The Temptation Of Torilla Part 16

"You would have had eyes to see what was wrong and you would have done something to improve it."

The Marquis looked at her and then he asked, "You believe in me?"

"I believe in you, I trust you and I think you are not only magnificent, but very a very wonderful."

There was a little break in her voice and her eyes filled with tears as she looked at the Marquis.

"Then I will try not to fail you, Torilla."

It was in the nature of a vow.

As if they both knew their conversation had come to an end and there was nothing left to say, they moved towards the door.

The Marquis opened it for her and they went out.

Torilla felt as they walked away down the pa.s.sage that they had left their hearts behind in that quiet fragrant room.

CHAPTER SIX.

Beryl burst into the room where Torilla was writing a letter to her father.

"What do you think, Torilla?" she asked excitedly. "Gallen fought a duel this morning at dawn!"

As she spoke, she walked across the room to the mirror so she did not see Torilla spring up from the desk, her face deathly pale, her lips moving although no sound came from them.

"You must admit it is really romantic," Beryl went on, regarding her reflection, "because of course, he fought over me!"

"He is a not hurt?"

Torilla managed to say the words but they were hardly audible.

"Charles tells me that Gallen received a slight scratch, but his opponent is at death's door."

"Who a was it?"

Torilla could not help the question even though she knew the answer.

"A man called Sir Jocelyn Threnton," Beryl replied, taking off her bonnet and smoothing down her hair. "I believe I have met him, but I cannot remember what he looks like."

"And the Marquis is a not really h-hurt?"

"He should not actually have received a scratch, so Charles says," Beryl answered, "but Sir Jocelyn fired before the referee had counted ten."

She gave a little laugh.

"It is so like Gallen's luck for him to sense what would happen and, as Sir Jocelyn fired, he stepped to one side. Instead of killing him the bullet merely grazed his left arm."

Beryl made a sound of delight as she went on, "Charles says all the Clubs in St. James's are talking about it. Sir Jocelyn is completely discredited and, if he does recover, he will have to go abroad."

Torilla clasped her hands together, but she did not speak.

"If he stays," Beryl said with satisfaction, "no one will speak to him and he will be ostracized."

Torilla felt her legs could no longer support her and she sat down heavily on a chair.

How could she ever imagine a how could she have guessed that the Marquis would solve their problem in such a manner?

"You are quite a certain," she said because she had to know, "that the Marquis is really not a badly wounded?"

Beryl threw herself down on the sofa.

"How you do fuss, Torilla!" she said. "Of course Gallen is all right. You must have realised by now that he is indestructible."

She leaned back against the satin cus.h.i.+ons to add, "I wonder what Sir Jocelyn said about me? Charles is certain he must have disparaged me in a most disgraceful manner for Gallen to call him out."

She sighed.

"I suppose I shall never know, for Gallen will certainly not tell me."

"Have you seen him?" Torilla asked.

"Who a Gallen?" Beryl asked. "I imagine he is at his house and it would be most improper for me to call there without a chaperone!"

She was not speaking seriously, but she added, "Not a word of this to Mama! You know how she worries over anything that concerns my reputation and it is not the 'done thing' to be duelled over."

"I will not say anything," Torilla murmured.

At the same time she felt like crying in her relief that the Marquis was not badly hurt.

Supposing Sir Jocelyn had succeeded in wounding him mortally? Suppose he had died?

She pushed the thoughts away from her mind.

The Marquis was all right and she must not show herself to be a coward, but she knew she was one where he was concerned.

"I think everything has happened to me now," Beryl said. "Men have threatened before to fight over me, but it has never actually happened. This will certainly be something to relate to my grandchildren, if I ever have any."

She was speaking in her frivolous voice, which made Torilla wince.

She knew that if she was in Beryl's position at the moment she would have been desperate with anxiety.

Whether it was conventional or not, she would have been unable to prevent herself from grushng to the Marquis's side.

Beryl rose from the sofa.

"I only hope that this does not mean that Gallen will cry off taking us to the Opera tonight. It is to be a very smart occasion and we are to be in the Prince Regent's box."

"We?" Torilla questioned.

"But of course a the invitation includes you, dearest. The Prince said some very flattering things about you to Mama and, after the Opera is over, we are all going to supper at Carlton House."

Torilla turned her head to look at the letter she had been writing to her father.

"I a suppose, Beryl," she said in a low voice, "you really a want me to stay with you for your wedding? I feel I ought to a return to look after Papa."

Beryl gave a scream.

"Are you crazy? Of course you must stay for my wedding! You are my bridesmaid and I want you. You know full well there would be no fun for me if you are not here to laugh about everybody and seeing the amusing side of it all."

With an effort Torilla replied, "I will stay, if you really want me, dearest. It was a just a thought."

