A Manifest Destiny. Julia Magruder
itself, and has written me the dearest, lovingest letters that ever a woman had. If they have been a little rarer and colder lately, it is only because of my own shortcomings toward him. I shall try to atone for them now. Since I realize how great an injury I have done to him, I shall try to be his compensation for it.”
“And you think you will succeed? I doubt it.”
Something in his manner impressed her in spite of herself. Perhaps he saw that it was so, for he pushed his advantage.
“Compare the length and opportunities of my intercourse with him and yours,” he said. “You would be acting the part of absolute folly not to listen to me now. In the end you will be as free to act as you were in the beginning. Only let me remind you that his future is involved as well as your own.”
He saw that this argument told.
“I am willing to listen,” she said.
“I am grateful to you,” he answered, with that air of finished politeness which makes the best graces of a young man seem crude, and which Bettina was not too ignorant to appreciate at its proper value.
“I have known Horace as child and boy and man—if he may yet be called a man,” he said, with a light touch of scorn. “You have known him in one capacity and state only—that of a lover, a rôle he can no doubt play very prettily, and one in which, despite his youth, he is far from being unpractised. He has been in love oftener than it behooves me to say or you to hear—quite harmless affairs, of course, but they prove to one who has watched him as I have that his nature is fickle and capricious. I confess that when I heard you say, just now, that his letters of late had been rarer and less ardent, I could not wholly attribute it to the reason which so quickly satisfied you. As a rule, these intensely ardent feelings are not of long duration, and I know well both the intensity and the brevity of Horace’s attacks of love. It was for this very reason that I so resented the idea of his marrying without my advice. I foresaw that he would soon weary of any woman. All the more reason, therefore, for his choosing one who was suited to him, apart from the matter of his loving her. I knew he had not the staying quality—that he was quite incapable of a sustained affection. I therefore considered his taste in the matter less than my own. As he was my heir in the event of my not marrying, I felt that I had the right to demand that he should marry suitably to his position.”
“I regret that he should have made an engagement which has disappointed you,” said Bettina, a slight curl at the corners of her lips.
“I regret it also; but you may remember that at the beginning of this interview I spoke of this mistake on your part and on his as great, though not perhaps irreparable.”
He was looking at her keenly, and he saw that his words had no effect upon her except to mystify her.
“I do not see any way to its reparation,” she said, and was about to continue, when he interrupted her.
“I have pointed out the way—a rupture of the engagement by mutual consent.”
“A consent that he would never give,” said Bettina, with a certain pride of confidence.
“And you?” he asked.
“Nor I either,” she said, “unless I were convinced that he wished it.”
“It would perhaps be not impossible to convince you of that, granted a little time,” said Lord Hurdly. “But, apart from his wish, have you no consideration for his interest? His position in diplomacy is at present insignificant, but he has talents and a chance to rise, unless that chance be utterly frustrated by his embarrassing himself with a family—a condition that would be death to his career. Ask any one you choose, and they will tell you that there cannot be two opinions about this. Besides, through my help he has been able to live like a man of fortune. His allowance, however, will be stopped on the day of his marriage, if he persists in such a course. If he abandons it, he will find himself with the principal as well as the interest at his disposal. So situated, he has every chance to rise. Under the other conditions, he inevitably falls. What would become of him ultimately is too dreary a line of conjecture to dwell upon.”
Bettina’s face was paler still. The tears sprang to her eyes—tears of mortification and keen regret. The thought of her mother pierced through her, and the consciousness that she had no longer the refuge of that gentle heart to cast herself upon almost overcame her. Pride lent her aid, however, and she rallied quickly.
“You have fully demonstrated to me,” she said, “that I have injured your cousin in promising to marry him. I did it in ignorance, however. With the facts before me which you have just given, I should perhaps have acted differently. Regret now, however, is useless.”
“On the contrary, this is one of the rare cases in which regret is not useless. The reparation of your mistake is in your own hands.”
The possibility of doing what he urged flashed through Bettina’s mind. Horace would certainly be infinitely better off without her, in every rational and material sense; and at this stage of Bettina’s development the rational and material were predominant. But what of her, apart from Horace? This thought found vent in words.
“You have been looking at this subject from your own point of view,” she said, “and perhaps naturally. I must, however, think of an aspect of the case in which you have no interest. I am absolutely alone in the world, and if, for your cousin’s sake, I made this sacrifice—”
In spite of herself her voice faltered.
Lord Hurdly drew his chair a little nearer to her. His eyes were fixed upon her with a yet more intent gaze as he said, with directness and decision:
“You are quite mistaken. It is this aspect of the case which concerns me chiefly. If, as is undoubtedly true, the prevention of this most mistaken marriage would be an advantage to Horace, to you it may be a far greater gain, and to me it may be the fulfilment of all that I have ever desired in life.”
“What do you mean?” she said, bewildered.
“I mean that the supreme desire of my heart is, and has been from the moment my eyes rested on you, to make you Lady Hurdly absolutely and at once, instead of your waiting for a name and position which, after all, may never come to you.”
Her heart beat so that her breathing came in smothered gasps. The piercing demand of his eyes was almost terrifying to her. She saw that he was absolutely in earnest, and the commiseration which she felt for Horace struggled with the dazzling temptation which this opportunity offered to that strong ambition which was so great an element in her essential nature.
“Do not be shocked or startled by the suddenness of my proposal,” he said. “I trust that you will come to see that it is eminently wise and reasonable. When I said the marriage was an unsuitable one, I was thinking more of you than of Horace. Your beauty, your manner, your voice, your words, your whole ego and personality, show you to have been born for a great position. It is a case of manifest destiny. The fortune and the social rank that I can bestow are all too little for you; I should like to be able to put a queen’s crown on your beautiful head. But such as I am—a man who has made his impression on the current history of his country, and who, though no longer young in the crude sense that counts only by months and years, is still by no means old—and such things as I have and can command, I lay at your feet, begging you humbly to impart to them a value which they have never had before, by accepting them and becoming the sharer of my name, my position, and my fortune, and the mistress of my heart.”
He had risen and was standing in front of her with the resolution of a strong purpose in his eyes. But she could not meet them, those dominating, searching eyes. The thoughts that his words had given rise to were too agitating, too uncertain, too tormenting to her. The thought of giving Horace up pained her more than she would have believed, while the vision of the grandeur so urged upon her, which not ten minutes gone she had seen dashed like a full beaker from her thirsty lips, tormented her as well. It was to her a vast sacrifice to think of resigning such possibilities, yet at the first she had no other thought but to resign