CHAPTER XLIII.
THE COURSE OF LOVE DOES NOT RUN SMOOTH.
Just before leaving, Godfrey went to Gertie, and, bending over her whispered a few words so low that no one heard them except the one for whom they were intended, and whose eye brightened as he said:
“Good-by, darling. I must go now, but shall come early to-morrow morning.”
He was holding her hand, and he noticed the absence of the ring and the scratch the stone had made when it was wrenched away. Instantly a cloud passed over his face and he looked searchingly at Gertie, but she knew nothing; and then he glanced at me.
“Ettie, if you find anything of value about Gertie’s person, or on the floor, keep it till I come again,” he said; and then I knew he meant the ring, and was puzzled more than ever.
Should I tell him where it was. No; he would see it for himself, I decided, as he went out from the room and joined his father and the ladies at the door.
Alice’s gloves were ruined, and she stood holding my water-proof around her with the bare hand on which the gem was shining. But Godfrey did not see it until he helped her into the carriage, when the stone pressed hard against his hand, making him start as if he had been stung, or, rather, as if that ring on Alice’s finger had riveted anew the fetters he had been so glad to break. How came she by it, and what did it mean? Surely not that he was hers again. A thousand times no, when he remembered the mighty love for another surging through his veins and making him so wildly happy. He was honorably free. Alice had made him so herself, and even his father could not gainsay that or think the Schuyler reputation for honor compromised in the least. A man could not marry a woman who would not marry him, who had told him so with angry words and biting sarcasms. Godfrey was in high spirits, and his manner was not like that of one who has been so near to death. He could even joke with Robert and Emma, and would have rallied Alice on her forlorn and bedraggled appearance when she came to him on the shore, if he had not remembered the scene which had followed that coming, when the ring of betrothal was hurled at him so fiercely. How it flashed and shone upon her hand, which, it seemed to him, was continually thrust upon his sight, now on the table, now on the back of the chair, now on the mantel,—everywhere he turned his eyes there was the restless hand and the diamond sparkling on it, and seeming to say to him that his freedom was not so sure. At last, when he could bear the sight no longer, he sauntered away to his father’s present business-room, where he sat down alone to think of Gertie, and wonder if it would be greatly out of place for him to go and inquire for her that night instead of waiting till morning.
And while he sat thinking there was a knock upon the door, and Alice came in with a grieved look in her face and tears in her eyes, as she said:
“Have you nothing to say to me, Godfrey? You have scarcely spoken to me since the accident.”
“What shall I say to you, Allie?” Godfrey asked, not unkindly; and then Alice’s tears fell in torrents as she burst out, impetuously:
“Oh, Godfrey, say you do not mind what I said to you on the river-bank. I was angry, jealous, furious, because you put me away to save another, and kissed her before my eyes, and called her your darling. I think I must have been crazed to say what I did, and throw my engagement ring away. But I have it again. I took it from her hand and put it back on mine. See, it is here; look, Godfrey, and tell me it is just as it was with us.”
To say that Godfrey was unmoved by this appeal would be wrong, for though he had never loved Alice, he did not dislike her, and would gladly have spared her pain could he have done so without compromising himself again: but he could not; he must be frank with her now, and settle their relations to each other at once and forever, and he said to her: “But, Allie, it is not with us as it was, and it never can be again. I do not wish to hurt you unnecessarily, and I mean to be as gentle and kind as I’d want a great brute of a fellow to be with my sister under similar circumstances. Allie, I have never supposed that you imagined our engagement to be one of love. We liked each other, and were taught to think it was the proper thing for us to marry. I did not love you very much, and you did not love me——”
“But, Godfrey, I can now,” Alice sobbed; and Godfrey replied:
“Not as you will love some one else by and by; while I,—Allie, I believe I have loved Gertie Westbrooke since she was a child, but I did not know it until I was engaged to you, and met her here a woman. Then it came upon me, and for a time I was miserable. But I meant to keep my word to you, and should have done so if you had not yourself set me free. I do not ask if you knew what you were saying. I accept the fact, and cannot go back on it. It was not a manly act to thrust you aside in the water, but I did not know what I was doing, for Gertie was drowning and calling on me to save her, and I had no thought for anything else. I shall ask her to be my wife, and if she refuses, as she may, I shall bide my time and ask her again; have her I must; but, Allie, you and I will be friends always, just the same, and try to forget the past summer, which has not brought much happiness to either of us. I have been constantly fighting against my love for another, and you have been dissatisfied at not receiving from me all you had a right to expect. And it would grow worse, all the time, and it is better to end it now. If you like the ring, keep it, as you would a gift from your brother, and let me be a brother to you. I cannot be anything else. Will you, Allie?”
Never in her life had Alice Creighton prized Godfrey as she did then when she knew she was losing him, and her slight form shook with sobs, but she did not withdraw the hand he took in his, and when he said again: “Shall it be so, Allie! Shall we be friends?” she answered: “Yes, Godfrey,” and hurriedly left the room.