The Daltons; Or, Three Roads In Life. Volume I

To return home again was the only issue she could see to her difficulties, to share the humble fortunes of her father and sister, away from a world in which she had no pretension to live! And this, too, just when that same world had cast its fascinations round her, just when its blandishments had gained possession of her heart, and made her feel that all without its pale was ignoble and unworthy. No other course seemed, however, to offer itself, and she had just determined on its adoption, when the short, quick step of some one following her made her turn her head. As she did so, her name was pronounced, and Mr. Albert Jekyl, with his hat courteously removed, advanced towards her.

“I see with what care Miss Dalton protects the roses of her cheeks,” said he, smiling; “and yet how few there are that know this simple secret.”

“You give me a credit I have no claim to, Mr. Jekyl. I have almost forgotten the sight of a rising sun, but this morning I did not feel quite well a headache a sleepless night – ”

“Perhaps caused by anxiety,” interposed he, quietly. “I wish I had discovered your loss in time, but I only detected that it must be yours when I reached home.”

“I don’t comprehend you,” said she, with some hesitation.

“Is not this yours, Miss Dalton?” said he, producing the bill, which had fallen unseen from her father’s letter. “I found it on the floor of the small boudoir, and not paying much attention to it at the time, did not perceive the signature, which would at once have betrayed the ownership.”

“It must have dropped from a letter I was reading,” said Kate, whose cheek was now scarlet, for she knew Jekyl well enough to be certain that her whole secret was by that time in his hands. Slighter materials than this would have sufficed for his intelligence to construct a theory upon. Nothing in his manner, however, evinced this knowledge, for he handed her the paper with an air of most impassive quietude; while, as if to turn her thoughts from any unpleasantness of the incident, he said,

“You haven’t yet heard, I suppose, of Lady Hester’s sudden resolve to quit Florence?”

“Leave Florence! and for where?” asked she, hurriedly.

“For Midchekoff’s villa at Como. We discussed it all last night after you left, and in twenty-four hours we are to be on the road.”

“What is the reason of this hurried departure?”

“The Ricketts invasion gives the pretext; but of course you know better than I do what a share the novelty of the scheme lends to its attractions.”

“And we are to leave this to-morrow?” said Kate, rather to herself than for her companion.

Jekyl marked well the tone and the expression of the speaker, but said not a word.

Kate stood for a few seconds lost in thought. Her difficulties were thickening around her, and not a gleam of light shone through the gloomy future before her. At last, as it were overpowered by the torturing anxieties of her situation, she covered her face with her hands to hide the tears that would gush forth in spite of her.

“Miss Dalton will forgive me,” said Jekyl, speaking in a low and most respectful voice, “if I step for once from the humble path I have tracked for myself in life, and offer my poor services as her adviser.”

Nothing could be more deferential than the speech, or the way in which it was uttered, and yet Kate heard it with a sense of pain. She felt that her personal independence was already in peril, and that the meek and bashful Mr. Jekyl had gained a mastery over her. He saw all this, he read each struggle of her mind, and, were retreat practicable, he would have retreated; but, the step once taken, the only course was “forwards.”

“Miss Dalton may reject my counsels, but she will not despise the devotion in which they are proffered. A mere accident” here he glanced at the paper which she still held in her fingers “a mere accident has shown me that you have a difficulty; one for which neither your habits nor knowledge of life can suggest the solution.” He paused, and a very slight nod from Kate emboldened him to proceed. “Were it not so, Miss Dalton were the case one for which your own exquisite tact could suffice, I never would have ventured on the liberty. I, who have watched you with wondering admiration, directing and guiding your course amid shoals and reefs and quicksands, where the most skilful might have found shipwreck, it would have been hardihood indeed for me to have offered my pilotage. But here, if I err not greatly, here is a new and unknown sea, and here I may be of service to you.”

“Is it so plain, then, what all this means?” said Kate, holding out the bill towards Jekyl.

