Thus confronted with the bald issue, Virgie felt as if he had slapped her in the face; but in a moment she had rallied. He had promised to give her all she asked. Could she, logically, do aught else but accept?

She clasped her hands tightly in her lap, hesitated, rose, and went to the window, gazing forth upon the little wet street. Over the way, at Alpine Cottage, the pug had managed to get shut out in the rain. It was astonishing how often he did this. It was the one thing that seriously displeased his prim and elderly mistress. Virgie's mind caught at the trifling fact, the little bit of her daily life, as if its consideration could protect her against the awful decision which loomed ahead.

"If you want to stipulate for other things, now is your time," said Gaunt, rising and coming towards her. It was but a step, for the room was tiny. "For instance, don't you want it put in the settlements that you should have so many months in town every year, or that I should give you a motor? I haven't got a motor, I must warn you."

Here was something that she could answer without hesitation. She turned to him her lovely, tender smile. "Oh, all that! Why, I shall be your wife," she sweetly answered him.

There was a tingling silence after this artless speech. Gaunt's face fell. He looked as though a momentary doubt a.s.sailed him. Then he realised that he must seize the chance she thus unwittingly gave him of a.s.suming her consent.

"Ah! then you can think of yourself as my wife?" He turned his face to where Mrs. Mynors sat like a woman hypnotised. "Then we are engaged!"

he cried. "I am such a crusted old provincial bachelor that I did not provide for this occasion before I left town by the purchase of a ring.

But I see upon your mother's finger a jewel which, if I mistake not, belongs to me." He approached the sofa with hand outstretched. "Thank you, madam. It seems to me a most touching idea that the mother and daughter should wear the same betrothal ring." He held it out to Virginia.

"Put it on," he said.

Virginia wavered. She looked from the man to the woman, bewildered with the invisible clash of feelings which she could not interpret. Mrs.

Mynors hid her face behind her perfumed wisp of lawn; but, then, she would have done that in any case at such a moment as her daughter's betrothal. Gaunt's eyes were alight, but, as it were, a-smoulder; there was no flame in their glance.

Turning very white, the girl took the ring from him and obediently slipped it upon her finger.

"Done!" he said, in tones of boundless satisfaction. "Now we come to definite arrangements." He seated himself again, but Virginia remained standing as if something had turned her to stone. "I live a very busy life at Omberleigh," he told her briskly, "farming my own land; and my estate is a big one. I must go down there to-night to superintend the end of the hay harvest, and I must stay there a few days in order to prepare the house for your reception. I should like to be married this day week if that will suit you. As we both live in our own parishes, there will be no difficulty about a licence. It is not possible for me to take a honeymoon at this time of year, so I shall carry you straight back to Derbyshire after the ceremony."

"Wait--wait. No, no, Osbert, this is preposterous!" broke in Mrs.

Mynors. "This cannot be. Virginia does not know you; she is all unprepared. Such haste is--improper! I will not have it."

He looked as obstinate as a mule with its ears laid back. "Sorry," he said. "On this matter I shall be obliged to insist. I must be married before we begin to reap, and it is going to be a very early harvest this year. Don't make difficulties. Remember that you profess to be very hard up, and I don't begin to make you any allowance until your daughter is my wife."

Virginia was reflecting. "If they told me I was to have an operation I would rather have it at once, than be left to think about it."

She spoke suddenly. "Mother, I can be ready," she said gently. "Let it be as Mr. Gaunt thinks best."

"Excellent!" said the bridegroom. "Your mother tells me that she allows you complete independence of action, so we will take this as settled.

Is that your solicitor now entering the gate? I will give him my instructions at once with your permission, for I must go back to London by the six train to catch the express to Ashbourne."

CHAPTER VIII

INTO THE UNKNOWN

"_Graceful as an ivy bough Born to cling and lean, Thus she sat to sing and sew....

When she raised her l.u.s.trous eyes A beast peeped at the door._"--Christina Rossetti.

Mr. Askew stood at the window, watching the figure of the prospective bridegroom limping down the road. He turned his mild eyes back to the two ladies within the room with something like wonder in their depths.

"Miss Virginia, I congratulate you," he said almost reverently. "You have indeed found a generous husband."

"You think--you are of opinion--that his generosity is exceptional?"

faltered Mrs. Mynors.

"Exceptional? But, my _dear_ madam, it is unheard of! Strong indeed must be the attachment! He told me," added the kind old man, with a smile of appreciation at the bride-elect, "that it was a case of love at first sight. Miss Virginia has made a conquest worth boasting of!"

Virginia stood gazing anxiously at the speaker. She longed to ask if he was quite sure that her future husband was sane; but such a question must appear too eccentric for her to venture upon it. Fortunately, the next words of the lawyer practically answered it.

"And such a grasp of business! Such a fine, keen intelligence! He tells me that he runs his estate at a profit, has all these new intensive culture ideas, and plenty of capital to carry them out. A fine fortune, indeed! One wonders how it chances that such a man has remained so long a bachelor!"

