when they went down to dinner that day it became known that mr. anderson did not intend to dine with them. "he's got a headache," said sir magnus. "he says he's got a headache. i never knew such a thing in my life before." it was quite clear that sir magnus did not think that his lieutenant ought to have such a headache as would prevent his coming to dinner, and that he did not quite believe in the headache. there was a dinner ready, a very good dinner, which it was his business to provide. he always did provide it, and took a great deal of trouble to see that it was good. "there isn't a table so well kept in all brussels," he used to boast. but when he had done his share he expected that anderson and arbuthnot should do theirs, especially anderson. there had been sometimes a few words,—not quite a quarrel but nearly so,—on the subject of dining out. sir magnus only dined out with royalty, cabinet ministers, and other diplomats. even then he rarely got a good dinner—what he called a good dinner. he often took anderson with him. he was the doyen among the diplomats in brussels, and a little indulgence was shown to him. therefore he thought that anderson should be as true to him as was he to anderson. it was not for anderson's sake, indeed, who felt the bondage to be irksome;—and sir magnus knew that his subordinate sometimes groaned in spirit. but a good dinner is a good dinner,—especially the best dinner in brussels,—and sir magnus felt that something ought to be given in return. he had not that perfect faith in mankind which is the surest evidence of a simple mind. ideas crowded upon him. had anderson a snug little dinner-party, just two or three friends, in his own room? sir magnus would not have been very angry,—he was rarely very angry,—but he should like to show his cleverness by finding it out. anderson had been quite well when he was out riding, and he did not remember him ever before to have had a headache. "is he very bad, arbuthnot?"
"i haven't seen him, sir, since he was riding."
"who has seen him?"
"he was in the garden with me," said florence, boldly.
"i suppose that did not give him a headache."
"not that i perceived."
"it is very singular that he should have a headache just when dinner is ready," continued sir magnus.
"you had better leave the young man alone," said lady mountjoy.
and one who knew the ways of living at the british embassy would be sure that after this sir magnus would not leave the young man alone. his nature was not simple. it seemed to him again that there might be a little dinner-party, and that lady mountjoy knew all about it. "richard," he said to the butler, "go into mr. anderson's room and see if he is very bad." richard came back, and whispered to the great man that anderson was not in his room. "this is very remarkable. a bad headache, and not in his room! where is he? i insist on knowing where mr. anderson is!"
"you had better leave him alone," said lady mountjoy.
"leave a man alone because he's ill! he might die."
"shall i go and see?" said arbuthnot.
"i wish you would, and bring him in here, if he's well enough to show. i don't approve of a young man going without his dinner. there's nothing so bad."
"he'll be sure to get something, sir magnus," said lady mountjoy. but sir magnus insisted that mr. arbuthnot should go and look after his friend.
it was now november, and at eight o'clock was quite dark, but the weather was fine, and something of the mildness of autumn remained. arbuthnot was not long in discovering that mr. anderson was again walking in the garden. he had left florence there and had gone to the house, but had found himself to be utterly desolate and miserable. she had exacted from him a promise which was not compatible with any kind of happiness to which he could now look forward. in the first place, all brussels knew that he had been in love with florence mountjoy. he thought that all brussels knew it. and they knew that he had been in earnest in this love. he did believe that all brussels had given him credit for so much. and now they would know that he had suddenly ceased to make love. it might be that this should be attributed to gallantry on his part,—that it should be considered that the lady had been deserted. but he was conscious that he was not so good a hypocrite as not to show that he was broken-hearted. he was quite sure that it would be seen that he had got the worst of it. but when he asked himself questions as to his own condition he told himself that there was suffering in store for him more heavy to bear than these. there could be no ponies, with florence driving them, and a boy in his own livery behind, seen upon the boulevards. that vision was gone, and forever. and then came upon him an idea that the absence of the girl from other portions of his life might touch him more nearly. he did feel something like actual love. and the more she had told him of her devotion to harry annesley, the more strongly he had felt the value of that devotion. why should this man have it and not he? he had not been disinherited. he had not been knocked about in a street quarrel. he had not been driven to tell a lie as to his having not seen a man when he had, in truth, knocked him down. he had quite agreed with florence that harry was justified in the lie; but there was nothing in it to make the girl love him the better for it.
and then, looking forward, he could perceive the possibility of an event which, if it should occur, would cover him with confusion and disgrace. if, after all, florence were to take, not harry annesley, but somebody else? how foolish, how credulous, how vain would he have been then to have made the promise! girls did such things every day. he had promised, and he thought that he must keep his promise; but she would be bound by no promise! as he thought of it, he reflected that he might even yet exact such a promise from her.
but when the dinner-time came he really was sick with love,—or sick with disappointment. he felt that he could not eat his dinner under the battery of raillery which was always coming from sir magnus, and therefore he had told the servants that as the evening progressed he would have something to eat in his own room. and then he went out to wander in the dusk beneath the trees in the garden. here he was encountered by mr. arbuthnot, with his dress boots and white cravat. "what the mischief are you doing here, old fellow?"
