Chapter XII: Her Offer

When Justin came in to dinner that evening the ladies were already in the room, and he hurried to their table to inquire how Iris felt after her mountain experience. From the door he noticed that she looked rather pale and tired, but as soon as she saw him a vivid flush mounted to her cheeks, and their eyes met in a quick, embracing glance.

“How late you are, Mr. Rees!” observed Mrs. Henderson, as soon as he had asked after her cousin and received her smiling reply. “Miss Smith expected you back much earlier.”

“Yes,” he answered, “I should have been here sooner, only the horse went lame and I had to walk nearly all the way home.”

“Any horse would go lame after the furious way you rode yesterday,” commented Amy. “It is a wonder you did not kill the poor animal and yourself too! But,” she added, her manner changing, “I simply don’t know how to thank you for finding Iris last night and looking after her so splendidly! I shall never forget your kindness. I don’t know what I should have done if it had not been for the comforting thought that you were up there on the mountains too, and I felt sure that somehow you would be able to find her; if you had not been there I think I should have gone quite mad!”

“I was most deeply thankful to be there,” he replied, with profound solemnity, “and if I had not found Miss Dearn I think I should have lost my reason too.”

“You are a perfect dear,” said Mrs. Henderson, with undisguised enthusiasm. “And,” she went on, “now that Captain Barton has left us, we should both love it if you would come and sit at our table at meals.”

A happy light sprang into Justin’s grey eyes.

“Do you really mean that, Mrs. Henderson? You are far too good to me. I shall be simply delighted.”

A very enjoyable meal followed. Iris and Justin were ideally happy; to be together again, able to talk to one another, and drink deep of each other’s love, was a joy which brought a glow to their faces and a bright sparkle to their eyes.

When dinner was over Mrs. Henderson invited Rees to spend the evening in their private sitting-room.

There had been a cold change in the weather; clouds had gathered over the mountains and covered the sky with chilly, billowy masses.

Their room looked very cosy and inviting. A bright log fire burned on the open hearth and the light from the gas came through a crimson silk shade, tinting the warm flower-scented air with a rosy sheen.

“Ah, how cosy!” exclaimed the driver, with a deep glad note in his voice.

“Yes, it is very comfortable,” replied Mrs. Henderson, taking up the paper and sitting down on a Chesterfield some distance away from the blaze.

Iris took a low chair close to the fire. She liked the warmth and glow from the flames, and, with a sense of happy languor, she sank back among the cushions Justin had piled behind her.

He stood on the hearthrug glancing round the changed apartment. It had never looked as it did now, till Iris and her cousin had taken possession of it. They had given it an atmosphere of well-being and comfort, of culture and luxury. He wondered vaguely what they had done to give it this air of delicious refinement. It was not merely due to the number of books, the profusion of soft-toned silk cushions they had brought to it; not only to the artistic rearrangement of the velvet moss-green furniture and the abundance of vases filled with fragrant roses; it was something above all these, yet showing itself through them, which dominated the rooms and brought to it a delicate perfumed breath from another world.

Justin glanced at Iris again and met her shining, smiling eyes. How radiant she looked, and how lovely as she lay luxuriously back in the low chair, the reflection of the fire playing caressingly over the satin texture of her skin, the crimson light behind her casting a red glow on the waves of her golden-brown hair.

Mrs. Henderson had been hidden behind the daily paper. Now she put it down and rose as she said: “I think I really must write some letters to-night; the English mail is going out to-morrow and I never can settle down to write in the daytime. I am sure you two can entertain each other for a while.”

When Justin had closed the door behind her he came over to Iris, held out his hands, and, as she placed her own in his clasp, he drew her to her feet and for a few seconds stood gazing at her.

“Iris,” he said in a low voice, “is it really true?”

“True about--last night?” she faltered.

“Yes. I was thinking as I stood watching you if--it really could be true--it seems too beautiful!”

“I was wondering about that too,” she admitted, her fingers responding to the pressure of his.

“But it _was_ true; you did sleep in my arms, your lovely head did rest on my breast, for look,” there was a strange smile in his eyes as he freed one of her hands, dived into an inner pocket and brought out a tortoise-shell, gold-mounted back comb. “Look,” he said, his eyes upon her face, “I found this when I left you early this morning, caught in a pocket.”

A pink flush spread over her face. “Was that really clinging to your coat pocket?” she said, slightly confused.

“Not the coat one. This one here.” And he touched his left breast.

“Oh, Justin!” Her confusion increased.

