CHAPTER V.
EXPELLED.
The next morning, leaving Madeline at the station to follow by a later train, Mr. Wynne called at Harperton, in order to have a little explanation. The maid’s face (she was an old maid) looked portentously solemn as she opened the door; and—oh! ominous objects!—two good-sized basket trunks, and a bonnet-box, stood waiting in the hall. As he glanced at them in passing, some one came out through a door just behind him, and said, in a biting tone—
“Dear me! I am surprised to see Mr. Wynne under the circumstances; but, as he is here, perhaps he can give an address for Miss West’s boxes?”
“May I ask what you mean, Miss Selina?” he said, turning to confront her the instant the drawing-room door was closed.
“I mean,” she replied, flushing to a dull brick colour, “that after her escapade of last evening, Miss West never enters this house again—a young lady who stayed out all night!” she concluded with a wild, dramatic gesture.
“But, you know, that was not her fault, Miss Selina. We waited exactly where you told us—at the bottom of the steps—and so missed the train. I could not get a cab, though I did my utmost, the snow was too deep. I left Miss West at the Railway Hotel and brought her from there this morning. She——”
“Oh,” interrupted his listener, throwing up both hands, “pray spare me the details! It is nothing to me whom she was with, or where she went. We have quite done with her. It was a planned thing between you, no doubt.”
“Miss Selina,” cried Mr. Wynne, “your sex protects you! A man dared not say what you have permitted yourself to utter, and do not in your own heart believe. Am I to understand that because, through waiting for you, by your own express direction, Miss West lost her only train home last night, and was obliged to remain in Riverside, you would blast her reputation, and thrust her out of doors?”
“You are!” she returned, defiantly, looking him full in the face with her cold, cruel, little eyes.
“And may I ask what is to become of the young lady?” he inquired, with a forced calmness that was ominous enough.
“Nay,” shrugging her shoulders, “that is a matter between her and you.” Then she added, with an evil smile, “She need not refer to us for a character.”
“Perhaps your mother will be more lenient,” he said, making a great effort to restrain his temper. “Remember that Miss West has no home and no friends. Can I see Mrs. Harper?”
“I am speaking for my mother,” she answered sharply. “She refuses to see the girl, or allow her inside our door. There is no use in your persisting—it is waste of time. We are not rich, but, at any rate,” choking with excitement, “we have always been respectable!”
“I am delighted to hear it,” he replied, making a low, ironical bow; “and as there is nothing further to be said, I will wish you good morning.”
“Good morning!” replied Miss Selina, ringing the bell, and curtseying simultaneously. “You will be pleased to remove Miss West’s boxes at once, and inform her that letters from her will be returned unopened”—thereby securing the last shot, and the last word. And Mr. Wynne walked out of the house in a bewildered and confused state of mind, outwardly cool, but in reality at boiling point.
He had not proceeded far when he met Madeline coming towards him, with a terrified and expectant face. Now was the moment for action. His senses were stung to alertness, his mind cleared of misgivings; he made a desperate resolve. She was thrust out homeless and alone in the wide, wide world! She should share his home, such as it was; it was better than none. She should, an she would, be his wife—and rich in love if in nothing else. Prudence had hitherto sealed his lips—for her sake chiefly. Now that she had no resources, no place open to receive her, he could and would speak.
The first thing he did was to hail a cab, and despatch the man straight back to Harperton for Miss West’s luggage, desiring him to bring it to the station.
“Why, what does it mean? Are they so very angry?” she asked with blanched cheeks. “Oh, you don’t mean that they are sending me away?” For she noticed that Mr. Wynne looked unusually pale and grave.
“Come down here with me,” leading her into some public gardens that they were passing, “and I will tell you all about it.”
