Leslie's Loyalty

"It's going to rain now, Miss Lucy," repeated Jenny, still more confidently; and a moment or two afterward she added, "There!"

Lucy felt a spot on her face and seized the girl's basket.

"You must let me carry this, Jenny, because we shall have to hurry all we know. It will never do to go in wet through. What would Miss Leslie say?"

This formula, which she found of great service when admonishing the children, lent speed to Jenny's small feet, and Lucy and she hurried along the road. But quickly as they went the rain caught them up, and presently it came down in a torrent.

Jenny laughed, and Lucy, being rather careful of her clothes, and inclined to take matters seriously, was constrained to laugh too.

"We must get under a tree," she said. "There, squeeze up against the trunk, and I will stand in front of you and shelter you as well as I can. Oh, what would I give for an umbrella!"

Jenny leaned against the tree and amused herself by twisting a spray of brown ivy leaves into a wreath, and looking up at the weather now and again; and Lucy was rapidly sinking into that semi-indifferent, semi-despairing condition which such circumstances produce, when she heard the rattle of a cart coming along the road.

"Jenny, there is a cart, and I believe it is going to Newfold," she said, with a sudden hopefulness. "Perhaps it is someone we know – one of the tradespeople. If so, we will ask them to give us a lift."

"They won't wait to be asked, Miss Lucy," said Jenny, shrewdly, and indeed truthfully, for the two school-teachers were already favorites in Newfold.

"Here it is now," said Lucy; then she sighed disappointedly. "It is a dog cart – a gentleman's dog-cart," she said. "Bother!"

It came abreast of them and was spinning past, when suddenly the gentleman who was driving seemed to see them, and after a moment's hesitation he pulled up the horse.

"You mustn't stand under that tree," he called out.

Lucy colored and started for two reasons; one, because she had been brought up in habits of obedience, and generally did what she was told, no matter who told her, and especially if the order was issued in a commanding voice, and this was a commanding voice. The other reason was that she recognized the voice itself. It was the gentleman she had met in the lane, and to whom she had given the fern root.

"Come away," he said, gravely; then he appeared to recognise her, for he jumped down and, still holding the reins, came forward and raised his hat, Jenny laughing to see the rain pour off the brim.

"I beg your pardon," he said. "I did not see who it was for a moment, the rain is pelting so. But all the same you really must not stand there. There is thunder in the air, and it is dangerous standing under a tree – lightning you know!"

Lucy uttered a little cry, then laughed and blushed.

"Of course. How foolish of me not to think of it! But when you called out I was afraid I was doing some injury to the tree by trespassing."

He laughed – a grave, short kind of laugh, which, however, seemed to Lucy to suit him somehow.

"How wet you are!" he said. "Have you been standing here long?"

"Ever since it began," replied Lucy with a little shrug of her shoulders – a trick she had unconsciously caught from Leslie. "And we are waiting till it stops."

"I am afraid you will have to wait a long time," he remarked. "It has set for a wet evening. May I ask where you are going?"

"To Newfold," said Lucy.

"Newfold? Ah, yes! Will you let me offer you a lift? I am going there, or, at any rate, very near there – as far as the London road goes."

"Oh, no, thank you," said Lucy, flushing. He looked disappointed; then he glanced at Jenny.

"The little girl is getting very wet. She will take a chill," he said, gravely.

"Oh, do you think so?" exclaimed Lucy, with instant alarm. "Oh, dear! And I am afraid she is not very strong. It doesn't in the least matter so far as I am concerned, for I never take cold. I am used to the country and rough weather; but Jenny – ."

Jenny grinned at the idea of her being in any danger from an autumn storm, but she was too wise to make any remark, for she was dying for a ride in the handsome dog-cart.

"I think you had better let me take her – and you," he said; and seeing that she still hesitated, he cut the Gordian knot by lifting Jenny into the cart and holding out his hand for Lucy.

Then when she was seated he got out a big carriage umbrella and put it up for them, and quickly slipping off his waterproof, arranged it on the seat behind so that it completely covered them.

"Oh, but you will get wet!" remonstrated Lucy, much distressed; but he laughed and made light of the business.

"We Londoners like getting wet sometimes," he said. "It is a change, you see. In London we take as much care of ourselves as if a spot of rain would kill us."

"Oh, I know," said Lucy, with shy pride. "I have lived in London for some time."