He folded her to him. “Never mind, dearest, don’t be distressed about it. But I am going to ask you if I may keep it, so that whenever I am in doubt about the reality of that sacred night, it will always assure me it was not a dream; and--” he added in lower tones, “I also want to keep it till I may have the right to remain with you always, and as close to you as I was when this little comb fell out.”

He glanced down at her splendid young form pressed to his, the proud head bent to his shoulder, her lovely neck curved as if in unutterable surrender. Ah, the amazing wonder of it! Could this really be Iris Dearn, standing there, submissive, wholly yielding her charms to a poor driver, an insignificant nobody?

He suddenly bent down and kissed her neck, where little golden-brown curls stole over its snowy whiteness. He felt her thrill to his caress.

“Iris,” he murmured, “may I kiss that entrancing spot again?”

In response a pair of bewitching white arms crept over his shoulders and clasped him closer.

He returned the embrace. The room suddenly reeled with him. He could see nothing, be conscious of nothing but the soft silken texture under his lips.

She drew a long, quivering breath.

There were footsteps in the corridor.

“Sit down, Iris,” he said, putting her gently into a chair and taking another beside her.

The footsteps without passed their door.

Iris leant back against the cushions, closing her eyes in delicious languor, and resting one long, slim ankle across the other.

“Are you very tired?” asked Justin, bending over her anxiously. “I should not have kept you standing so long.”

She turned her head to him without opening her eyes, her lashes shadowing her paled cheeks. “Perhaps I am a little tired, but it is not that--only to have you with me again,” she whispered in faint trailing tones, not finishing her sentence.

“I am afraid you are very tired after all you have been through, and this long, unpleasant day.”

She looked up at him quickly and the colour came back to her face again. Had Justin heard about the bank-manager’s visit, and all he had said--that horrible humiliation she wished to spare him? Her pulses quickened with sudden fear; could he have seen Ralph after all?

“How do you know it has been unpleasant?” she asked, trying to speak calmly.

“Well, as I saw Captain Barton leaving so suddenly, I knew there must have been a scene beforehand; he seemed on the verge of an outbreak this morning. I suppose the thought of our spending--all that time together, upset him. Still, it was very unreasonable of him to be angry, when he was really the cause of our being there.”

“No, it was not only that.”

“What was it, then?”

“He saw us through his field-glasses when I--when you----” The vermilion in her cheeks told him the rest.

“When you were in my--arms?”

“Yes,” she replied, evading his eyes; “of course that made him very angry; he tried to make me give you up; and when I wouldn’t, he was most unpleasant, so--I sent him away.”

“My poor little girl, how terrible for you to have to go through all that for me.”

She smiled at him tenderly. “I would go through much more than that for you.”

She closed her eyes again. There was no doubt about it, she was very tired, and for some moments he sat watching her exquisite face with its adorable drooping lashes. He sighed as he thought how he had rested her the night before, and a great yearning shone from his anxious grey eyes.

“Iris, you are utterly exhausted,” he said, bending over her; “if only I could take you and hold you as I did last night, and soothe you off to sleep, you would wake up as rested and as radiant as you were this morning.”

The blue eyes opened for a moment and a look of intense longing came into them as they met his.

He drew a laboured breath. “Oh, Iris, why can’t we always be together?” he broke out vehemently. “Why should you have to do without all the comfort, the rest--all that my love could give you? I hate the hour I am barred from being with you; Iris, I want you all the time--don’t you understand? Don’t you know what it means to me to be without you? Iris, I do not want to be merely your lover; I want the tender, sacred privileges of a husband.” He had risen and stood by the fire, his eyes burning upon her face.

Now he suddenly turned, placed his arms upon the mantelpiece, his face on his sleeve, and Iris saw that his shoulders were moving in deep agitation.

She rose too--all her tiredness had vanished. How well she understood all he was going through!

She touched his shoulder gently; he stretched out one arm and clasped her to him without lifting his head.

“Justin,” she breathed, in quick sympathy, “I cannot bear you to suffer like this; you must not grieve! Don’t put your dear head there, come over to the sofa and I will rest it near my heart.” And she led him to the Chesterfield and gently drew his head down to her gauzy shoulder.

“Now, Justin,” she continued, “I am going to say something to you I meant to say last night. I wanted to say it then, but--somehow I couldn’t. However, I am going to say it now. But I want you not to stir nor look at me while I am speaking; nor interrupt, but listen until I have quite, quite finished. I am going to give you all--no, don’t move; I have only just begun and you must keep quiet.”

