meanwhile, richard received a sealed and perfumed note from miss jilian bidding him visit her at last at hardacre. jeffray, who felt cold and reluctant when he read the letter, did not guess how much plotting and planning, how many fears and heart-searchings had been squandered over that simple sheet of paper. poor jilian had been pressed by lot to send for jeffray before her inclination was mature. she had desired to wait till her face was fairer, but her ulysses of a brother willed it otherwise, being suspicious of richard’s faith. he argued that it would be better for the lad to see jilian soon and be impressed by the trouble he had brought on her. jeffray was an amiable fellow with a wealth of sentiment in his blood. and then when miss hardacre’s looks improved, as improve they would, her cousin might be so charmed with the change as to fall in love with the betterment of the bargain. there would have been much wisdom in lot’s strategy had he not been ignorant of the subtle undercurrent in the romance. he counted on his cousin’s impressionable good-nature, and he might have counted on it with some confidence but for the existence of bess of the woods.
it was as unpropitious a moment as fate could have found for thrusting him back upon his allegiance to poor jilian.
miss hardacre had spent two hours at her toilet that morning, and had warred with nature to the best of her ability. she had crimped her short aureole of hair, daubed her cheeks, salved her lips, and used pearl powder for her neck and arms. she wore a green gown that morning covered with red carnations, a red silk hoop, and a band of black velvet about her throat. in the dusk she might have passed for a comely woman, but the full glare of day dissolved the dream.
jilian chose the red parlor for the receiving of her betrothed, since the coloring of the room was red, damask curtains tempering the white light and diffusing a glow over her face. seated on a high-backed chair before the harpsichord, she let her fingers idle over the keys, while she listened every now and again for the sound of hoofs on the gravel space before the house. it was a little before noon when she heard the clangor of hoofs passing under the gate-tower into the paved court-yard. to ease her nervousness and the sense of tightness over her heart, she broke into a ditty from the “beggar’s opera,” her eyes brightening with the fever of waiting. she heard lot’s voice rising from the hall below, the sound of footsteps on the stairs, a quiet knocking at the door. the handle rattled. pushing back the chair, she stood up, trembling, her hands opening and closing, her lips dry. she saw jeffray standing on the threshold, one hand on his sword-hilt, the other holding the lappet of his coat.
“richard!”
unconsciously, jilian had put all the strained self-shame of her poor soul into the cry. she took two steps forward, holding out her hands. jeffray closed the door slowly, like a man seeking to compose his thoughts. he turned and looked at jilian. unwittingly, in her agitation, she had taken her stand where a sunbeam slanted full upon her face, disclosing all its seamed and pitted ugliness with a brilliance that was almost brutal.
a woman’s eyes are quick in piecing together the emotions on a man’s face. she saw jeffray start, saw him catch his breath, saw the critical yet instinctive repulsion in his eyes. he appeared to conquer himself by an effort, yet the smile he gave her was soulless and unreal. she said nothing as he came forward, bent, and kissed her hand.
“richard, mon cher, and are you glad to see me?”
she spoke very softly to him, as she turned aside and walked a little unsteadily to a settle standing by the harpsichord. jeffray felt a great flush of shame and a miserable sense of reluctance that made him gauche and clumsy. he followed her as though under compulsion, and sat down beside her on the settle.
“of course i am glad to see you, jilian,” he said.
miss hardacre’s hands were fidgeting in her lap. she had prepared a gay and airy part, but all her brave impudence and coquetry seemed to have deserted her. she was too conscious of her ugliness; the inspiration of vanity was dead within her. the pretty puppet could no longer ply her fan, flash her gray eyes, simper, and show her teeth. she seemed to realize of a sudden that courteous pity alone could make a man look kindly at her face. jeffray’s first stare had told her that.
“i have been very ill, richard,” she said, almost humbly, looking at him a moment as for sympathy, and then lowering her eyes.
jeffray was sitting very stiffly on the settle, looking like a man who had been offered a cup of poison or the renunciation of his faith.
“i know; i am sorry; it was all my fault,” he answered her.
there was a lack of tone and of vitality about the reply that made jilian shrink.
“i am not what i was, richard,” she said, pressing her handkerchief against her lips and leaving a vermilion stain on the cambric; “no doubt you find me greatly changed.”
her eyes challenged him with the shallow despair of a vain woman. jeffray reddened, and could not meet her look as he stammered out feeble contradictions.
