The Awakening of Helena Richie Part 28

"It is all finished," said Sam.

"What is finished?"

"The drama," the young man explained.

"Oh," she said, "do forgive me! My mind is so full of David, I can't think of anything else."

He smiled at that. "You couldn't do anything I wouldn't forgive,"

"Couldn't I?"

He looked up at her, wistfully. "I love you, you know."

"Oh, please, please--"

"I love you," he said, trembling.

"Sam," she said--and in her distress she put her hand on his shoulder--"you don't really care for me. I am so much older, and--there are other reasons. Oh, why did I come here!" she burst out. "You displease me very much when you talk this way!" She pushed her chair back, and would have risen but for his detaining hand upon her arm,

"Will you marry me?"

"No! of course I won't!"

"Why?"

"Because--" she stopped; then, breathlessly; "I only want to be let alone, I came to Old Chester to be alone. I didn't want to thrust myself on you.--any of you!"

"You never did," he said wonderingly. "You? Why, there never was anybody so reserved, so--shy, almost. That's one reason I love you, I guess," he said boyishly.

"You mustn't love me."

"Will you marry me?" he repeated. "Oh, I know; it is like asking an angel to come down out of heaven--"

"An angel!"

"Mrs. Richie, isn't it possible for you to care, just a little, and marry me?"

"No, Sam: indeed it isn't. Please don't think of it any more."

"Is it because you love him, still?"

"Love--_him?_" she breathed.

"He is dead," Sam said; "and I thought from something you once said, that you didn't really love him. But if you do--"

"My--husband, you mean? No! I don't. I never did. That's not the reason; oh, why did I come here?" she said in a distressed whisper.

At that he lifted his head. "Don't be unhappy. It doesn't matter about me." His eyes glittered. "'All is dross that is not Helena'! I shall love you as long as I live, even if you don't marry me. Perhaps-- perhaps I wouldn't if you did!"

He did not notice her involuntary start of astonishment, he rose, and lifting his arms to the sky, stood motionless, rapt, as if in wordless appeal to heaven. Then his arms dropped. "No," he said, speaking with curious thoughtfulness: "no; you would be human if you could marry a fool like me." Helena made a protesting gesture, but he went on, quietly: "Oh, yes; I am a fool. I've been told so all my life; but I knew it, anyhow. n.o.body need have told me. Of course you couldn't marry me! If you could, you would be like me. And I would not want that. No; you are G.o.d to me. Stay divine."

Helena put her hands over her ears.

"But please, can't you love me? We needn't be married, if you'd rather not. If you'll just love me a little?"

The innocence of the plea for love without marriage struck her with a dull humor that faded into annoyance that she should see the humor. It was an uncomfortable sensation, and she hated discomfort; in her desire to escape from it, she spoke with quick impatience. "No, Sam, of course not,--not the way you want me to. Why, you are just a boy, you know!" she added, lightly.

But Sam threw himself on his knees beside her, and pressed his head against her skirts. "Oh, are you _sure_, Mrs. Richie? Why, it seems to me you might--just a little? Can't you? You see, I'm so lonely," he ended pitifully. His innocent solemn eyes were limpid with tears, and he looked at her with terrified beseeching, like a lost child.

The tears that sprang to her eyes were almost motherly; for an impetuous instant she bent over him, then drew back sharply, and the tears dried in a hot pang of shame. "No, Sam; I can't. Oh, I am so sorry! Please forgive me--I ought not to have let you--but I didn't know--yes; I did know! And I ought to have stopped you. It's my fault.

Oh, how selfish I have been! But it's horrible to have you talk this way! Won't you please not say anything more?" She was incoherent to the point of crying.

Sam looked out over the dark garden in silence. "Well," he said slowly, "if you can't, then I don't want to see you. It would hurt me too much to see you. I'll go away. I will go on loving you, but I will go away, so that I needn't see you. Yes; I will leave Old Chester--"

"Oh, I wish you would," she said.

"You don't love me," he repeated, in a sort of hopeless astonishment; "why, I can't seem to believe it! I thought you must--I love you so.

But no, you don't. Not even just a little. Well--"

And without another word he left her. She could not hear his step on the locust flowers on the porch.

CHAPTER XVII

_"I wish your confounded Old Chester people would mind their own affairs! This prying into things that are none of their business is--"_

Lloyd Pryor stopped; read over what he had written, and ground his teeth. No; he couldn't send her such a letter. It would call down a storm of reproach and anger and love. And, after all, it wasn't her fault; this doctor fellow had said that she did not know of his call.

Still, if she hadn't been friendly with those people, the man wouldn't have thought of "looking him up"! Then he remembered that he had been the one to be friendly with the "doctor fellow"; and that made him angry again. But his next letter was more reasonable, and so more deadly.

_"You will see that if I had not happened to be at home, it might have been a very serious matter. I must ask you to consider my position, and discourage your friends in paying any attention to me."_

This, too, he tore up, with a smothered word. It wouldn't do; if he wounded her too much, she was capable of taking the next train--! And so he wrote, with non-committal brevity:

_"I have to be in Mercer Friday night, and I think I can get down to Old Chester for a few hours between stages on Sat.u.r.day. I hope your cook has recovered, and we can have some dinner? Tell David he can get his sling ready; and do, for Heaven's sake, fend off visitors!" Then he added a postscript: _"I want you all to myself."_ He smiled as he wrote that, but half shook his head. He did not (such was his code) enjoy being agreeable for a purpose. "But I can't help it," he thought, frowning; "she is so very difficult, just now."

He was right about the postscript; she read the letter with a curl of her lip. "'A few hours,'" she said; then--"'I want you all to myself.'" The delicate color flooded into her face; she crushed the letter to her lips, her eyes running over with laughing tears.

"Oh, David," she cried,--"let's go and tell Maggie--we must have such a dinner! He's coming!"

"Who?" said David.

"Why, Mr. Pryor, dear little boy. I want you to love him. Will you love him?" "I'll see," said David; "is Alice coming?"

Instantly her gayety flagged. "No, dear, no!"