He looked at her fondly, took her hand, and drew her to the table; and, in after years, she recalled this occasion with mournful pleasure as the last on which he had ever given her his pet name.

CHAPTER XVIII

A REFUSAL

"Come out on the colonnade; the air is delicious." As he spoke, Hugh drew his cousin's arm through his, and led the way from the tea-table.

"Irene, how long do you intend to keep me in painful suspense?"

"I am not aware that I have in any degree kept you in suspense."

"You shall not evade me; I have been patient, and the time has come when we must talk of our future. Irene, dearest, be generous, and tell me when will you give me, irrevocably, this hand which has been promised to me from your infancy?"

He took the hand and carried it to his lips, but she forcibly withdrew it, and, disengaging her arm, said emphatically--

"Never, Hugh. Never."

"How can you trifle with me, Irene? If you could realize how impatient I am for the happy day when I shall call you my wife, you would be serious, and fix an early period for our marriage."

"Hugh, why will you affect to misconceive my meaning? I am serious; I have pondered, long and well, a matter involving your life-long happiness and mine, and I tell you, most solemnly, that I will never be your wife."

"Oh, Irene! your promise! your sacred promise!"

"I never gave it! On the contrary, I have never failed to show you that my whole nature rebelled against the most unnatural relation forced upon me."

"My dear Irene, have you, then, no love for me? I have hoped and believed that you hid your love behind your cold mask of proud silence. You must, you do love me, my beautiful cousin!"

"You do not believe your own words; you are obliged to know better. I love you as my cousin, love you somewhat as I love Uncle Eric, love you as the sole young relative left to me, as the only companion of my lonely childhood; but other love than this I never had, never can have for you.

Hugh, my cousin, look fearlessly at the unvarnished truth; neither you nor I have one spark of that affection which alone can sanction marriage."

"Indeed, you wrong me, my worshipped cousin. You are dearer to me than anything else on earth. I have loved you, and you only, from my boyhood; you have been a lovely idol from earliest recollection."

"You are mistaken, most entirely mistaken; I am not to be deceived, neither can you hoodwink yourself. You like me, you love me, in the same quiet way that I love you; you admire me, perhaps, more than anyone you chance to know just now; you are partial to my beauty, and, from long habit, have come to regard me as your property, much in the same light as that in which you look upon your costly diamond b.u.t.tons, or your high-spirited horses, or rare imported pointers. Hugh, I abhor sham! and I tell you now that I never will be a party to that which others have arranged without my consent."

"Ah! I see how matters stand. Having disposed of your heart, and lavished your love elsewhere, you shrink from fulfilling the sacred obligations that make you mine. I little dreamed that you were so susceptible, else I had not left you feeling so secure. My uncle has not proved the faithful guardian I believed him when I entrusted my treasure, my affianced bride to his care."

Bitter disappointment flashed in his face and quivered in his voice, rendering him reckless of consequences. But though he gazed fiercely at her as he uttered the taunt, it produced not the faintest visible effect.

"Confess who stands between your heart and mine. I have a right to ask; I will know."

"You forget yourself, my cousin. Your right is obviously a debatable question; we will waive it, if you please. I have told you already, and now I repeat it for the last time, I will not go with you to the altar, because neither of us has proper affection for the other to warrant such a union; because it would be an infamous pecuniary contract, revolting to every true soul. Hugh, cherish no animosity against me; I merit none. Because we cannot be more, shall we be less than friends?"

She turned to leave him, but he caught her dress, and exclaimed, with more tenderness than he had ever manifested before--

"Oh, Irene! do not reject me utterly! I cannot relinquish you. Give me one more year to prove my love--to win yours. If your proud heart is still your own, may I not hope to obtain it by----"

"No, Hugh! no. As well hope to inspire affection in yonder mute marble guardians. Forgive me if I pain you, but I must be candid at every hazard."

