“He is addicted to horses and dogs, and he seems to consider that he may claim—or show—some sort of equal attachment to me,” I answered.
Then I told him the story of the broken sixpence, and how I became engaged, without knowing it, to both Harry Temple and Will Levett on the same day.
My lord laughed, and then became grave.
“I do not wonder,” he said, “that all classes of men have fallen in love with the sweetest and most charming of her sex. That does not surprise me. Still, though we have disposed of Mr. Temple, who is, I am bound to say, a gentleman open to reason, there may be more trouble with this headstrong country lad, who is evidently in sober earnest, as I saw from his eyes. What shall we do, Kitty?”
“My lord,” I whispered, “let me advise for your safety. Withdraw yourself for a while from Epsom. Give up Durdans and go to London. I could not bear to see you embroiled with this rude and boisterous clown. Oh, how could such a woman as Lady Levett have such a son? Leave me to deal with him as best I can.”
But he laughed at this. To be sure, fear had no part in the composition of this noble, this incomparable man.
“Should I run away because a rustic says he loves my Kitty?” But then his forehead clouded again. “Yet, alas! for my folly and my crime, I may not call her my Kitty.”
“Oh yes, my lord! Call me always thine. Indeed, I am all thine own, if only I could think myself worthy.”
We were walking together, the others a little distance behind us, and he could do no more than touch my fingers with his own. Alas! the very touch of his fingers caused a delightful tremor to run through my veins—so helplessly, so deeply was I in love with him.
Thus we walked, not hand-in-hand, yet from time to time our hands met: and thus we talked, not as betrothed lovers, yet as lovers: thus my lord spoke to me, confiding to me his most secret affairs, his projects, and his ambitions, as no man can tell them save to a woman he loves. Truly, it was a sweet and delicious time. I fondly turn to it now, after so many years, not, Heaven knows! with regret, any more than September, rich in golden harvest and laden orchards, regrets the sweet and tender April, when all the gardens were white and pink with the blossoms of plum and pear and apple, and the fields were green with the springing barley, oats, and wheat. Yet a dear, delightful time, only spoiled by that skeleton in the cupboard, that consciousness that the only person who stood between my lord and his happiness was—the woman he loved. Heard man ever so strange, so pitiful a case?