Bandit Love - Juanita Savage (e manga reader TXT) 📗

to take the consequences. How do you deal with such a situation in England? In my country we would fight a duel, and the lady would marry the survivor. Should you think of fighting a duel, however, Mr. Standish, it is only fair to warn you that I am an expert swordsman and a dead shot. How shall we deal with the matter?"

Baffled, and at a loss to know how to deal with the situation, Tony Standish glowered at him, with the uncomfortable sensation that he was making a fool of himself, and that Don Carlos was inwardly laughing at him.

"It isn't a matter to jest about," he said stiffly. "That sort of thing isn't done in England, and I must ask you to refrain from approaching Miss Rostrevor again."

"I am desolated, señor!" exclaimed Don Carlos, with a despairing gesture. "I find it difficult to understand the English conventionalities in the matter of love-making. If you were Spanish, my dear Standish, you would not complain of my making love to your betrothed unless you were unsure of her and were afraid of my winning her away from you. If you regard me as a dangerous rival, and the adorable Miss Rostrevor takes me seriously, and you are afraid——"

"That isn't the point, Don Carlos," hastily interposed Tony, beginning to regret having made so much fuss. "I—er—I am willing to believe that you have not seriously been trying to steal Myra's affections away from me, or that possibly Myra may have taken you too seriously."

"How can a mere man hope to read what is in the heart of a woman?" responded Don Carlos, helping himself to a cigarette. "Our Spanish girls, if they think an accepted lover is not sufficiently devoted and attentive, will complain that another man is making passionate love—thus arousing the lover's jealousy and re-firing him with ardour; and a married woman will invent a lover and complain of his attentions for the same reason, if her husband's love seems to be cooling."

"I say, Don Carlos, are you suggesting that Myra complained for that reason—because she thinks I'm not keen enough?"

"My dear Standish, I am not suggesting anything. I am merely trying to explain the psychology of the women of my own country as I understand it. Yet I doubt if Englishwomen differ very greatly, after all, from their Latin sisters where affairs of the heart are concerned. Won't you have a cigarette?"

Tony accepted a cigarette from the silver-and-cedar-wood box that was slid across the table to him, and he lit it with thoughtful deliberation. Had Myra complained about Don Carlos making love to her just to keep him "up to scratch," he was wondering, and found himself more puzzled than ever. He knew that lots of men had been, and probably still were, in love with Myra, and that fact made him the more proud to be her accepted lover. He recalled Myra's boast that there was no horse or man she could not master, and he found it a little difficult to believe she was really scared of Don Carlos.

"In my country, Mr. Standish, a man betrothed to a girl as beautiful as Miss Rostrevor would feel almost insulted if his friends did not openly envy him and protest themselves hopelessly in love with the young lady he had won," resumed Don Carlos. "The lady herself would feel slighted if the friends of her betrothed did not continue to attempt to make love to her. To profess to be heartbroken because she belongs to another, and to make love to a betrothed girl or a married woman, is surely paying an indirect compliment to the accepted lover or husband, as well as a direct compliment to the lady."

"Humph! I hadn't thought of it that way," commented Tony drily. "It would never have occurred to me for a moment that in making love to Myra you were paying me any sort of compliment. Here in England, Don Carlos, any man who persists in making love to an engaged girl or a married woman is asking for trouble. Of course, I can appreciate the fact that most women would feel flattered by the thought that a man like you had fallen in love with them, even if you were only pretending out of a desire to be polite, but—er—well, obviously Myra appears to be more annoyed than flattered. Perhaps, as I said before, she has taken you too seriously."

"Or possibly not seriously enough," responded Don Carlos, his grave face crinkling into a smile. "I am hopelessly in love with her, my dear Standish, and mean to make her fall in love with me. What are we going to do in the circumstances?"

"Really, I don't know, Don Carlos," answered Standish, deciding that the other was jesting. "It's frightfully awkward. Frightfully! Er—you see, old chap, Myra says she won't come to Auchinleven for the shooting if you are going to be one of the party, and—er—well, as you can understand, that places me in a frightfully awkward position."

"I fully realise that, Mr. Standish," said Don Carlos very gravely, after a long pause which increased Tony's embarrassment. "I, also, am now placed in an awkward position. I have told many of my friends and acquaintances to-day that I have been invited to Auchinleven for the shooting by my friend Mr. Antony Standish, and now I shall have to explain to everyone that the invitation is cancelled because my friend fears I shall continue to make love to his fiancée, and Miss Rostrevor fears I may abduct her, persuade her to elope with me, or something of the sort. Yes, decidedly a difficult situation!"

"Here, I say, Don Carlos, you'll make me and Myra the laughing-stock of London if you tell people that!" Tony protested, looking quite distressed. "Myra will be furious with me and with you, and—er—I—I suppose you are thinking I am a mean sort of skunk. I'm frightfully sorry! I say, old chap, can't you suggest some way out of the difficulty?"

