CHAPTER LXXXVII.
THE LAMP BURNS OUT AT LAST
From the roof of the house to the floor of the cellar, ominous silence reigned in Deerham Court. Mrs. Verner lay in it—dying. She had been conveyed home from the Hall on the morning following the catastrophe. Miss Hautley and Sir Edmund urged her remaining longer, offering every possible hospitality; but poor Sibylla seemed to have taken a caprice against it. Caprices she would have, up to her last breath. All her words were "Home! home!" Jan said she might be moved with safety; and she was taken there.
She seemed none the worse for the removal—she was none the worse for it. She was dying, but the transit had not increased her danger or her pain. Dr. Hayes had been over in the course of the night, and was now expected again.
"It's all waste of time, his coming; he can't do anything; but it is satisfaction for Lionel," observed Jan to his mother.
Lady Verner felt inclined to blame those of her household who had been left at home, for Sibylla's escapade: all of them—Lionel, Lucy Tempest, and the servants. They ought to have prevented it, she said; have kept her in by force, had need been. But she blamed them wrongly. Lionel might have done so had he been present; there was no knowing whether he would so far have exerted his authority, but the scene that would inevitably have ensued might not have been less fatal in its consequences to Sibylla. Lucy answered, and with truth, that any remonstrance of hers to Sibylla would never have been listened to; and the servants excused themselves—it was not their place to presume to oppose Mr. Verner's wife.
She lay on the sofa in her dressing-room, propped up by pillows; her face wan, her breathing laboured. Decima with her, calm and still; Catherine hovered near, to be useful, if necessary; Lady Verner was in her room within call; Lucy Tempest sat on the stairs. Lucy, remembering certain curious explosions, feared that her presence might not be acceptable to the invalid; but Lucy partook of the general restlessness, and sat down in her simple fashion on the stairs, listening for news from the sick-chamber. Neither she nor any one else in the house could have divested themselves of the prevailing excitement that day, or settled to calmness in the remotest degree. Lucy wished from her very heart that she could do anything to alleviate the sufferings of Mrs. Verner, or to soothe the general discomfort.
By and by, Jan entered, and came straight up the stairs. "Am I to walk over you, Miss Lucy?"
"There's plenty of room to go by, Jan," she answered, pulling her dress aside.
"Are you doing penance?" he asked, as he strode past her.
"It is so dull remaining in the drawing-room by myself," answered Lucy apologetically. "Everybody is upstairs."
Jan went into the sick-room, and Lucy sat on in silence; her head bent down on her knees, as before. Presently Jan returned.
"Is she any better, Jan?"
"She's no worse," was Jan's answer. "That's something, when it comes to this stage. Where's Lionel?"
"I do not know," replied Lucy. "I think he went out. Jan," she added, dropping her voice, "will she get well?"
"Get well!" echoed Jan in his plainness. "It's not likely. She won't be here four-and-twenty hours longer."
"Oh, Jan!" uttered Lucy, painfully startled and distressed. "What a dreadful thing! And all because of her going out last night!"
"Not altogether," answered Jan. "It has hastened it, no doubt; but the ending was not far off in any case."
"If I could but save her!" murmured Lucy in her unselfish sympathy. "I shall always be thinking that perhaps if I had spoken to her last night, instead of going out to find Mr. Verner, she might not have gone."
"Look here," said Jan. "You are not an angel yet, are you, Miss Lucy?"
"Not at all like one, I fear, Jan," was her sad answer.
"Well, then, I can tell you for your satisfaction that an angel, coming down from heaven and endued with angel's powers, wouldn't have stopped her last night. She'd have gone in spite of it; in spite of you all. Her mind was made up to it; and her telling Lionel in the morning that she'd give up going, provided he would promise to take her for a day's pleasure to Heartburg, was only a ruse to throw the house off its guard."
Jan passed down; Lucy sat on. As Jan was crossing the courtyard—for he actually went out at the front door for once in his life, as he had done the day he carried the blanket and the black tea-kettle—he encountered John Massingbird. Mr. John wore his usual free-and-easy costume, and had his short pipe in his mouth.
"I say," began he, "what's this tale about Mrs. Lionel? Folks are saying that she went off to Hautley's last night, and danced herself to death."
"That's near enough," replied Jan. "She would go; and she did; and she danced; and she finished it up by breaking a blood-vessel. And now she is dying."
"What was Lionel about, to let her go?"
"Lionel knew nothing of it. She slipped off while he was out. Nobody was in the house but Lucy Tempest and one or two of the servants. She dressed herself on the quiet, sent for a fly, and went."
