Page:The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 17.djvu/121

1866.] "Now, first of all," said she, "what answer made you to this?"

"What answer should I make? I pledged my word to be at Bolton at nine of the clock."

"Oh, blind!" sighed Kate. "And I must be out of the room! What shall I do? My dear friend, forgive me: I am a wretched girl. I am to blame. I ought to have dismissed them both, or else decided between them. But who would have thought it would go this length? I did not think Griffith was brave enough. Have pity on me, and help me. Stop this fearful fighting." And now the young creature clung to the man-of-business, and prayed and prayed him earnestly to avert bloodshed.

Mr. Houseman was staggered by this passionate appeal from one who so rarely lost her self-command. He soothed her as well as he could, and said he would do his best,—but added, which was very true, that he thought her interference would be more effective than his own.

"What care these young bloods for an old attorney? I should fare ill, came I between their rapiers. To be sure, I might bind them over to keep the peace. But, Mistress Kate, now be frank with me; then I can serve you better. You love one of these two: that is clear. Which is the man?—that I may know what I am about."

For all her agitation, Kate was on her guard in some things.

"Nay," she faltered, "I love neither,—not to say love them: but I pity him so!"

"Which?"

"Both."

"Ay, Mistress; but which do you pity most?" asked the shrewd lawyer.

"Whichever shall come to harm for my sake," replied the simple girl.

"You could not go to them to-night, and bring them to reason?" asked she, piteously.

She went to the window to see what sort of a night it was. She drew the heavy crimson curtains and opened the window. In rushed a bitter blast laden with flying snow. The window-ledges, too, were clogged with snow, and all the ground was white.

Houseman shuddered, and drew nearer to the blazing logs. Kate closed the window with a groan.

"It is not to be thought of," said she, "at your age, and not a road to be seen for snow. What shall I do?"

"Wait till to-morrow," said Mr. Houseman.

(Procrastination was his daily work, being an attorney.)

"To-morrow!" cried Catharine. "Perhaps to-morrow will be too late. Perhaps even now they have met, and he lies a corpse."

"Who?"

"Whichever it is, I shall end my days in a convent praying for his soul."

She wrung her hands while she said this, and still there was no catching her.

Little did the lawyer think to rouse such a storm with his good news. And now he made a feeble and vain attempt to soothe her, and ended by promising to start the first thing in the morning and get both her testators bound over to keep the peace by noon. With this resolution he went to bed early.

She was glad to be alone, at all events.

Now, mind you, there were plenty of vain and vulgar, yet respectable girls, in Cumberland, who would have been delighted to be fought about, even though bloodshed were to be the result. But this young lady was not vain, but proud. She was sensitive, too, and troubled with a conscience. It reproached her bitterly: it told her she had permitted the addresses of two gentlemen, and so mischief had somehow arisen—out of her levity. Now her life had been uneventful and innocent: this was the very first time she had been connected with anything like a crime, and her remorse was great; so was her grief; but her fears were greater still. The terrible look Griffith had cast at his rival flashed on her; so did his sinister words. She felt, that, if he and Neville met, nothing less than Neville's death or his own would separate them. Suppose that even now one of them lay a corpse,