"I thought you said you were used to the country?" he remarked.

"So I am – I was born in the country," Lucy explained, in her frank, simple manner – a manner, by the way, which possesses a greater charm for some, indeed most, men, than all the cultivated artificialities.

"I have lived all my life," she said – "all my life" – as if she were at least ninety – "in the country until I went up to London to cram for my exam."

"Your exam.?" he said, invitingly, and yet not obtrusively, and there was nothing in the interest displayed in his face which indicated presumptuous or idle curiosity.

"Yes," said Lucy, blushing faintly; "I am a teacher."

"A governess?" he said.

"No, a teacher," corrected Lucy, with fine emphasis. "I am one of the teachers at the village school. There are only two – I mean teachers. I am the second."

"And do you like being a teacher?" he asked. His voice was as grave as ever, but the expression of interest seemed increasing; the pleasant face looked so pretty and innocent and girlish under the shadow of the big umbrella; the clear, low voice rang so true and sweet. It seemed to the weary city man as if he had stopped to pick up one of the wild flowers from the hedge-row.

"Oh, yes," said Lucy, promptly.

"I thought so by the way you spoke," he said, with a smile; and Lucy laughed and blushed again.

"I like it very much," she said. "But, then, ours is such a nice school, and the girls are all such good girls, aren't they, Jenny?"

"Yes, Miss Lucy," assented Jenny, from under the wrap into which she had nestled.

"Self-praise, eh?" he said.

"Oh, but she is really a very good girl," said Lucy, in a confidential whisper, which seemed to make them more intimate. "They are all good, and so we are both as happy as we can be."

"We both?" he said.

"I mean my fellow-teacher; my principal," said Lucy, "Miss – " She was about to tell him the name, but stopped, remembering that he was a stranger and that Leslie might not like to be so confidential, about herself, at any rate.

"I am very glad you are so happy," he said. "Do you know, I had been on the point of visiting your school."

"You?" said Lucy, opening her eyes with surprise; and, as he noticed, with something else – a faint but unmistakable pleasure.

"Yes," he said. "It belongs to a lady who is a friend of mine. She is kind enough to let me see to some of her business matters."

"The kindness seems to be on the other side," said Lucy, laughing.

Ralph Duncombe colored and found himself laughing too.

"Well," he said, "let us say we are both kind. I was going to explain that she had asked me to do something in connection with the school. I forget what it was now."

"Perhaps it was the roof," said Lucy, eagerly. "It is rather bad in one or two places, and the other morning two or three spots of water came through. Oh, I hope it was the roof!"

"It must have been," he said, with due gravity; "and I will see that it is put right at once. Is there anything else that wants doing, Miss – Miss Lucy, I think you said your name was?"

"Yes, Lucy Somes," she said, thinking hard, and trying to remember if there was anything else wrong at her beloved school. "N-o, I don't think there is anything else the matter, excepting the roof."

"Perhaps I had better come and see for myself, he said, in a matter-of-fact way.

"Are you – an architect?" Lucy inquired, rather timidly.

Ralph Duncombe smiled.

"No; I am nothing nearly so clever. I am only an ordinary business man, very hard worked and very glad to run away from the city and into the fresh air."

"Ah, yes; how you must enjoy it!" said Lucy, with a sympathetic little sigh, "to get away from the crowd and the heat and the smoke."

So they talked, and as Ralph Duncombe listened to the sweet young voice it seemed to him as if there was a power in it to soothe his weary, restless spirit; and when Lucy suddenly exclaimed, as if she were quite surprised that they should have reached the spot so soon, "Why, here is the corner!" he pulled the horse up with evident reluctance.

"I'll drive you around to the school," he said; but Lucy declined, and so earnestly that he could not persist.

He lifted them down, and cut short Lucy's blushing thanks.

"It is I who ought to be, and am very much, obliged to you, Miss Somes," he said, "for you have made one part of my lonely drive very pleasant. I hope you won't be any the worse for your wetting."

"Oh, but I am as dry as a bone – and so is Jenny," said Lucy, blushing still more. "Good-by – and you will not forget the roof?"

"No, no," he said; "but I must come and see it myself."

