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Mrs. Lancaster’s Rival

Chapter XIX. Randal and Flora

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Chapter XIX. Randal and Flora.

I am so glad! Did you know we were here, or have you found us quite by accident?’ said Mabel, as she went forward to meet her friend, sliding among the pebbles.

‘Who would have dreamed of seeing you so far from St. Denys!’ said Randal, in his usual manner. ‘Have you dropped from the sky, or do you generally haunt this beach? Can you answer all our questions at once?’

Flora gave him a curious quick look, and answered Mabel.

‘You are surprised, I daresay. The fact is, that I went to-day to see some friends of mine at Sadleigh, and came back just now by the ferry. The boy told me that he had just seen you rowing up here, and thought you must have landed in this cove.’

‘Then the boy did know you, Randal, and that was why he stared so,’ said Mabel.

‘Yes, the boy knows Mr. Hawke by sight very well. He is one of Mrs. Sale’s sons. He lives at that cottage on the road where you took shelter from the thunderstorm.’

‘They are good-for-nothing rascals, those Sales,’ said Randal.

‘At any rate they know no better, and have had very little in the way of example,’ said Flora. ‘For my part, I am much obliged to Tommy Sale. He has done me a great service.’

This was a pleasant thing to say, but Mabel did not quite know what to make of her friend’s manner. Its page 168 animation seemed almost unnatural; there was something strained and odd in her voice and her looks. She was not unlike what she had been during the last part of her visit at the Castle. Only her manner then was a little exaggerated to-day.

‘Are you going back by the combe?’ said Randal politely. ‘Perhaps I may have the pleasure of rowing you in, when you and Miss Ashley have had enough of this. It will spare you some rough walking.’

‘No, Mr. Hawke, thank you,’ said Flora. ‘Two people are quite enough for your boat.’

‘You have no idea of the capacities of my boat,’ said Randal.

‘I won’t trouble you to row me,’ replied Flora.

Randal made her a slight bow, smiling faintly. He was even paler than usual. He walked down the beach to the water’s edge, and stood there for a minute, looking up and down the river. Mrs. Lancaster stood and stared after him. Then she clasped her hands together, and, to Mabel’s extreme horror, made a little gesture of wringing them. It occurred to Mabel, with a shiver of dismay, that this pretty elegant woman, who was so strangely different at different times, could not be quite in her right mind. With a sudden impulse of pity she laid her hand on Flora’s arm, and looked up earnestly into her face.

‘What is the matter?’ she said, in a low voice.

‘The matter!’ cried Flora, with a small burst of laughing. ‘My dear Miss Ashley, what are you talking about?’

‘I beg your pardon,’ said Mabel, frightened, and instantly withdrawing her hand.

‘O, don’t beg my pardon. I am so glad. The world is a charming place, isn’t it?’ said Flora. ‘You are a sweet girl. You are sorry for any one who is not so happy as yourself, are you not?’

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These strange words, spoken in a clear ringing voice, made Mabel move backwards in horrified amazement, while Randal turned suddenly round and came back to them.

‘Miss Ashley does not understand you, Mrs. Lancaster,’ he said, standing before Flora and looking her straight in the face. ‘Neither do I.’

‘O, doesn’t she? Don’t you?’ said Flora.

‘Come here,’ said Randal.

He walked a few yards along the beach, and she followed him silently. When they were out of Mabel’s hearing, he stopped and looked at her again.

‘What can be your reason for following me about in this way?’

‘You know. You half confessed it yesterday.’

‘I did nothing of the kind. Let me tell you that being jealous and suspicious is the surest way to make yourself and others miserable. And I will not endure this sort of thing.’

His voice and manner seemed to bring Flora back to herself, though it was a miserable self enough.

‘Randal,’ she said, ‘it is you who make me jealous and suspicious. You could make me happy by saying two or three words, and you will not. I want to know the truth—just the truth—for I don’t understand you; and if you go on in this way you will drive me mad.’

‘That means, I suppose,’ said Randal, ‘that I am to have no peace till there has been a thorough explanation. Cannot you go quietly home, or is it a pleasure to you to torment yourself and me and that girl in this ridiculous way?

