Wild Margaret

"Oh, you've written a play!" she said coolly; "well, that's more in your line. And when are you going to produce it? And I'm to have a big part, am I, or is it a little one as usual? The authors always try and persuade you when they are giving you a part with about five lines in it, that it's the most important in the cast."

"I haven't written a play, and yet I have, so to speak," he said. "And you have the best part, far and away, Lottie. By the way, I have a piece of news for you. Lord Blair is going to be married!"

He burst it upon her purposely to see how she would like it, and for a moment Lottie turned crimson and then white, and her eyes blazed; then the actress asserted herself over the mere woman, and taking up another cigarette she lit it before she gave vent to a cool —

"Oh, really!"

But Austin Ambrose had seen the deep red and the quick flash of the eyes and was not taken in by the nonchalant "Oh, really!"

"Yes," he said; "but it is a profound secret at present."

"And so you want me to tell everybody! I understand."

"No," he said, "I do not want you to tell anyone this time. I want it to be really kept quiet. You will see why directly."

"And the happy young lady is Miss Violet Graham, I suppose?" said Lottie, after a moment's pause. "What a funny thing it is that Fortune showers all her gifts on some persons and bestows only slaps on the face on others. Now, there's Miss Graham, the richest woman in England, and Fortune goes and gives her the nicest and handsomest young man for a husband, while I, poor Lottie Belvoir, have to struggle and struggle, and work like a nigger, and all I get is some small part in a frivolity burlesque. It is funny, isn't it?"

"Very funny," assented Austin Ambrose; "but you are a little wrong in your guess. It is not Miss Graham."

"Not Miss Graham! Who then?"

Austin Ambrose did not hesitate a moment. He had well calculated his plans, and he knew that if he meant to tell anything to the sharp Miss Lottie he must tell all. Half confidences could be of no use.

"Look here, Lottie," he said, "I am going to confide in you because I know that you are unlike most women, inasmuch as you can, if you like, hold your tongue."

"Thanks," she said, watching him closely; "that's a compliment for me. I really think you do mean business, you are so very polite."

"I told you I wanted you to help me, and you can't help me unless you know all I know. Blair is not going to marry Miss Graham, but a young woman whom I have not seen, whom I never heard of – nor any one else. She is, I believe, a kind of servant – "

Lottie sat up, open-eyed.

"What!" she exclaimed and the color came into her face again. If Lord Blair had been going to marry Miss Graham, she would have regarded it as a matter of course, but that he should be going to throw himself away upon a "kind of servant" was more than she could bear with equanimity.

"It is true," said Austin Ambrose.

"Blair —Blair, of all people! – going to make such a fool of himself as that! Why, he must be out of his mind!"

Austin Ambrose shrugged his shoulders.

"I think he is," he said, coolly. "I never saw him so mad. He simply raves about her like a schoolboy. She's everything that is beautiful and angelic. Oh! he is most completely gone, my dear Lottie."

Lottie bit her lip.

"The nicest and handsomest fellow in London," she murmured. "To be picked up by a – a slavey! What a beastly shame it is! What a fool he must be! What's her name?"

"Margaret Hale," said Austin Ambrose, instantly. "You understand, Lottie, that I am telling you what I would tell to no one else."

She nodded.

"And it's about this you came to see me?" she said.

"Yes," he said; "I want you to help me save Blair from this folly. Of course it would ruin him. He would never be able to hold up his head again."

"He'd get tired of her in a week. I know him so well," she said, in a low voice.

"Exactly. In less than a week, perhaps, and then – " he shrugged his shoulders.

"And she would be the Viscountess Leyton, and, of course, the Countess Ferrers when the old man died?" for Lottie knew her peerage pretty well.

"Yes, and we must prevent that," he said, looking at her.

She made an impatient gesture.

"I don't care about the title, and all that," she said; "why should I? If he had been going to marry Miss Graham, or any other of the swells, why – why it would be all right, and I shouldn't complain; but a servant! Blair, too! Why, he's as proud as Lucifer, really, though people wouldn't think it! He'd be wretched for life! He'd be fit to cut his throat a week afterward, and he's too good for that sort of thing."