"Well, possibly if I were permitted to have a talk with Miss Rostrevor, and explain why I have been making love to her, she might understand matters better and raise no objection to my figuring as a guest at Auchinleven," said Don Carlos, after another thoughtful pause.

"Jolly good idea!" Tony exclaimed. "I'm quite sure if you explained matters tactfully to Myra she would understand you have really only been trying to pay her compliments. Myra's a good sort, and I feel sure she will accept your explanation."

Don Carlos made no immediate response. He dropped his cigarette into an ash-tray, rose to his feet with a sigh, and strolled to the window of his sitting room to gaze out absently across the Green Park.

"'There be three things which are too wonderful for me, yea, four which I know not: The way of an eagle in the air; the way of a serpent upon a rock; the way of a ship in the midst of the sea; and the way of a man with a maid,'" he said at length, as if to himself. "So it is written in the Book of Proverbs."

"Er—I say, old chap, I—I hope you are not going to take this too much to heart," remarked Tony, again feeling puzzled and uncomfortable. "If only Myra understands and appreciates what your love-making meant——"

"I shall be happy—provided she responds in the way I desire," broke in Don Carlos, swinging round suddenly from the window, his face lighting up into a smile again. "Of course, if Miss Rostrevor is afraid of me, or if you are afraid I shall take her from you and desire to cancel your invitation on that account, I——"

"There isn't any question of that, Don Carlos," Tony interrupted in turn. "At least, I—er—I don't think Myra is afraid of you. I fancy she has merely misunderstood your intentions."

"I should not have imagined that to be possible," said Don Carlos. "However, when I have discussed the situation with the charming lady, perhaps she will decide to allow me to be a guest at Auchinleven. I warn you, my dear Standish, that I shall not promise to refrain from making love to her, and will continue to try to win her heart. I think I can take the risk of your challenging me to mortal combat."

He looked with a challenging smile at Tony, who laughed, imagining that he was making a jest of the whole affair.

"I hardly fancy it will be a case of 'pistols for two; coffee for one,'" Tony said; "and I feel sure you will be able to make peace with Myra. As a matter of fact, Don Carlos, I am beginning to wonder now if Myra has been pulling my leg. She has played jokes on me more than once before and made me feel rather an ass."

"Perhaps on this occasion the charming lady is playing a joke on both of us," suggested Don Carlos lightly. "Let us drink a toast to her together, although we are such deadly rivals."

He slid the decanter across the table invitingly, and Tony helped himself to a drink, still imagining that Don Carlos was jesting, and deciding that Myra had again made him feel "rather an ass."

"Cheerio!" he drawled, raising his glass after Don Carlos had poured himself a drink. "All the best!"

"The toast is Miss Myra Rostrevor, the loveliest and most adorable girl in the world, and may her lover get his heart's desire," cried Don Carlos gaily, and drained his glass.

"Thanks awfully!" said Tony. "It's frightfully good of you, my dear chap, not to take offence, and I feel sure you will be able to win Myra over."

"It is my most ardent desire to win Myra over, my dear Standish," said Don Carlos, as Tony rose to go. "Pray convey to her my most respectful salutations, and beg her to receive me this afternoon."

It was with mingled amusement and exasperation that Myra listened to
Tony's account of the interview. She could not help feeling that Don
Carlos had turned the tables on Tony, and now had it in his power to
make her look ridiculous.

"I think he is the most conceited and impudent man in the world," she commented. "And he's clever! If I refuse to go to Auchinleven, he will tell the world it is because I am afraid of falling in love with him. If you withdraw your invitation to him, he will explain it is because you are afraid he might persuade me to elope with him. He will flatter himself we are both afraid of him, and the affair will become the joke of the season."

"Yes, I realise that, Myra," drawled Tony. "He's got that laugh on us, so to speak, and I think it would be best to save our faces by pretending the whole affair was a sort of practical joke on your part. I don't suppose he'll try to make love to you again, and even if he does you will know he is not in earnest."

"Tony, you duffer, let me assure you he is very much in earnest, and he means to take me from you," said Myra. "And I warn you, my dear, that I should probably have fallen for him and jilted you if he wasn't so inordinately proud of himself and hadn't boasted that he would compel me to love him. As it is, I am not sure that I am not in love with him."

"I say, Myra, you're not pulling my leg again, are you?" asked Tony, tugging at his little sandy moustache and looking worried. "I'm in a frightfully awkward position, as I said before. I like the chap immensely, and I think he's too much of a gentleman to poach—although, of course, foreigners have a different code of morals from us, and aren't to be trusted where women are concerned. I—er—I don't quite know what to do, but, of course, I'll do anything rather than risk losing you."

There flashed into his mind as he spoke Don Carlos's remark concerning women complaining of another man's attentions in order to bring a husband or a lover "up to scratch," and he had what he would have described as a "brain wave."

"I say, I've got a bright idea, darling," he continued, before Myra could