CHAPTER XVIII.

HE LOVES ME, TRULY!

To Audley's mind there was a freshness and innocence about Sybil, that made her image dwell in his heart prominently, and more vividly than the dashing and showy Mabel and Rose Trecarrel could have conceived to be possible. Moreover, there was, to him, something glorious in the conviction that for the sake of this lovely young girl he had confronted a manifest peril; that by doing so he had saved her and established--as he hoped--a tie of no ordinary strength and peculiarity between them, linking, in the future, their histories if not their lives together; for to him she owned now, most probably, the fact that she existed at all.

Such were the kind of thoughts to which Trevelyan, hitherto a heedless and pleasure-loving young subaltern of Hussars, indulged in many a dreamy hour, even when half flirting or "chaffing" with the Trecarrels, riding or driving abroad with them, turning the leaves at the piano while Rose displayed the perfection of her white shoulders and taper arms after dinner, and dawdled languidly over the airs of Verdi and Balfe; and to which he fully abandoned himself, when he strolled forth alone, to enjoy a cigar in the lawn or in some secluded lane.

Sybil on her part deemed it equally delightful, to think that she owed her life to him; for had not Audley and others said (and she felt the truth of it) that, ere the ebb of the tide should have left the lower end of the cavern open and free, she must have perished of cold or terror, or both.

She had read the contents of many a box from "Mudie's," but no episode in any of the three volumes octavo therein seemed exactly to resemble hers in the Pixies' Hole. It was very romantic and strange, no doubt; but to Constance it appeared that the still concealed part of their relationship was the most strange and romantic feature in the affair.

Like most, if not all, young girls, she had read all about love in novels and romances; she had talked about love to school-companions, some of them enthusiastic Italian girls at Como, by the Arno, and elsewhere; and now a lover had actually come, one who on three successive days had left cards, with earnest inquiries concerning her health and that of her mamma.

She remembered the endearment of his manner when he saved her, but feared, at times, that such might only have been caused by the peculiarity of their situation; and then she would blush with annoyance at herself, as she recalled the somewhat too pointed way in which she questioned him about Rose Trecarrel, to whom she was still a stranger, and of whom she had thus evinced a jealousy--actually a jealousy, as if thereby assuming a right to question his actions!

But had he not called her Sybil, and said that he loved her, and her only?

The afternoon of the fourth day saw Audley Trevelyan--always careful of his costume, on this occasion unusually so--passing slowly down the willow avenue towards the villa; and as he approached the latter, the beating of his heart quickened on perceiving the light figure of Sybil pass from the pillared portico into a conservatory that adjoined the house. So she was convalescent--had recovered at last; and now he would speak with her alone, and might resume perhaps the thread of that hurried but delightful topic, which was so suddenly cut short on the evening he saved her, by the voice of the impatient General.

He approached the glass door of the conservatory, which she had left invitingly open, his footsteps being completely muffled by the soft and close-clipped turf of the little lawn.

The conservatory was handsome, lofty, and spacious, floored with brilliantly coloured encaustic tiles, and constructed of iron, like a kiosk; its shelves were laden with delicate ferns, with cacti and gorgeous exotics in full bloom, though the season was in the last days of autumn, and over all drooped, almost from the roof to the ground, the far-stretching and slender green sprays of a graceful acacia. Under this stood Sybil, clad in a simple white dress, decorated by trimmings of rose-coloured satin ribbon, and having a dainty little lace collar round her slender neck; and Trevelyan watched her in silence and with admiration for half a minute ere he entered.

It was the freshness and girlish purity of Sybil that charmed him quite as much as the delicacy of her beauty. During his few years of military life, in London, at Bath, Brighton, and Canterbury, even at Calcutta, he had met many such girls as the Trecarrels--brilliant in flirtation and knowing in all manner of arts and graces; but none that resembled Sybil.

She had plucked a dwarf rose, and was about to place it in the breast of her dress. Suddenly she seemed to pause and change her intention; for a bright and fond smile spread over her soft little face, and while speaking to herself, leaf by leaf, she began to pluck the flower slowly to pieces.

She spoke aloud, but her voice was so low that it failed to reach the ears of Trevelyan, till after a time, when, as the leaves lessened in number, she began to raise her tones, and her occupation became plain to him. She was acting to herself--repeating the little part of Goethe's Marguerite in the garden, but in a fashion of her own.

"He loves me a little--tenderly--truly--he loves me not!"

