Only One Love; or, Who Was the Heir

“She is a very nice girl,” said Mrs. Fellowes. “She ought to make a good match.”

“Ay de me,” said Lady Bell, with a sigh. “I’m sick of that word. Men and women don’t ‘marry’ now, they make ‘good matches.’ My dear, I hate your worldly way of looking at matrimony. If I were a poor girl, I’d marry the man of my heart, if he hadn’t a penny. Ah, and if he were the baddest of bad lots.”

“Like Jack Newcombe, for instance,” said Mrs. Fellowes, archly.

“Yes,” said Lady Bell, turning with the door in her hand; “like Jack Newcombe,” and she ran up to her room.

Punctual to the minute, Laura Treherne knocked at the door of the dressing-room. Lady Bell was seated before the glass, surrounded by her walking clothes, which, as was her custom, she had slipped out of or flung carelessly aside.

Without a word Laura picked them up and put them in the wardrobe, and without a word took up the hair brushes. Lady Bell watched her in the glass, and gave her a hint now and then, and when her hair was dressed glanced round approvingly.

“Yes,” she said, “that is very nice; and you have not hurt me once. The last maid used to pull me terribly. I suppose she was thinking of her young man. By the way, are you engaged?”

The dark face flushed for a moment, then grew pale.

“No, my lady.”

“I’m glad of it. Take my advice and don’t be. That sounds selfish, doesn’t it. Now you want to know what I am going to wear. I don’t know myself. What would you choose? Go to the wardrobe.”

Laura went to the wardrobe, and came back after a minute or two with a dress of black satin and lace looped up with rosebuds of the darkest red. It was one newly arrived from Worth.

Lady Bell nodded.

“Yes, that just suits me. Give me a lady for good taste! And now choose the ornaments. There is the jewel-box.”

Laura chose the set of rubies and diamonds, and Lady Bell smiled again.

“I shall look rather Spanish. Never mind. Let us try them.”

With deft and gentle hands Laura helped her to dress, and Lady Bell nodded approval.

“Am I ready?”

Laura hesitated a moment.

“Will your ladyship wear the pendant?”

Lady Bell glanced in the glass.

“Ah, I see, you think that is rather too much against the rosebuds. You are right. Take it off, please. Thanks. Put the key of the jewel-box in your pocket. Stay! there is a chain for you to wear it on;” and she took out a small gold chain. “You can keep that as your own.”

Laura Treherne flushed, and she inclined her head gratefully.

Lady Bell was relieved; her last maid used to overwhelm her with thanks.

“And now I will go down. By the way, will you please tell Simcox – that’s the butler – that the gentlemen will want Lafitte, at least, Mr. Newcombe will. I don’t know what Mr. Stephen Davenant drinks. What’s the matter?” she broke off to inquire, for she heard Laura stumble and fall against the wardrobe.

There was a moment’s pause; then, calmly enough, Laura said:

“My foot caught in your ladyship’s dress, I think.”

“Have you hurt yourself?” asked Lady Bell, kindly. “You have gone quite pale! Here, take some of this sal-volatile.”

But Laura declined, respectfully. It was a mere nothing, and she would be more careful of alarming her ladyship for the future.

Lady Bell looked at her curiously. The quiet, self-contained manner, so free from nervousness or embarrassment, interested her.

She stopped her as Laura was leaving the room.

“We haven’t fixed upon a name for you yet,” she said.

“No, my lady; any name will do.”

“It is a pity to change yours – it is a pretty one.”

“Will Mary Burns do, my lady? It was my mother’s name.”

“Very well,” said Lady Bell; “I will tell Mrs. Fellowes that you will be known by that.”

“That girl has a history, I know,” she thought, as she went downstairs.

Punctual almost to the minute, Mrs. Davenant’s brougham arrived.

The evenings had drawn in, and a lamp was burning in the hall; and a small fire made the dining-room comfortable.

Lady Bell welcomed Una most affectionately.

“Now we will have a really enjoyable evening,” she said. “I hate dinner parties, and if I had my way, would never give nor go to another one. If it were only a little colder, we’d sit round the fire and bake chestnuts. Have you ever done that, Wild Bird?”

“Often,” said Una, with a quiet smile, and something like a sigh, as she thought of the long winter evenings in the cot. How long ago they seemed, almost unreal, as if they had never happened.

“Oh, Una is very accomplished,” said Jack; “I believe she could make coffee if she tried.”

Very snug and comfortable the dining-room looked. Lady Bell had dispensed with one of the footmen, and had evidently determined to make the meal as homely and unceremonious as possible.

