Part 95 (1/2)

'Not to love it?'

'I believe I was beginning to love her--just when you were cold to me. You remember when?'

'I do; and it was this coldness was the cause? Was it the only cause?'

'No, no. She has wiles and ways which, with her beauty, make her nigh irresistible.'

'And now you are cured of this pa.s.sion? There is no trace of it in your breast?'

'Not a vestige. But why speak of her?'

'Perhaps I am jealous.'

Once more he pressed his lips to her hand, and kissed it rapturously.

'No, Kate,' cried he, 'none but you have the place in my heart. Whenever I have tried a treason, it has turned against me. Is there light enough in the room to find a small portfolio of red-brown leather? It is on that table yonder.'

Had the darkness been not almost complete, Nina would scarcely have ventured to rise and cross the room, so fearful was she of being recognised.

'It is locked,' said she, as she laid it beside him on the bed; but touching a secret spring, he opened it, and pa.s.sed his fingers hurriedly through the papers within.

'I believe it must be this,' said he. 'I think I know the feel of the paper. It is a telegram from my aunt; the doctor gave it to me last night.

We read it over together four or five times. This is it, and these are the words: ”If Kate will be your wife, the estate of O'Shea's Barn is your own for ever.”'

'Is she to have no time to think over this offer?' asked she.

'Would you like candles, miss?' asked a maid-servant, of whose presence there neither of the others had been aware.

'No, nor are you wanted,' said Nina haughtily, as she arose; while it was not without some difficulty she withdrew her hand from the sick man's grasp.

'I know,' said he falteringly, 'you would not leave me if you had not left hope to keep me company in your absence. Is not that so, Kate?'

'Bye-bye,' said she softly, and stole away.

CHAPTER LXXIV

AN ANGRY COLLOQUY

It was with pa.s.sionate eagerness Nina set off in search of Kate. Why she should have felt herself wronged, outraged, insulted even, is not so easy to say, nor shall I attempt any a.n.a.lysis of the complex web of sentiments which, so to say, spread itself over her faculties. The man who had so wounded her self-love had been at her feet, he had followed her in her walks, hung over the piano as she sang--shown by a thousand signs that sort of devotion by which men intimate that their lives have but one solace, one ecstasy, one joy. By what treachery had he been moved to all this, if he really loved another? That he was simply amusing himself with the sort of flirtation she herself could take up as a mere pastime was not to be believed. That the wors.h.i.+pper should be insincere in his wors.h.i.+p was too dreadful to think of. And yet it was to this very man she had once turned to avenge herself on Walpole's treatment of her; she had even said, 'Could you not make a quarrel with him?' Now, no woman of foreign breeding puts such a question without the perfect consciousness that, in accepting a man's champions.h.i.+p, she has virtually admitted his devotion. Her own levity of character, the thoughtless indifference with which she would sport with any man's affections, so far from inducing her to palliate such caprices, made her more severe and unforgiving. 'How shall I punish him for this? How shall I make him remember whom it is he has insulted?' repeated she over and over to herself as she went.

The servants pa.s.sed her on the stairs with trunks and luggage of various kinds; but she was too much engrossed with her own thoughts to notice them.

Suddenly the words, 'Mr. Walpole's room,' caught her ear, and she asked, 'Has any one come?'

Yes, two gentlemen had just arrived. A third was to come that night, and Miss O'Shea might be expected at any moment.

'Where was Miss Kate?' she inquired.

'In her own room at the top of the house.'