“Tell me,” she whispered urgently as he paused.
He turned from her eager questioning face with acute embarrassment. He hated himself, he hated his task, only the darkness of the room seemed to make it possible.
“Gillian,” he said, with constrained gravity. “I came to you to-day deliberately to ask you what I believe no man has any right to ask a woman. I have tried all the afternoon to tell you. Something you said just now makes it easier. You say you love the Towers—do you love it well enough to stay here as its mistress, on the only terms that I can offer?”
The look of incredulous horror that leaped into her startled eyes made him realise suddenly the interpretation that might be put upon his words. He caught her hands almost roughly. “Good heavens, child, not that!” he cried aghast. “What do you take me for? I am asking you to marry me—but not the kind of marriage that every woman has the right to expect. If I could offer you that, God knows how willingly I would. But there has been that in my life which comes between me and the happiness that other men can look forward to. For me that part of life is over. I have only friendship to offer. I know I am asking more than it seems possible for you to grant, more, a thousand times more than I ought to ask you—but I do ask it, most earnestly. If you can bring yourself to make so great a sacrifice, if you can accept a marriage that will be a marriage only in name–”
She shuddered from him with a bitter cry. “You are offering me charity!” she wailed, struggling to free her hands. But he held them firmer. “I am asking you to take pity on a very lonely man,” he said gently. “I am asking you to care for a very lonely house. You have brought sunshine into the Towers, you have brought sunshine into the lives of many people living on the estate. I am asking you to stay where you are so much wanted—so much—loved.”
Then he let her go and she walked unsteadily to the fireplace. She stood for a moment, her fingers working convulsively, staring into the smouldering embers, and then sank into a chair, for her limbs were shaking under her. He followed slowly and stooped to stir the fire to a blaze. Covertly she looked at him as the red light illuminated his face and scalding tears gathered in her eyes. And, curiously, it was not wholly of herself that she was thinking. She was envying, with a feeling of hopeless intolerable pain, that other woman whom he had loved. For his words could only have meant one thing, and the great sorrow she had imagined seemed all at once explained. She wondered what manner of woman she had been, if she had died—or if she had proved unworthy. And the last thought roused a sudden fierce resentment—how could a woman who had won his love throw it back at his feet, unwanted! The envious tears welled over and she brushed them furtively away. Then her thoughts turned in compassion to him. Through death or faithlessness love had brought no joy to him—he suffered as she was suffering now. She looked at the silver threads gleaming in his hair, at the deep lines in his face and the pain in her eyes gave place to a wonderful tenderness. She had prayed for a chance to show her gratitude; if what he asked could bring any alleviation to his life, if her presence could bring any sort of comfort to his loneliness, was not even that more than she had ever dared to hope? That he should turn to her was understandable. He had men friends in plenty, but women he openly and undisguisedly avoided. He had grown used to her presence at the Towers, a marriage such as he proposed would call for no great alteration in the daily routine to which he had become accustomed. If by doing this she could in any way repay....
The replenished fire was filling the room with soft flickering light, it cast strange shadows on the curtained walls and revealed the girl’s strained white face pitilessly. Craven had risen and was standing looking down on her. She grew aware of his scrutiny and flinched, the hot blood rolling slowly, painfully over her face and neck. He spoke abruptly, as if the words were forced from him:
“But I want you to realise fully what this marriage with me would mean, for it is a very big sacrifice I am asking of you. Whatever happened, you would be bound to me. If”—his voice faltered momentarily—“if you were sometime to meet a man—and love him—you would be my wife, you would not be free to follow your heart.”
She stared straight before her, her hands clasped tight around her knees, shivering slightly. “I shall never—want to marry—in that way,” she said in a strangled voice. He smiled sadly. “You think that now—you are very young,” he argued, “but we have the future to think of.”
She did not answer and in the silence that ensued he wondered what had induced him to put forward an argument that might defeat his purpose. In any other case it would have been only the honourable thing to do, but in this it was a risk he should not have taken. He moved impatiently. Then suddenly he leaned forward and laid his hands on her shoulders, drawing her gently to her feet.
“Gillian!”
Slowly she raised her head. The touch of his hands was almost more than she could bear, but she steadied her trembling lips and met his gaze bravely as he spoke again.
“If you will agree to this—this mariage de convenance, I will do all that lies in my power to make your life happy. You will be free in everything. I ask nothing but that you will look on me as a friend to whom you can always come in any difficulty or any trouble. You will be complete mistress of yourself, your time, your inclinations. I will not interfere with you in any way.”
She searched his face, trying to read what lay behind his inscrutable expression. His eyes were kind, but there was in them a curious underlying gleam that she could not understand. And his voice puzzled her. She was bewildered, torn with conflicting doubts. Sensitively she shrank from his inexplicable suggestion, she could see no reason for his amazing proposal save an extraordinary generosity that filled her with gratitude and yet against which she revolted.
“You are doing this in pity!” she cried miserably.
“Before God I swear that I am not,” he said, with unexpected fierceness that startled her, and the sudden painful gripping of the strong hands on her shoulders made her for the first time aware of his strength. She thought of it wonderingly. If it had been otherwise, if he had loved her, how gladly she would have surrendered to it. It would have stood between her and the unknown world that loomed sometimes in spite of her confidence with a sinister horror on which she dared not dwell. In the safety of his arms she would never have known fear, his strength would have shielded her through life. And, in a lesser degree, his strength might still be hers to turn to, if she would. A new conception of the future she had planned rushed over her, the confidence she had felt fell suddenly away, leaving fear and dread and a terror of loneliness. His touch had destroyed her faith in herself. It had done more. In some subtle way it seemed to her he had by his touch claimed her. And with his hands still pressing her shoulders she felt a strange inability to oppose him. He had sworn that it was not pity that dictated his offer. He had said that love did not exist for him. What then could be his motive? She could find none.
“You wouldn’t lie to me?” she whispered, tormented with doubt, “you wish this—this marriage—truly?”
He looked at her steadily.
“I wish it, truly,” he said firmly.
“You would let me go on with my work?” she faltered, fighting for time.