Agnes Giberne

“ Are we not one already in mind and heart? If you love—would you consent to separation for life, only for this?—only that yours is bluer blood than mine! You shall make of me what you will! My people shall not trouble you—that I can promise. It is you and I who love—just you and I! What has the rest of the world to do with us? Just you and I!—my Doris!—my darling! ”

“ You once asked me to consider Maurice's side of the question; and rightly. What now about Stirling's side of it?"
"You mean—should I be wronging him?"
"Not if you love him."
She lifted a flushed face.
"But—I don't. Not love, daddy. I love Dick. The two things are so different. I don't think—really—he would want that sort of love!"
"If you give yourself to him, he will want the whole of you—he will have a right to the whole. No man, worth calling a man, would be content with less. Loving one man, you cannot rightly marry another." ”

“ Doris, all life and glow and high spirits; Katherine, colourless, still, and impassive.
Nobody noticed Katherine's look. She had much self-control; and one who is always pale may easily be a little paler than usual, without causing comment. Doris's vividness absorbed attention. She had not expected to find Hamilton here; and the encounter, just after Mrs. Winton's unwise suggestion, threw her off her balance. Whatever she really felt about him—and no one knew this less than the girl herself—she was flattered by his attentions. ”

“ More than a month had gone by since Maurice's brief visit; and to Doris it looked like six months. The days dragged, and all she had to do was a trouble. Under pressure, she had cycled over this afternoon to call upon Katherine,—and she found the way thither extraordinarily long.
On arrival she collapsed into one of the luxurious arm-chairs,— her pretty face laid against a crimson cushion; the cheeks less tinted than their wont; the mouth-corners dropped; the deep-set eyes dark and sad. Katherine, knowing nothing of the foreign entanglement, was puzzled by her present mood. ”

“ Doris wondered that anybody could grumble, with such an outlook.
She had been up herself since six o'clock; and from her little balcony, facing another way, had watched the goats of the village, starting for their day upon the alps; gathered together by the goatherd with his horn; each small beast coming composedly from its own stable at the sound. Already Doris had had one ramble, and now she was more than ready for breakfast. It was all too delicious—except Mrs. Brutt. The girl was in dancing spirits with the air, the views, the novelty, the freedom. ”

“ He had chosen a couloir or gully, never more than a dozen feet in width, rugged, broken, partly lined with snow, partly glazed with ice. It swerved a little to the left, so that one climber would seldom be just over the head of the other.
Doris below, near Maurice, watched steadfastly, fascinated by Pressford's advance, as he crept upward, making no hasty movement, testing each foothold before he trusted to it, taking advantage of every handhold. At times he appeared to cling bodily to the steep rock, writhing and working himself cleverly over one obstacle after another. ”

“ She did so admire Doris Winton; a captivating creature, pretty, graceful, full of life, "the dearest of girls." And wasn't it touching to see one, so fitted to adorn society, devoting herself to parish drudgery? So good and useful! But rather melancholy—didn't the Squire think?
"Of course one knows that the work has to be done. And the Rector's daughter has to take her share. But there are limits. And she is so young—so taking! For my part, I do like young folks to have a merry time—not to wear themselves out before they've had their swing." ”

“ Still free of the rope, he moved some paces away, munching chocolate, and scanning the rocks which frowned grimly above. Maurice came back to his seat by Doris.
They had the world to themselves. Pressford, always aloof and preoccupied, hardly counted.
From their very feet the snow-slope fell away. Behind rose the stern rock-rampart, calling to be climbed. But their eyes were turned to the wide sweep of mountain pastures far below, and downward thence to valleys shepherding cloudlets of morning mist.
Like birds they were perched aloft; away from common life; cut off from human habitations. ”

“ They seem rather to be intensely earnest; uplifted above light talk and merriment; brooding solemnly over earth's smallness; apart from lesser interests; leading the minds of those who gain their presence to deeper and higher topics.
Pressford, having gone farther than he intended, now came crunching over the hard snow. It was all right, he said,—and "a rare sporting bit." His quiet eyes held an unwonted gleam in them, as of a mountain warrior, eager for the fray, thirsting for a fight with Nature's obstacles.
But for Maurice all was not so clear. ”

“ She knew that he objected to rapid bicycling for women; and she was bent still on crossing him. Mrs. Winton had seemed to take it for granted—or so Doris imagined—that he only had to speak to be accepted. Her pride was up in arms. Nobody should suppose that she sat meekly, with folded hands, awaiting permission to be his.
She might marry some day. She might even marry Hamilton Stirling. It was not an impossibility. All things considered, she rather favoured the notion, as a dim and distant prospect. She enjoyed feeling herself the object of somebody's attentions. ”

“ She was leaning idly out of her little bedroom window, surveying the hotel garden below, and the Rhone valley beyond, bounded by its stately mountain ramparts. Bex lies at the bottom of a tea-cup, closed in around by lofty heights, like the sides of the cup. She had always so longed to see Swiss mountains. And they were very grand, ineffably beautiful, clothed in pine-woods, streaked with ravines and valleys. Yet Doris, possessing her wish, was by no means in tip-top spirits. ”

