The Story of Antony Grace

“Ah, my dear Miriam!” he exclaimed; “why, my dear girl, you look quite pale.”

I felt very guilty, and as if I were listening purposely to the words passing in the next room; so, taking up a book, I tried to read it, but in spite of my efforts every word came plain and clear, and I heard all.

“I have been a little unwell,” said Miss Carr quietly.

“My poor girl!” he said tenderly. “Ah, you have been away too much! Miriam, dear, I want you to listen to me to-day. When am I to make you my prisoner, and keep you from these errant ways?”

There was no reply, and a dead silence seemed to fall.

“Why, Miriam, darling,” said Mr Lister, in a tender voice, “you are more unwell than I thought for; why not have advice?”

“No, no,” she said hastily. “I am quite well, indeed, John.”

“Then why are you so cold and strange and distant? Have I offended you, darling?”

“Oh no, John; indeed, no.”

“I could not visit you more frequently, Miriam. I could not join you abroad, for, as you know, my circumstances are only moderate, and I have to keep very, very close to the business. Ruddle does not spare me much. Are you annoyed because you think I slight you?”

“Oh no, no, John – indeed no.”

“Yes, that is it,” he cried; “you think I ought to have come down when you were staying at Rowford.”

“Can you not believe me, John,” she said coldly, “when I tell you that there are no grounds for such a charge? You ought to know me better now.”

“I do know you better, my own, my beautiful darling,” he cried passionately; “but you drive me nearly mad. We have been engaged now so many weary months, and yet I seem to occupy no warmer position in your heart than when I first met you. It is dreadful!”

I heard him get up and walk about the room, while she sat perfectly silent.

“You rebuff me,” he cried angrily. “You are cold and distant; my every advance is met by some chilly look. Good heavens! Miriam, are we engaged to be man and wife, or not?”

“You are unjust, John, in your anger,” said Miss Carr in her low, sweet voice. “I do not rebuff you, and I am never intentionally cold. Indeed, I try to meet you as the man who is to be my husband.”

“And lover?” he said, with an almost imperceptible sneer.

“As my husband,” she said quietly; “a holier, greater title far than that of lover. We are not girl and boy, John Lister, and I do not think that you would love and respect me the more for acting like some weak, silly school-girl, who does not know her own mind.”

“She would at least be warmer in her love.”

“But not nearly so lasting,” said Miss Carr, in a low, almost pathetic voice. “I look upon our engagement as so sacred a thing that I think we ought not to hurry on our marriage as you wish. Besides, was it not understood that we should wait awhile?”

“Yes; that was when some tattling fool told you about my losses over that race, and I suppose made out that I was in a hurry to win the heiress, so as to make ducks and drakes of her money.”

“You hurt me,” she said softly; “no one ever hinted at such a degrading idea.”

“Just when a fellow had gone into the thing for once in a way. Of course I was unlucky, and a good job too. If I had won I might have been tempted to try again. Now I have done with racing and betting and the rest of it for ever.”

“I had not thought of that affair, John, when I spoke as I did. I promised you I would forget it, and I had forgotten it, believe me.”

“Oh yes, of course,” he said bitterly.

“I am speaking frankly and openly to you, John,” continued Miss Carr gently; “and I want you to think as I do, that, in taking so grave a step as that which joins two people together for life, it should be taken only as one makes a step from which there is no recall.”

“Miriam!” he exclaimed, and he seemed to stop short in front of her, “I am a hot, impetuous fellow, and I love you passionately, as you know, and have known since the day when first we met. Have I ever given up the pursuit?”

“No,” she said, half-laughingly. “You did not let me rest, nor did our friends, until we were engaged.”

“Of course not. There, come now, you look more like your own dear self. I want to ask you a question.”

“Yes, John. What is it?”

He cleared his voice and hesitated, but only to speak out firmly at last.

“Do you think – have you ever thought me such a cur that I wanted you for the sake of your money?”

“John, this is the second time that you have brought up my fortune to-day. There is no need to answer such a question.”

“But I beg – I desire – I insist upon knowing,” he cried passionately.

“You have your answer in the fact that you are standing before me talking as you are. If I believed for an instant that you had such sordid thoughts, our engagement would be at an end. I would sooner give you the money than be your wife.”

“Of course, yes: of course, my own dear, noble girl!” he cried excitedly. “Then why all this waiting – why keep me at arm’s length? Come now, darling, let us settle it at once.”

“No, John,” she said calmly. “I cannot yet consent.”

“Your old excuse,” he cried, striding up and down the room.

“I never held out hopes to you that it would be soon,” she replied; and I felt that she must be looking at him wistfully.

“But why – why all this waiting, dear?” he said, evidently struggling with his anger, and striving to speak calmly.

“I have told you again and again, dear John, my sole reason.”

“And what is that?” he said bitterly; “it must have been so trifling that I forget it.”

“You do not forget it, indeed,” she said tenderly. “I ask you to wait, because I wish, when I marry you, to be sure that I am offering you a true and loving wife.”

“Oh, if that’s all,” he said laughingly, “I’m satisfied as you are; and on my soul, Miriam, I wish you had not a penny, so that all ideas of self-interest might be set aside!”

“They are set aside, dear John,” she said calmly.

“Well then, love, let there be an end to this miserable waiting and disappointment. If I did not know thoroughly your sweet disposition, and that you are so far above all silly coquettish ways, I should say that you were trifling with me, to make me more eager for the day.”

“You know me better.”

“I do, my darling,” he said in a low impassioned voice, which I heard quite plainly, though I had gone to the window and was looking out into the street. “Then let us settle it at once. I am in your hands, Miriam, as I have been from the day I first set eyes upon you. At present I am wretched – miserable – my whole thoughts are of you, and I feel at times half-mad – that I cannot wait. Do you wish to torture me?”

“No.”