Athlyne

“ Had Joy been present and known his difficulty, and had cared to express herself then as she would have done later, she would have smiled at him as she said:
“Why you dear old goose how could I fall in love with you when I had done that already!”
Had Aunt Judy been commenting on the comment she would have said in her genial cynicism:
“A woman—or a man either—can only fall in love once in a life time; with the same person!”
Athlyne telephoned his chauffeur to whom he had already sent a wire to be prepared, and in a time to be computed by minutes met him outside Ambleside. ”

“ All rushed to the windows to see the great red car swing round the corner. The chauffeur was driving; the bride and groom sat in the tonneau. As Athlyne was not driving he wore an ordinary morning dress—a well-cut suit of light grey which set out well his tall, lithe powerful figure. Joy was wrapped in a huge motor coat of soft grey, with her head shrouded in a veil of the same colour. In the hall they both took off their wraps, Athlyne helping his wife with the utmost tenderness. ”

“ There must be no names!”
“How do you mean, Daddy?”
“I gather that there has been a joke amongst some of you as to calling you the Countess or Lady Athlyne, or some of that kind of foolishness. My dear child, that is not right. You are not the Countess, nor Lady Athlyne, nor Lady anything. A name my dear when it is an honourable one is a very precious possession. A woman must cherish the name she does possess as a part of her honour.” ”

“ Joy fled incontinently. The movements of a young woman can be of extraordinary quickness, but never quicker than when fear lends her wings. It seemed to Athlyne that she made but one jump from where she stood through the door-way. He could remember afterwards the flash of her bare heels as she turned in closing the door behind her.
“Now Sir!” Colonel Ogilvie’s voice was stern to deadliness as he spoke. Athlyne realised its import. He felt that he was bound hand and foot, and knew that his part of the coming struggle would have to be passive. He braced himself to endure. ”

“ God’s death! sir, be careful or you shall rue it!” He stopped almost choking with passion. Athlyne felt himself once more overwhelmed with the cold wave of responsibility. “Joy! Joy! Joy!” he kept repeating to himself as a sort of charm to keep off evil. To let go his anger now might—would be fatal to her happiness. ”

“ Joy he read like an open book. There was no mistaking her love, her anxiety, her apprehension. Athlyne he knew something of already, but he now saw in his face a warning look which bade him be silent regarding him. He diagnosed Colonel Ogilvie as a proud, masterful, vain, passionate man; something of a prig; tender, in a way he understood himself; faithful to his word; relentless to an expressed intention ”

“ Love is a blindness—in certain ways. It never once occurred to Athlyne that Joy might have seen him, might have even known of his being at Ambleside or in its neighbourhood. Any independent onlooker or any one not bound by the simplicity and unquestioning faith of ardent love would at least have doubted whether there was not some possible intention in Joy’s movements. ”

“ Joy clapped her hands with delight like a happy child as she glanced around her. Athlyne drew up sharp, and jumping from his seat held out his hand to Joy who sprang beside him on the road. As they stood together when Joy’s wrap had been removed they made a handsome couple. Both tall and slim and elegant and strong. ”

“ Athlyne went back to his seat; once again the pendulum of his thoughts swung to and fro.
He was now face to face with one certainty amongst many possibilities: Whatever befel he could not give any immediate help to Joy. She, poor dear, must fend for herself and if need be, fight her battle alone. ”

“ As Athlyne stood face to face with him, watching for every sign of intention as a fencer watches his opponent, he realised that there would be for him no pity, no mercy, not even understanding. He would have to fight an uphill contest—if Joy was to be saved even a single pang. What he could do he would: sacrifice himself in any way that a man can accomplish it. Life and happiness had for him passed by! One of his greatest difficulties would be, he felt, that of so controlling himself that he would not of necessity shut behind him, by anything which he might say or do, the door of conciliation. ”