Never, perhaps, had the butler seen a merrier party. Even Stephen was genial and humorous; indeed he seemed to exert himself in an extraordinary fashion. Lady Bell had given him Una to take in, and he was most attentive and entertaining – so much that Jack, who was sitting opposite, and next to Lady Bell, felt amused and interested at the change which seemed to have come over him.

Could he have seen the workings of the subtle mind concealed behind the smiling exterior, he would have felt very much less at his ease; for even now Stephen was plotting how best he could mold the material round him to serve his purpose, and while the laugh was lingering on his smooth lips, his heart was burning with hate and jealousy of the rival who sat opposite.

For it had come to this, that he desired Una, and not only for the wealth of which he had robbed her, but for herself. As deeply as it was possible for one of his nature he loved the innocent, unsuspecting girl who sat beside him.

Tonight, as he looked at the beautiful face and marked each fleeting expression that flitted like sunshine over it: as he listened to the musical voice, and felt the touch of her dress as it brushed his arm, a passionate longing seized and mastered him, and he felt that he would risk all of which he was wrongfully possessed to win her – ah, and if she were, indeed, only the daughter of a common woodman.

“Curse him!” he murmured over his wine glass, as his eyes rested on Jack’s handsome face. “If he had not crossed my path, she would have been mine ere now; no matter, I will strike him out of it, as if he were a viper in my road.”

Meanwhile, quite unconscious of Stephen’s generous sentiments, Jack went on with his dinner, enjoying it thoroughly, and as happy as it is given to a mortal to be.

Presently the conversation turned upon their plans for the autumn.

“What are we all going to do?” said Lady Bell. “You, I suppose, Mr. Davenant, will go down to your place in Wealdshire – what is it called?”

“Hurst Leigh,” said Stephen, quietly. “Yes, I must go down there, I ought to have been there before now, but I find so many attractions in town,” and he smiled at Una.

“And you, my dear?” said Lady Bell to Mrs. Davenant.

“My mother will go down with me,” said Stephen.

Mrs. Davenant glanced at him nervously.

“And that means Miss Wild Bird, too, I suppose?” remarked Lady Bell.

“If Miss Una will honor us,” said Stephen, with an inclination of the head to Una. “Yes, we shall make quite a family party. You will join us, of course, Jack?”

Jack, who had looked up rather grim at the foregoing, bit his lip.

“I don’t quite know,” he said, gravely.

“Surely you will not let the poachers have all the birds this year, Jack!” said Stephen, brightly. “Besides my mother will be quite lost without you.”

“Do come, Jack,” whispered Mrs. Davenant.

“I’ll see,” said Jack, grimly, and Una looked down uneasily; she understood his reluctance to go to the old place.

“Oh, we will take no refusal,” said Stephen, buoyantly. “And what are your plans, Lady Bell?”

Lady Bell looked up with rather a start and a flush.

“I – I – don’t quite know,” she said. “I had been thinking of going to a small place we have at Earl’s Court.”

“Earl’s Court!” exclaimed Jack. “Why, that is only thirteen miles or so from the Hurst.”

“Is it?” said Lady Bell. “I didn’t know. I haven’t seen it. I’m ashamed to say that I haven’t made a round of inspection of the property yet. My stewards are always bothering me to do so, but I don’t seem to have time.”

“A sovereign cannot be expected to visit the whole of her kingdom,” said Stephen, with a smile.

Lady Bell sighed.

“I often wish the old earl had left me five hundred a year and a cottage somewhere,” she said, quietly. “I should have been a happier woman. Oh, here is the claret. Give Mr. Newcombe the Lafitte, Simcox. Mr. Davenant – ”

“I always follow Jack’s suit,” said Stephen, rising to open the door for the ladies. “He is an infallible guide in such matters.”

“Fancy a woman lamenting the extent of her wealth,” he said, with something like a sneer, as he went back to the table. “If any girl ought to be happy that girl ought to be. What a chance for some young fellow! My dear Jack, if I had been in your place – ”

Jack looked up with a tinge of red in his face.

“What nonsense. Lady Bell knows better than to be caught by such chaff as I am. Besides, I am more than content. I wouldn’t exchange Una for a Duchess, with the riches of Peru in her pockets. What about the commissionership, or whatever it is, Stephen?”

“All in good time, my dear Jack. Those sort of things aren’t done in a moment; the matter is in hand, and we shall get it, be sure. Meanwhile, if you want any money – ”

“Thanks, no,” said Jack, easily.