The gardens were miserably wintry. Snow lay on the ground, a couple of boys were snowballing, some starving red-wings fluttered across the path, a granite-grey sky lowered overhead. Surely it was the last place on God’s earth in which to relate a love tale; and the girl herself, what a picture of misery! Oh! thought the young man, if Mrs. Wolferton had but been at home—but, alas! she was abroad—she would have been a true friend to this poor forlorn child. Madeline was, of course, wearing her evening dress, such as it was—at any rate, it was thin. A shabby little plush opera cloak barely covered her perishing neck and arms. Over this was drawn a meagre black cape. On her head she wore a sunburnt sailor hat; in her frozen, mittened hand she held a fan; her face was pinched with cold, and white with anxiety. No lovely lady-fair was here to woo this bleak January forenoon. And what of ambition—the stern, jealous mistress to whom he was pledged?
“They are very angry, senselessly angry,” began the young man. “They won’t take you back again, and have actually packed your boxes ready for removal. However, when one door shuts, another opens. There is a home ready for you, Madeline. Can you guess where it is?”
She gazed at Mr. Wynne, and stood perfectly still and very white, with her thin, sensitive lips tightly pressed together, and made no reply.
“You know that it is my home,” he continued eagerly. “I need not tell you that I love you, and so well do I love you, that until now I have never dared even to whisper my love. I am poor, I have my way to make as yet, it may be a life of struggling poverty. Can you share it—will you venture, Madeline?”
The girl stepped back a pace, and suddenly sat down upon an iron garden bench, still silent, and covered her face with her mittened hands.
“Will you not answer me!” he pleaded. He dared not remove her hands, or offer her a caress. The snowballing had ceased; the present scene in real life attracted the two boys, who had drawn near. The lady was sick, or looked like it.
“You do not mean it,” she faltered. “I know you are very, very kind, but I cannot accept your pity, for that is what it comes to.”
“I solemnly declare to you that it is not,” he rejoined with emphasis; “but even if it were, have you not heard that pity is akin to love?”
“It is utterly impossible,” she said slowly. “You are speaking out of the goodness of your heart, on the impulse of the moment. This time yesterday, tell me honestly,” raising her lovely eyes to his, “had you any intention of—of—of this?”
“To be truthful, then, I had not.”
“There, you see, that is enough. There is your answer,” with a quick little gesture.
“No, no, hear me out. It was on your account that I held my tongue. If I had had a decent income I would have spoken to you long ago; but I felt that I had no right to remove you from Mrs. Harper’s care without having a comfortable home to offer you. I meant to work very hard and to return next year. Now all has been changed. Circumstances alter cases. I ask you now, Madeline, will you be afraid to begin with me at the bottom of the ladder—something tells me that I shall reach the top?”
“I shall only be a dead weight and a burden,” she replied in a broken voice. She was relenting. Her own heart was an eloquent advocate for Mr. Wynne.
“What will your relations say when they hear that you wish to marry a portionless girl, a—beggar?” she murmured tremulously.
“They will say nothing that can affect us. I am independent. I have no claims on them, and they have no right to dictate to me. By the time they hear the news, we shall, I hope, be married. We have nothing to wait for, and the sooner you have a home of your own the better. I wish I had a sister or some near relative that I could take you to, but I am almost as much alone in the world as you are.”
In the end Mr. Wynne prevailed—was not talking his trade?—and Madeline West walked out of that wintry white garden his affianced wife.
Rash young man! Rash young woman! One would have thought that they had the wealth of Crœsus, the full consent and warmest wishes of tribes of wealthy relations, to look at their faces as they passed through the gates side by side.
Miss West did not feel the snow soaking through her thin walking shoes. No, she was treading on air—had thrown all doubts and misgivings to the winds, and was prepared to make the most of this heaven-sent period. She was about to enter on a new and happy life, believing that, although a poor man’s wife, her path would be strewn with roses.
She had about as much practical experience of household cares—the value of pounds, shillings, and pence—as one of the children in the third class at Harperton. As for Laurence Wynne, Madeline was his, Madeline was an angel, young, unspoiled, and unsophisticated, with modest wishes, and a firm faith in him. Their future was before them! It was!