Sir Geoffrey

“ To the surprise of everybody, Geoffrey takes no open notice of his mother's speech. He does not give way to wrath, nor does he open his lips on any subject. His face is innocent of anger, horror, or distrust. It changes, indeed, beneath the glow of the burning logs but in a manner totally unexpected. An expression that might even be termed hope lights it up. Like this do his thoughts run: "Can it be possible that the Australian has caved in, and, fearing publicity after last night's fiasco, surrendered the will to Mona?" ”

“ Geoffrey returned, bitterly; “the man is a miserable coward, and he dare not meet me; his history is doubtless one of shame and wrong—he knew that I would force it from him, and he fears to remain and confess it. But, Gladys, I shall find him yet—some day I will compel him to face me and own the truth. I will hunt him down! he shall not escape me!”
“Oh, Geoffrey, pray do not let it trouble you so—there may have been some other reason for his going,” said the young girl, laying her hand sympathetically on his arm. ”

“ Huntress—“I can never repay.”
Geoffrey warmly grasped that extended hand.
“You have made my heart more glad than I can tell you, sir,” he said. “I can forget—I can overlook everything, now that I know my mother was your loved and honored wife. I came here fearing the worst—fearing that a dreadful stigma rested upon my birth—that I was not entitled to an honorable name.”
“You are entitled to much more than that, Geoffrey,” Colonel Mapleson returned, smiling, although his lips trembled and his eyes were full of tears; “there is a handsome fortune awaiting your disposal.” ”

“ What do you say to that, Sir Geoffrey?"
"I was just going to suggest that you were altogether too fine a bride for the occasion," said Sir Geoffrey, rather glumly. "A less resplendent toilet would be less likely to attract attention."
"Eclipse me then under this big cloak," she replied, giving it to him. "Do you think, you foolish man, that I am dressed up like this to wed a footpad? I am on my way to Marlborough House to dine with the duchess, and must hasten or I shall be late and may chance to get a box o' the ear for my first course." ”

“ Empty hands are no disgrace if they are honest and willing hands, backed by energy and a resolute spirit, both of which I know you possess. As for the name, it is above reproach, but not more so than the manly fellow upon whom I have bestowed it, and of whom I am very proud; I know he will never dishonor it.”
“Thank you, Uncle August,” Geoffrey replied, with a suspicious tremor in his voice: “but heart, hands, name, and even life itself will not amount to much with me if I am denied the love I crave—the world would be nothing to me without Gladys.” ”

“ When I went down on a visit to you, Lord Lathon, that I might be near Sir Geoffrey, he took a small cottage in the neighborhood, intending to do his best to counteract my schemes. But I was too cunning for him.
"On the morning of Sir Geoffrey's murder I was on the cliffs, under the pretence of botanizing. While there I heard the guns of a shooting party, and through a field-glass I saw Mr. Thurwell and Sir Geoffrey Kynaston. At that time I scarcely thought that chance would bring Sir Geoffrey within my power, but I made up my mind to watch them. ”

“ There then sat Geoffrey at the banquet; and Christopher smiled on him, and said: "See now, lord, if I have not done as thou badest when thou gavest me the treasure of Greenharbour, for I have brought the wolf-heads to thy helping and not to thy scathing. Do thou as much for me, and be thou a good earl to thy Lady and mine, and then shalt thou yet live and die a happy man, and my friend. Or else—"
"There shall be no else, Lord King," quoth Geoffrey; "all men henceforth shall tell of me as a true man." ”

“ Geoffrey smiled wisely.
“You have guessed too much and too little, my sunbeam,” he said.
“What a paradoxical statement, my learned Bachelor of Arts! I expected better things of you,” retorted Gladys, merrily.
“You have yet to find my statement true, in spite of the seeming paradox,” he replied, with mock dignity. “Somebody is going to Europe—we are not all going, however.”
“Oh, Geoff! you are not to be left at home, are you?” cried his betrothed, in a disappointed tone, her face paling at the thought. ”