There was a pause. She drank some of the stout, for her lips felt dry, then she said, more to herself than him:

"Yes, he's far too good! Poor Blair! Why, the very first diamonds I ever had he gave me. He'd have given me the top brick off the chimney if I'd asked for it! You won't believe it, because you don't believe anything, Mr. Ambrose, but I tell you I'd do anything for Lord Blair! I never told you when I first met him?"

"No," said Austin Ambrose.

Lottie took another draught of the stout, and her color came and went.

"It was when I was singing at the South Audley Music Hall. I wasn't much of a singer, then, and one night I sang worse than usual; I was ill too, and out of sorts, and the people – they aren't the most refined at the South Audley, you know – they cut up rough, and began to hiss and shout. I was only a slip of a girl, and I got frightened – too frightened to run off, and one brute of a fellow took up a wineglass from one of the tables, and flung it at me. I suppose I must have fainted, for the next thing I remember was finding myself in a young gentleman's arms. It was Lord Blair. He'd sprung on the stage, and caught me, and I shall never forget, till the day of my death, the look on his face as he looked down at them. 'I'll give a sovereign to anyone who'll keep that fellow in the hall till I come back!' he said, and though he didn't shout it, you could hear his voice all over the hall. Then he carried me into the greenroom, and got me some wine, and put me into a cab, as if I was a lady! Just as if I was a lady, mind! Then he went back to the hall, and it was a bad time for that brute with the glass, I expect."

She paused a minute and caught her lip between her teeth.

"We didn't meet again for three or four years, and he didn't know me. I was a woman, then, and he had grown into a man. I dare say he'd forgotten all about the girl he protected at the South Audley, and I didn't remind him. But I haven't forgotten it. No!" and she made an impatient dash at her eyes, as if ashamed of the moisture which had made them suddenly dim.

Austin Ambrose listened and watched.

"That's like Blair," he said. "He's a good fellow."

"A good fellow!" she exclaimed, almost fiercely; "that's what you say of any man who is free with his money and can make himself pleasant. Blair is more than that; he's – he's – " she paused for want of a word, then wound up emphatically, "he's a gentleman!"

"Too good a gentleman to be wasted on Miss Margaret Hale!" said Austin Ambrose, insidiously.

"Yes!" she assented, as fiercely as before. "What is to be done? I suppose you have got some plan? You generally have your wits about you." She paused a moment. "But why are you so keen about this business?" she inquired, suspiciously.

"Simply out of pure good nature," he said. "Don't look so incredulous, my dear Lottie. Permit me to possess some good nature as well as yourself. Blair and I are old and fast friends. I don't think I ever told you, but one confidence deserves another, and I will tell you now. Blair once saved my life. If it had not been for him I should have been lying at the bottom of the Thames."

Lottie nodded.

"They say it's the worst thing you can do for yourself is to save another person's life. I don't say he saved mine, but he did me a good turn, and – and – well, I expect now he wishes he had never seen me, and I dare say he'd have been all the better off if he hadn't. And as for you – well, Mr. Ambrose, I don't see why you shouldn't want to do him a good turn."

"I do," he said. "And I couldn't do him a better than by preventing this marriage. And now, Lottie, I will tell you plainly that this marriage can be prevented if you will lend me a hand."

"How?" she said.

"Lottie, you are a good actress," he said, slowly; "I always said so, and I always thought so. I want you to prove it. I have a little plot, as you surmised, and I want you to play a part in it. It's a difficult one, but you can play it if you like. And, Lottie, if you do play it well, why, I'll see what I can do in getting you an engagement at the Coronet."

Lottie's face flushed. An engagement at the Coronet was one of the dramatic prizes.

"You will? But you needn't take the trouble to bribe me. I don't want anything for helping Blair out of this mess," she said; "I'll do it for – for auld lang syne!"

"That's right, Lottie," he said; "but you shall get your engagement at the Coronet all the same. And now I'll tell you what I mean to do."

He leant forward and began to speak in a low, impressive voice, and Lottie Belvoir listened, her eyes fixed on his face. Suddenly she started, and turned pale.

"I say! Isn't that rather – rather strong?" she said.

"Rather strong?" he murmured, blandly.

"Rather risky?" she responded. "I – I don't much like it. Seems to me that it's a part which might land me – well, I don't know where."

