Sophia: A Romance

"And great afterwards!"

She had much ado not to laugh, he looked at her so piteously, his hands clasped. "Perhaps," she said. "At any rate the future will show. Here is the note." She passed it to him quickly, with one eye on the windows. "You will tell no one, you will mention it to no one; but you will see that it reaches his hands to-night."

"It shall if I live," Tom answered fervently. "To whom am I to deliver it?"

"To Sir Hervey."

Tom swore outright, and turned crimson. They looked at one another, the man and the maid.

When Betty spoke again-after a long, strange pause, during which he stood holding the note loosely in his fingers as if he would drop it-it was in a tone of passion which she had not used before. "Listen!" she said. "Listen, sir, and understand if you can-for it behoves you! There is an offence that passes forgiveness. I believe that a moment ago you were on the point of committing it. If so, and if you have not yet repented, think, think before you do commit it. For there will be no place for repentance afterwards. It is not for me to defend my conduct, nor for you to suspect it," the young girl continued proudly. "That is my father's right, and my husband's when I have one. It imports no one else. But I will stoop to tell you this, sir. If you had said the words that were on your lips a moment ago, as surely as you stand there to-day, you would have come to me to-morrow to crave my pardon, and to crave it in shame, in comparison of which anything you have felt to-day is nothing. And you would have craved it in vain!" she continued vehemently. "I would rather the lowest servant here-soiled my lips-than you!"

Her passion had so much the better of her, when she came to the last words, that she could scarcely utter them. But she recovered herself with marvellous rapidity. "Do you take the note, sir," she said coldly, "or do you leave it?"

"I will take it, if it be to the devil!" he cried.

"No," she answered quickly; and she stayed him by a haughty gesture. "That will not do! Do you take it, thinking no evil? Do you take it, thinking me a good woman? Or do you take it thinking me something lower, infinitely lower, than the creatures you make your sport and pastime?"

"I do, I do believe!" Tom cried; and, dropping on his knees, he hid his face against her hoop-skirt, and pressed his lips to the stuff. And strange to say when he had risen and gone-without another word-there were tears in the girl's eyes. Tom had touched her.

CHAPTER XXVI

A DRAGON DISARMED

It was five o'clock in the morning. The low sun shone athwart the cool, green sward of the park, leaving the dells and leafy retreats of the deer in shadow. In the window recess of the hall, whence the eye had that view, and could drink in the freshness of the early morning, the small oak table was laid for breakfast. Old plate that had escaped the melting-pot and the direful year of the new coinage, dragon china imported when Queen Anne was young, linen, white as sun and dew or D'Oyley could make it, gave back the pure light of early morning, and bade welcome a guest as dainty as themselves. Yet Lady Betty, for whom the table was prepared, and who stood beside it in an attitude of expectation, tapped the floor with her foot and looked but half pleased. "Is Lady Coke not coming?" she asked at last.

"No, my lady," Mrs. Stokes answered. "Her ladyship is taking her meal in her room."

"Oh!" Lady Betty rejoined drily. "She's not ailing, I hope?"

"No, my lady. She bade me say that the chariot would be at the door at half after five."

Betty grimaced, but took her seat in silence, and kept one eye on the clock. Had her messenger played her false? Or was Coke incredulous? Or what kept him? Even if he did not come before they set out, he might meet them on the hither side of Lewes; but that was a slender thread to which to trust, and Lady Betty had no mind to be packed home in error. As the finger of the clock in the corner moved slowly downwards, as the sun drank up the dew on leaf and bracken, and the day hardened, she listened, and more intently listened for the foot that was overdue. It wanted but five minutes of the half hour now! Now it wanted but three minutes! Two minutes! Now the rustle of my lady's skirts was on the stairs, the door was opened for her to enter and-and then at last, Betty caught the ring of spurred heels on the pavement of the terrace.

"He's come!" she cried, springing from her seat, and forgetting everything else in her relief. "He's come!"

Sophia from the inner threshold stared coldly. "Who?" she asked. It was the first time the two had met in the morning and had not kissed; but there are bounds to the generosity of woman, and Sophia could not stoop to kiss her rival. "Who?" she repeated, standing stiffly aloof, near the door by which she had entered.

"You will see!" Betty cried, with a bubble of laughter. "You will see."

The next moment Sir Hervey's figure darkened the open doorway, and Sophia saw him and understood. For an instant surprise drove the blood from her cheeks; then, as astonishment gave place to indignation, and to all the feelings which a wife-though a wife in name only-might be expected to experience in such a position, the tide returned in double volume. She, did not speak, she did not move; but she saw that they understood one another, she felt that this sudden return was concerted between them; and her eyes sparkled, her bosom rose. If she had never been beautiful before, Sophia was beautiful at that moment.

Sir Hervey smiled, as he looked at her. "Good morning, my dear," he said cheerily. "I'm of the earliest, or thought I was. But you had nearly stolen a march on me."

