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Title: He Knew He Was Right
Author: Trollope, Anthony, 1815-1882
Language: English
As this book started as an ASCII text book there are no pictures available.
*** Start of this LibraryBlog Digital Book "He Knew He Was Right" ***
Joseph E. Loewenstein, M.D., and Delpine Lettau
Transcriber's note:
This novel was first published in serial form in 1868-1869,
followed by a two-volume book version in 1869. Both were
illustrated by Marcus Stone, and those illustrations can
be seen in the HTML version of this e-text. See
HE KNEW HE WAS RIGHT
by
ANTHONY TROLLOPE
With Illustrations by Marcus Stone
CONTENTS
I. SHEWING HOW WRATH BEGAN.
II. COLONEL OSBORNE.
III. LADY MILBOROUGH'S DINNER PARTY.
IV. HUGH STANBURY.
V. SHEWING HOW THE QUARREL PROGRESSED.
VI. SHEWING HOW RECONCILIATION WAS MADE.
VII. MISS JEMIMA STANBURY, OF EXETER.
VIII. "I KNOW IT WILL DO."
IX. SHEWING HOW THE QUARREL PROGRESSED AGAIN.
X. HARD WORDS.
XI. LADY MILBOROUGH AS AMBASSADOR.
XII. MISS STANBURY'S GENEROSITY.
XIII. THE HONOURABLE MR. GLASCOCK.
XIV. THE CLOCK HOUSE AT NUNCOMBE PUTNEY.
XV. WHAT THEY SAID ABOUT IT IN THE CLOSE.
XVI. DARTMOOR.
XVII. A GENTLEMAN COMES TO NUNCOMBE PUTNEY.
XVIII. THE STANBURY CORRESPONDENCE.
XIX. BOZZLE, THE EX-POLICEMAN.
XX. SHEWING HOW COLONEL OSBORNE WENT TO COCKCHAFFINGTON.
XXI. SHEWING HOW COLONEL OSBORNE WENT TO NUNCOMBE PUTNEY.
XXII. SHEWING HOW MISS STANBURY BEHAVED TO HER TWO NIECES.
XXIII. COLONEL OSBORNE AND MR. BOZZLE RETURN TO LONDON.
XXIV. NIDDON PARK.
XXV. HUGH STANBURY SMOKES HIS PIPE.
XXVI. A THIRD PARTY IS SO OBJECTIONABLE.
XXVII. MR. TREVELYAN'S LETTER TO HIS WIFE.
XXVIII. GREAT TRIBULATION.
XXIX. MR. AND MRS. OUTHOUSE.
XXX. DOROTHY MAKES UP HER MIND.
XXXI. MR. BROOKE BURGESS.
XXXII. THE "FULL MOON" AT ST. DIDDULPH'S.
XXXIII. HUGH STANBURY SMOKES ANOTHER PIPE.
XXXIV. PRISCILLA'S WISDOM.
XXXV. MR. GIBSON'S GOOD FORTUNE.
XXXVI. MISS STANBURY'S WRATH.
XXXVII. MONT CENIS.
XXXVIII. VERDICT OF THE JURY--"MAD, MY LORD."
XXXIX. MISS NORA ROWLEY IS MALTREATED.
XL. "C. G."
XLI. SHEWING WHAT TOOK PLACE AT ST. DIDDULPH'S.
XLII. MISS STANBURY AND MR. GIBSON BECOME TWO.
XLIII. LABURNUM COTTAGE.
XLIV. BROOKE BURGESS TAKES LEAVE OF EXETER.
XLV. TREVELYAN AT VENICE.
XLVI. THE AMERICAN MINISTER.
XLVII. ABOUT FISHING, AND NAVIGATION, AND HEAD-DRESSES.
XLVIII. MR. GIBSON IS PUNISHED.
XLIX. MR. BROOKE BURGESS AFTER SUPPER.
L. CAMILLA TRIUMPHANT.
LI. SHEWING WHAT HAPPENED DURING MISS STANBURY'S ILLNESS.
LII. MR. OUTHOUSE COMPLAINS THAT IT'S HARD.
LIII. HUGH STANBURY IS SHEWN TO BE NO CONJUROR.
LIV. MR. GIBSON'S THREAT.
LV. THE REPUBLICAN BROWNING.
LVI. WITHERED GRASS.
LVII. DOROTHY'S FATE.
LVIII. DOROTHY AT HOME.
LIX. MR. BOZZLE AT HOME.
LX. ANOTHER STRUGGLE.
LXI. PARKER'S HOTEL, MOWBRAY STREET.
LXII. LADY ROWLEY MAKES AN ATTEMPT.
LXIII. SIR MARMADUKE AT HOME.
LXIV. SIR MARMADUKE AT HIS CLUB.
LXV. MYSTERIOUS AGENCIES.
LXVI. OF A QUARTER OF LAMB.
LXVII. RIVER'S COTTAGE.
LXVIII. MAJOR MAGRUDER'S COMMITTEE.
LXIX. SIR MARMADUKE AT WILLESDEN.
LXX. SHEWING WHAT NORA ROWLEY THOUGHT ABOUT CARRIAGES.
LXXI. SHEWING WHAT HUGH STANBURY THOUGHT ABOUT THE DUTY OF MAN.
LXXII. THE DELIVERY OF THE LAMB.
LXXIII. DOROTHY RETURNS TO EXETER.
LXXIV. THE LIONESS AROUSED.
LXXV. THE ROWLEYS GO OVER THE ALPS.
LXXVI. "WE SHALL BE SO POOR."
LXXVII. THE FUTURE LADY PETERBOROUGH.
LXXVIII. CASALUNGA.
LXXIX. "I CAN SLEEP ON THE BOARDS."
LXXX. "WILL THEY DESPISE HIM?"
LXXXI. MR. GLASCOCK IS MASTER.
LXXXII. MRS. FRENCH'S CARVING KNIFE.
LXXXIII. BELLA VICTRIX.
LXXXIV. SELF-SACRIFICE.
LXXXV. THE BATHS OF LUCCA.
LXXXVI. MR. GLASCOCK AS NURSE.
LXXXVII. MR. GLASCOCK'S MARRIAGE COMPLETED.
LXXXVIII. CROPPER AND BURGESS.
LXXXIX. "I WOULDN'T DO IT, IF I WAS YOU."
XC. LADY ROWLEY CONQUERED.
XCI. FOUR O'CLOCK IN THE MORNING.
XCII. TREVELYAN DISCOURSES ON LIFE.
XCIII. "SAY THAT YOU FORGIVE ME."
XCIV. A REAL CHRISTIAN.
XCV. TREVELYAN BACK IN ENGLAND.
XCVI. MONKHAMS.
XCVII. MRS. BROOKE BURGESS.
XCVIII. ACQUITTED.
XCIX. CONCLUSION.
ILLUSTRATIONS
SHEWING HOW WRATH BEGAN. Chapter I
SHEWING HOW RECONCILIATION WAS MADE. Chapter VI
"I ONLY COME AS A MESSENGER." Chapter IX
AUNT STANBURY AT DINNER WILL NOT SPEAK. Chapter XII
TO HAVE BEEN THE MOTHER OF A FUTURE PEER! Chapter XIII
NORA TRIES TO MAKE HERSELF BELIEVE. Chapter XVI
THE WOODEN-LEGGED POSTMAN OF NUNCOMBE PUTNEY. Chapter XXI
NIDDON PARK. Chapter XXIV
THAT THIRD PERSON WAS MR. BOZZLE. Chapter XXVI
DOROTHY MAKES UP HER MIND. Chapter XXX
THE "FULL MOON" AT ST. DIDDULPH'S. Chapter XXXII
"I WONDER WHY PEOPLE MAKE THESE REPORTS." Chapter XXXV
"AM I TO GO?" Chapter XXXIX
AT ST. DIDDULPH'S. Chapter XLI
BROOKE BURGESS TAKES HIS LEAVE. Chapter XLIV
MISS STANBURY VISITS THE FRENCHES. Chapter XLVIII
THE WORLD WAS GOING ROUND WITH DOROTHY. Chapter LI
NORA'S LETTER. Chapter LIII
"BROOKE WANTS ME TO BE HIS WIFE." Chapter LVII
"PUT IT ON THE FIRE-BACK, BOZZLE." Chapter LIX
"AND WHY DOES HE COME HERE?" Chapter LXIII
"YOU HAVEN'T FORGOTTEN MAMMA?" Chapter LXVII
"BUT YOU MUST GIVE IT UP," SAID SIR MARMADUKE. Chapter LXX
"ONLY THE VAGARIES OF AN OLD WOMAN." Chapter LXXIII
THE RIVALS. Chapter LXXVI
"IT IS HARD TO SPEAK SOMETIMES." Chapter LXXIX
CAMILLA'S WRATH. Chapter LXXXII
TREVELYAN AT CASALUNGA. Chapter LXXXIV
BARTY BURGESS. Chapter LXXXVIII
"I MUST ALWAYS REMEMBER THAT I MET YOU THERE." Chapter XC
NORA'S VEIL. Chapter XCV
MONKHAMS. Chapter XCVI
CHAPTER I.
SHEWING HOW WRATH BEGAN.
[Illustration]
When Louis Trevelyan was twenty-four years old, he had all the world
before him where to choose; and, among other things, he chose to go
to the Mandarin Islands, and there fell in love with Emily Rowley,
the daughter of Sir Marmaduke, the governor. Sir Marmaduke Rowley,
at this period of his life, was a respectable middle-aged public
servant, in good repute, who had, however, as yet achieved for
himself neither an exalted position nor a large fortune. He had been
governor of many islands, and had never lacked employment; and now,
at the age of fifty, found himself at the Mandarins, with a salary
of £3,000 a year, living in a temperature at which 80° in the shade
is considered to be cool, with eight daughters, and not a shilling
saved. A governor at the Mandarins who is social by nature and
hospitable on principle, cannot save money in the islands even on
£3,000 a year when he has eight daughters. And at the Mandarins,
though hospitality is a duty, the gentlemen who ate Sir Rowley's
dinners were not exactly the men whom he or Lady Rowley desired to
welcome to their bosoms as sons-in-law. Nor when Mr. Trevelyan came
that way, desirous of seeing everything in the somewhat indefinite
course of his travels, had Emily Rowley, the eldest of the flock,
then twenty years of age, seen as yet any Mandariner who exactly came
up to her fancy. And, as Louis Trevelyan was a remarkably handsome
young man, who was well connected, who had been ninth wrangler at
Cambridge, who had already published a volume of poems, and who
possessed £3,000 a year of his own, arising from various perfectly
secure investments, he was not forced to sigh long in vain. Indeed,
the Rowleys, one and all, felt that providence had been very good to
them in sending young Trevelyan on his travels in that direction, for
he seemed to be a very pearl among men. Both Sir Marmaduke and Lady
Rowley felt that there might be objections to such a marriage as that
proposed to them, raised by the Trevelyan family. Lady Rowley would
not have liked her daughter to go to England, to be received with
cold looks by strangers. But it soon appeared that there was no one
to make objections. Louis, the lover, had no living relative nearer
than cousins. His father, a barrister of repute, had died a widower,
and had left the money which he had made to an only child. The head
of the family was a first cousin who lived in Cornwall on a moderate
property,--a very good sort of stupid fellow, as Louis said, who
would be quite indifferent as to any marriage that his cousin might
make. No man could be more independent or more clearly justified in
pleasing himself than was this lover. And then he himself proposed
that the second daughter, Nora, should come and live with them in
London. What a lover to fall suddenly from the heavens into such a
dovecote!
"I haven't a penny-piece to give to either of them," said Sir Rowley.
"It is my idea that girls should not have fortunes," said Trevelyan.
"At any rate, I am quite sure that men should never look for money.
A man must be more comfortable, and, I think, is likely to be more
affectionate, when the money has belonged to himself."
Sir Rowley was a high-minded gentleman, who would have liked to have
handed over a few thousand pounds on giving up his daughters; but,
having no thousands of pounds to hand over, he could not but admire
the principles of his proposed son-in-law. As it was about time for
him to have his leave of absence, he and sundry of the girls went to
England with Mr. Trevelyan, and the wedding was celebrated in London
by the Rev. Oliphant Outhouse, of Saint Diddulph-in-the-East, who
had married Sir Rowley's sister. Then a small house was taken and
furnished in Curzon Street, Mayfair, and the Rowleys went back to the
seat of their government, leaving Nora, the second girl, in charge of
her elder sister.
The Rowleys had found, on reaching London, that they had lighted upon
a pearl indeed. Louis Trevelyan was a man of whom all people said
all good things. He might have been a fellow of his college had he
not been a man of fortune. He might already,--so Sir Rowley was
told,--have been in Parliament, had he not thought it to be wiser to
wait awhile. Indeed, he was very wise in many things. He had gone
out on his travels thus young,--not in search of excitement, to kill
beasts, or to encounter he knew not what novelty and amusement,--but
that he might see men and know the world. He had been on his travels
for more than a year when the winds blew him to the Mandarins. Oh,
how blessed were the winds! And, moreover, Sir Rowley found that his
son-in-law was well spoken of at the clubs by those who had known him
during his university career, as a man popular as well as wise, not
a book-worm, or a dry philosopher, or a prig. He could talk on all
subjects, was very generous, a man sure to be honoured and respected;
and then such a handsome, manly fellow, with short brown hair, a nose
divinely chiselled, an Apollo's mouth, six feet high, with shoulders
and legs and arms in proportion,--a pearl of pearls! Only, as Lady
Rowley was the first to find out, he liked to have his own way.
"But his way is such a good way," said Sir Marmaduke. "He will be
such a good guide for the girls!"
"But Emily likes her way too," said Lady Rowley.
Sir Marmaduke argued the matter no further, but thought, no doubt,
that such a husband as Louis Trevelyan was entitled to have his own
way. He probably had not observed his daughter's temper so accurately
as his wife had done. With eight of them coming up around him, how
should he have observed their tempers? At any rate, if there were
anything amiss with Emily's temper, it would be well that she should
find her master in such a husband as Louis Trevelyan.
For nearly two years the little household in Curzon Street went on
well, or if anything was the matter no one outside of the little
household was aware of it. And there was a baby, a boy, a young
Louis, and a baby in such a household is apt to make things go
sweetly.
The marriage had taken place in July, and after the wedding tour
there had been a winter and a spring in London; and then they passed
a month or two at the sea-side, after which the baby had been born.
And then there came another winter and another spring. Nora Rowley
was with them in London, and by this time Mr. Trevelyan had begun to
think that he should like to have his own way completely. His baby
was very nice, and his wife was clever, pretty, and attractive. Nora
was all that an unmarried sister should be. But,--but there had come
to be trouble and bitter words. Lady Rowley had been right when she
said that her daughter Emily also liked to have her own way.
"If I am suspected," said Mrs. Trevelyan to her sister one morning,
as they sat together in the little back drawing-room, "life will not
be worth having."
"How can you talk of being suspected, Emily?"
"What does he mean then by saying that he would rather not have
Colonel Osborne here? A man older than my own father, who has known
me since I was a baby!"
"He didn't mean anything of that kind, Emily. You know he did not,
and you should not say so. It would be too horrible to think of."
"It was a great deal too horrible to be spoken, I know. If he does
not beg my pardon, I shall,--I shall continue to live with him, of
course, as a sort of upper servant, because of baby. But he shall
know what I think and feel."
"If I were you I would forget it."
"How can I forget it? Nothing that I can do pleases him. He is civil
and kind to you because he is not your master; but you don't know
what things he says to me. Am I to tell Colonel Osborne not to come?
Heavens and earth! How should I ever hold up my head again if I were
driven to do that? He will be here to-day I have no doubt; and Louis
will sit there below in the library, and hear his step, and will not
come up."
"Tell Richard to say you are not at home."
"Yes; and everybody will understand why. And for what am I to deny
myself in that way to the best and oldest friend I have? If any such
orders are to be given, let him give them and then see what will come
of it."
Mrs. Trevelyan had described Colonel Osborne truly as far as words
went, in saying that he had known her since she was a baby, and that
he was an older man than her father. Colonel Osborne's age exceeded
her father's by about a month, and as he was now past fifty, he might
be considered perhaps, in that respect, to be a safe friend for a
young married woman. But he was in every respect a man very different
from Sir Marmaduke. Sir Marmaduke, blessed and at the same time
burdened as he was with a wife and eight daughters, and condemned as
he had been to pass a large portion of his life within the tropics,
had become at fifty what many people call quite a middle-aged man.
That is to say, he was one from whom the effervescence and elasticity
and salt of youth had altogether passed away. He was fat and slow,
thinking much of his wife and eight daughters, thinking much also of
his dinner. Now Colonel Osborne was a bachelor, with no burdens but
those imposed upon him by his position as a member of Parliament,--a
man of fortune to whom the world had been very easy. It was not
therefore said so decidedly of him as of Sir Marmaduke, that he
was a middle-aged man, although he had probably already lived more
than two-thirds of his life. And he was a good-looking man of his
age, bald indeed at the top of his head, and with a considerable
sprinkling of grey hair through his bushy beard; but upright in his
carriage, active, and quick in his step, who dressed well, and was
clearly determined to make the most he could of what remained to him
of the advantages of youth. Colonel Osborne was always so dressed
that no one ever observed the nature of his garments, being no doubt
well aware that no man after twenty-five can afford to call special
attention to his coat, his hat, his cravat, or his trousers; but
nevertheless the matter was one to which he paid much attention, and
he was by no means lax in ascertaining what his tailor did for him.
He always rode a pretty horse, and mounted his groom on one at any
rate as pretty. He was known to have an excellent stud down in the
shires, and had the reputation of going well with hounds. Poor Sir
Marmaduke could not have ridden a hunt to save either his government
or his credit. When, therefore, Mrs. Trevelyan declared to her sister
that Colonel Osborne was a man whom she was entitled to regard with
semi-parental feelings of veneration because he was older than her
father, she made a comparison which was more true in the letter than
in the spirit. And when she asserted that Colonel Osborne had known
her since she was a baby, she fell again into the same mistake.
Colonel Osborne had indeed known her when she was a baby, and had in
old days been the very intimate friend of her father; but of herself
he had seen little or nothing since those baby days, till he had met
her just as she was about to become Mrs. Trevelyan; and though it was
natural that so old a friend should come to her and congratulate her
and renew his friendship, nevertheless it was not true that he made
his appearance in her husband's house in the guise of the useful old
family friend, who gives silver cups to the children and kisses the
little girls for the sake of the old affection which he has borne for
the parents. We all know the appearance of that old gentleman, how
pleasant and dear a fellow he is, how welcome is his face within the
gate, how free he makes with our wine, generally abusing it, how he
tells our eldest daughter to light his candle for him, how he gave
silver cups when the girls were born, and now bestows tea-services as
they get married,--a most useful, safe, and charming fellow, not a
year younger-looking or more nimble than ourselves, without whom life
would be very blank. We all know that man; but such a man was not
Colonel Osborne in the house of Mr. Trevelyan's young bride.
Emily Rowley, when she was brought home from the Mandarin Islands
to be the wife of Louis Trevelyan, was a very handsome young woman,
tall, with a bust rather full for her age, with dark eyes--eyes that
looked to be dark because her eye-brows and eye-lashes were nearly
black, but which were in truth so varying in colour, that you could
not tell their hue. Her brown hair was very dark and very soft; and
the tint of her complexion was brown also, though the colour of her
cheeks was often so bright as to induce her enemies to say falsely of
her that she painted them. And she was very strong, as are some girls
who come from the tropics, and whom a tropical climate has suited.
She could sit on her horse the whole day long, and would never be
weary with dancing at the Government House balls. When Colonel
Osborne was introduced to her as the baby whom he had known, he
thought it would be very pleasant to be intimate with so pleasant a
friend,--meaning no harm indeed, as but few men do mean harm on such
occasions,--but still, not regarding the beautiful young woman whom
he had seen as one of a generation succeeding to that of his own, to
whom it would be his duty to make himself useful on account of the
old friendship which he bore to her father.
It was, moreover, well known in London,--though not known at all
to Mrs. Trevelyan,--that this ancient Lothario had before this
made himself troublesome in more than one family. He was fond of
intimacies with married ladies, and perhaps was not averse to the
excitement of marital hostility. It must be remembered, however, that
the hostility to which allusion is here made was not the hostility
of the pistol or the horsewhip,--nor, indeed, was it generally the
hostility of a word of spoken anger. A young husband may dislike
the too-friendly bearing of a friend, and may yet abstain from that
outrage on his own dignity and on his wife, which is conveyed by a
word of suspicion. Louis Trevelyan having taken a strong dislike to
Colonel Osborne, and having failed to make his wife understand that
this dislike should have induced her to throw cold water upon the
Colonel's friendship, had allowed himself to speak a word which
probably he would have willingly recalled as soon as spoken. But
words spoken cannot be recalled, and many a man and many a woman who
has spoken a word at once regretted, are far too proud to express
that regret. So it was with Louis Trevelyan when he told his wife
that he did not wish Colonel Osborne to come so often to his house.
He had said it with a flashing eye and an angry tone; and though she
had seen the eye flash before, and was familiar with the angry tone,
she had never before felt herself to be insulted by her husband. As
soon as the word had been spoken Trevelyan had left the room, and had
gone down among his books. But when he was alone, he knew that he
had insulted his wife. He was quite aware that he should have spoken
to her gently, and have explained to her, with his arm round her
waist, that it would be better for both of them that this friend's
friendship should be limited. There is so much in a turn of the eye
and in the tone given to a word when such things have to be said,--so
much more of importance than in the words themselves. As Trevelyan
thought of this, and remembered what his manner had been, how much
anger he had expressed, how far he had been from having his arm round
his wife's waist as he spoke to her, he almost made up his mind to
go up-stairs and to apologise. But he was one to whose nature the
giving of any apology was repulsive. He could not bear to have to own
himself to have been wrong. And then his wife had been most provoking
in her manner to him. When he had endeavoured to make her understand
his wishes by certain disparaging hints which he had thrown out as to
Colonel Osborne, saying that he was a dangerous man, one who did not
show his true character, a snake in the grass, a man without settled
principles, and such like, his wife had taken up the cudgels for her
friend, and had openly declared that she did not believe a word of
the things that were alleged against him. "But still, for all that,
it is true," the husband had said. "I have no doubt that you think
so," the wife had replied. "Men do believe evil of one another, very
often. But you must excuse me if I say that I think you are mistaken.
I have known Colonel Osborne much longer than you have done, Louis,
and papa has always had the highest opinion of him." Then Mr.
Trevelyan had become very angry, and had spoken those words which
he could not recall. As he walked to and fro among his books
down-stairs, he almost felt that he ought to beg his wife's pardon.
He knew his wife well enough to be sure that she would not forgive
him unless he did so. He would do so, he thought, but not exactly
now. A moment would come in which it might be easier than at present.
He would be able to assure her when he went up to dress for dinner,
that he had meant no harm. They were going out to dine at the house
of a lady of rank, the Countess Dowager of Milborough, a lady
standing high in the world's esteem, of whom his wife stood a little
in awe; and he calculated that this feeling, if it did not make his
task easy would yet take from it some of its difficulty. Emily would
be, not exactly cowed, by the prospect of Lady Milborough's dinner,
but perhaps a little reduced from her usual self-assertion. He would
say a word to her when he was dressing, assuring her that he had not
intended to animadvert in the slightest degree upon her own conduct.
[Illustration: Shewing how wrath began.]
Luncheon was served, and the two ladies went down into the
dining-room. Mr. Trevelyan did not appear. There was nothing in
itself singular in that, as he was accustomed to declare that
luncheon was a meal too much in the day, and that a man should eat
nothing beyond a biscuit between breakfast and dinner. But he would
sometimes come in and eat his biscuit standing on the hearth-rug,
and drink what he would call half a quarter of a glass of sherry. It
would probably have been well that he should have done so now; but
he remained in his library behind the dining-room, and when his wife
and his sister-in-law had gone up-stairs, he became anxious to learn
whether Colonel Osborne would come on that day, and, if so, whether
he would be admitted. He had been told that Nora Rowley was to be
called for by another lady, a Mrs. Fairfax, to go out and look at
pictures. His wife had declined to join Mrs. Fairfax's party, having
declared that, as she was going to dine out, she would not leave
her baby all the afternoon. Louis Trevelyan, though he strove to
apply his mind to an article which he was writing for a scientific
quarterly review, could not keep himself from anxiety as to this
expected visit from Colonel Osborne. He was not in the least jealous.