"i'm not very well. i have an awfully bilious headache."
"sir magnus is kicking up a deuce of a row because you're not there."
"sir magnus be blowed! how am i to be there if i've got a bilious headache? i'm not dressed. i could not have dressed myself for a five-pound note."
"couldn't you, now? shall i go back and tell him that? but you must have something to eat. i don't know what's up, but sir magnus is in a taking."
"he's always in a taking. i sometimes think he's the biggest fool out."
"and there's the place kept vacant next to miss mountjoy. grascour wanted to sit there, but her ladyship wouldn't let him. and i sat next miss abbott because i didn't want to be in your way."
"tell grascour to go and sit there, or you may do so. it's all nothing to me." this he said in the bitterness of his heart, by no means intending to tell his secret, but unable to keep it within his own bosom.
"what's the matter, anderson?" asked the other piteously.
"i am clean broken-hearted. i don't mind telling you. i know you're a good fellow, and i'll tell you everything. it's all over."
"all over—with miss mountjoy?" then anderson began to tell the whole story; but before he had got half through, or a quarter through, another message came from sir magnus. "sir magnus is becoming very angry indeed," whispered the butler. "he says that mr. arbuthnot is to go back."
"i'd better go, or i shall catch it."
"what's up with him, richard?" asked anderson.
"well, if you ask me, mr. anderson, i think he's—a-suspecting of something."
"what does he suspect?"
"i think he's a-thinking that perhaps you are having a jolly time of it." richard had known his master many years, and could almost read his inmost thoughts. "i don't say as it so, but that's what i am thinking."
"you tell him i ain't. you tell him i've a bad bilious headache, and that the air in the garden does it good. you tell him that i mean to have something to eat up-stairs when my head is better; and do you mind and let me have it, and a bottle of claret."
with this the butler went back, and so did arbuthnot, after asking one other question: "i'm so sorry it isn't all serene with miss mountjoy?"
"it isn't then. don't mind now, but it isn't serene. don't say a word about her; but she has done me. i think i shall get leave of absence and go away for two months. you'll have to do all the riding, old fellow. i shall go,—but i don't know where i shall go. you return to them now, and tell them i've such a bilious headache i don't know which way to turn myself."
arbuthnot went back, and found sir magnus quarrelling grievously with the butler. "i don't think he's doing anything as he shouldn't," the butler whispered, having seen into his master's mind.
"what do you mean by that?"
"do let the matter drop," said lady mountjoy, who had also seen into her husband's mind, and saw, moreover, that the butler had done so. "a young man's dinner isn't worth all this bother."
"i won't let the matter drop. what does he mean when he says that he isn't doing anything that he shouldn't? i've never said anything about what he was doing."
"he isn't dressed, sir magnus. he finds himself a little better now, and means to have something up-stairs." then there came an awful silence, during which the dinner was eaten. sir magnus knew nothing of the truth, simply suspecting the headache to be a myth. lady mountjoy, with a woman's quickness, thought that there had been some words between florence and her late lover, and, as she disliked florence, was inclined to throw all the blame upon her. a word had been said to mrs. mountjoy,—"i don't think he'll trouble me any more, mamma,"—which mrs. mountjoy did not quite understand, but which she connected with the young man's absence. but florence understood it all, and liked mr. anderson the better. could it really be that for love of her he would lose his dinner? could it be that he was so grievously afflicted at the loss of a girl's heart? there he was, walking out in the dark and the cold, half-famished, all because she loved harry annesley so well that there could be no chance for him! girls believe so little in the truth of the love of men that any sign of its reality touches them to the core. poor hugh anderson! a tear came into her eye as she thought that he was wandering there in the dark, and all for the love of her. the rest of the dinner passed away in silence, and sir magnus hardly became cordial and communicative with m. grascour, even under the influence of his wine.
on the next morning just before lunch florence was waylaid by mr. anderson as she was passing along one of the passages in the back part of the house. "miss mountjoy," he said, "i want to ask from your great goodness the indulgence of a few words."