With each pause in this floral formula, the old German mode of divination in love affairs, a pink leaf floated away or fell on her white dress; and when but seven remained round the calyx, she paused for a moment; her face brightened as the charm seemed to work satisfactorily; she resumed her plucking, and as the seventh or last leaf was twitched from the stem, she clasped her hands and exclaimed with joy--

"Truly--Audley loves me _truly_!"

Her colour deepened, and there was almost a divine expression about her eyes and lips; but she became covered with intense confusion when Trevelyan approached her suddenly, and said with a tender and pleasantly modulated voice--

"Your floral spell has worked to admiration, for Audley does love you truly and fondly, dearest Sybil!"

"Oh, Mr. Trevelyan--and you have overheard my folly!" was all she could falter out, as he captured her hands in his own, and she stooped her face aside.

"_Mr._ Trevelyan? Why, a moment ago you called me plain Audley, and it did sound so delightful! Pray do not let us go back in our relations. And you have quite recovered, I hope, from the effects of that frightful affair?" he added, while smiling with fondness into the clear bright eyes that drooped beneath his gaze.

"It seems as nothing, now--save when I dream; you make too much of it--indeed you do," blundered Sybil.

"Can I do so of aught in which you have a part?"

"Poor mamma is still in a weak and nervous state; so, I am sorry to say, she will be unable to see you."

As it was not "mamma" he had come exactly to visit, Audley could only murmur some well-bred expression of regret.

"How very remarkable that you should have been there to save me!" said Sybil, after a pause.

"The coldly treated stranger by the moorland tarn, eh?"

"You forget that we had not been introduced, or how came it all to pass?" she asked, with growing confusion.

"As all things in this life do, dearest Sybil."

"But how?"

"It was fate--destiny."

"What--are you a fatalist?"

"I hope not; and yet it were sweet to think that--that----"

"What?" murmured Sybil, her long lashes drooping beneath the ardour of his glance, while his clasp seemed to tighten on her slender fingers.

Much more passed that has been said, over and over again, under the same circumstances, by every pair of lovers since roses grew in Eden (and, unluckily, apples too); and there were long pauses, that were only pauses of the tongue, and which beatings of the heart filled up, with many a sigh "the deeper for suppression." There grew between these two a sudden sense of great trust which increased the tenderness of their sentiments, while deep gratitude was mingled now with Sybil's former budding love. It did seem to her, as if Fate had deliberately cast each in the path of the other; and doubtless it was so, for "out of these chance-affinities grow sometimes the passion of a life, and sometimes the disappointments that embitter existence."

"Oh, Audley, without mamma's consent, dare I accept so lovely a ring?" said Sybil, in a low voice, as she lingered at the conservatory door and contemplated a jewel which Trevelyan had just slipped upon her engaged finger.

"You will surely wear it for my sake, till--till--" he paused, and scarcely knew what to say, for he now began to reflect that he was only a subaltern, and had been "going the pace," in his love-making, with a vengeance! To fall in love and engage oneself were easy enough; but, as yet, he did not quite see the end of the affair. Sybil was, moreover, the daughter of an officer whose temper, perhaps, might not brook trifling.

"Oh, it is an exquisite diamond!" resumed the girl, the pause unnoticed, and its cause, to her, unknown.

"It formed one of the eyes of Vishnu, a Hindoo idol, in a temple near Agra. One of the Cornish Light Infantry--old Mike Treherne, the miner's son--poked out both with his bayonet. Jack Delamere bought one; I the other, and had it set thus in a ring by a Parsee jeweller in the Chandney Choke, at a time when I little thought of having in mine so dear a hand to place it on. Has not our acquaintance ripened with wonderful rapidity, darling??

"Under such terrible circumstances, I don't wonder at it," said she, smiling tenderly as she toyed with the ring, which was now enhanced in value--priceless in her eyes, for it was a love-token.

A love-token! and what might be its future history, and what their fate? "Customs alter, and fashions change," says a writer; "but love-gifts never grow old-fashioned or out of date,--they are always fresh from the golden age. Old people die, and desks and drawers are ransacked by their heirs. Oh, take up tenderly the withered petals, the lock of hair, the quaint ring hidden away in some secret recess; for hearts have once thrilled and eyes moistened at their touch. Precious gems and rare objects there may be in casket and cabinet; but none preserved with such jealous care as _these_, for they were the gifts of love."

Sybil was a thoughtful girl, and even in that happy hour a sadness stole through her heart, as some such ideas occurred to her; but the young officer thought only of the present time, of its joy and of her beauty.

He pressed her to name a day when she and her mamma, as by courtesy bound, would return the visit of the Trecarrels; but, ere that could be accomplished, there came to pass that "greater sorrow" which the heart of Constance had foreboded, and which must be duly recorded in its place; so the hoped-for visit was never paid.

