Love Eternal - H. Rider Haggard (ereader ebook .TXT) 📗

The angel, which was only pinned by lead-coated rivets to its base and the column behind, flew from its supports, as did Mr. Knight from his, so that in another second, the men having tripped against the surround of the grave, all three rolled upon the path, the marble luckily falling clear of both of them.

"Now I've done it," said Godfrey in a reflective voice as he contemplated the tangled ruin.

"Yes," exclaimed Isobel, "I think you have."

Then they remained grim and silent while the pair, who were not really much injured, picked themselves up with groans.

"I am sorry that I knocked you down, since I am young and you are not," said Godfrey, "but I repeat that you are a liar," he added by an afterthought.

Sir John spat out a tooth, and began to mop the blood from his nose with a silk pocket-handkerchief.

"Oh! you do, do you?" he said in a somewhat subdued voice. "Well, you'll find out that I'm other things too before I'm done with you. And I repeat that you are fortune-hunting young rascal and that I would rather see my daughter dead than married to you."

"And I say, Godfrey, I would rather see you dead than married to her!" broke in Mr. Knight, spitting out his words like an angry cat.

"I don't think that you need be afraid, Father," answered Godfrey quietly, although his rage burned as fiercely as ever. "You have worked this business well, and it seems a little impossible now, doesn't it? Listen, Sir John Blake. Not even for the sake of Isobel will I submit to such insults. I will not give her up, but I swear by God that while you are alive I will not marry Isobel, nor will I write to her or speak to her again. After you are dead, which I dare say will be before so very long," and he surveyed the huge, puffy-fleshed baronet with a critical eye, "then--if she cares to wait for me--I will marry her, hoping that in the meanwhile you may lose your money or dispose of it as you like."

Sir John stared, still mopping his face, but finding no words. He feared death very much and this prophecy of it, spoken with such a ring of truth, as though the speaker knew, frightened him. At that moment in his heart he cursed the Reverend Mr. Knight and his tale- bearing, and wished most earnestly that he had never been led into interference with this matter. After all Godfrey was a fine young man whom his daughter cared for, and might do well in life, and he had struck him first after offering him intentional and pre-arranged insult. Such were the thoughts that flashed through his somewhat muddled brain. Also another, that they were too late. The evil was done and never could be undone.

Then Isobel spoke in cold, clear tones, saying:

"Godfrey is quite right and has been right all through. Had you, Father, and that man," and she pointed contemptuously at Mr. Knight, "left us alone we should have come and told you what had happened between us, and if you disapproved we would have waited until we were of full age and have married as we should have been free to do. But now that is impossible, for blows have passed between you. After slandering him vilely, you struck Godfrey first, Father, and he would not have been a man if he had not struck you back; indeed I should have thought little of him afterwards. Well, he has made an oath, and I know that he will keep it. Now I, too, make an oath which certainly I shall keep. I swear in the presence of both of you, by myself and by Godfrey, that neither in this world or in any other, should I live again and have remembrance, will I marry any man or exchange tendernesses with any man, except himself. So all your plans come to nothing; yes, you have brought all this misery upon us for nothing, and if you want to found a great family, as I know you do, you had better marry again yourself and let me go my way. In any case, if I should survive you and should Godfrey live, I will marry him after your death, even if we have to wait until we are old to do so. As to your fortune, I care nothing for it, being quite ready to work in the world with the help of the little I have."

She paused as though for an answer, but none came, for if Sir John had been frightened before, now he was terrified of this outraged young woman who, tall, commanding and stern-eyed, looked to him like an avenging angel.

"There doesn't seem much more to say, does there?" she went on, "except that I think, Father, you had better telegraph to your guests that you are not well and cannot receive them, for I won't. So good- bye, dearest Godfrey. I shall remember all that you have said, and you will remember all that I have said, and as I believe, we shall live to meet again one day. Meanwhile, don't think too bitterly of my father, or of your own, because they have acted according to their natures and lights, though where these will lead them I am sure I do not know. Good-bye, dearest, dearest Godfrey. Do your best in the world and keep out of troubles if you can. Oh! what a lot we shall have to tell each other when we meet again."

