A Mere Chance: A Novel. Vol. 1

"Oh, dear me, yes!" assented the younger matron pettishly. "Why didn't we have figures like that!"

Meanwhile, the black mare and the big brown horse paced out into the road, and for a little while the riders contented themselves with friendly glances at one another. Rachel was crimson with pride and bashfulness, looking lovely and riding beautifully, as she could not but know she was. Mr. Kingston, sharing some measure of her elation and excitement, was absorbed in looking at and admiring her.

By and bye they had a long canter, which carried them well out into the country, where there were no houses and no people, and where the shadows were beginning to rest on the peaceful autumn landscape. And then Mr. Kingston made her draw rein under a clump of trees, while she looked back at the city they had left behind, glorified in the light of the sinking sun.

"So now there is something else you like besides operas and balls?" he said, laying his hand upon the black mare's silky mane.

"Yes," she replied, drawing a long breath, "and I think this is best of all! She is like a swallow – she seems to skim the ground! And I – I don't know when I have felt so happy!"

All his years and his experience went for nothing under these circumstances, when she looked as sweet as she did now.

"You must keep Black Agnes," he said eagerly. "I will speak to your uncle. I will not have you riding low-bred brutes. Nothing but the best is fit for you; you, who know how to ride so well, and enjoy it so much! You will keep her, to please me?"

If she had been sitting in a green satin drawing-room she would probably have checked this ardent outburst at an apparently harmless stage. She would have blushed, and looked grave and majestic; but now she was, in a sense, intoxicated. She lifted a pair of radiant, grateful eyes to his face, and she held out her hand impulsively.

"How good you are to me!" she said. "How much pleasure you give me!"

And then, of course, he succumbed altogether.

"That is what I want to do, not now, but always," he said, drawing the mare's head to his knee, and the small, weak hand to his lips, which had kissed so many hands, though never with quite the same kind of kiss. "That is why I am building my house. It is you I wanted to be its mistress – didn't you know that? – to do just what you like with it, and with me, and with all I have!" And, when once he had fairly set it going, the flood of his eloquence, running in a well-channelled groove, flowed freely, and overwhelmed the poor little novice, who had never been made love to before.

"I – we – we have only seen each other a few times," she ventured to suggest at last, but not until her imagination had been captivated by the splendid prospect before her. She had the colour of a peony in her cheeks, and frightened tears in her soft child's eyes; but her experienced lover knew that his cause was gained.

"That has been enough for me," he said. "Once was enough for me." Then, after a long pause, "Well? Is it to be 'yes' or 'no?'"

"Oh, I don't know!" she stammered desperately, turning her head from side to side. "I have had no time. Let us wait until we know each other better."

"I know quite enough," he persisted, "and I am not so young as you are that I can afford to wait."

She trembled and panted, gathering up her reins and dropping them in an agony of embarrassment.

"Oh," she said at last, "what can I say? Won't you let me speak to Aunt Elizabeth?"

"Of course, as soon as you like after you get home. I am not afraid of Aunt Elizabeth. I know what she will say. But now, dear – while we are here by ourselves – I want you to tell me, of your own self, whether you like me – whether you would really like to come and live with me in my new house? You don't want anybody to help you to make up your mind about that?"

"No," she whispered, hanging her head, feeling at once terrified and elated, and wishing to goodness she could see Mrs. Hardy and Beatrice driving along the lonely empty road.

"You would like it? Turn your face to me and say 'Yes,' just once, and I won't bother you any more."

She turned her face, scarlet all over her ears and all down her throat, and she tried to meet his ardent eyes and could not. Her lips shaped themselves to say "Yes," but no sound would come. However, sound would have been, perhaps, less expressive than the silence which overwhelmed her in this proud but dreadful moment. At any rate, Mr. Kingston was satisfied.

CHAPTER V.

SO SOON!

THEY rode home sedately in the cool and quiet evening. Mr. Kingston, having accomplished the end for which he had contrived this unchaperoned expedition, was content to keep close to his pretty sweetheart's side, to look in her face occasionally with significant smiles, and to ruminate on his own good fortune.

Rachel, fluttered and dismayed at the situation in which she found herself, bestowed a wandering attention on the near-side fields and hedges, and discouraged conversation. It is needless to remark that the carriage did not come to meet them. The long shadows lengthened, the sun sank down below the glowing horizon, the glory of the evening faded away into the soft dusk of the autumn night.

Lamps were being lighted when they entered Toorak; the workmen who had begun at the foundations of the new house were "knocking off;" the gates of Mrs. Hardy's domain were standing open, and the woman at the lodge informed them that she had not returned from her drive.

