Edith Nesbit - The Incredible Honeymoon

"I believe you're serious," she said, half incredulously.

"Of course I am. It's a way out of all your troubles."

"I couldn't," she said, earnestly, "marry any one I wasn't very fond of. And one can't be fond of a person one's only seen twice."

"Can't you?" he said, a little sadly.

"No," she answered. "I think it's very fine of you to offer me this – just to get me out of a bother. And I'm sorry I thought you were being horrid. I'll tell you something. I've always thought that even if I cared very much for some one I should be almost afraid to marry him unless I knew him very, very well. Girls do make such frightful mistakes. You ought to see a man every day for a year, and then, perhaps, you'd know if you could really bear to live with him all your life."

Instead of answering her directly, he said: "You would love the life in the caravan. Think of the camp – making a fire of sticks and cooking your supper under the stars, and the great moonlit nights, and sleeping in pine woods and waking in the dawn and curling yourself up in your blanket and going to sleep again till I shouted out that the fire was alight and breakfast nearly ready."

"I wish I could come with you without having to be married."

"Come, then," he said. "Come on any terms. I'll take you as a sister if I'm not to take you as a wife."

"Do you mean it? Really?" she said. "Oh, why shouldn't I? I believe you would take me – and I should be perfectly free then. I've got a little money of my own that my godmother left me. I was twenty-one the other day. I don't get it, of course. My father says it costs that to keep me. But if I were to run away he would have to give it to me, wouldn't he? And then I could pay you back what you spent on me. Oh, I wish I could. Will you really take me?"

But he had had time to think. "No," he said, "on reflection, I don't think I will."

But she did not hear him, for as he spoke she spoke, too. "Hush!" she said. "Look – look there."

Across the park, near the house, lights were moving.

"They're looking for me," she gasped. "They've found out that I'm away. Oh, what shall I do? Aunt Loo will never be decent to me again. What shall I do?"

"Come with me," he said, strongly. "I'll take care of you. Come."

He took her hand. "I swear by God," he said, "that everything shall be as you choose. Only come now – come away from these people. You're twenty-one. You're your own mistress. Let me help you to get free from all this stuffy, stupid tyranny."

"You won't make me marry you?" she asked.

"I can't make you do anything," he said. "But if you're coming, it must be now."

"Come, then," she said, making for the ladder.

HE had brought a ball of string in his pocket, this time, and he was glad to know he could lower the ladder by it – for the thud of a falling ladder would sound far in the night stillness. From the top of the wall he held the ladder while she mounted.

"Sit here a moment," he said, "while I get rid of the ladder." He lowered it gently, drew the string up, leaped to the ground outside the wall, and held up his hands to her.

"Jump," he whispered. "I'll catch you."

But even as he spoke she had turned and was hanging by her hands. He let her do it her own way. She dropped expertly, landing with a little rebound. He was glad he had not tried to catch her. It would have been a poor beginning to their comradeship if he had, at the very outset, shown doubts of her competence to do anything she set out to do.

They stood under the wall very near together.

"What are you going to do?" she said.

"I must get a car and take you away. Are you afraid to be left alone for a couple of hours?"

"I – I don't think so," she said. "But where? Did you notice the lights as you got over the wall?"

"Yes; they were still near the house."

The two were walking side by side along the road now.

"If you were any ordinary girl I should be afraid to leave you to think things over – for fear you should think you'd been rash or silly or something – and worry yourself about all sorts of nonsense, and perhaps end in bolting back to your hutch before I could come back to you. But since it's you – let's cut across the downs here – we'll keep close to the edge of the wood."

Their feet now trod the soft grass.

"How sensible of you to wear a dark cloak," he said.

"Yes," she said, "a really romantic young lady in distress would have come in white muslin and blue ribbons, wouldn't she?"

He glowed to the courage that let her jest at such a moment.

"Where am I to wait?" she asked.

"There's an old farm-house not far away," he said. "If you don't mind waiting there. Could you?"

"Who lives there?"

"Nobody. I happen to have the key. I was looking at it yesterday. It's not furnished, but I noticed some straw and packing-cases. I could rig you up some sort of lounge, but don't do it if you're afraid. If you're afraid to be left to yourself we'll walk together to Eastbourne. But if we do we're much more likely to be caught."

"I'm not in the least afraid. Why should I be?" she said, and they toiled up the hill among the furze bushes in the still starlight.

"What they'll do," she said, presently, "when they're sure I'm not in the park, is to go down to your inn and see if you're there."

"Yes," he said, "I'm counting on that. That's why I said two or three hours. You see, I must be there when they do come, and the minute they're gone I'll go for the motor. Look here – I've got some chocolate that I got for a kiddy to-day; luckily, I forgot to give it to him; and here are some matches, only don't strike them if you can help it. Now, stick to it."

They went on in silence; half-way up the hill he took her arm to help her. Then, over the crest of the hill, in a hollow of the downs there was the dark-spread blot of house and farm buildings. They went down the road. Nothing stirred – only as they neared the farm-yard a horse in the stable rattled his halter against the manger and they heard his hoofs moving on the cobbled floor of his stall. They stood listening. No, all was still.

"Give me your hand," he said, and led her round to the side of the house. The key grated a little as he turned it in the lock. He threw back the door.

"This is the kitchen," he said. "Stand just inside and I'll make a nest for you. I know exactly where to lay my hands on the straw."

There was rustling in the darkness and a sound of boards grating on bricks. She stood at the door and waited.

"Ready," he said.

"They'll find me," she said. "We shall never get away."

"Trust me for that," said he.

"I must have been mad to come," he heard through the darkness.

"We're all mad once in our lives," he said, cheerfully. "Now roll yourself in your cloak. Give me your hands – so." He led her to the straw nest he had made, and lowered her to it.

"Do you wish you hadn't come?" he asked.

"I don't know," she said.

"I hope to Heaven I haven't misjudged you," he said, with the first trace of anxiety she had yet heard in his voice. "If you should be the kind of girl who's afraid of the dark – "

The straw rustled as she curled herself more comfortably in her nest.

"I'm not afraid," she said.

"Look here," said he, "here's my match-box, but don't strike a light among the straw. The door into the house is locked and the key's on this side of the door. Can you come to the back door and lock it after me, and then find your way back to your nest?"

"Yes," she said, and felt her way past the big copper to the door.

"Sure you're not frightened?"

"Quite," said she.

"Then I'll go," said he, and went.

She locked the door and crept back to the straw. He waited till its crackling told him that she had found her way back to her couch. Then he started for Jevington.