Then before them both she kissed him, and he kissed her back, saying:

"I will remember. I am glad you think there was nothing else to be done. God bless you, Isobel. Make the best of your life, as I will try to do with mine. Good-bye."

"Good-bye, dear," she answered, "think of me always when you wake and before you go to sleep, as I will think of you."

Then she turned and went, never looking behind her.

 

Godfrey watched her tall form vanish through the churchyard gate and over the slope of a little hill that lay between it and Hawk's Hall, and that was the last sight he had of her for many a year. When she was quite lost to view, he spoke to the two men who still stood irresolute before him.

"Isobel I shall meet again," he said, "but not either of you, for I have done with you both. It is not for me to judge you. Judge yourself and be judged."

Then he turned, too, and went.

 

"It's all right," said Sir John to Mr. Knight, "that is, he won't marry her, at any rate at present, so I suppose that we should both be pleased, if anyone can be pleased with cut lips and two black eyes. And yet somehow we seem to have made a mess of it," and he glanced at the shattered marble statue of the Victorian angel of which both the wings were broken off.

"We have done our duty," replied Mr. Knight, pursing up his thin lips, "and at least Godfrey is freed from your daughter."

"I'm not so sure of that, my reverend friend. But of one thing I am sure, that I am freed from her also, or rather that she is freed from me. Also you are freed from him. Don't you understand, you vicious little viper, that you will never see that young man again, and that thanks to your cursed advice I shall never see my daughter again, at least not really? What devil was it that sent you to play upon my weaknesses and ambition? If you had left things alone and they had come to me in a natural way there would have been a row, of course, but I dare say it would have ended all right. But you told me how to work on him and I overdid the part. Now nothing can ever be all right for either of us, or for them either, until we are both dead. Do you understand also that we have made two young people who should have been the supports of our old age desire above everything our deaths because we have given them cause to hate us, and since they are of the sort that keep their word, only by our deaths can they become free, or, at any rate, by mine? Well, it doesn't matter what you understand, you little bigot, but I know what I do."

"I have done my duty," repeated Mr. Knight sullenly, "and I don't care what happens afterwards. '/Fiat justita ruat cœlum/,'" he added in the Latin tag.

"Oh, yes. Justice may say fie and the sky may be rude, and anything else may happen, but we've dished our lives and theirs, my friend, and --damn you! get out of my sight. Rows I am accustomed to with Isobel and others, but this isn't a row, it's an earthquake; it's a catastrophe, for which I have to thank you. Lord! how my mouth hurts, and I can't see out of my right eye. Talk of a mailed fist, that young beggar has one like a pole-axe. Now I must go to telegraph to all those people. Temporary indisposition, yes--temporary indisposition, that's it. Good-bye, my holy friend. You won't do as much mischief in one day again in a hurry, spy as hard as you like."

Then Sir John departed, nursing his cut lips with one hand and his broken umbrella with the other.

Mr. Knight watched him go, and said to himself:

"I thought that I disliked the daughter, but the father is worse. Offensive, purse-proud, vulgar beast! How dare he speak to me like that! I'm glad, yes, I'm glad Godfrey knocked him down, though I suppose there will be a scandal. Well, my hands are clean; I have done my duty, and I must not complain if it is unpleasant, since I have dragged Godfrey back from the mouth of the pit. I think I'll take a walk to steady my nerves; it may be as well not to meet Godfrey again just now."

 

CHAPTER XVII(INDIA)

 

On his road to the house to pack his portmanteau Godfrey went a little way round to arrange with a blacksmith, generally known as Tom, who jobbed out a pony-trap, to drive him to the station to catch the 7.15 train. The blacksmith remarked that they would have to hurry, and set to work to put the pony in, while Godfrey ran on to the Abbey House and hurriedly collected his clothes. He got them packed and down into the hall just as the trap arrived.

As he was entering it the servant put a letter into his hand which she said had come for him by the afternoon post. He thrust it into his pocket unlooked at, and off they went at the pony's best pace.

"You are going away oncommon quick, Master Godfrey. Coming back to these parts soon?" queried the blacksmith.

"No, not for a long while, Tom."

"I think there must have been lightning with that rain," went on Tom, after a pause, "although I heard no thunder. Else how ever did that marble angel over poor Lady Jane's grave come down with such a