He swore to himself fifty times over that any such feeling on his
part would be a monstrous injury to his wife. Nevertheless he knew
that he would be gratified if on that special day Colonel Osborne
should be informed that his wife was not at home. Whether the man
were admitted or not, he would beg his wife's pardon; but he could,
he thought, do so with more thorough efficacy and affection if she
should have shown a disposition to comply with his wishes on this
day.
"Do say a word to Richard," said Nora to her sister in a whisper as
they were going up-stairs after luncheon.
"I will not," said Mrs. Trevelyan.
"May I do it?"
"Certainly not, Nora. I should feel that I were demeaning myself were
I to allow what was said to me in such a manner to have any effect
upon me."
"I think you are so wrong, Emily. I do indeed."
"You must allow me to be the best judge what to do in my own house,
and with my own husband."
"Oh, yes; certainly."
"If he gives me any command I will obey it. Or if he had expressed
his wish in any other words I would have complied. But to be told
that he would rather not have Colonel Osborne here! If you had seen
his manner and heard his words, you would not have been surprised
that I should feel it as I do. It was a gross insult,--and it was not
the first."
As she spoke the fire flashed from her eye, and the bright red colour
of her cheek told a tale of her anger which her sister well knew how
to read. Then there was a knock at the door, and they both knew that
Colonel Osborne was there. Louis Trevelyan, sitting in his library,
also knew of whose coming that knock gave notice.
CHAPTER II.
COLONEL OSBORNE.
It has been already said that Colonel Osborne was a bachelor, a man
of fortune, a member of Parliament, and one who carried his half
century of years lightly on his shoulders. It will only be necessary
to say further of him that he was a man popular with those among
whom he lived, as a politician, as a sportsman, and as a member
of society. He could speak well in the House, though he spoke but
seldom, and it was generally thought of him that he might have been
something considerable, had it not suited him better to be nothing at
all. He was supposed to be a Conservative, and generally voted with
the Conservative party; but he could boast that he was altogether
independent, and on an occasion would take the trouble of proving
himself to be so. He was in possession of excellent health; had all
that the world could give; was fond of books, pictures, architecture,
and china; had various tastes, and the means of indulging them, and
was one of those few men on whom it seems that every pleasant thing
has been lavished. There was that little slur on his good name to
which allusion has been made; but those who knew Colonel Osborne best
were generally willing to declare that no harm was intended, and
that the evils which arose were always to be attributed to mistaken
jealousy. He had, his friends said, a free and pleasant way with
women which women like,--a pleasant way of free friendship; that
there was no more, and that the harm which had come had always
come from false suspicion. But there were certain ladies about the
town,--good, motherly, discreet women,--who hated the name of Colonel
Osborne, who would not admit him within their doors, who would not
bow to him in other people's houses, who would always speak of him as
a serpent, a hyena, a kite, or a shark. Old Lady Milborough was one
of these, a daughter of a friend of hers having once admitted the
serpent to her intimacy.
"Augustus Poole was wise enough to take his wife abroad," said old
Lady Milborough, discussing about this time with a gossip of hers
the danger of Mrs. Trevelyan's position, "or there would have been a
break-up there; and yet there never was a better girl in the world
than Jane Marriott."
The reader may be quite certain that Colonel Osborne had no
premeditated evil intention when he allowed himself to become the
intimate friend of his old friend's daughter. There was nothing
fiendish in his nature. He was not a man who boasted of his
conquests. He was not a ravening wolf going about seeking whom he
might devour, and determined to devour whatever might come in his
way; but he liked that which was pleasant; and of all pleasant things
the company of a pretty clever woman was to him the pleasantest. At
this exact period of his life no woman was so pleasantly pretty to
him, and so agreeably clever, as Mrs. Trevelyan.
When Louis Trevelyan heard on the stairs the step of the dangerous
man, he got up from his chair as though he too would have gone into
the drawing-room, and it would perhaps have been well had he done so.
Could he have done this, and kept his temper with the man, he would
have paved the way for an easy reconciliation with his wife. But when
he reached the door of his room, and had placed his hand upon the
lock, he withdrew again. He told himself he withdrew because he would
not allow himself to be jealous; but in truth he did so because he
knew he could not have brought himself to be civil to the man he
hated. So he sat down, and took up his pen, and began to cudgel
his brain about the scientific article. He was intent on raising a
dispute with some learned pundit about the waves of sound,--but he
could think of no other sound than that of the light steps of Colonel
Osborne as he had gone up-stairs. He put down his pen, and clenched
his fist, and allowed a black frown to settle upon his brow. What
right had the man to come there, unasked by him, and disturb his
happiness? And then this poor wife of his, who knew so little of
English life, who had lived in the Mandarin Islands almost since she
had been a child, who had lived in one colony or another almost since
she had been born, who had had so few of those advantages for which
he should have looked in marrying a wife, how was the poor girl to
conduct herself properly when subjected to the arts and practised
villanies of this viper? And yet the poor girl was so stiff in her
temper, had picked up such a trick of obstinacy in those tropical
regions, that Louis Trevelyan felt that he did not know how to manage
her. He too had heard how Jane Marriott had been carried off to
Naples after she had become Mrs. Poole. Must he too carry off his
wife to Naples in order to place her out of the reach of this hyena?
It was terrible to him to think that he must pack up everything and
run away from such a one as Colonel Osborne. And even were he to
consent to do this, how could he explain it all to that very wife for
whose sake he would do it? If she got a hint of the reason she would,
he did not doubt, refuse to go. As he thought of it, and as that
visit up-stairs prolonged itself, he almost thought it would be best
for him to be round with her! We all know what a husband means when
he resolves to be round with his wife. He began to think that he
would not apologise at all for the words he had spoken,--but would
speak them again somewhat more sharply than before. She would be
very wrathful with him; there would be a silent enduring indignation,
which, as he understood well, would be infinitely worse than any
torrent of words. But was he, a man, to abstain from doing that which
he believed to be his duty because he was afraid of his wife's anger?
Should he be deterred from saying that which he conceived it would
be right that he should say, because she was stiff-necked? No. He
would not apologise, but would tell her again that it was necessary,
both for his happiness and for hers, that all intimacy with Colonel
Osborne should be discontinued.
He was brought to this strongly marital resolution by the length of
the man's present visit; by that and by the fact that, during the
latter portion of it, his wife was alone with Colonel Osborne. Nora
had been there when the man came, but Mrs. Fairfax had called, not
getting out of her carriage, and Nora had been constrained to go down
to her. She had hesitated a moment, and Colonel Osborne had observed
and partly understood the hesitation. When he saw it, had he been
perfectly well-minded in the matter, he would have gone too. But he
probably told himself that Nora Rowley was a fool, and that in such
matters it was quite enough for a man to know that he did not intend
any harm.
"You had better go down, Nora," said Mrs. Trevelyan; "Mrs. Fairfax
will be ever so angry if you keep her waiting."
Then Nora had gone and the two were alone together. Nora had gone,
and Trevelyan had heard her as she was going and knew that Colonel
Osborne was alone with his wife.
"If you can manage that it will be so nice," said Mrs. Trevelyan,
continuing the conversation.
"My dear Emily," he said, "you must not talk of my managing it, or
you will spoil it all."
He had called them both Emily and Nora when Sir Marmaduke and Lady
Rowley were with them before the marriage, and, taking the liberty of
a very old family friend, had continued the practice. Mrs. Trevelyan
was quite aware that she had been so called by him in the presence of
her husband,--and that her husband had not objected. But that was now
some months ago, before baby was born; and she was aware also that
he had not called her so latterly in presence of her husband. She
thoroughly wished that she knew how to ask him not to do so again;
but the matter was very difficult, as she could not make such a
request without betraying some fear on her husband's part. The
subject which they were now discussing was too important to her
to allow her to dwell upon this trouble at the moment, and so she
permitted him to go on with his speech.
"If I were to manage it, as you call it,--which I can't do at
all,--it would be a gross job."
"That's all nonsense to us, Colonel Osborne. Ladies always like
political jobs, and think that they,--and they only,--make politics
bearable. But this would not be a job at all. Papa could do it better
than anybody else. Think how long he has been at it!"
The matter in discussion was the chance of an order being sent out to
Sir Marmaduke to come home from his islands at the public expense,
to give evidence, respecting colonial government in general, to a
committee of the House of Commons which was about to sit on the
subject. The committee had been voted, and two governors were to be
brought home for the purpose of giving evidence. What arrangement
could be so pleasant to a governor living in the Mandarin Islands,
who had had a holiday lately, and who could but ill afford to
take any holidays at his own expense? Colonel Osborne was on this
committee, and, moreover, was on good terms at the Colonial Office.
There were men in office who would be glad to do Colonel Osborne a
service, and then if this were a job, it would be so very little of
a job! Perhaps Sir Marmaduke might not be the very best man for the
purpose. Perhaps the government of the Mandarins did not afford the
best specimen of that colonial lore which it was the business of the
committee to master. But then two governors were to come, and it
might be as well to have one of the best sort, and one of the second
best. No one supposed that excellent old Sir Marmaduke was a paragon
of a governor, but then he had an infinity of experience! For over
twenty years he had been from island to island, and had at least
steered clear of great scrapes.
"We'll try it, at any rate," said the Colonel.
"Do, Colonel Osborne. Mamma would come with him, of course?"
"We should leave him to manage all that. It's not very likely that he
would leave Lady Rowley behind."
"He never has. I know he thinks more of mamma than he ever does of
himself. Fancy having them here in the autumn! I suppose if he came
for the end of the session, they wouldn't send him back quite at
once?"
"I rather fancy that our foreign and colonial servants know how to
stretch a point when they find themselves in England."
"Of course they do, Colonel Osborne; and why shouldn't they? Think of
all that they have to endure out in those horrible places. How would
you like to live in the Mandarins?"
"I should prefer London, certainly."
"Of course you would; and you mustn't begrudge papa a month or two
when he comes. I never cared about your being in Parliament before,
but I shall think so much of you now if you can manage to get papa
home."
There could be nothing more innocent than this,--nothing more
innocent at any rate as regarded any offence against Mr. Trevelyan.
But just then there came a word which a little startled Mrs.
Trevelyan, and made her feel afraid that she was doing wrong.
"I must make one stipulation with you, Emily," said the Colonel.
"What is that?"
"You must not tell your husband."
"Oh, dear! and why not?"
"I am sure you are sharp enough to see why you should not. A word of
this repeated at any club would put an end at once to your project,
and would be very damaging to me. And, beyond that, I wouldn't wish
him to know that I had meddled with it at all. I am very chary of
having my name connected with anything of the kind; and, upon my
word, I wouldn't do it for any living human being but yourself.
You'll promise me, Emily?"
She gave the promise, but there were two things in the matter, as it
stood at present, which she did not at all like. She was very averse
to having any secret from her husband with Colonel Osborne; and she
was not at all pleased at being told that he was doing for her a
favour that he would not have done for any other living human being.
Had he said so to her yesterday, before those offensive words had
been spoken by her husband, she would not have thought much about it.
She would have connected the man's friendship for herself with his
very old friendship for her father, and she would have regarded the
assurance as made to the Rowleys in general, and not to herself in
particular. But now, after what had occurred, it pained her to be
told by Colonel Osborne that he would make, specially on her behalf,
a sacrifice of his political pride which he would make for no other
person living. And then, as he had called her by her Christian name,
as he had exacted the promise, there had been a tone of affection in
his voice that she had almost felt to be too warm. But she gave the
promise; and when he pressed her hand at parting, she pressed his
again, in token of gratitude for the kindness to be done to her
father and mother.
Immediately afterwards Colonel Osborne went away, and Mrs. Trevelyan
was left alone in her drawing-room. She knew that her husband was
still down-stairs, and listened for a moment to hear whether he would
now come up to her. And he, too, had heard the Colonel's step as he
went, and for a few moments had doubted whether or no he would at
once go to his wife. Though he believed himself to be a man very firm
of purpose, his mind had oscillated backwards and forwards within the
last quarter of an hour between those two purposes of being round
with his wife, and of begging her pardon for the words which he
had already spoken. He believed that he would best do his duty by
that plan of being round with her; but then it would be so much
pleasanter--at any rate, so much easier, to beg her pardon. But of
one thing he was quite certain, he must by some means exclude Colonel
Osborne from his house. He could not live and continue to endure the
feelings which he had suffered while sitting down-stairs at his desk,
with the knowledge that Colonel Osborne was closeted with his wife
up-stairs. It might be that there was nothing in it. That his wife
was innocent he was quite sure. But nevertheless, he was himself so
much affected by some feeling which pervaded him in reference to this
man, that all his energy was destroyed, and his powers of mind and
body were paralysed. He could not, and would not, stand it. Rather
than that he would follow Mr. Poole, and take his wife to Naples. So
resolving, he put his hat on his head and walked out of the house. He
would have the advantage of the afternoon's consideration before he
took either the one step or the other.
As soon as he was gone Emily Trevelyan went up-stairs to her baby.
She would not stir as long as there had been a chance of his coming
to her. She very much wished that he would come, and had made up her
mind, in spite of the fierceness of her assertion to her sister, to
accept any slightest hint at an apology which her husband might offer
to her. To this state of mind she was brought by the consciousness of
having a secret from him, and by a sense not of impropriety on her
own part, but of conduct which some people might have called improper
in her mode of parting from the man against whom her husband had
warned her. The warmth of that hand-pressing, and the affectionate
tone in which her name had been pronounced, and the promise made to
her, softened her heart towards her husband. Had he gone to her now
and said a word to her in gentleness all might have been made right.
But he did not go to her.
"If he chooses to be cross and sulky, he may be cross and sulky,"
said Mrs. Trevelyan to herself as she went up to her baby.
"Has Louis been with you?" Nora asked, as soon as Mrs. Fairfax had
brought her home.
"I have not seen him since you left me," said Mrs. Trevelyan.
"I suppose he went out before Colonel Osborne?"
"No, indeed. He waited till Colonel Osborne had gone, and then he
went himself; but he did not come near me. It is for him to judge of
his own conduct, but I must say that I think he is very foolish."
This the young wife said in a tone which clearly indicated that she
had judged her husband's conduct, and had found it to be very foolish
indeed.
"Do you think that papa and mamma will really come?" said Nora,
changing the subject of conversation.
"How can I tell? How am I to know? After all that has passed I am
afraid to say a word lest I should be accused of doing wrong. But
remember this, Nora, you are not to speak of it to any one."
"You will tell Louis?"
"No; I will tell no one."
"Dear, dear Emily; pray do not keep anything secret from him."
"What do you mean by secret? There isn't any secret. Only in such
matters as that,--about politics,--no gentleman likes to have his
name talked about!"
A look of great distress came upon Nora's face as she heard this. To
her it seemed to be very bad that there should be a secret between
her sister and Colonel Osborne to be kept from her brother-in-law.
"I suppose you will suspect me next?" said Mrs. Trevelyan, angrily.
"Emily, how can you say anything so cruel?"
"You look as if you did."
"I only mean that I think it would be wiser to tell all this to
Louis."
"How can I tell him Colonel Osborne's private business, when Colonel
Osborne has desired me not to do so. For whose sake is Colonel
Osborne doing this? For papa's and mamma's! I suppose Louis won't
be--jealous, because I want to have papa and mamma home. It would not
be a bit less unreasonable than the other."
CHAPTER III.
LADY MILBOROUGH'S DINNER PARTY.
Louis Trevelyan went down to his club in Pall Mall, the Acrobats, and
there heard a rumour that added to his anger against Colonel Osborne.
The Acrobats was a very distinguished club, into which it was now
difficult for a young man to find his way, and almost impossible
for a man who was no longer young, and therefore known to many. It
had been founded some twenty years since with the idea of promoting
muscular exercise and gymnastic amusements; but the promoters had
become fat and lethargic, and the Acrobats spent their time mostly in
playing whist, and in ordering and eating their dinners. There were
supposed to be, in some out-of-the-way part of the building, certain
poles and sticks and parallel bars with which feats of activity might
be practised, but no one ever asked for them now-a-days, and a man,
when he became an Acrobat, did so with a view either to the whist or
the cook, or possibly to the social excellences of the club. Louis
Trevelyan was an Acrobat;--as was also Colonel Osborne.
"So old Rowley is coming home," said one distinguished Acrobat to
another in Trevelyan's hearing.
"How the deuce is he managing that? He was here a year ago?"
"Osborne is getting it done. He is to come as a witness for this
committee. It must be no end of a lounge for him. It doesn't count as
leave, and he has every shilling paid for him, down to his cab-fares
when he goes out to dinner. There's nothing like having a friend at
Court."
Such was the secrecy of Colonel Osborne's secret! He had been so
chary of having his name mentioned in connection with a political
job, that he had found it necessary to impose on his young friend
the burden of a secret from her husband, and yet the husband heard
the whole story told openly at his club on the same day! There was
nothing in the story to anger Trevelyan had he not immediately felt
that there must be some plan in the matter between his wife and
Colonel Osborne, of which he had been kept ignorant. Hitherto,
indeed, his wife, as the reader knows, could not have told him. He
had not seen her since the matter had been discussed between her and
her friend. But he was angry because he first learned at his club
that which he thought he ought to have learned at home.
As soon as he reached his house he went at once to his wife's room,
but her maid was with her, and nothing could be said at that moment.
He then dressed himself, intending to go to Emily as soon as the girl
had left her; but the girl remained,--was, as he believed, kept in
the room purposely by his wife, so that he should have no moment of
private conversation. He went down-stairs, therefore, and found Nora
standing by the drawing-room fire.
"So you are dressed first to-day?" he said. "I thought your turn
always came last."
"Emily sent Jenny to me first to-day because she thought you would be
home, and she didn't go up to dress till the last minute."
This was intended well by Nora, but it did not have the desired
effect. Trevelyan, who had no command over his own features, frowned,
and showed that he was displeased. He hesitated a moment, thinking
whether he would ask Nora any question as to this report about her
father and mother; but, before he had spoken, his wife was in the
room.
"We are all late, I fear," said Emily.
"You, at any rate, are the last," said her husband.
"About half a minute," said the wife.
Then they got into the hired brougham which was standing at the door.
Trevelyan, in the sweet days of his early confidence with his wife,
had offered to keep a carriage for her, explaining to her that the
luxury, though costly, would not be beyond his reach. But she had
persuaded him against the carriage, and there had come to be an
agreement that instead of the carriage there should always be an
autumn tour. "One learns something from going about; but one learns
nothing from keeping a carriage," Emily had said. Those had been
happy days, in which it had been intended that everything should
always be rose-coloured. Now he was meditating whether, in lieu of
that autumn tour, it would not be necessary to take his wife away to
Naples altogether, so that she might be removed from the influence
of--of--of--; no, not even to himself would he think of Colonel
Osborne as his wife's lover. The idea was too horrible! And yet, how
dreadful was it that he should have, for any reason, to withdraw her
from the influence of any man!
Lady Milborough lived ever so far away, in Eccleston Square, but
Trevelyan did not say a single word to either of his companions
during the journey. He was cross and vexed, and was conscious that
they knew that he was cross and vexed. Mrs. Trevelyan and her sister
talked to each other the whole way, but they did so in that tone
which clearly indicates that the conversation is made up, not for any
interest attached to the questions asked or the answers given, but
because it is expedient that there should not be silence. Nora said
something about Marshall and Snellgrove, and tried to make believe
that she was very anxious for her sister's answer. And Emily said
something about the opera at Covent Garden, which was intended
to show that her mind was quite at ease. But both of them failed
altogether, and knew that they failed. Once or twice Trevelyan
thought that he would say a word in token, as it were, of repentance.
Like the naughty child who knew that he was naughty, he was trying to
be good. But he could not do it. The fiend was too strong within him.
She must have known that there was a proposition for her father's
return through Colonel Osborne's influence. As that man at the club
had heard it, how could she not have known it? When they got out at
Lady Milborough's door he had spoken to neither of them.
There was a large dull party, made up mostly of old people. Lady
Milborough and Trevelyan's mother had been bosom friends, and
Lady Milborough had on this account taken upon herself to be much
interested in Trevelyan's wife. But Louis Trevelyan himself, in
discussing Lady Milborough with Emily, had rather turned his mother's
old friend into ridicule, and Emily had, of course, followed her
husband's mode of thinking. Lady Milborough had once or twice given
her some advice on small matters, telling her that this or that air
would be good for her baby, and explaining that a mother during a
certain interesting portion of her life, should refresh herself
with a certain kind of malt liquor. Of all counsel on such domestic
subjects Mrs. Trevelyan was impatient,--as indeed it was her nature
to be in all matters, and consequently, authorized as she had been
by her husband's manner of speaking of his mother's friend, she
had taken a habit of quizzing Lady Milborough behind her back,
and almost of continuing the practice before the old lady's face.
Lady Milborough, who was the most affectionate old soul alive,
and good-tempered with her friends to a fault, had never resented
this, but had come to fear that Mrs. Trevelyan was perhaps a little
flighty. She had never as yet allowed herself to say anything worse
of her young friend's wife than that. And she would always add that
that kind of thing would cure itself as the nursery became full. It
must be understood therefore that Mrs. Trevelyan was not anticipating
much pleasure from Lady Milborough's party, and that she had accepted
the invitation as a matter of duty.
There was present among the guests a certain Honourable Charles
Glascock, the eldest son of Lord Peterborough, who made the
affair more interesting to Nora than it was to her sister. It had
been whispered into Nora's ears, by more than one person,--and
among others by Lady Milborough, whose own daughters were all
married,--that she might, if she thought fit, become the Honourable
Mrs. Charles Glascock. Now, whether she might think fit, or
whether she might not, the presence of the gentleman under such
circumstances, as far as she was concerned, gave an interest to the
evening. And as Lady Milborough took care that Mr. Glascock should
take Nora down to dinner, the interest was very great. Mr. Glascock
was a good-looking man, just under forty, in Parliament, heir to
a peerage, and known to be well off in respect to income. Lady
Milborough and Mrs. Trevelyan had told Nora Rowley that should
encouragement in that direction come in her way, she ought to allow
herself to fall in love with Mr. Glascock. A certain amount of
encouragement had come in her way, but she had not as yet allowed
herself to fall in love with Mr. Glascock. It seemed to her that Mr.
Glascock was quite conscious of the advantages of his own position,
and that his powers of talking about other matters than those with
which he was immediately connected were limited. She did believe that
he had in truth paid her the compliment of falling in love with her,
and this is a compliment to which few girls are indifferent. Nora
might perhaps have tried to fall in love with Mr. Glascock, had she
not been forced to make comparisons between him and another. This
other one had not fallen in love with her, as she well knew; and she
certainly had not fallen in love with him. But still, the comparison
was forced upon her, and it did not result in favour of Mr. Glascock.
On the present occasion Mr. Glascock as he sat next to her almost
proposed to her.
"You have never seen Monkhams?" he said. Monkhams was his father's
seat, a very grand place in Worcestershire. Of course he knew very
well that she had never seen Monkhams. How should she have seen it?
"I have never been in that part of England at all," she replied.
"I should so like to show you Monkhams. The oaks there are the finest
in the kingdom. Do you like oaks?"
"Who does not like oaks? But we have none in the islands, and nobody
has ever seen so few as I have."
"I'll show you Monkhams some day. Shall I? Indeed, I hope that some
day I may really show you Monkhams."
