Lady Jane withdrew her right hand, putting it within his arm. She held up that which had the ring upon it, and put her lips to it. “I don’t know what this means,” she said, tremulous and yet clear, “but I am his wife.”
“Let go my daughter, sir!” cried the Duke. They were all speaking together. The pair who were not wedded turned round arm in arm as they might have done had the ceremony been completed. Once more the Duke caught hold of his daughter roughly. “Jane, leave this man! I command you to leave him! Come home at once!” he cried. “Mr Winton, if you have any sense of honour, you will give her up at once. My God! will you compromise my daughter and pretend to love her? Jane, will you make your family a laughing-stock? Come, come! You will cover us with shame. You will kill your mother.” He condescended to plead with her, so intense was his feeling. “Jane, for the love of heaven——”
Lady Germaine rose up from the bench on which she had flung herself. “Oh, Duke!” she cried, “don’t you see things have gone too far? Leave her with me. She will not be compromised with me. Have pity upon your own child! Don’t you see, don’t you see that it is too late to stop it now?”
“Lady Germaine!” cried the Duke, “I hope you can forgive yourself for your share in this, but I cannot forgive you. Certainly my daughter shall not go with you. There is but one house to which she can go—her father’s.” He tightened his hold on her arm as he spoke. “Jane!—this scene is disgraceful to all of us. Put a stop to it at once. Come home; it is the only place for you now.”
Then there was a pause, and they all looked at each other with a mute consultation. The little ring of spectators stood and listened. Mrs Marston, with the tears scarcely dried from her eyes, watched them with fluttered eagerness, expecting the moment when the Duke should come and thank her for the warning he had received. She was compunctious for the sake of the young people; but yet to have the thanks of the Duke—— The Rector had made haste to get out of his surplice, and now came out with a little importance and the same idea in his mind.
Lady Jane was the first to speak. She said, “It is cruel for us all; but perhaps my father is right, things being as they are. I cannot go with you, Reginald, to our own house.”
Winton’s voice came with a burst, half-groan, half-sob, uncontrollable. “God help us! I don’t suppose you can, my darling—till to-morrow.”
“Till to-morrow! Then I will go home to my father’s now. Oh no,” she said, shrinking back a little, “not with you. Reginald will take me home.”
“Let go my daughter, sir!” the Duke said. “He shall not touch you. He shall not come near you. What! do you persist? Give her up, Winton; do you hear me? She says she will come home.”
“Father,” said Lady Jane very low, “it is you who are forgetting our dignity. I will go home, if Reginald takes me; but not with you. I suppose no one doubts our honour. It is not the time for delay now, after you have done all this. Reginald will take me home.”