"My dear Lottie, there is no risk, or very little," he said, with a cool laugh. "What can happen to you?"

"I don't know; a good many things if I were to be found out," she retorted. "Especially if Blair found it out!" and her face grew paler. "You don't know what Blair is when his temper is up. I've seen him, and probably you haven't."

"But there will be no need to get in his way," said Austin Ambrose. "Directly the thing is done, and your part is played, you can get away for awhile, go to Paris, or where you like. I'll find the money. You may look upon yourself as engaged to me for a term, just as if I were manager of a theater."

Still she hesitated, biting her lip softly and looking at him with evident apprehension.

"I don't like it," she said in a low voice. "It – it seems like playing it very low down on her – and him, too! And if it failed! Good Lord, Mr. Ambrose!"

"It will not fail," he said calmly and confidently. "I will take care that it shall not fail. I'm responsible for this little plot, and from mere pride in it I shall see that it comes off all right. Where is the difficulty? You have hardly a dozen lines to speak and a few others to make up, as the occasion may demand, and your woman's wit, Lottie, will supply you with those."

"Oh, that is easy enough," she said, with a wave of her hand. "I could play the part well enough! I see myself at it now!" and her face took color and her eyes began to glow. "It is a part I could do to perfection. And shouldn't be at a loss for gagging if it were needed, but – "

"But what?" he said, softly.

"But I don't fancy it all the same. It's risky and dangerous and – " she stopped for a moment and looked at his cool, set face keenly. "Mr. Ambrose, I suppose if I got found out, they could send me to prison?"

His face did not alter in the slightest.

"Nonsense!" he said. "Prison! What an absurd notion! Besides, who could find you out? I'm surprised, Lottie, you should hesitate. I thought you were a girl of spirit!"

"I've spirit enough," she said, grimly. "I've spirit enough for most things. For instance, if a man were to throw a glass at me now, I shouldn't faint, but I should throw it back at him. But this – well, this is quite a different thing."

"It is all in your line," he argued.

She remained silent, and he leaned back and shrugged his shoulders.

"Well, I suppose poor Blair will have to drift to the dogs, then? I am surprised; I must say I am surprised, Lottie. I did think that you were as good and stanch a friend of his as I am, and I thought I'd only to tell you the plight in which he stood, and show you how to help one to save him. I thought you'd jump at it. But never mind. I don't want to persuade you against your will; but I tell you plainly that if you won't help me, I shall go to no one else – I shall let things slide. I'm sorry for Blair; I am, indeed, very sorry, but – " he reached for his hat.

"Wait," she said, and her voice sounded dry and troubled, "give me a minute."

He leant back and watched her from under his lowered lids, while she leant her head on her hands, her intelligent face all puckered with thought.

Then she looked up suddenly.

"I'll do it," she said, with sharp decision.

Austin Ambrose's eyes flashed, then he smiled coolly.

"Of course you will. I can't think why you should hesitate. Why, my dear Lottie, no woman of spirit could sit down idly and see an old flame picked up by a mere nobody of a girl, a kind of servant – "

"That will do," she broke in, his words affecting her as he intended. "I've said I'll do it, and I will, let the consequences be what they may. But mind, you have promised to stand by me?"

"Certainly I will," he said, promptly, "and you shall have the engagement at the Coronet, as well as the satisfaction of feeling that you have saved Blair from ruining his life, and an old title from disgrace."

"Hang the title!" she exclaimed, carelessly, "it's Blair I'm thinking of. And – and when will you want me?"

"I can't tell you now," he said. "I may want you at any moment, so that you must hold yourself in readiness. I suppose you will dress the part carefully?"

She looked up and smiled.

"You can trust me to do that," she said. "Wait! Take another cigar; there's some more whisky there. I won't keep you ten minutes," and she got up and ran from the room.

She was scarcely gone more than ten minutes when there came a knock at the door.

"Come in," he said, and a fair-haired lady, dressed in black, with a pale face and dark hollows under her eyes, with quivering lips and shaking hands, nervously and timidly entered the room.

Austin Ambrose rose with some surprise and embarrassment.

"Do you wish to see Miss Belvoir?" he said quietly.

The lady threw up her hands to her face and broke into passionate sobs; then suddenly they changed to peals of laughter, and, whipping off her bonnet and wig, Lottie herself stood before him.

