CHAPTER XV.

BETROTHED.

“IF only you would speak, Miss Ida, and say what ails you, I should know what to do, but to see you look so pale and lifeless, with your eyes staring before you and yet seeing nothing, is more than I know how to bear.”

Thus spoke Marie at the end of the day, as she stood brushing her young lady’s long dark hair. Ida would sometimes have been glad to dispense with Marie’s attendance, but her nurse could seldom be persuaded to give up the duties she loved. Her words roused Ida from absorbing thought.

“Am I pale, Marie?” she said, trying to smile. “Surely that is nothing unusual; I could never please you with my colour.”

“No, you were never rosy,” said Marie. “But it is not the paleness only; you look so sad and weary, Miss Ida. It goes to my heart to see you looking like that.”

“I am weary,” said Ida, with a sigh, “weary of thinking. Oh, I wish I knew how I ought to act! Life is so perplexing. Marie, I never longed for my mother as I do now. It seems to me that she would understand.”

“Ay, surely,” said Marie, full of sympathy. “There’s no one like a mother. I would do anything for you, Ida, my sweet lamb, but I can’t take the place of a mother. Still, if you would tell me what troubles you, maybe it would lighten your heart just to speak of it.”

“You are very good, Marie,” said Ida, grasping her nurse’s arm and resting her head against it; “I would tell you if I could.”

“Bless you, my angel!” responded Marie, fervently. After a minute she added, “There’s Mrs. Tregoning, Miss Ida—she loves you dearly—maybe you could tell her your trouble, if you can’t tell it to me.”

Ida made no reply. She felt that it would be as difficult to confide in Mrs. Tregoning as in Marie. She roused herself and shook back her hair, as a sign to Marie to continue her brushing.

“Marie,” she said presently, speaking in a brighter tone, “I have been thinking about the time when you were married. Did you find it easy to make up your mind? Were you always sure that you loved Fritz better than any one else?”

“Dear me, no,” said Marie, with a laugh; “I was not sure that I loved him at all, and as for loving him better than any one else, I always said that I loved you best, and so I did, Miss Ida. I told Fritz I would not leave you for any one; it was the master’s doing that we got married. He showed me that it would be good thing for Fritz, and he arranged that Fritz should come and live here, so that I need not leave you.”

“How strange! I had no idea that father was such a match-maker,” said Ida. “But you must have loved Fritz, or you would not have consented.”

“I don’t know as I did, Miss Ida, but I was sorry for the poor creature, for I saw that he wanted some one to look after him, and I knew that his heart was set upon it, and he’d worry himself ill if I did not say 'yes,’ so I just took and married him out of pity.”

Troubled as she was, Ida could not help laughing at Marie’s words.

“So you married him out of pity,” she said. “Do many women marry men out of pity, I wonder?”

“Surely, or there would not be many marriages,” said Marie. “It can’t be for the sake of the men, when one sees what troublesome beings they are—though, to be sure, it is after marriage that we learn that best.”

Ida smiled, but presently her face grew grave as she pondered Marie’s words. Was it meant that marriage should be thus a voluntary sacrifice of one’s personal inclinations for the sake of another’s good, to be made even when the love was lacking which would render this sacrifice a holy and blessed thing?

Marie would have been astonished, could she have known how much meaning Ida had put into her lightly-spoken words.

On the following day Ida, though hardly conscious of her purpose, avoided Wilfred’s presence as much as possible. She was especially anxious to avoid being alone with him, and for two or three days she succeeded in so doing, and gave Wilfred no chance of a confidential talk with her. She did not mean to make any change in her manner towards him, but he, observing her closely, was quick to detect a difference. There was a shyness in her demeanour, her glances did not meet his with the old freedom, and she had little to say in response to his words, leaving her father to sustain the conversation.

Wilfred did not interpret this change in a manner unfavourable to his hopes. He was not the man to make a diffident lover; he rather took encouragement from Ida’s shrinking manner. It showed she was conscious that they no longer stood on the old footing. He felt pretty secure of winning Ida, for he judged it well-nigh impossible that she could prefer any one to himself. He guessed that Ida was trying to avoid him, and he watched the more eagerly for a chance of speaking to her. As chance did not favour him, Wilfred at last made an opportunity in a way that was very characteristic.

It was Wednesday afternoon. Ida was sitting her father in the drawing-room. She had drawn his armchair into the bay-window, and seated on the window-seat at his elbow, she was engaged in describing to him the gay scene the river presented on this lovely afternoon in early June. It was vexatious that Anne should enter with the message—“If you please, miss, Mr. Ormiston would be glad if you could come to the studio whilst Miss Seabrook is there.”

“Oh, has Miss Seabrook come?” exclaimed Ida.

But Anne, obedient to the instructions she had received, disappeared as soon as she had delivered the message.

“Anne might have waited to hear what I had to say,” remarked Ida; “she gets more and more incomprehensible in her ways. Marie is losing all patience with her. Well, I am glad Miss Seabrook has come, but I wish I need not go to her.”

“I think you had better go, dear,” said her father, gently; “she will expect to see you, as you have always been present at the sittings.”

Ida rose at once. “I dare say she will not stay very long,” she said as she quitted the room.