He sat bolt upright in the cart, watching them as they ran along the road shining with the rain, and a strange feeling took possession of him. How lonely he had been before he saw them! How lonely all his life was! He was rich, fearfully rich, and yet there was not a streak of sunshine in his life. His love for Leslie Lisle had clouded it over as with a pall. Oh! why had the fates dealt with him so unkindly? Why had he not given his heart to some girl like the one who had just left him – one who would have returned his love, and borne for him the sweet name of – wife?

For the first time in his life Ralph Duncombe found himself thinking tenderly and wistfully of some other woman than Leslie Lisle.

He thought of her several times the next day. Her sweet girlish face came between him and a most important letter he was writing; and once during the morning his chief clerk came in and found him – the great city man – sitting with his head leaning on his hands and his eyes fixed vacantly on the window.

When Saturday came around again he remembered that he must go round to White Place to see Lady Eleanor. He had the horse harnessed, and drove along the road, light now with the autumn sunshine, and every inch of the way he thought of Lucy. When, in the afternoon, he reached the corner where he had set her and Jenny down, he pulled up, stared straight in front of him for a moment, then suddenly turned the corner and drove to the school, and his heart beat as it had not beaten since he said good-by to Leslie as he saw Lucy's girlish figure in the garden. She wore a plain cotton frock; a big sun hat, much battered and sunburned, was on her head, and the prettiest and most useless of rakes in her hand. She almost dropped this apology for a tool when she saw him, and the color ran up her cheeks as she came to the gate.

"You have come to see the roof!" she said. "That is kind of you."

"Yes, I have come to see the roof!" he said.

He had forgotten all about it; but he could scarcely say he had come to see her.

"I am so sorry," said Lucy; "but my friend – the principal, you know – is out. She does not often leave the house and garden, even for an hour, excepting to go to church; but I persuaded her to go down to the village this afternoon. I am so very sorry!"

"So am I," responded Ralph, with mendacious politeness. "May I come in?"

"Oh, yes, please!" said Lucy. "But the horse?"

"He will stand till this day week," said Ralph. "But I'll hitch the reins over the palings all the same."

"This way," said Lucy, eagerly; and she led him to the school-room. He stared up at the very small hole in the roof with the deepest gravity apparently; but in reality he was thinking how sweetly pretty the face beside him looked as she upturned to gaze aloft.

"All right," he said, with a laugh. "I'll see that it is put straight. You are sure there is nothing else?"

"N-o," said Lucy, "nothing. Oh, yes! the gate to the meadow is so very old that that the donkey in the next field pushes it open, and – "

"Let us go in and see it," said Ralph, promptly. "We may as well do everything that wants doing at once."

They went to the meadow, and he examined the gate and admired the view across the fields, and on Lucy telling him it was much better from the edge of the wood, he wandered off in that direction, and, somehow or other, they found themselves sitting on the stile that led into the plantation and talking, as Lucy put it afterward, "like old friends" – so much so, indeed, that it was with quite a start that Lucy heard the clock strike five.

"Oh, I have not offered you any tea!" she exclaimed, remorsefully. "Please come into the school-house. My friend will be back by this time, and she will be quite angry at my want of hospitality."

Ralph, picturing to himself a middle-aged school-mistress as the 'principal,' glanced at his watch hesitatingly; but seeing a look of disappointment beginning to cloud Lucy's face, rose promptly.

Why should he not go in to tea with her? It was the last time he would see her, having an opportunity of listening to the sweet young voice; and at the thought a sudden pang shot through his heart. He had spent his life following a will-o'-the-wisp. Leslie Lisle, even if he found her, could never be his. Why should he not ask this pretty, innocent-eyed girl —

"Lucy," he said, suddenly, and yet gently.

She started at the sound of the Christian name, and turned her eyes upon him questioningly.

"Don't be frightened," he said, still more gently, but with an earnest gravity that thrilled her. "And yet I am afraid I shall frighten you. Do you know what it is I am going to ask you? No, you cannot guess. Lucy, since last Saturday I have been thinking of you every day!"

"Of me?" The words left her lips in a whisper, and the color deepened in her cheeks.

"Of you!" he said, fervently. "I love you, Lucy. Will you be my wife?"

She stepped back, her eyes opening wide, her parted lips tremulous. But when he took her hand she did not shrink back further, and she did not attempt to take the hand away.

They wandered hand in hand about the lanes for an hour, while the horse contentedly nibbled at the grass at the bottom of the garden hedge, and during that hour Ralph told her who and what he was – told her everything, indeed, excepting his love for Leslie Lisle – and Lucy was still in 'love's amaze' as they made their way back to the house.