"And a very foolish one," Beryl said. "Now you are back in my life again I have no intention of losing you and if you raise more objections I shall write to your father myself."

She smiled as she added, "I shall point out to Uncle Augustus that Parsons are supposed to be unselfish and if he takes you away from me it will be very very selfish indeed!"

This was Beryl's parting shot as she left the room.

Torilla put her hands up to her face.

She was still feeling rather faint from the shock of thinking that the Marquis might have been injured and it brought home to her very forcefully how much she loved him.

She had lain awake all last night after they left the ball, feeling one moment a strange, unearthly happiness because he had said he loved her and the next cast into the darkness of h.e.l.l because she knew they could never be together and that Beryl stood between them like a flaming sword.

She could not believe that what she felt for the Marquis and he for her was wrong or wicked.

Love could never be that.

What they were feeling was sacred, but Torilla knew it would soil and defame what was Divine if they hurt Beryl and took their happiness at her expense.

She had been right when she told the Marquis she would not let him do anything that was dishonourable.

She knew enough of the world to be aware that, however reprehensibly the Marquis might have behaved where his love affairs were concerned, he had never done anything that broke the unwritten code expected of an honourable gentleman.

Just as he would never pull his horses on a Racecourse, cheat at cards or, like Sir Jocelyn, fire in a duel before the count of ten, so he could not refuse to marry Beryl, having once asked her to be his wife.

'I love him for what he is and nothing I will ever do must spoil the standing of the man who is admired as a Corinthian and a sportsman,' she said to herself.

When she thought of all he had done at Barrowfield because she had asked it of him, she thought that no man could have been more generous or open-minded.

He had not made excuses for his neglect of the pit in the past, he had condemned his own ignorance and made what retribution he could.

He had said that her father was satisfied and she knew that in that case the changed conditions at his pit would surpa.s.s all the others in South Yorks.h.i.+re.

The Marquis did not go to the Opera that night on, Beryl was told, his doctor's orders, but Torilla fancied that there was perhaps another more personal reason.

They both had to adjust themselves to what had been said in the privacy of the boudoir at the ball. It was going to be difficult to meet in public without revealing their feelings.

In the days that followed Torilla only saw the Marquis when a large number of other people were present and he made no attempt to speak to her alone.

Because they were so closely attuned to each other, she knew, even when she looked at him across a crowded room, that he was suffering.

He appeared to have grown thinner, the lines of cynicism on his face were sharply etched, but to Torilla they were lines of pain.

She learnt inadvertently from one of the grooms that the Marquis was riding his horses to the point of exhaustion.

She herself found it almost impossible to eat the rich meals she had enjoyed when she first came South, and, as the day of the wedding drew nearer, Beryl asked her anxiously, "What are you doing to yourself, Torilla? You are so thin that my gowns are beginning to hang on you like a sack! If you go on like this, we will have to have your bridesmaid's gown altered!"

"It fits very well," Torilla protested and did not add that she had already had the waist taken in by two inches.

It was a very beautiful gown and she knew that she should be grateful to her aunt for giving it to her. But she felt almost as if it was a shroud that would cover her last glimpse of happiness.

She had already determined that when she went North after the wedding she would never return.

It would be impossible to see the Marquis without feeling, because Beryl was his wife, an irrepressible pang of jealousy, if not bitterness.

Every night Torilla prayed that she would feel neither of these things.

'I love them both,' she said to herself, 'and I want them to be happy. Help me, G.o.d, to make my love overcome all other emotions. Help me! Help me!'

It was the cry of a frightened child and she was afraid because it was impossible not to feel her whole body and mind yearning for the Marquis.

She longed for him so desperately that at times it threatened her self-control.

Beryl had designed Torilla's bridesmaid's gown herself. It was of white satin, decorated around the hem with white roses that glittered with diamante as if they were little drops of dew.

There were roses in a wreath, which was very becoming on Torilla's fair hair and she was to carry a bouquet of the same flowers.

Beryl came to the last fitting.

"You look absolutely lovely, dearest!" she exclaimed, "and almost like a bride yourself."

"That's true, my Lady," the dressmaker chipped in. "I hope I shall be making a wedding gown for Miss Clifford in the very near future."

"I think that is very likely," Beryl smiled and Torilla knew she was thinking of Lord Arkley.

She wanted to repudiate such an idea, then she told herself there was no point in protesting and saying she had no intention of marrying Lord Arkley a or any other man for that matter.

She knew Beryl would not understand and she was quite certain her aunt, when she had time, was still intriguing on her behalf.

Fortunately the Countess was so engrossed with the innumerable arrangements involved in Beryl's wedding that she had little time to worry about her niece.

But Torilla knew that it was at the back of her mind and she was determined as soon as the ceremony was over to return to Barrowfield where it would be impossible for her aunt to concern herself with her.