She pointed to the statues near the door, and went through the greenhouse to the library, thence to the observatory, expecting, ere long, to be joined by her father. Gradually the house became quiet, and, oppressed with the painful sense of coming trouble, she sought her own room just as the clock struck twelve. Pausing to count the strokes, she saw a light gleaming through the keyhole of her father's door, opposite her own, and heard the sound of low but earnest conversation mingled with the restless tramp of pacing feet. She was powerfully tempted to cross the pa.s.sage, knock, and have the ordeal ended then and there; but second thought whispered, "To-morrow will soon be here; be patient." She entered her room, and, wearied by the events of the day, fell asleep, dreaming of the new lot in the cemetery, and the lonely, joyless man who haunted it.

As she adjusted her riding-habit the following morning, and suffered Andrew to arrange her stirrup, the latter said good-humouredly--

"So, Mas' Hugh got the start of you? It isn't often he beats you."

"What do you mean?"

"He started a while ago, and, if he drives as he generally does, he will get to his plantation in time for dinner."

"Did father go, too?"

"No, ma'am; only Mas' Hugh in his own buggy."

Returning from her ride, she stood a moment on the front step, looking down the avenue. The Bermuda terrace blazed in the sunlight like a jewelled coronal, the billowy sea of foliage, crested by dewy drops, flashed and dripped as the soft air stirred the ancient trees, the hedges were all alive with birds and b.u.t.terflies, the rich aroma of brilliant and countless flowers, the graceful curl of smoke wreathing up from the valley beyond, the measured musical tinkle of bells as the cows slowly descended the distant hills, and, over all, like G.o.d's mantling mercy, a summer sky.

Involuntarily she stretched out her arms to the bending heavens and her lips moved, but no sound escaped to tell what pet.i.tion went forth to the All-Father. She went to her room, changed her dress, and joined her father at the breakfast-table. Half-concealed behind his paper, he took no notice of her quiet "good morning," seeming absorbed in an editorial. The silent meal ended, he said, as they left the table--

"I want to see you in the library."

She followed him without comment; he locked the door, threw open the blinds, and drew two chairs to the window, seating himself immediately in front of her. For a moment he eyed her earnestly, as if measuring her strength; and she saw the peculiar sparkle in his falcon eye, which, like the first lurid flash in a darkened sky, betokened tempests.

"Irene, I was very much astonished to learn the result of an interview between Hugh and yourself; I can scarcely believe that you were in earnest, and feel disposed to attribute your foolish words to some trifling motive of girlish coquetry or momentary pique. You have long been perfectly well aware that you and your cousin were destined for each other; that I solemnly promised the marriage should take place as soon as you were of age; that all my plans and hopes for you centred in this one engagement. I have not pressed the matter on your attention of late, because I knew you had sense enough to appreciate your position, and because I believed you would be guided by my wishes in this important affair. You are no longer a child; I treat you as a reasonable woman, and now I tell you candidly it is the one wish of my heart to see you Hugh's wife."

"Father, my happiness will not be promoted by this marriage, and if you are actuated solely by this motive, allow me to remain just as I am. I should be most miserable as Hugh's wife; most utterly miserable."

"Why so?"

"Father, my own feelings stand an everlasting barrier to our union. I do not love Hugh, and--I must tell you, sir, that I think it wrong for cousins to marry."

"You talk like a silly child; I thought you had more sense. Your objections I have listened to; they are imaginary and trifling; and I ask you, as a father has a right to ask his child, to waive these ridiculous notions, and grant the only request I have ever made of you. Tell me, my daughter, that you will consent to accept your cousin, and thereby make me happy."

He stooped and kissed her forehead, watching her countenance eagerly.

"Oh, father! do not ask this of me! Anything else! anything else."

"Answer me, my darling child; give me your promise."

His hold was painful, and an angry pant mingled with the pleading tones.

She raised her head and said slowly--

"My father, I cannot."

He threw her hand from him, and sprang up.

"Ingrate! do you mean to say that you will not fulfil a sacred engagement?--that you will break an oath given to the dead."

"I do not hold myself bound by the oaths of another, though he were twice my father. I am responsible for no acts but my own. I, only, can give myself away. Why should you wish to force this marriage on me? Father, do you think that a woman has no voice in a matter involving her happiness for life?"