"certainly."
"could you come into the garden?"
"if you will give me time to go and change my boots and get a shawl. we ladies are not ready to go out always, as are you gentlemen."
"anywhere will do. come in here," and he led the way into a small parlor which was not often used.
"i was so sorry to hear last night that you were unwell, mr. anderson."
"i was not very well, certainly, after what i had heard before dinner." he did not tell her that he so far recovered as to be able to drink a bottle of claret and to smoke a couple of cigars in his bedroom. "of course you remember what took place yesterday."
"remember! oh yes. i shall not readily forget it."
"i made you a promise—"
"you did—very kindly."
"and i mean to keep it."
"i'm sure you do, because you're a gentleman."
"i don't think i ought to have made it."
"oh, mr. anderson!"
"i don't think i ought. see what i am giving up."
"nothing, except the privilege of troubling me."
"but if it should be something else? do not be angry with me, but, loving you as i do, of course my mind is full of it. i have promised, and must be dumb."
"and i shall be spared great vexation."
"but suppose i were to hear that in six months' time you had married some one else?"
"mr. annesley, you mean. not in six months."
"somebody else. not mr. annesley."
"there is nobody else."
"but there might be."
"it is impossible. after all that i told you, do not you understand?"
"but if there were?" the poor man, as he made the suggestion, looked very piteous. "if there were, i think you should promise me i shall be that somebody else. that would be no more than fair."
she paused a moment to think, frowning the while. "certainly not."
"certainly not?"
"i can make no such promise, nor should you ask it. i am to promise that under certain circumstances i would become your wife, when i know that under no circumstances i would do so."
"under no circumstances?"
"under none. what would you have me say, mr. anderson? supposing yourself engaged to marry a girl—"
"i wish i were—to you."
"to a girl who loved you, and whom you loved?"
"there's no doubt about my loving her."
"you can follow my meaning, and i wish that you would do so. what would you think if you were to hear that she had promised to marry some one else in the event of your deserting her? it is out of the question. i mean to be the wife of harry annesley. say that it is not to be so, and you will simply destroy me. of one thing i may be sure,—that i will marry him or nobody. you promised me, not because your promise was necessary for that, but to spare me from trouble till that time shall come. and i am grateful,—very grateful." then she left him suffering from another headache.
"was there anything said between you and mr. anderson yesterday?" her aunt inquired, that afternoon.
"why do you ask?"
"because it is necessary that i should know."
"i do not see the necessity. mr. anderson has, at any rate, your permission to say what he likes to me, but i am not on that account bound to tell you all that he does say. but i will tell you. he has promised to trouble me no farther. i told him that i was engaged to mr. annesley, and he, like a gentleman, has assured me that he will desist."
"just because you asked him?"
"yes, aunt; just because i asked him."
"he will not be bound by such a promise for a moment. it is a thing not to be heard of. if that kind of thing is to go on, any young lady will be entitled to ask any young gentleman not to say a word of marriage, just at her request."
"some of the young ladies would not care for that, perhaps."
"don't be impertinent."
"i should not, for one, aunt; only that i am already engaged."
"and of course the young ladies would be bound to make such requests, which would go for nothing at all. i never heard of anything so monstrous. you are not only to have the liberty of refusing, but are to be allowed to bind a gentleman not to ask!"
"he has promised."
"pshaw! it means nothing."
"it is between him and me. i asked him because i wished to save myself from being troubled."
"as for that other man, my dear, it is quite out of the question. from all that i hear, it is on the cards that he may be arrested and put into prison. i am quite sure that at any rate he deserves it. the letters which sir magnus gets about him are fearful. the things that he has done,—well, penal servitude for life would be the proper punishment. and it will come upon him sooner or later. i never knew a man of that kind escape. and you now to come and tell us that you intend to be his wife!"
"i do," said florence, bobbing her head.
"and what your uncle says to you has no effect?"
"not the least in the world; nor what my aunt says. i believe that neither the one nor the other know what they are talking about. you have been defaming a gentleman of the highest character, a fellow of a college, a fine-hearted, noble, high-spirited man, simply because—because—because—" then she burst into tears and rushed out of the room; but she did not break down before she had looked at her aunt, and spoken to her aunt with a fierce indignation which had altogether served to silence lady mountjoy for the moment.