‘Don’t put me off like that,’ said Flora. ‘You are a coward; and I have a good mind to go and tell her everything.’

Randal smiled, though even his lips were white.

‘Well, we must talk it out, I see,’ he said quietly. page 170 ‘You are very unreasonable. Stay here a moment. I must ask Miss Ashley to wait for me.’

‘Do; she will be too happy,’ said Flora.

She turned her back on him, and stood gazing over the water, though one may doubt whether she saw anything. The beautiful afternoon was going off a little with the turn of the tide; gray clouds had come up, and a low wind was moaning on the river; it swayed restlessly, and the small waves broke splashing on the shingle. Some wild and melancholy power seemed to have taken possession of the day.

Mabel, waiting in some anxiety, was glad to see Randal coming back to her.

‘What is it?’ she said. ‘Is Mrs. Lancaster ill?’

‘Not exactly ill,’ said Randal. ‘But she is—very peculiar at times, Mabel. She has troubles which—I know more about than any one; and she can’t be satisfied without a talk with me. Would you mind our leaving you here for a few minutes? She wants me to take a turn along the beach with her. We shall not be far off. You won’t mind waiting in this safe little corner?’

Randal was agitated, and spoke at first with hesitation, but gained confidence as he went on. Mabel looked at him wonderingly. It was impossible that she should not feel the strangeness of his intimacy with Mrs. Lancaster. It was a mystery, though she was inclined to believe that there was a little oddity about Flora—her manner to herself just now had been so extraordinary.

‘I shall not mind waiting at all,’ she said; and there was in her voice and look a sort of womanly quietness which was very attractive to Randal, horribly disturbed as he was.

‘Thank you, Mabel,’ he said. ‘You are a noble girl. I shall not be long away from you, I hope.’

Mabel did not quite feel her own nobleness. She page 171 smiled, and he went back to Flora. Mabel waited there very patiently, gathering the purple flowers that grew among the rocks.

Her two friends walked away along the far-stretching beach, at first silently. Flora did not seem able to take her eyes away from the gray and green surface of the water, with its monotonous movement. Randal was looking down and frowning. At last, when Mabel was left far behind, out of sight, he stopped and said,

‘Where are you going, Flora?’

She looked round at him suddenly, as if startled. Her blue eyes were wet with tears, and the bright colour of excitement was gone from her face.

‘I don’t know,’ she said. ‘Not to heaven, I fancy.’

‘Don’t take such a dreary view of things,’ said Randal. ‘Sit down here. I have a great deal to say to you, if you can listen reasonably.’

I do not think there are many people like Randal Hawke in the world. I hope not. People who have ways of disarming the most righteous anger, and of being still loved by those whose hearts they are coolly breaking.

For a few moments, perhaps, Flora thought it was one of those happy old evenings in the combe, which made up to her for so many weeks and months of lonely faithfulness. And yet no; the combe was peaceful and shady and still, while here that restless river went flowing on, without pause or pity. After all, this was real life, and the other only a dream.

‘I never knew you to be jealous before, Flora,’ Randal said presently. ‘And I have set you no example of it. I did not object to your flirtations with that fool Dick.’

‘No; you certainly had no cause,’ said Flora. ‘Flirtation, do you call that? It did you more good page 172 than harm, as long as it lasted. I was glad when he went away, though, for his own sake.’

‘Ah, you always had a great deal of consideration for him.’

‘Don’t be absurd as well as cruel! Randal, can’t you put an end to all this wretchedness?’

‘Do you think it is pleasant for me?” said Randal.

‘I don’t know. You must have left off caring for me completely, or you could not be so cold and horrid. The way in which you spoke and behaved yesterday—O, it was not you at all, it was some indifferent stranger. “What does it all mean?—but I know that too well.’

‘When you talk of my manner yesterday,’ said Randal, ‘you forget that anything I may have said or done was provoked by yourself. You attacked me in a very extraordinary way, and almost accused me of being false to you. You would not be reasonable for a moment; and you are just the same still. You behave like a passionate child, and expect me to be just as foolish and impulsive as yourself.’

