A Woman Martyr

								

ideas which he had jotted down at intervals for his future guidance, in
his mind.  "I suppose you do not believe in marriage.  You have seen its
failure!  Is that it?"
"Perhaps," she said.  "I really can’t tell, myself.  All I know is, that
I am firmly resolved not to marry--any one!"  She spoke doggedly, with
almost a childish obstinacy.
"But--you do not bar friendship?" he said, earnestly, appealingly.
"Supposing some one of the unfortunate men you determine to have nothing
to do with were to wish to devote his whole life and energies to you,
secretly, but entirely--with the absolute devotion of a would-be
anchorite or martyr--what then?  You would not refuse to give the poor
devil a chance?  I mean, to give him something in return; if friendship
were too much to expect, tolerance, pity, a look now and then, or a
word, you would allow him to play your faithful knight, of course in
strict secrecy, from afar, unsuspected by the world?"
A faint colour suffused her lovely face. She looked at him, furtively.
"Some people may care for that sort of thing--I don’t!" she bluntly
said.  "Oh, Lord Vansittart! why will you not, can you not, see and
understand that all I want of--of--everyone is to be let alone?  I have
my own ideas of what my life should be; surely any one professing
interest in me ought to respect them!"
"I respect your every thought," he eagerly, if somewhat perplexedly
returned.  "Only--I should like thoroughly to understand the kind of
life you wish to lead.  Because--well, I will not beat about the bush.
Joan! you know I love you!  You are my very life! And if I cannot be
nearer than I am now, my only happiness and motive for living must be to
serve you in some way, to see you, speak to you, help you, be your very
slave----"
Just as his voice was most impassioned his appeal was interrupted.  An
elderly gentleman rode swiftly up and tapped him on the arm.
"Why, Vansittart!  can I believe my eyes?" he exclaimed, somewhat
breathlessly. "Joan, where has he dropped from?"
It was Sir Thomas Thorne, the wealthy uncle who had adopted Joan, his
late brother’s only child, at her mother’s death a few years previously.
The admired beauty, whose only flaw seemed to be her adamantine pose in
regard to her many suitors, was known to be sole heiress of the wealthy
baronet and his wife, who were not only childless, but curiously devoid
of near relations.
"From Paris, Sir Thomas," he replied, as easily as he could.  Then he
gave a brief account of his wanderings.  He seemed to have roamed and
ranged over the earth, prowling about for some interest, which evaded
him from Dan to Beersheba.  Sir Thomas listened with a peculiar twist of
his thin, fine lips and a curious twinkle in his shrewd, handsome old
eyes.
"Come in to lunch," he genially, if abruptly, proposed, as they left the
park.  "My lady will be delighted to see you--you are one of her
particular favourites."