Chapter VII: “i Do Not Believe You.”

Thus, for more than a week, this farce went on.

Philip Paxton was wretched from his losses and disappointment, yet, with the determination not to succumb, and with his new object in view, he strove to keep up an appearance of content and enjoyment which he was far from feeling.

The next day he resolved to meet strategy with strategy.

Several of the guests who remained at Hazelmere since the dinner party departed that morning, leaving the family and original guests by themselves.

On the south side of the house there was a little piazza shaded by a stately old beech, and where a hammock had been swung to tempt anybody who might be lazy, or wish to while away a quiet hour or two with an interesting book.

This was a favorite resort of Arley’s, and now, believing herself free and unwatched, she stole thither with book and pillow and snugly laid herself away to enjoy the supposed liberty.

I should not have used the word enjoy, for she was very miserable.

Nothing but her pride kept her from giving up the battle and running away from both her trouble and friends, for she had promised to remain several weeks longer at Hazelmere.

But if she went she would have to give some reason for breaking her promise, and her face burned and her blood boiled with shame and indignation as she thought of the true and only one that she could give.

“Was a woman ever such a fool before?” she would cry in scorn and rage day after day, as she took herself to task for her folly. “Am I so much weaker and lower than others that I should thus disgrace my sex?”

But it was of no use to upbraid herself thus; she knew that she loved Philip Paxton with all the strength and passion of her young heart, and having given that love unasked, the knowledge brought her only wretchedness and shame.

Without warning, the man of whom she had been thinking appeared on the scene.

“You do not find your book very interesting, do you, Miss Wentworth?” he said, coming slowly up the steps, and standing directly before her, for he did not intend that she should circumvent him this time. His patience was at an end, and he was determined to settle an important question without further delay.

Arley started at the sound of his voice like a frightened fawn, the rich color, which she tried in vain to repress, surging to her temples.

“How do you know?” she demanded, with a pretty air of defiance, as she gracefully swung herself to a sitting posture in the hammock, the toes of her tiny slippers just touching the floor of the veranda.

If she had been caught napping, she meant to fight hard to preserve her secret intact.

“How do I know?” he repeated with a laugh that was very pleasant to her ears. “Because you have been lying here for the last half hour, and have not turned a single leaf.”

“And you have been watching me?” she flashed back, indignantly, but turning hot and cold as she remembered of what and whom she had been thinking during that half hour.

“Yes, I confess it. I could not help it, you made such an attractive picture, and since you would not allow me to come near you, I have been obliged to worship at a distance,” he returned, throwing a sort of sad tenderness into his tones.

“Mr. Paxton! I do not understand. You speak in enigmas,” Arley said, assuming a look of cool surprise, though her nerves tingled to her very finger tips at his words.

“Don’t you understand, Miss Wentworth?” he inquired, bending a scrutinizing glance upon her. “Do you suppose I can believe that your strange coldness and avoidance of me during the past fortnight have been wholly unstudied on your part? I think I owe it to myself, and to you as well, to inquire into the cause of your displeasure, and how I have given offense.”

“I am not displeased--you have not offended me,” stammered Arley, feeling miserably guilty for the way she had been treating him; then, conscious that she was making a worse blunder, she would have bitten her tongue off for having admitted so much.

“Then why on earth have you treated me so, Arley?” he burst forth, with a show of passion. “Pardon me, Miss Wentworth,” he continued, more quietly, “I am forgetting myself; but I am in trouble, and I am going away from Hazelmere. But I could not go until I had made my peace with you; we were such good friends for a while that I could not endure the thought of leaving you offended with me.”

Arley had lost all her brilliant color during the latter part of this speech, and she forgot everything but that he was in trouble and going away, and she would be thrice wretched when she could see him no more.

“In trouble, Mr. Paxton?” she repeated, with gentle questioning, and raising her great dark eyes to his with a look which thrilled him in spite of the fact that he was playing a treacherous part. “I am very sorry.”

“Thank you; and will you miss me?--will you be sorry to have me go?” he asked, bending nearer to her.

But Arley was too proud and high-spirited to fall into his arms in such a way as this. She could not forget how eager he had been in his pursuit of Lady Elaine, and drawing back a trifle, she replied, somewhat coldly:

“It is always unpleasant to have an agreeable party broken up, and I am sure that Annie and Wil will be sorry to have any of their guests depart.”

Philip Paxton stood thinking a moment what it would be best to say next, and during that moment Arley arose.

She dare not trust herself longer alone with him; she had nearly betrayed herself once already, and she was anxious to get away to the solitude of her own room and out of all danger of a second yielding to such weakness.

“I shall have to ask you to excuse me, Mr. Paxton,” she said, looking at her tiny watch, and then holding it up to him with an arch look. “See how late it is getting to be. You know Annie is to have a lawn party this afternoon, and I must go and make myself as bewildering as possible for the occasion. You do not go to-day, I hope?” she added, as if that was a matter of secondary importance. “It would be a pity for you to lose all the fun.”

He bit his lips with vexation, for she was making the task he had set himself to accomplish abominably hard.

“Why will you be so obtuse?” he cried, growing crimson to his very brow--“you compel me to be very abrupt for--I came here to tell you--to ask you--to be my wife! Arley, I love you.”

It was very abrupt surely--very awkward, though there was a ring of desperation in his words that suited Arley better than if it had been a more finished declaration.

Her pulses leaped and bounded within her with joy, with which, however, very much of pain was mingled.

But her reply was as abrupt as his avowal had been, and it amazed and confounded him with its independent frankness.

She lifted her face--very beautiful it was, too, with those crimson spots on her cheeks--and looking him straight in the eye, said:

“Mr. Paxton, I do not believe you.”