Lover or Friend Part 93

The next few days were terrible to Audrey. More than once she feared she would be ill. She could not sleep properly. The mornings, the afternoons, the evenings, were endless to her. Mollie's merry chatter seemed to jar on her. Her mother's kindly commonplace remarks seemed devoid of interest, and yet above all things she dreaded to be alone.

Was she growing nervous? for any sudden sound, an unaccustomed footstep, even the clanging of the door-bell, made her start, and drove the blood from her heart. Would he write or would he telegraph? Should she hear one day that he was on his way home? Audrey was asking herself these questions morning, noon, and night. She felt as though the suspense would wear her out in time. If anyone had told Audrey that for the first time in her life she had all the symptoms that belong to a certain well-known disease--that these cold and hot fits, this self-distrustfulness and new timidity that were transforming her into a different Audrey, were only its salient features--she would have scouted the idea very fiercely. That she was in love with Michael, and that her love for Cyril was a very dim, shadowy sort of affection compared with her love for Michael,--such a thought would have utterly shocked her; and yet it was the truth. Michael had always been more to her than ever she had guessed, and this long absence had taught her the unmistakable fact that she could not do without him.

Audrey struggled on as well as she could through those restless, miserable days. She would not give in; she had never given in in her life to any pa.s.sing tide of emotion, and she would not be weak now.

Every morning, after a wakeful, unrefres.h.i.+ng night, she braced herself to meet the day's duties. She read French and German with Mollie; she superintended her practising, and only wandered off in a dream when Mollie's scales and exercises became too monotonous. She went up to Hillside and played with Leonard in the nursery, and though Geraldine's sharp eyes discovered that something was amiss, and that Audrey was not in her usual spirits, she had the tact and wisdom not to press for an immediate confidence; and Audrey was very grateful for this forbearance.

Audrey's st.u.r.dy nature could brook no self-indulgence, and though the March winds were cold, and the Brail lanes deep in miry clay, she persisted in paying her accustomed weekly visit to Thomas...o...b..ien.

Mollie had a cold, and so had established a claim to remain by the fireside; but Audrey would listen to no weak persuasion to ensconce herself comfortably in the opposite easy-chair. On the contrary, she put on her thickest boots, and, tucking up her skirts, braved wind and mud, and even a cold mizzle of rain, on her way back, and had her reward, for the walk freshened her, and in cheering her old friend she felt her own spirits revive.

She was in a happier mood as she let herself in, and shook out her wet cloak. She was in far too disreputable a state to present herself in the drawing-room; besides, she was late, and she must get ready for dinner.

She ran upstairs lightly, but at the top of the staircase she suddenly stopped as though she had been turned to stone. And yet there was nothing very astonis.h.i.+ng in the fact that a small brown dog, with very short legs, should be pattering in a cheerful manner down the corridor, or that he should utter a whine of friendly and delighted recognition when he saw Audrey; and if she stared at him as though he were some ghostly apparition, that was not Booty's fault. But the next moment she had caught him up, and had darted with him into her own room.

'Oh, Booty, Booty!' she gasped, as the little animal licked her pale face in a most feeling manner; 'to think he has come, Booty!' And if the application of a warm tongue could have given comfort and a.s.surance, Audrey could have had plenty of both.

For a little while she could do nothing but sit there hugging the dog, and making little plaintive speeches to him, until she heard Mollie's step at the door, and then she put him down hastily.

'Oh, Audrey dear!' exclaimed Mollie, breathless with excitement. 'Have you really got back at last? They are all asking for you. Dinner is nearly ready, and you have not begun to dress yet. And who do you think is in the drawing-room?'

For Booty, who always knew when he was not wanted, had pattered softly out of the room, thinking it high time to rejoin his master.

'Is it Michael?' asked Audrey, with her face well hidden in her wardrobe.

'To think of your guessing like that!' returned Mollie in a vexed tone.

'Whatever put Captain Burnett in your head, Audrey? Everyone else is so surprised. Mrs. Ross nearly jumped off her chair when she heard his voice. He has been here two hours, and we have all been so busy getting his room ready.'

'I am very glad he has come,' returned Audrey, trying to speak as usual; 'but now will you go down, Mollie dear? for I shall dress more quickly if you do not talk to me. You may give me my dress if you like. There, that will do.' For Mollie's chatter was unendurable.

'How was she to go down and meet him before them all?' she thought, as her trembling fingers bungled with the fastening. Her cheeks were burning, and yet her hands were cold as ice. Would he see how nervous she was, and how she dreaded to meet him? And yet the thought that he was there--in the house--and that in a few minutes she should hear his beloved voice, made her almost dizzy with happiness. And as she clasped the brilliant cross on her neck she hardly dare look at herself, for fear she should read her own secret in her eyes.

The gong sounded before she was ready, and she dared not linger, for fear Mollie should come again in search of her. Without giving herself time for thought, she hurried down, and stood panting a little before the drawing-room door. Yes, they were all there: her father and mother and Mollie; and someone else--imperfectly seen through a sort of haze--was there too! Audrey never knew what word of greeting came to her lips as Michael took her hand. Her eyes were never lifted, as she felt that strong, warm pressure. His low-toned 'I have come, Audrey,' might mean anything or nothing, and was met by absolute silence on her part.