"And danced!"
"And danced," assented Jan. "Her back and shoulders looked like a bag of bones. You might nearly have heard them rattle."
"I always said there were moments when Sibylla's mind was not right," composedly observed John Massingbird. "Is there any hope?"
"None. There has not been hope, in point of fact, for a long while," continued Jan, "as anybody might have seen, except Sibylla. She has been obstinately blind to it. Although her father warned her, when he was here, that she could not live."
John Massingbird smoked for some moments in silence. "She was always sickly," he presently said; "sickly in constitution; sickly in temper."
Jan nodded. But what he might further have said was stopped by the entrance of Lionel. He came in at the gate, looking jaded and tired. His mind was ill at ease, and he had not been to bed.
"I have been searching for you, Jan. Dr. West ought to be telegraphed to. Can you tell where he is?"
"No, I can't," replied Jan. "He was at Biarritz when he last wrote; but they were about to leave. I expect to hear from him daily. If we did know where he is, Lionel, telegraphing would be of no use. He could not get here."
"I should like him telegraphed to, if possible," was Lionel's answer.
"I'll telegraph to Biarritz, if you like," said Jan. "He is sure to have left it, though."
"Do so," returned Lionel. "Will you come in?" he added to John Massingbird.
"No, thank you," replied John Massingbird. "They'd not like my pipe. Tell Sibylla I hope she'll get over it. I'll come again by and by, and hear how she is."
Lionel went indoors and passed upstairs with a heavy footstep. Lucy started from her place, but not before he had seen her in it.
"Why do you sit there, Lucy?"
"I don't know," she answered, blushing that he should have caught her there, though she had not cared for Jan's doing so. "It is lonely downstairs to-day; here I can ask everybody who comes out of the room how she is. I wish I could cure her! I wish I could do anything for her!"
He laid his hand lightly on her head as he passed. "Thank you for all, my dear child!" and there was a strange tone of pain in his low voice as he spoke it.
Only Decima was in the room then, and she quitted it as Lionel entered. Treading softly across the carpet, he took his seat in a chair opposite Sibylla's couch. She slept—for a great wonder—or appeared to sleep. The whole morning long—nay, the whole night long, her bright, restless eyes had been wide open; sleep as far from her as it could well be. It had seemed that her fractious temper kept the sleep away. But her eyes were closed now, and two dark, purple rims inclosed them, terribly dark on the wan, white face. Suddenly the eyes unclosed with a start, as if her doze had been abruptly disturbed, though Lionel had been perfectly still. She looked at him for a minute or two in silence, and he, knowing it would be well that she should doze again, neither spoke nor moved.
"Lionel, am I dying?"
Quietly as the words were spoken, they struck on his ear with startling intensity. He rose then and pushed her hair from her damp brow with a fond hand, murmuring some general inquiry as to how she felt.
"Am I dying?" came again from the panting lips.
What was he to answer her? To say that she was dying might send her into a paroxysm of terror; to deceive her in that awful hour by telling her she was not, went against every feeling of his heart.
"But I don't want to die," she urged, in some excitement, interpreting his silence to mean the worst. "Can't Jan do anything for me? Can't Dr. Hayes?"
"Dr. Hayes will be here soon," observed Lionel soothingly, if somewhat evasively. "He will come by the next train."
She took his hand, held it between hers, and looked beseechingly up to his face. "I don't want to leave you," she whispered. "Oh, Lionel! keep me here if you can! You know you are always kind to me. Sometimes I have reproached you that you were not, but it was not true. You have been ever kind, have you not?"
"I have ever striven to be so," he answered, the tears glistening on his eyelashes.
"I don't want to die. I want to get well and go about again, as I used to do when at Verner's Pride. Now Sir Edmund Hautley is come home, that will be a good place to visit at. Lionel, I don't want to die! Can't you keep me in life?"
"If by sacrificing my own life, I could save yours, Heaven knows how willingly I would do it," he tenderly answered.
"Why should I die? Why should I die more than others? I don't think I am dying, Lionel," she added, after a pause. "I shall get well yet."
She stretched out her hand for some cooling drink that was near, and Lionel gave her a teaspoonful. He was giving her another, but she jerked her head away and spilled it.
"It's not nice," she said. So he put it down.
"I want to see Deborah," she resumed.
"My dear, they are at Heartburg. I told you so this morning. They will be home, no doubt, by the next train. Jan has sent to them."