Poor Flora! She certainly could not have accounted for the sudden variations in her mood. When one’s life seems likely to be wrecked, and all the different aspects of this catastrophe come crowding into one’s mind at once, it is a great wonder if that mind remains calm and reasonable. It is more likely to catch at every chance of possible help, however inconsistent and unlikely, as a drowning creature would clutch at the very hand that was pushing it under water. Of course Flora had expected her fears and jealousies to be laughed off at once. She had not really known what they were till Randal had treated them seriously, and had refused to set her mind at ease by flatly contradicting her.

‘O Randal, you are quite mistaken,’ she said very gently. ‘I don’t want you to be foolish and impulsive. I only want to know the truth. If you have left off page 173 caring for me, you might tell me so. I may have done something to offend you; if so, do forgive me, for I did not mean it. Dear Randal, tell me all about it.’

Randal was touched for the moment by her gentleness. He put his arm round her and kissed her, remembering that after all they had been engaged for two years, and that she had the best right to know his plans and intentions. Of course she must know them some day, poor thing. Only he had intended to put off telling her for some time yet, till they were really quite decided. He had thought he might be an exception to the good old rule—

“‘Tis well to be off with the old love
Before you are on with the new.’

Because if any evil fate were to turn Mabel obstinately against him, Flora after all was far prettier, and he had cared for her very much in his way. But now this sudden flame of jealousy was come to spoil it all. He blamed himself for not warning Flora against going to the Castle; but it was no use going back to the past; it seemed as if he must make the best he could of the present.

‘As for my leaving off caring for you, Flora,’ he said, ‘that is all nonsense. The thing is impossible. One does not bring half one’s life to an end in that way. I have told you all about it many times; how I used to look at you in church, when I was a boy, and think that if I could marry such a beautiful princess as you, life would indeed be worth living. You know that if I had not depended on my father it would have been all right long ago. I might have been a different sort of fellow altogether, and certainly should have spared you and myself all this misery. He would have found that I cost him less in the end, for you would have looked after me, and I should not have ruined myself and him with gambling, as I have.’

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‘But it is not too late now to stop all that,’ said Flora eagerly.

Where she found the gleam of hope in this talk of Randal’s I do not know. But there was something very sweet to the poor wounded soul in being told even that she might have had a good influence on him. It was not likely, however, that a pretty plebeian like herself would have had any real power to withdraw him from his natural tastes and companions. The thing might have been just possible before they were married; certainly not afterwards.

‘Rather late to talk about stopping,’ said Randal, ‘when I am so tremendously in debt that the only thing left to us is to mortgage Pensand. And naturally my father does not care for that idea.’

‘Is there nothing that can be done? ‘Why didn’t you tell me before?’

‘One does not care to talk about such disagreeable things,’ said Randal.

Flora sat and looked at him in silence. She was much calmer now; the change in his manner had done a great deal for her in that way, and she was almost her usual self again. She was able to say very quietly, after a long pause,

‘Is there anything that I can do, Randal?’

‘I want you to understand the state of the case; how hopelessly foolish and imprudent we have been, in this engagement of ours. However likely it was, two years ago, that we might be able to marry some day, the prospect has gone on getting dimmer and dimmer, till at last there’s nothing but a blank. I am sorry for you and for myself; but you must quite see that, Flora.’

At that moment Flora Lancaster’s usual wits failed her, and she did not in any way connect this explanation with her other anxieties.

‘O,’ she said, ‘if you think I am not willing to wait, page 175 you don’t know me, Randal. Things may get bright again, and if the worst comes to the worst, there is my little fortune, you must remember. We might manage to live on that. My father will help us too—if he ever forgives me for keeping the secret so long.’

