"Do you mind going into the little room for a moment," she said.

The little room was on the same floor, it was the room where I had seen Althorp on that dreadful day when I had bound myself in a bondage in many ways worse than death.

"Why?" I asked, looking at her with frightened eyes. She took my hand and patted it softly.

"You are a very good girl and a very brave one," she said, "and there's nothing Albert and I wouldn't do for you. Albert wants to have a chat with you, he's waiting in the other room; you go along, dear.

Oh, after the first blush you won't mind a bit; go, dear, go."

I looked at mother, who was talking with Mrs. Furlong. The whole room was peaceful and quiet, a good many of the boarders were out, for it was now the height of the season and almost midsummer. The windows were wide open. I caught mother's eye for an instant; mother smiled at me. Of late she used to wear a very far away look. There was often an expression in her eyes which seemed to say that she and father were holding converse. I caught that glance now, and it steadied my own nerves, and stilled the rebellion at my heart. I got up steadily. Had my stepping down--oh, had my stepping down led to this? It was a bitter thought, and yet when I looked at mother, and felt that I had saved her from intolerable anguish and perhaps sudden death, I felt that it was worth while. I went into the next room.

Albert Fanning, before our engagement--(oh yes, of course, we were engaged, I must use the hated word)--Albert before our engagement had thought little or nothing of his dress, but now he was extremely particular. An evening suit had been made to fit his tall ungainly person by one of the best tailors in the West End. He was wearing it now, and his light flaxen hair was standing up straighter than ever, and he had a kind of nervous smile round his lips. When he saw me enter he came forward and held out his hand.

"Well," he said, "and how is Westenra? Sit down, won't you?"

I did sit down; I sat where some of the summer breeze coming in from across the Square garden could fan my hot cheeks. I sat down trembling. He stood perfectly still an inch or two away from me. He did not attempt to take my hand again. After a pause, being surprised at his stillness, I looked up at him; I saw his blue eyes fixed on my face, with a very hungry expression. I sighed heavily.

"Oh," I said, "you have been so very good, and I have never even thanked you."

"You never have after, just the first day," he said; "but I did not expect thanks. Thanks were not in the bond, _you_ were in the bond, you know. That is all I want."

He sat down then near me, and we both must have felt the same summer breeze blowing on our faces.

"I am picturing the time when the year is out," he said slowly, "when you and I are away together in the country. I never cared much for the country, nor for nature, nor for anything of that sort, but I think I should like those things if you were with me. You embody a great deal to me, you make poetry for me. I never knew what poetry was before. I never cared for anything but nonsense rhymes and matters of that sort, until I met you, but you make poetry and beauty for me and all the best things of life. There is nothing I won't promise to do for you when you come to me, and in the meantime----"

"Yes," I said, "in the meantime."

"If you are certain sure, Westenra, that you are going to keep your bond, why, I--I won't worry you more than I can help just at present."

"Certain sure that I am going to keep my bond? Yes, I am sure," I said. "Would I take your money and, and deceive you? Would I have asked you to save us and deceive you? No, no; you think I am good. I am not specially good, but I am not so low as that."

"Dear child," he said, and now he took my hand and stroked it softly.

He did not squeeze it, or draw it near to him, but he laid it on one of his own huge palms and kept on stroking it.

"The very prettiest little paw I ever saw in my life," he said then; "it's wonderful how slim it is, and how long, and how white, and what little taper fingers; it's wonderful. I never saw anything like it.

You are a poem to me, that's just what you are, Westenra, you are a poem to me, and you will make a new man of me, and you will keep the bond, won't you, dear?"

"I will," I said.

"I have put down the date," he said; "I put it down in my note-book; I am going to keep it _always_ by me; it is writ in my heart too. I declare I am getting poetical myself when I look at you. It's writ in my heart in gold letters. It was the 18th of May when you promised yourself to me, dear. May is not a lucky month to marry in, so we will marry on the first of June of next year. You'll promise me that, won't you?"

"Yes," I said.

"And in the meantime very likely you would rather not have it known."

"It has been most kind and generous of you and Mrs. Fanning not to speak of it," I answered.

"Just as you like about that; but I can see that, with the care of your mother and one thing or another you find me rather in the way, so I thought I would tell you that I am going off, I am going to Germany to begin with for a fortnight, and then I shall take lodgings in town.

Oh, the house at Highgate won't hold me until it holds my little wife as well, but I won't live in this house to be a worry to you morning, noon, and night. And when I am not always there perhaps you'll think of me, and how faithful I am to you, and how truly, truly I love you; and you will think, too, of what you are to me, a poem, yes, that's the right word, a beautiful poem, something holy, something that makes a new man of me, the most lovely bit of a thing I ever saw. Sevres china is nothing to you. I have seen dainty bits of art sold at Christy's before now, but there never was anything daintier than you before in the world, and I love you, there! I have said it. It means a good deal when a man gives all his love to a woman, and I give it all to you; and when everything is said and done, Westenra, bonny as you are, and lovely, and dainty as you are, you are only a woman and I am only a man."

"I think," I said suddenly, and I found the tears coming into my eyes and stealing down my cheeks, "that you are one of the best men I ever met. I did not think it. I will tell you frankly that I used to regard you as commonplace, and--as vulgar. I saw nothing but the commonplace and the vulgar in you, but now I do see something else, something which is high, and generous, and even beautiful. I know that you are a good man, a very good man. I don't love you yet, but I will try; I will try at least to like you, and on the first of June next year I will be your wife."