Mrs. Mynors bridled, but said nothing. Virginia absorbed the sense of the opinion just given with considerable relief. The information respecting Gaunt's scientific cultivation of his land interested her.

Her own father, living on his hereditary acres, had been in like manner devoted to the soil. At Lissendean, however, the land had starved to supply the constantly increasing demands of the mistress of the house; and the shadow of the approaching, inevitable bankruptcy had paralysed all planning, and embittered the premature illness and death of a chivalrous and simple gentleman.

The thought that this free life, of tramping over fields and through spinneys, of riding across one's own acres, and watching the response of the earth to the hand of man, might once more be hers, went far to reconcile the new Andromeda to her lot. The manner and appearance of her suitor had rather puzzled than hurt her. He had pleaded solitude and boorishness as a reason for his extraordinarily abrupt tactics. If he atoned for his surprising rudeness in the matter (for instance) of her mother's ring by being good to his wife, and allowing her to have Pansy to stay with her, then she might be so nearly happy that she need waste little regret upon her own action in shutting upon her youth the gate of dreams. Softly she stole from the room, leaving her mother still in talk with Mr. Askew, finding out all she could as to the extent of her son-in-law's means; and privately speculating as to how far it would be prudent to exceed the miserable allowance which he proposed to make her.

Virginia went upstairs to Pansy's room to console the child for her disappointment in not having seen her future brother. Shyly the elder sister, when Gaunt was taking leave, had suggested a moment's visit to the little invalid. She had been curtly refused. He had barely time in which to catch his train to London. By way of comfort, Virgie now enlarged upon the big, beautiful garden at Omberleigh, wherein, of course, Pansy would ere long find herself installed. Eagerly the child noticed and remarked upon the beautiful ring which her sister wore. She had not previously seen it, and was naturally kept in ignorance of its somewhat humiliating history.

"I wonder what else he will send you, Virgie," said the child eagerly.

"I expect that before long lovely wedding presents will begin to come.

What dress shall you buy to be married in, darling?"

"I shan't buy any," was the calm reply. "We are to be married with n.o.body there but mother and Tony, at ten o'clock in the morning, and I shall have to travel back to Omberleigh afterwards. I shall just wear my frock that you are so fond of, with the chiffon tunic, and take a dust-coat to church with me."

Pansy was inclined to be disappointed, but Virginia showed her how impossible it was for her to spend money which they had not got, and how far more honourable she felt it to be going to her marriage in things which had been paid for.

Busy days they were for Virgie, for she had to engage a good, competent servant for Laburnum Villa, and also to make arrangements with their doctor for Pansy to try the treatment he had always been so eager to recommend. Everything had to be so ordered that it might be fully in train by the wedding day, that her mother should not feel too much inconvenienced by the departure of her devoted maid-of-all-work.

Perhaps the most difficult task of all that fell to the bride was the writing of her news to Miriam Rosenberg. Long did she sit with the tip of her penholder laid thoughtfully on her lip, her eyes gazing gravely forth, but seeing nothing. She felt the extraordinary circ.u.mstances needed some handling. She must try to put things in their most favourable light without actually violating truth. And it was only a few days before her day of doom that she finally achieved the following:

_My dearest Mims,_

_I am writing a line to tell you a piece of news which will, I think, astonish you. I am going to be married! More surprising still, I am going to be married next Tuesday! It sounds wild, I know, considering that when I was with you there was no such idea; but it is not quite as sudden as it seems, for Mr. Gaunt is a very old friend, and knew mother before I was born. He is being most incredibly good, and is to provide for mother, Pansy and Tony. Is it not wonderful? Like a story in a book. He lives in Derbyshire, and has a big estate, so I shall be in the country, as in old days--and you know how I love a country life.

When we are settled down, you must come and stay with us._

_n.o.body is invited to the wedding, Mr. Gaunt having no near relative.

It is to be early in the morning, with only mother and Tony present, as we have a long way to go afterwards._

_I send you much love, and I shall never forget all your goodness to me.--Your constant friend_,

Virginia Mynors.

For the two days which followed the despatch of this letter Virginia lived in secret suspense. She did not really believe that there was any likelihood that Perseus, in the handsome person of Gerald Rosenberg, would arrive to unchain her from her rock; yet the tiny chance that he might fought and struggled within her. Each time the postman pa.s.sed she felt her heart lift in her side. Each time the bell rang she wondered whether there might not be a tall figure waiting on the other side of the door.

As might have been expected, no such thing happened. A letter came from Mims by return of post, full of congratulation and excitement, and stating that a consignment of wedding presents had been despatched. In fact, Mr. Rosenberg, senior, was so transported with grat.i.tude to Virginia for refraining from becoming his daughter-in-law that he bestowed on her a set of ermine furs fit for a princess. Mims sent a mirror in a silver frame; Gerald a pendant.

Except for a silver cream-jug from Mr. Askew, these were the only presents the girl received. Tony and Pansy almost broke their hearts at being unable to give anything, until Mrs. Mynors, roused to most unexpected generosity, allowed them to go shares with her in pressing upon Virgie's acceptance some articles of her mother's silver toilet set--brush, comb, and so on.