“ It is too splendid to enjoy all one’s self; and I was afraid if I told Mother she might not understand—she’s only a woman you know, and might put a wrong construction on my telling her, and so worry herself about me. And I didn’t dare to tell Aunt Judy, for she’s so chock full of romance that she would have simply gone crazy and chaffed me out of all reason. There is no holding back Aunt Judy when she is chasing after a romance! And besides, Daddy dear” here she took his arm and looked up in his face “I wanted you to know that Lord Athlyne is a gentleman.” ”

“ THE CAR OF DESTINY Athlyne did not feel safe till the French vessel was dipping her nose into the open Atlantic seas, and the Long Island Hills were a faint blue line on the western horizon. The last dozen hours of his stay in New York had been as though spent in prison. He knew well now that he really loved Joy; that this was no passing fancy, no mere desire of possession of a pretty woman. All phases of the passion of love, from the solely physical to the purely spiritual, have their own forces commanding different sets of nerves. ”

“ Athlyne loved Joy in all ways, so that the best of his nature regulated the standard of his thoughts. His love was no passing fancy which might or might not develop, flame up, and fade away. He had, he felt, found the other half of him, lost in the primeval chaos; and he wanted the union to be so complete that it would outlive the clashing of worlds in the final cataclysm. Healthy people are healthy in their loves and even in their passions. ”

“ Athlyne had his full share of it. Being young and strong and of a class in life which seldom lacks amusement he had not been given to self-analysis. But all the same, though he did not think of it, the force was there. In his present emotional crisis it brought the lover in him up to the Celtic ideal. An ideal so strangely saturated with love that his whole being, his aims and ambitions, his hopes and fears, his pleasures and pains yielded place to it and for the time became merged in it. To him the whole world seemed to revolve round Joy as a pivotal point. ”

“ In answer Joy and Athlyne spoke together. Said the latter:
"Oh sir! There he stopped; he feared to say more lest his anger should master him. But the protest was effective; the old man flushed—over forehead and ears and neck. Joy spoke in a different vein:
"There is no estrangement, Daddy dear; and therefore it can be no one's doing. Least of all could such a thing come from this man who loves me, and ... and whom I love." As she spoke she blushed divinely, and taking her lover's right hand between both her hands held it tight. ”

“ At this threat Joy grew ghastly pale. Athlyne, wrung to the heart by it, forgot his intention of discretion and said quickly and sharply:
“That is not fair, Colonel Ogilvie. She is a woman—if she is your daughter, and is not to be treated brutally. You must not strike at a man through a woman. If you want to strike a man do so direct! I am the man. Strike me, how and when you will; but this woman is my wife—at least she is until she repudiates our marriage! But till then by God! no man—not even her father himself—shall strike her or at her, or through her!” ”

“ Both straight as lances; both bright and eager; with the light of love and happiness shining on them more notably than even the flicker of sunlight between the great stems and branches of the trees. His brown hair seemed to match her black; the brown eyes and the grey both were lit with a “light that never came from land or sea!” Joy’s eyes fell under the burning glances of her lover; the time had not yet come for that absolutely fearless recognition which, being a man’s unconscious demand, a woman instinctively resists. Athlyne recognised the delicacy and acquiesced. ”

“ His ardour redoubled, and her heart beat harder with new love as well as triumph as he drew her closer to him in a pythonic embrace. Then she, too, clung to him even closer than before. That embrace was all lover-like—an agony of rapture.
In its midst they were startled somewhat by the rumbling of a motor driven fast which seemed to stop close to them. Instinctively Joy tried to draw away from her lover; such is woman’s impulse. But Athlyne held her all the tighter—his embrace was not all love now, but the protection which comes from love. ”

“ Joy would never quarrel with her father; of that he felt as surely as that he loved her. All unknown to himself Athlyne had an instinctive knowledge of character. Any one who had ever seen him exercise the faculty would have been astonished by the rapidity of its working. The instant he had seen Joy he had recognised her qualities. He had understood young Breckenridge at a glance; otherwise he was too shrewd a man to trust him as he had done. It is not often that a man will entrust the first comer in a crowd with a valuable horse. ”

