第94章

At the present crisis Dolly was very much excited. When the dance was over, as a matter of course, he offered the lady his arm, and as a matter of course she accepted it. 'You'll take a turn; won't you?' he said.

'It must be a very short turn,' she said,--'as I am expected to make myself busy.'

'Oh, bother that.'

'It bothers me; but it has to be done.'

'You have set everything going now. They'll begin dancing again without your telling them.'

'I hope so.'

'And I've got something I want to say.'

'Dear me;--what is it?'

They were now on a path close to the riverside, in which there were many loungers. 'Would you mind coming up to the temple?' he said.

'What temple?'

'Oh such a beautiful place. The Temple of the Wind, I think they call it; or Venus;--or--or--Mrs Arthur de Bever.'

'Was she a goddess?'

'It was something built to her memory. Such a view of the river!

I was here once before and they took me up. Everybody who comes here goes and see Mrs Arthur de Bever. They ought to have told you.'

'Let us go then,' said Miss Boncassen. 'Only it must not be long.'

'Five minutes will do it all.' Then he walked rather quickly up a flight of rural steps. 'Loverly spot, isn't it?'

'Yes, indeed.'

'That's Maidenhead Bridge;--that's somebody's place;--and now, I've got something to say to you.'

'You're not going to murder me now you've got me up here alone,' said Miss Boncassen, laughing.

'Murder you!' said Dolly, throwing himself into an attitude that was intended to express devoted affection. 'Oh no!'

'I am glad of that.'

'Miss Boncassen!'

'Mr Longstaff! If you sigh like that you'll burst yourself.'

'I'll--what?'

'Burst yourself!' and she nodded her head at him.

Then he clasped his hands together, and turned his head away from her towards the little temple. 'I wonder whether she knows what love is,' he said, as though he were addressing himself to Mrs Arthur de Bever.

'No, she don't,' said Miss Boncassen.

'But I do,' he shouted, turning back towards her. 'I do. If any man were ever absolutely, actually, really in love, I am the man.'

'Are you indeed, Mr Longstaff? Isn't this pleasant?'

'Pleasant;--pleasant? Oh, it could be so pleasant.'

'But who is the lady? Perhaps you don't mean to tell me that.'

'You mean to say you don't know?'

'Haven't the least idea in life.'

'Let me tell you then that it could only be one person. It never was but one person. It never could have been but one person. It is you.'

'Me!' said Miss Boncassen, choosing to be ungrammatical in order that he might be more absurd.

'Of course it is you. Do you think that I should have brought you all the way up here to tell that I was in love with anybody else?'

'I thought I was brought up here to see Mrs de Somebody, and the view.'

'Not at all,' said Dolly emphatically.

'Then you have deceived me.'

'I will never deceive you. Only say that you will love me, and I will be as true to you as the North Pole.'

'Is that true to me?'

'You know what I mean.'

'But if I don't love you?'

'Yes, you do!'

'Do I?'

'I beg your pardon,' said Dolly. 'I didn't mean to say that. Of course a man shouldn't make sure of a thing.'

'Not in this case, Mr Longstaff; because really I entertain no such feeling.'

'But you can if you please. Just let me tell you who I am.'

'That will do no good whatever, Mr Longstaff.'

'Let me tell you at any rate. I have a very good income of my own as it is.'

'Money can have nothing to do with it.'

'But I want you to know that I can afford it. You might perhaps have thought that I wanted your money.'

'I will attribute nothing evil to you, Mr Longstaff. Only it is quite out of the question that I should--respond as I suppose you wish me to; and therefore, pray, do not say anything further.'

She went to the head of the little steps but her interrupted her.

'You ought to hear me,' he said.

'I have heard you.'

'I can give you as good a position as any man without a title in England.'

'Mr Longstaff, I rather fancy that wherever I may be I can make a position for myself. At any rate I shall not marry with a view of getting one. If my husband were an English Duke I should think myself nothing, unless I was something as Isabel Boncassen.'

When she said that she did not bethink herself that Lord Silverbridge would be in the course of nature an English Duke. But the allusion to an English Duke told intensely on Dolly, who had suspected that he had a noble rival. 'English Dukes aren't so easily got,' he said.

'Very likely not. I might have expressed my meaning better had I said an English Prince.'

'That's quite out of the question,' said Dolly. 'They can't do it,--by Act of Parliament,--except in some hugger-mugger left-handed way, that wouldn't suit you at all.'

'Mr Longstaff,--you must forgive me,--if I say--that of all the gentlemen--I have ever met in this country or in any other--you are the--most obtuse.' This she brought out in little disjointed sentences, not with any hesitation, but in a way to make every word she uttered more clear to an intelligence which she did not believe to be bright. But in this belief she did some injustice to Dolly. He was quite alive to the disgrace of being called obtuse, and quick enough to avenge himself at the moment.

'Am I?' said he. 'How humble-minded you must be when you think me a fool because I have fallen in love with such a one as yourself.'