He had only that morning negotiated a bill with Mr. Moss for another hundred pounds.

Stephen smiled evilly behind his pocket handkerchief. He held that bill in his pocketbook at that moment, in company with all Jack’s previous ones.

CHAPTER XXX

The two men sat beside the fire almost in silence. Jack was trying to get over his reluctance to go to the Hurst, and wondering what would become of him if he did not, and Una left him all alone in town; and Stephen was wondering whether it was time to strike the blow he meditated.

Very soon Jack jumped up.

“If you’ve had enough wine, let us join the ladies,” he said, and went toward the door.

Stephen followed him, but turned back to fetch his pocket handkerchief.

Lying beside it, on the table, was a rose which had fallen from the bosom of Una’s dress. He took it up, and looked at it with that look which a man bestows on some trifle which has been worn by the woman he loves, and then, as if by an irresistible impulse, raised it to his lips, kissing it passionately, and put it carefully in his bosom. As he did so, he raised his eyes to the glass, which reflected one side of the room, and saw the slight figure of a woman standing in the open door and watching him.

The light from the carefully shaded lamp was too dim to allow him to see the face distinctly, but something in the figure caused him to feel a sudden chill.

He turned sharply and walked to the door; but the hall was empty and there was no sound of retreating footsteps.

“Some servant maid waiting to come in to clear the table,” he muttered.

But he returned to the dining-room, and drank off a glass of liquor before going to the drawing-room, from which ripples of Jack’s frank laughter were floating in the hall.

Lady Bell was seated at the piano, playing and singing in her light-hearted, careless fashion; Jack and Una were seated in a dimly-lit corner, talking in an undertone.

Stephen went up to the piano and stood apparently listening intently, but in reality watching the other two under his lowered lids.

The presence of the rose in his bosom seemed to heighten the passion which burned in his heart; and the sight of Jack bending over Una, and of her rapt, up-turned face as she looked up, drinking in his lightest word as if it were gospel, maddened him.

It was with a start that he became conscious that Lady Bell had ceased playing, and that she, like him, was watching the lovers.

“Miss Una and Mr. Newcombe seem very good friends,” she said, with a forced smile.

“Do they not?” said Stephen, in his softest voice. “Too good.”

Lady Bell looked up at him quickly.

“What do you mean?”

Stephen looked down at her gravely.

“Can you keep a secret, Lady Bell?” he said, hesitatingly.

“Sometimes,” she said. “What is it?”

Stephen glanced across at Jack and Una.

“I’m rather anxious about our young friends,” he said, his voice dropped still lower, his head bent forward with such an insidious smile that Lady Bell could not, for the life of her, help thinking of a serpent.

“Anxious!” she echoed, her heart beating. “As how?”

“Can you not guess?” he said, raising his eyebrows.

“You – you mean that they may fall in love with each other. Well, they are not badly matched,” said Lady Bell, bravely, though her heart was aching.

“Not badly, in one sense,” said Stephen, after a pause; “but as badly as two persons could be in all others. They are a match as regards their means. They are both penniless.”

Lady Bell looked up with a start.

“Is – is Mr. Newcombe so badly off? I thought – that is, I fancied he had a wealthy uncle – ” She paused.

“You mean Mr. Ralph Davenant,” said Stephen, calmly, and with an air of sadness. “I am sorry to say that he left everything which he possessed to a less worthy person – to me.”

Lady Bell looked at him inquiringly.

“To me,” he repeated, “and poor Jack was – well, disinherited, and left penniless. It is of him I think when I say that I am anxious about them; naturally, I think of him. Miss Rolfe is a friend of my mother’s, and has been used to a straitened life; but poor Jack does not know what poverty means, and in his ignorance may drift into an entanglement which may embitter her life. No man in the world is less fitted for love in a cottage, and nothing to pay the rent, than Jack Newcombe. You, who have seen something of him, must have remarked his easy-going, careless nature, his utter ignorance of the value of money, his unsuitableness for a life of poverty and privation.”

Lady Bell’s heart beat fast.

“But – but – ” she said, “you have plenty.”

“Of which Jack will not take one penny. You see he is as proud as he is poor.”

“I like him for that,” murmured Lady Bell.

“Yes, so do I; though it pains and grieves me. If Jack would permit me to help him, Lady Bell, he might marry Una Rolfe tomorrow; but as it is, I fear, I am anxious. Another man would be wiser, but Jack has no idea of prudence, and would plunge head first into all the misery of such a union without a thought of the morrow.”

