CHAPTER XVII
"He that rebuketh a wicked man getteth himself a blot!"--_The Bible_.
By all the ill-luck in the world Sir Walter Hickle was sitting in thepatch called the garden, turning a small parcel elatedly over and overin his pocket, as Leonie, and her companion, and the dog came slidingdown the hill towards the cottage.
For the time being Leonie had totally forgotten the proceedings of thenight before, which had metamorphosed her radiant self from a free intoa bond woman.
"Oh!" she said, putting one hand unexpectedly on Jan Cuxson's arm anddigging her stick fiercely into the ground, as the man in the gardenhalf rose from his chair and sank back with a frown.
"Oh!" she repeated.
"Tired, dear?"
Neither of them noticed the little endearing word which had slipped outso naturally, but Leonie's face was wan and her eyes were dead as shedragged herself down the last few yards, while her aunt fluttered downto the gate to meet them, with her mind and skirts in a whirl.
"Jan Cuxson!" she exclaimed, offering a limp hand, and "How _very_nice," she continued, lying quite successfully. "I should have knownyou anywhere. _Do_ come in and have tea!"
And in the same breath, and with that strange cruel cunning of theshallow mind, which is the abortive twin of decent feminine intuition,she leapt at the difficulty she saw threatening, and tried to dispel it.
"Let me introduce you to Sir Walter Hickle, my niece's fiance."
Sir Walter ambled forward with outstretched hand as Cuxson, noddingcurtly, bent to pick up Leonie's stick, which had clattered to thefloor.
A malicious gleam shone in the elder man's little eyes as he looked atthe splendid young fellow who had seemed, physically anyway, so fit amatch for Leonie as they tramped down the hill together; and thoughthere was no sign of his inward perplexity and repulsion in JanCuxson's face as his eyes swept the obese figure of the notorious oldknight, his jaw took a sudden, almost ugly, outward thrust with thebirth of a mighty resolution.
Leonie walked to the gate with him when he took his departure, havingrefused tea from a certain undefined feeling that he could not even sitin the same room as the man whom he intended to do out of the odd trick.
He crushed Leonie's hand as he looked straight into her eyes, sodesperate and ashamed, and spoke very gently and deliberately as heslipped his hand to her wrist and pulled her a little closer.
"I shall be in the last cove to-morrow at eleven, waiting for you."
And naturally Leonie had responded to the mastery in the voice, as allwomen do respond when the voice is the right one; and a soft wave ofcolour swept from chin to brow as she turned from the gate, and walkedthrough the doorway straight to her bedroom; while her future lordpranced furiously among the bric-a-brac, and her aunt's beads andbracelets clashed against the china as she wrung her hands over the teathings, and portending disaster.
Leonie sat down on her bed with her eyes shining like stars.
The lid of her life's casket had opened wide, and from under a hideousheap of fear, disgust, lost illusions, and despair, hope had sprung,spreading her iridescent wings in the warmth of love.
She sat until the shadows crept about her, then got up from her bedwith a little laugh, and descended to give battle for her life andfreedom.
Think of every synonym connected with the word tumult and you will geta vague idea of the storm which crashed about the girl's defencelesshead as she stood with her back to the door of the tiny sitting-room,with a perfectly gorgeous diamond ring sparkling and flashing in frontof her upon a table.
"I cannot marry you, Sir Walter, I simply cannot do it," she wassaying, slowly and distinctly. "You must let me go. So please givethe ring to somebody else, there are heaps of girls ever--oh, ever somuch nicer than me!"
She smiled sweetly as she picked up the ring and held it out to theman, who snatched it from her as he sprang to his feet, and hurled itthrough the window.
Then he moved to the other side of the table and leant both clenchedfists upon it as he looked Leonie up and down.
"You needn't wear the ring, my girl," he said slowly, "but no one picksWalter Hickle up one day and throws him down the next. You're going tomarry me this day month, you take that straight from me. Let's hearwhy you've changed your mind so sudden; willing to marry last night,unwilling to marry to-day.
"Come on, now, out with it!" he suddenly shouted, bringing his handwith a crash on the table as Leonie hesitated, blushing divinely.
"Only--be-cause I--I don't love you, Sir Walter, and it's--it's _not_right to marry without love!"
"Posh! There wasn't so much of this 'ere right to marry last night.Fallen in love with that young feller-me-lad, I suppose. Where did youmeet him? What were you doing? How--how----"
Leonie turned the handle of the door, but shrank back as the man, witha bound, flung himself at her and wrenched her hand free; and SusanHetth clashed her bracelets and bits as she put her hands tightly overher face, in her fright forgetting the mixture of colours she heaped onit daily in the hope of stemming the neap tide of old age.
"Get out, you there!" snarled the man, lashed to fury by the whip ofjealousy. "Get out, go away, wash your face--you look like a--a--likea damned fut'rist, get _out_!"
