With All My Worldly Goods (22 page)

“Nothing. Please, you mustn’t tell him. You see, when the sale is all complete, I want you to draw up a deed of gift for me, making the place over to him.”

“Deed of gift! Make the place over to your husband!” Mr. Meerwell began to look scandalized at once.

“Yes. It was his old home you know, and even now he longs passionately for it, I know. I want him to have it. I can afford to give it to him. Why
shouldn’t
I?”

She thought from Mr. Meerwell’s expression that he was going to advance a variety of reasons why she should not. But after a moment he said rather disagreeably: “Well, it’s a very nice idea, of course. Sentimental and dreadfully unbusinesslike but—well, it’s a nice idea.”

And Leonora, too, felt that it was indeed a nice idea. It was terribly difficult to keep her nervous excitement from Bruce, while all the formalities of the sale were being affected. In fact, she was not entirely successful, because once at least Bruce said: “Is there anything wrong, Lora? You seem so full of suppressed excitement.”

“Oh no,” she assured him eagerly. “No, no. There’s nothing wrong at all.”

Which was strictly true, of course, because everything was gloriously right. But when it was all finished, and even the deed of gift had been drawn up and signed and witnessed under the disapproving glare of Mr. Meerwell—Leonora suddenly felt a wave of genuine fear.

Suppose she had only precipitated another terrible scene, like that one when she had tried before to buy Farron?

It was unthinkable, really, that Bruce could ever behave like that again, of course. But—

Well, it had been unthinkable before. Yet it had happened.

It was ridiculous of her, but she walked most of the way home from the solicitors, because she could not quite bring herself to face the moment of terrible joy when she told Bruce.

She felt guilty and triumphant at one and the same time, and she was divided between the happiness of telling him, and the profound wish that it were all over. The house was very quiet when she came in, and for a moment she thought he must be out.

But almost immediately, he came to the door of the library and stood there smiling but saying nothing, which was often his way of greeting her.

She pulled off her hat, and nervously ran her hand through her thick, fair hair before she came over to kiss him.

“Have you been doing something you shouldn’t?” he asked very tenderly, as he drew her into the library with him.

“Why?” Leonora looked a little startled, she knew.

“Because you have a delicious air of guilt about you,” he told her with a laugh as he sat down at his desk, and watched her sink into the arm-chair opposite.

“Oh.” She hesitated. “It—it isn’t anything
wrong,
Bruce. But—promise me not to be angry, will you?”

“I promise,” he said gravely. “I have entirely forgotten how to be angry where you are concerned, in any case.”

“Well—well, I have something for you.”

She fumbled nervously with the clasp of her bag, and then drew out the long, legal envelope and handed it to him. She wondered, as she did so, if he noticed that the envelope was shaking a little.

Perhaps he did, because he smiled at her reassuringly before he drew out the document.

She sat there, almost paralysed with anxiety, until the sudden dark colour in his face told her that he had grasped the contents.

“Lora!”

There was such joy and pain in the cry that she shivered, even while she smiled at him.

“But I can’t, darling. I can’t. Don’t you remember—I told you that I couldn’t possibly take Farron at your hands?”

The colour was gone completely from his face now, and the line of his nostrils was thin and very clearly marked.

“But I want you to, Bruce.” There was something very compelling in the sheer gentleness of her voice.

“There’s no reason in the world, dear—”

“Yes. There is a reason, Bruce. A very good reason, which didn’t exist when you refused it before.” Leonora’s hands were locked rather tightly together, and her smile was nervous again.

“What reason?” He passed his hand agitatedly over his hair and stared across at her.

“I thought, perhaps, you would like to have your son born at Farron.”

“My—what?
Lora!”
He was beside her suddenly, kneeling there with his arms round her. “Darling, it’s not true?”

“Yes. It’s true. I’ve been longing to tell you, but I thought if I waited until this was ready”—she touched the legal document rather pleadingly—“you might listen to me more easily. Couldn’t you accept for him what you refused for yourself alone, Bruce? Besides, my dear, I want to live at Farron, too. Hasn’t that any weight with you?”

“Yes, of course. Only—oh, it’s so difficult to explain,” he muttered, and suddenly hid his face against her.

“What is there
to
explain?” she said very gently. Can’t there be any gifts of love between people who feel as we do?”

He didn’t answer at once, only moved against her as though something she said hurt dreadfully.

Then suddenly he raised his head, and there was a look of white determination on his face.

“Listen, Lora. I’ve got to tell you now, though God knows what you will think of me. I
did
marry you for your money in the beginning. Just that. I married you because you were an heiress.”

Leonora put her hand against his cheek, with that half maternal caress that she knew he loved.

“But I know, my dear,” she told him calmly. “I’ve known that all along.”

CHAPTER TWELVE

Bruce looked at
her for a long moment in silence.

“Do you know everything?” he said very quietly, and then, with a sigh of almost unbearable relief, he put his head against her again.

Leonora laughed softly.

“Well, there wasn’t any magical deduction about that. I actually heard you telling Agatha.”

He moved slightly again, but not with quite such obvious pain.

“God, how awful! What sort of a cad did you think me?”

“Pretty bad at the time,” she admitted with a smile. “But it was afterwards that Agatha told me about you and Farron. And then it was the night that I waited up for you, and when you finally came, nothing seemed to matter except that you were safe after all.”

