"You frighten me. I can hardly understand. I must go now; they will think that I am lost."
He rose with her, and stood by her side.
"You will keep the ring, Doris, for my sake, in memory of the time when I first saw you?"
"I will keep it," she replied, hastily. "Oh, Lord Vivianne, let me go; I am frightened – this is so different to being with Earle. Let me go."
"You will meet me again," he urged, "say on Friday – you will not refuse – at this same time and same place? I will lavish the luxury of the whole world on you, if you will only care for me."
But now that her ambition was satisfied, was realized, she was frightened at her own success, and hastened away.
CHAPTER XXV
THE FALSE LIPS OF WOMAN
Earle was not the only one who found Doris changed. She had hastened home from that interview almost wild with excitement. Could it be that the wildest dream of her life was realized at last; that this handsome lord had offered her every luxury in the world; it seemed too bright a vision to be real; she was obliged to look again at the diamond on her finger to convince herself of its truth.
Mark Brace and his wife, as well as Mattie, wondered when Doris reached home, where her animation and high spirits had gone. Mattie spoke, and she seemed hardly to hear her; her mother asked her some trifling question and she made no answer. She was like one in a dream. As a rule she was the delight and torment of Mark's life. As they sat together in the evening, she would puzzle him with questions – she would tease, irritate, charm, and annoy him. But on this night Doris said no word, and Mark fancied it was because Earle was away. He sat looking at her with great solemn eyes, wondering who could fathom the mysteries of a woman's heart. He had never thought Doris fond of Earle, yet there she was, wretched, miserable, and lonely, because he was away.
How little he guessed that in her mind Earle was already of the past. She had loved him as well as it was in her power to love any one, but that was not much; and now that the grand temptation of her life was before her all regard for Earle sank into insignificance. She was faint with wonder, and amazed that she, Doris Brace should have made such a conquest; her heart beat with delight, then sank with fear. Was he only trifling with her, this handsome lord? Her face flushed proudly.
"If I thought he was only trifling with me," she said to herself, "I should know how to treat him."
Then one look at the jewel on her finger reassured her.
"Gentlemen do not give jewels that cost hundreds of pounds unless they really love and intend marriage."
There was some assurance of success in the gleam of the diamond. She had been obliged to remove the ring lest her mother and Mattie might see it.
On the morning following Earle hastened to Brackenside. He was longing to see his lady-love again; she was so kind to him when they parted – she had been so unusually gentle that he had longed for more kindness. He was at Brackenside before the breakfast was finished. One look at the beautiful face of his love sufficed; she was dreamy, abstracted; she seemed hardly to notice his entrance. No light came in her eyes as she spoke to him; she did not make room for him by her side. When he went up to her and tried to kiss the face he loved so well, she drew back, not angrily, but carelessly.
"I never said you might kiss me every day, Earle," she said.
"I know, my darling, but I cannot help it. It has grown into a custom now."
"When anything becomes a custom it ceases to be a charm," she said, with unconscious philosophy.
Earle looked down sadly at her.
"Doris," he said, "you are so sadly changed to me, I cannot understand it, dear. You say that I have not displeased you?"
"No," she said, carelessly, "I am not in the least displeased."
"Then, what have I done, my darling? I love you too madly to suffer anything to come between us. If I could win your love by dying for it, I would cheerfully die. Tell me what I can do to make you as you were once to me?"
She raised her head impatiently.
"You are always talking nonsense, Earle. I cannot regulate my words and thoughts as I would regulate a clock. I cannot undertake to be always the same."
"You are charming, but your variety used to be one of your greatest charms. I do not complain of that – the summer sky changes; it goes from crimson to blue, and then white – you changed from grave to gay, and in each mood you seemed to me most charming. It is not that now."
"What is it, then?" she asked.
He looked so wistfully at her that, if she had had any heart, it must have been touched.
"I can hardly tell – I dare not even to myself say what your manner seems to me. Doris, you cannot surely repent of having promised to marry me – it cannot be that?"
His honest eyes grew so dim with pain – his face grew so white – she would sooner, heartless coquette as she was, have stabbed him to the heart than have answered "Yes." She turned away from him.
"I suppose you cannot help talking nonsense, Earle? I am not sentimental myself, and so much of it wearies me. When you can talk about anything else I shall be glad."
As soon as she could she quitted the room, and Earle was at a loss to know what to do or say. He tried to comfort himself.
"She is so beautiful, my darling," he said, tenderly, "and beauty is always capricious; it is but the caprice of a young girl. I must be patient." He tried to school himself to patience, but he felt unutterably sad. There was something in her manner he could not understand. "I know what lovers' quarrels are," he thought to himself – "they are the renewal of love; but I cannot understand this dark, cold shadow which comes between us, and seems to hide from me the beauty and light of her face."
He went out and tried to interest himself in his work, thinking to himself that her mood would soon change, and then the sun would shine for him again. But he found work impossible; he could think of nothing else but the loved one's face with the shadow on it.
He went through the meadows, and stood leaning over the gate. When Mattie saw him she watched him for some minutes in silence, her sweet, homely face full of wistful anxiety, her eyes full of tenderest love. To her simple mind he was as far above her as the angels were; but she loved him as she never loved any one else. She had feared greatly for him, and it had been some relief to her to find that Doris had really promised to marry him and intended to keep her word. It was the first time since she had heard the news of the engagement that she had seen that look of doubt, almost despair, on his face, and it troubled her greatly.
"What can have happened?" she said to herself; then, with a sudden sense of foreboding, it seemed to her what she had always dreaded had come at last.
Involuntarily the girl clasped her hands: "God save Earle!" she said; then she went up to him.
She spoke twice to him before he heard her; then she started in alarm as the white face, with its expression of bitter sorrow, was turned to her.
"Earle, what has happened?"
"Nothing," he replied. Then the sweet, mild, sympathizing face reproached him with kindness. "Nothing has happened, Mattie," he said, "but I am not happy; I am afraid that I have grieved Doris."
"What