“And you – you think he loves her,” murmured Lady Bell; and she waited for an answer as a man on his trial might wait for the verdict of the jury.

Stephen smiled. He could read Lady Bell’s heart as if it were an open book.

“Loves her! No, certainly not – not yet. He is amused and entertained, but love has not come yet.”

“And she?” asked Lady Bell, anxiously, her eyes fixed on Una’s face.

Stephen smiled again.

“No, not yet. She is ignorant of the meaning of the word. I have taken some trouble to arrive at the truth, and I am sure of what I say. It is well for her that she is not, for anything like a serious engagement would be simply madness. Poor Jack! His future lies so plainly before him, and if he would follow it, the rest of his life might be happiness itself.”

“You mean that he should marry for money,” said Lady Bell, coldly.

“No, not for money alone,” murmured Stephen. “Jack is too high-minded to be guilty of such meanness; but is it not possible to marry for love and money, too, Lady Bell?”

Lady Bell turned her head aside; her heart beating fast. The voice of the tempter sounded like music in her ear. Why should not he marry for love as well as money? She had both. She loved him passionately, and she would pour her money at his feet to do as he liked with; to squander and make ducks and drakes of, if he would but give her a little love in return.

As she looked across the room at him, that awful, wistful longing which only a woman who loves with all her heart can feel, took possession of her and mastered her.

“Why do you tell me this?” she asked, sharply turning her face, pale and working.

“Because,” murmured Stephen, “because I have Jack’s interest so much at heart that I am bold enough to ask for aid where I know it can be of avail.”

“Do you mean that you ask me?” she said, tremulously. “What can I do?”

“Much, everything,” he whispered, his head bent low, almost to her ear. “Ask yourself, dear Lady Bell, and you will understand me. Let me be plain and straightforward, even at the risk of offending you. There was a time, not many months ago, when I and his best friends thought Jack had made a choice at once happy and wise.”

Lady Bell rose and moved to and fro, and then sank down again trembling with agitation.

“You mean that – that he was falling in love with me?”

Stephen inclined his head with lowered eyes.

“It is true,” he said. “You cannot fail to have seen what all observed.” And he went on quickly – “And but for this fancy – this passing fancy – all would have been well. Lady Bell, I am speaking more openly than I ever have spoken to woman before. I am risking offending you, but I do so from the affection which I bear my cousin. Lady Bell, I implore you to help me in saving him from a step which will plunge him into life-long misery. He is totally unfitted to battle with the world; married wisely and well, he would be a happy and contented man; married unwisely and badly, no one can picture the future.”

Lady Bell rose, her face pale, her eyes gleaming under the strain which she was enduring.

“Don’t say any more,” she said; “I – I cannot bear it. You have guessed my secret; I can feel that. Yes, I would save him if I could, and if you are sure that – that there is no engagement – ”

“There is none,” said Stephen, lying smoothly. “There can be none; the idea is preposterous.”

Lady Bell moved away as he spoke, and turned over some book on the table to conceal her agitation, and Stephen, humming a popular hymn tune, crossed the room and looked down at Jack and Una with a benedictory smile, as if he was blessing them.

“Are you aware of the time, and that Lady Bell’s hall porter is uttering maledictions for our tardiness?” he said, playfully.

Jack looked at his watch.

“By Jove! No idea it was so late. Are you ready, Mrs. Davenant?”

Mrs. Davenant woke from a sleep, and she and Una went upstairs.

“I see you have a new maid,” she said, when they came down again. “What a superior-looking young girl.”

“Is she not?” said Lady Bell, absently. “She is more than superior, she is interesting. She has a history.”

Stephen, standing by, folding and unfolding his opera hat, smiled.

“Very interesting; but take care, Lady Bell; I am always suspicious of interesting people with a history.”

As he spoke, a pale, dark face looked down upon him from the upper landing for a moment, then disappeared.

“You will come with us, Stephen?” said Mrs. Davenant, nervously.

“No, thanks. I should like the walk. Good-night,” and he kissed her dutifully, and shook hands with Jack and Lady Bell.

“Going to walk?” cried Mrs. Davenant. “It is very chilly, and you’ve only that thin overcoat.”

“I’ve a scarf somewhere – where is it?” said Stephen.

Una stooped, and picked up a white scarf.

“Here it is,” she said, laughing, and all innocently she threw it round his neck.

“Will you tie it, please?” said Stephen, in an ordinary tone, and Una, laughing still, tied it.

