Saved from herself or, On the edge of doom
“I don’t know any,” Cristiane said calmly, taking a large bite of
muffin, with her white teeth showing in a faultless half-circle.
“What!” Ismay exclaimed. “Why, there was a lovely young man here the
first day we came.”
Cristiane reddened.
“That was only Miles Cylmer,” she said scornfully. “I’ve known him for
ages, but he is about as exciting as--as Thomas!” remembering her own
comparison of Mr. Cylmer to that worthy man. “He’s only a neighbor, and
a friend of father’s.”
“Oh!” said Miss Trelane demurely. “He is good-looking.”
“I never noticed him especially. He is often here when father is at
home.”
The other girl made a mental comment, but she only said:
“I suppose he wouldn’t come when you were alone?”
Cristiane reflected. Miles had not been near her for a week, and, in
spite of her guests, she had missed him.
“He has more amusing things to do, I dare say,” she said smartly. It
was so silly of Miles not to come just because she had refused him;
selfish, too, for there was a distinct blank in her afternoon rides
without him.
Ismay smiled.
“I believe you were horrid to him and told him not to come,” she
observed shrewdly. “Now, weren’t you?”
“I don’t take enough interest in him,” said the other loftily. “I don’t
take any interest in any one but father. I wish he would come home.”
She looked out of the window, where the morning sun streamed in, over
the wide stretch of wintry park and great beech-trees. “This is a
hunting-morning; would you like to drive to the meet?”
“I can’t leave mother,” was the answer. It would never do to have Miles
Cylmer see her seated in Cristiane’s high dog-cart for the first time
since that night in London. Somehow or other, she must manage to meet
him first alone. And as yet she had no idea even where he lived.
“I suppose you can’t,” Cristiane assented disappointedly. “I will ride
over then by myself, but that’s dull.”
“Haven’t you any near neighbors?”
Both girls stood by the window as Ismay spoke.
“Only Miles Cylmer, and he hunts,” said Cristiane crossly. “Besides,
even he lives four miles off, that much nearer to the meet than we do.
It’s seven miles to Stoneycross by that road you see there,” pointing
to a glimpse of a highway that was just visible on the side of a hill
far across the park.
“Then he’s of no use.” Ismay turned into the room again to hide the
change in her face. Hurrah! she had got her bearings at last. If she
had to wait all day at his gate she would see him face to face this
very afternoon.
“You won’t be dull if I go out and leave you alone? You see, I am used
to riding every day. But it is stupid for you,” said Cristiane.
“Dull! I’m never dull.” Miss Trelane’s face wore that strange smile
that was so full of years and knowledge, her back still turned safely
to her hostess. Dull, with the prospect before her of hunting down
Miles Cylmer! She turned with quick, lovely grace. “Come, and I’ll help
you into your habit,” she cried; “I’m much cleverer than your maid.”
“I think you’re wonderful; how you do your own hair as you do is beyond
me,” Cristiane said, as they went up-stairs.
They were nearly of a height, and she ran her hand up the wonderful
flaxen waves that rippled up from the nape of Ismay’s white neck.
The girl frowned sharply.
“It’s hateful hair.” She moved her head away from the gentle hand. In
any case, she hated to be touched, and it was unbearable from a simple
little fool like Cristiane, who took her and her mother for decent
ladies. “Hateful! Some day I shall dye it,” and she slipped from the
other girl’s side and was up-stairs like a flash.
Yet two hours after she was coiling and twisting that hair she had
said was hateful, with a care that made it look like golden threads
shot with silver. The dark-green, velvet toque she set on it made its
strange sheen more lovely; the green cloth coat with its velvet collar
set off to perfection the milk-white beauty of her face. As she turned
from the glass to draw on her gloves her scarlet lips parted in a smile
of triumph. Queer as her beauty was, it would move the heart of a man
more than Cristiane’s roses and cream, or there was no truth in her
glass.
“Let me see,” she reflected, “four miles to Cylmer’s Ferry--he will be
at the meet and following the hounds--if they find a fox it will be
three o’clock or so before he gets home, perhaps later. There’s heaps
of time, but I had better get off before Cristiane gets home, or she
might be kind enough to go with me.”
She bestowed no thought on the suffering parent she had been unable
to leave, nor had she visited her all the morning. The atmosphere of
Mrs. Trelane’s room, where scents fought with the smell of menthol, had
no charms for her daughter. The only pause she made was in the empty
dining-room, where the table was laid for lunch. The silver epergne
was piled with forced peaches and hothouse grapes, a bread-tray full
of crisp dinner rolls adorned the sideboard among a multitude of cold
meats.
Miss Trelane stuffed two peaches into her pocket, inserted some cold
chicken that was ready cut between the halves of two rolls, calmly
wrapped up her spoils in a napkin, tucked them into her muff, and
departed unnoticed.
“Wonderfully convenient, living like this,” she reflected, with a sweet
little grin. “Otherwise, Mr. Cylmer might have caused me to go forth
hungry.”
CHAPTER X.
A KISS.
Ismay went out into the clear, soft sunlight, treading lightly in her
smart, thick boots, with joy in her heart.