She stroked the black hair tenderly till he was still again.

“I am going to fulfil your every wish, you darling boy; you shall have all you want, and I have a lovely plan for making us both ideally happy. You are not to do that hard work any more----No, I haven’t nearly finished yet, and you are not to say a word till I stop. You have been so brave about everything, and now your hardships must end. We shall have the dearest home near the mountains, where no--no danger can touch you. You must have a car, so that you can run into the township whenever you wish to, and help all your friends here; and----Now, Justin, didn’t I say you were not to attempt to look at me,” and she pressed his face back to the folds of her gown. Then she went on, in lower tones: “I am going to be all yours, myself and--all I have too. I am going to make everything over to you; I want you to have it. Then you will certainly have to provide for me! Oh, Justin, it will be simply adorable to be dependent on you! You will be generous to me, I know, and not insist on my frocks lasting too many seasons; and, Justin, think how lovely it will be to have a home of our very own, and be always----”

Her lover had not stirred or tried to protest for some moments; he had been suspiciously quiet--so quiet that Iris lifted his face from her shoulder, and looked at it a little anxiously. It had grown very white; his lashes were moist, and so were his cheeks.

“Oh, darling!” she whispered, with deep concern, “have I hurt you? Do tell me! I did not mean to make you sad, I only wanted to make you happy--oh, so happy! You will allow me to do it, won’t you?”

He looked at her from behind the moist lashes, his grey eyes brimming with an overwhelming emotion. “Iris,” he said very unsteadily, “you are too wonderful, too touchingly sweet; I can’t tell you how I feel about your amazing suggestion, but----”

“No, no, Justin, there are to be no buts.”

He gazed at her in wistful adoration. “Dearest,” he began, “you shall build the house----” He stopped speaking, as if afraid of wounding her.

“And won’t you come and--live there, too?” she breathed a little anxiously.

“Yes, some day, when I have myself in hand----”

“That is now--remember how we knocked at the gate of the Angels’ Home last night! You _will_ come, then, and let me do what I ask? Think how lovely it will be! We can spend our days together--go about and help all the people in the district; you will be able to give them lots of money, and I will take them great baskets of things! Justin, you will let me carry out my plan, won’t you?”

The long black lashes shading the large grey eyes grew moister. “You blessed little girl! It is just like you to want to do things like that! When I am sure of myself, and if you will let me work, I will come to you--it will be bliss to come,” he said, with a break in his voice.

Her face dropped. “Won’t you come--the other way?”

“No, Iris, I cannot take your--money.”

“But, Justin, if I were poor and you rich, wouldn’t you want me to have yours?”

“Yes, of course--that would be a different thing.”

“I can’t see the difference.”

“That is only because you are so generous and good, and don’t want to.”

She sighed deeply. “If only you knew how much I wanted to do what I’ve told you!”

“Yes, I know, Iris, and to my dying day I shall never forget your loving offer!”

“But couldn’t you just take half?”

“No, my heart’s treasure; not that either.”

“Justin, you are horribly proud,” she said, with quivering lips.

He kissed the tremulous mouth. “I am dreadfully proud of you, if that is what you mean,” he said, with a not too steady smile; “and now tell me: when I am sure of myself, may I come to you then as your--husband?”

The lovely white arms stole about his neck again. “Yes,” she breathed, “I shall always be ready for you, waiting for you.”

Footsteps came along the hall, and there was a sharp knock on the door.

Justin walked over and opened it. The little kitchen-maid had come up with a message from Miss Green saying her father had a very bad heart attack, and she would be glad if Mr. Rees could come and help her.

The girl went away and Justin came back to say good-bye to Iris. “Please let me come with you,” she said, “there might be lots of things I could do.”

“No, you are far too tired; I couldn’t allow you to stir.”

“But you are tired too.”

“Oh, I shall be all right; but, Iris,” he went on, “if you are still here when I come back, may I come in and say--good-night?”

“Of course--I will wait till you come.”

“No, you must not do that; I might be late, and you need a good sleep.”

She glanced down on the moss-green hearthrug as she said: “Justin, I want you to come and say good-night, and you know I can’t sleep if I’m--unhappy.”

Her eyes were still on the rug, so she did not see the expression on the face watching her; she only knew there was a perceptible pause; then a clinging arm lay for a moment round her shoulders, and a low voice said: “I will be sure to come to you, darling.” And he was gone.