Now when an unmarried man talks to a young lady of really showing her
the house in which it will be his destiny to live, he can hardly mean
other than to invite her to live there with him. It must at least be
his purpose to signify that, if duly encouraged, he will so invite
her. But Nora Rowley did not give Mr. Glascock much encouragement on
this occasion.
"I'm afraid it is not likely that anything will ever take me into
that part of the country," she said. There was something perhaps in
her tone which checked Mr. Glascock, so that he did not then press
the invitation.
When the ladies were up-stairs in the drawing-room, Lady Milborough
contrived to seat herself on a couch intended for two persons only,
close to Mrs. Trevelyan. Emily, thinking that she might perhaps hear
some advice about Guinness's stout, prepared herself to be saucy. But
the matter in hand was graver than that. Lady Milborough's mind was
uneasy about Colonel Osborne.
"My dear," said she, "was not your father very intimate with that
Colonel Osborne?"
"He is very intimate with him, Lady Milborough."
"Ah, yes; I thought I had heard so. That makes it of course natural
that you should know him."
"We have known him all our lives," said Emily, forgetting probably
that out of the twenty-three years and some months which she had
hitherto lived, there had been a consecutive period of more than
twenty years in which she had never seen this man whom she had known
all her life.
"That makes a difference, of course; and I don't mean to say anything
against him."
"I hope not, Lady Milborough, because we are all especially fond of
him." This was said with so much of purpose, that poor, dear old Lady
Milborough was stopped in her good work. She knew well the terrible
strait to which Augustus Poole had been brought with his wife,
although nobody supposed that Poole's wife had ever entertained a
wrong thought in her pretty little heart. Nevertheless he had been
compelled to break up his establishment, and take his wife to Naples,
because this horrid Colonel would make himself at home in Mrs.
Poole's drawing-room in Knightsbridge. Augustus Poole, with courage
enough to take any man by the beard, had taking by the beard been
possible, had found it impossible to dislodge the Colonel. He could
not do so without making a row which would have been disgraceful to
himself and injurious to his wife; and therefore he had taken Mrs.
Poole to Naples. Lady Milborough knew the whole story, and thought
that she foresaw that the same thing was about to happen in the
drawing-room in Curzon Street. When she attempted to say a word to
the wife, she found herself stopped. She could not go on in that
quarter after the reception with which the beginning of her word had
been met. But perhaps she might succeed better with the husband.
After all, her friendship was with the Trevelyan side, and not with
the Rowleys.
"My dear Louis," she said, "I want to speak a word to you. Come
here." And then she led him into a distant corner, Mrs. Trevelyan
watching her all the while, and guessing why her husband was thus
carried away. "I just want to give you a little hint, which I am sure
I believe is quite unnecessary," continued Lady Milborough. Then she
paused, but Trevelyan would not speak. She looked into his face, and
saw that it was black. But the man was the only child of her dearest
friend, and she persevered. "Do you know I don't quite like that
Colonel Osborne coming so much to your house." The face before her
became still blacker, but still the man said nothing. "I dare say it
is a prejudice on my part, but I have always disliked him. I think he
is a dangerous friend;--what I call a snake in the grass. And though
Emily's high good sense, and love for you, and general feelings on
such a subject, are just what a husband must desire--Indeed, I am
quite sure that the possibility of anything wrong has never entered
into her head. But it is the very purity of her innocence which makes
the danger. He is a bad man, and I would just say a word to her, if I
were you, to make her understand that his coming to her of a morning
is not desirable. Upon my word, I believe there is nothing he likes
so much as going about and making mischief between men and their
wives."
Thus she delivered herself; and Louis Trevelyan, though he was sore
and angry, could not but feel that she had taken the part of a
friend. All that she had said had been true; all that she had said
to him he had said to himself more than once. He too hated the man.
He believed him to be a snake in the grass. But it was intolerably
bitter to him that he should be warned about his wife's conduct by
any living human being; that he, to whom the world had been so full
of good fortune,--that he, who had in truth taught himself to think
that he deserved so much good fortune, should be made the subject of
care on behalf of his friend, because of danger between himself and
his wife! On the spur of the moment he did not know what answer to
make. "He is not a man whom I like myself," he said.
"Just be careful, Louis, that is all," said Lady Milborough, and then
she was gone.
To be cautioned about his wife's conduct cannot be pleasant to any
man, and it was very unpleasant to Louis Trevelyan. He, too, had been
asked a question about Sir Marmaduke's expected visit to England
after the ladies had left the room. All the town had heard of it
except himself. He hardly spoke another word that evening till the
brougham was announced; and his wife had observed his silence. When
they were seated in the carriage, he together with his wife and Nora
Rowley, he immediately asked a question about Sir Marmaduke. "Emily,"
he said, "is there any truth in a report I hear that your father is
coming home?" No answer was made, and for a moment or two there was
silence. "You must have heard of it, then," he said. "Perhaps you can
tell me, Nora, as Emily will not reply. Have you heard anything of
your father's coming?"
"Yes; I have heard of it," said Nora slowly.
"And why have I not been told?"
"It was to be kept a secret," said Mrs. Trevelyan boldly.
"A secret from me; and everybody else knows it! And why was it to be
a secret?"
"Colonel Osborne did not wish that it should be known," said Mrs.
Trevelyan.
"And what has Colonel Osborne to do between you and your father in
any matter with which I may not be made acquainted? I will have
nothing more between you and Colonel Osborne. You shall not see
Colonel Osborne. Do you hear me?"
"Yes, I hear you, Louis."
"And do you mean to obey me? By G----, you shall obey me. Remember
this, that I lay my positive order upon you, that you shall not see
Colonel Osborne again. You do not know it, perhaps, but you are
already forfeiting your reputation as an honest woman, and bringing
disgrace upon me by your familiarity with Colonel Osborne."
"Oh, Louis, do not say that!" said Nora.
"You had better let him speak it all at once," said Emily.
"I have said what I have got to say. It is now only necessary that
you should give me your solemn assurance that you will obey me."
"If you have said all that you have to say, perhaps you will listen
to me," said his wife.
"I will listen to nothing till you have given me your promise."
"Then I certainly shall not give it you."
"Dear Emily, pray, pray do what he tells you," said Nora.
"She has yet to learn that it is her duty to do as I tell her," said
Trevelyan. "And because she is obstinate, and will not learn from
those who know better than herself what a woman may do, and what she
may not, she will ruin herself, and destroy my happiness."
"I know that you have destroyed my happiness by your unreasonable
jealousy," said the wife. "Have you considered what I must feel in
having such words addressed to me by my husband? If I am fit to be
told that I must promise not to see any man living, I cannot be fit
to be any man's wife." Then she burst out into an hysterical fit of
tears, and in this condition she got out of the carriage, entered her
house, and hurried up to her own room.
"Indeed, she has not been to blame," said Nora to Trevelyan on the
staircase.
"Why has there been a secret kept from me between her and this man;
and that too, after I had cautioned her against being intimate with
him? I am sorry that she should suffer; but it is better that she
should suffer a little now, than that we should both suffer much
by-and-by."
Nora endeavoured to explain to him the truth about the committee, and
Colonel Osborne's promised influence, and the reason why there was to
be a secret. But she was too much in a hurry to get to her sister to
make the matter plain, and he was too much angered to listen to her.
He shook his head when she spoke of Colonel Osborne's dislike to have
his name mentioned in connection with the matter. "All the world
knows it," he said with scornful laughter.
It was in vain that Nora endeavoured to explain to him that though
all the world might know it, Emily herself had only heard of the
proposition as a thing quite unsettled, as to which nothing at
present should be spoken openly. It was in vain to endeavour to make
peace on that night. Nora hurried up to her sister, and found that
the hysterical tears had again given place to anger. She would not
see her husband, unless he would beg her pardon; and he would not see
her unless she would give the promise he demanded. And the husband
and wife did not see each other again on that night.
CHAPTER IV.
HUGH STANBURY.
[Illustration]
It has been already stated that Nora Rowley was not quite so well
disposed as perhaps she ought to have been, to fall in love with the
Honourable Charles Glascock, there having come upon her the habit of
comparing him with another gentleman whenever this duty of falling in
love with Mr. Glascock was exacted from her. That other gentleman was
one with whom she knew that it was quite out of the question that she
should fall in love, because he had not a shilling in the world; and
the other gentleman was equally aware that it was not open to him to
fall in love with Nora Rowley--for the same reason. In regard to such
matters Nora Rowley had been properly brought up, having been made
to understand by the best and most cautious of mothers, that in that
matter of falling in love it was absolutely necessary that bread and
cheese should be considered. "Romance is a very pretty thing," Lady
Rowley had been wont to say to her daughters, "and I don't think life
would be worth having without a little of it. I should be very sorry
to think that either of my girls would marry a man only because he
had money. But you can't even be romantic without something to eat
and drink." Nora thoroughly understood all this, and being well aware
that her fortune in the world, if it ever was to be made at all,
could only be made by marriage, had laid down for herself certain
hard lines,--lines intended to be as fast as they were hard. Let
what might come to her in the way of likings and dislikings, let the
temptation to her be ever so strong, she would never allow her heart
to rest on a man who, if he should ask her to be his wife, would not
have the means of supporting her. There were many, she knew, who
would condemn such a resolution as cold, selfish, and heartless. She
heard people saying so daily. She read in books that it ought to be
so regarded. But she declared to herself that she would respect the
judgment neither of the people nor of the books. To be poor alone, to
have to live without a husband, to look forward to a life in which
there would be nothing of a career, almost nothing to do, to await
the vacuity of an existence in which she would be useful to no one,
was a destiny which she could teach herself to endure, because it
might probably be forced upon her by necessity. Were her father to
die there would hardly be bread for that female flock to eat. As it
was, she was eating the bread of a man in whose house she was no more
than a visitor. The lot of a woman, as she often told herself, was
wretched, unfortunate, almost degrading. For a woman such as herself
there was no path open to her energy, other than that of getting a
husband. Nora Rowley thought of all this till she was almost sick of
the prospect of her life,--especially sick of it when she was told
with much authority by the Lady Milboroughs of her acquaintance that
it was her bounden duty to fall in love with Mr. Glascock. As to
falling in love with Mr. Glascock, she had not as yet quite made up
her mind. There was so much to be said on that side of the question,
if such falling in love could only be made possible. But she had
quite made up her mind that she would never fall in love with a poor
man. In spite, however, of all that, she felt herself compelled to
make comparisons between Mr. Glascock and one Mr. Hugh Stanbury, a
gentleman who had not a shilling.
Mr. Hugh Stanbury had been at college the most intimate friend of
Louis Trevelyan, and at Oxford had been, in spite of Trevelyan's
successes, a bigger man than his friend. Stanbury had not taken so
high a degree as Trevelyan,--indeed had not gone out in honours at
all. He had done little for the credit of his college, and had never
put himself in the way of wrapping himself up for life in the scanty
lambswool of a fellowship. But he had won for himself reputation as
a clever speaker, as a man who had learned much that college tutors
do not profess to teach, as a hard-headed, ready-witted fellow, who,
having the world as an oyster before him, which it was necessary that
he should open, would certainly find either a knife or a sword with
which to open it.
Immediately on leaving college he had come to town, and had entered
himself at Lincoln's Inn. Now, at the time of our story, he was a
barrister of four years' standing, but had never yet made a guinea.
He had never made a guinea by his work as a barrister, and was
beginning to doubt of himself whether he ever would do so. Not, as he
knew well, that guineas are generally made with ease by barristers
of four years' standing, but because, as he said to his friends, he
did not see his way to the knack of it. He did not know an attorney
in the world, and could not conceive how any attorney should ever
be induced to apply to him for legal aid. He had done his work of
learning his trade about as well as other young men, but had had no
means of distinguishing himself within his reach. He went the Western
Circuit because his aunt, old Miss Stanbury, lived at Exeter, but, as
he declared of himself, had he had another aunt living at York, he
would have had nothing whatsoever to guide him in his choice. He sat
idle in the courts, and hated himself for so sitting. So it had been
with him for two years without any consolation or additional burden
from other employment than that of his profession. After that, by
some chance, he had become acquainted with the editor of the Daily
Record, and by degrees had taken to the writing of articles. He had
been told by all his friends, and especially by Trevelyan, that if
he did this, he might as well sell his gown and wig. He declared,
in reply, that he had no objection to sell his gown and wig. He did
not see how he should ever make more money out of them than he would
do by such sale. But for the articles which he wrote, he received
instant payment, a process which he found to be most consolatory,
most comfortable, and, as he said to Trevelyan, as warm to him as a
blanket in winter.
Trevelyan, who was a year younger than Stanbury, had taken upon
himself to be very angry. He professed that he did not think much of
the trade of a journalist, and told Stanbury that he was sinking from
the highest to almost the lowest business by which an educated man
and a gentleman could earn his bread. Stanbury had simply replied
that he saw some bread on the one side, but none on the other; and
that bread from some side was indispensable to him. Then there had
come to be that famous war between Great Britain and the republic
of Patagonia, and Hugh Stanbury had been sent out as a special
correspondent by the editor and proprietor of the Daily Record.
His letters had been much read, and had called up a great deal of
newspaper pugnacity. He had made important statements which had been
flatly denied, and found to be utterly false; which again had been
warmly reasserted and proved to be most remarkably true to the
letter. In this way the correspondence, and he as its author, became
so much talked about that, on his return to England, he did actually
sell his gown and wig and declare to his friends,--and to Trevelyan
among the number,--that he intended to look to journalism for his
future career.
He had been often at the house in Curzon Street in the earliest
happy days of his friend's marriage, and had thus become
acquainted,--intimately acquainted,--with Nora Rowley. And now again,
since his return from Patagonia, that acquaintance had been renewed.
Quite lately, since the actual sale of that wig and gown had been
effected, he had not been there so frequently as before, because
Trevelyan had expressed his indignation almost too openly.
"That such a man as you should be so faint-hearted," Trevelyan had
said, "is a thing that I can not understand."
"Is a man faint-hearted when he finds it improbable that he shall be
able to leap his horse over a house?"
"What you had to do had been done by hundreds before you."
"What I had to do has never yet been done by any man," replied
Stanbury. "I had to live upon nothing till the lucky hour should
strike."
"I think you have been cowardly," said Trevelyan.
Even this had made no quarrel between the two men; but Stanbury had
expressed himself annoyed by his friend's language, and partly on
that account, and partly perhaps on another, had stayed away from
Curzon Street. As Nora Rowley had made comparisons about him, so had
he made comparisons about her. He had owned to himself that had it
been possible that he should marry, he would willingly entrust his
happiness to Miss Rowley. And he had thought once or twice that
Trevelyan had wished that such an arrangement might be made at some
future day. Trevelyan had always been much more sanguine in expecting
success for his friend at the Bar, than Stanbury had been for
himself. It might well be that such a man as Trevelyan might think
that a clever rising barrister would be an excellent husband for his
sister-in-law, but that a man earning a precarious living as a writer
for a penny paper would be by no means so desirable a connection.
Stanbury, as he thought of this, declared to himself that he would
not care two straws for Trevelyan in the matter, if he could see his
way without other impediments. But the other impediments were there
in such strength and numbers as to make him feel that it could not
have been intended by Fate that he should take to himself a wife.
Although those letters of his to the Daily Record had been so
pre-eminently successful, he had never yet been able to earn by
writing above twenty-five or thirty pounds a month. If that might be
continued to him he could live upon it himself; but, even with his
moderate views, it would not suffice for himself and family.
He had told Trevelyan that while living as an expectant barrister he
had no means of subsistence. In this, as Trevelyan knew, he was not
strictly correct. There was an allowance of £100 a year coming to him
from the aunt whose residence at Exeter had induced him to devote
himself to the Western Circuit. His father had been a clergyman with
a small living in Devonshire, and had now been dead some fifteen
years. His mother and two sisters were still living in a small
cottage in his late father's parish, on the interest of the money
arising from a life insurance. Some pittance from sixty to seventy
pounds a year was all they had among them. But there was a rich aunt,
Miss Stanbury, to whom had come considerable wealth in a manner most
romantic,--the little tale shall be told before this larger tale
is completed,--and this aunt had undertaken to educate and place
out in the world her nephew Hugh. So Hugh had been sent to Harrow,
and then to Oxford,--where he had much displeased his aunt by not
accomplishing great things,--and then had been set down to make his
fortune as a barrister in London, with an allowance of £100 a year,
his aunt having paid, moreover, certain fees for entrance, tuition,
and the like. The very hour in which Miss Stanbury learned that her
nephew was writing for a penny newspaper she sent off a dispatch to
tell him that he must give up her or the penny paper. He replied by
saying that he felt himself called upon to earn his bread in the only
line from which, as it seemed to him, bread would be forthcoming. By
return of post he got another letter to say that he might draw for
the quarter then becoming due, but that that would be the last. And
it was the last.
Stanbury made an ineffectual effort to induce his aunt to make over
the allowance,--or at least a part of it,--to his mother and sisters,
but the old lady paid no attention whatever to the request. She never
had given, and at that moment did not intend to give, a shilling
to the widow and daughters of her brother. Nor did she intend, or
had she ever intended, to leave a shilling of her money to Hugh
Stanbury,--as she had very often told him. The money was, at her
death, to go back to the people from whom it had come to her.
When Nora Rowley made those comparisons between Mr. Hugh Stanbury and
Mr. Charles Glascock, they were always wound up very much in favour
of the briefless barrister. It was not that he was the handsomer man,
for he was by no means handsome, nor was he the bigger man, for Mr.
Glascock was six feet tall; nor was he better dressed, for Stanbury
was untidy rather than otherwise in his outward person. Nor had
he any air of fashion or special grace to recommend him, for he
was undoubtedly an awkward-mannered man. But there was a glance of
sunshine in his eye, and a sweetness in the curl of his mouth when he
smiled, which made Nora feel that it would have been all up with her
had she not made so very strong a law for her own guidance. Stanbury
was a man about five feet ten, with shoulders more than broad in
proportion, stout limbed, rather awkward of his gait, with large feet
and hands, with soft wavy light hair, with light grey eyes, with a
broad, but by no means ugly, nose. His mouth and lips were large, and
he rarely showed his teeth. He wore no other beard than whiskers,
which he was apt to cut away through heaviness of his hand in
shaving, till Nora longed to bid him be more careful. "He doesn't
care what sort of a guy he makes of himself," she once said to her
sister, almost angrily. "He is a plain man, and he knows it," Emily
had replied. Mr. Trevelyan was doubtless a handsome man, and it was
almost on Nora's tongue to say something ill-natured on the subject.
Hugh Stanbury was reputed to be somewhat hot in spirit and manner. He
would be very sage in argument, pounding down his ideas on politics,
religion, or social life with his fist as well as his voice. He was
quick, perhaps, at making antipathies, and quick, too, in making
friendships; impressionable, demonstrative, eager, rapid in his
movements,--sometimes to the great detriment of his shins and
knuckles; and he possessed the sweetest temper that was ever given
to a man for the blessing of a woman. This was the man between whom
and Mr. Glascock Nora Rowley found it to be impossible not to make
comparisons.
On the very day after Lady Milborough's dinner party Stanbury
overtook Trevelyan in the street, and asked his friend where he was
going eastward. Trevelyan was on his way to call upon his lawyer, and
said so. But he did not say why he was going to his lawyer. He had
sent to his wife by Nora that morning to know whether she would make
to him the promise he required. The only answer which Nora could draw
from her sister was a counter question, demanding whether he would
ask her pardon for the injury he had done her. Nora had been most
eager, most anxious, most conciliatory as a messenger; but no good
had come of these messages, and Trevelyan had gone forth to tell all
his trouble to his family lawyer. Old Mr. Bideawhile had been his
father's ancient and esteemed friend, and he could tell things to
Mr. Bideawhile which he could not bring himself to tell to any
other living man; and he could generally condescend to accept Mr.
Bideawhile's advice, knowing that his father before him had been
guided by the same.
"But you are out of your way for Lincoln's Inn Fields," said
Stanbury.
"I have to call at Twining's. And where are you going?"
"I have been three times round St. James's Park to collect my
thoughts," said Stanbury, "and now I am on my way to the Daily R.,
250, Fleet Street. It is my custom of an afternoon. I am prepared
to instruct the British public of to-morrow on any subject, as per
order, from the downfall of a European compact to the price of a
London mutton chop."
"I suppose there is nothing more to be said about it," said
Trevelyan, after a pause.
"Not another word. How should there be? Aunt Jemima has already drawn
tight the purse strings, and it would soon be the casual ward in
earnest if it were not for the Daily R. God bless the Daily R. Only
think what a thing it is to have all subjects open to one, from the
destinies of France to the profit proper to a butcher."
"If you like it!"
"I do like it. It may not be altogether honest. I don't know what
is. But it's a deal honester than defending thieves and bamboozling
juries. How is your wife?"
"She's pretty well, thank you."
Stanbury knew at once from the tone of his friend's voice that there
was something wrong.
"And Louis the less?" he said, asking after Trevelyan's child.
"He's all right."
"And Miss Rowley? When one begins one's inquiries one is bound to go
through the whole family."
"Miss Rowley is pretty well," said Trevelyan.
Previously to this, Trevelyan when speaking of his sister-in-law to
Stanbury, had always called her Nora, and had been wont to speak
of her as though she were almost as much the friend of one of them
as of the other. The change of tone on this occasion was in truth
occasioned by the sadness of the man's thoughts in reference to his
wife, but Stanbury attributed it to another cause. "He need not be
afraid of me," he said to himself, "and at least he should not show
me that he is." Then they parted, Trevelyan going into Twining's
bank, and Stanbury passing on towards the office of the Daily R.
Stanbury had in truth been altogether mistaken as to the state of his
friend's mind on that morning. Trevelyan, although he had, according
to his custom, put in a word in condemnation of the newspaper line of
life, was at the moment thinking whether he would not tell all his
trouble to Hugh Stanbury. He knew that he should not find anywhere,
not even in Mr. Bideawhile, a more friendly or more trustworthy
listener. When Nora Rowley's name had been mentioned, he had not
thought of her. He had simply repeated the name with the usual
answer. He was at the moment cautioning himself against a confidence
which after all might not be necessary, and which on this occasion
was not made. When one is in trouble it is a great ease to tell one's
trouble to a friend; but then one should always wash one's dirty
linen at home. The latter consideration prevailed, and Trevelyan
allowed his friend to go on without burdening him with the story of
that domestic quarrel. Nor did he on that occasion tell it to Mr.
Bideawhile; for Mr. Bideawhile was not found at his chambers.
CHAPTER V.
SHEWING HOW THE QUARREL PROGRESSED.
Trevelyan got back to his own house at about three, and on going into
the library, found on his table a letter to him addressed in his
wife's handwriting. He opened it quickly, hoping to find that promise
which he had demanded, and resolving that if it were made he would at
once become affectionate, yielding, and gentle to his wife. But there
was not a word written by his wife within the envelope. It contained
simply another letter, already opened, addressed to her. This letter
had been brought up to her during her husband's absence from the
house, and was as follows:--
Acrobats, Thursday.
DEAR EMILY,
I have just come from the Colonial Office. It is all
settled, and Sir M. has been sent for. Of course, you will
tell T. now.
Yours, F. O.
The letter was, of course, from Colonel Osborne, and Mrs. Trevelyan,
when she received it, had had great doubts whether she would enclose
it to her husband opened or unopened. She had hitherto refused to
make the promise which her husband exacted, but nevertheless, she was
minded to obey him. Had he included in his demand any requirement
that she should receive no letter from Colonel Osborne, she would not
have opened this one. But nothing had been said about letters, and
she would not shew herself to be afraid. So she read the note, and
then sent it down to be put on Mr. Trevelyan's table in an envelope
addressed to him.
"If he is not altogether blinded, it will show him how cruelly he has
wronged me," said she to her sister. She was sitting at the time with
her boy in her lap, telling herself that the child's features were in
all respects the very same as his father's, and that, come what come
might, the child should always be taught by her to love and respect
his father. And then there came a horrible thought. What if the child
should be taken away from her? If this quarrel, out of which she saw
no present mode of escape, were to lead to a separation between her
and her husband, would not the law, and the judges, and the courts,
and all the Lady Milboroughs of their joint acquaintance into the
bargain, say that the child should go with his father? The judges,
and the courts, and the Lady Milboroughs would, of course, say that
she was the sinner. And what could she do without her boy? Would not
any humility, any grovelling in the dust be better for her than that?