“ By this time Doris had left off analysing her own sensations; the state of her mind being too simple to need dissection. She thought no more of Hamilton; but she thought a great deal of Dick Maurice. When with him, she wanted nothing else. When not with him, she was looking forward to their next meeting. The present was enough; and she shut her eyes to possible complications. Each day brought its own delights.
Mr. Pressford's coming had made developments easy. He was a strong wiry man, about forty in age; brusque in manner, taciturn in speech, and a passionate devotee of Alpine climbing. ”

“ NOT a word about Dick Maurice was spoken that first evening.
Twice Doris tried to bring him forward, and was rebuffed,—very kindly, yet decidedly. She could not resolve to do it again. She seemed to be under a spell; able only to bask in the sunshine of home, in the loving welcome from all sides.
And though she thought of her lover continually, yet in a manner he was pushed to the background of her mind. Switzerland already began to look far off. Her feelings had become mixed and indefinite. She had almost the sensations of a naughty child, come back to be good. ”

“ Maurice remarked, as their silent leader moved. "Are you getting on all right?"
"It's too lovely for anything," she said with energy. "I never enjoyed myself one-hundredth part as much in all my life."
Two hours of this rock-climbing brought them to the foot of a snow-slope, which formed the "shoulder" of the mountain. Far away upward from where they stood stretched a smooth sheet of sparkling purity.
"Now we shall be above the snow-line," joyously exclaimed Doris. "I've been longing for that, ever since I came to Switzerland." ”

“ The heaven was one unbroken expanse of rich blue.
Maurice pointed out to her in a subdued voice some chief features in the landscape; beginning with the Lake of Geneva, a misty blur, bounded by dim Jura outlines; and travelling thence to the left, by way of the rugged Gramont and the pale blue Dent du Midi. Between the latter and the Dent du Morcles was a radiant vision of the monarch of Swiss mountains, pure and spotlessly white; also of the massed turrets and glaciers of the Valaisian Range. ”

“ They would want for their only child a husband of unexceptionable parentage; and who could wonder? Not Maurice!—who saw the objections to himself almost as clearly as Mrs. Winton did. Like most people without "descent," he valued it less than do those who rejoice in a pedigree; yet he could estimate their side of the question.
But with regard to Doris herself he had no shadow of doubt. He loved her; she loved him; and, as he had said, they together might face a world in opposition. ”

“ Winnie whispered a "Yes," and lay as if worn out. The half-hour of sitting up had tried her severely. Doris examined the pale face, and felt a wish to know more of what lay beneath that serene white brow, with its clustering hair, its sweet patience. Winnie Morris, though perhaps not much older than herself, seemed to have lived a good deal longer.
"Where is the pain, Winnie,—if I may call you so?"
"Almost everywhere. But I mustn't mind," the girl repeated. "People often have worse things to bear than rheumatism." ”

“ He—the beloved and esteemed and honoured Squire— the foremost man in the neighbourhood—he to confess all! He—Richard Raye Stirling of Lynnthorpe!—so to lower himself in the eyes of men! He—to put these people into their rightful position before the sight of the world, his world, which meant so much to him! The thing was impossible. Wildly, madly impossible.
Nobody imagined aught of what he was going through. He had great self-control, never betraying what he felt. "He isn't quite the thing— looks worried!" ”

“ Appreciation of good birth, extreme particularity of taste, a passion for refinement and high breeding,—these were by nature and by training a part of her very self. In reverting to them, after a brief spell of dislocation, she reverted also to Hamilton Stirling as the embodiment of them.
"If it has to be, it must be, I suppose," she said one day to herself, as she stood in the hall, gazing out of the window. "I don't know what I really want. I wish I did. He really is a dear man—rather too fond of old bones and stones; but everybody is too fond of something. ”

“ She was not so clear-sighted as she imagined. "Nothing ever escapes me!" was a pet phrase with her; yet a good deal did escape her. Once aroused, however, she could be sagacious enough.
On the return of the two that evening, towards the close of table d'hôte, fresh from their day of intercourse, he must indeed have been nonobservant who should have seen nothing unusual in Maurice's look, however carefully repressed,—who should not have detected an unwonted brightness in Doris's eyes, and noted her soft brilliancy of colouring. ”

“ She was in a state of acute nervous strain. One object only lay before her mind,—the next step, the next handhold. Other thoughts died out, or were entirely subordinate. Her powers of climbing, under the present exigency, were increased to a remarkable degree. Maurice marvelled, as he watched and feared.
At last she was nearly on a level with Pressford!
She could see now that he hung against a face of smooth rock, beyond the couloir which she was mounting; and that between him and death lay nothing but the upholding rope. ”

“ Winton have realised it, she might at any time have controlled this daughter of hers by the slightest of silken threads. Stern opposition, severe management, always stiffened the young back; but Doris would succumb at once to the touch of love and gentleness.
Those clasping arms meant to her what she had known, but often had not realised, the strength of mother-love! She knew that the firm grip meant more than love. ”

“ Doris's reception of him and his offerings varied, as of old. Sometimes she was submissively sweet. Sometimes she contradicted and laughed at him. Sometimes she was dignified and indifferent. Sometimes she felt that she never, never could, never, never would, marry any man living except Dick Maurice. Sometimes she felt that in the future— not too soon!—Hamilton might really do quite nicely.
Though she did not know her own mind, she knew her mother's mind. Every power that Mrs. Winton possessed was bent to the furtherance of Hamilton's suit. ”