Lemorne Versus Huell | Page 7

as sad as death."
"How do you call me 'Margaret?'"
"As I would call my wife--Margaret."
He rose and stood before me to screen my face from observation. I supposed so, and endeavored to stifle my agitation.
"You are better," he said, presently. "Come go with me and get some refreshment." And he beckoned to Mrs. Bliss, who was down the hall with an unwieldy gentleman.
"Will you go to supper now?" she asked. "We are only waiting for you," Mr. Uxbridge answered, offering me his arm.
When we emerged into the blaze and glitter of the supper-room I sought refuge in the shadow of Mrs. Bliss's companion, for it seemed to me that I had lost my own.
"Drink this Champagne," said Mr. Uxbridge. "Pay no attention to the Colonel on your left; he won't expect it."
"Neither must you."
"Drink."
The Champagne did not prevent me from reflecting on the fact that he had not yet asked whether I loved him.
The spirit chorus again floated through my mind:
"Where lovers, Deep in thought, *Give* themselves for life."
I was not allowed to *give* myself--I was *taken*.
"No heel-taps," he whispered, "to the bottom quaff."
"Take me home, will you?"
"Mrs. Bliss is not ready."
"Tell her that I must go."
He went behind her chair and whispered something, and she nodded to me to go without her.
When her carriage came up, I think he gave the coachman an order to drive home in a round-about way, for we were a long time reaching it. I kept my face to the window, and he made no effort to divert my attention. When we came to a street whose thick rows of trees shut out the moonlight my eager soul longed to leap out into the dark and demand of him his heart, soul, life, for *me*.
I struck him lightly on the shoulder; he seized my hand.
"Oh, I know you, Margaret; you are mine!"
"We are at the hotel."
He sent the carriage back, and said that he would leave me at my aunt's door. He wished that he could see her then. Was it magic that made her open the door before I reached it?
"Have you come on legal business?" she asked him.
"You have divined what I come for."
"Step in, step in; it's very late. I should have been in bed but for neuralgia. Did Mr. Uxbridge come home with you, Margaret?"
"Yes, in Mrs. Bliss's carriage; I wished to come before she was ready to leave."
"Well, Mr. Uxbridge is old enough for your protector, certainly."
"I *am* forty, ma'am."
"Do you want Margaret?"
"I do."
"You know exactly how much is involved in your client's suit?"
"Exactly."
"You know also that his claim is an unjust one."
"Do I?"
"I shall not be poor if I lose; if I gain, Margaret will be rich."
"'Margaret will be rich,'" he repeated, absently.
"What! have you changed your mind respecting the orphans, aunt?"
"She has, and is--nothing," she went on, not heeding my remark. "Her father married below his station; when he died his wife fell back to her place--for he spent his fortune--and there she and Margaret must remain, unless Lemorne is defeated."
"Aunt, for your succinct biography of my position many thanks."
"Sixty thousand dollars," she continued. "Van Horn tells me that, as yet, the firm of Uxbridge Brothers have only an income--no capital."
"It is true," he answered, musingly.
The clock on the mantle struck two.
"A thousand dollars for every year of my life," she said. "You and I, Uxbridge, know the value and beauty of money.
"Yes, there is beauty in money, and"--looking at me--"beauty without it."
"The striking of the clock," I soliloquized, "proves that this scene is not a phantasm."
"Margaret is fatigued," he said, rising. "May I come to-morrow?"
"It is my part only," replied Aunt Eliza, "to see that she is, or is not, Cinderella."
"If you have ever thought of me, aunt, as an individual, you must have seen that I am not averse to ashes."
He held my hand a moment, and then kissed me with a kiss of appropriation.
"He is in love with you," she said, after he had gone. "I think I know him. He has found beauty ignorant of itself; he will teach you to develop it."
The next morning Mr. Uxbridge had an interview with Aunt Eliza before he saw me.
When we were alone I asked him how her eccentricities affected him; he could not but consider her violent, prejudiced, warped, and whimsical. I told him that I had been taught to accept all that she did on this basis. Would this explain to him my silence in regard to her?
"Can you endure to live with her in Bond Street for the present, or would you rather return to Waterbury?"
"She desires my company while she is in Newport only. I have never been with her so long before."
"I understand her. Law is a game, in her estimation, in which cheating can as easily be carried on as at