“ Gladys stole one little hand confidingly into his, under cover of her opera cloak.
“Never mind, Geoff, now that I have you here; I will tell you some other time,” she whispered, as she involuntarily turned her still flashing eyes toward young Mapleson, while a slight shiver ran through her frame.
Geoffrey’s glance followed hers, and his face clouded.
“Has he dared——” he began, sternly.
“Hush!” she returned; “it is all past; he will never dare again.” ”

“ Geoffrey returned, apologetically, “but I confess I was startled, as well as my horse, for a moment. Are you not afraid to be traveling this lonely way at this time of the evening?”
“No, sir, I am not afraid. I know every step of the road, but I am not so young as I was once, and it tires me to walk,” the woman replied, with a weary note in her voice, accompanied by a heavy sigh. ”

“ Geoffrey is quite dumb, and stands gazing at her surprised at the amazing change a stuff, a color, can make in so short a time. Beautiful she always is in his sight, but he wonders that until now it never occurred to him what a sensation she is likely to create in the London world. When at last he does give way to speech, driven to break his curious silence by something in her face, he says nothing of the gown, but only this.
"Oh, Mona, will you always love me as you do now?" ”

“ May pressed Geoffrey's hand with gentle sympathy.
"You have my real regrets," she said. "What a horrible thing it is to think that you are all powerless to help it. Good-bye."
Geoffrey found Ralph at the entrance to the castle gate. There was a queer smile on his face, a smile of amused expectation.
"You found her charming?" he asked.
"And clever," said Geoffrey. "I guessed your plot, uncle. She is very clever."
"The cleverest woman in the world, the most wicked, the most unscrupulous. Of course she asked you to dinner, and, of course, you will go. Nobody is to know of it, mind." ”

“ I believe that man is my father!” Geoffrey replied, with quivering lips.
“Oh, Geoff!”
“I do, dear; and I fear, too, that there is some miserable secret connected with my early life.”
“Do not think that,” the beautiful girl pleaded; “I will not believe it without the strongest proof; and even if it should be so, the fact cannot harm you.”
“Gladys,” Geoffrey said, in a stern, repressed tone, while his face was dreadful to look upon in its ghastliness, “if there is sin connected with my life—if I find that my birthright is one of shame—I can never ask you to share it.” ”

“ What will poor Miss Rose say! To be sure, there is nothing boys won't do; their equals for perverseness don't walk the earth. Though I ought not to speak against them, while there's Master William and Master Edward to contradict me. They are boys, to be sure; but as for that Geoffrey!' And here she shook her head in silence, as if Geoffrey's delinquencies were beyond the power of words to express. ”

“ He turned, with blazing eyes, and faced Geoffrey, but the expression which he saw upon his face warned him that he had no irresolute spirit to deal with.
“Go!” reiterated Geoffrey, inflexibly, “or I may be tempted beyond my strength and forget one of the ‘thou shalt nots.’”
“I will not!” he returned, as resolutely, all his antagonism aroused. “Do you imagine that, after having struggled so desperately to attain the dearest hopes of my life, I will fly like a coward in the very hour of their achievement?” ”

“ Every day makes Mona dearer and more dear, her sweet and guileless nature being one calculated to create, with growing knowledge, an increasing admiration and tenderness. Indeed, each happy afternoon spent with her serves but to forge another link in the chain that binds him to her.
To-day is "so cool, so calm, so bright," that Geoffrey's heart grows glad within him as he walks along the road that leads to the farm, his gun upon his shoulder, his trusty dog at his heels.
All through the air the smell of heather, sweet and fragrant, reigns. ”

“ Geoffrey made a sudden spring as he uttered those last words, seized the young Southerner about the waist, whirled him to the floor quick as a flash, and grasping him by the legs, held him aloft in this reversed position with a grip of iron, while he repeated, in a voice of thunder, that Latin maxim:
“Sæpe intereunt aliis meditantes necem. Often they who plot the destruction of others become the victims of their own machinations.” ”