"Will that do?" she demanded.

Austin Ambrose nodded emphatic approval.

"Excellent! You nearly took me in, my dear Lottie, and I was prepared for you. Capital!"

"Oh, I can do better than that!" she said, half contemptuously, as she wiped the paint and powder from her face with her handkerchief. "But it isn't the make-up I shall rely on so much as the acting. I flatter myself that I can play the part to a nicety. It mustn't be overdone, you know; and it mustn't be taken too slowly. Oh, I know! You leave it to me, Mr. Ambrose!"

"That's just what I meant to do!" he said. "I place every confidence in you, my dear Lottie!"

"And you'll come and see me in prison on visiting days?" she said, with a smile that was rather serious.

"Yes," he said, laughing lightly, "I'll come and see you, and bring you a tract. But all that is nonsense! There is not the slightest risk of such a thing. Once you have played your part, you shall be off to Paris and take your fling for a month or two."

"All this will cost you something," she said, thoughtfully.

He shrugged his shoulders.

"It isn't a question of pounds, shillings and pence on such an occasion as this," he said; "and as to money, I dare say Blair will be only too glad to pay all the expenses when he comes to his senses, and finds who it is that has saved him from committing social suicide. He will owe us a deep debt of gratitude, Lottie."

"I hope he'll think so," she said, rather doubtfully, and with a little shudder; "if he shouldn't – well, I don't think Paris will be far enough off for me, and as for you" – and she smiled strangely and significantly – "well, I wouldn't care to insure your life, Mr. Austin Ambrose."

He laughed as he shook hands with her.

"My dear Lottie, Blair will know that we have been his best friends, and will be grateful accordingly. Good-night. Mind, not a word to a soul!"

"No," said Lottie, grimly; "I'm not likely to proclaim this business from the housetops. This is a play that it will be best not to advertise. Good-night!"

CHAPTER XII

Margaret had read those lines of Swinburne's:

"Nothing is better, I well think,Than love; the hidden well-waterIs not so delicate to drink."Nothing so bitter, I well know,Than love; no amber in cold sea,Or gathered berries under snow,"

and she remembered them; they came floating up through her memory during the still hours of the night following Lord Blair's passionate avowal.

It had taken her so completely by surprise that even yet she had scarcely realized what this was that had happened to her.

She had read of love, had painted it, but hitherto she and it had been perfect strangers; and now – and now all wonderful mysterious sweetness of it suffused her whole being. "He loves me! he loves me!" she found herself repeating over and over again in a species of half-unconscious rapture; and as she murmured the significant words she hid her face in her hands, and the words he had spoken came surging back on her ears and in her heart, and she could still feel his hot, passionate kisses on her hands and hair.

All the next day she lived like one in a dream.

She never asked herself whether she had acted wisely or even rightly in listening to him, or promising to meet him again. Wisdom and propriety were swamped and overwhelmed by the full tide of love which had taken possession of her.

Once there flashed upon her the thought that she ought to tell her grandmother, but the same instant she felt that it would be impossible. It would be like sacrilege to utter a word of this new mystery which she had discovered. Besides, she had not yet given him his answer. It would be time enough to tell Mrs. Hale after then.

In the evening she wandered slowly to the glade, and rested on the spot where she had sat the day before; and there she re-enacted the whole scene so vividly that she could almost believe that he was really present, kneeling at her side, and holding her hand.

With a sigh, she leaned her head on her hand, and tried to think it out, but she could not think. A great joy, like a great pain, makes thought impossible.

The day passed, she scarcely knew how, and the night. She slept some hours, but her sleep was full of dreams, in which Lord Leyton was the predominant figure; the handsome face may be said to have hovered about her pillow; and when she awoke, flushed and quivering, it was to have the sense of her great joy sweeping over her anew like an overwhelming flood.

"Margaret, my dear, you look pale," said Mrs. Hale, at breakfast. "It's the heat. I wouldn't go painting in the gallery to-day. It's hot there, and the colors must give you a headache, I should think. If I were you, I'd go and sit in the woods; there is some shade there, and it's cool, especially near the cascade."

Margaret colored furiously. It almost seemed as if Mrs. Hale had got an inkling of her appointment with Lord Blair.

