A Fair Mystery: The Story of a Coquette. Charlotte M. Brame
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 have you done to her?" she asked, briefly.
"That is what I want to find out and cannot," he replied. "Tell me, Mattie, have you noticed a change in her?"
"Yes," replied the young girl, gravely, "I have, Earle, ever since the day she went to the Castle. I wish she had never seen it. We were very happy until then."
"Yes, we were happy," he replied sadly. "What has changed her, Mattie? Tell me truthfully; never mind about giving me pain."
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