"What should they do at Heartburg?" she fractiously asked.
"They went over yesterday to remain until to-day, I hear."
Subsiding into silence, she lay quite still, save for her panting breath, holding Lionel's hand as he bent over her. Some noise in the corridor outside attracted her attention, and she signed to him to open the door.
"Perhaps it is Dr. Hayes," she murmured. "He is better than Jan."
Better than Jan, insomuch as that he was rather given to assure his patients they would soon be strong enough to enjoy the al fresco delights of a gipsy party, even though he knew that they had not an hour's prolonged life left in them. Not so Jan. Never did a more cheering doctor enter a sick-room than Jan, so long as there was the faintest shade of hope. But, when the closing scene was actually come, the spirit all but upon the wing, then Jan whispered of hope no more. He could not do it in his pure sincerity. Jan could be silent; but Jan could not tell a man, whose soul was hovering on the threshold of the next world, that he might yet recreate himself dancing hornpipes in this. Dr. Hayes would; it was in his creed to do so; and in that respect Dr. Hayes was different from Jan.
It was not Dr. Hayes. As Lionel opened the door, Lucy was passing it, and Thérèse was at the end of the corridor talking to Lady Verner. Lucy stopped to make her kind inquiries, her tone a low one, of how the invalid was then.
"Whose voice is that?" called out Mrs. Verner, her words scarcely reaching her husband's ears.
"It is Lucy Tempest's," he said, closing the door, and returning to her. "She was asking after you."
"Tell her to come in."
Lionel opened the door again, and beckoned to Lucy. "Mrs. Verner is asking if you will come in and see her," he said, as she approached.
All the old grievances, the insults of Sibylla, blotted out from her gentle and forgiving mind, lost sight of in this great crisis, Lucy went up to the couch, and stood by the side of Sibylla. Lionel leaned over its back.
"I trust you are not feeling very ill, Mrs. Verner," she said in a low, sweet tone as she bent towards her and touched her hand. Touched it only; let her own fall lightly upon it; as if she did not feel sufficiently sure of Sibylla's humour to presume to take it.
"No, I don't think I'm better. I am so weak here."
She touched her chest as she spoke. Lucy, perhaps somewhat at a loss what to say, stood in silence.
"I have been very cross to you sometimes, Lucy," she resumed. "I meant nothing. I used to feel vexed with everybody, and said foolish things without meaning it. It was so cruel to be turned from Verner's Pride, and it made me unhappy."
"Indeed I do not think anything about it," replied Lucy, the tears rising to her eyes in her forgiving tenderness. "I know how ill you must have felt. I used to feel that I should like to help you to bear the pain and the sorrow."
Sibylla lay panting. Lucy remained as she was; Lionel also. Presently she, Sibylla, glanced at Lucy.
"I wish you'd kiss me."
Lucy, unnerved by the words, bent closer to her, a shower of tears falling from her eyes on Sibylla's face.
"If I could but save her life for you!" she murmured to Lionel, glancing up at him through her tears as she rose from the embrace. And she saw that Lionel's eyes were as wet as hers.
And now there was a commotion outside. Sounds, as of talking and wailing and crying, were heard. Little need to tell Lionel that they came from the Misses West; he recognised the voices; and Lucy glided forward to open the door.
Poor ladies! They were wont to say ever after that their absence had happened on purpose. Mortified at being ignored in Miss Hautley's invitations, they had made a little plan to get out of Deerham. An old friend in Heartburg had repeatedly pressed them to dine there and remain for the night, and they determined to avail themselves of the invitation this very day of the fête at Deerham Hall. It would be pleasant to have to say to inquisitive friends, "We could not attend it; we were engaged to Heartburg." Many a lady, of more account in the world than Deborah or Amilly West, has resorted to a less innocent ruse to conceal an offered slight. Jan had despatched Master Cheese by the new railway that morning with the information of Sibylla's illness; and here they were back again, full of grief, of consternation, and ready to show it in their demonstrative way.
Lionel hastened out to them, a Hush—sh! upon his tongue. He caught hold of them as they were hastening in.
"Yes; but not like this. Be still, for her sake."
Deborah looked at his pale face, reading it aright. "Is she so ill as tha'?" she gasped. "Is there no hope?"
He only shook his head. "Whatever you do, preserve a calm demeanour before her. We must keep her in tranquillity."
"Master Cheese says she went to the ball—and danced," said Deborah. "Mr. Verner, how could you allow it?"
"She did go," he answered. "It was no fault of mine."