Perhaps Michael felt this meeting embarra.s.sing, for he dropped her hand in another moment and spoke to Mollie, and Audrey took refuge with her father.

But dinner was on the table, and she must take her seat opposite to him.

It was Mollie who was beside him. Happily, no one spoke to her for the first few minutes. Dr. Ross was questioning Michael about his route, and Michael seemed to have a great deal to say about his journey.

Audrey recovered herself, and breathed a little more freely. He was talking to her father, and she could venture one glance at him. How well he looked! He was not so pale, and his moustache seemed darker--she had never thought him handsome before. But at this point, and as though aware of her scrutiny, Michael turned his face full on her, and a flash from the keen blue eyes made her head droop over her plate. During the rest of dinner she scarcely spoke, and more than once Mrs. Ross looked at her in some perplexity. Audrey was very strange, she thought. Had she and Michael quarrelled, that they had met so coldly, with not even a cousinly kiss after his long absence. And now they did not speak to each other!

Dinner was later than usual that night, and the prayer-bell sounded before they left the table. Audrey whispered to Mollie to play the hymn; but she was almost sorry she had done so when she found that Michael had no hymn-book, and she must offer him hers. He took it from her, perhaps because he noticed that her hand was not steady; and she could hear his clear, full ba.s.s, though she could not utter a note.

He was still beside her as they left the schoolroom; but as she was about to follow her mother and Mollie, she felt his hand on hers.

'Come with me a moment,' he said. 'I want to show you something.'

And there was no resisting the firm grasp that compelled her to obey. He was taking her to her father's study; and there he shut the door, as though to exclude the outer world. She was trembling with the fear of what he would say to her, and how she was to answer him, when he came up to her and said, in his old familiar voice:

'Are you never going to look at me again, Audrey?'

Something amused, and yet caressing, in his tone made her raise her eyes, and the look that met hers said so plainly that he understood everything, that her embarra.s.sment and shyness pa.s.sed away for ever; and as he took her in his arms, with a word or two that told her of his deep inward gladness, a sense of well-being and utter content seemed to a.s.sure her that she had found her true rest at last.

CHAPTER LI

'LOVE'S AFTERMATH'

'I seek no copy now of life's first half: Leave here the pages with long musing curled, And write me new my future's epigraph, New angel mine, unhoped for in the world.'

MRS. BROWNING.

Neither of them spoke for some minutes; perhaps Michael's strong emotion felt the need of silence. But presently he said in a voice that thrilled her with its tenderness:

'Audrey, you must never be afraid of me again.'

'I shall never need to be afraid again,' she returned softly. 'Oh, Michael, if you only knew how dreadful it has been all the week! I would not go through it again for worlds.'

'Has it been so bad as that?' in his old rallying tone, for he saw how greatly she was moved.

'You have no idea how bad it was. I felt that I had done something very bold and unmaidenly in writing that postscript to father's letter. I had longed for your return; but after that I began to dread it: I was so afraid of what you must think of me.'

'I think you have known my opinion on that subject for a great many years,' he replied gently. 'If you had not been different from other girls, if you had not been immeasurably above them all in my eyes, I would never have asked you to send me that message. I knew I could rely on your perfect truth, and you have not disappointed me.'

This delicate flattery soothed her and appeased her sensitiveness.

Michael watched her for a moment; then he drew up a chair to the fire in his old way.

'You must sit there and talk to me for a little while,' he said quietly.

And as she looked at him rather doubtfully, and suggested that her mother would be wondering at their absence, he negatived the idea at once.

'By this time your father will have told her everything; he has been in my confidence all these months. No, they will not want us, and I have not seen you yet--at least, you have not seen me; I am quite sure of that.' And as Audrey's dimples came into play at this remark, he very nearly made her feel shy again by saying, 'You have no idea how lovely you have grown, Audrey! Has anyone told you so, I wonder?'

'No, of course not. Who do you think would talk such nonsense to me?'

But her blush made him still more certain of the fact.

'At any rate, it is the dearest face in the world to me,' he went on, still more earnestly. 'Audrey, I think even if you had not written those three little words, I must still have come home. I could not have stayed away from you any longer.'

'If I had only known that, I might have spared myself a great deal of pain,' she replied quickly; 'but they told me that you were going to Greece and the Holy Land, and Mr. Abercrombie had come back alone, and I thought--I thought that I should never see you again.'

'I began to have the same sort of feeling myself, and then I was so tired of waiting. How long have I wanted you, Audrey?--ten or twelve years, at least. I begin to think that there never was such a fellow for constancy.'

'Ten or twelve years! What can you mean, Michael?'

But she knew well enough what he meant, only she was woman enough to love to hear him say it.

'Oh, it was quite twelve years ago! I can remember the occasion quite well. You were in a short white frock, and you had your hair streaming over your shoulders. You were such a pretty little girl, Audrey. I admired you far more than I admired Gage, with all her regular features.'

'Oh, what nonsense, Michael!'