Next day they were together in the drawingroom at Westbourne Terrace: Marian writing, Elinor at the pianoforte, working at some technical studies, to which she had been incited by the shortcoming of her performance on the previous night. She stopped on hearing a bell ring.
“What o’clock is it?” she said, after listening a moment. “Surely it is too early for a visit.”
“It is only half past two,” replied Marian. “I hope it is not anybody. I have not half finished my correspondence.”
“If you please, Miss,” said a maid, entering, “Mr. Douglas wants to see you, and he wont come up.”
“I suppose he expects you to go down and talk to him in the hall,” said
Elinor.
“He is in the dining-room, and wishes to see you most particular,” said the maid.
“Tell him I will come down,” said Marian.
“He heard me practising,” said Elinor, “that is why he would not come up. I am in disgrace, I suppose.”
“Nonsense, Nelly! But indeed I have no doubt he has come to complain of our conduct, since he insists on seeing me alone.”
Miss McQuinch looked sceptically at Marian’s guileless eyes, but resumed her technical studies without saying anything. Marian went to the dining-room, where she found Douglas standing near the window, tall and handsome, frock coated and groomed to a spotless glossiness that established a sort of relationship between him and the sideboard, the condition of which did credit to Marian’s influence over her housemaids. He looked intently at her as she bade him good morning.
“I am afraid I am rather early,” he said, half stiffly, half apologetically.
“Not at all,” said Marian.
“I have come to say something which I do not care to keep unsaid longer than I can help; so I thought it better to come when I could hope to find you alone. I hope I have not disturbed you. I have something rather important to say.”
“You are the same as one of ourselves, of course, Sholto. But I believe you delight in stiffness and ceremony. Will you not come upstairs?”
“I wish to speak to you privately. First, I have to apologize to you for what passed last night.”
“Pray dont, Sholto: it doesnt matter. I am afraid we were rude to you.”
“Pardon me. It is I who am in fault. I never before made an apology to any human being; and I should not do so now without a painful conviction that I forgot what I owed to myself.”
“Then you ought to be ashamed of yourself — I mean for never having apologized before. I am quite sure you have not got through life without having done at least one or two things that required an apology.”
“I am sorry you hold that opinion of me.”
“How is Brutus’s paw?”
“Brutus!”
“Yes. That abrupt way of changing the subject is what Mrs. Fairfax calls a display of tact. I know it is very annoying; so you may talk about anything you please. But I really want to hear how the poor dog is.”
“His paw is nearly healed.”
“I’m so glad — poor old dear!”
“You are aware that I did not come here to speak of my mother’s dog,
Marian?”
“I supposed not,” said Marian, with a smile. “But now that you have made your apology, wont you come upstairs? Nelly is there.”
“I have something else to say — to you alone, Marian. I entreat you to listen to it seriously.” Marian looked as grave as she could. “I confess that in some respects I do not understand you; and before you enter upon another London season, through which I cannot be at your side, I would obtain from you some assurance of the nature of your regard for me. I do not wish to harass you with jealous importunity. You have given me the most unequivocal tokens of a feeling different from that which inspires the ordinary intercourse of a lady and gentleman in society; but of late it has seemed to me that you maintain as little reserve toward other men as toward me. I am not thinking of Marmaduke: he is your cousin. But I observed that even the working man who sang at the concert last night was received — I do not say intentionally — with a cordiality which might have tempted a more humbly disposed person than he seemed to be to forget — —” Here Douglas, seeing Marian’s bearing change suddenly, hesitated. Her beautiful gray eyes, always pleading for peace like those of a good angel, were now full of reproach; and her mouth, but for those eyes, would have suggested that she was at heart an obstinate woman.
“Sholto,” she said, “I dont know what to say to you. If this is jealousy, it may be very flattering; but it is ridiculous. If it is a lecture, seriously intended, it is — it is really most insulting. What do you mean by my having given you unequivocal signs of regard? Of course I think of you very differently from the chance acquaintances I make in society. It would be strange if I did not, having known you so long and been your mother’s guest so often. But you talk almost as if I had been making love to you.”
“No,” said Douglas, forgetting his ceremonious manner and speaking angrily and naturally; “but you talk as though I had not been making love to you.”
“If you have, I never knew it. I never dreamt it.”
“Then, since you are not the stupidest lady of my acquaintance, you must be the most innocent.”
“Tell me of one single occasion on which anything has passed between us that justifies your speaking to me as you are doing now.”
“Innumerable occasions. But since I cannot compel you to acknowledge them, it would be useless to cite them.”
“All I can say is that we have utterly misunderstood one another,” she said, after a pause.
He said nothing, but took up his hat, and looked down at it with angry determination. Marian, too uneasy to endure silence, added:
“But I shall know better in future.”
“True,” said Douglas, hastily putting down his hat and advancing a step. “You cannot plead misunderstanding now. Can you give me the assurance I seek?”
“What assurance?”
Douglas shook his shoulders impatiently.
“You expect me to know everything by intuition,” she said.
“Well, my declaration shall be definite enough, even for you. Do you love me?”
“No, I dont think I do. In fact, I am quite sure I do not — in the way you mean. I wish you would not talk like this, Sholto. We have all got on so pleasantly together: you, and I, and Nelly, and Marmaduke, and my father. And now you begin making love, and stuff of that kind. Pray let us agree to forget all about it, and remain friends as before.”
“You need not be anxious about our future relations: I shall not embarrass you with my society again. I hoped to find you a woman capable of appreciating a man’s passion, even if you should be unable to respond to it. But I perceive that you are only a girl, not yet aware of the deeper life that underlies the ice of conventionality.”
“That is a very good metaphor for your own case,” said Marian, interrupting him. “Your ordinary manner is all ice, hard and chilling. One may suspect that there are depths beneath, but that is only an additional inducement to keep on the surface.”
“Then even your amiability is a delusion! Or is it that you are amiable to the rest of the world, and reserve taunts