"Don't be so sad, sir," she murmured, cooing like the gentlest of doves.
"I can't bear to see you look like that."Alfred looked up, and met her full with his mournful honest eyes. "Ah, Hannah, how can I be anything but sad, imprisoned here, sane amongst the mad?""Well, and so am I, sir; so is Mrs. Archbold herself.""Ay, but you have not been entrapped, imprisoned on your wedding-day. Icannot even get a word sent to my Julia, my wife that ought to be. Only think of the affront they have made me put on her I love better, ten times better, than myself. Why, she must have been waiting for me;humiliated perhaps by my absence. What will she think of me? The rogues will tell her a thousand lies: she is very high spirited, Hannah, impetuous like myself, only so gentle and so good. Oh, my angel, my angel; I shall lose you for ever."Hannah clasped her hands, with tears in her eyes: "No, no," she cried;"it is a burning shame to part true lovers like you and her. Hush! speak low. Brown told me you are as well as he is.""God bless him for it, then.""You have got money, they say; try it on with Brown.""I will. Oh you darling. What is the matter?"For Baby-face was beginning to whimper.
"Oh, nothing, sir; only you are so glad to go; and we shall be sorry to part with you: but you won't care for that--oh! oh! oh!""What, do you think I shall forget you and your kindness? Never: I'll square accounts with friends and foes; not one shall be forgotten.""Don't offer me any of your money," sobbed Hannah, "for I wouldn't touch it. Good-bye," said she: "I shan't have as much as a kiss for it I'll be bound: good-bye," said she again, and never moved.
"Oh, won't you, though," cried Alfred gaily. "What is that? and that? and that? Now, what on earth are you crying about? Dry your tears, you dear good-hearted girl: no, I'll dry them for you."He took out a white handkerchief and dried her cheeks gently for her, and gave her a parting kiss. But the Archbold's patience was exhausted: a door opened nearly opposite, and there she stood yellow with jealousy and sombre as night with her ebon brows. At sight of this lowering figure Hannah uttered a squawk, and fled with cheeks red as fire. Alfred, not aware of Mrs. Archbold's smouldering passion, and little dreaming that jealous anguish and rage stood incarnate before him, burst out laughing like a mischievous boy! On this she swept upon him, and took him by both shoulders, and awed him with her lowering brows close to his. "You ungrateful wretch," she said violently, and panted.
His colour rose. "Ungrateful? That I am not madam. Why do you call me so?""You are--you are. What have I done to you that you run from me to the very servants? However, she shall be packed off this very night, and you to thank for it."This was the way to wound the generous youth. "Now it is you that are ungenerous," he said. "What harm has the poor girl done? She had a virtuous movement and pitied me for the heartless fraud I suffer by; that is all. Pray, do you never pity me?""Was it this virtuous movement set her kissing you?" said the Archbold, clenching her teeth as if the word stung her, like the sight.
"She didn't, now," said Alfred; "it was I kissed her.""And yet you pretend to love your Julia so truly?""This is no place for that sacred name, madam. But be sure I have no secrets from her, and kiss nobody she would not kiss herself.""She must be a very accommodating young lady."At this insult Alfred rose pale with anger, and was about to defy his monitor mortally; but the quick-witted woman saw and disarmed him. In one moment, before ever he could speak, she was a transformed creature, a penitent; she put her hands together supplicatingly, and murmured--"I didn't mean it; I respect _her;_ and your love for her; forgive me, Alfred: I am so unhappy, oh forgive me.
And behold she held his hand between her soft, burning palms, and her proud head sank languidly on his shoulder, and the inevitable tears ran gently.
Morals apart, it was glorious love-making.
"Bother the woman," thought Alfred.
"Promise me not to do it again," she murmured, "and the girl shall stay.""Oh, lord, yes, I promise; though I can't see what it matters to you.""Not much, cruel boy, alas! but it matters to her; for----" She kissed Alfred's hand gently, and rose to her feet and moved away; but at the second step turned her head sudden as a bird and finished her sentence--"if you kiss her before me, I shall kill her before you."Here was a fresh complication! The men had left off blistering, torturing, and bullying him; but his guardian angels, the women, were turning up their sleeves to pull caps over him, and plenty of the random scratches would fall on him. If anything could have made him pine more to be out of the horrid place, this voluptuous prospect would. He hunted everywhere for Brown. But he was away the day with a patient. At night he lay awake for a long time, thinking how he should open the negotiation.
He shrank from it. He felt a delicacy about bribing Beelzebub's servant to betray him.
As Hannah had originated the idea, he thought he might very well ask her to do the dirty work of bribing Brown, and he would pay her for it; only in money, not kisses. With this resolution he sank to sleep, and his spirit broke prison: he stood with Julia before the altar, and the priest made them one. Then the church and the company and daylight disappeared, and her own sweet low moving voice came thrilling, "My own, own, own,"she murmured. "I love you ten times more for all you have endured for me;" and with this her sweet lips settled on his like the dew.