“I can see you now,” he said softly, “sitting there so white and cold and frightened because you thought I must be dead. It was then I fell in love with you.”

“Oh, Bruce, was it?”

“Yes. You’d been doing queer things to my heart before. That was partly why I was so defiant to Agatha. But at that moment I knew that I should have felt just as you were feeling if it had been I who had to wait.”

“Poor darling.”

He corrected her. “It was an unbelievably wonderful moment when I found out what had happened to me.”

“Was it?” She touched his hair lovingly.

He was silent for a moment, and then said in a low voice: “The dreadful moment was when you accused me of what had once been true.”

“Oh, that first evening after we were married, you mean?” She looked very grave now, too. “I’m so sorry about that, Bruce. I regretted it terribly the very next minute, you know.”

“But you shouldn’t have regretted it,” he said earnestly. “It was the truth. Or, rather, it had once been the truth. That was why there seemed nothing at all to say. There
was
no defence. I was just exactly the beast you thought me.”

“No, no.” She smiled a little again at that and drew him close. “I won’t have you reproaching yourself so much. It was wrong, I dare say, but not exactly a crime, and I do understand, my dear, about your terrible longing for your home.”

He kissed her then with the strangest touch of humiliation, which sat very oddly upon him.

“You understand everything, don’t you?” he said. And then, as she only smiled without replying, he added: “That is why there is just one other thing about this whole wretched business that I think I must tell you. It is not an excuse exactly, but it does explain why I managed to justify to myself the wild idea of marrying you for your money.”

She looked surprised.

“Wasn’t it just because of Farron?”

He shook his head.

“No. Not entirely. You see, while I had struggled for years trying to make money to buy back Farron, your father, in his turn, had gone on for equally weary years trying to find his fantastic treasure.”

“Yes?” Leonora spoke a little sharply, aware suddenly of a curious tenseness and anxiety which, she knew now, she had connected with the thought of her father for some while. “Yes, Bruce? What about daddy?”

“The one thing I never told you, Lora,” he said slowly, “was
where
your father eventually found his treasure.”

“And where was it?”

“On my land.”

“But”—she paled slightly—“didn’t he share it with you, then?”

“No.” Bruce’s voice was expressionless. “He just quietly persuaded me to sell him the piece of land in question.”

“Bruce! Daddy did that? You mean he—he never said a word about it until the land was his?”

Bruce put his arms round her and held her very tenderly. “Listen, darling—will you please not blame him now.” His voice was curiously earnest. “That unspeakable succession of hope and disappointment over and over and over again does strange things to a man’s sense of right and wrong. He didn’t even think he had done something unjust, because he told me about it quite frankly afterwards, and obviously expected me to feel no resentment Only, the knowledge that I had been living all those frightful years with double the price of Farron within reach of my hand drove me nearly mad.”

“Poor Bruce. I can imagine it.” She sighed a little. “And don’t you blame daddy at all now? You speak as though you don’t.”

“No.” Bruce spoke quite positively. “I can see that he justified it to himself. It was, after all,
his
skill and knowledge that had led him to the treasure. The fact that it was on the land which belonged to his best friend was a mere detail. But I couldn’t come anywhere near seeing his point of view then. It just seemed to me the last cruel injustice in the awful series of barriers between me and Farron.”

“Did you—did you have it out with him?”

Bruce shook his head.

“No. He was already very ill, and I just controlled myself sufficiently to prevent a scene. It was simply chance that I travelled with him to New York that last time. And all the while he was curiously unaware of my bitter feeling towards him. Just like a happy child whom nothing could touch.”

Leonora smiled faintly.

“You can still speak very nicely of him, Bruce.”

“Well, we were friends for years, Leonora. And lately I have been so happy that I find myself remembering only the good things of the past and not the bad. Besides”—he smiled, too, but a little doubtfully—“it is scarcely for me to start judging someone else, is it?”

Leonora just touched his cheek with her fingers. “Very well. We won’t go into that. But I see now—In a way, you must have felt as though the money were half yours by right.”

“Yes. You do see why I argued that to myself, don’t you?” He gripped her hand nervously in his. “It was quite illogical, of course, but the furious feeling of frustration somehow drove me to that idea. And then, when your father was so ill, and asked me to take on your guardianship, I thought—”

“Yes? What did you think?” Leonora asked, as remorseful embarrassment suddenly choked back the words.

“I thought,” Bruce said in a very low voice, “ ‘I’ll marry the little fool and get the money that way.’ It seemed quite simple and defensible in theory.”

“And in practice?” Leonora looked amused.

“Oh, in
practice
—” He put his head against her adoringly. “In practice I found that there was only one treasure for me. And that was you, my darling. But I always had the guilty feeling that I
had
meant to marry you just for your money. So that your sweet generosity I could never, never accept. I had forfeited the right to it myself.”

Leonora kissed him very gently.

“And now it’s all explained.”

He nodded without saying anything.

“And the money is not yours nor mine, but, as it should be—ours. We need never bother now whether daddy was right or you were right. The money would be used exactly the same way in either case—to buy back your home.”

Bruce raised his head, then, and the way he smiled brought the tears to her eyes.

“My home,” he said slowly, in a tone of indescribable joy. “My home! I’ve wandered round the world all these years, trying to find the way back. But I see now—it wasn’t worth while going home until you were there.”

THE END

MARY BURCHELL is a firm believer in happy endings and this has translated itself into happy reading for millions of women throughout the world.