"Thank you, dear," he replied, "you could not have spoken clearer and plainer and more straight if you were to study the matter for ever and ever. Now I know where I am, and I am contented. With your sweet little self to take pattern by, I have not the slightest doubt that I'll win that golden heart of yours yet. I mean to have a right good try for it anyhow. The mater will be so pleased when I tell her how nicely you spoke to me to-night. I am off to Germany first thing in the morning; you won't see me for a fortnight, and I won't write to you, Westenra; you'd be worried by my letters, and I cannot express what I feel except when you are there. I won't even kiss you now, for I know you would rather not, but perhaps I may kiss your hand."

He raised my hand to his lips; I did not look at him, I slowly left the room. He was very good, and I was very fortunate. Oh yes, although my heart kept bleeding.

CHAPTER XXVI

HAND IN HAND

Mr. Fanning went away and Mrs. Fanning took care of me. She openly did this; she made a tremendous fuss about me, but she never by word or deed alluded to my engagement to her son Albert. She did not talk nearly so much as in former times of her son; perhaps he had told her that I was not to be worried, but she was very good and very nice, and I got sincerely attached to her: and I never saw the d.u.c.h.ess nor Lady Thesiger nor my old friends, although I heard that the d.u.c.h.ess was fairly well again, and was out and going into society; and every one now seemed certain that Jim Randolph had gone to the bottom in the _Star of Hope_, but by universal consent the boarders decided that the news should be kept from mother, and mother grew much better. The weather was so fine she was able to go out. We got a bath chair for her and took her out every day; and the boarding-house was thronged, absolutely thronged with guests; and by Mrs. Fanning's suggestion Miss Mullins put up the prices, and very considerably too, for the London season, but the boarders paid what they were asked willingly, for the house was so sweet and so bright and so comfortable; and Jane had her moment of triumph when she saw that No. 14 in the next street was beginning to imitate us, to put up sun blinds, and even to fix balconies on to the windows, and to have the same hours for meals; and the ladies who kept No. 14 called one day and asked to see Jane Mullins. Jane did give them a spice of her mind, and sent them away without any information whatever with regard to her plans.

"I could not tell them to their faces," said Jane to me that day, "that it wasn't I. I am just a homely body, and can only do the rough homely work; I didn't tell them that it was because I had a lady who had the face of an angel and the ways of a queen in the drawing-room, and a young lady, the princess, her daughter, that the boarding-house prospered. I never let out to them that because you two are real ladies, and know how to be courteous and sympathetic and sweet, and yet to uphold your own dignity through everything, that the place was always full. No, I never told them that. What cheek those Miss Simpsons had to try to pick my brains!"

Yes, undoubtedly, whether we were the cause or not, things seemed to be flourishing, and mother enjoyed her life; but one evening towards the end of June she began to talk of old times, of the d.u.c.h.ess, and the friends she knew in Mayfair, and then quite quietly her conversation turned to a subject ever I believe near her heart, James Randolph and his friendship for her.

"He ought to be back now," she said. "I have counted the months, and he ought to be in England many weeks ago. I cannot understand his silence and his absence."

I did not answer. Mother looked at me.

"He was fond of you, West," she said.

My heart gave a great throb and then stood still. I bent my head, but did not reply.

"He never wished me to tell you," said mother. "He felt, and I agreed with him, that it would be best for him to speak to you himself. He said that he would be back in England early in April at the latest, and then he would speak to you. But he gave me to understand that if for any reason his return was delayed I might act on my own discretion, and tell you what comforts me beyond all possible words, and what may also cheer you, for I can scarcely think, my darling, that the love of a man like that would be unreturned by a girl like you, when once you knew, Westenra, when once you surely knew. Yes, he loves you with all his great heart, and when he comes back you will tell him----"

"Oh don't, mother," I interrupted, "oh don't say any more."

My face, which had been flushed, felt white and cold now, my heart after its one wild bound was beating low and feebly in my breast.

"What is it, West?" said mother.

"I would rather----" I began.

"That he told you himself? Yes, yes, that I understand. Whenever he comes, West, take your mother's blessing with the gift of a good man's heart. He has relieved my anxieties about you, and his friendship has sweetened the end of a pilgrimage full--oh, full to overflowing--of many blessings."

Mother lay quite quiet after these last words, and I did not dare to interrupt her, nor did I dare to speak. After a time she said gently--

"Your father came to me again last night. He sat down by me and held my hand. He looked very happy, almost eager. He did not say much about the life he now leads, but his eyes spoke volumes. I think he will come back to-night. It is quite as though we had resumed our old happy life together."

Mother looked rather sleepy as she spoke, and I bent down and kissed her, and sat with her for some little time. I saw that she was in a sound sleep, and her lips were breaking into smiles every now and then. She had been so well lately that we had sent Nurse Marion away, for her services seemed to be no longer required.

After sitting with mother until nearly midnight I went up to my own room. I sat down then and faced the news that mother had given me.

"I always knew it," I said to myself, "but I would not put it into words before; I always guessed it, and I was happy, although I scarcely knew why. Yes, I have put it into words at last, but I must never do so again, for on the 1st of June next year I am to marry Albert Fanning, and he is a good man, and he loves me."