Part 109

‘You are very hasty and abrupt this morning, I think,’ he faltered.

Paula rose determinedly from the chair. ‘Since you won’t do it, I must,’ she said.

‘No, dearest!--Let me beg you not to!’

‘Sir William De Stancy!’

She moved towards the bell-pull; but he stepped before and intercepted her.

‘You must not ring the bell for that purpose,’ he said with husky deliberateness, looking into the depths of her face.

‘It wants two hours to the time when you might have a right to express such a command as that,’ she said haughtily.

‘I certainly have not the honour to be your husband yet,’ he sadly replied, ‘but surely you can listen? There exist reasons against giving this boy in charge which I could easily get you to admit by explanation; but I would rather, without explanation, have you take my word, when I say that by doing so you are striking a blow against both yourself and me.’

Paula, however, had rung the bell.

‘You are jealous of somebody or something perhaps!’ she said, in tones which showed how fatally all this was telling against the intention of that day. ‘I will not be a party to baseness, if it is to save all my fortune!’

The bell was answered quickly. But De Stancy, though plainly in great misery, did not give up his point. Meeting the servant at the door before he could enter the room he said. ‘It is nothing; you can go again.’

Paula looked at the unhappy baronet in amazement; then turning to the servant, who stood with the door in his hand, said, ‘Tell Thomas to saddle the chestnut, and--’

‘It’s all a mistake,’ insisted De Stancy. ‘Leave the room, James!’

James looked at his mistress.

‘Yes, James, leave the room,’ she calmly said, sitting down. ‘Now what have you to say?’ she asked, when they were again alone. ‘Why must I not issue orders in my own house? Who is this young criminal, that you value his interests higher than my honour? I have delayed for one moment sending my messenger to the chief constable to hear your explanation--only for that.’

‘You will still persevere?’

‘Certainly. Who is he?’

‘Paula... he is my son.’

She remained still as death while one might count ten; then turned her back upon him. ‘I think you had better go away,’ she whispered. ‘You need not come again.’

He did not move. ‘Paula--do you indeed mean this?’ he asked.

‘I do.’

De Stancy walked a few paces, then said in a low voice: ‘Miss Power, I knew--I guessed just now, as soon as it began--that we were going to split on this rock. Well--let it be--it cannot be helped; destiny is supreme. The boy was to be my ruin; he is my ruin, and rightly. But before I go grant me one request. Do not prosecute him. Believe me, I will do everything I can to get him out of your way. He shall annoy you no more.... Do you promise?’

‘I do,’ she said. ‘Now please leave me.’

‘Once more--am I to understand that no marriage is to take place to-day between you and me?’

‘You are.’

Sir William De Stancy left the room. It was noticeable throughout the interview that his manner had not been the manner of a man altogether taken by surprise. During the few preceding days his mood had been that of the gambler seasoned in ill-luck, who adopts pessimist surmises as a safe background to his most sanguine hopes.

She remained alone for some time. Then she rang, and requested that Mr. Wardlaw, her father’s solicitor and friend, would come up to her. A messenger was despatched, not to Mr. Cunningham Haze, but to the parson of the parish, who in his turn sent to the clerk and clerk’s wife, then busy in the church. On receipt of the intelligence the two latter functionaries proceeded to roll up the carpet which had been laid from the door to the gate, put away the kneeling-cushions, locked the doors, and went off to inquire the reason of so strange a countermand. It was soon proclaimed in Markton that the marriage had been postponed for a fortnight in consequence of the bride’s sudden indisposition: and less public emotion was felt than the case might have drawn forth, from the ignorance of the majority of the populace that a wedding had been going to take place at all.

Meanwhile Miss De Stancy had been closeted with Paula for more than an hour. It was a difficult meeting, and a severe test to any friendship but that of the most sterling sort. In the turmoil of her distraction Charlotte had the consolation of knowing that if her act of justice to Somerset at such a moment were the act of a simpleton, it was the only course open to honesty. But Paula’s cheerful serenity in some measure laid her own troubles to rest, till they were reawakened by a rumour--which got wind some weeks later, and quite drowned all other surprises--of the true relation between the vanished clerk of works, Mr. Dare, and the fallen family of De Stancy.