“ Geoffrey rose instantly from the table upon which he had been seated.
He saw a tall woman who might have been anything between thirty and fifty years of age, a woman of great beauty. It was the hard, commanding style of beauty that men call regal. She might have been a queen, but for the faint suggestion of the adventuress about her. To Geoffrey's bow she made the slightest possible haughty recognition.
"I'm going out, Mrs. Jessop," she said. "I shall be back to luncheon. If a telegram should happen to come for me, I shall be along the cliffs between here and Beauhaven." ”

“ The young men stood in silence for a moment, then Geoffrey spoke—
"The King has laid a heavy trust upon us," he said, "and therein has conferred on us great honour, for we shall now be doing service to our own dear country as well as to his. Let us ask a greater King than Philip, even our Heavenly Father, to bless our enterprise."
With one impulse the young men knelt, and for a few minutes held silent converse with God. Ere they left the tent William spoke.
"In this matter, my brothers, we need a leader whom we swear to obey in all things. I propose that Geoffrey be our captain." ”

“ Then, with an evident effort, he looked up in Geoffrey’s face, and said:
“I know that you might have all, had you chosen to take it, and in that case I would have been a beggar. You have led me to believe—and not by this act alone, either—that there is at least one truly noble, unselfish man in the world. If you do not utterly despise me, will you henceforth recognize me as a friend?”
He extended his hand as he spoke, but it shook visibly, and he was very pale. It had not been an easy thing for this proud young Southerner to make such a confession and appeal. ”

“ Sure you can live alone with yourself for one minute," returns she, in very fine Irish; and, with a parting smile, sweet as nectar and far more dangerous, she goes.
When she is gone, Geoffrey walks impatiently up and down the small hall, conflicting emotions robbing him of the serenity that usually attends his footsteps. He is happy, yet full of a secret gnawing uneasiness that weighs upon him daily, hourly. Near Mona—when in her presence—a gladness that amounts almost to perfect happiness is his; apart from her is unrest. ”

“ He saw Geoffrey approaching them, and surmised that he contemplated taking Gladys in to supper.
He resolved that he should not; so, turning to her with a smile, as he laid her hand upon his arm, he remarked:
“That is no doubt a pleasing announcement to everybody. Shall we follow the hungry crowd?”
“Thanks; but I see Geoffrey coming for me; pray find some one else, Mr. Mapleson; I have already occupied more of your time and attention this evening than I ought,” the fair girl responded. ”

“ Geoffrey and Mona go up the road with the serenader behind them, and, turning aside, she guiding, mount a stile, and, striking across a field, make straight for the high hill that conceals the ocean from the farm. Over many fields they travel, until at length they reach the mountain's summit and gaze down upon the beauteous scene below.
The very air is still. There is no sound, no motion, save the coming and going of their own breath as it rises quickly from their hearts, filled full of passionate admiration for the loveliness before them. ”

“ He was wondering how much longer he could bear the strain, when the second telegram reached him.
"Arrived Southampton. Destination unknown. Love. Lionel."
The Squire, you may be sure, shared these good tidings with many friends, who congratulated him warmly. Obviously, the wound must be light. Exasperations followed, thick and fast. Sir Geoffrey hurried to the War Office, and thence to the Admiralty, and finally to Waterloo, where, eventually, he had the joy of seeing his son step out of a train, with a much-bandaged head, but apparently fit and in the highest spirits. ”

“ When at last we ceased Geoffrey declared that the song and the gay and heartening talk withal had done for him more good than all the herbs and poultices of the leech, and that with one more day like to this he verily believed he could ride abroad whole and sound.
Our audience departed with the end of the singing; and then Lord Mountjoy spoke most seriously:
“What thou say’st, Sir Geoffrey, puts me in mind that in these rough times there is other work for us who are verily whole and sound than this chaffering and singing at a bonny fireside, most pleasant though it be. ”

“ The Australian struggles for a moment. Then, finding Geoffrey too many for him, he looses one of his hands, and, thrusting it between his shirt and waistcoat, brings to light a tiny dagger, very flat, and lightly sheathed.
Fortunately this dagger refuses to be shaken from its hold. Mona, feeling that fair play is at an end, and that treachery is asserting itself, turns instinctively to her faithful allies the bloodhounds, who have risen, and, with their hair standing straight on their backs, are growling ominously. ”