"It is a very poor thing to be a woman," she said to her sister.
"It is perhaps better than being a dog," said Nora; "but, of course,
we can't compare ourselves to men."
"It would be better to be a dog. One wouldn't be made to suffer so
much. When a puppy is taken away from its mother, she is bad enough
for a few days, but she gets over it in a week." There was a pause
then for a few moments. Nora knew well which way ran the current of
her sister's thoughts, and had nothing at the present moment which
she could say on that subject. "It is very hard for a woman to know
what to do," continued Emily, "but if she is to marry, I think she
had better marry a fool. After all, a fool generally knows that he is
a fool, and will trust some one, though he may not trust his wife."
"I will never wittingly marry a fool," said Nora.
"You will marry Mr. Glascock, of course. I don't say that he is a
fool; but I do not think he has that kind of strength which shows
itself in perversity."
"If he asked me, I should not have him;--and he will never ask me."
"He will ask you, and, of course, you'll take him. Why not? You can't
be otherwise than a woman. And you must marry. And this man is a
gentleman, and will be a peer. There is nothing on earth against him,
except that he does not set the Thames on fire. Louis intends to set
the Thames on fire some day, and see what comes of it."
"All the same, I shall not marry Mr. Glascock. A woman can die, at
any rate," said Nora.
"No, she can't. A woman must be decent; and to die of want is very
indecent. She can't die, and she mustn't be in want, and she oughtn't
to be a burden. I suppose it was thought necessary that every man
should have two to choose from; and therefore there are so many more
of us than the world wants. I wonder whether you'd mind taking that
down-stairs to his table? I don't like to send it by the servant; and
I don't want to go myself."
Then Nora had taken the letter down, and left it where Louis
Trevelyan would be sure to find it.
He did find it, and was sorely disappointed when he perceived that
it contained no word from his wife to himself. He opened Colonel
Osborne's note, and read it, and became, as he did so, almost more
angry than before. Who was this man that he should dare to address
another man's wife as "Dear Emily?" At the moment Trevelyan
remembered well enough that he had heard the man so call his wife,
that it had been done openly in his presence, and had not given him
a thought. But Lady Rowley and Sir Marmaduke had then been present
also; and that man on that occasion had been the old friend of the
old father, and not the would-be young friend of the young daughter.
Trevelyan could hardly reason about it, but felt that whereas the one
was not improper, the other was grossly impertinent, and even wicked.
And then, again, his wife, his Emily, was to show to him, to her
husband, or was not to show to him, the letter which she received
from this man, the letter in which she was addressed as "Dear Emily,"
according to this man's judgment and wish, and not according to his
judgment and wish,--not according to the judgment and wish of him who
was her husband, her lord, and her master! "Of course you will tell
T. now." This was intolerable to him. It made him feel that he was
to be regarded as second, and this man to be regarded as first. And
then he began to recapitulate all the good things he had done for his
wife, and all the causes which he had given her for gratitude. Had
he not taken her to his bosom, and bestowed upon her the half of all
that he had simply for herself, asking for nothing more than her
love? He had possessed money, position, a name,--all that makes life
worth having. He had found her in a remote corner of the world, with
no fortune, with no advantages of family or social standing,--so
circumstanced that any friend would have warned him against such
a marriage; but he had given her his heart, and his hand, and his
house, and had asked for nothing in return but that he should be all
in all to her,--that he should be her one god upon earth. And he had
done more even than this. "Bring your sister," he had said. "The
house shall be big enough for her also, and she shall be my sister as
well as yours." Who had ever done more for a woman, or shown a more
absolute confidence? And now what was the return he received? She was
not contented with her one god upon earth, but must make to herself
other gods,--another god, and that too out of a lump of the basest
clay to be found around her. He thought that he could remember to
have heard it said in early days, long before he himself had had
an idea of marrying, that no man should look for a wife from among
the tropics, that women educated amidst the languors of those sunny
climes rarely came to possess those high ideas of conjugal duty and
feminine truth which a man should regard as the first requisites of a
good wife. As he thought of all this, he almost regretted that he had
ever visited the Mandarins, or ever heard the name of Sir Marmaduke
Rowley.
He should have nourished no such thoughts in his heart. He had,
indeed, been generous to his wife and to his wife's family; but we
may almost say that the man who is really generous in such matters,
is unconscious of his own generosity. The giver who gives the most,
gives, and does not know that he gives. And had not she given too?
In that matter of giving between a man and his wife, if each gives
all, the two are equal, let the things given be what they may! King
Cophetua did nothing for his beggar maid, unless she were to him,
after he had married her, as royal a queen as though he had taken her
from the oldest stock of reigning families then extant. Trevelyan
knew all this himself,--had said so to himself a score of times,
though not probably in spoken words or formed sentences. But, that
all was equal between himself and the wife of his bosom, had been
a thing ascertained by him as a certainty. There was no debt of
gratitude from her to him which he did not acknowledge to exist also
as from him to her. But yet, in his anger, he could not keep himself
from thinking of the gifts he had showered upon her. And he had been,
was, would ever be, if she would only allow it, so true to her! He
had selected no other friend to take her place in his councils! There
was no "dear Mary," or "dear Augusta," with whom he had secrets to
be kept from his wife. When there arose with him any question of
interest,--question of interest such as was this of the return of Sir
Marmaduke to her,--he would show it in all its bearings to his wife.
He had his secrets too, but his secrets had all been made secrets for
her also. There was not a woman in the world in whose company he took
special delight in her absence.
And if there had been, how much less would have been her ground of
complaint? Let a man have any such friendships,--what friendships he
may,--he does not disgrace his wife. He felt himself to be so true of
heart that he desired no such friendships; but for a man indulging in
such friendships there might be excuse. Even though a man be false,
a woman is not shamed and brought unto the dust before all the world.
But the slightest rumour on a woman's name is a load of infamy on
her husband's shoulders. It was not enough for Cæsar that his wife
should be true; it was necessary to Cæsar that she should not even be
suspected. Trevelyan told himself that he suspected his wife of no
sin. God forbid that it should ever come to that, both for his sake
and for hers; and, above all, for the sake of that boy who was so
dear to them both! But there would be the vile whispers, and dirty
slanders would be dropped from envious tongues into envious ears, and
minds prone to evil would think evil of him and of his. Had not Lady
Milborough already cautioned him? Oh, that he should have lived to
have been cautioned about his wife;--that he should be told that eyes
outside had looked into the sacred shrine of his heart and seen that
things there were fatally amiss! And yet Lady Milborough was quite
right. Had he not in his hand at this moment a document that proved
her to be right? "Dear Emily!" He took this note and crushed it in
his fist, and then pulled it into fragments.
But what should he do? There was, first of all considerations, the
duty which he owed to his wife, and the love which he bore her.
That she was ignorant and innocent he was sure; but then she was so
contumacious that he hardly knew how to take a step in the direction
of guarding her from the effects of her ignorance, and maintaining
for her the advantages of her innocence. He was her master, and she
must know that he was her master. But how was he to proceed when she
refused to obey the plainest and most necessary command which he laid
upon her? Let a man be ever so much his wife's master, he cannot
maintain his masterdom by any power which the law places in his
hands. He had asked his wife for a promise of obedience, and she
would not give it to him! What was he to do next? He could, no
doubt,--at least he thought so,--keep the man from her presence. He
could order the servant not to admit the man, and the servant would
doubtless obey him. But to what a condition would he then have been
brought! Would not the world then be over for him,--over for him as
the husband of a wife whom he could not love unless he respected her?
Better that there should be no such world, than call in the aid of a
servant to guard the conduct of his wife!
As he thought of it all it seemed to him that if she would not obey
him, and give him this promise, they must be separated. He would not
live with her, he would not give her the privileges of his wife, if
she refused to render to him the obedience which was his privilege.
The more he thought of it, the more convinced he was that he ought
not to yield to her. Let her once yield to him, and then his
tenderness should begin, and there should be no limit to it. But he
would not see her till she had yielded. He would not see her; and if
he should find that she did see Colonel Osborne, then he would tell
her that she could no longer dwell under the same roof with him.
His resolution on these points was very strong, and yet there came
over him a feeling that it was his duty to be gentle. There was a
feeling also that that privilege of receiving obedience, which was
so indubitably his own, could only be maintained by certain wise
practices on his part, in which gentleness must predominate.
Wives are bound to obey their husbands, but obedience cannot be
exacted from wives, as it may from servants, by aid of law and
with penalties, or as from a horse, by punishments and manger
curtailments. A man should be master in his own house, but he should
make his mastery palatable, equitable, smooth, soft to the touch,
a thing almost unfelt. How was he to do all this now, when he had
already given an order to which obedience had been refused unless
under certain stipulations,--an agreement with which would be
degradation to him? He had pointed out to his wife her duty, and she
had said she would do her duty as pointed out, on condition that he
would beg her pardon for having pointed it out! This he could not and
would not do. Let the heavens fall,--and the falling of the heavens
in this case was a separation between him and his wife,--but he would
not consent to such injustice as that!
But what was he to do at this moment,--especially with reference to
that note which he had destroyed. At last he resolved to write to his
wife, and he consequently did write and send to her the following
letter:--
May 4.
DEAREST EMILY,
If Colonel Osborne should write to you again, it will
be better that you should not open his letter. As you
know his handwriting, you will have no difficulty in so
arranging. Should any further letter come from Colonel
Osborne addressed to you, you had better put it under
cover to me, and take no notice of it yourself.
I shall dine at the club to-day. We were to have gone to
Mrs. Peacock's in the evening. You had better write a line
to say that we shall not be there. I am very sorry that
Nora should lose her evening. Pray think very carefully
over what I have asked of you. My request to you is, that
you shall give me a promise that you will not willingly
see Colonel Osborne again. Of course you will understand
that this is not supposed to extend to accidental
meetings, as to which, should they occur,--and they would
be sure to occur,--you would find that they would be
wholly unnoticed by me.
But I must request that you will comply with my wish in
this matter. If you will send for me, I will go to you
instantly, and after one word from you to the desired
effect, you will find that there will be no recurrence by
me to a subject so hateful. As I have done, and am doing
what I think to be right, I cannot stultify myself by
saying that I think I have been wrong.
Yours always, dearest Emily,
With the most thorough love,
LOUIS TREVELYAN.
This letter he himself put on his wife's dressing-room table, and
then he went out to his club.
CHAPTER VI.
SHEWING HOW RECONCILIATION WAS MADE.
"Look at that," said Mrs. Trevelyan, when her sister came into her
room about an hour before dinner-time. Nora read the letter, and
then asked her sister what she meant to do. "I have written to Mrs.
Peacock. I don't know what else I can do. It is very hard upon
you,--that you should have been kept at home. But I don't suppose Mr.
Glascock would have been at Mrs. Peacock's."
"And what else will you do, Emily?"
"Nothing;--simply live deserted and forlorn till he shall choose to
find his wits again. There is nothing else that a woman can do. If he
chooses to dine at his club every day, I can't help it. We must put
off all the engagements, and that will be hard upon you."
"Don't talk about me. It is too terrible to think that there should
be such a quarrel."
"What can I do? Have I been wrong?"
"Simply do what he tells you, whether it is wrong or right. If it's
right, it ought to be done, and if it's wrong, it will not be your
fault."
"That's very easily said, and it sounds logical; but you must know
it's unreasonable."
"I don't care about reason. He is your husband, and if he wishes it
you should do it. And what will be the harm? You don't mean to see
Colonel Osborne any more. You have already said that he's not to be
admitted."
"I have said that nobody is to be admitted. Louis has driven me
to that. How can I look the servant in the face and tell him that
any special gentleman is not to be admitted to see me? Oh dear! oh
dear! have I done anything to deserve it? Was ever so monstrous an
accusation made against any woman! If it were not for my boy, I would
defy him to do his worst."
On the day following, Nora again became a messenger between the
husband and wife, and before dinner-time a reconciliation had been
effected. Of course the wife gave way at last; and of course she gave
way so cunningly that the husband received none of the gratification
which he had expected in her surrender. "Tell him to come," Nora had
urged. "Of course he can come if he pleases," Emily had replied.
Then Nora had told Louis to come, and Louis had demanded whether,
if he did so, the promise which he had exacted would be given. It
is to be feared that Nora perverted the truth a little; but if ever
such perversion may be forgiven, forgiveness was due to her. If
they could only be brought together, she was sure that there would
be a reconciliation. They were brought together, and there was a
reconciliation.
"Dearest Emily, I am so glad to come to you," said the husband,
walking up to his wife in their bed-room, and taking her in his arms.
[Illustration: Shewing how reconciliation was made.]
"I have been very unhappy, Louis, for the last two days," said she,
very gravely,--returning his kiss, but returning it somewhat coldly.
"We have both been unhappy, I am sure," said he. Then he paused that
the promise might be made to him. He had certainly understood that
it was to be made without reserve,--as an act on her part which she
had fully consented to perform. But she stood silent, with one hand
on the dressing-table, looking away from him, very beautiful, and
dignified too, in her manner; but not, as far as he could judge,
either repentant or submissive. "Nora said that you would make me the
promise which I ask from you."
"I cannot think, Louis, how you can want such a promise from me."
"I think it right to ask it; I do indeed."
"Can you imagine that I shall ever willingly see this gentleman again
after what has occurred? It will be for you to tell the servant. I
do not know how I can do that. But, as a matter of course, I will
encourage no person to come to your house of whom you disapprove. It
would be exactly the same of any man or of any woman."
"That is all that I ask."
"I am surprised that you should have thought it necessary to make any
formal request in the matter. Your word was quite sufficient. That
you should find cause of complaint in Colonel Osborne's coming here
is of course a different thing."
"Quite a different thing," said he.
"I cannot pretend to understand either your motives or your fears.
I do not understand them. My own self-respect prevents me from
supposing it to be possible that you have attributed an evil thought
to me."
"Indeed, indeed, I never have," said the husband.
"That I can assure you I regard as a matter of course," said the
wife.
"But you know, Emily, the way in which the world talks."
"The world! And do you regard the world, Louis?"
"Lady Milborough, I believe, spoke to yourself."
"Lady Milborough! No, she did not speak to me. She began to do so,
but I was careful to silence her at once. From you, Louis, I am bound
to hear whatever you may choose to say to me; but I will not hear
from any other lips a single word that may be injurious to your
honour." This she said very quietly, with much dignity, and he felt
that he had better not answer her. She had given him the promise
which he had demanded, and he began to fear that if he pushed the
matter further she might go back even from that amount of submission.
So he kissed her again, and had the boy brought into the room, and by
the time that he went to dress for dinner he was able, at any rate,
to seem to be well pleased.
"Richard," he said to the servant, as soon as he was down-stairs,
"when Colonel Osborne calls again, say that your mistress is--not at
home." He gave the order in the most indifferent tone of voice which
he could assume; but as he gave it he felt thoroughly ashamed of it.
Richard, who, with the other servants, had of course known that there
had been a quarrel between his master and mistress for the last two
days, no doubt understood all about it.
While they were sitting at dinner on the next day, a Saturday, there
came another note from Colonel Osborne. The servant brought it to
his mistress, and she, when she had looked at it, put it down by her
plate. Trevelyan knew immediately from whom the letter had come, and
understood how impossible it was for his wife to give it up in the
servant's presence. The letter lay there till the man was out of the
room, and then she handed it to Nora. "Will you give that to Louis?"
she said. "It comes from the man whom he supposes to be my lover."
"Emily!" said he, jumping from his seat, "how can you allow words so
horrible and so untrue to fall from your mouth?"
"If it be not so, why am I to be placed in such a position as this?
The servant knows, of course, from whom the letter comes, and sees
that I have been forbidden to open it." Then the man returned to the
room, and the remainder of the dinner passed off almost in silence.
It was their custom when they dined without company to leave the
dining-room together, but on this evening Trevelyan remained for a
few minutes that he might read Colonel Osborne's letter. He waited,
standing on the rug with his face to the fire-place, till he was
quite alone, and then he opened it. It ran as follows:--
House of Commons, Saturday.
DEAR EMILY,--
Trevelyan, as he read this, cursed Colonel Osborne between his teeth.
DEAR EMILY,
I called this afternoon, but you were out. I am afraid you
will be disappointed by what I have to tell you, but you
should rather be glad of it. They say at the C. O. that
Sir Marmaduke would not receive their letter if sent
now till the middle of June, and that he could not be
in London, let him do what he would, till the end of
July. They hope to have the session over by that time,
and therefore the committee is to be put off till next
session. They mean to have Lord Bowles home from Canada,
and they think that Bowles would like to be here in the
winter. Sir Marmaduke will be summoned for February next,
and will of course stretch his stay over the hot months.
All this will, on the whole, be for the best. Lady Rowley
could hardly have packed up her things and come away at a
day's notice, whatever your father might have done. I'll
call to-morrow at luncheon time.
Yours always,
F. O.
There was nothing objectionable in this letter,--excepting always the
"Dear Emily,"--nothing which it was not imperative on Colonel Osborne
to communicate to the person to whom it was addressed. Trevelyan must
now go up-stairs and tell the contents of the letter to his wife.
But he felt that he had created for himself a terrible trouble. He
must tell his wife what was in the letter, but the very telling of
it would be a renewing of the soreness of his wound. And then what
was to be done in reference to the threatened visit for the Sunday
morning? Trevelyan knew very well that were his wife denied at
that hour, Colonel Osborne would understand the whole matter. He
had doubtless in his anger intended that Colonel Osborne should
understand the whole matter; but he was calmer now than he had been
then, and almost wished that the command given by him had not been so
definite and imperious. He remained with his arm on the mantel-piece,
thinking of it, for some ten minutes, and then went up into the
drawing-room. "Emily," he said, walking up to the table at which she
was sitting, "you had better read that letter."
"I would so much rather not," she replied haughtily.
"Then Nora can read it. It concerns you both equally."
Nora, with hesitating hand, took the letter and read it. "They are
not to come after all," said she, "till next February."
"And why not?" asked Mrs. Trevelyan.
"Something about the session. I don't quite understand."
"Lord Bowles is to come from Canada," said Louis, "and they think he
would prefer being here in the winter. I dare say he would."
"But what has that to do with papa?"
"I suppose they must both be here together," said Nora.
"I call that very hard indeed," said Mrs. Trevelyan.
"I can't agree with you there," said her husband. "His coming at all
is so much of a favour that it is almost a job."
"I don't see that it is a job at all," said Mrs. Trevelyan. "Somebody
is wanted, and nobody can know more of the service than papa does.
But as the other man is a lord, I suppose papa must give way. Does he
say anything about mamma, Nora?"
"You had better read the letter yourself," said Trevelyan, who was
desirous that his wife should know of the threatened visit.
"No, Louis, I shall not do that. You must not blow hot and cold too.
Till the other day I should have thought that Colonel Osborne's
letters were as innocent as an old newspaper. As you have supposed
them to be poisoned I will have nothing to do with them."
This speech made him very angry. It seemed that his wife, who
had yielded to him, was determined to take out the value of her
submission in the most disagreeable words which she could utter. Nora
now closed the letter and handed it back to her brother-in-law. He
laid it down on the table beside him, and sat for a while with his
eyes fixed upon his book. At last he spoke again. "Colonel Osborne
says that he will call to-morrow at luncheon time. You can admit him,
if you please, and thank him for the trouble he has taken in this
matter."
"I shall not remain in the room if he be admitted," said Mrs.
Trevelyan.
There was silence again for some minutes, and the cloud upon
Trevelyan's brow became blacker than before. Then he rose from his
chair and walked round to the sofa on which his wife was sitting. "I
presume," said he, "that your wishes and mine in this matter must be
the same."
"I cannot tell what your wishes are," she replied. "I never was more
in the dark on any subject in my life. My wishes at present are
confined to a desire to save you as far as may be possible from the
shame which must be attached to your own suspicions."
"I have never had any suspicions."
"A husband without suspicions does not intercept his wife's letters.
A husband without suspicions does not call in the aid of his servants
to guard his wife. A husband without suspicions--"
"Emily," exclaimed Nora Rowley, "how can you say such things,--on
purpose to provoke him?"
"Yes; on purpose to provoke me," said Trevelyan.
"And have I not been provoked? Have I not been injured? You say now
that you have not suspected me, and yet in what condition do I find
myself? Because an old woman has chosen to talk scandal about me, I
am placed in a position in my own house which is disgraceful to you
and insupportable to myself. This man has been in the habit of coming
here on Sundays, and will, of course, know that we are at home. You
must manage it as you please. If you choose to receive him, I will go
up-stairs."
"Why can't you let him come in and go away, just as usual?" said
Nora.
"Because Louis has made me promise that I will never willingly be
in his company again," said Mrs. Trevelyan. "I would have given the
world to avoid a promise so disgraceful to me; but it was exacted,
and it shall be kept." Having so spoken, she swept out of the room,
and went up-stairs to the nursery. Trevelyan sat for an hour with his
book before him, reading or pretending to read, but his wife did not
come down-stairs. Then Nora went up to her, and he descended to his
solitude below. So far he had hardly gained much by the enforced
obedience of his wife.
On the next morning the three went to church together, and as they
were walking home Trevelyan's heart was filled with returning
gentleness towards his wife. He could not bear to be at wrath with
her after the church service which they had just heard together.
But he was softer-hearted than was she, and knowing this, was
almost afraid to say anything that would again bring forth from her
expressions of scorn. As soon as they were alone within the house he
took her by the hand and led her apart. "Let all this be," said he,
"as though it had never been."
"That will hardly be possible, Louis," she answered. "I cannot forget
that I have been--cautioned."
"But cannot you bring yourself to believe that I have meant it all
for your good?"
"I have never doubted it, Louis;--never for a moment. But it has hurt
me to find that you should think that such caution was needed for my
good."
It was almost on his tongue to beg her pardon, to acknowledge that
he had made a mistake, and to implore her to forget that he had ever
made an objection to Colonel Osborne's visit. He remembered at this
moment the painful odiousness of that "Dear Emily;" but he had to
reconcile himself even to that, telling himself that, after all,
Colonel Osborne was an old man,--a man older even than his wife's
father. If she would only have met him with gentleness, he would have
withdrawn his command, and have acknowledged that he had been wrong.
But she was hard, dignified, obedient, and resentful. "It will, I
think," he said, "be better for both of us that he should be asked in
to lunch to-day."
"You must judge of that," said Emily. "Perhaps, upon the whole, it
will be best. I can only say that I will not be present. I will lunch
up-stairs with baby, and you can make what excuse for me you please."
This was all very bad, but it was in this way that things were
allowed to arrange themselves. Richard was told that Colonel Osborne
was coming to lunch, and when he came something was muttered to him
about Mrs. Trevelyan being not quite well. It was Nora who told the
innocent fib, and though she did not tell it well, she did her very
best. She felt that her brother-in-law was very wretched, and she was
most anxious to relieve him. Colonel Osborne did not stay long, and
then Nora went up-stairs to her sister.
Louis Trevelyan felt that he had disgraced himself. He had meant to
have been strong, and he had, as he knew, been very weak. He had
meant to have acted in a high-minded, honest, manly manner; but
circumstances had been so untoward with him, that on looking at his
own conduct, it seemed to him to have been mean, and almost false
and cowardly. As the order for the exclusion of this hated man from
his house had been given, he should at any rate have stuck to the
order. At the moment of his vacillation he had simply intended to
make things easy for his wife; but she had taken advantage of his
vacillation, and had now clearly conquered him. Perhaps he respected
her more than he had done when he was resolving, three or four days
since, that he would be the master in his own house; but it may be
feared that the tenderness of his love for her had been impaired.
