“There has been discontent and well-nigh mutiny among my people,” he exclaimed in an angry tone. “I might have known that it would have been so; idleness does not suit the fellows—I must take care that they have no more of it; they will have plenty to do in future. Well, Hilda, our happy days here must now come to an end. They have flitted by faster than I could have expected.” Hilda gazed in his face, trembling to hear what might follow. He spoke calmly: “Yes, a few short weeks seem not longer than as many hours; and now I fear, dearest, we must part, though it may be but for a short period. I may obtain leave to return with the ‘Saint Cecilia,’ or you must travel south by a shorter route through England, and thence on to Spain. I cannot shield you, I fear, from some of the inconveniences to which sailors’ wives are exposed.”
“Leave me! Oh, no, no!” exclaimed Hilda, passionately. “Take me with you. I cannot be parted from you! You tell me you love me: it would be but cruel love to kill me; and I tell you I could not survive our separation. I speak the truth—oh, believe me, Hernan,—I do!”
The Spanish captain looked at her as if he doubted her assertion; but he would indeed have been a sceptic as to the depth of the power of woman’s affection had he longer continued to doubt when he saw her beseeching and almost agonised countenance turned on him, waiting for his decision.
“But can you, Hilda, endure all the hardships and dangers we may have to go through?” he asked. “We may be exposed to furious tempests, and perhaps have to fight more than one battle, before we reach a Spanish port.”
“Yes, yes, I can endure everything you have to suffer,” she answered, taking his hand in one of hers, while she placed the other on his shoulder, and looked up into his face as if she would read his inward soul. “Why should I fear the tempest when you are on board, or the battle, while I can stand by your side? Take me with you, Hernan. Prove me, and I shall not be found wanting.”
“Hilda, you are a brave woman—you have conquered my resolution. We will go together,” he exclaimed, clasping her to his heart.
The shriek of joy she gave showed the intensity of her anxiety, and how it had been relieved by this announcement.
Still Don Hernan lingered. Was it that he was unwilling to tear himself away from a spot where he had spent some of the brightest moments of his existence? Had he other less ostensible motives for delay?
Hilda’s announcement of her intended departure was received in silence by Sandy Redland, the factor, and David Cheyne, the old butler. The former, perhaps, was not ill-content to have the entire management of the estate left in his hands. Nanny Clousta, without hesitation, agreed to accompany her mistress, and thus the only person who really grieved for Hilda’s departure was Bertha Eswick. She walked about the castle in a state of bewilderment very different to her usual collected manner, and was continually asking herself if she could not have prevented the result for which she mourned. The only person who seemed totally unconscious that any unusual event was about to occur was Lawrence Brindister. He treated his cousin and Don Hernan with a mock courtesy which was excessively annoying, the more especially as it was utterly impossible to resent it.
The hour of her departure arrived. Hilda had made every preparation for it in her power; still the utter want of propriety in the step she was taking pressed heavily on her spirits. Except her own garments and a few of her books, she took nothing with her. “It shall not be said that I am spoiling my father’s house,” she exclaimed, with some bitterness, as she showed Bertha everything she wished packed up.