Only a Girl's Love. Garvice Charles
at him. Speechless from the sheer breathlessness of furious hate he stood and looked at the tall, velvet-clad figure.
Stella was the first to break the silence.
"Oh, my lord!" she said.
At the sound of her reproachful voice, Lord Leycester's face paled.
"Forgive me," he said, humbly. "I beg—I crave your forgiveness; but I thought you were in danger, you were—you were!" Then, at the thought, his fiery passion broke out again, and he turned to the silent, white-faced Jasper. "What the devil do you mean by riding in that fashion?"
Jasper Adelstone's lips moved, and at last speech came.
"You shall answer for this, Lord Leycester."
It was the worst word he could have said.
In an instant all Lord Leycester's repentances fled.
With a smothered oath on his lips, he advanced toward him.
"What! Is that all you have to say? Do you know, you miserable wretch, that you nearly rode over this lady—yes, rode over her? Answer for it! Confound you——" and he raised his arm.
But Stella, all her wits on the qui vive, was in time, and her own arms were wound about his, on which the muscles stood thick and prominent—like iron bands.
With a gesture he became calm again, and there was a mute prayer for pardon in his eyes as he looked at her.
"Do not be afraid," he murmured, between his lips; "I will not hurt him. No, no."
Then he pointed to the horse.
"Mount, sir, and get out of my sight. Stop!" and the fiery passion broke out again. "No, by Heaven, you shall not, until you have begged the lady's pardon."
"No, no!" said Stella.
"But I say 'Yes!'" said Lord Leycester, his eyes blazing. "Is every tailor to ride through the Chase and knock down whom he will? Ask for pardon, sir, or——"
Jasper stood looking from one to the other.
"No, no!" said Stella. "It was all an accident. Please, pray do not say another word. Mr. Adelstone, I beg you will go without another word."
Jasper Adelstone hesitated for a moment.
"Miss Stella," he said, hoarsely.
Alas! it was oil on the smoldering fire.
"Miss Stella!" exclaimed Lord Leycester. "Who gave you the right to address this lady by her Christian name, sir?"
Jasper bit his lip.
"Miss Etheridge, you cannot doubt that I am heartily sorry that this unpleasant contretemps should have been caused by my carelessness. I was riding carelessly——"
"Like an idiot!" broke in Lord Leycester.
"And did not see you. No harm would have resulted, however, if this man—if Lord Leycester Wyndward had not, with brutal force, thrown me from the saddle. I should have seen you in time, and, as I say, no harm would have been done. All that has occurred is this man—Lord Leycester Wyndward's—fault. Again I beg your pardon."
And he bent his head before her. But as he did so a malignant gleam shot out of his eyes in the direction of the tall, stalwart figure and white, passionate face.
"No, no, there is no occasion!" said Stella, trembling. "I do not want you to beg my pardon. It was only an accident. You did not expect to see anyone here—I—I—oh, I wish I had not come."
Lord Leycester started.
"Do not say that," he murmured.
Then aloud:
"Here is your horse, sir; mount him and go home, and thank your stars the lady has escaped without a broken limb."
Jasper stood a moment looking at him, then, with another inclination of the head, he slowly mounted the horse.
Lord Leycester, his passion gone, stood calm and motionless for a moment, then raised his hat with an old-world gesture.
"Good-day to you, and remember to ride more carefully in future."
Jasper Adelstone looked down at him with a malignant smile on his thin lips.
"Good-day, my lord. I shall remember. I am not one to forget. No, I am not one to forget," and striking spurs into the horse, he rode off.
CHAPTER IX.
"Who is 'Lenore,' uncle?"
It was the evening of the same day—a day never to be forgotten by Stella, a day marked with a white stone in her mental calendar. Never would she be able to look upon a field of primroses, never hear the music of the river running over the weir, without remembering this morning the first she had spent with Lord Leycester.
It was evening now, and the two—the painter and the girl—were sitting by the open window, looking out into the gloaming, he lost in memory, she going over and over again the incidents of the morning, from the visit of Mr. Jasper Adelstone to his encounter with Lord Leycester.
It was strange, it was almost phenomenal—for Stella was frankness and candor itself—that she had said nothing of the encounter to her uncle; once or twice she had opened her lips—once at dinner, and once again as she sat beside him, leaning her arm on his chair while he smoked his pipe—she had opened her lips to tell him of that sudden outburst of fury on the part of Lord Leycester—that passionate rage which proved all that the painter had said of his hot temper to be true, but she had found some difficulty in the recital which had kept her silent.
She had told him of her walk in the woods, had told him of her meeting with Lady Lilian, but of that passionate encounter between the two men she said nothing.
When Jasper had ridden on, pale and livid with suppressed passion, Lord Leycester had stood looking at her in silence. Now, as she sat looking into the gloaming, she saw him in her mind's eye still, his beautiful eyes eloquent with remorse and humility, his clear-cut lip quivering with the sense of his weakness.
"Will you forgive me?" he said, at last, and that was all. Without another word, he had offered to help her into the boat, help which Stella had disregarded, and had rowed her across to her uncle. Without a word, but with the same penitent, imploring look in his eyes, he raised his hat and left her—had gone home to the Hall, to his sister Lady Lilian, and to Lenore.
Ever since she had heard the name drop softly from Lady Lilian's lips it had rung in her ears. There was a subtle kind of charm about it that half fascinated, half annoyed her.
And now, leaning her head on her arm, and with her dark eyes fixed on the stars which glittered merrily in the sky, she put the question:
"Who is Lenore, uncle?"
He stirred in his chair and looked at her absently.
"Lenore, Lenore? I don't know, Stella, and yet the name sounds familiar. Where did you hear it? It's scarcely fair to spring a question like that on me; you might ask me who is Julia, Louisa, Anna Maria——"
Stella laughed softly.
"I heard it this morning, uncle. Lady Lilian told her brother as she left us that 'Lenore had come.'"
"Ah, yes," he said. "Now I know. So she has come, has she? Who is Lenore?" and he smiled. "There is scarcely another woman in England who would need to ask that question, Stella."
"No?" she said, turning her eyes upon him with surprise. "Why? Is she so famous?"
"Exactly, yes; that is just the word. She is famous."
"For what, uncle? Is she a great actress, painter, musician—what?"