Late in the afternoon his wife and sister-in-law came down dressed
for walking, and, finding Trevelyan in the library, they asked him to
join them,--it was a custom with them to walk in the park on a Sunday
afternoon,--and he at once assented, and went out with them. Emily,
who had had her triumph, was very gracious. There should not be a
word more said by her about Colonel Osborne. She would avoid that
gentleman, never receiving him in Curzon Street, and having as little
to say to him as possible elsewhere; but she would not throw his name
in her husband's teeth, or make any reference to the injury which had
so manifestly been done to her. Unless Louis should be indiscreet,
it should be as though it had been forgotten. As they walked by
Chesterfield House and Stanhope Street into the park, she began to
discuss the sermon they had heard that morning, and when she found
that that subject was not alluring, she spoke of a dinner to which
they were to go at Mrs. Fairfax's house. Louis Trevelyan was quite
aware that he was being treated as a naughty boy, who was to be
forgiven.
They went across Hyde Park into Kensington Gardens, and still the
same thing was going on. Nora found it to be almost impossible to say
a word. Trevelyan answered his wife's questions, but was otherwise
silent. Emily worked very hard at her mission of forgiveness, and
hardly ceased in her efforts at conciliatory conversation. Women
can work so much harder in this way than men find it possible to do!
She never flagged, but continued to be fluent, conciliatory, and
intolerably wearisome. On a sudden they came across two men together,
who, as they all knew, were barely acquainted with each other. These
were Colonel Osborne and Hugh Stanbury.
"I am glad to find you are able to be out," said the Colonel.
"Thanks; yes. I think my seclusion just now was almost as much due to
baby as to anything else. Mr. Stanbury, how is it we never see you
now?"
"It is the D. R., Mrs. Trevelyan;--nothing else. The D. R. is a most
grateful mistress, but somewhat exacting. I am allowed a couple of
hours on Sundays, but otherwise my time is wholly passed in Fleet
Street."
"How very unpleasant."
"Well; yes. The unpleasantness of this world consists chiefly in the
fact that when a man wants wages, he must earn them. The Christian
philosophers have a theory about it. Don't they call it the primeval
fall, original sin, and that kind of thing?"
"Mr. Stanbury, I won't have irreligion. I hope that doesn't come from
writing for the newspapers."
"Certainly not with me, Mrs. Trevelyan. I have never been put on
to take that branch yet. Scrubby does that with us, and does it
excellently. It was he who touched up the Ritualists, and then the
Commission, and then the Low Church bishops, till he didn't leave one
of them a leg to stand upon."
"What is it, then, that the Daily Record upholds?"
"It upholds the Daily Record. Believe in that and you will surely be
saved." Then he turned to Miss Rowley, and they two were soon walking
on together, each manifestly interested in what the other was saying,
though there was no word of tenderness spoken between them.
Colonel Osborne was now between Mr. and Mrs. Trevelyan. She would
have avoided the position had it been possible for her to do so.
While they were falling into their present places, she had made a
little mute appeal to her husband to take her away from the spot, to
give her his arm and return with her, to save her in some way from
remaining in company with the man to whose company for her he had
objected; but he took no such step. It had seemed to him that he
could take no such step without showing his hostility to Colonel
Osborne.
They walked on along the broad path together, and the Colonel was
between them.
"I hope you think it satisfactory,--about Sir Rowley," he said.
"Beggars must not be choosers, you know, Colonel Osborne. I felt a
little disappointed when I found that we were not to see them till
February next."
"They will stay longer then, you know, than they could now."
"I have no doubt when the time comes we shall all believe it to be
better."
"I suppose you think, Emily, that a little pudding to-day is better
than much to-morrow."
Colonel Osborne certainly had a caressing, would-be affectionate mode
of talking to women, which, unless it were reciprocated and enjoyed,
was likely to make itself disagreeable. No possible words could have
been more innocent than those he had now spoken; but he had turned
his face down close to her face, and had almost whispered them. And
then, too, he had again called her by her Christian name. Trevelyan
had not heard the words. He had walked on, making the distance
between him and the other man greater than was necessary, anxious to
show to his wife that he had no jealousy at such a meeting as this.
But his wife was determined that she would put an end to this state
of things, let the cost be what it might. She did not say a word to
Colonel Osborne, but addressed herself at once to her husband.
"Louis," she said, "will you give me your arm? We will go back, if
you please." Then she took her husband's arm, and turned herself and
him abruptly away from their companion.
The thing was done in such a manner that it was impossible that
Colonel Osborne should not perceive that he had been left in anger.
When Trevelyan and his wife had gone back a few yards, he was obliged
to return for Nora. He did so, and then rejoined his wife.
"It was quite unnecessary, Emily," he said, "that you should behave
like that."
"Your suspicions," she said, "have made it almost impossible for me
to behave with propriety."
"You have told him everything now," said Trevelyan.
"And it was requisite that he should be told," said his wife. Then
they walked home without interchanging another word. When they
reached their house, Emily at once went up to her own room, and
Trevelyan to his. They parted as though they had no common interest
which was worthy of a moment's conversation. And she by her step,
and gait, and every movement of her body showed to him that she was
not his wife now in any sense that could bring to him a feeling of
domestic happiness. Her compliance with his command was of no use
to him unless she could be brought to comply in spirit. Unless she
would be soft to him he could not be happy. He walked about his room
uneasily for half-an-hour, trying to shake off his sorrow, and then
he went up to her room. "Emily," he said, "for God's sake let all
this pass away."
"What is to pass away?"
"This feeling of rancour between you and me. What is the world to us
unless we can love one another? At any rate it will be nothing to
me."
"Do you doubt my love?" said she.
"No; certainly not."
"Nor I yours. Without love, Louis, you and I can not be happy. But
love alone will not make us so. There must be trust, and there must
also be forbearance. My feeling of annoyance will pass away in time;
and till it does, I will shew it as little as may be possible."
He felt that he had nothing more to say, and then he left her; but he
had gained nothing by the interview. She was still hard and cold, and
still assumed a tone which seemed to imply that she had manifestly
been the injured person.
Colonel Osborne, when he was left alone, stood for a few moments on
the spot, and then with a whistle, a shake of the head, and a little
low chuckle of laughter, rejoined the crowd.
CHAPTER VII.
MISS JEMIMA STANBURY, OF EXETER.
[Illustration]
Miss Jemima Stanbury, the aunt of our friend Hugh, was a maiden lady,
very much respected, indeed, in the city of Exeter. It is to be
hoped that no readers of these pages will be so un-English as to be
unable to appreciate the difference between county society and town
society,--the society, that is, of a provincial town, or so ignorant
as not to know also that there may be persons so privileged, that
although they live distinctly within a provincial town, there
is accorded to them, as though by brevet rank, all the merit of
living in the county. In reference to persons so privileged, it is
considered that they have been made free from the contamination of
contiguous bricks and mortar by certain inner gifts, probably of
birth, occasionally of profession, possibly of merit. It is very
rarely, indeed, that money alone will bestow this acknowledged
rank; and in Exeter, which by the stringency and excellence of its
well-defined rules on such matters, may perhaps be said to take the
lead of all English provincial towns, money alone has never availed.
Good blood, especially if it be blood good in Devonshire, is rarely
rejected. Clergymen are allowed within the pale,--though by no means
as certainly as used to be the case; and, indeed, in these days of
literates, clergymen have to pass harder examinations than those ever
imposed upon them by bishops' chaplains, before they are admitted ad
eundem among the chosen ones of the city of Exeter. The wives and
daughters of the old prebendaries see well to that. And, as has been
said, special merit may prevail. Sir Peter Mancrudy, the great Exeter
physician, has won his way in,--not at all by being Sir Peter, which
has stood in his way rather than otherwise,--but by the acknowledged
excellence of his book about saltzes. Sir Peter Mancrudy is supposed
to have quite a metropolitan, almost a European reputation,--and
therefore is acknowledged to belong to the county set, although he
never dines out at any house beyond the limits of the city. Now, let
it be known that no inhabitant of Exeter ever achieved a clearer
right to be regarded as "county," in opposition to "town," than had
Miss Jemima Stanbury. There was not a tradesman in Exeter who was not
aware of it, and who did not touch his hat to her accordingly. The
men who drove the flies, when summoned to take her out at night,
would bring oats with them, knowing how probable it was that they
might have to travel far. A distinct apology was made if she was
asked to drink tea with people who were simply "town." The Noels of
Doddescombe Leigh, the Cliffords of Budleigh Salterton, the Powels of
Haldon, the Cheritons of Alphington,--all county persons, but very
frequently in the city,--were greeted by her, and greeted her, on
terms of equality. Her most intimate friend was old Mrs. MacHugh,
the widow of the last dean but two, who could not have stood higher
had she been the widow of the last bishop. And then, although Miss
Stanbury was intimate with the Frenches of Heavitree, with the
Wrights of Northernhay, with the Apjohns of Helion Villa,--a really
magnificent house, two miles out of the city on the Crediton
Road, and with the Crumbies of Cronstadt House, Saint Ide's,--who
would have been county people, if living in the country made the
difference;--although she was intimate with all these families,
her manner to them was not the same, nor was it expected to be the
same, as with those of her own acknowledged set. These things are
understood in Exeter so well!
Miss Stanbury belonged to the county set, but she lived in a large
brick house, standing in the Close, almost behind the Cathedral.
Indeed it was so close to the eastern end of the edifice that a
carriage could not be brought quite up to her door. It was a large
brick house, very old, with a door in the middle, and five steps
ascending to it between high iron rails. On each side of the door
there were two windows on the ground floor, and above that there
were three tiers of five windows each, and the house was double
throughout, having as many windows looking out behind into a gloomy
courtyard. But the glory of the house consisted in this, that there
was a garden attached to it, a garden with very high walls, over
which the boughs of trees might be seen, giving to the otherwise
gloomy abode a touch of freshness in the summer, and a look of space
in the winter, which no doubt added something to the reputation even
of Miss Stanbury. The fact,--for it was a fact,--that there was
no gloomier or less attractive spot in the whole city than Miss
Stanbury's garden, when seen inside, did not militate against this
advantage. There were but half-a-dozen trees, and a few square yards
of grass that was never green, and a damp ungravelled path on which
no one ever walked. Seen from the inside the garden was not much;
but, from the outside, it gave a distinct character to the house, and
produced an unexpressed acknowledgment that the owner of it ought to
belong to the county set.
The house and all that was in it belonged to Miss Stanbury herself,
as did also many other houses in the neighbourhood. She was the owner
of the "Cock and Bottle," a very decent second class inn on the other
side of the Close, an inn supposed to have clerical tendencies, which
made it quite suitable for a close. The choristers took their beer
there, and the landlord was a retired verger. Nearly the whole of
one side of a dark passage leading out of the Close towards the High
Street belonged to her; and though the passage be narrow and the
houses dark, the locality is known to be good for trade. And she
owned two large houses in the High Street, and a great warehouse
at St. Thomas's, and had been bought out of land by the Railway at
St. David's,--much to her own dissatisfaction, as she was wont to
express herself, but, undoubtedly, at a very high price. It will be
understood therefore, that Miss Stanbury was wealthy, and that she
was bound to the city in which she lived by peculiar ties.
But Miss Stanbury had not been born to this wealth, nor can she
be said to have inherited from her forefathers any of these high
privileges which had been awarded to her. She had achieved them by
the romance of her life and the manner in which she had carried
herself amidst its vicissitudes. Her father had been vicar of
Nuncombe Putney, a parish lying twenty miles west of Exeter, among
the moors. And on her father's death, her brother, also now dead, had
become vicar of the same parish,--her brother, whose only son, Hugh
Stanbury, we already know, working for the "D. R." up in London. When
Miss Stanbury was twenty-one she became engaged to a certain Mr.
Brooke Burgess, the eldest son of a banker in Exeter,--or, it might,
perhaps, be better said, a banker himself; for at the time Mr.
Brooke Burgess was in the firm. It need not here be told how various
misfortunes arose, how Mr. Burgess quarrelled with the Stanbury
family, how Jemima quarrelled with her own family, how, when her
father died, she went out from Nuncombe Putney parsonage, and lived
on the smallest pittance in a city lodging, how her lover was untrue
to her and did not marry her, and how at last he died and left her
every shilling that he possessed.
The Devonshire people, at the time, had been much divided as to the
merits of the Stanbury quarrel. There were many who said that the
brother could not have acted otherwise than he did; and that Miss
Stanbury, though by force of character and force of circumstances
she had weathered the storm, had in truth been very indiscreet. The
results, however, were as have been described. At the period of which
we treat, Miss Stanbury was a very rich lady, living by herself in
Exeter, admitted, without question, to be one of the county set, and
still at variance with her brother's family. Except to Hugh, she had
never spoken a word to one of them since her brother's death. When
the money came into her hands, she at that time being over forty
and her nephew being then just ten years old, she had undertaken to
educate him, and to start him in the world. We know how she had kept
her word, and how and why she had withdrawn herself from any further
responsibility in the matter.
And in regard to this business of starting the young man she had been
careful to let it be known that she would do no more than start him.
In the formal document, by means of which she had made the proposal
to her brother, she had been careful to let it be understood that
simple education was all that she intended to bestow upon him,--"and
that only," she had added, "in the event of my surviving till his
education be completed." And to Hugh himself she had declared that
any allowance which she made him after he was called to the Bar,
was only made in order to give him room for his foot, a spot of
ground from whence to make his first leap. We know how he made that
leap, infinitely to the disgust of his aunt, who, when he refused
obedience to her in the matter of withdrawing from the Daily Record,
immediately withdrew from him, not only her patronage and assistance,
but even her friendship and acquaintance. This was the letter which
she wrote to him--
I don't think that writing radical stuff for a penny
newspaper is a respectable occupation for a gentleman, and
I will have nothing to do with it. If you choose to do
such work, I cannot help it; but it was not for such that
I sent you to Harrow and Oxford, nor yet up to London and
paid £100 a year to Mr. Lambert. I think you are treating
me badly, but that is nothing to your bad treatment of
yourself. You need not trouble yourself to answer this,
unless you are prepared to say that you will not write any
more stuff for that penny newspaper. Only I wish to be
understood. I will have no connection that I can help,
and no acquaintance at all, with radical scribblers and
incendiaries.
JEMIMA STANBURY.
The Close, Exeter, April 15, 186--.
Hugh Stanbury had answered this, thanking his aunt for past favours,
and explaining to her,--or striving to do so,--that he felt it to be
his duty to earn his bread, as a means of earning it had come within
his reach. He might as well have spared himself the trouble. She
simply wrote a few words across his own letter in red ink:--"The
bread of unworthiness should never be earned or eaten;" and then sent
the letter back under a blank envelope to her nephew.
She was a thorough Tory of the old school. Had Hugh taken to writing
for a newspaper that had cost sixpence, or even threepence, for its
copies, she might perhaps have forgiven him. At any rate the offence
would not have been so flagrant. And had the paper been conservative
instead of liberal, she would have had some qualms of conscience
before she gave him up. But to live by writing for a newspaper! and
for a penny newspaper!! and for a penny radical newspaper!!! It was
more than she could endure. Of what nature were the articles which he
contributed it was impossible that she should have any idea, for no
consideration would have induced her to look at a penny newspaper, or
to admit it within her doors. She herself took in the John Bull and
the Herald, and daily groaned deeply at the way in which those once
great organs of true British public feeling were becoming demoralised
and perverted. Had any reduction been made in the price of either of
them, she would at once have stopped her subscription. In the matter
of politics she had long since come to think that everything good was
over. She hated the name of Reform so much that she could not bring
herself to believe in Mr. Disraeli and his bill. For many years she
had believed in Lord Derby. She would fain believe in him still if
she could. It was the great desire of her heart to have some one in
whom she believed. In the bishop of her diocese she did believe, and
annually sent him some little comforting present from her own hand.
And in two or three of the clergymen around her she believed, finding
in them a flavour of the unascetic godliness of ancient days which
was gratifying to her palate. But in politics there was hardly a name
remaining to which she could fix her faith and declare that there
should be her guide. For awhile she thought she would cling to Mr.
Lowe; but, when she made inquiry, she found that there was no base
there of really well-formed conservative granite. The three gentlemen
who had dissevered themselves from Mr. Disraeli when Mr. Disraeli was
passing his Reform bill, were doubtless very good in their way; but
they were not big enough to fill her heart. She tried to make herself
happy with General Peel, but General Peel was after all no more than
a shade to her. But the untruth of others never made her untrue, and
she still talked of the excellence of George III. and the glories of
the subsequent reign. She had a bust of Lord Eldon, before which she
was accustomed to stand with hands closed and to weep,--or to think
that she wept.
She was a little woman, now nearly sixty years of age, with bright
grey eyes, and a strong Roman nose, and thin lips, and a sharp-cut
chin. She wore a head-gear that almost amounted to a mob-cap, and
beneath it her grey hair was always frizzled with the greatest care.
Her dress was invariably of black silk, and she had five gowns,--one
for church, one for evening parties, one for driving out, and one for
evenings at home, and one for mornings. The dress, when new, always
went to church. Nothing, she was wont to say, was too good for the
Lord's house. In the days of crinolines she had protested that she
had never worn one,--a protest, however, which was hardly true; and
now, in these later days, her hatred was especially developed in
reference to the head-dresses of young women. "Chignon" was a word
which she had never been heard to pronounce. She would talk of "those
bandboxes which the sluts wear behind their noddles;" for Miss
Stanbury allowed herself the use of much strong language. She was
very punctilious in all her habits, breakfasting ever at half-past
eight, and dining always at six. Half-past five had been her time,
till the bishop, who, on an occasion, was to be her guest, once
signified to her that such an hour cut up the day and interfered with
clerical work. Her lunch was always of bread and cheese, and they who
lunched with her either eat that,--or the bread without the cheese.
An afternoon "tea" was a thing horrible to her imagination. Tea and
buttered toast at half-past eight in the evening was the great luxury
of her life. She was as strong as a horse, and had never hitherto
known a day's illness. As a consequence of this, she did not believe
in the illness of other people,--especially not in the illness of
women. She did not like a girl who could not drink a glass of beer
with her bread and cheese in the middle of the day, and she thought
that a glass of port after dinner was good for everybody. Indeed, she
had a thorough belief in port wine, thinking that it would go far to
cure most miseries. But she could not put up with the idea that a
woman, young or old, should want the stimulus of a glass of sherry
to support her at any odd time of the day. Hot concoctions of strong
drink at Christmas she would allow to everybody, and was very strong
in recommending such comforts to ladies blessed, or about to be
blessed, with babies. She took the sacrament every month, and gave
away exactly a tenth of her income to the poor. She believed that
there was a special holiness in a tithe of a thing, and attributed
the commencement of the downfall of the Church of England to rent
charges, and the commutation of clergymen's incomes. Since Judas,
there had never been, to her thinking, a traitor so base, or an
apostate so sinful, as Colenso; and yet, of the nature of Colenso's
teaching she was as ignorant as the towers of the cathedral opposite
to her.
She believed in Exeter, thinking that there was no other provincial
town in England in which a maiden lady could live safely and
decently. London to her was an abode of sin; and though, as we have
seen, she delighted to call herself one of the county set, she did
not love the fields and lanes. And in Exeter the only place for a
lady was the Close. Southernhay and Northernhay might be very well,
and there was doubtless a respectable neighbourhood on the Heavitree
side of the town; but for the new streets, and especially for the
suburban villas, she had no endurance. She liked to deal at dear
shops; but would leave any shop, either dear or cheap, in regard to
which a printed advertisement should reach her eye. She paid all her
bills at the end of each six months, and almost took a delight in
high prices. She would rejoice that bread should be cheap, and grieve
that meat should be dear, because of the poor; but in regard to other
matters no reduction in the cost of an article ever pleased her.
She had houses as to which she was told by her agent that the rents
should be raised; but she would not raise them. She had others which
it was difficult to let without lowering the rents, but she would not
lower them. All change was to her hateful and unnecessary.
She kept three maid-servants, and a man came in every day to clean
the knives and boots. Service with her was well requited, and much
labour was never exacted. But it was not every young woman who could
live with her. A rigidity as to hours, as to religious exercises,
and as to dress, was exacted, under which many poor girls altogether
broke down; but they who could stand this rigidity came to know that
their places were very valuable. No one belonging to them need want
for aught, when once the good opinion of Miss Stanbury had been
earned. When once she believed in her servant there was nobody like
that servant. There was not a man in Exeter could clean a boot except
Giles Hickbody,--and if not in Exeter, then where else? And her own
maid Martha, who had lived with her now for twenty years, and who had
come with her to the brick house when she first inhabited it, was
such a woman that no other servant anywhere was fit to hold a candle
to her. But then Martha had great gifts,--was never ill, and really
liked having sermons read to her.
Such was Miss Stanbury, who had now discarded her nephew Hugh. She
had never been tenderly affectionate to Hugh, or she would hardly
have asked him to live in London on a hundred a year. She had never
really been kind to him since he was a boy, for although she had paid
for him, she had been almost penurious in her manner of doing so,
and had repeatedly given him to understand, that in the event of her
death not a shilling would be left to him. Indeed, as to that matter
of bequeathing her money, it was understood that it was her purpose
to let it all go back to the Burgess family. With the Burgess family
she had kept up no sustained connection, it being quite understood
that she was never to be asked to meet the only one of them now left
in Exeter. Nor was it as yet known to any one in what manner the
money was to go back, how it was to be divided, or who were to be the
recipients. But she had declared that it should go back, explaining
that she had conceived it to be a duty to let her own relations know
that they would not inherit her wealth at her death.
About a week after she had sent back poor Hugh's letter with the
endorsement on it as to unworthy bread, she summoned Martha to the
back parlour in which she was accustomed to write her letters. It was
one of the theories of her life that different rooms should be used
only for the purposes for which they were intended. She never allowed
pens and ink up into the bed-rooms, and had she ever heard that any
guest in her house was reading in bed, she would have made an instant
personal attack upon that guest, whether male or female, which would
have surprised that guest. Poor Hugh would have got on better with
her had he not been discovered once smoking in the garden. Nor would
she have writing materials in the drawing-room or dining-room. There
was a chamber behind the dining-room in which there was an inkbottle,
and if there was a letter to be written, let the writer go there
and write it. In the writing of many letters, however, she put no
confidence, and regarded penny postage as one of the strongest
evidences of the coming ruin.
"Martha," she said, "I want to speak to you. Sit down. I think I am
going to do something." Martha sat down, but did not speak a word.
There had been no question asked of her, and the time for speaking
had not come. "I am writing to Mrs. Stanbury, at Nuncombe Putney; and
what do you think I am saying to her?"
Now the question had been asked, and it was Martha's duty to reply.
"Writing to Mrs. Stanbury, ma'am?"
"Yes, to Mrs. Stanbury."
"It ain't possible for me to say, ma'am, unless it's to put Mr. Hugh
from going on with the newspapers."
"When my nephew won't be controlled by me, I shan't go elsewhere
to look for control over him; you may be sure of that, Martha. And
remember, Martha, I don't want to have his name mentioned again in
the house. You will tell them all so, if you please."
"He was a very nice gentleman, ma'am."
"Martha, I won't have it; and there's an end of it. I won't have it.
Perhaps I know what goes to the making of a nice gentleman as well as
you do."
"Mr. Hugh, ma'am,--"
"I won't have it, Martha. And when I say so, let there be an end
of it." As she said this, she got up from her chair, and shook her
head, and took a turn about the room. "If I'm not mistress here, I'm
nobody."
"Of course you're mistress here, ma'am."
"And if I don't know what's fit to be done, and what's not fit, I'm
too old to learn; and, what's more, I won't be taught. I'm not going
to have my house crammed with radical incendiary stuff, printed with
ink that stinks, on paper made out of straw. If I can't live without
penny literature, at any rate I'll die without it. Now listen to me."
"Yes, ma'am."
"I have asked Mrs. Stanbury to send one of the girls over here."
"To live, ma'am?" Martha's tone as she asked the question, showed how
deeply she felt its importance.