What was her astonishment, on entering the studio, to find Wilfred alone!

“Why, where is Miss Seabrook?” she asked. “Anne told me that she was here.”

“Miss Seabrook has not yet come, but I expect her every minute,” said Wilfred, coolly. “You must have misunderstood Anne. I did not tell her to say that Miss Seabrook was here.”

Then Ida perceived the trap that had been laid for her, and she naturally felt some indignation.

“You might have waited till Miss Seabrook came before you sent for me,” she said; “you know that I do not like to leave my father any more than I can help.”

“Forgive me, Ida,” said Wilfred, penitently; “I must confess that I sent for you because I am very anxious to speak to you alone.”

“I should have been obliged to you, Wilfred, if you had waited for a convenient opportunity,” said Ida, loftily. “Will not some other time do? I should be glad to return to my father now.”

“No, another time will not do,” said Wilfred, firmly; “I can bear suspense no longer, Ida. You must know what it is I wish to speak to you about.”

Ida knew but too well what it was. She longed for power to avert what was coming. She had paused on her way to the door, and she stood waiting, weak and tremulous, her heart beating painfully.

“You know,” he repeated, as she did not speak; “your father has told you what I wish.”

“Yes, I know,” faltered Ida, “but oh, Wilfred, I wish you did not care for me in that way. I wish you would be my brother as you have always been.”

“That is no longer possible,” he said. “Ida, you would make me miserable if you were to refuse me, I should be good for nothing then; my whole life would be ruined.”

“No, no, you must not say that; it is wrong of you, Wilfred!” cried Ida. “You have your work to live for. The value of your life does not depend on me.”

“But it does,” urged Wilfred, adopting the line of argument which he knew would have most influence over Ida. “If you reject me, I shall throw up my work and renounce all thought of being a sculptor. You cannot suppose that I could live on here, seeing you every day, if you refused to make me happy. It would be a torture to me. No, I should go abroad and seek a new career.”

“Oh, Wilfred!” cried Ida, imploringly, tears starting to her eyes, “I wish you would not speak so; you make me very unhappy. It would break my father’s heart if you gave up being a sculptor.”

“I cannot help that,” said Wilfred, with what seemed to her cruel hardness of tone. But the next minute, his manner softened, and he turned to her saying tenderly:

“Oh, Ida, darling, have you no feeling for me? Is it nothing to you that my heart should be broken and my life spoiled? You used to be kinder to me; I used to hope that you loved me.”

“I always have loved you,” said Ida, simply, “but I never dreamed of this. I can’t bear to think of being married. I want to live for my father; I care for nothing but to make him happy.”

“Then you will not refuse to think of our marriage, Ida, for that would make him happy; he told me so. And I could better help you to take care of him then. It would be my delight to serve him. I would be to him all that the most loving son could be.”

Ida was silent. Wilfred’s words had touched her keenly. For her father’s sake she would venture anything. To secure his happiness, she would even dare to risk her own.

Wilfred saw the advantage he had gained, and was quick to profit by it.

“Ida,” he whispered, “let it be so; let us together watch over your father and take tenderest care of him in his blindness.”

Ida put her hand into his. “If you will,” she said in a very low voice. “I hope I am doing right. It is for his sake, because I think it will make him happy. You will not mind my thinking most of him, Wilfred? I shall always love my father better than any one else.”

Wilfred was hardly satisfied—what lover would have been with such an acceptance of his love? But he felt confident that Antonio was his sole rival. Ida loved him, of that he had no doubt, and her love would grow warmer and deeper when she was his wife. Nicolari was an old man. He had spoken of his death to Wilfred as an event which could not be distant, and since then it had seemed to Wilfred that his master was failing rapidly, and showed from week to week fresh signs of feebleness. With no selfish wish that Nicolari’s decline might be hastened, Wilfred could not help reminding himself that he need not grudge her father the first place in Ida’s heart, since the bond between them must so soon be broken. When Antonio was no more, Ida must lean for her happiness on her husband’s love, and how sweet it would be to cherish so lovely a young wife! So Wilfred caught at Ida’s reluctant consent.

“Darling, I cannot wish you to care less for your father,” he said tenderly. “Only let me have a share in your love—that is all I ask. We shall be very happy, Ida, I am sure of that.”

“I hope so,” she said falteringly; “I will try to please you, Wilfred, and we will both try to make father as happy as is possible.”

“You cannot fail to please me,” he said warmly; “you do not know how I love you. Come, you will give me a kiss?”

Simply and unblushingly Ida lifted her lips to his. It did not seem long since the childish days when kisses had been matters of course between them. The lips were cold as Wilfred kissed them, and the hand he had retained in his was cold too.

Ida’s manner disappointed him. He was glad that he had won her, but his success did not yield him the rapture it should have done. They stood in silence for a few moments, Ida ill at ease and desirous that Wilfred should release her hand, whilst he felt unable to utter the words he should have said.

“May I go now?” asked Ida, at length. “I had better go back to father.”

“I will come with you,” said Wilfred, “and we will tell him our news; he will be so glad to hear it.”

“Yes, he will be glad,” said Ida; and they went upstairs together.