Aprils Lady | Page 7

that they----" she pauses.
"No. They couldn't make me their heir. The property is strictly entailed (what is left of it); you need not make yourself miserable imagining you have done me out of anything more than their good-will. George will inherit whatever he has left them to leave."
"It is sad," says she, with downcast eyes.
"Yes. He has been a constant source of annoyance to them ever since he left Eton."
"Where is he now?"
"Abroad, I believe. In Italy, somewhere, or France--not far from a gaming table, you may be sure. But I know nothing very exactly, as he does not correspond with me, and that letter of this morning is the first I have received from my father for four years."
"He must, indeed, hate me," says she, in a low tone. "His elder son such a failure, and you--he considers you a failure, too."
"Well, I don't consider myself so," says he, gaily.
"They were in want of money, and you--you married a girl without a penny."
"I married a girl who was in herself a mine of gold," returns he, laying his hands on her shoulders and giving her a little shake. "Come, never mind that letter, darling; what does it matter when all is said and done?"
"The first after all these years; and the, last--you remember it? It was terrible. Am I unreasonable if I remember it?"
"It was a cruel letter," says he slowly; "to forget it would be impossible, either for you or me. But, as I said just now, how does it affect us? You have me, and I have you; and they, those foolish old people, they have----" He pauses abruptly, and then goes on in a changed tone, "their memories."
"Oh! and sad ones!" cries she, sharply, as if hurt. "It is a terrible picture you have conjured up. You and I so happy, and they--Oh! poor old people!"
"They have wronged you--slighted you--ill-treated you," says he, looking at her.
"But they are unhappy; they must be wretched always about your brother, their first child. Oh! what a grief is theirs!"
"What a heart is yours!" says he, drawing her to him. "Barbara! surely I shall not die until they have met you, and learned why I love you."
CHAPTER III.
"It was a lover and his lass With a hey and a ho, and a hey-nonino! That o'er the green cornfield did pass In the Spring-time, the only pretty ring-time, When birds do sing hey-ding-a-ding, Sweet lovers love the Spring."
Joyce is running through the garden, all the sweet wild winds of heaven playing round her. They are a little wild still. It is the end of lovely May, but though languid Summer is almost with us, a suspicion of her more sparkling sister Spring fills all the air.
Miss Kavanagh has caught up the tail of her gown, and is flying as if for dear life. Behind her come the foe, fast and furious. Tommy, indeed, is now dangerously close at her heels, armed with a ferocious-looking garden fork, his face crimson, his eyes glowing with the ardor of the chase; Mabel, much in the background, is making a bad third.
Miss Kavanagh is growing distinctly out of breath. In another moment Tommy will have her. By this time he has fully worked himself into the belief that he is a Red Indian, and she his lawful prey, and is prepared to make a tomahawk of his fork, and having felled her, to scalp her somehow, when Providence shows her a corner round a rhododendron bush that may save her for the moment. She makes for it, gains it, turns it, dashes round it, and all but precipitates herself into the arms of a young man who has been walking leisurely towards her.
He is a tall young man, not strictly handsome, but decidedly good to look at, with honest hazel eyes, and a shapely head, and altogether very well set up. As a rule he is one of the most cheerful people alive, and a tremendous favorite in his regiment, the ---- Hussars, though just now it might suggest itself to the intelligent observer that he considers he has been hardly used. A very little more haste, and that precipitation must have taken place. He had made an instinctive movement towards her with protective arms outstretched; but though a little cry had escaped her, she had maintained her balance, and now stands looking at him with laughing eyes, and panting breath, and two pretty hands pressed against her bosom.
Mr. Dysart lets his disappointed arms fall to his sides, and assumes the aggrieved air of one who has been done out of a good thing.
"You!" says she, when at last she can speak.
"I suppose so," returns he discontentedly. He might just as well have been anyone else, or anywhere else--such a chance--and gone!
"Never were you so