Stephen stood motionless, his eyes cast down; he was afraid to raise them lest the passion blazing in them should be read by all there.

“Thanks. I cannot catch cold now,” he said, as he took her hand and held it for a moment.

He put them into the brougham, and under the pretext of arranging her shawl, touched her hand once again; then he stood in the chilly street and watched the brougham till it disappeared in the distance.

Then he turned and walked homeward.

“One step in the right direction,” he muttered. “Take care, Master Jack; I shall outwit you yet.”

As he ascended the stairs of his chambers, Slummers came out to meet him.

“There is a – person waiting for you, Mr. Stephen,” he said.

Stephen stopped, and his hand closed on the balustrade; his thoughts flew to Laura Treherne.

“A – woman, Slummers?”

“No, sir, a man,” said Slummers.

“Very good,” said Stephen, with a breath of relief. “Who is it – do you know?”

Slummers shook his head.

“A rough sort of man, sir; says he has come on business. He has been waiting for hours.”

“I am very sorry,” said Stephen, aloud and blandly, for the benefit of the visitor. “I am sorry to have kept anyone waiting. But it is rather late – ”

He entered the room as he spoke, and started slightly, for standing in the center of the apartment was Gideon Rolfe.

Notwithstanding the start Stephen came forward with outstretched hand and a ready smile of welcome.

“My dear Mr. Rolfe, I am indeed sorry that you should have been kept so long. If I had only known that you were coming – ”

Gideon Rolfe waived all further compliment aside with a gesture of impatience.

“I wished to see you,” he said. “Time is no object to me.”

Stephen shut the door carefully and stood in a listening attitude. He knew it was of no use to ask his visitor to sit down.

“You have come to inquire about your daughter?”

“No, I have not,” said Gideon Rolfe, calmly. “I know that she is well – I see her daily. I came to remind you of our contract – I came to remind you of your promise that no harm should come near her.”

Stephen smiled and shook his head.

“And I trust no harm has come near her, my dear Mr. Rolfe.”

“But I say that it has,” said Gideon Rolfe, coldly. “I have watched her daily and I know.”

“To what harm do you allude?” asked Stephen, bravely.

“Do you deny that the young man Jack Newcombe is near her?”

“Oh,” said Stephen, and he drew a long breath.

Then he commenced untying the scarf, his acute brain hard at work.

Here was an instrument ready to his hand, if he chose to use it properly.

“Oh, I understand. No, I do not deny it; I wish that I could do so, for your sake and for Una’s,” he said gravely.

“Speak plainly,” said Gideon Rolfe, hoarsely.

“I will,” said Stephen. “Plainly then, Mr. Newcombe has chosen to fall in love with – your daughter! That accounts for his constant attendance upon her.”

Gideon Rolfe’s face worked.

“I will take her back,” he said, grimly.

Stephen smiled.

“Softly, softly. There are two to that bargain, my dear Mr. Rolfe. For Miss Una to go back to a state of savagery in Warden Forest is impossible. You, who have seen her in her new surroundings, and the change they have wrought in her, must admit that.”

Gideon Rolfe wiped the perspiration from his brow.

“I know that she is changed,” he said. “She is like a great lady now. I see her dressed in rich silks and satins, and coming and going in carriages, with servants to wait upon her, and I know that she is changed, and that she has forgotten the friends of her childhood – forgotten those who were father and mother to her – ”

“You wrong Miss Una,” said Stephen, smoothly. “Not a day passes but she inquires for you and deplores your absence – ”

“But,” went on Gideon, as if he had not been interrupted, “I have not forgotten her, nor my promise to her mother. In a weak moment, moved by your threats more than your persuasions, I consented to part with her, but I would rather she were dead than that should happen – which you say will happen.”

“Pardon me,” said Stephen, blandly, and with an evil smile. “I said that Mr. Newcombe had fallen in love with her; I did not say that he would marry her. I would rather she were dead than that should happen,” and he turned his face for one moment to the light.

It was pale even to the lips, the eyes gleaming with resolute purpose.

Gideon Rolfe looked at him in silence for a moment.

“I do not understand,” he said, in a troubled voice.

“Let me make it clear to you,” said Stephen. “Against my will and wish these two have met and become acquainted. Against my will and wish that acquaintance has ripened into” – he drew a long breath as if the word hurt him – “into love, or what they mistake for love. Thus far it has gone, but it must go no further. I am at one with you there. You and I must prevent it. You cannot do it alone, you know. You have no control over Miss Una; you who are not her father and in no way related to her.”