Lord Loveland Discovers America. C. N. Williamson
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"It's no use pretending not to understand. I know what you want me to think you mean."
"If I never knew before how much I do mean it, I know now, when I've got to say 'goodbye.'"
"You needn't say it."
"You've tried hard to keep me from saying it, haven't you? But look here, Lesley—do look at me. I'm awfully cut up at leaving you."
"You're not to call me Lesley."
"You can't prevent my calling you Lesley to myself."
"You'll soon forget the name."
"Never. I can never forget you—worse luck. The thought of you is going to come between me and—other things."
"The thought must learn better manners. Not to 'butt in,' as we say over here. Oh, it will soon be tamed. You'll have so much to do."
"I hope I shall," said Loveland. "I say, are you going to forget me as soon as we're parted?"
The girl was silent for a moment. Then she laughed. Yet her laugh had not quite the frank lightheartedness which was usually one of its charms. "I shall make a note of you for my next story but one," she answered.
"You're not very kind."
"Are you sure you deserve kindness?"
"I'm sure I want it—from you."
"How you have always got what you wanted in your life, haven't you—one way or another?"
"Life wouldn't be worth living if one didn't."
"Oh, it's not much good saying to you that that's a selfish way of looking at life. But you've never had any lessons, and I suppose you never will have. You'll go on getting what you want, and taking it for granted that you ought to get it, till the end."
"I hope so, sincerely," said Val, without shame. "But I shan't get one of the things I want most, unless you promise to write to me."
She shook her head. "I can't promise that. I wouldn't if I could. As for getting your news, I shall read it in the papers, which are sure to chronicle all Lord Loveland does and says, and a lot he doesn't do or say. The Louisville papers will have things about you, copied from New York, in the Sunday editions. Yes, I shall be able to read about you every Sunday—lots of things you wouldn't tell in letters if I let you write. I shall see rumours of your engagement, then an announcement. I wonder if it will be the survival of the prettiest; Miss Coolidge—or if you'll be knocked down—on your knees—to a higher bid?"
"You're not letting me get much pleasure out of my last moments with you," he complained, his blue eyes really pathetic. "Do you despise me, after all?"
She looked up at him. "Only one side of you," she answered, a little sadly. "But—you're rather like the moon. We see only one of her sides. The other we have to take on faith. Perhaps it's silly of me, yet sometimes—in some moods—I do take your other side on faith."
"What is there—on that side?" he asked, eagerly.
"I don't know. And I'm sure you don't. You probably never will. For the light shines so brightly on the one turned towards the world. Now it must be 'goodbye.' There's my dear little aunt—who's been on deck ever since we passed Governor's Island—looking for me."
"Are these to be our last words together, then?" Val had a sickening pang. He had not known it was going to be as bad as this. And it wouldn't have been so bad, if she had seemed to care more.
"Yes, they must be the last, unless just a snippy 'goodbye, very pleased to have met you,' as we leave the ship. I wish you the best luck. Shall I say 'Thine own wish, wish I thee'?" She spoke in a hard, bright tone, just poising like a bird on the wing, before flitting to her aunt.
"Don't forget me. Think of me sometimes," Loveland implored, as he wrung the little hand she held out. And perhaps never in his life had there been so much true feeling in his voice.
"I will think of you sometimes," she said, as if mechanically repeating the words.
"Try and think the best of me."
"Yes. I'll try to do that, too. Goodbye."
But he would not let her hand go. It seemed to him that he could not—although he knew he must. It was all he could do to keep back a plea that she would love him, that she would marry him, even though the crumbling walls of Loveland Castle fell. But instead he stammered, "Am I never to see you again? Can't you stop in New York for a few days, and let me call on—on you and your aunt—just to break the blow of parting?"
"No, we can't stop," she said. "We've been away from home too long already. We have lots to do. You know I work for my living."
"Those stories! Yes. But couldn't you write them in New York?"
"No, I couldn't, indeed. Aunt Barbara and I start for Louisville this afternoon. We live not far away."
"Mayn't I go with you to the train?"
"What! desert valuable friends whom it's your duty to cultivate—if you're to have flowers in the garden of your future?"
"I'd desert anyone or anything for you."
"Thank you. I believe you really mean that—this minute."
"I——"
"No. Don't protest. Sufficient for the minute is the meaning thereof. I must go—I want to go—while you still mean it all. And I'd rather not see you again, because I'd like to keep the memory of you as you look and are in this minute—nothing less. It will seem afterwards to justify our temporary partnership, in case I ever ask myself—Why?"
And before he could answer she was gone.
He dared not follow, and instantly lost sight of her in the crowd that poured to the rail to greet the waiting crowd below. Afterwards, on the dock, he saw her again, but only at a distance, for her aunt's luggage had been marked "D," that it might chaperon Miss Dearmer's, and enable the two ladies to keep each other company during the tedious time of waiting.
From the far off stall under the big letter "L," Loveland gazed sadly at the back of his lost friend's head, her face, either by accident or design, being turned from him. His boxes were long in coming, and as it happened that none of his ship-acquaintances were "L's," he had no one to talk to, nothing pleasanter to do than look at Miss Dearmer's back and gradually lose hope of her relenting.
She had brought a little camp-stool for her aunt, and that lady sat facing Loveland, her eyes so destitute of interest when now and then they strayed in his direction, that he began to believe her niece had never mentioned his existence. More than once he had pictured Lesley describing her aunt's distinguished namesake; had fancied Mrs. Loveland asking questions; and wished that he might hear the answers. The lady's indifference was not flattering to his self-esteem; but Mrs. Loveland did not look a woman to claim a relation because he was a peer.
Lesley's aunt was a little woman with dove-grey hair, folded like dove's wings that slanted softly down her forehead, covering her ears. Hers was a gentle face, with eyes that gazed kindly, and somehow impersonally, out upon the world. She had the air which many American mothers wear, of having contentedly stepped aside from the fore-front of life in favour of a younger generation, and of having lost interest in herself as a separate entity.
Lesley and Mrs. Loveland all got their luggage dumped down under letter "D," before a single "L" box had appeared. Then, when Val's did come, and the property of other impatient "L's" at the same time, the outside world was lost to view. Loveland got hold of a good-natured Custom House man, who, considering the indubitable fact that he was dealing with a British subject, and believing the "Britisher's" statement that he was merely on a visit to America, made no unnecessary trouble. He was in a hurry, like everybody else, and did little more than casually open the leather portmanteaux, the cabin trunk, the hat box, and the fitted suit-case glittering with coronets, which constituted Lord Loveland's luggage.
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