“ Now, as they paused at the joining of the roads, Athlyne said—and strange to say it was in an ordinary commonplace voice:
“Joy won’t you come with me for a ride. I have my motor here, and we can go alone. There is much I want to say to you—much to tell you, and the speed will help us. I want to rush along—to fly. Earth is too prosaic for me—now!” Joy looking softly up caught the lightning that flashed from his eyes, and her own fell. ”

“ The breakfast was a great success, though but few of the party ate heartily. Neither Athlyne nor Joy did justice to the provender. They whispered a good deal and held hands surreptitiously under the table, and their eyes met constantly. The same want of appetite seemed to have affected both the Sheriff and Judy; but silence and a certain restraint and primness were their characteristics. Mrs. O’Brien, seated on the very edge of her chair, was too proud and too happy to eat. ”

“ Sometimes Athlyne grumbled to himself of the hardness of his lot. It was too bad that from such a little thing as taking another name, and merely for the purpose of a self-protective investigation of a lie, he should find himself involved in such a net-work of deceit. Other people did things a hundred times worse every day of their lives. He had often done so himself; but nothing ever came of it. But now, when his whole future might depend upon it, he was face to face with an actual danger. If Colonel Ogilvie quarrelled with him about it that would mean the end of all. ”

“ As she heard it Joy’s heart beat so that she feared he would notice it, and all the self-protective instincts of womanhood rose at the thought. For an instant her face glowed; then it grew pale again. She did not hesitate, however. She raised her eyes and looked him full in the face. Her cheeks were flaming now, but she did not heed it. In the face of nature what, after all, is convention. As Athlyne lost himself in those wonderful eyes he had a wild almost over-mastering desire to take her in his arms and kiss her straight on the beautiful mouth. ”

“ Judy had a wild impulse to tell Joy to go to the door with the departing guest, but in the presence of her mother she did not dare to suggest it. Had she been alone she would probably have done so.
Athlyne walked away with his mind in a whirl. In his heart was ever surging up through all other thoughts that one sublime recognition which comes to every man at least once in his life: that which Sir Geraint voiced:
“Here, by God’s rood is the one maid for me!” To this all other thoughts gave way. It obsessed him. ”

“ But this man, heart-hungry and naturally susceptible after some years of campaigning, fell madly in love. His very soul had gone down into the depths of those unfathomable eyes, and come back purified and sweetened—like the smoke drawn through the rosewater of a hookah. Every instant that he sat beside her the spell grew upon him. Joy was a woman in whom the sex-instinct was very strong. She was woman all over; type of woman who seems to draw man to her as the magnet draws the steel. Athlyne was a very masculine person and therefore peculiarly sensitive to the influence. ”

“ He purposely addressed himself to Colonel Ogilvie, evidently bearing in mind Athlyne’s look of warning to silence regarding himself.
Whilst he had been speaking, Joy stood still, holding Judy by the hand and keeping her close to her. Judy whispered, holding her mouth close to her ear and trying to avoid the observation of the others:
“Come away dear whilst they are talking. They will be freer alone!” Joy whispered in return:
“No, I must not go. I must stay here, I am wanted. Do not say anything, dear—not a word; but stay by me.” Judy in reply squeezed her hand and remained silent. ”

“ With that logical mind of his, and with his experience of law and the passions that lead to law-invoking, he knew that the realization of Athlyne’s name and position was a troublesome matter which might have been attended with disastrous consequences. To a man of Colonel Ogilvie’s courage and strong passion the presence of an antagonist worthy of his powers is rather an incentive to quarrel than a palliative.
As to poor Judy she was in no position to think at all. She was to all practical intents, except for the noise she was occasionally making—her transport was subsiding—as one who is not. ”