“You are both insolent and false. But listen
to me, since you are here and I cannot avoid you.
I know what your threats mean.”
“I have never threatened you. I have promised
you my aid, but have used no threats.”
“Not when you tell me that I shall be punished?
But to avoid no punishment, if any be in your power,
will I ever willingly place myself in your company.
You may write of me what papers you please, and repeat
of me whatever stories you may choose to fabricate,
but you will not frighten me into compliance by doing
so. I have; at any rate, spirit enough to resist
such attempts as that.”
“As you are living at present, you are alone
in the world!”
“And I am content to remain alone.”
“You are thinking, then, of no second marriage?”
“If I were, does that concern you? But
I will speak no further word to you. If you follow
me into the inn, or persecute me further by forcing
yourself upon me, I will put myself under the protection
of the police.”
Having said this, she walked on as quickly as her
strength would permit, while he walked by her side,
urging upon her his old arguments as to Lord Ongar’s
expressed wishes, as to his own efforts on her behalf—and
at last as to the strong affection with which he regarded
her. But she kept her promise, and said not a
word in answer to it all. For more than an hour
they walked side by side, and during the greater part
of that time not a syllable escaped from her.
From moment to moment she kept her eye warily on him,
fearing that he might take her by the arm, or attempt
some violence with her. But he was too wise for
this, and too fully conscious that no such proceeding
on his part could be of any service to him. He
continued, however, to speak to her words which she
could not avoid hearing—hoping rather than
thinking that he might at last frighten her by a description
of all the evil which it was within his power to do
her. But in acting thus he showed that he knew
nothing of her character. She was not a woman
whom any prospect of evil could possibly frighten
into a distasteful marriage.
Within a few hundred yards of the hotel there is another
fort, and at this point the path taken by Lady Ongar
led into the private grounds of the inn at which she
was staying. Here the count left her, raising
his hat as he did so, and saying that he hoped to
see her again before she left the island.
“If you do so,” said she, “it shall
be in presence of those who can protect me.”
And so they parted.
What Cecilia Burton Did For Her Sister-In-Law
