CHAPTER XVII.

A STORMY ENCOUNTER.

Ruth held her breath and listened. She heard the door open, and footsteps in the little passage. Then her natural courage aroused itself, and lifting the posset-cup from the coals, she left it on the warm hearth, and met the intruder at the kitchen door.

"Is it you?" she said, with a quiver of fear in her voice. "I am sorry father is not at home."

"But I am not," answered the young man, setting down a gun he had brought in, behind the door. "It was just because he wasn't here, and I knew it, that I came in. It is high time, miss, that you and I should have a talk together, and no father to put in his word between pipes."

"What do you want? Why should you wish to speak with me at this time of night?"

"Why, now, I like that," answered the young fellow, with a laugh that made Ruth shudder. "Well, I'll just come in and have my say. There mayn't be another chance like this."

Richard Storms turned and advanced a step, as if he meant to enter the little parlor, but Ruth called him back. It seemed to her like desecration, that this man should tread on the same floor that Hurst, her husband--oh, how the thought swelled her heart!--had walked over.

"Not there," she said. "I must mind my father's supper. He will be home in a few minutes."

"Well, I don't much care; the kitchen seems more natural. It is here that we used to sit before the young master found out how well-favored you are, as if he couldn't find comely faces enough at the house, but must come poaching down here on my warren."

"Who are you speaking of? I cannot make it out," faltered Ruth, turning cold.

"Who? As if you didn't know well enough; as if I didn't see you and him talking together thick as two bees this very morning."

"No, no!" protested Ruth, throwing out both her hands. "You could not--you did not!"

"But I did, though, and the gun just trembled of itself in my hand, it so wanted to be at him. If it hadn't been that you seemed offish, and he looked black as a thunder-clap, I couldn't have kept my hand from the trigger."

"That would have been murder," whispered the girl, through her white lips.

"Murder, would it? That's according as one thinks. What do men carry a gun at night for, let me ask you, but to keep the deer and the birds safe from poachers? If they catch them at it, haven't they a right to fire? Well, Ruth, you are my game, and my gun takes care of you as keepers protect the deer. It will be safe to warn the young master of that!"

"I do not know--I cannot understand--"

"Oh, you don't, ha!" broke in the young man, throwing himself into a chair and stretching out his legs on the hearth. "Well, then, I'll tell you a secret about him that'll take the starch out of your pride. You're not the only girl with a pretty face that brings him among my covers!"

"What?"

"Ah, ha! Oh, ho! That wakes you up, does it? I thought so. Nothing like a swoop of spite to bring a girl out of cover."

"I do not understand you," said Ruth, flashing out upon her tormentor with sudden spirit. "What have I to do with anything you are talking about?"

"The other lass, you mean. Not much, of course. It isn't likely he put her in your way."

A burst of indignation, perhaps of something more stinging than that, filled the splendid eyes with fire that Ruth fixed upon her tormentor.

"Do you know--can you even guess that it is my--my--!"

The girl broke her imprudent speech off with a thrill of warning that left the prints of her white teeth on the burning lips which had almost betrayed her. In her terror the insult that followed was almost a relief.

"Sweetheart!" sneered the young man.

She did not heed the word or sneer; both were a proof that her secret was safe as yet.

"One up at the house, one here, and another--well, no matter about her. You understand?"

"You slander an honorable gentleman," said Ruth, controlling herself with a great effort.

"Do I? Ask the Lady Rose, if she ever stoops to speak to you."

"She is a sweet, gracious lady," broke in Ruth, magnanimous in her swift jealousy. "A great lady, who refuses speech or smile to no one."

"Ask her, then, who was out on the terrace this evening, before he came home, robbing the great stone vases of their sweetest flowers for his button-hole!"

Ruth lifted one hand to her bosom, and pressed the golden ring there close to her heart.

Then turning to the young man, who was watching her keenly, she said, with composure:

"Well, why should you or I ask such questions of the young lady? I would no more do that than spy upon her, as you have done!"

Storms looked at her keenly from under his bent brows, and his thin lips closed with a baffled expression.

"Off the scent," he thought. "What is it? She was hot on the chase just now. Has she really doubled on him?"

"It needs no spying to see what goes on up there," he answered, after a moment, waving his head toward the great house. "Grand people like them think we have neither eyes nor ears. They pay us for being without them, and think we earn our wages like dumb cattle. Just as if sharpness went with money. But we do see and hear, when they would be glad to think us blind and dumb!"

The girl made no answer. She longed to question the creature she despised, and had a fierce struggle with her heart, until more honorable feelings put down the swift cravings of jealousy that were wounding her heart, as bees sting a flower while rifling it of honey.

The young man watched her cunningly, but failed to understand her. The jealousy which made him so cruel had no similitude with her finer and keener feelings. He longed to see her break out in a tirade of abuse, or to have her question him broadly, as he wished to answer.

Ruth did nothing of the kind. In the tumult of feelings aroused by his words she remembered all that had been done that day, and, with sudden vividness of recollection, the promise of caution she had made to her husband.