Things had played into her hands at last. Toward half-past two
o’clock, warm and lovely with her quick walk, she stood at Miles
Cylmer’s gates. They were heavy iron, hung from carved stone posts,
“Cylmer’s Ferry” cut deeply on them. She saw the significance of
the name, for a hundred yards in front of her a narrow river ran
sluggishly, cutting through Cylmer’s property for miles. There was a
high ivy-covered wall on both sides of the road, and the view, except
of the river, was limited.
Miss Trelane glanced up and down.
“Very considerate of Mr. Cylmer to have no lodge,” she observed aloud.
“A lodge-keeper and six children would have embarrassed me very much.”
She marched deliberately to the ivy-covered wall opposite the gate, and
swung herself up with the ease of long practise over Mrs. Barlow’s wall
at school. She had come up-hill all the way from Marchant’s Hold, and
now from the top of the six-foot wall the country lay before her like a
map.
She seated herself comfortably, and began with a capital appetite on
her lunch. As she took the peaches from her pocket she gave a little
nod of satisfaction. Far off down in the valley she could see the
hounds being taken home. There would be no late waiting for Mr. Cylmer,
since there had evidently been no sport to speak of. The peaches had
rubbed against her pocket and stained its smart green lining.
“Bother!” said the girl, with the thriftiness of poverty. She turned
the pocket inside out to dry.
“But the peaches are all right,” she added, as she finished them and
wiped her fingers on the fine damask napkin which she neatly bestowed
down a convenient hole in the wall. There were plenty more at Marchant
Hold, and it was greasy.
For a moment her back was to the road. She did not see a man riding
toward her, and turned with a real start, to discover Miles Cylmer on
a big chestnut horse within ten yards of her. The sunlight fell on his
handsome, hard face, his tawny mustache, his splendid figure in his
red coat and white riding-breeches. The sight of him brought dismay to
Ismay’s heart. She forgot all she had meant to say in sheer foolish
excitement at seeing him.
“I--I can’t get down,” she said childishly.
Cylmer stopped his horse and sat staring at her in utter amazement.
Who was this who sat on his wall like a lovely nymph, her water-green
eyes on his, her flaxen hair glinting like barley in the sun? There
flashed up before him the lights of the Palace Theater, a slim girl in
black who was hungry.
“I beg your pardon,” he stammered in his surprise. Could there be two
girls in the world with such scarlet lips and strange eyes, for surely
this could not be the lonely girl he had taken home that night? How
could she get here?
Ismay Trelane smiled in his perplexed face that slow, witch-smile that
was her best weapon.
“Don’t you know me, Mr. Cylmer? I know you, you see, and--please take
me down!” She held out her hands entreatingly.
Cylmer, like a man in a dream, swung himself off his horse and slipped
his arm through the reins.
He had seen Cristiane at the meet, lovely in her blue habit, had ridden
up to greet her, and been smartly snubbed for his pains. Somehow it
had stung unbearably. And the joy on the face of the girl he had never
thought to see again was like balm to his wounds.
Ismay, seated on the wall, leaned down and gave him both hands; her
eyes met his, strange and deep, with something in them that brought the
blood to his face.
“I told you we should meet again!” she cried, with soft delight in her
voice. “Are you glad to see me?”
Cylmer lifted her down, setting her safely clear of his fretting horse.
Her queer beauty dazzled him.
“Very glad,” he answered slowly.
For the first time in her life Ismay Trelane’s eyes fell before the
look of other eyes.
Cylmer stooped and kissed her lips.
* * * * *
For a moment the whole world swung dizzily to Ismay Trelane. A golden
mist blotted out the bare trees and ivied walls; a sound as of many
waters was in her ears. She staggered helplessly, and from far, far
away heard a voice that was very low and pitiful.
“My little girl, don’t look like that. I was a brute! Did I frighten
you?”
Was it fright that made her feel her own blood running in her veins?
She did not know. With a sharp wrench she was clear of him, and stood
leaning against his horse’s shoulder, her breath coming fast and hard.
Cristiane would have stamped her foot at him. Ismay only looked him
full in the face.
“Why did you do that?” she said quietly, though her hand went to her
breast as if something hurt her.
Cylmer bit his lip.
“Because I----” he hesitated. The truth, because she was so fair, would
be an insult.
“Never mind looking for a reason,” she said; and he saw that even her
lips were white.
“You did it, and that’s enough. If you will move your horse out of the
way I will go home.”
She shook from head to foot. He had kissed her, as a man kisses a girl
he has met alone at a music-hall, and she had kissed him like a nun who
kisses the cross.
Her voice cut, but something in it made Miles Cylmer take off his hat
and stand bareheaded before her.
“I won’t even ask you to forgive me.” His voice was low and sweet as
perhaps but one other woman knew it could be. “I behaved unpardonably.
Yet if you can believe me, I was so much more than glad to see you that
I--I forgot myself.”
“And me!” she interrupted with a hard little smile. “You remembered me
as a toy: you greeted me as one. If it is of any interest to you I may
tell you the toy is--broken!” She made a little gesture and turned away
without looking at him.
Cylmer, leading his horse, was at her side before she had taken ten
steps.
“Don’t go away like this,” he said, a shamed color on his tanned
cheek. “I deserve all you can say to me, and more. I only want you
to let me beg your pardon. I won’t”--his keen eyes very sweet, very
honest--“even ask you to forgive me.”
“It would be of no use if you did,” she returned quietly. “I never
forgave anything I had against any one in all my life. You were the
first person I ever knew who was kind to me, and now you have made me
sorry that you were.”