"You must come in, if only for a moment," she said as he was unfastening the reins. "I want to tell her – my fellow-teacher – to – to – to show you to her." Her eyes sunk and her voice trembled. "I know she will be so glad! Besides, I – I couldn't tell her about it all by myself. It is so sudden – so dreadfully sudden – that I should die of shame!" and her face grew crimson as she laughed.

"All right," he said; "I will come in; but it must be only for a moment, Lucy."

She opened the gate, and as she did so something glittering on the path caught her eye.

She stooped and picked it up.

"Why, it's a ring!" she exclaimed – "a gentleman's ring! You must have dropped it as you came in – Ralph."

"Not I!" he said, shaking his head.

He had not worn a ring since – since he had given his to Leslie.

"But you must have done," she said, with charming persistence. "No gentleman has passed this gate excepting you, sir."

He laughed.

"Let me see," he said.

He took the ring, looked at it, and the smile fled from his face, which suddenly went pale. It was the ring he had given Leslie! He stood, dumb with amazement.

"Well?" she said, linking her arm in his, and so intent on the ring that she did not notice his pallor and constraint.

"Yes," he said, and his voice rang out with a strange doubt and trouble – "yes, it is my ring!"

CHAPTER XXXVII.

"POOR GIRL!"

Ralph Duncombe stood looking at the ring as a man looks upon some trinket he has happened on that belonged to some dearly loved friend long since dead. The ring he had given to Leslie! Back in a flash came the memory of that morning he had given it to her. The sea, the beach, the lovely face floated before his eyes and made him giddy. He had just asked this sweet, innocent girl to be his wife; he had no right, no wish to think of Leslie as a lover, and yet – ah, well, in the heart, as in heaven, there are many manoeuvres, and for the moment the old love filled the biggest place in Ralph Duncombe's heart.

"What is the matter?" asked Lucy, with faint wonder at his silence and stillness. "Is it so very precious a ring? Let me look at it. Would you have been very sorry if you had lost it?"

"Very," he said, scarcely knowing what he said.

"How glad I am that I found it! You must have dropped it as you came in. How careless of you!"

"No," he said, bravely; he could no more prevaricate before that sweet innocence than lie outright. "No, Lucy, I did not drop it just now. I parted with it a long while ago, and I have not seen it since until now."

Lucy gazed up at him open-eyed.

"Then how did it come here?" she asked, in an awestruck whisper. "To whom did you give it? A gentleman, of course?"

"No," he said, after a moment's hesitation. "It was to – ."

Before he could add 'a woman,' a voice low and clear, a voice which thrilled him and awoke the echo – thank God, for Lucy's sake – only the echo – of his old passion, was heard in the doorway.

"Lucy, are you there?"

It was Leslie's voice! Ralph Duncombe started, and in the shock of surprise seized Lucy's arm.

"Who is that?" he breathed, in a hushed whisper, his eyes fixed on the doorway.

"Why, how nervous you are!" she said, laughing softly, but a little timidly, for she had seen him start, and felt the pressure of his hand. "Who should it be but my friend, Miss Lisle?"

"Miss – Lisle!" he repeated.

Something in his voice startled Lucy, and she shrank from him the slightest bit in the world. But he noticed it, and he put his arm round her.

"Your – your fellow teacher is called Leslie Lisle?" he said.

"I didn't say 'Leslie,'" said Lucy, half-frightened; "but it is Leslie."

As she spoke, a tall, slim figure in a white dress appeared against the dim background of the open doorway, then came towards them, then stopped.

"Is that you, Lucy? You are not alone – ." As she stopped her eyes glanced quickly from one to the other, dilating as she looked; then her face grew crimson, and she spoke his name: "Ralph!"

"Leslie!" he answered, and made a movement towards her; then, as if suddenly remembering the wondering, frightened girl on his arm, stopped.

"You – you know one another!" said Lucy, at last, in a kind of gasp. "Oh, what does it mean?"

Ralph Duncombe, the ever ready, self-possessed city man, the man whose clerks regarded him as of iron rather than flesh and blood, stood biting his lip, and staring at the white figure motionless and dumb.

But the gods made women quick, and that glance from one to the other had told Leslie all their story. Trembling a little, but outwardly calm, she glided towards them.