"I will go to the woods, grandma," she said; and she put her arm round the old lady's neck, and laid her soft cheek against the withered one.

"Yes, my dear," said Mrs. Hale, "you can go there quite safely, for the earl never walks there even when he does go out, and Lord Leyton's gone. But you won't disturb the birds, Margaret, will you? Mr. Simpson, the head keeper, is so particular."

"No, I will do no harm, grandma," Margaret said, and she got her hat and went to the woods.

It was a lovely morning; the birds were singing in full note; the butterflies were flitting from wild flower to wild flower; the miniature cascade made a delicious music. But it and the birds seemed to sing the same song for Margaret. "I love you! I love you!"

Surely, if she lived to be a hundred, whatever happened in her life, she should never forget this spot sacred to her in the first passion that had ever stirred her maiden heart. Always before her eyes in the future would rise this glade at Leyton woods; always would she hear the ceaseless babble of the brook, the song of the linnets!

She had not long to wait. There came a quick, firm step – she knew it so well, although it had come into her life so recently – and with a spring like a boy's, Lord Blair was beside her; not only beside her, but on one knee.

For a moment he seemed unable to speak, and the color came and went on his tanned cheek.

"Do you know," he said with a smile, and in that hushed, lingering voice which love takes to itself, "all the way I have been tormenting myself with the dread that you wouldn't come!"

"I said that I would come!" she said, with downcast eyes.

"I know! And I ought to have known that you would rather die than break your word. But I thought that perhaps you would be prevented, that you might have told some one – Mrs. Hale – "

"I have told no one," said Margaret, with a sudden feeling of gratitude.

"That is right," he said; then, as the shadow swept over her face, he went on quickly – "Not that I should have cared for myself. No! I would like all the world to know how I love you; not that they could possibly know that. Not even you can guess at that, Margaret. But I should like to tell everybody that I love you, and that – But, ah, Margaret, you haven't told me yet! Are you going to let me stay? Are you going to let me go on loving you? Dearest, you have not come to be hard and cruel to me! You will say 'yes?'" and he held out his arms to her.

Margaret sat silent for a moment, then she raised her eyes; they seemed heavy with love's mysterious shyness, and she breathed the word that gave her to him.

His arms closed round her, and he held her to him with one passionate kiss until, half frightened, she drew away from him.

There was silence between them then, and they sat hand in hand in that communion of spirit which is only permitted to us poor mortals once in a life. To him she was the embodiment of all that was beautiful and good! To her he was the epitome of all that was handsome and brave; and he was to be good also now, for had he not said that her love should be his salvation?

After a time they began to talk, as newly-made lovers do talk. Short little sentences, full of delicious meaning; small nothings, which represented the sum of all things to them.

Then Blair said, suddenly:

"Dearest, you said you had told no one: Mrs. Hale, or any one, about our meeting?"

"No," she assented.

"That was right, Margaret," he said. "I don't want you to tell any one."

She looked at him trustingly, but with a vague surprise.

"Do you mind, dear?" he asked. "If so, if you would rather this were told, we will go together, you and I, and then we will go to the earl – "

"No, no," said Margaret, shrinking from such an ordeal, and longing – girl-like – to keep her delicious secret to herself for a little longer.

"It shall be as you wish, dearest," he said, frankly; "but there are reasons why it would be better for us to say nothing about our engagement. Look here, Margaret," he went on, earnestly, "I spoke the truth just now, when I said that I would like to proclaim my happiness to all the world, but I'm afraid it wouldn't be a good thing to do. It would be better not to do so, for your sake."

"For mine?" she said, looking into his dark eyes with a tender questioning.

"Yes. I don't want you to lose anything by your goodness to me, dear; that's natural enough, isn't it? And I am afraid you would lose a great deal if we declared our engagement."

"What should I lose?" she asked.

"You know, dear," he answered, "that I am the heir to my uncle's title and estates."

"I know," said Margaret.

She would not wound him by reminding him that she was the granddaughter of the earl's housekeeper, and penniless.

"Well, that's very good; and I wish I were the King of England, that I could make you the queen, Madge," he said, with a smile. "But in addition to the title and estates, mine uncle has a great deal of money, and if he likes he can leave that to us, or to anybody else."