“Alas! Miss Dalton,” said he, with a faint smile, “these are no enigmas to us who mix in all the worries and cares of life.”

“Then how do you read the riddle?” said she, almost laughing at the easy flippancy of his tone.

“Mr. Dalton being an Irish gentleman of a kind disposition and facile temper, suffers his tenantry to run most grievously into arrear. They won’t pay, and he won’t make them; his own creditors having no sympathy with such proceedings, become pressing and importunate. Mr. Dalton grows angry, and they grow irritable; he makes his agent write to them, they ‘instruct’ their attorney to write to him. Mr. D. is puzzled, and were it not that But, may I go on?”

“Of course; proceed,” said she, smiling.

“You’ll not be offended, though?” said he, “because, if I have not the privilege of being frank, I shall be worthless to you.”

“There is no serious offence without intention.”

“Very true; but I do not wish there should be even a trivial transgression.”

“I ‘m not afraid. Go on,” said she, nodding her head.

“Where was I, then? Oh! I remember. I said that Mr. Dalton, seeing difficulties thickening and troubles gathering, suddenly bethinks him that he has a daughter, a young lady of such attractions that, in a society where wealth and splendor and rank hold highest place, her beauty has already established a dominion which nothing, save her gentleness, prevents being a despotism.”

“Mr. Jekyl mistakes the part of a friend when he becomes flatterer.”

“There is no flattery in a plain unadorned truth,” said he, hastily.

“And were it all as you say,” rejoined she, speaking with a heightened color and a flashing eye, “how could such circumstances be linked with those you spoke of?”

“Easily enough, if I did but dare to tell it,” was his reply.

“It is too late for reserve; go on freely,” said she, with a faint sigh.

Jekyl resumed,

“Mr. Dalton knows there are thousands could have told him so that his daughter may be a princess to-morrow if she wishes it. She has but to choose her rank and her nationality, and there is not a land in Europe in whose peerage she may not inscribe her name. It is too late for reserve,” said he, quickly, “and consequently too late for resentment. You must not be angry with me now; I am but speaking in your presence what all the world says behind your back. Hearing this, and believing it, as all believe it, what is there more natural than that he should address himself to her at whose disposal lie all that wealth can compass? The sun bestows many a gleam of warmth and brightness before he reaches the zenith. Do not mistake me. This request was scarcely fair; it was ill-advised. Your freedom should never have been jeopardized for such a mere trifle. Had your father but seen with his own eyes your position here, he would never have done this; but, being done, there is no harm in it.”

“But what am I to do?” said Kate, trembling with embarrassment and vexation together.

“Send the money, of course,” said he, coolly.

“But how from what source?”

“Your own benevolence, none other,” said he, as calmly.

“There is no question of a favor, no stooping to an obligation necessary. You will simply give your promise to repay it at some future day, not specifying when; and I will find a banker but too happy to treat with you.”

“But what prospect have I of such ability to pay? what resources can I reckon upon?”

“You will be angry if I repeat myself,” said Jekyl, with deep humility.

“I am already angry with myself that I should have listened to your proposal so indulgently; my troubles must, indeed, have affected me deeply when I so far forgot myself.”

Jekyl dropped his head forward on his breast, and looked a picture of sorrow; after a while he said,

“Sir Stafford Onslow would, I well know, but be honored by your asking him the slight favor; but I could not counsel you to do so. Your feelings would have to pay too severe a sacrifice, and hence I advise making it a mere business matter; depositing some ornament a necklace you were tired of, a bracelet, anything in fact, a nothing and thus there is neither a difficulty nor a disclosure.”

“I have scarcely anything,” said Kate; “and what I have, have been all presents from Lady Hester.”

“Morlache would be quite content with your word,” said Jekyl, blandly.

“And if I should be unable to acquit the debt, will these few things I possess be sufficient to do it?”

“I should say double the amount, as a mere guess.”

“Can I dare I take your counsel?” cried she, in an accent of intense anxiety.