"Yes," she said, slowly, distinctly, "Mr. Duncombe and I know each other. We are old, very old friends – ."

"Friends?" fell from Lucy's quivering lips, and spoke doubtfully in her wide-open eyes.

"Yes, dear," said Leslie, softly, "great friends – nothing more." The last two words were breathed rather than spoken, and Lucy's lips opened with a deep sigh of relief, and the hand that had been gradually slipping, slipping from Ralph's arm, tightened again.

"This – this is a surprise, Les – Miss Lisle," he said at last, and his voice sounded almost harsh from his emotion. "Where have you been? What has happened?" he glanced at the black scarf, at the black ribbons on her sleeves, and his voice faltered.

Leslie's head drooped for a moment, then she raised it bravely.

"Yes!" she said, answering his unspoken question. "Months ago. I will tell you about it – presently. Will you both go in? You have something to tell me, I see," and she smiled. "I will come directly. I have lost something – ."

Lucy took Ralph's hand and held it up.

"It is found," she said, and pointed to the ring solemnly. "It was to you he gave it, was it not, Leslie?" and a dark, a terrible fear, a pang almost of jealousy shook her heart.

Leslie motioned to Ralph to be silent, and taking Lucy's hand drew her towards her.

"Yes, Lucy," she said, in a low voice, every word thrilling intensely. "The ring was given to me by Mr. Duncombe. It was given to me as a pledge of friendship. It was a farewell gift. Given without requital; a pledge and a token that if ever I needed the donor's help I had but to send it as a message to find that help. Since the day he gave it to me I have not seen Mr. Duncombe, but I have not forgotten him nor ceased to cherish my ring. And yet," a sad little smile curved her lip. "I have lost it twice – ."

Somehow, these last few words went farther to reassure Lucy than anything else could go. Lovers do not lose their love tokens! If Leslie had cared for Ralph, she would have taken better care of her ring.

"I – I don't understand – ah, yes, I do! I see it all!" she said, with a little sob, and looking from one to the other. "I understand it all! It is very natural," her voice choked a little. "Who could see you, know you, without loving you – ."

"Hush, hush!" whispered Leslie in her ear. "That was so long ago that he has forgotten it. There is only one woman in the world he loves, and she is here!" and she drew Lucy's face against her bosom with a loving pressure.

Ralph Duncombe stood, as a man in such a situation must stand, silent and awkward. It seemed as if both had clean forgotten him, but suddenly Leslie held out her hand to him.

"We have not shaken hands yet," she said, with a little laugh, "and we are keeping you outside in the most inhospitable fashion. Pray come in!" and she went in, still holding Lucy to her.

"Now let me turn up the lamp; how the evenings draw in, do they not? Supper is ready, and – ." Then she broke down, and sinking into a chair, leant her head in her hands.

Lucy knelt beside her and soothed her.

"It is her father she is thinking of," she whispered to Ralph with womanly instinct; she knew that Leslie would have died rather than weep over a lost lover before that lover and the woman who had won him. "It is of her father; the sight of you has brought it all back to her! Oh, how wonderful it all is! To think that you – ."

"I'd better go!" said Ralph, with a man's aptitude at doing the wrong thing.

"No, no! wait till she has got over it. She will be all right in a moment; you don't know how brave she is."

Indeed, almost in a moment Leslie had dried her tears.

"Forgive me!" she murmured penitently. "How selfish you must think me! and I am so full of happiness at her happiness too! And it was to this gentleman – this old friend of mine – you gave the fern root, and it was he who drove you and Jenny home in the rain!"

"Yes! isn't it like a fairy story, Leslie? And you are really glad?" she asked wistfully.

Leslie took the upturned face in her hand.

"Gladder than I have ever been in my life – than I have been for, ah! so long!" she corrected herself. "If I could have chosen your future for you I would have chosen just this that fate has planned. You will make each other very, very happy, I know! Now sit down, Mr. Duncombe. I will promise not to – not to cry again. Lucy, cut some bread. I will be back in a moment."

As she left the room, Lucy stole half timidly up to Ralph.

"Oh, how could you think of me after – after loving her!" she whispered.

He bent his head and kissed her.

"Say no more, Lucy," he said gravely. "Let the past bury its dead. Yes I – I loved her; but she – I was no more to her, never could have been more to her, than just a friend. I know it now; are you satisfied, dearest?"