‘I quite expected you to say all that,’ said Randal, ‘but don’t you see that by your goodness you are only making things worse for me? It is hard enough to have to give you up, Flora, for any one that I can never love as I do you. It is a terribly hard fate for both of us, my dearest Flora. I wish with all my heart the money belonged to you; but don’t you see a man has duties to his family and his home and so on, that make it impossible to follow his own inclinations always? It seems as if my only way to save us from ruin—my father, and all that—was to marry some one with money. I am more sorry than I can tell you—can’t bear to think it; but it really is simple madness, in these days, to marry without enough to live on.’

Flora listened quite calmly to all this. ‘How long is it since you made up your mind?’ she said.

‘A few weeks,’ said Randal. ‘At least, I have known for more than that time that something of the sort must happen. But of course, till I saw that things were quite hopeless, I did not wish—’

‘Till you had made sure of the heiress,’ said Flora, with a cold quietness which made him look at her wonderingly. ‘How blind I have been, and how undignified and foolish! I wish you had done me the honour of telling me all this some time ago; not that it really matters—’

‘Don’t be so cruel, Flora,’ said Randal, trying to take her hand.

‘Don’t touch me, if you please. Cruel! You never cared for me in the least.’

‘I did, and do still, with all my heart,’ said Randal.

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She looked so lovely in her indignation that for one wild moment he was tempted to beg her forgiveness, to renounce his designs on Mabel Ashley and her money, to swear eternal faithfulness to Flora and poverty. But Randal’s good angel seldom approached him now, or only to fly away with one flutter of his wings. He was there on the beach for a moment, as the young man’s cheek crimsoned slowly with shame under the stern eyes of the woman who had risen from her place beside him.

‘You are a miserable liar,’ said Flora deliberately. ‘If you had ever cared for me, you would have not been quite so selfish. You would have thought of me a little, and would have kept yourself out of these debts as far as you could. A few weeks ago! Good heavens! And how many times we have met since then! and what letters you have written!’

‘You will oblige me by returning those letters, perhaps,’ said Randal, who had regained his native coolness on hearing himself called a miserable liar. ‘And I think you had better try and control yourself, Flora. You must have expected something of this kind, at least since yesterday.’

‘Since yesterday! Where was I yesterday? I don’t know,’ said Flora.

She put up her hand to her head, and walked down to the water’s edge. Randal stood looking after her, and wishing himself well out of this unpleasant business. He had hardly expected Flora, who had worshipped him, to turn round so completely, and behave in this disagreeable, contemptuous, insulting way. As if nobody had ever broken off an engagement before—and for much weaker reasons too. Any pity he had felt for her was fast changing into angry disgust. A woman who could allow herself to call him names, who could show her unwillingness to give him up in this undignified way, did not seem to deserve much consideration. Flora’s inbred page 177 vulgarity was showing itself, he decided, and he began to congratulate himself on his escape. She would probably have tried him very much when her beauty was gone, and her pretty ways with it.

Some time passed, he did not know how long, as he stood there thinking, and gazing at Flora, a solitary figure against the gray waste of waters. A cold whistling wind was blowing, and clouds were covering the bright summer sky. Perhaps it was not wonderful that those two should have forgotten the existence of anybody besides themselves. But at last, with a start of real consternation, Randal remembered the girl he had left waiting for him on the beach yonder. He had asked her to wait a few minutes; he thought it must be nearly an hour since he and Flora walked away from her together. He was seized with anxiety; a delicate nervous girl, left alone for so long, and perhaps angry with him for leaving her. Certainly no consideration for Flora Lancaster must interfere with his going back to her at once. Yet he could not leave Flora standing there alone by the river, in her present state of mind. The situation struck Randal as almost comic. He gave himself no time to think about it, however, but walked down and joined Flora where she stood.

‘We have left Miss Ashley alone for a long time,’ he said. ‘Shall we go back to her now?’

‘As you please,’ said Flora. ‘Yes; the poor girl may be frightened.’

Randal was immensely relieved by this answer, and by the ease and coolness of Flora’s manner. He walked along by her side without speaking. That pretty stretch of river beach had never seemed so long! But at last they turned a corner, and came to the place where they had left Mabel, among the rocks and grass and wild flowers. There was the boat, swinging by its chain; but Mabel was gone.