Heavier footsteps up the stairs now. They were those of the physician, who had come by the train which had brought the Misses West. He, Dr. Hayes, entered the room, and they stole in after him; Lionel followed; Jan came bursting in, and made another; and Lucy remained outside.
Lady Verner saw Dr. Hayes when he was going away.
"There was no change," he said, in answer to her inquiries. "Mrs. Verner was certainly in a very weak, sick state, and—there was no change."
The Misses West removed their travelling garments, and took up their stations in the sick-room—not to leave it again, until the life should have departed from Sibylla. Lionel remained in it. Decima and Catherine went in and out, and Jan made frequent visits to the house.
"Tell papa it is the leaving Verner's Pride that has killed me," said Sibylla to Amilly with nearly her latest breath.
There was no bed for any of them that night, any more than there had been the previous one. A life was hovering in the balance. Lucy sat with Lady Verner, and the rest went in to them occasionally, taking news. Dawn was breaking when one went in for the last time.
It was Jan. He had come to break the tidings to his mother, and he sat himself down on the arm of the sofa—Jan fashion—while he did it.
The flickering lamp of life had burned out at last.
CHAPTER LXXXVIII.
ACHING HEARTS
If there be one day in the whole year more gladdening to the heart than all others, it is surely the first day of early spring. It may come and give us a glimpse almost in mid-winter; it may not come until winter ought to have been long past: but, appear when it will, it brings rejoicing with it. How many a heart, sinking under its bitter burden of care, is reawakened to hope by that first spring day of brightness! It seems to promise that there shall be yet a change in the dreary lot; it whispers that trouble may not last: that sickness may be superseded by health; that this dark wintry world will be followed by heaven.
Such a day was smiling over Deerham. And they were only in the first days of February. The sun was warm, the fields were green, the sky was blue; all Nature seemed to have put on her brightness. As Mrs. Duff stood at her door and exchanged greetings with sundry gossips passing by—an unusual number of whom were abroad—she gave it as her opinion that the charming weather had been vouchsafed as a special favour to Miss Decima Verner; for it was the wedding-day of that young lady and Sir Edmund Hautley.
Sir Edmund would fain have been married immediately after his return. Perhaps Decima would also. But Lady Verner, always given to study the proprieties of life, considered that it would be more seemly to allow first a few months to roll on after the death of her son's wife. So the autumn and part of the winter were allowed to go by; and in this, the first week of February, they were united; being favoured with weather that might have cheated them into a belief that it was May-day.
How anxious Deerham was to get a sight of her, as the carriages conveying the party to church drove to and fro! Lionel gave her away, and her bride's-maids were Lady Mary Elmsley and Lucy Tempest. The story of the long engagement between her and Edmund Hautley had electrified Deerham; and some began to wish that they had not called her an old maid quite so prematurely. Should it unfortunately have reached her ears, it might tend to place them in the black books of the future Lady Hautley. Lady Verner was rather against Jan's going to church. Lady Verner's private opinion was—indeed it may be said her proclaimed opinion as well as her private one—that Jan would be no ornament to a wedding party. But Decima had already got Jan's promise to be present, which Jan had given conditionally—that no patients required him at the time. But Jan's patients proved themselves considerate that day; and Jan appeared not only at the church, but at the breakfast.
At the dinner, also, in the evening. Sir Edmund and Lady Hautley had left then; but those who remained of course wanted some dinner; and had it. It was a small party, more social than formal: Mr. and Mrs. Bitterworth, Lord Garle and his sister, Miss Hautley and John Massingbird. Miss Hautley was again staying temporarily at Deerham Hall, but she would leave it on the following day. John Massingbird was invited at the special request of Lionel. Perhaps John was less of an ornament to a social party than even Jan, but Lionel had been anxious that no slight should be placed upon him. It would have been a slight for the owner of Verner's Pride to be left out at Decima Verner's wedding. Lady Verner held out a little while; she did not like John Massingbird: never had liked any of the Massingbirds; but Lionel carried his point. John Massingbird showed himself presentable that day, and had left his pipe at home.
In one point Mr. Massingbird proved himself as little given to ceremony as Jan could be. The dinner hour, he had been told, was seven o'clock; and he arrived shortly after six. Lucy Tempest and Mary Elmsley were in the drawing-room. Fair, graceful girls, both of them, in their floating white bride's-maid's robes, which they would wear for the day; Lucy always serene and quiet; Mary, merry-hearted, gay-natured. Mary was to stay with them for some days. They looked somewhat scared at the early entrance of John Massingbird. Curious tales had gone about Deerham of John's wild habits at Verner's Pride, and, it may be, they felt half afraid of him. Lucy whispered to the servant to find Mr. Verner and tell him. Lady Verner had gone to her room to make ready for dinner.