On this evening, Audley lingered long with Sybil. Each had so much to say to the other, and so many questions to ask, and so many fond plans for the future, that parting was a difficult task, even with the knowledge that they were to meet again on the morrow.

It came; and noon saw him again at the villa, where he was received in the drawing-room by Constance alone; and to her he began to speak of Sybil after a time, and to express his admiration and regard for her.

This Constance had fully foreseen and expected; but she was outwardly, to all appearance, collected and calm, till the secret that oppressed her became too much for her nervous system. Thus, the tenor of her bearing, which before had been all kindness and gratitude, suddenly changed. She became cold and constrained, perplexed and even awkward; so that a chill fell upon the heart of Audley, whose nature, all unlike that of his father, was frank and generous to a fault. She curtly but gently told him, that until the return of her husband she could afford no permission for her daughter to receive addresses; and soon after, full of deep mortification, and dreading he knew not what, Audley Trevelyan took his leave; and Constance, as she watched his figure pass out of the avenue, burst into tears.

Sybil, as her youngest-born, she had ever looked upon as a species of child--called "_the_ baby," when long past babyhood; and now Sybil had a lover! Awakened to the reality of this, the poor lonely mother regarded this new phase of her daughter's existence with a species of alarm that bordered on terror.

"Would that Richard were home!" was her first thought; "even Denzil's advice would be something to me now, poor boy!"

Audley had barely entered the Trecarrels' drawing-room, when Rose, who was reclining on a fauteuil, with her rich brown hair beautifully dressed by the hands of her Ayah, and who fancied herself immersed in a novel, tossed it aside, for her clear hazel eyes speedily detected the disturbed expression of his face, and proceeded forthwith to quiz him as usual about "the Devereaux girl," and his intentions in that quarter; while Mabel, who was seated at the piano, sang laughingly a verse of "Wanted, a Wife," then a popular song, altering certain words "to suit the occasion," as Rose said--

"As to fortune--of course, I have but my pay, A sub with seven-and-sixpence a day, And a pension beside--rather small, 'tis confest, For a leg shot away in the action 'off Brest;' For the loss of three fingers in fighting a chase, And a terrible cut from a sword in my face. But with all these defects, my nerves I must string, To propose for Miss Devereaux--delicate thing!"

Audley felt almost inclined to quarrel with his fair friends.

"Don't tease a fellow so, Rose," said he, wearily; "I have no money--at least, little beyond my pay; and have as much idea of marrying as--as----"

"I have, perhaps."

"I cannot say that."

"You could ask this Sybil Devereaux?"

"Of course--it would be easy as cribbage."

"And what would she say, think you?"

"As a sensible girl such as she seems to be--'wait.'"

"Which means, that she would take you in time to come?"

"Perhaps."

"Unless something better turned up."

"Don't judge of her by yourself, Rose," he retorted, laughing, to conceal his annoyance, which was greatly increased when the General's butler, just as Audley was ascending to his own room to dress for dinner, handed him a letter on a silver salver.

It was from his father; written in his usual clear and precise hand. Audley for a time left it on the toilette table; then he tore it open, with an air of irritation, as these paternal missives were rarely pleasant ones, being always filled with advice, varied by reprehension.

"Fathers have flinty hearts--and, by Jove, here is one!" muttered Audley, while his brows contracted.

"I have seen in the public prints," ran the letter, "all about your adventure with the daughter of those strange people who live at Porthellick. The woman Devereaux is, as her name imports, too probably some designing French adventuress. Mabel Trecarrel has written to your sister Gartha, that you are quite smitten with the daughter; but I give you my distinct advice and notice to take heed of what you are about, and to join us in London without delay. You left the Hussars, even in India, because of the expense of the corps, neither tentage nor loot" (loot! the governor means batta) "being sufficient to maintain you. Disobey me in the matter of this girl Devereaux, and _I shall cut off_ even the slender allowance I promised you, for the Cornish Light Infantry."

Audley crushed up the letter in his hand, for it came, at that particular moment, like a sentence of death.

And Downie Trevelyan could write thus of the loving and amiable little family circle at the villa, knowing all he did, and suspecting more!

To fear, or to find that his brother Richard, so long deemed an eccentric bachelor, had a family ready made and at hand to succeed him in the honours of Rhoscadzhel and Lamorna was bad enough. These interlopers who came between his own family and the line of Trevelyan might (perhaps) be set aside; but to find that his eldest son had become entangled with one of those so-called Devereaux, proved too much for the equanimity of the far-seeing lawyer.