Agatha's Husband Part 24

and she went.

But on the staircase she could not forbear saying, "I thought you two would never have done talking. Is it anything very serious? I trust not, since your brother walked down the street so cheerfully."

"Did he?--and--were you watching him?"

"Yes, indeed," returned Agatha, for she had no notion of doing anything that she would be afterwards ashamed to confess. "But what put him into such a state of mind, and made him behave to me so strangely?"

"How dared he behave?" asked the husband, with quickness, then stopped.

"Forgive me. You know, I have never inquired--I never shall inquire about anything."--Again he paused, seeing how his mood alarmed her. "Do not be afraid of me! Poor child--poor little Agatha!"

Waiting for no reply, he led her in to dinner.

While the servants waited, Mr. Harper scarcely spoke, except when necessary. Only in his lightest word addressed to Agatha was a certain tremulousness--in his most careless look a constant tender observance, which soothed her mind, and quite removed from thence the impression of his hasty and incomprehensible words. She laid all to the charge of Major Harper and his unpleasant business.

At dessert, Nathanael sat varying his long silences with a few commonplace remarks which showed how oblivious he was of all around him, and how sedulously he tried to disguise the fact, and rise to the surface of conversation. Agatha's curiosity returned, not unmingled with a feeling tenderer, more woman-like, more wife-like, which showed itself in stray peeps at him from under the lashes of net brown eyes. At length she took courage to say:

"Now--since we seem to have nothing better to talk about, will you tell me what you and your brother were plotting together, that you kept poor little me out of the room so long?"

"Plotting together? Surely, Agatha, you did not mean to use that word?"

She had used it according to a habit she had of putting a jesting form of phrase upon matters where she was most in earnest. She was amazed to see her husband take it so seriously.

"Well, blot out the offending word, and put in any other you choose; only tell me."

"Why do you wish to know, little Curiosity?" said he, recovering himself, and eagerly catching the tone his wife had adopted.

"Why? Because I am a little Curiosity, and like to know everything."

"That is both presumptuous and impossible, your ladys.h.i.+p! If one-half the world were always bent on knowing all the secrets of the other half, what a very uncomfortable world it would be!"

"I do not see that, even if the first half included the wives, and the second the husbands; which is apparently what you mean to imply."

"I shall not plead guilty to anything by implication."

They went on a few moments longer in this skirmish of a.s.sumed gaiety, when Agatha, pausing, leant her elbows on the table, and looked seriously at her husband,

"Do you know we are two very foolish people?"

"Wherefore?"

"We are pretending to make idle jests, when all the time we are both of us very much in earnest."

"That is true!" And he sighed, though within himself, as though he did not wish her to hear it. "Agatha, come over to me." He held out both his hands; she came, and placed herself beside him, all her jesting subdued.

She even trembled, at the expectation of something painful or sorrowful to be told. But her husband said nothing--except to ask if she would like to go anywhere this evening.

Agatha felt annoyed. "Why do you put me off in this manner, when I know you have something on your mind?"

"Have I?" he said, half mournfully.

"Then tell it to me."

"Nay. I always thought it was wisest, kindest, for a man to bear the burden of his own cares."

Nathanael had spoken in his most gentle tone, and slowly, as if impelled to what he said by hard necessity. He was not prepared to see the sudden childish burst of astonishment, anger, and resistance.

"From this, I understand, what you might as well have said plainly, that I am not to inquire what pa.s.sed between you and your brother?"

He moved his head in a.s.sent, and then sunk it on his left hand, holding out the other to his wife, as though talking were impossible to him, and all he wished were silence and peace. Agatha was too angry for either.

"But if I do not choose at nineteen to be treated like a mere child--if I ask, nay, _insist_"--She hesitated, lest the last word might have irritated him too far. Vague fears concerning the full meaning of the word "obey" in the marriage service rushed into her mind.

Nathanael sat motionless, his fingers pressed upon his eyelids. This silence was worse than any words.

"Mr. Harper!"

"I hear." And the grave, sad eyes--and without any displeasure--were turned upon her. Agatha felt a sting of conscience.

"I did not mean to speak rudely to my husband; but I had my own reasons for inquiring about Major Harper, from something Emma said to-day."

"What was that?"

"How eager you look! Nay, I can keep a secret too. But no, I will not."

And the generous impulse burst out, even accompanied by a few childish tears and childish blushes. "She told me he had probably lost money. I wished to say that if such a trifle made him unhappy he might take as much as he liked of mine. That was all!"

Her husband regarded her with mingled emotions, which at last all melted into one--deep tenderness. "And you would do this, even for him? Thank G.o.d! I never doubted your goodness, Agatha. And I _trusted_ you always."

Wondering, yet half-pleased, to see him so moved, Agatha received his offered hand. "Then all is settled. Now tell me everything that pa.s.sed between you."

"I cannot."

Gentle as the tone was, there was something in it which implied that to strive with Nathanael would be like beating against a marble wall.

A great terror came over Agatha--she, who had lived like a wild bird, knowing no stronger will than her own. Then all the combativeness of her nature, hitherto dormant because she had known none worthy to contend against, awoke up, and tempted her to struggle fiercely with her chain.

She unloosed her hands and sprang from him. "Mr. Harper, you are teaching me early how men rule their wives."

"I only ask my wife to trust me. She would, if she knew how great was the sacrifice."

"What sacrifice? How many more mysteries am I to be led through blindfold?"

And her crimson cheek, her quick wild step across the room, showed a new picture to the husband's eyes--a picture that all young wives should be slow to let any man see, for it is often a fatal vision.

Nathanael closed his eyes--was it to shut it out?--then spoke, steadily, sorrowfully:

"We have scarcely been married a month. Are we beginning to be angry with one another already?"

She made him no answer.

"Will you listen to me--if for only two minutes?"