"I say, young ladies, is it six or seven o'clock that we are to dine?" he began. "I could not remember."
"Seven," replied Lucy.
"I am too soon by an hour, then," returned he, sitting down in front of the fire. "How are you by this time, Lionel?"
Lionel shook hands with him as he came in. "Never mind; we are glad to see you," he said in answer to a half apology from John Massingbird about the arriving early. "I can show you those calculations now, if you like."
"Calculations be hanged!" returned John. "When a fellow comes out to dinner, he does not want to be met with 'calculations.' What else, Lionel?"
Lionel Verner laughed. They were certain calculations drawn out by himself, connected with unavoidable work to be commenced on the Verner's Pride estate. For the last month he had been vainly seeking an opportunity of going over them with John Massingbird; that gentleman, who hated details as much as Master Cheese hated work, continually contrived to put it off.
"Have you given yourself the pleasure of making them out in duplicate, that you propose to show them here?" asked he, some irony in his tone. "I thought they were in the study at Verner's Pride."
"I brought them home a day or two ago," replied Lionel. "Some alteration was required, and I thought I would do it quietly here."
"You are a rare—I suppose if I say 'steward' I shall offend your pride, Lionel? 'Bailiff' would be worse. If real stewards were as faithful and indefatigable as you, landlords might get on better than they do. You can't think how he plagues me with his business details, Miss Tempest."
"I can," said Lady Mary freely. "I think he is terribly conscientious."
"All the more so, that he is not going to be a steward long," answered Lionel in a tone through which ran a serious meaning, light as it was. "The time is approaching when I shall render up an account of my stewardship, so far as Verner's Pride is concerned."
"What do you mean by that?" cried John Massingbird.
"I'll tell you to-morrow," answered Lionel.
"I'd like to know now, if it's all the same to you, sir," was John's answer. "You are not going to give up the management of Verner's Pride?"
"Yes, I am," replied Lionel. "I should have resigned it when my wife died, but that—that—Decima wished me to remain in Deerham until her marriage," he concluded after some perceptible hesitation.
"What has Deerham done to you that you want to quit it?" asked John Massingbird.
"I would have left Deerham years ago, had it been practicable," was the remark of Lionel.
"I ask you why?"
"Why? Do you think Deerham and its reminiscences can be so pleasant to me that I should care to stop in it, unless compelled?"
"Bother reminiscences!" rejoined Mr. Massingbird. "I conclude you make believe to allude to the ups and downs you have had in regard to Verner's Pride. That's not the cause, Lionel Verner—if you do want to go away. You have had time to get over that. Perhaps some lady is in the way? Some cross-grained disappointment in that line? Have you been refusing to marry him, Lady Mary?"
Lady Mary threw her laughing blue eyes full in the face of the questioner. "He never asked me, Mr. Massingbird."
"No!" said John.
"No," said she, the lips laughing now, as well as the eyes. "In the old days—I declare I don't mind letting out the secret—in the old days before he was married at all, mamma and Lady Verner contrived to let me know, by indirect hints, that Lionel Verner might be expected to—to—solicit the honour of my becoming his wife. How I laughed behind their backs! It would have been time enough to turn rebellious when the offer came—which I was quite sure never would come—to make them and him a low curtsy, and say, 'You are very kind, but I must decline the honour.' Did you get any teasings on your side, Lionel?" asked she frankly.
A half smile flitted over Lionel's lips. He did not speak.
"No," added Lady Mary, her joking tone turning to seriousness, her blue eyes to earnestness, "I and Lionel have ever been good friends, fond of each other, I believe, in a sober kind of way: but—any closer relationship, we should both have run apart from, as wide as the two poles. I can answer for myself; and I think I can for him."
"I see," said John Massingbird. "To be husband and wife would go against the grain: you'd rather be brother and sister."
What there could be in the remark to disturb the perfect equanimity of Mary Elmsley, she best knew. Certain it was that her face turned of a fiery red, and it seemed that she did not know where to look. She spoke rapid words, as if to cover her confusion.
"So you perceive, Mr. Massingbird, that I have nothing to do with Mr. Verner's plans and projects; with his stopping at Deerham or going away from it. I should not think any lady has. You are not going, are you?" she asked turning to Lionel.