They rode up to the house, and Mr. Kingston got off his horse and lifted Rachel down. She disengaged herself from his arms as quickly as possible, and then stood on the doorstep, while the groom led both horses away, and looked at her fiancé anxiously, blushing with all her might.

"Won't you let me come in?" he asked smiling. But he did not mean to be refused admittance; and he turned the handle of the door and led her into the hall and into the drawing-room, as if it had been his own house.

The lamps had not been lit in the drawing-room, but a bright fire was burning, making a glow of rich and pleasant colour all over its mossy carpet and its shining furniture. Rachel's flowers were blooming everywhere. Soft armchairs stood seductively round the cheerful hearth. An afternoon tea-table was set for four, with everything on it but the teapot.

"My aunt is late," said Rachel uneasily. "I wonder what can have kept her. I hope there has been no accident."

Mr. Kingston showed all his teeth in a momentary smile, and then addressed himself to the opportunity that had so happily offered.

"Oh, no, she is not late; it is the days that are getting so short," he said. And as he spoke he unfastened her hat and laid it aside, and then drew her burning face to his shoulder and kissed her. She stood still, trembling, to let him do it, one tingling blush from head to foot. She liked him very much; she was very proud and glad that she was going to marry him; she quite understood that it was his right and privilege to kiss her, if he felt so disposed. Still her strongest conscious sentiment was an ardent longing for her aunt's return – or her uncle's, or anybody's. The spiritual woman in her protested against being kissed.

"I want you not to be afraid of me," said Mr. Kingston, half anxious, half amused, as he patted her head. "I am not an ogre, nor Bluebeard either; you seem to shrink from me almost as if I was. You must not shrink from me now, you know."

"I will not – by and bye – when I get used to it," she gasped, with a touch of hysterical excitement, extricating her pretty head, and standing appealingly before him, with her pink palms outwards. "I'm not afraid of you, Mr. Kingston, but – but it is very new yet! I shall get used to it after a little."

He looked down at her with sudden gravity. She was on the verge of tears.

"Oh, yes," he said quietly, almost paternally, "we shall soon get used to each other. There is plenty of time. Let me see – how old are you? Don't tell me; let me guess. Eighteen?"

She smiled and composed herself. Yes, she was just eighteen. Somebody must have told him. No, upon his honour, nobody had; it was his own guess entirely. Did he not think he ought to have chosen someone older for such a position of importance and responsibility? No; she was gallantly assured that she had been an object, not of choice, but of necessity. And so on.

When the dialogue had brought itself down to a sufficiently sober level, he took her hand, and drawing her into a seat beside him, continued to hold it, and to stroke her slight white fingers between his palms.

"They say good blood always shows itself in the fineness of a woman's hands," he said; "if so, you ought to be particularly well-born."

"I don't know what your standard is," she answered, smiling. "My father came of a border family ages ago, I believe. I never knew anything about my mother's parentage; she died when I was a baby."

"I am sure you are well born," he said, looking fondly and proudly at her as she sat in the firelight, with her golden hair shining. "I shall have not only the finest house, but the most beautiful wife to sit at the head of my table. I don't believe there is another woman in Melbourne who will compare with you, especially when you get those diamonds on."

"Diamonds!" ejaculated Rachel.

"Yes; those diamonds you talked about the other night, don't you know? – that you would have if you were very rich. Well, you are going to be very rich. And I am going to order you some of them to-morrow. You must give me the size of your finger. A 'ring full of diamonds,' didn't you say? How full?"

Rachel smiled, blushed, and ceased to feel that strong repugnance to the amenities of courtship which had distressed both herself and her lover at an earlier stage.

Here a servant came in to light the gas. The man appeared conscious of the inopportuneness of his intrusion, and despatched his business in nervous haste, clinking the pendants of the cut-glass chandelier in a manner that his mistress would have highly disapproved of.

Rachel and her visitor watched him with a sort of silent fascination, as if they had never seen gas lighted before. When he was gone, Mr. Kingston took out his watch. It was past six o'clock. He had a dinner engagement at seven, and had to get into town and change his clothes.

"I'm afraid I dare not wait for Mrs. Hardy," he said, rising. "I hate to go, but you know I would not if I could help it. I will see your uncle at his office the first thing in the morning, and come to lunch afterwards. Shall I?"

"If you like," murmured Rachel, shyly. And then she submitted to be kissed again, and being asked to do it, touched her lover's fierce moustaches with her own soft lips – not "minding" it nearly so much as she did at first. She was beginning to get used to being engaged to him.

When immediately after his departure Mrs. Hardy, having left her daughter at her own house, came home, and heard what had been taking place, she could hardly believe the evidence of her ears.

"So soon!" she ejaculated, lifting her hands. "Is it credible? My dear, are you sure you are not making a mistake?"