And not daring to pass the two near the door, she prepared to get, witha great loss of dignity, through the bow window; in fact, one foot wasjust over the sill when the man called her back.
"Come back," he bellowed, "I want you as witness to what I'm goin' tosay to your niece, the young lady what plays fast and loose with honestmen. Fast and loose, I _don't_ fink!"
Leonie shuddered as the veneer of refinement cracked under the strainof the man's rage, showing the brutality and grossness immediatelyunderneath.
She pulled her hand free, and backed towards the mantelpiece, againstwhich she leant, staring at him.
"I am not going to marry you!"
The voice was low but positive, and the quiet in the room was intenseas Sir Walter bounced up within a foot of her and shook a fatforefinger in her face.
"Aren't you," he said, "aren't you! And I'll just tell you threethings what'll make you change your tune, my girl.
"One," he placed the fat forefinger on the ill-bred thumb, "an' theleast important, you'll marry me 'cos you're an 'etth, daughter ofColonel Bob Hetth, V.C., an' your fut'rist aunt ain't--hasn't halfrubbed it in about the Hetths never breaking their word, I give youmine!"
"Please leave my father's name out of this," quietly replied Leonie,her face dead white from the sickening thudding of her heart.
"Well, if you don't keep your word, Miss tiger cat, I'll run you in forbreach of promise, an' bring your father's name into court!"
"You couldn't!"
"_Couldn't_!--couldn't what?" stormed the man.
"Run," said Leonie gently, and added sweetly, and with great vulgarity,"you're too fat!"
"Two!" continued Sir Walter, purple in the face, but wisely ignoringthe insult to his person. "You'll marry me 'cos no one else'll haveyou. You're batty, my gel--gone in the top storey--can't even go outto work for your living 'cause you ain't always to be trusted. I knowall about yer, but I'm willin' to take the risk. There won't be anytrapersin' round the 'ouse after dark once yer married to me, I giveyou my word. Course, if you like to go on spungin' on your aunt,obligin' her to live in a 'ole like this, well, that's your lookh'out--'ardly up to mark tho', being an 'etth, daughter of a V.C."
His small eyes gleamed as they rested on Leonie's stricken face.
"Stop, please," she said hurriedly, "I can't stand any more just now.I--I couldn't really. Will you give me a week to think it over?"
The man laughed contemptuously.
"A few days, a few hours, then?"
There was something horrible in the humiliation of the girl's pleading,but it made not the slightest impression on the ex-costermonger, whohad at one time been accustomed to enforcing his commands with thebuckle end of his waist-belt.
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sp; "Not a minute, not a second," he chortled, seeing the end of the chasein sight. "Think of the 'old I have on yer aunt. Lady Susan Hetth,sister of Colonel Bob 'etth, V.C., creeping out h'of a gentleman'srooms at three h'o'clock of the mornin' an' payin' me 'ush money--thinkof h'it. _Now_ what 'ev you got to say. Why don't you be sensible an'quiet, gal? I've _got_ yer, it ain't no use kickin'. Be sensible an'I'll smother you in di'monds, give yer two Rolls-Royce, yacht, MontyCarlo any time, Park Lane--make every other woman want ter scratch yereyes out--what more _could_ yer want? Now what have yer got to say!"
What was there to say?
Aunt Susan tried to obliterate herself behind the window curtain; SirWalter, thumbs in armholes, tilted himself backwards and forwards ontoe and heel as Leonie came forward and leant with both hands thetable, as she looked from one to the other without speaking.
In fact the silence became intolerable to Sir Walter, who had expected,and would have thoroughly enjoyed a heated altercation, in which hewould have known exactly where he was.
"Well, what 'ev yer got to say, my gel?"
Leonie looked from one to the other.
"I will marry you this day month, Sir Walter." She threw up her handas he laughed triumphantly. "Wait one moment! But until that day Iwill have nothing to do with you, _nothing_. I will not meet you norgo out with you, nor bother about a trousseau, nor the future in anyway. I shall go out and come in when I like, and go where and how Ilike. I shall meet whom I like. I won't deceive you, I shall meet JanCuxson just as often as I like. And I should advise you not tointerfere with me in any way. He is young and strong, and, as an oldfriend of the family, might resent it. You can trust him, he is agentleman--which means--oh, well!--you will find the exact meaning in aFrench dictionary."
She crossed to the door, turned, and looked, slowly from one to theother.
"Is the bargain concluded?"
"Yes!--I'll take yer on those terms--but you'll pay a 'undred per centinterest on the month, I've lent yer--an' _then_ some I give yer _my_word!"
The door shut quietly as the man sank into a chair.
"Batty!" he said as he mopped his bald head, "absolutely balmy. Butit's worth while--it's worth while--let her have 'er month--let 'er--Ishall have a whole lifetime to break 'er in."
Leonie of the Jungle Page 17