"Yes, Martha; to live."
"You'll never like it, ma'am."
"I don't suppose I shall."
"You'll never get on with it, ma'am; never. The young lady'll be out
of the house in a week; or if she ain't, somebody else will."
"You mean yourself."
"I'm only a servant, ma'am, and it don't signify about me."
"You're a fool."
"That's true, ma'am, I don't doubt."
"I've sent for her, and we must do the best we can. Perhaps she won't
come."
"She'll come fast enough," said Martha. "But whether she'll stay,
that's a different thing. I don't see how it's possible she's to
stay. I'm told they're feckless, idle young ladies. She'll be so
soft, ma'am, and you,--"
"Well; what of me?"
"You'll be so hard, ma'am!"
"I'm not a bit harder than you, Martha; nor yet so hard. I'll do my
duty, or at least I'll try. Now you know all about it, and you may go
away. There's the letter, and I mean to go out and post it myself."
CHAPTER VIII.
"I KNOW IT WILL DO."
Miss Stanbury carried her letter all the way to the chief post-office
in the city, having no faith whatever in those little subsidiary
receiving houses which are established in different parts of the
city. As for the iron pillar boxes which had been erected of late
years for the receipt of letters, one of which,--a most hateful thing
to her,--stood almost close to her own hall door, she had not the
faintest belief that any letter put into one of them would ever reach
its destination. She could not understand why people should not walk
with their letters to a respectable post-office instead of chucking
them into an iron stump,--as she called it,--out in the middle of the
street with nobody to look after it. Positive orders had been given
that no letter from her house should ever be put into the iron post.
Her epistle to her sister-in-law, of whom she never spoke otherwise
than as Mrs. Stanbury, was as follows:--
The Close, Exeter, 22nd April, 186--.
MY DEAR SISTER STANBURY,
Your son, Hugh, has taken to courses of which I do not
approve, and therefore I have put an end to my connection
with him. I shall be happy to entertain your daughter
Dorothy in my house if you and she approve of such a plan.
Should you agree to this, she will be welcome to receive
you or her sister,--_not her brother_,--in my house any
Wednesday morning between half-past nine and half-past
twelve. I will endeavour to make my house pleasant to her
and useful, and will make her an allowance of £25 per
annum for her clothes as long as she may remain with me. I
shall expect her to be regular at meals, to be constant in
going to church, and not to read modern novels.
I intend the arrangement to be permanent, but of course I
must retain the power of closing it if, and when, I shall
see fit. Its permanence must be contingent on my life. I
have no power of providing for any one _after my death_.
Yours truly,
JEMIMA STANBURY.
I hope the young lady does not have any false hair about
her.
When this note was received at Nuncombe Putney the amazement which it
occasioned was extreme. Mrs. Stanbury, the widow of the late vicar,
lived in a little morsel of a cottage on the outskirts of the
village, with her two daughters, Priscilla and Dorothy. Their whole
income, out of which it was necessary that they should pay rent for
their cottage, was less than £70 per annum. During the last few
months a five-pound note now and again had found its way to Nuncombe
Putney out of the coffers of the "D. R.;" but the ladies there were
most unwilling to be so relieved, thinking that their brother's
career was of infinitely more importance than their comforts or even
than their living. They were very poor, but they were accustomed
to poverty. The elder sister was older than Hugh, but Dorothy, the
younger, to whom this strange invitation was now made, was two years
younger than her brother, and was now nearly twenty-six. How they had
lived, and dressed themselves, and had continued to be called ladies
by the inhabitants of the village was, and is, and will be a mystery
to those who have had the spending of much larger incomes, but have
still been always poor. But they had lived, had gone to church every
Sunday in decent apparel, and had kept up friendly relations with the
family of the present vicar, and with one or two other neighbours.
When the letter had been read first by the mother, and then aloud,
and then by each of them separately, in the little sitting-room in
the cottage, there was silence among them,--for neither of them
desired to be the first to express an opinion. Nothing could be more
natural than the proposed arrangement, had it not been made unnatural
by a quarrel existing nearly throughout the whole life of the person
most nearly concerned. Priscilla, the elder daughter, was the one of
the family who was generally the ruler, and she at last expressed an
opinion adverse to the arrangement. "My dear, you would never be able
to bear it," said Priscilla.
"I suppose not," said Mrs. Stanbury, plaintively.
"I could try," said Dorothy.
"My dear, you don't know that woman," said Priscilla.
"Of course I don't know her," said Dorothy.
"She has always been very good to Hugh," said Mrs. Stanbury.
"I don't think she has been good to him at all," said Priscilla.
"But think what a saving it would be," said Dorothy. "And I could
send home half of what Aunt Stanbury says she would give me."
"You must not think of that," said Priscilla, "because she expects
you to be dressed."
"I should like to try," she said, before the morning was over,--"if
you and mamma don't think it would be wrong."
The conference that day ended in a written request to Aunt Stanbury
that a week might be allowed for consideration,--the letter being
written by Priscilla, but signed with her mother's name,--and with a
very long epistle to Hugh, in which each of the ladies took a part,
and in which advice and decision were demanded. It was very evident
to Hugh that his mother and Dorothy were for compliance, and that
Priscilla was for refusal. But he never doubted for a moment. "Of
course she will go," he said in his answer to Priscilla; "and she
must understand that Aunt Stanbury is a most excellent woman, as true
as the sun, thoroughly honest, with no fault but this, that she likes
her own way. Of course Dolly can go back again if she finds the house
too hard for her." Then he sent another five-pound note, observing
that Dolly's journey to Exeter would cost money, and that her
wardrobe would want some improvement.
"I'm very glad that it isn't me," said Priscilla, who, however, did
not attempt to oppose the decision of the man of the family. Dorothy
was greatly gratified by the excitement of the proposed change in
her life, and the following letter, the product of the wisdom of the
family, was written by Mrs. Stanbury:--
Nuncombe Putney, 1st May, 186--.
MY DEAR SISTER STANBURY,
We are all very thankful for the kindness of your offer,
which my daughter Dorothy will accept with feelings of
affectionate gratitude. I think you will find her docile,
good-tempered, and amiable; but a mother, of course,
speaks well of her own child. She will endeavour to comply
with your wishes in all things reasonable. She, of course,
understands that should the arrangement not suit, she will
come back home on the expression of your wish that it
should be so. And she will, of course, do the same, if she
should find that living in Exeter does not suit herself.
[This sentence was inserted at the instance of Priscilla,
after much urgent expostulation.] Dorothy will be ready
to go to you on any day you may fix after the 7th of this
month.
Believe me to remain,
Your affectionate sister-in-law,
P. STANBURY.
"She's going to come," said Miss Stanbury to Martha, holding the
letter in her hand.
"I never doubted her coming, ma'am," said Martha.
"And I mean her to stay, unless it's her own fault. She'll have the
small room up-stairs, looking out front, next to mine. And you must
go and fetch her."
"Go and fetch her, ma'am?"
"Yes. If you won't, I must."
"She ain't a child, ma'am. She's twenty-five years old, and surely
she can come to Exeter by herself, with a railroad all the way from
Lessboro'."
"There's no place a young woman is insulted in so bad as those
railway carriages, and I won't have her come by herself. If she is to
live with me, she shall begin decently at any rate."
Martha argued the matter, but was of course beaten, and on the day
fixed started early in the morning for Nuncombe Putney, and returned
in the afternoon to the Close with her charge. By the time that she
had reached the house she had in some degree reconciled herself to
the dangerous step that her mistress had taken, partly by perceiving
that in face Dorothy Stanbury was very like her brother Hugh, and
partly, perhaps, by finding that the young woman's manner to herself
was both gentle and sprightly. She knew well that gentleness alone,
without some back-bone of strength under it, would not long succeed
with Miss Stanbury. "As far as I can judge, ma'am, she's a sweet
young lady," said Martha, when she reported her arrival to her
mistress, who had retired up-stairs to her own room, in order that
she might thus hear a word of tidings from her lieutenant, before she
showed herself on the field of action.
"Sweet! I hate your sweets," said Miss Stanbury.
"Then why did you send for her, ma'am?"
"Because I was an old fool. But I must go down and receive her, I
suppose."
Then Miss Stanbury went down, almost trembling as she went. The
matter to her was one of vital importance. She was going to change
the whole tenour of her life for the sake,--as she told herself,--of
doing her duty by a relative whom she did not even know. But we may
fairly suppose that there had in truth been a feeling beyond that,
which taught her to desire to have some one near her to whom she
might not only do her duty as guardian, but whom she might also love.
She had tried this with her nephew; but her nephew had been too
strong for her, too far from her, too unlike to herself. When he came
to see her he had smoked a short pipe,--which had been shocking to
her,--and he had spoken of Reform, and Trades' Unions, and meetings
in the parks, as though they had not been Devil's ordinances. And he
was very shy of going to church,--utterly refusing to be taken there
twice on the same Sunday. And he had told his aunt that owing to a
peculiar and unfortunate weakness in his constitution he could not
listen to the reading of sermons. And then she was almost certain
that he had once kissed one of the maids! She had found it impossible
to manage him in any way; and when he positively declared himself as
permanently devoted to the degrading iniquities of penny newspapers,
she had thought it best to cast him off altogether. Now, thus late in
life, she was going to make another venture, to try an altogether new
mode of living,--in order, as she said to herself, that she might be
of some use to somebody,--but, no doubt, with a further unexpressed
hope in her bosom, that the solitude of her life might be relieved by
the companionship of some one whom she might love. She had arrayed
herself in a clean cap and her evening gown, and she went down-stairs
looking sternly, with a fully-developed idea that she must initiate
her new duties by assuming a mastery at once. But inwardly she
trembled, and was intensely anxious as to the first appearance of
her niece. Of course there would be a little morsel of a bonnet.
She hated those vile patches,--dirty flat daubs of millinery as
she called them; but they had become too general for her to refuse
admittance for such a thing within her doors. But a chignon, a
bandbox behind the noddle,--she would not endure. And then there were
other details of feminine gear, which shall not be specified, as to
which she was painfully anxious,--almost forgetting in her anxiety
that the dress of this young woman whom she was about to see must
have ever been regulated by the closest possible economy.
The first thing she saw on entering the room was a dark straw hat,
a straw hat with a strong penthouse flap to it, and her heart was
immediately softened.
"My dear," she said, "I am glad to see you."
Dorothy, who, on her part, was trembling also, whose position was one
to justify most intense anxiety, murmured some reply.
"Take off your hat," said the aunt, "and let me give you a kiss."
The hat was taken off and the kiss was given. There was certainly no
chignon there. Dorothy Stanbury was light haired, with almost flaxen
ringlets, worn after the old-fashioned way which we used to think so
pretty when we were young. She had very soft grey eyes, which ever
seemed to beseech you to do something when they looked at you, and
her mouth was a beseeching mouth. There are women who, even amidst
their strongest efforts at giving assistance to others, always look
as though they were asking aid themselves, and such a one was Dorothy
Stanbury. Her complexion was pale, but there was always present in
it a tint of pink running here and there, changing with every word
she spoke, changing indeed with every pulse of her heart. Nothing
ever was softer than her cheek; but her hands were thin and hard,
and almost fibrous with the working of the thread upon them. She
was rather tall than otherwise, but that extreme look of feminine
dependence which always accompanied her, took away something even
from the appearance of her height.
"These are all real, at any rate," said her aunt, taking hold of the
curls, "and won't be hurt by a little cold water."
Dorothy smiled but said nothing, and was then taken up to her
bed-room. Indeed, when the aunt and niece sat down to dinner together
Dorothy had hardly spoken. But Miss Stanbury had spoken, and things
upon the whole had gone very well.
"I hope you like roast chicken, my dear?" said Miss Stanbury.
"Oh, thank you."
"And bread sauce? Jane, I do hope the bread sauce is hot."
If the reader thinks that Miss Stanbury was indifferent to
considerations of the table, the reader is altogether ignorant of
Miss Stanbury's character. When Miss Stanbury gave her niece the
liver-wing, and picked out from the attendant sausages one that had
been well browned and properly broken in the frying, she meant to do
a real kindness.
"And now, my dear, there are mashed potatoes and bread sauce. As for
green vegetables, I don't know what has become of them. They tell me
I may have green peas from France at a shilling a quart; but if I
can't have English green peas, I won't have any."
Miss Stanbury was standing up as she said this,--as she always did on
such occasions, liking to have a full mastery over the dish.
"I hope you like it, my dear?"
"Everything is so very nice."
"That's right. I like to see a young woman with an appetite. Remember
that God sends the good things for us to eat; and as long as we
don't take more than our share, and give away something to those who
haven't a fair share of their own, I for one think it quite right to
enjoy my victuals. Jane, this bread sauce isn't hot. It never is hot.
Don't tell me; I know what hot is!"
Dorothy thought that her aunt was very angry; but Jane knew Miss
Stanbury better, and bore the scolding without shaking in her shoes.
"And now, my dear, you must take a glass of port wine. It will do you
good after your journey."
Dorothy attempted to explain that she never did drink any wine, but
her aunt talked down her scruples at once.
"One glass of port wine never did anybody any harm, and as there is
port wine, it must be intended that somebody should drink it."
Miss Stanbury, as she sipped hers out very slowly, seemed to enjoy it
much. Although May had come, there was a fire in the grate, and she
sat with her toes on the fender, and her silk dress folded up above
her knees. She sat quite silent in this position for a quarter of an
hour, every now and then raising her glass to her lips. Dorothy sat
silent also. To her, in the newness of her condition, speech was
impossible.
"I think it will do," said Miss Stanbury at last.
As Dorothy had no idea what would do, she could make no reply to
this.
"I'm sure it will do," said Miss Stanbury, after another short
interval. "You're as like my poor sister as two eggs. You don't have
headaches, do you?"
Dorothy said that she was not ordinarily affected in that way.
"When girls have headaches it comes from tight-lacing, and not
walking enough, and carrying all manner of nasty smells about with
them. I know what headaches mean. How is a woman not to have a
headache, when she carries a thing on the back of her poll as big
as a gardener's wheel-barrow? Come, it's a fine evening, and we'll
go out and look at the towers. You've never even seen them yet, I
suppose?"
So they went out, and finding the verger at the Cathedral door, he
being a great friend of Miss Stanbury's, they walked up and down the
aisles, and Dorothy was instructed as to what would be expected from
her in regard to the outward forms of religion. She was to go to the
Cathedral service on the morning of every week-day, and on Sundays in
the afternoon. On Sunday mornings she was to attend the little church
of St. Margaret. On Sunday evenings it was the practice of Miss
Stanbury to read a sermon in the dining-room to all of whom her
household consisted. Did Dorothy like daily services? Dorothy, who
was more patient than her brother, and whose life had been much less
energetic, said that she had no objection to going to church every
day when there was not too much to do.
"There never need be too much to do to attend the Lord's house," said
Miss Stanbury, somewhat angrily.
"Only if you've got to make the beds," said Dorothy.
"My dear, I beg your pardon," said Miss Stanbury. "I beg your pardon,
heartily. I'm a thoughtless old woman, I know. Never mind. Now, we'll
go in."
Later in the evening, when she gave her niece a candlestick to go to
bed, she repeated what she had said before.
"It'll do very well, my dear. I'm sure it'll do. But if you read in
bed either night or morning, I'll never forgive you."
This last caution was uttered with so much energy, that Dorothy gave
a little jump as she promised obedience.
CHAPTER IX.
SHEWING HOW THE QUARREL PROGRESSED AGAIN.
On one Sunday morning, when the month of May was nearly over, Hugh
Stanbury met Colonel Osborne in Curzon Street, not many yards from
Trevelyan's door. Colonel Osborne had just come from the house, and
Stanbury was going to it. Hugh had not spoken to Osborne since the
day, now a fortnight since, on which both of them had witnessed
the scene in the park; but on that occasion they had been left
together, and it had been impossible for them not to say a few words
about their mutual friends. Osborne had expressed his sorrow that
there should be any misunderstanding, and had called Trevelyan a
"confounded fool." Stanbury had suggested that there was something in
it which they two probably did not understand, and that matters would
be sure to come all right. "The truth is Trevelyan bullies her," said
Osborne; "and if he goes on with that he'll be sure to get the worst
of it." Now,--on this present occasion,--Stanbury asked whether he
would find the ladies at home. "Yes, they are both there," said
Osborne. "Trevelyan has just gone out in a huff. She'll never be able
to go on living with him. Anybody can see that with half an eye."
Then he had passed on, and Hugh Stanbury knocked at the door.
He was shown up into the drawing-room, and found both the sisters
there; but he could see that Mrs. Trevelyan had been in tears. The
avowed purpose of his visit,--that is, the purpose which he had
avowed to himself,--was to talk about his sister Dorothy. He had told
Miss Rowley, while walking in the park with her, how Dorothy had been
invited over to Exeter by her aunt, and how he had counselled his
sister to accept the invitation. Nora had expressed herself very
interested as to Dorothy's fate, and had said how much she wished
that she knew Dorothy. We all understand how sweet it is, when two
such persons as Hugh Stanbury and Nora Rowley cannot speak of their
love for each other, to say these tender things in regard to some
one else. Nora had been quite anxious to know how Dorothy had been
received by that old conservative warrior, as Hugh Stanbury had
called his aunt, and Hugh had now come to Curzon Street with a letter
from Dorothy in his pocket. But when he saw that there had been some
cause for trouble, he hardly knew how to introduce his subject.
"Trevelyan is not at home?" he asked.
"No," said Emily, with her face turned away. "He went out and left us
a quarter of an hour since. Did you meet Colonel Osborne?"
"I was speaking to him in the street not a moment since." As he
answered he could see that Nora was making some sign to her sister.
Nora was most anxious that Emily should not speak of what had just
occurred, but her signs were all thrown away. "Somebody must tell
him," said Mrs. Trevelyan, "and I don't know who can do so better
than so old a friend as Mr. Stanbury."
"Tell what, and to whom?" he asked.
"No, no, no," said Nora.
"Then I must tell him myself," said she, "that is all. As for
standing this kind of life, it is out of the question. I should
either destroy myself or go mad."
"If I could do any good I should be so happy," said Stanbury.
"Nobody can do any good between a man and his wife," said Nora.
Then Mrs. Trevelyan began to tell her story, putting aside, with an
impatient motion of her hands, the efforts which her sister made to
stop her. She was very angry, and as she told it, standing up, all
trace of sobbing soon disappeared from her voice. "The fact is," she
said, "he does not know his own mind, or what to fear or what not to
fear. He told me that I was never to see Colonel Osborne again."
"What is the use, Emily, of your repeating that to Mr. Stanbury?"
"Why should I not repeat it? Colonel Osborne is papa's oldest friend,
and mine too. He is a man I like very much,--who is a real friend to
me. As he is old enough to be my father, one would have thought that
my husband could have found no objection."
"I don't know much about his age," said Stanbury.
"It does make a difference. It must make a difference. I should not
think of becoming so intimate with a younger man. But, however, when
my husband told me that I was to see him no more,--though the insult
nearly killed me, I determined to obey him. An order was given that
Colonel Osborne should not be admitted. You may imagine how painful
it was; but it was given, and I was prepared to bear it."
"But he had been lunching with you on that Sunday."
"Yes; that is just it. As soon as it was given Louis would rescind
it, because he was ashamed of what he had done. He was so jealous
that he did not want me to see the man; and yet he was so afraid that
it should be known that he ordered me to see him. He ordered him into
the house at last, and I,--I went away up-stairs."
"That was on the Sunday that we met you in the park?" asked Stanbury.
"What is the use of going back to all that?" said Nora.
"Then I met him by chance in the park," continued Mrs. Trevelyan,
"and because he said a word which I knew would anger my husband, I
left him abruptly. Since that my husband has begged that things might
go on as they were before. He could not bear that Colonel Osborne
himself should think that he was jealous. Well; I gave way, and the
man has been here as before. And now there has been a scene which has
been disgraceful to us all. I cannot stand it, and I won't. If he
does not behave himself with more manliness,--I will leave him."
"But what can I do?"
"Nothing, Mr. Stanbury," said Nora.
"Yes; you can do this. You can go to him from me, and can tell him
that I have chosen you as a messenger because you are his friend.
You can tell him that I am willing to obey him in anything. If he
chooses, I will consent that Colonel Osborne shall be asked never
to come into my presence again. It will be very absurd; but if he
chooses, I will consent. Or I will let things go on as they are, and
continue to receive my father's old friend when he comes. But if I
do, I will not put up with an imputation on my conduct because he
does not like the way in which the gentleman thinks fit to address
me. I take upon myself to say that if any man alive spoke to me as
he ought not to speak, I should know how to resent it myself. But I
cannot fly into a passion with an old gentleman for calling me by my
Christian name, when he has done so habitually for years."
From all this it will appear that the great godsend of a rich
marriage, with all manner of attendant comforts, which had come in
the way of the Rowley family as they were living at the Mandarins,
had not turned out to be an unmixed blessing. In the matter of the
quarrel, as it had hitherto progressed, the husband had perhaps been
more in the wrong than his wife; but the wife, in spite of all her
promises of perfect obedience, had proved herself to be a woman very
hard to manage. Had she been earnest in her desire to please her lord
and master in this matter of Colonel Osborne's visits,--to please
him even after he had so vacillated in his own behests,--she might
probably have so received the man as to have quelled all feeling of
jealousy in her husband's bosom. But instead of doing so she had
told herself that as she was innocent, and as her innocence had been
acknowledged, and as she had been specially instructed to receive
this man whom she had before been specially instructed not to
receive, she would now fall back exactly into her old manner with
him. She had told Colonel Osborne never to allude to that meeting
in the park, and to ask no creature as to what had occasioned her
conduct on that Sunday; thus having a mystery with him, which of
course he understood as well as she did. And then she had again taken
to writing notes to him and receiving notes from him,--none of which
she showed to her husband. She was more intimate with him than ever,
and yet she hardly ever mentioned his name to her husband. Trevelyan,
acknowledging to himself that he had done no good by his former
interference, feeling that he had put himself in the wrong on that
occasion, and that his wife had got the better of him, had borne with
all this, with soreness and a moody savageness of general conduct,
but still without further words of anger with reference to the man
himself. But now, on this Sunday, when his wife had been closeted
with Colonel Osborne in the back drawing-room, leaving him with his
sister-in-law, his temper had become too hot for him, and he had
suddenly left the house, declaring that he would not walk with the
two women on that day. "Why not, Louis?" his wife had said, coming up
to him. "Never mind why not, but I shall not," he had answered; and
then he left the room.
"What is the matter with him?" Colonel Osborne had asked.
"It is impossible to say what is the matter with him," Mrs. Trevelyan
had replied. After that she had at once gone up-stairs to her child,
telling herself that she was doing all that the strictest propriety
could require in leaving the man's society as soon as her husband
was gone. Then there was an awkward minute or two between Nora and
Colonel Osborne, and he took his leave.
Stanbury at last promised that he would see Trevelyan, repeating,
however, very frequently that often-used assertion, that no task
is so hopeless as that of interfering between a man and his wife.
Nevertheless he promised, and undertook to look for Trevelyan at
the Acrobats on that afternoon. At last he got a moment in which
to produce the letter from his sister, and was able to turn the
conversation for a few minutes to his own affairs. Dorothy's letter
was read and discussed by both the ladies with much zeal. "It is
quite a strange world to me," said Dorothy, "but I am beginning to
find myself more at my ease than I was at first. Aunt Stanbury is
very good-natured, and when I know what she wants, I think I shall be
able to please her. What you said of her disposition is not so bad to
me, as of course a girl in my position does not expect to have her
own way."
"Why shouldn't she have her share of her own way as well as anybody
else?" said Mrs. Trevelyan.
"Poor Dorothy would never want to have her own way," said Hugh.
"She ought to want it," said Mrs. Trevelyan.
"She has spirit enough to turn if she's trodden on," said Hugh.
"That's more than what most women have," said Mrs. Trevelyan.