"Yes, I shall go, Mary," he answered. "As soon as Mr. Massingbird can find somebody to replace me—"
"Mr. Massingbird's not going to find anybody to replace you," burst forth John. "I declare, Lionel, if you do go, I'll take on Roy, just to spite you and your old tenants. By the way, though, talking of Roy, who do you think has come back to Deerham?" he broke off, rather less vehemently.
"How can I guess?" asked Lionel. "Some of the Mormons, perhaps."
"No. Luke Roy. He has arrived this afternoon."
"Has he indeed?" replied Lionel, a shade of sadness in his tone, more than surprise, for somehow the name of Luke, coupled with his return, brought back all too vividly the recollection of his departure, and the tragic end of Rachel Frost which had followed so close upon it.
"I have not seen him," rejoined Mr. Massingbird. "I met Mrs. Roy as I came on here, and she told me. She was scuttering along with some muffins in her hand—to regale him on, I suppose."
"How glad she must be!" exclaimed Lucy.
"Rather sorry, I thought," returned John. "She looked very quaky and shivery. I tell you what, Lionel," he continued, turning to him, "your dinner will not be ready this three-quarters of an hour yet. I'll just go as far as old Roy's, and have a word with Luke. I have got a top-coat in the hall."
He went out without ceremony. Lionel walked with him to the door. It was a fine, starlight evening. When he, Lionel, returned, Lucy was alone. Mary Elmsley had left the room.
Lucy had quitted the chair of state she had been sitting in, and was in her favourite place on a low stool on the hearth-rug. She was more kneeling than sitting. The fire-light played on her sweet face, so young and girlish still in its outlines, on her pretty hands clasped on her knees, on her arms which glittered with pearls, on the pearls that rested on her neck. Lionel stood on the other side of the hearth-rug, leaning, as usual, on the mantel-piece.
At least five minutes passed in silence. And then Lucy raised her eyes to his.
"Was it a joke, what you said to John Massingbird—about leaving Deerham?"
"It was sober earnest, Lucy. I shall go as soon as I possibly can now."
"But why?" she presently asked.
"I should have left, as you heard me say, after Mrs. Verner's death, but for one or two considerations. Decima very much wished me to remain until her marriage; and—I did not see my way particularly clear to embark in a new course of life. I do not see it yet."
"Why should you go?" asked Lucy.
"Because I—because it is expedient that I should, for many reasons," he answered.
"You do not like to remain subservient to John Massingbird?"
"It is not that. I have got over that. My prospects have been so utterly blighted, Lucy, that I think some of the old pride of the Verner race has gone out of me. I do not see a chance of getting anything to do half as good as this stewardship—as he but now called it—under John Massingbird. But I shall try at it."
"What shall you try, do you think?"
"I cannot tell. I should like to get something abroad; I should like to go to India. I do not suppose I have any real chance of getting an appointment there; but stopping in Deerham will certainly not bring it to me: that, or anything else."
Lucy's lips had parted. "You will not think of going to India now!" she breathlessly exclaimed.
"Indeed I do think of it, Lucy."
"So far off as that!"
The words were uttered with a strange sound of pain. Lionel passed his hand over his brow, the action betokening pain quite as great as Lucy's tone. Lucy rose from her seat and stood near him, her thoughtful face upturned.
"What is left for me in England?" he resumed. "What am I here? A man without home, fortune, hope. I have worse than no prospects. The ceremony at which we have been assisting this day seems to have brought the bare facts more palpably before me in all their naked truth. Other men can have a home, can form social ties to bless it. I cannot."
"But why?" asked Lucy, her lips trembling.
"Why! Can you ask it, Lucy? There are moments—and they are all too frequent—when a fond vision comes over me of what my future might be; of the new ties I might form, and find the happiness in, that—that I did not find in the last. The vision, I say, comes all too frequently for my peace of mind, when I realise the fact that it can never be realised."
Lucy stood, her hands tightly clasped before her, a world of sadness in her fair, young face. One less entirely single-hearted, less true than Lucy Tempest, might have professed to ignore the drift of his words. Had Lucy, since Mrs. Verner's death, cast a thought to the possibility of certain happy relations arising between her and Lionel—those social ties he now spoke of? No, not intentionally. If any such dreams did lurk in her heart unbidden, there she let them lie, in entire abeyance. Lionel Verner had never spoken a word to her, or dropped a hint that he contemplated such; his intercourse with her had been free and open, just as it was with Decima. She was quite content; to be with him, to see him daily, was enough of happiness for her, without looking to the future.