door if you had said all that to him. And you stand before a man that has fought, and has the Queen’s medals on his breast—that has been wounded in battle, and faced cannon and sword; and before a lady that has no knowledge of the ways of common folk; and before me, that you said you loved; and you stand up and tell them of the female teacher that you held out your hand to, and of your merits, that make you good enough for the best—for Colonel Hayward’s daughter, that is a great soldier, a great captain, far too noble and great to put you to the door like Peter Matheson. Oh, Andrew Halliday, for shame, for shame!—you, after all the books you have read, and all the fine words you have said. I am ashamed myself,’ said Joyce, turning from him with a proud despair, ‘for I thought that Shakespeare and all the poets would make a gentleman even out of the commonest clay.’
Andrew bore this without quailing, with a smile on his face. When she stopped, he drew a long breath, and turned with an explanatory air to Colonel Hayward. ‘That is just one of her old tirades,’ he said.
The Colonel paid him no attention: he put his arm round his daughter, as tremulous as she was. ‘Joyce,’ he said faltering— ‘Joyce, my dear child, you see it all. You see through him, and—and all of us. Thank God that it’s all over now!’
Joyce drew back from him, trembling with the reaction from her own excitement. The flush that had given her a temporary brilliancy and force faded away. ‘But yet that alters nothing,’ she said.
Mrs. Hayward put her hand upon the girl’s arm with an impatient pressure. ‘Do you mean that you are going to marry that man, Joyce?’
‘Mr. Halliday,’ said the Colonel, ‘I hope, after what my daughter has said, that you will see the inexpediency of—of continuing this discussion. She has her ideas of honour, which are a little overstrained—overstrained, as is perhaps natural; but she sees all the discrepancies—all the—— You know, you must see that it’s quite impossible. My consent you will never get—never! and as for Joyce, she will not—you can see by what she has said—go against me.’
‘She will never go against her word.’
‘Oh, this is endless!’ the Colonel cried. ‘We may go on contradicting each other till doomsday. You understand that I will hear no more, and that Joyce, as she has told you, will hear no more.’
‘She may object to my manners, Cornel, but she will keep her word to me,’ said Andrew, regaining all the force of his conviction. ‘But, as you say, it is little use bandying words. I will withdraw. I have made a long journey for very little—not half-a-dozen words by ourselves with the young lady to whom I am engaged to be married. But I will not keep up a needless discussion. She understands me, and you understand. If you meet me in a friendly spirit, everything may yet be arranged for the best; if not, she will be of age at least in a year, and we will have no need of your consent. Joyce,’ he said, suddenly, making a quick step towards her, seizing her hand, ‘I’ll bid you good-bye, my dearest. You’ll mind your honour and duty to me. Rich or poor, high or low, makes no difference. You have my word, and I have yours. Have you any message for the old folk.’