Then he went on with the letter. "She is very generous, and has given
me £6 5_s._ in advance of my allowance. When I said I would send part
of it home to mamma, she seemed to be angry, and said that she wanted
me always to look nice about my clothes. She told me afterwards to do
as I pleased, and that I might try my own way for the first quarter.
So I was frightened, and only sent thirty shillings. We went out
the other evening to drink tea with Mrs. MacHugh, an old lady whose
husband was once dean. I had to go, and it was all very nice. There
were a great many clergymen there, but many of them were young men."
"Poor Dorothy," exclaimed Nora. "One of them was the minor canon who
chants the service every morning. He is a bachelor--" "Then there is
a hope for her," said Nora--"and he always talks a little as though
he were singing the Litany." "That's very bad," said Nora; "fancy
having a husband to sing the Litany to you always." "Better that,
perhaps, than having him always singing something else," said Mrs.
Trevelyan.
It was decided between them that Dorothy's state might on the whole
be considered as flourishing, but that Hugh was bound as a brother
to go down to Exeter and look after her. He explained, however, that
he was expressly debarred from calling on his sister, even between
the hours of half-past nine and half-past twelve on Wednesday
mornings, and that he could not see her at all unless he did so
surreptitiously.
"If I were you I would see my sister in spite of all the old viragos
in Exeter," said Mrs. Trevelyan. "I have no idea of anybody taking so
much upon themselves."
"You must remember, Mrs. Trevelyan, that she has taken upon herself
much also in the way of kindness, in doing what perhaps I ought to
call charity. I wonder what I should have been doing now if it were
not for my Aunt Stanbury."
He took his leave, and went at once from Curzon Street to Trevelyan's
club, and found that Trevelyan had not been there as yet. In another
hour he called again, and was about to give it up, when he met the
man whom he was seeking on the steps.
"I was looking for you," he said.
"Well, here I am."
It was impossible not to see in the look of Trevelyan's face, and not
to hear in the tone of his voice, that he was, at the moment, in an
angry and unhappy frame of mind. He did not move as though he were
willing to accompany his friend, and seemed almost to know beforehand
that the approaching interview was to be an unpleasant one.
"I want to speak to you, and perhaps you wouldn't mind taking a turn
with me," said Stanbury.
But Trevelyan objected to this, and led the way into the club
waiting-room. A club waiting-room is always a gloomy, unpromising
place for a confidential conversation, and so Stanbury felt it to be
on the present occasion. But he had no alternative. There they were
together, and he must do as he had promised. Trevelyan kept on his
hat and did not sit down, and looked very gloomy. Stanbury having
to commence without any assistance from outward auxiliaries, almost
forgot what it was that he had promised to do.
"I have just come from Curzon Street," he said.
"Well!"
"At least I was there about two hours ago."
"It doesn't matter, I suppose, whether it was two hours or two
minutes," said Trevelyan.
"Not in the least. The fact is this; I happened to come upon the two
girls there, when they were very unhappy, and your wife asked me to
come and say a word or two to you."
"Was Colonel Osborne there?"
"No; I had met him in the street a minute or two before."
"Well, now; look here, Stanbury. If you'll take my advice, you'll
keep your hands out of this. It is not but that I regard you as being
as good a friend as I have in the world; but, to own the truth, I
cannot put up with interference between myself and my wife."
"Of course you understand that I only come as a messenger."
[Illustration: "I only come as a messenger."]
"You had better not be a messenger in such a cause. If she has
anything to say she can say it to myself."
"Am I to understand that you will not listen to me?"
"I had rather not."
"I think you are wrong," said Stanbury.
"In that matter you must allow me to judge for myself. I can easily
understand that a young woman like her, especially with her sister to
back her, should induce such a one as you to take her part."
"I am taking nobody's part. You wrong your wife, and you especially
wrong Miss Rowley."
"If you please, Stanbury, we will say nothing more about it." This
Trevelyan said holding the door of the room half open in his hand, so
that the other was obliged to pass out through it.
"Good evening," said Stanbury, with much anger.
"Good evening," said Trevelyan, with an assumption of indifference.
Stanbury went away in absolute wrath, though the trouble which he had
had in the interview was much less than he had anticipated, and the
result quite as favourable. He had known that no good would come of
his visit. And yet he was now full of anger against Trevelyan, and
had become a partisan in the matter,--which was exactly that which he
had resolutely determined that he would not become. "I believe that
no woman on earth could live with him," he said to himself as he
walked away. "It was always the same with him,--a desire for mastery,
which he did not know how to use when he had obtained it. If it were
Nora, instead of the other sister, he would break her sweet heart
within a month."
Trevelyan dined at his club, and hardly spoke a word to any one
during the evening. At about eleven he started to walk home, but
went by no means straight thither, taking a long turn through St.
James's Park, and by Pimlico. It was necessary that he should make
up his mind as to what he would do. He had sternly refused the
interference of a friend, and he must be prepared to act on his own
responsibility. He knew well that he could not begin again with his
wife on the next day as though nothing had happened. Stanbury's visit
to him, if it had done nothing else, had made this impossible. He
determined that he would not go to her room to-night, but would see
her as early as possible in the morning;--and would then talk to her
with all the wisdom of which he was master.
How many husbands have come to the same resolution; and how few of
them have found the words of wisdom to be efficacious!
CHAPTER X.
HARD WORDS.
[Illustration]
It is to be feared that men in general do not regret as they should
do any temporary ill-feeling, or irritating jealousy between husbands
and wives, of which they themselves have been the cause. The author
is not speaking now of actual love-makings, of intrigues and devilish
villany, either perpetrated or imagined; but rather of those passing
gusts of short-lived and unfounded suspicion to which, as to other
accidents, very well-regulated families may occasionally be liable.
When such suspicion rises in the bosom of a wife, some woman
intervening or being believed to intervene between her and the man
who is her own, that woman who has intervened or been supposed to
intervene, will either glory in her position or bewail it bitterly,
according to the circumstances of the case. We will charitably
suppose that, in a great majority of such instances, she will bewail
it. But when such painful jealous doubts annoy the husband, the
man who is in the way will almost always feel himself justified in
extracting a slightly pleasurable sensation from the transaction.
He will say to himself probably, unconsciously indeed, and with
no formed words, that the husband is an ass, an ass if he be in
a twitter either for that which he has kept or for that which he
has been unable to keep, that the lady has shewn a good deal of
appreciation, and that he himself is--is--is--quite a Captain bold
of Halifax. All the while he will not have the slightest intention
of wronging the husband's honour, and will have received no greater
favour from the intimacy accorded to him than the privilege of
running on one day to Marshall and Snellgrove's, the haberdashers,
and on another to Handcocks', the jewellers. If he be allowed to buy
a present or two, or to pay a few shillings here or there, he has
achieved much. Terrible things now and again do occur, even here in
England; but women, with us, are slow to burn their household gods.
It happens, however, occasionally, as we are all aware, that the
outward garments of a domestic deity will be a little scorched; and
when this occurs, the man who is the interloper, will generally find
a gentle consolation in his position, let its interest be ever so
flaccid and unreal, and its troubles in running about, and the like,
ever so considerable and time-destructive.
It was so certainly with Colonel Osborne when he became aware that
his intimacy with Mrs. Trevelyan had caused her husband uneasiness.
He was not especially a vicious man, and had now, as we know, reached
a time of life when such vice as that in question might be supposed
to have lost its charm for him. A gentleman over fifty, popular
in London, with a seat in Parliament, fond of good dinners, and
possessed of everything which the world has to give, could hardly
have wished to run away with his neighbour's wife, or to have
destroyed the happiness of his old friend's daughter. Such wickedness
had never come into his head; but he had a certain pleasure in being
the confidential friend of a very pretty woman; and when he heard
that that pretty woman's husband was jealous, the pleasure was
enhanced rather than otherwise. On that Sunday, as he had left the
house in Curzon Street, he had told Stanbury that Trevelyan had just
gone off in a huff, which was true enough, and he had walked from
thence down Clarges Street, and across Piccadilly to St. James's
Street, with a jauntier step than usual, because he was aware that he
himself had been the occasion of that trouble. This was very wrong;
but there is reason to believe that many such men as Colonel Osborne,
who are bachelors at fifty, are equally malicious.
He thought a good deal about it on that evening, and was still
thinking about it on the following morning. He had promised to go up
to Curzon Street on the Monday,--really on some most trivial mission,
on a matter of business which no man could have taken in hand whose
time was of the slightest value to himself or any one else. But now
that mission assumed an importance in his eyes, and seemed to require
either a special observance or a special excuse. There was no real
reason why he should not have stayed away from Curzon Street for the
next fortnight; and had he done so he need have made no excuse to
Mrs. Trevelyan when he met her. But the opportunity for a little
excitement was not to be missed, and instead of going he wrote to her
the following note:--
Albany, Monday.
DEAR EMILY,
What was it all about yesterday? I was to have come up
with the words of that opera, but perhaps it will be
better to send it. If it be not wicked, do tell me whether
I am to consider myself as a banished man. I thought that
our little meetings were so innocent,--and so pleasant!
The green-eyed monster is of all monsters the most
monstrous,--and the most unreasonable. Pray let me have a
line, if it be not forbidden.
Yours always heartily,
F. O.
Putting aside all joking, I beg you to remember that I
consider myself always entitled to be regarded by you as
your most sincere friend.
When this was brought to Mrs. Trevelyan, about twelve o'clock in
the day, she had already undergone the infliction of those words
of wisdom which her husband had prepared for her, and which were
threatened at the close of the last chapter. Her husband had come
up to her while she was yet in her bed-room, and had striven hard
to prevail against her. But his success had been very doubtful. In
regard to the number of words, Mrs. Trevelyan certainly had had
the best of it. As far as any understanding, one of another, was
concerned, the conversation had been useless. She believed herself to
be injured and aggrieved, and would continue so to assert, let him
implore her to listen to him as loudly as he might. "Yes;--I will
listen, and I will obey you," she had said, "but I will not endure
such insults without telling you that I feel them." Then he had left
her, fully conscious that he had failed, and went forth out of his
house into the City, to his club, to wander about the streets, not
knowing what he had best do to bring back that state of tranquillity
at home which he felt to be so desirable.
Mrs. Trevelyan was alone when Colonel Osborne's note was brought to
her, and was at that moment struggling with herself in anger against
her husband. If he laid any command upon her, she would execute it;
but she would never cease to tell him that he had ill-used her. She
would din it into his ears, let him come to her as often as he might
with his wise words. Wise words! What was the use of wise words when
a man was such a fool in nature? And as for Colonel Osborne,--she
would see him if he came to her three times a day, unless her husband
gave some clearly intelligible order to the contrary. She was
fortifying her mind with this resolution when Colonel Osborne's
letter was brought to her. She asked whether any servant was waiting
for an answer. No,--the servant, who had left it, had gone at once.
She read the note, and sat working, with it before her, for a quarter
of an hour; and then walked over to her desk and answered it.
MY DEAR COLONEL OSBORNE,
It will be best to say nothing whatever about the
occurrence of yesterday; and if possible, not to
think of it. As far as I am concerned, I wish for no
change;--except that people should be more reasonable.
You can call of course whenever you please; and I am very
grateful for your expression of friendship.
Yours most sincerely,
EMILY TREVELYAN.
Thanks for the words of the opera.
When she had written this, being determined that all should be open
and above board, she put a penny stamp on the envelope, and desired
that the letter should be posted. But she destroyed that which she
had received from Colonel Osborne. In all things she would act as she
would have done if her husband had not been so foolish, and there
could have been no reason why she should have kept so unimportant a
communication.
In the course of the day Trevelyan passed through the hall to the
room which he himself was accustomed to occupy behind the parlour,
and as he did so saw the note lying ready to be posted, took it up,
and read the address. He held it for a moment in his hand, then
replaced it on the hall table, and passed on. When he reached his own
table he sat down hurriedly, and took up in his hand some Review that
was lying ready for him to read. But he was quite unable to fix his
mind upon the words before him. He had spoken to his wife on that
morning in the strongest language he could use as to the unseemliness
of her intimacy with Colonel Osborne; and then, the first thing she
had done when his back was turned was to write to this very Colonel
Osborne, and tell him, no doubt, what had occurred between her and
her husband. He sat thinking of it all for many minutes. He would
probably have declared himself that he had thought of it for an hour
as he sat there. Then he got up, went up-stairs and walked slowly
into the drawing-room. There he found his wife sitting with her
sister. "Nora," he said, "I want to speak to Emily. Will you forgive
me, if I ask you to leave us for a few minutes?" Nora, with an
anxious look at Emily, got up and left the room.
"Why do you send her away?" said Mrs. Trevelyan.
"Because I wish to be alone with you for a few minutes. Since what I
said to you this morning, you have written to Colonel Osborne."
"Yes;--I have. I do not know how you have found it out; but I suppose
you keep a watch on me."
"I keep no watch on you. As I came into the house, I saw your letter
lying in the hall."
"Very well. You could have read it if you pleased."
"Emily, this matter is becoming very serious, and I strongly advise
you to be on your guard in what you say. I will bear much for you,
and much for our boy; but I will not bear to have my name made a
reproach."
"Sir, if you think your name is shamed by me, we had better part,"
said Mrs. Trevelyan, rising from her chair, and confronting him with
a look before which his own almost quailed.
"It may be that we had better part," he said, slowly. "But in the
first place I wish you to tell me what were the contents of that
letter."
"If it was there when you came in, no doubt it is there still. Go and
look at it."
"That is no answer to me. I have desired you to tell me what are its
contents."
"I shall not tell you. I will not demean myself by repeating anything
so insignificant in my own justification. If you suspect me of
writing what I should not write, you will suspect me also of lying to
conceal it."
"Have you heard from Colonel Osborne this morning?"
"I have."
"And where is his letter?"
"I have destroyed it."
Again he paused, trying to think what he had better do, trying to be
calm. And she stood still opposite to him, confronting him with the
scorn of her bright angry eyes. Of course, he was not calm. He was
the very reverse of calm. "And you refuse to tell me what you wrote,"
he said.
"The letter is there," she answered, pointing away towards the door.
"If you want to play the spy, go and look at it for yourself."
"Do you call me a spy?"
"And what have you called me? Because you are a husband, is the
privilege of vituperation to be all on your side?"
"It is impossible that I should put up with this," he said;--"quite
impossible. This would kill me. Anything is better than this. My
present orders to you are not to see Colonel Osborne, not to write
to him or have any communication with him, and to put under cover to
me, unopened, any letter that may come from him. I shall expect your
implicit obedience to these orders."
"Well;--go on."
"Have I your promise?"
"No;--no. You have no promise. I will make no promise exacted from me
in so disgraceful a manner."
"You refuse to obey me?"
"I will refuse nothing, and will promise nothing."
"Then we must part;--that is all. I will take care that you shall
hear from me before to-morrow morning."
So saying, he left the room, and, passing through the hall, saw that
the letter had been taken away.
CHAPTER XI.
LADY MILBOROUGH AS AMBASSADOR.
"Of course, I know you are right," said Nora to her sister;--"right
as far as Colonel Osborne is concerned; but nevertheless you ought to
give way."
"And be trampled upon?" said Mrs. Trevelyan.
"Yes; and be trampled upon, if he should trample on you;--which,
however, he is the last man in the world to do."
"And to endure any insult and any names? You yourself--you would be a
Griselda, I suppose."
"I don't want to talk about myself," said Nora, "nor about Griselda.
But I know that, however unreasonable it may seem, you had better
give way to him now and tell him what there was in the note to
Colonel Osborne."
"Never! He has ordered me not to see him or to write to him, or to
open his letters,--having, mind you, ordered just the reverse a day
or two before; and I will obey him. Absurd as it is, I will obey him.
But as for submitting to him, and letting him suppose that I think
he is right;--never! I should be lying to him then, and I will never
lie to him. He has said that we must part, and I suppose it will be
better so. How can a woman live with a man that suspects her? He
cannot take my baby from me."
There were many such conversations as the above between the two
sisters before Mrs. Trevelyan received from her husband the
communication with which she had been threatened. And Nora, acting on
her own judgment in the matter, made an attempt to see Mr. Trevelyan,
writing to him a pretty little note, and beseeching him to be kind to
her. But he declined to see her, and the two women sat at home, with
the baby between them, holding such pleasant conversations as that
above narrated. When such tempests occur in a family, a woman will
generally suffer the least during the thick of the tempest. While
the hurricane is at the fiercest, she will be sustained by the most
thorough conviction that the right is on her side, that she is
aggrieved, that there is nothing for her to acknowledge, and no
position that she need surrender. Whereas her husband will desire a
compromise, even amidst the violence of the storm. But afterwards,
when the wind has lulled, but while the heavens around are still all
black and murky, then the woman's sufferings begin. When passion
gives way to thought and memory, she feels the loneliness of her
position,--the loneliness, and the possible degradation. It is all
very well for a man to talk about his name and his honour; but it is
the woman's honour and the woman's name that are, in truth, placed in
jeopardy. Let the woman do what she will, the man can, in truth, show
his face in the world;--and, after awhile, does show his face. But
the woman may be compelled to veil hers, either by her own fault, or
by his. Mrs. Trevelyan was now told that she was to be separated from
her husband, and she did not, at any rate, believe that she had done
any harm. But, if such separation did come, where could she live,
what could she do, what position in the world would she possess?
Would not her face be, in truth, veiled as effectually as though she
had disgraced herself and her husband?
And then there was that terrible question about the child. Mrs.
Trevelyan had said a dozen times to her sister that her husband could
not take the boy away from her. Nora, however, had never assented to
this, partly from a conviction of her own ignorance, not knowing what
might be the power of a husband in such a matter, and partly thinking
that any argument would be good and fair by which she could induce
her sister to avoid a catastrophe so terrible as that which was now
threatened.
"I suppose he could take him, if he chose," she said at last.
"I don't believe he is wicked like that," said Mrs. Trevelyan. "He
would not wish to kill me."
"But he will say that he loves baby as well as you do."
"He will never take my child from me. He could never be so bad as
that."
"And you will never be so bad as to leave him," said Nora after a
pause. "I will not believe that it can come to that. You know that he
is good at heart,--that nobody on earth loves you as he does."
So they went on for two days, and on the evening of the second day
there came a letter from Trevelyan to his wife. They had neither of
them seen him, although he had been in and out of the house. And
on the afternoon of the Sunday a new grievance, a very terrible
grievance, was added to those which Mrs. Trevelyan was made to bear.
Her husband had told one of the servants in the house that Colonel
Osborne was not to be admitted. And the servant to whom he had given
this order was the--cook. There is no reason why a cook should be
less trustworthy in such a matter than any other servant; and in
Mr. Trevelyan's household there was a reason why she should be more
so,--as she, and she alone, was what we generally call an old family
domestic. She had lived with her master's mother, and had known her
master when he was a boy. Looking about him, therefore, for some one
in his house to whom he could speak,--feeling that he was bound to
convey the order through some medium,--he called to him the ancient
cook, and imparted to her so much of his trouble as was necessary
to make the order intelligible. This he did with various ill-worded
assurances to Mrs. Prodgers that there really was nothing amiss. But
when Mrs. Trevelyan heard what had been done,--which she did from
Mrs. Prodgers herself, Mrs. Prodgers having been desired by her
master to make the communication,--she declared to her sister that
everything was now over. She could never again live with a husband
who had disgraced his wife by desiring her own cook to keep a guard
upon her. Had the footman been instructed not to admit Colonel
Osborne, there would have been in such instruction some apparent
adherence to the recognised usages of society. If you do not desire
either your friend or your enemy to be received into your house, you
communicate your desire to the person who has charge of the door. But
the cook!
"And now, Nora, if it were you, do you mean to say that you would
remain with him?" asked Mrs. Trevelyan.
Nora simply replied that anything under any circumstances would be
better than a separation.
On the morning of the third day there came the following letter:--
Wednesday, June 1, 12 midnight.
DEAREST EMILY,
You will readily believe me when I say that I never in my
life was so wretched as I have been during the last two
days. That you and I should be in the same house together
and not able to speak to each other is in itself a misery,
but this is terribly enhanced by the dread lest this state
of things should be made to continue.
I want you to understand that I do not in the least
suspect you of having as yet done anything wrong,--or
having even said anything injurious either to my position
as your husband, or to your position as my wife. But I
cannot but perceive that you are allowing yourself to be
entrapped into an intimacy with Colonel Osborne which if
it be not checked, will be destructive to my happiness and
your own. After what had passed before, you cannot have
thought it right to receive letters from him which I was
not to see, or to write letters to him of which I was
not to know the contents. It must be manifest to you that
such conduct on your part is wrong as judged by any of
the rules by which a wife's conduct can be measured.
And yet you have refused even to say that this shall be
discontinued! I need hardly explain to you that if you
persist in this refusal you and I cannot continue to live
together as man and wife. All my hopes and prospects in
life will be blighted by such a separation. I have not as
yet been able to think what I should do in such wretched
circumstances. And for you, as also for Nora, such a
catastrophe would be most lamentable. Do, therefore, think
of it well, and write me such a letter as may bring me
back to your side.
There is only one friend in the world to whom I could
endure to talk of this great grief, and I have been to
her and told her everything. You will know that I mean
Lady Milborough. After much difficult conversation I
have persuaded her to see you, and she will call in
Curzon Street to-morrow about twelve. There can be no
kinder-hearted, or more gentle woman in the world than
Lady Milborough; nor did any one ever have a warmer friend
than both you and I have in her. Let me implore you then
to listen to her, and be guided by her advice.
Pray believe, dearest Emily, that I am now, as ever, your
most affectionate husband, and that I have no wish so
strong as that we should not be compelled to part.
LOUIS TREVELYAN.
This epistle was, in many respects, a very injudicious composition.
Trevelyan should have trusted either to the eloquence of his own
written words, or to that of the ambassador whom he was about to
despatch; but by sending both he weakened both. And then there were
certain words in the letter which were odious to Mrs. Trevelyan, and
must have been odious to any young wife. He had said that he did not
"as yet" suspect her of having done anything wrong. And then, when
he endeavoured to explain to her that a separation would be very
injurious to herself, he had coupled her sister with her, thus
seeming to imply that the injury to be avoided was of a material
kind. She had better do what he told her, as, otherwise, she and her
sister would not have a roof over their head! That was the nature of
the threat which his words were supposed to convey.
The matter had become so serious, that Mrs. Trevelyan, haughty and
stiff-necked as she was, did not dare to abstain from showing the
letter to her sister. She had no other counsellor, at any rate, till
Lady Milborough came, and the weight of the battle was too great for
her own unaided spirit. The letter had been written late at night, as
was shown by the precision of the date, and had been brought to her
early in the morning. At first she had determined to say nothing
about it to Nora, but she was not strong enough to maintain such a
purpose. She felt that she needed the poor consolation of discussing
her wretchedness. She first declared that she would not see Lady
Milborough. "I hate her, and she knows that I hate her, and she ought
not to have thought of coming," said Mrs. Trevelyan.
But she was at last beaten out of this purpose by Nora's argument,
that all the world would be against her if she refused to see her
husband's old friend. And then, though the letter was an odious
letter, as she declared a dozen times, she took some little
comfort in the fact that not a word was said in it about the baby.
She thought that if she could take her child with her into any
separation, she could endure it, and her husband would ultimately be
conquered.
"Yes; I'll see her," she said, as they finished the discussion. "As
he chooses to send her, I suppose I had better see her. But I don't
think he does much to mend matters when he sends the woman whom he
knows I dislike more than any other in all London."
Exactly at twelve o'clock Lady Milborough's carriage was at the door.
Trevelyan was in the house at the time and heard the knock at the
door. During those two or three days of absolute wretchedness,
he spent most of his hours under the same roof with his wife and
sister-in-law, though he spoke to neither of them. He had had his
doubts as to the reception of Lady Milborough, and was, to tell
the truth, listening with most anxious ear, when her ladyship was
announced. His wife, however, was not so bitterly contumacious as
to refuse admittance to his friend, and he heard the rustle of the
ponderous silk as the old woman was shown up-stairs. When Lady
Milborough reached the drawing-room, Mrs. Trevelyan was alone.