“you are not recovered yet, jilian, and lot hinted that i might find you a little changed. i am sorry; believe me, i am. why, you don’t look so pale as i expected, nor yet so thin. we shall soon have you well and handsome again, and all the women round about will be for envying you.”
it was a poor and jerky apology enough, and miss hardacre was not for one moment deceived by it. the boy was shocked, disgusted, even as she had feared he would be, and no doubt he was wondering how he could marry such a painted hag. jilian imagined that she understood the whole of jeffray’s heart, and that he shrank from her just as the rest of the world might shrink. from humiliation her mood turned suddenly towards impatience, and from impatience to reproachful bitterness.
“it is very hard, richard,” she said, keeping her eyes fixed upon her satin slippers.
“hard, jilian?”
she flashed up petulantly, her eyes beginning to glitter.
“to be sure, i am ugly now, an old fright; i shall never be pretty again. don’t deny it, richard; i saw it all in your eyes from the first moment. yes, i am ugly, and very miserable, and it is hard and bitter and cruel. i am beginning to hate myself just as everybody else will hate me.”
jeffray hung his head, looked as ashamed and contrite as though every word accused him of dishonor. yet for the life of him he could not forget bess grimshaw’s face, the scent of her clothes, the glimmer of her hair. the generous hypocrisies died unuttered on his tongue. his sincerity grappled him; he was sorry for jilian, but he could not do his pity justice.
“it is all my fault,” he said, dejectedly.
miss hardacre’s fingers were crushing her handkerchief into a ball. the interview was proving too bitter to her, and she was beginning to revolt against jeffray’s apathy. why did he not try to comfort her? she would never have believed that richard had so hard a heart.
“you are very cold, cousin,” she said.
jeffray blushed, and looked almost afraid to meet her eyes.
“of course, men change. they only care for a pretty face, and love only so long as the woman pleases them. is not that so, richard?”
“for god’s sake, jilian, don’t talk like this—”
“yes, yes, that is very well, but can i—a woman—help seeing the truth?”
jeffray drew a deep breath and leaned back against the harpsichord.
“i know it is all my fault,” he said, “and i am very miserable over what has happened. leave me alone a moment, and let me take it all in. i am just as unhappy as you are, jilian; it is no use my pretending that i do not see the change in you.”
jeffray, full of the egotism of a man in love, could not have spoken more biting words. jilian started as though he had struck her, rose up from the settle with a sudden dignity and restraint that made richard appear wholly in the wrong. she made him a slight courtesy, turned on her heel, and walked towards the door.
“to be sure, you must think it over, cousin,” she said, with a vicious sneer; “remember that i am ugly, and remember also that you have told me so.”
“jilian!”
“think it over, sir, but do not imagine that i am going to be thrown aside like a soiled shoe. i have more pride, more conceit, than that. no, i have no wish to have all the women jeering and laughing behind my back. you understand me, richard, eh? very good. think it over, by all means, but remember that we are betrothed.”
“i have not forgotten it, jilian.”
“very good, cousin. i will excuse you from the discomfort of studying my ugliness any further to-day. sir peter and lot will be glad to see you to dinner.”
when jeffray left hardacre house that afternoon, after enduring a somewhat embarrassing interview with sir peter and mr. lot, he was filled with mingled feelings of recklessness and shame. he almost detested jilian for her reproachful bitterness and her threats, forgetting to pity her now that she had shown the will to govern him. moreover, lancelot, who had seen his sister in one of the galleries after her meeting with richard, had treated his cousin with ominous and threatening courtesy. three months ago jeffray would have blushed crimson at the thought of wounding the sensibilities of his kinsfolk. any suggestion of personal dishonor that his conscience might then have flung at him would have brought him to the penitential kissing of miss jilian’s hands. now, the swarthy splendor of a single face had blinded him to all else as a great light blinds the eyes. he hated sir peter, he hated lancelot, he hated his old self, he almost hated jilian. was he not to see bess that very evening? was not pevensel before him with all its mystery, its glamour, its romance?
but jeffray did not find bess in the valley of yews that evening. she had been unable to escape dan’s vigilance and had bided at home, hoeing the weeds in the garden sullenly. as for richard, he rode back to rodenham very sad and weary, and feeling sick and faint as though he had overtaxed his strength.
