Airy Fairy Lilian. Duchess

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СКАЧАТЬ condescended to hold me in his arms and kiss me into good humor. It is more than I have any right to expect. I am positively overwhelmed. By the bye, had your remedy the desired effect? Did I subdue my naughty passion under your treatment?"

      "As far as I can recollect, yes," rather stiffly. Nobody likes being laughed at.

      "How odd!" says Miss Chesney.

      "Not very," retorts he: "at that time you were very fond of me."

      "That is even odder," says Miss Chesney, who takes an insane delight in teasing him. "What a pity it is you cannot invent some plan for reducing me to order now!"

      "There are some tasks too great for a mere mortal to undertake," replies Sir Guy, calmly.

      Miss Chesney, not being just then prepared with a crushing retort, wisely refrains from speech altogether, although it is by a superhuman effort she does so. Presently, however, lest he should think her overpowered by the irony of his remark, she says, quite pleasantly:

      "Did Cyril ever see me before I came here?"

      "No." Then abruptly, "Do you like Cyril?"

      "Oh, immensely! He suits me wonderfully, he is so utterly devoid of dignity, and all that. One need not mind what one says to Cyril; in his worst mood he could not terrify. Whereas his brother – " with a little malicious gleam from under her long, heavy lashes.

      "Well, what of his brother?"

      "Nay, Sir Guy, the month we agreed on has not yet expired," says Lilian. "I cannot tell you what I think of you yet. Still, you cannot imagine how dreadfully afraid I am of you at times."

      "If I believed you, it would cause me great regret," says her guardian, rather hurt. "I am afraid, Lilian, your father acted unwisely when he chose Chetwoode as a home for you."

      "What! are you tired of me already?" asks she hastily, with a little tremor in her voice, that might be anger, and that might be pain.

      "Tired of you? No! But I cannot help seeing that the fact of my being your guardian makes me abhorrent to you."

      "Not quite that," says Miss Chesney, in a little soft, repentant tone. "What a curious idea to get into your head? dismiss it; there is really no reason why it should remain."

      "You are sure?" with rather more earnestness than the occasion demands.

      "Quite sure. And now tell me how it was I never saw you until now, since I was two years old."

      "Well, for one thing, your mother died; then I went to Eton, to Cambridge, got a commission in the Dragoons, tired of it, sold out, and am now as you see me."

      "What an eventful history!" says Lilian, laughing.

      At this moment, who should come toward them, beneath the trees, but Cyril, walking as though for a wager.

      "'Whither awa?'" asks Miss Lilian, gayly stopping him with outstretched hands.

      "You have spoiled my quotation," says Cyril, reproachfully, "and it was on the very tip of my tongue. I call it disgraceful. I was going to say with fine effect, 'Where are you going, my pretty maid?' but I fear it would fall rather flat if I said it now."

      "Rather. Nevertheless, I accept the compliment. Are you in training? or where are you going in such a hurry?"

      "A mere constitutional," says Cyril, lightly, – which is a base and ready lie. "Good-bye, I won't detain you longer. Long ago I learned the useful lesson that where 'two is company, three is trumpery.' Don't look as though you would like to devour me, Guy: I meant no harm."

      Lilian laughs, so does Guy, and Cyril continues his hurried walk.

      "Where does that path lead to?" asks Lilian, looking after him as he disappeared rapidly in the distance.

      "To The Cottage first, and then to the gamekeeper's lodge, and farther on to another entrance-gate that opens on the road."

      "Perhaps he will see your pretty tenant on his way?"

      "I hardly think so. It seems she never goes beyond her own garden."

      "Poor thing! I feel the greatest curiosity about her, indeed I might say an interest in her. Perhaps she is unhappy."

      "Perhaps so; though her manner is more frozen than melancholy. She is almost forbidding, she is so cold."

      "She may be in ill health."

      "She may be," unsympathetically.

      "You do not seem very prepossessed in her favor," says Lilian, impatiently.

      "Well, I confess I am not," carelessly. "Experience has taught me that when a woman withdraws persistently from the society of her own sex, and eschews the companionship of her fellow-creatures, there is sure to be something radically wrong with her."

      "But you forget there are exceptions to every rule. I confess I would give anything to see her," says Lilian, warmly.

      "I don't believe you would be the gainer by that bargain," replies he, with conviction, being oddly, unaccountably prejudiced against this silent, undemonstrative widow.

* * * * * * *

      Meantime, Cyril pursues his way along the path, that every day of late he has traveled with unexampled perseverance. Seven times he has passed along it full of hope, and only twice has been rewarded, with a bare glimpse of the fair unknown, whose face has obstinately haunted him since his first meeting with it.

      On these two momentous occasions, she has appeared to him so pale and wan that he is fain to believe the color he saw in her cheeks on that first day arose from vexation and excitement, rather than health, – a conclusion that fills him with alarm.

      Now, as he nears the house between the interstices of the hedge he catches the gleam of a white gown moving to and fro, that surely covers his divinity.

      Time proves his surmise right. It is the admired incognita, who almost as he reaches the gate that leads to her bower, comes up to one of the huge rose-bushes that decorate either side of it, and – unconscious of criticism – commences to gather from it such flowers as shall add beauty to the bouquet already growing large within her hands.

      Presently the restless feeling that makes us all know when some unexpected presence is near, compels her to raise her head. Thereupon her eyes and those of Cyril Chetwoode meet. She pauses in her occupation as though irresolute; Cyril pauses too; and then gravely, unsmilingly, she bows in cold recognition. Certainly her reception is not encouraging; but Cyril is not to be daunted.

      "I hope," he says, deferentially, "your little dog has been conducting himself with due propriety since last I had the pleasure of restoring him to your arms?"

      This Grandisonian speech surely calls for a reply.

      "Yes," says Incognita, graciously. "I think it was only the worry caused by change of scene made him behave so very badly that – last day."

      So saying, she turns from him, as though anxious to give him a gentle congé. But Cyril, driven to desperation, makes one last effort at detaining her.

      "I hope your friend is better," he says, leaning his arms upon the top of the gate, and looking full of anxiety about the absent widow. "My brother – Sir Guy – called the other day, СКАЧАТЬ