She did not answer him. "Lady Betty," she said, without turning her head or looking at the girl, "you had better leave us."

"Yes, Betty, away with you!" he cried, good humouredly. "You'll find Tom outside." And as Betty whisked away through the open door, "You'll pardon me, my dear," he continued quietly, but with dignity, "I have countermanded the carriage. When you have heard what I have to say you will agree with me, I am sure, that there is no necessity for our guest to leave us to-day." He laid his whip aside, as he spoke, and turned to the table from which Lady Betty had lately risen. "I have not broken my fast," he said. "Give me some tea, child."

A wild look, as of a creature caged and beating vain wings against bars, darkened Sophia's eyes. She was trembling with agitation, panting to resist, outraged in her pride if not in her love; and he asked for tea! Yet words did not come at once, his easy manner had its effect; as if she acknowledged that he had still a right to her service, she sat down at the little table in the window bay. He passed his legs over the bench on the other side, and sat waiting, the width of the table only-and it was narrow-between them. As she washed Betty's cup in the basin the china tinkled, and betrayed her agitation; but she managed to make his tea and pass it to him.

"Thank you," he said quietly. "And now for what I was saying. Lady Betty sent me a note last night, stating that she was to go to-day, unless I interceded for her. It was that brought me back this morning."

Sophia's eyes burned, but she forced herself to speak with calmness. "Did she tell you," she asked, "why she was to go?"

Sir Hervey shrugged his shoulders. "Well," he said, with a smile, "she hinted at the reason."

"Did she tell you what I had said to her?"

"I am afraid not," he said politely. "Probably space-"

"Or shame!" Sophia cried; and the next moment could have bitten her tongue. "Pardon me," she said in an altered tone, "I had no right to say that. But if she has not told you, 'tis I must tell you, myself. And it is more fitting. I am aware that you have discovered-all too soon, Sir Hervey-that our marriage, if it could be called a marriage, was a mistake. I cannot-I cannot," Sophia continued, trembling from head to foot, "take all the blame of that to myself, though I know that the first cause was my fault, and that it was I led you to commit the error. But I cannot take all the blame," she repeated, "I cannot! For you knew the world, you should have known yourself, and what was likely, what was certain to come of it! What has come of it!"

Sir Hervey drummed on the table with his fingers, and when he spoke, it was in a tone of apology. "The future is hard to read," he said. "It is easy, child, to be wise after the event."

Her next words seemed strangely ill-directed to the issue. "You never told me that you had been betrothed before," she said, "and that she died. If you had told me, and if I had seen her face-I should have been wiser. I should have foreseen what would happen. I do not wonder that such a face seen again has" – she paused, stammering and pale, "has recalled old times and your youth. I have no right to blame you. I do not blame you. At least, I-I try not to blame you," she repeated, her voice sinking lower and lower. "I have told her, and it is true, that if I could bear all the consequences of our error I would bear them. That if I could release you and set you free to marry the-the woman you have learned to love-I would, sir, willingly. That, at any rate, I would not raise a finger to prevent such a marriage."

"And did you-mean that," he asked in a low voice, his face averted.

"As God sees me, I did."

"You are in earnest, Sophia?" For an instant he turned his head and looked at her.

"I am."

"Yet-you were for sending her away," he said. "This morning? Before I could return? That I might not see her again."

She looked at him with astonishment, with indignation. "Cannot you understand," she cried, "that that was not on my account, but on hers?"

"It seems to have been rather on my account," he muttered doggedly, his fingers toying with the teaspoon, his eyes on the table. He seemed strangely changed. He did not seem to be himself.

She shuddered. "At any rate, it was not on my account," she said.

"And you are still fixed that she must go?"

"Yes."

"Then I'll tell you what it is," he answered with sudden determination, "I'll take you at your word!" He raised his cup, which was half full, and held it in front of his lips, looking at her across it as he spoke. "You said just now that if there was a way to-to give me the woman I loved-you would take it."

She started. For a moment she did not answer.

He waited. At last: "You didn't mean it?" he said, his tone cold.

The room, the high window with its stained escutcheons, the dark oak walls, the dark oak table, the leafage reflected cool and green in the tall mirror opposite the door, went round with her; she swallowed something that rose in her throat, and set her teeth hard, and at length she found her voice. "Yes," she said, "I meant it."

"Well, there is a way," he answered; and he rose from the table, and, moving to the door which led to the main hall and the staircase, he closed it. "There is a way of doing it. But it is not quite easy to explain it to you in a moment. 'Twas a hurried marriage, as you know, and informal, and a marriage only in name. And something has happened since then."

He paused there; she asked in a low tone, "What?"

"Well, it is what took me to Lewes yesterday," he answered. "I should have told you of it then, but I was in doubt how you would take it. And Betty persuaded me not to tell it. The man Hawkesworth-"