A Son of Perdition: An Occult Romance

"So cold a word," pleaded the other softly.

"What other word can I use to you when we have only known each other for a single week?"

"That is in this life. In other existences we knew each other for years."

Alice looked down timidly. "It – is – probable," she breathed.

"Then why not take up the new life at the point where the old one left off?"

"We don't know how it left off, Mr. Montrose."

"No. But assuredly it did at a point where you called me by my then Christian name – Alice."

Her heart fluttered as he spoke thus intimately. "Perhaps we were not Christians," she said, rather embarrassed.

"Ah!" he dropped her hand, "you are fencing. I merely spoke in the style of to-day to illustrate my point."

"Now you are angry!"

"I never could be angry with you; only you will not understand."

"Perhaps I do," said Alice, with a whimsical smile.

"If so, why aren't you plain with me?" said Montrose, ruffled.

The mothering instinct, which makes every woman see in every man a child to be soothed and petted, rose within her. "Let us slap the bad, naughty table that has hurt baby," she said demurely, and Montrose looked up to see the laughter in her eyes.

"You little witch!" He caught her hand again and this time so roughly that she winced at the delicious pain. "You know quite well what I mean."

"I do – Douglas!"

"Oh!" He leaned towards her so violently that she swung aside in alarm.

"The eyes of Europe are on us," she said hastily, indicating the throng of children and nursemaids and grown-up people round the pond and on the paths and lying on the grass.

"Bother the eyes of Europe." But he saw that she was right and he did not dare proclaim his love by taking her in his arms. It was rather a poor thing to content himself with squeezing her hand. But he did, and so hard that she uttered an exclamation.

"Mr. Montrose, you are hurting me."

"Am I? Poor hand! I wish I could kiss it!" with a swift look round, he managed to do so. "There – Alice. Don't you dare to call me anything but Douglas."

"I believe you wish to take me by storm," she pouted, not ill-pleased.

"What! capture my own city?"

"Your own city? What do you mean?"

"I mean that I dwell in your heart. That city is mine."

"How conceited you are."

"Indeed, I am not. You know quite well that I am only speaking the truth. I loved you in the past and I love you now. All preliminaries of love were gone through ages ago. Why fence, as if we now meet for the first time? When I saw you in Mrs. Barrast's drawing-room I said, 'She is mine!' When you saw me you said, 'I am his' – "

"I'm sure I didn't," interrupted Alice hastily.

"You thought it, though."

"I shan't tell you."

"There is no need for you to do so. Oh, my dear," he went on entreatingly, "is there so much love in the world that you and I can afford to throw what we possess away? All my life I have been lonely: all my life I have wanted to meet you, to adore you, to – "

"How could you when you didn't know that I existed?"

"Fencing again. As if you didn't know that spirit is everything and form is nothing. We have been apart on earth until last week; but we have always been together in higher worlds, although neither you nor I can remember our companionship."

Alice laughed in a rather anxious manner. "Any one listening to us would be certain both of us were insane."

"I daresay. But as no one is listening, it doesn't matter. For the convenience of a world that doesn't understand such things, let us behave in a conventional manner. I shall visit at Mrs. Barrast's and court you in the approved style. In due time I shall write and ask your father if I may make you my wife. Meanwhile I want your assurance that you love me and have always loved me in the past."

"But a single week – "

"Time doesn't matter. You know it doesn't. You love me, Alice?"

"Yes!" She saw that the time for fencing was ended. "I love you, Douglas!"

He kissed her hand again, then, aware that the place was too public for him to take her in his arms, suppressed his feelings. Side by side they sat in a stiff kind of way, while each longed for demonstrations which the situation forbade. It was decidedly uncomfortable to be thus conventional. But it was just as well that they thus came to an understanding in the eye of the sun, as the self-control was quite an education.

"One would think we were a couple of old married people, sitting side by side in this stiff manner," said Montrose with a vexed laugh. "I should like to be a Sabine and carry you away by force."

"Perhaps you will have to do so," said Alice, thinking of Don Pablo. "My father will never consent to my becoming your wife."

Montrose looked amazed and anxious. "Why not? There is nothing against my character and position," he said rapidly, "and as I have inherited Lady Staunton's money, your father will be glad that I should bring it into the Enistor family again by making you my wife."

"I don't think my father cares anything about the money," said Alice, ignorant of her parent's true feelings. "He wants me to marry Don Pablo."

"A Spaniard. Who is he?"

"A Spaniard, as you have said. He is my father's greatest friend."

"Young and handsome and wealthy?"

"Wealthy, certainly. But very ugly, just like a mummy, and as old as the hills – older, I believe. He must be eighty."

"Then why does your father wish you to marry him?"

"Because Don Pablo is rich."

"Well, I am rich also. Five thousand a year is riches."