Portia; Or, By Passions Rocked. Duchess

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СКАЧАТЬ sounds like Martha's baker's boy," says Dulce, laughing; "but you may call Roger what you like. I wish with all my heart you could call him husband, as that would take him out of my way."

      They are standing on the balcony, and are looking toward the South. Beyond them stretch the lawns, green and sloping; from below, the breath of the sleeping flowers comes up to greet them; through the trees in the far, far distance comes to them a glimpse of the great ocean as it lies calm and silent, almost to melancholy, but for the soft lap, lapping of the waves upon the pebbly shore.

      "Some one told me he was very handsome," says Portia, at a venture. Perhaps she has heard this, perhaps she hasn't. It even seems to her there is more truth in the "has" than in the "hasn't."

      "I have seen uglier people," admits Dulcinea, regretfully; "when he has his face washed, and his hair brushed, he isn't half a bad boy."

      "Boy?" asks Portia, doubtfully; to her the foregoing speech is full of difficulty.

      "I daresay you would call him a man," says Dulce, with a shrug of her soft shoulders; "but really he isn't. If you had grown up with him, as I have, you would never think of him as being anything but an overgrown baby, and a very cross one. That is the worst of being brought up with a person, and being told one is to marry him by-and-by. It rather takes the gilt off him, I think," says Dulce with a small smile.

      "But why must you marry him?" asks Portia, opening her large black fan in an indolent fashion, and waving it to and fro.

      The sun retiring

"On waves of glory, like an ocean god,"

      flings over her a pale, pink halo, that renders even more delicately fine the beauty of her complexion. A passing breeze flings into her lap a few rose-leaves from a trailing tree that has climbed the balcony, and is now nodding drowsily as the day slowly dies. She is feeling a little sorry for Dulce, who is reciting her family history with such a doleful air.

      "Well, I needn't, you know," says that young lady, lightly; "not if I don't choose, you know. I have got until I am twenty-one to think about it, and I am only eighteen now. I daresay I shall cry-off at the last moment; indeed, I am sure I shall," with a wilful shake of the head, "because Roger, at times, is quite too much, and utterly insupportable, yet, in that case, I shall vex Uncle Christopher, and I do so love Uncle Christopher!"

      "But he had nothing to do with the arrangement, had he?"

      "Nothing. It was his brother, Uncle Humphrey, who made the mistake. He left the property between us on condition we married each other. Whichever of us, at twenty-one, declines to carry out the agreement, gets £500 a year off the property, and the rest goes to the happy rejected. It is a charming place, about six miles from this, all lakes and trees, and the most enchanting gardens. I daresay Roger would be delighted if I would give him up, but" (vindictively) "I shan't. He shall never get those delicious gardens all to himself."

      "What an eccentric will," says Portia.

      "Well, hardly that. The place is very large, and requires money to keep it up. If he had divided the income between us, and we had been at liberty to go each our own way, the possessor of the house and lands would not have had enough money to keep it in proper order. I think it rather a just will. I wish it had been differently arranged, of course, but it can't be helped now."

      "Is he your first cousin? You know I have heard very little about this branch of my family, having lived so long in India."

      "No, my second cousin. Fabian is Uncle Christopher's heir, but if – if he died, Roger would inherit title and all. That is another reason why I hate him. Why should he have even a distant claim to anything that belongs to Fabian?"

      "But, my dear girl, you are not going to marry a man you hate?" says Portia, sitting up very straight, and forgetting to wave her fan.

      "Not exactly," says Dulce, meditatively; "I really don't think I hate him, but he can be disagreeable, I promise you."

      "But if you marry him, hardly tolerating him, and afterwards you meet somebody you can love, how will it be with you then?"

      "Oh, I shan't do that," she says; "I have felt so married to Roger for years, that it would be positively indecent of me, even now, to fall in love with any one. In fact I couldn't."

      "I daresay, after all, you like him well enough," says Miss Vibart, with her low, soft laugh. "Mark Gore says you are exactly suited to each other."

      "Mark Gore is a confirmed old bachelor, and knows nothing," says Dulce, contemptuously.

      "Yet once, they say, he was hopelessly in love with Phyllis Carrington."

      "So he was. It was quite a romance, and he was the hero."

      "Phyllis is quite everything she ought to be, and utterly sweet," says Portia, thoughtfully. "But is she the sort of person to create a grande passion in a man like Mark?"

      "I daresay. Her eyes are lovely; so babyish, yet so full of latent coquetry. A man of the world, like Mark, would like that sort of thing. But it is all over now, quite a worn-out tale. He visits there at stated times, and she has thoughts only for her baby and her 'Duke,' as she calls her husband."

      "I wonder," says Miss Vibart, with a faint yawn, "if at times she doesn't find that a trifle slow?"

      Then she grows a little ashamed of herself, as she catches Dulce's quick, puzzled glance.

      "It is a very pretty baby," says Dulce, as though anxious to explain matters.

      "And what can be more adorable than a pretty baby?" responds her cousin, with a charming smile. "Now do tell me" – quickly, and as though to change the current of her companion's thoughts – "how many people are in this house, and who they are, and everything that is bad and good about them."

      Dulce laughs.

      "We come and go," she says. "It would be hard to arrange us. I am always here, and Uncle Christopher, and – Fabian. Roger calls this his home, too, but sometimes he goes away for awhile, and Dicky's room is always kept for him. We are all cousins pretty nearly, and there is one peculiarity – I mean, Uncle Christopher makes no one welcome who does not believe – in – Fabian."

      Her voice falls slightly as she makes the last remark, and she turns her head aside, and, leaning over the balcony, plays absently with a rosebud that is growing within her reach. In this position she cannot see that Portia has colored warmly, and is watching her with some curiosity.

      "You must try to like Fabian," says Dulce, presently. Her voice is sad, but quite composed. She appears mournful, but not disconcerted. "You have no doubt heard his unfortunate story from Auntie Maud, and —you believe in him, don't you?" She raises her eyes to her cousin's face.

      "I hardly think I have quite heard the story," says Miss Vibart evasively.

      "No? It is a very sad one, and quite unaccountable. If you have heard anything about it, you have heard all I can tell you. Nothing has ever been explained; I am afraid now nothing ever will be. It rests as it did at the beginning – that is the pity of it – but you shall hear."

      "Not if it distresses you," says Portia gently. A feeling of utter pity for Fabian's sister, with all her faith and trust so full upon her at this moment, touches her keenly. As for the story itself, she has heard it a score of times, with variations, from Auntie Maud. But then, when brought to bay, what can one say!

      "It will not distress me," says Dulce, earnestly; СКАЧАТЬ