Mistress Wilding Read Online Free PDF Page A

here," said he, and it was not clear from his manner which of them he addressed. "Not a doubt but he will have brought you the news." He seemed to
sneer.
    Ruth advanced towards him, her face grave, her sweet eyes full of pitying concern. She placed a hand upon his sleeve. "My poor Richard . . ." she began, but he shook off her kindly touch,
laughing angrily — a mere cackle of irritability.
    "Odso!" he interrupted her. "It is a thought late for this mock kindliness!"
    Diana, in the background, arched her brows, then with a shrug turned aside and seated herself on the stone seat by which they had been standing. Ruth shrank back as if her brother had struck
her.
    "Richard!" she cried, and searched his livid face with her eyes. "Richard!"
    He read a question in the interjection, and he answered it. "Had you known any real care, any true concern for me, you had not given cause for this affair," he chid her peevishly.
    "What are you saying?" she cried, and it occurred to her at last that Richard was afraid. He was a coward! She felt as she would faint.
    "I am saying," said he, hunching his shoulders, and shivering as he spoke, yet his glance unable to meet hers, "that it is your fault that I am like to get my throat cut before sunset."
    "My fault?" she murmured. The slope of lawn seemed to wave and swim about her. "My fault?"
    "The fault of your wanton ways," he accused her harshly. "You have so played fast and loose with this fellow Wilding that he makes free of your name in my very presence, and puts upon me the
need to get myself killed by him to save the family honour."
    He would have said more in this strain, but something in her glance gave him pause. There fell a silence. From the distance came the melodious pealing of church bells. High overhead a lark was
pouring out its song; in the lane at the orchard end rang the beat of trotting hoofs. It was Diana who spoke presently. Just indignation stirred her, and, when stirred, she knew no pity, set no
limits to her speech.
    "I think, indeed," said she, her voice crisp and merciless, "that the family honour will best be saved if Mr. Wilding kills you. It is in danger while you live. You are a coward, Richard."
    "Diana!" he thundered — he could be mighty brave with women — whilst Ruth clutched her arm to restrain her.
    But she continued, undeterred: "You are a coward — a pitiful coward," she told him. "Consult your mirror. It will tell you what a palsied thing you are. That you should dare so speak to
Ruth . . ."
    "Don't!" Ruth begged her, turning.
    "Aye," growled Richard, "she had best be silent."
    Diana rose, to battle, her cheeks crimson. "It asks a braver man than you to compel my obedience," she told him. "La!" she fumed, "I'll swear that had Mr. Wilding overheard what you have said to
your sister, you would have little to fear from his sword. A cane would be the weapon he'd use on you."
    Richard's pale eyes flamed malevolently; a violent rage possessed him and flooded out his fear, for nothing can so goad a man as an offensive truth. Ruth approached him again; again she took him
by the arm, seeking to soothe his over-troubled spirit; but again he shook her off. And then to save the situation came a servant from the house. So lost in anger was all Richard's sense of decency
that the mere supervention of the man would not have been enough to have silenced him could he have found adequate words in which to answer Mistress Horton. But even as he racked his mind, the
footman's voice broke the silence, and the words the fellow uttered did what his presence alone might not have sufficed to do.
    "Mr. Vallancey is asking for you, sir," he announced.
    Richard started. Vallancey! He had come at last, and his coming was connected with the impending duel. The thought was paralyzing to young Westmacott. The flush of anger faded from his face; its
leaden hue returned and he shivered as with cold. At last he mastered himself sufficiently to ask:
    "Where is he,