Her husband! She pressed her hand against her bosom, where the wedding-ring lay hid, and a glorified expression came to her face as she turned it toward the firelight, absolutely forgetful that a hateful intruder shared it with her.

Richard Storms was baffled, and a little saddened by the strange beauty in the face his eyes were searching.

"Ruth!" he said at length. "Ruth!"

The girl started. His voice had dragged her out of a dream of heaven. She looked around vaguely on finding herself on earth again, and with him.

"Well," she said, impatiently, "what would you say to me?"

"Just this: when is it to be? I am really tired of waiting."

"Tired of waiting!" said Ruth, impatiently. "Waiting for what?"

"Why, for our wedding-day. What else?"

The proud blood of an empress seemed to flame up into the girl's face; a smile, half rage, half scorn, curved her lips, which, finally, relaxed into a clear, ringing laugh.

"You--you think to marry me!" was her broken exclamation, as the untoward laugh died out.

The young man turned fiery red. The scornfulness of that laugh stung him, and he returned it with interest.

"No wonder you ask," he said, with a sharp, venomous look, from which she shrunk instinctively. "It isn't every honest man that would hold to his bargain, after all these galivantings with the young master."

Ruth turned white as snow, and caught hold of a chair for support. Her evident terror seemed to appease the tormentor, and he continued, with a relenting laugh, "Don't be put about, though. I'm too fond to be jealous, because my sweetheart takes a turn now and then in the moonlight when she thinks no one is looking."

"Your sweetheart! Yours!"

Storms waved his hand, and went on.

"Though, mind me, all this must stop when we're married."

Ruth had no disposition to laugh now. The very mention of Hurst had made a coward of her. Storms saw how pale she was, and came toward her.

"There, now, give us a kiss, and make up. It's all settled between father and the old man, so just be conformable, and I'll say nothing about the young master."

As the young man came toward her, with his arms extended, Ruth drew back, step by step, with such fright and loathing in her eyes that his temper rose again. With startling suddenness he gave a leap, and, flinging one arm around her, attempted to force her averted face to his.

One sharp cry, one look, and Ruth fell to the floor, quivering like a shot bird.

She had seen the door open, and caught one glimpse of her husband's face. Then a powerful blow followed, and Richard Storms went reeling across the kitchen, and struck with a crash against the opposite wall.

Ruth remembered afterward, as one takes up the painful visions of a dream, the deadly venom of those eyes; the gray whiteness of that aquiline face; the specks of foam that flew from those half-open lips. She saw, too, the slow retreat during which those threatening features were turned upon her husband. Then all was blank--she had fainted away.

For some moments it seemed as if the girl were dead, she lay so limp and helpless on her husband's bosom; but the burning words that rose from his lips, the kisses he rained down upon hers, brought a stir of life back to her heart. Awaking with a dim sense of danger, she clung to him, shivering and in tears.

"Where is he? Oh, Walton! is he gone?"

"Gone, the hound! Yes, darling, to his kennel."

"Ah, how he frightened me!"

"But how dare he enter this house?"

"I cannot tell--only--only my father has not come home yet. Oh, I--I hate him. He frightens me. He threatens me."

"Threatens you! When? How?"

"Oh, Walton! he has seen us together. He will bring you into trouble."

"Not easily."

"Your father?"

"Is not a man to listen to the gossip of his servants."

Ruth drew a deep breath. Walton had concealed his real anxiety so well, that her own fears were calmed.

"Come, come," he said; "we must not let this hind embitter the few minutes I can spend with you. Look up, love, and tell me that you are better."

"Oh! I am; but he frightened me so."

"And now?"

Hurst folded the fair girl in his arms, and smoothed her bright hair with a caressing hand.

"Now!" she answered, lifting her mouth, which had grown red again, and timidly returning his kisses. "Now I am safe, and I fear nothing. Oh, mercy! Look!"

"What? Where?"

"The window! That face at the window!"

"It is your fancy, darling. I see nothing there."

"But I saw it. Surely I did. His keen, wicked face. It was close to the glass."

"There, there! It was only the ivy leaves glancing in the moonlight."

"No, no! I saw it. He is waiting for you."

"Let him wait. I shall not stir a step the sooner or later for that."

Ruth began to tremble again. Her eyes were constantly turning toward the window. She scarcely heard the words of endearment with which Hurst strove to reassure her. All at once the old clock filled the house with its brazen warning. It was ten o'clock. The girl sprang to her feet.

"It is time for my father to come. He must not find you here."

Hurst took his hat, and glancing down at his dinner dress, remembered that he would be missed from the drawing-room. Once more he enfolded the girl in his arms, called her by the new endearing name that was so sweet to them both, and finally left her smiling through all her fears.

Ruth stole to the little oriel window, and watched her husband as he turned from the moonlight and entered the shadows of the park. Then she went back to the kitchen and busied herself about the fire.