"I had better see her by myself," she had said to her sister.
Nora had then left her, with one word of prayer that she would be as
little defiant as possible.
"That must depend," Emily had said, with a little shake of her head.
There had been a suggestion that the child should be with her, but
the mother herself had rejected this.
"It would be stagey," she had said, "and clap-trap. There is nothing
I hate so much as that."
She was sitting, therefore, quite alone, and as stiff as a man in
armour, when Lady Milborough was shown up to her.
And Lady Milborough herself was not at all comfortable as she
commenced the interview. She had prepared many wise words to be
spoken, but was not so little ignorant of the character of the woman
with whom she had to deal, as to suppose that the wise words would
get themselves spoken without interruption. She had known from the
first that Mrs. Trevelyan would have much to say for herself, and the
feeling that it would be so became stronger than ever as she entered
the room. The ordinary feelings between the two ladies were cold and
constrained, and then there was silence for a few moments when the
Countess had taken her seat. Mrs. Trevelyan had quite determined that
the enemy should fire the first shot.
"This is a very sad state of things," said the Countess.
"Yes, indeed, Lady Milborough."
"The saddest in the world;--and so unnecessary;--is it not?"
"Very unnecessary, indeed, as I think."
"Yes, my dear, yes. But, of course, we must remember--"
Then Lady Milborough could not clearly bring to her mind what it was
that she had to remember.
"The fact is, my dear, that all this kind of thing is too monstrous
to be thought of. Goodness, gracious, me; two young people like you
and Louis, who thoroughly love each other, and who have got a baby,
to think of being separated! Of course it is out of the question."
"You cannot suppose, Lady Milborough, that I want to be separated
from my husband?"
"Of course not. How should it be possible? The very idea is too
shocking to be thought of. I declare I haven't slept since Louis
was talking to me about it. But, my dear, you must remember, you
know, that a husband has a right to expect some--some--some--a sort
of--submission from his wife."
"He has a right to expect obedience, Lady Milborough."
"Of course; that is all one wants."
"And I will obey Mr. Trevelyan--in anything reasonable."
"But, my dear, who is to say what is reasonable? That, you see, is
always the difficulty. You must allow that your husband is the person
who ought to decide that."
"Has he told you that I have refused to obey him, Lady Milborough?"
The Countess paused a moment before she replied. "Well, yes; I think
he has," she said. "He asked you to do something about a letter,--a
letter to that Colonel Osborne, who is a man, my dear, really to be
very much afraid of; a man who has done a great deal of harm,--and
you declined. Now in a matter of that kind of course the husband--"
"Lady Milborough, I must ask you to listen to me. You have listened
to Mr. Trevelyan, and I must ask you to listen to me. I am sorry
to trouble you, but as you have come here about this unpleasant
business, you must forgive me if I insist upon it."
"Of course I will listen to you, my dear."
"I have never refused to obey my husband, and I do not refuse now.
The gentleman of whom you have been speaking is an old friend of my
father's, and has become my friend. Nevertheless, had Mr. Trevelyan
given me any plain order about him, I should have obeyed him. A
wife does not feel that her chances of happiness are increased when
she finds that her husband suspects her of being too intimate with
another man. It is a thing very hard to bear. But I would have
endeavoured to bear it, knowing how important it is for both our
sakes, and more especially for our child. I would have made excuses,
and would have endeavoured to think that this horrid feeling on his
part is nothing more than a short delusion."
"But my dear--"
"I must ask you to hear me out, Lady Milborough. But when he tells me
first that I am not to meet the man, and so instructs the servants;
then tells me that I am to meet him, and go on just as I was going
before, and then again tells me that I am not to see him, and again
instructs the servants,--and, above all, the cook!--that Colonel
Osborne is not to come into the house, then obedience becomes rather
difficult."
"Just say now that you will do what he wants, and then all will be
right."
"I will not say so to you, Lady Milborough. It is not to you that
I ought to say it. But as he has chosen to send you here, I will
explain to you that I have never disobeyed him. When I was free, in
accordance with Mr. Trevelyan's wishes, to have what intercourse I
pleased with Colonel Osborne, I received a note from that gentleman
on a most trivial matter. I answered it as trivially. My husband saw
my letter, closed, and questioned me about it. I told him that the
letter was still there, and that if he chose to be a spy upon my
actions he could open it and read it."
"My dear, how could you bring yourself to use the word spy to your
husband?"
"How could he bring himself to accuse me as he did? If he cares for
me let him come and beg my pardon for the insult he has offered me."
"Oh, Mrs. Trevelyan,--"
"Yes; that seems very wrong to you, who have not had to bear it. It
is very easy for a stranger to take a husband's part, and help to put
down a poor woman who has been ill-used. I have done nothing wrong,
nothing to be ashamed of; and I will not say that I have. I never
have spoken a word to Colonel Osborne that all the world might not
hear."
"Nobody has accused you, my dear."
"Yes; he has accused me, and you have accused me, and you will make
all the world accuse me. He may put me out of his house if he likes,
but he shall not make me say I have been wrong, when I know I have
been right. He cannot take my child from me."
"But he will."
"No," shouted Mrs. Trevelyan, jumping up from her chair, "no; he
shall never do that. I will cling to him so that he cannot separate
us. He will never be so wicked,--such a monster as that. I would go
about the world saying what a monster he had been to me." The passion
of the interview was becoming too great for Lady Milborough's power
of moderating it, and she was beginning to feel herself to be in a
difficulty. "Lady Milborough," continued Mrs. Trevelyan, "tell him
from me that I will bear anything but that. That I will not bear."
"Dear Mrs. Trevelyan, do not let us talk about it."
"Who wants to talk about it? Why do you come here and threaten me
with a thing so horrible? I do not believe you. He would not dare to
separate me and my--child."
"But you have only to say that you will submit yourself to him."
"I have submitted myself to him, and I will submit no further. What
does he want? Why does he send you here? He does not know what he
wants. He has made himself miserable by an absurd idea, and he wants
everybody to tell him that he has been right. He has been very wrong;
and if he desires to be wise now, he will come back to his home,
and say nothing further about it. He will gain nothing by sending
messengers here."
Lady Milborough, who had undertaken a most disagreeable task from
the purest motives of old friendship, did not like being called a
messenger; but the woman before her was so strong in her words, so
eager, and so passionate, that she did not know how to resent the
injury. And there was coming over her an idea, of which she herself
was hardly conscious, that after all, perhaps, the husband was not in
the right. She had come there with the general idea that wives, and
especially young wives, should be submissive. She had naturally taken
the husband's part; and having a preconceived dislike to Colonel
Osborne, she had been willing enough to think that precautionary
measures were necessary in reference to so eminent, and notorious,
and experienced a Lothario. She had never altogether loved Mrs.
Trevelyan, and had always been a little in dread of her. But she had
thought that the authority with which she would be invested on this
occasion, the manifest right on her side, and the undeniable truth of
her grand argument, that a wife should obey, would carry her, if not
easily, still successfully through all difficulties. It was probably
the case that Lady Milborough when preparing for her visit, had
anticipated a triumph. But when she had been closeted for an hour
with Mrs. Trevelyan, she found that she was not triumphant. She was
told that she was a messenger, and an unwelcome messenger; and she
began to feel that she did not know how she was to take herself away.
"I am sure I have done everything for the best," she said, getting up
from her chair.
"The best will be to send him back, and make him feel the truth."
"The best for you, my dear, will be to consider well what should be
the duty of a wife."
"I have considered, Lady Milborough. It cannot be a wife's duty to
acknowledge that she has been wrong in such a matter as this."
Then Lady Milborough made her curtsey and got herself away in some
manner that was sufficiently awkward, and Mrs. Trevelyan curtseyed
also as she rang the bell; and, though she was sore and wretched,
and, in truth, sadly frightened, she was not awkward. In that
encounter, so far as it had gone, she had been the victor.
As soon as she was alone and the carriage had been driven well away
from the door, Mrs. Trevelyan left the drawing-room and went up to
the nursery. As she entered she clothed her face with her sweetest
smile. "How is his own mother's dearest, dearest, darling duck?"
she said, putting out her arms and taking the boy from the nurse.
The child was at this time about ten months old, and was a strong,
hearty, happy infant, always laughing when he was awake and always
sleeping when he did not laugh, because his little limbs were
free from pain and his little stomach was not annoyed by internal
troubles. He kicked, and crowed, and sputtered, when his mother took
him, and put up his little fingers to clutch her hair, and was to her
as a young god upon the earth. Nothing in the world had ever been
created so beautiful, so joyous, so satisfactory, so divine! And they
told her that this apple of her eye was to be taken away from her!
No;--that must be impossible. "I will take him into my own room,
nurse, for a little while--you have had him all the morning," she
said; as though the "having baby" was a privilege over which there
might almost be a quarrel. Then she took her boy away with her,
and when she was alone with him, went through such a service in
baby-worship as most mothers will understand. Divide these two! No;
nobody should do that. Sooner than that, she, the mother, would
consent to be no more than a servant in her husband's house. Was not
her baby all the world to her?
On the evening of that day the husband and wife had an interview
together in the library, which, unfortunately, was as unsatisfactory
as Lady Milborough's visit. The cause of the failure of them all
lay probably in this,--that there was no decided point which, if
conceded, would have brought about a reconciliation. Trevelyan asked
for general submission, which he regarded as his right, and which in
the existing circumstances he thought it necessary to claim, and
though Mrs. Trevelyan did not refuse to be submissive she would make
no promise on the subject. But the truth was that each desired that
the other should acknowledge a fault, and that neither of them would
make that acknowledgment. Emily Trevelyan felt acutely that she
had been ill-used, not only by her husband's suspicion, but by the
manner in which he had talked of his suspicion to others,--to Lady
Milborough and the cook, and she was quite convinced that she was
right herself, because he had been so vacillating in his conduct
about Colonel Osborne. But Trevelyan was equally sure that justice
was on his side. Emily must have known his real wishes about Colonel
Osborne; but when she had found that he had rescinded his verbal
orders about the admission of the man to the house,--which he had
done to save himself and her from slander and gossip,--she had taken
advantage of this and had thrown herself more entirely than ever into
the intimacy of which he disapproved! When they met, each was so sore
that no approach to terms was made by them.
"If I am to be treated in that way, I would rather not live with
you," said the wife. "It is impossible to live with a husband who is
jealous."
"All I ask of you is that you shall promise me to have no further
communication with this man."
"I will make no promise that implies my own disgrace."
"Then we must part; and if that be so, this house will be given up.
You may live where you please,--in the country, not in London; but I
shall take steps that Colonel Osborne does not see you."
"I will not remain in the room with you to be insulted thus," said
Mrs. Trevelyan. And she did not remain, but left the chamber,
slamming the door after her as she went.
"It will be better that she should go," said Trevelyan, when he found
himself alone. And so it came to pass that that blessing of a rich
marriage, which had as it were fallen upon them at the Mandarins from
out of heaven, had become, after an interval of but two short years,
anything but an unmixed blessing.
CHAPTER XII.
MISS STANBURY'S GENEROSITY.
On one Wednesday morning early in June, great preparations were being
made at the brick house in the Close at Exeter for an event which can
hardly be said to have required any preparation at all. Mrs. Stanbury
and her elder daughter were coming into Exeter from Nuncombe Putney
to visit Dorothy. The reader may perhaps remember that when Miss
Stanbury's invitation was sent to her niece, she was pleased to
promise that such visits should be permitted on a Wednesday morning.
Such a visit was now to be made, and old Miss Stanbury was quite
moved by the occasion. "I shall not see them, you know, Martha," she
had said, on the afternoon of the preceding day.
"I suppose not, ma'am."
"Certainly not. Why should I? It would do no good."
"It is not for me to say, ma'am, of course."
"No, Martha, it is not. And I am sure that I am right. It's no good
going back and undoing in ten minutes what twenty years have done.
She's a poor harmless creature, I believe."
"The most harmless in the world, ma'am."
"But she was as bad as poison to me when she was young, and what's
the good of trying to change it now? If I was to tell her that I
loved her, I should only be lying."
"Then, ma'am, I would not say it."
"And I don't mean. But you'll take in some wine and cake, you know."
"I don't think they'll care for wine and cake."
"Will you do as I tell you? What matters whether they care for it or
not? They need not take it. It will look better for Miss Dorothy.
If Dorothy is to remain here I shall choose that she should be
respected." And so the question of the cake and wine had been decided
overnight. But when the morning came Miss Stanbury was still in
a twitter. Half-past ten had been the hour fixed for the visit,
in consequence of there being a train in from Lessboro', due at
the Exeter station at ten. As Miss Stanbury breakfasted always
at half-past eight, there was no need of hurry on account of the
expected visit. But, nevertheless, she was in a fuss all the morning;
and spoke of the coming period as one in which she must necessarily
put herself into solitary confinement.
"Perhaps your mamma will be cold," she said, "and will expect a
fire."
"Oh, dear, no, Aunt Stanbury."
"It could be lighted of course. It is a pity they should come just so
as to prevent you from going to morning service; is it not?"
"I could go with you, aunt, and be back very nearly in time. They
won't mind waiting a quarter of an hour."
"What; and have them here all alone! I wouldn't think of such a
thing. I shall go up-stairs. You had better come to me when they are
gone. Don't hurry them. I don't want you to hurry them at all; and
if you require anything, Martha will wait upon you. I have told the
girls to keep out of the way. They are so giddy, there's no knowing
what they might be after. Besides,--they've got their work to mind."
All this was very terrible to poor Dorothy, who had not as yet quite
recovered from the original fear with which her aunt had inspired
her,--so terrible that she was almost sorry that her mother and
sister were coming to her. When the knock was heard at the door,
precisely as the cathedral clock was striking half-past ten,--to
secure which punctuality, and thereby not to offend the owner of the
mansion, Mrs. Stanbury and Priscilla had been walking about the Close
for the last ten minutes,--Miss Stanbury was still in the parlour.
"There they are!" she exclaimed, jumping up. "They haven't given
a body much time to run away, have they, my dear? Half a minute,
Martha,--just half a minute!" Then she gathered up her things as
though she had been ill-treated in being driven to make so sudden a
retreat, and Martha, as soon as the last hem of her mistress's dress
had become invisible on the stairs, opened the front door for the
visitors.
"Do you mean to say you like it?" said Priscilla, when they had been
there about a quarter of an hour.
"H--u--sh," whispered Mrs. Stanbury.
"I don't suppose she's listening at the door," said Priscilla.
"Indeed, she's not," said Dorothy. "There can't be a truer, honester
woman, than Aunt Stanbury."
"But is she kind to you, Dolly?" asked the mother.
"Very kind; too kind. Only I don't understand her quite, and then
she gets angry with me. I know she thinks I'm a fool, and that's the
worst of it."
"Then, if I were you, I would come home," said Priscilla.
"She'll never forgive you if you do," said Mrs. Stanbury.
"And who need care about her forgiveness?" said Priscilla.
"I don't mean to go home yet, at any rate," said Dorothy. Then there
was a knock at the door, and Martha entered with the cake and wine.
"Miss Stanbury's compliments, ladies, and she hopes you'll take a
glass of sherry." Whereupon she filled out the glasses and carried
them round.
"Pray give my compliments and thanks to my sister Stanbury," said
Dorothy's mother. But Priscilla put down the glass of wine without
touching it, and looked her sternest at the maid.
Altogether, the visit was not very successful, and poor Dorothy
almost felt that if she chose to remain in the Close she must lose
her mother and sister, and that without really making a friend of
her aunt. There had as yet been no quarrel,--nothing that had been
plainly recognised as disagreeable; but there had not as yet come to
be any sympathy, or assured signs of comfortable love. Miss Stanbury
had declared more than once that it would do, but had not succeeded
in showing in what the success consisted. When she was told that the
two ladies were gone, she desired that Dorothy might be sent to her,
and immediately began to make anxious inquiries.
"Well, my dear, and what do they think of it?"
"I don't know, aunt, that they think very much."
"And what do they say about it?"
"They didn't say very much, aunt. I was very glad to see mamma and
Priscilla. Perhaps I ought to tell you that mamma gave me back the
money I sent her."
"What did she do that for?" asked Miss Stanbury very sharply.
"Because she says that Hugh sends her now what she wants." Miss
Stanbury, when she heard this, looked very sour. "I thought it best
to tell you, you know."
"It will never come to any good, got in that way,--never."
"But, Aunt Stanbury, isn't it good of him to send it?"
"I don't know. I suppose it's better than drinking, and smoking, and
gambling. But I dare say he gets enough for that too. When a man,
born and bred like a gentleman, condescends to let out his talents
and education for such purposes, I dare say they are willing enough
to pay him. The devil always does pay high wages. But that only makes
it so much the worse. One almost comes to doubt whether any one ought
to learn to write at all, when it is used for such vile purposes.
I've said what I've got to say, and I don't mean to say anything
more. What's the use? But it has been hard upon me,--very. It was my
money did it, and I feel I've misused it. It's a disgrace to me which
I don't deserve."
For a couple of minutes Dorothy remained quite silent, and Miss
Stanbury did not herself say anything further. Nor during that time
did she observe her niece, or she would probably have seen that the
subject was not to be dropped. Dorothy, though she was silent, was
not calm, and was preparing herself for a crusade in her brother's
defence.
"Aunt Stanbury, he's my brother, you know."
"Of course he's your brother. I wish he were not."
"I think him the best brother in the world,--and the best son."
"Why does he sell himself to write sedition?"
"He doesn't sell himself to write sedition. I don't see why it should
be sedition, or anything wicked, because it's sold for a penny."
"If you are going to cram him down my throat, Dorothy, you and I had
better part."
"I don't want to say anything about him, only you ought--not--to
abuse him--before me." By this time Dorothy was beginning to sob,
but Miss Stanbury's countenance was still very grim and very stern.
"He's coming home to Nuncombe Putney, and I want to--see--see him,"
continued Dorothy.
"Hugh Stanbury coming to Exeter! He won't come here."
"Then I'd rather go home, Aunt Stanbury."
"Very well, very well," said Miss Stanbury, and she got up and left
the room.
Dorothy was in dismay, and began to think that there was nothing for
her to do but to pack up her clothes and prepare for her departure.
She was very sorry for what had occurred, being fully alive to the
importance of the aid not only to herself, but to her mother and
sister, which was afforded by the present arrangement, and she felt
very angry with herself, in that she had already driven her aunt to
quarrel with her. But she had found it to be impossible to hear her
own brother abused without saying a word on his behalf. She did not
see her aunt again till dinner-time, and then there was hardly a word
uttered. Once or twice Dorothy made a little effort to speak, but
these attempts failed utterly. The old woman would hardly reply even
by a monosyllable, but simply muttered something, or shook her head
when she was addressed. Jane, who waited at table, was very demure
and silent, and Martha, who once came into the room during the meal,
merely whispered a word into Miss Stanbury's ear. When the cloth
was removed, and two glasses of port had been poured out by Miss
Stanbury herself, Dorothy felt that she could endure this treatment
no longer. How was it possible that she could drink wine under such
circumstances?
[Illustration: Aunt Stanbury at dinner will not speak.]
"Not for me, Aunt Stanbury," said she, with a deploring tone.
"Why not?"
"I couldn't drink it to-day."
"Why didn't you say so before it was poured out? And why not to-day?
Come, drink it. Do as I bid you." And she stood over her niece, as a
tragedy queen in a play with a bowl of poison. Dorothy took it and
sipped it from mere force of obedience. "You make as many bones about
a glass of port wine as though it were senna and salts," said Miss
Stanbury. "Now I've got something to say to you." By this time the
servant was gone, and the two were seated alone together in the
parlour. Dorothy, who had not as yet swallowed above half her wine,
at once put the glass down. There was an importance in her aunt's
tone which frightened her, and made her feel that some evil was
coming. And yet, as she had made up her mind that she must return
home, there was no further evil that she need dread. "You didn't
write any of those horrid articles?" said Miss Stanbury.
"No, aunt; I didn't write them. I shouldn't know how."
"And I hope you'll never learn. They say women are to vote, and
become doctors, and if so, there's no knowing what devil's tricks
they mayn't do. But it isn't your fault about that filthy newspaper.
How he can let himself down to write stuff that is to be printed on
straw is what I can't understand."
"I don't see how it can make a difference as he writes it."
"It would make a great deal of difference to me. And I'm told that
what they call ink comes off on your fingers like lamp-black. I never
touched one, thank God; but they tell me so. All the same; it isn't
your fault."
"I've nothing to do with it, Aunt Stanbury."
"Of course you've not. And as he is your brother it wouldn't be
natural that you should like to throw him off. And, my dear, I like
you for taking his part. Only you needn't have been so fierce with an
old woman."
"Indeed--indeed I didn't mean to be--fierce, Aunt Stanbury."
"I never was taken up so short in my life. But we won't mind that.
There; he shall come and see you. I suppose he won't insist on
leaving any of his nastiness about."
"But is he to come here, Aunt Stanbury?"
"He may if he pleases."
"Oh, Aunt Stanbury!"
"When he was here last he generally had a pipe in his mouth, and I
dare say he never puts it down at all now. Those things grow upon
young people so fast. But if he could leave it on the door-step just
while he's here I should be obliged to him."
"But, dear aunt, couldn't I see him in the street?"
"Out in the street! No, my dear. All the world is not to know that
he's your brother; and he is dressed in such a rapscallion manner
that the people would think you were talking to a house-breaker."
Dorothy's face became again red as she heard this, and the angry
words were very nearly spoken. "The last time I saw him," continued
Miss Stanbury, "he had on a short, rough jacket, with enormous
buttons, and one of those flipperty-flopperty things on his head,
that the butcher-boys wear. And, oh, the smell of tobacco! As he had
been up in London I suppose he thought Exeter was no better than a
village, and he might do just as he pleased. But he knew that if
I'm particular about anything, it is about a gentleman's hat in
the streets. And he wanted me--me!--to walk with him across to Mrs.
MacHugh's! We should have been hooted about the Close like a pair of
mad dogs;--and so I told him."
"All the young men seem to dress like that now, Aunt Stanbury."
"No, they don't. Mr. Gibson doesn't dress like that."
"But he's a clergyman, Aunt Stanbury."
"Perhaps I'm an old fool. I dare say I am, and of course that's what
you mean. At any rate I'm too old to change, and I don't mean to try.
I like to see a difference between a gentleman and a house-breaker.
For the matter of that I'm told that there is a difference, and that
the house-breakers all look like gentlemen now. It may be proper to
make us all stand on our heads, with our legs sticking up in the air;
but I for one don't like being topsy-turvey, and I won't try it. When
is he to reach Exeter?"
"He is coming on Tuesday next, by the last train."
"Then you can't see him that night. That's out of the question. No
doubt he'll sleep at the Nag's Head, as that's the lowest radical
public-house in the city. Martha shall try to find him. She knows
more about his doings than I do. If he chooses to come here the
following morning before he goes down to Nuncombe Putney, well and
good. I shall wait up till Martha comes back from the train on
Tuesday night, and hear." Dorothy was of course full of gratitude and
thanks; but yet she felt almost disappointed by the result of her
aunt's clemency on the matter. She had desired to take her brother's
part, and it had seemed to her as though she had done so in a very
lukewarm manner. She had listened to an immense number of accusations
against him, and had been unable to reply to them because she had
been conquered by the promise of a visit. And now it was out of the
question that she should speak of going. Her aunt had given way to
her, and of course had conquered her.
Late on the Tuesday evening, after ten o'clock, Hugh Stanbury was
walking round the Close with his aunt's old servant. He had not put
up at that dreadfully radical establishment of which Miss Stanbury
was so much afraid, but had taken a bed-room at the Railway Inn. From
there he had walked up to the Close with Martha, and now was having a
few last words with her before he would allow her to return to the
house.
"I suppose she'd as soon see the devil as see me," said Hugh.
"If you speak in that way, Mr. Hugh, I won't listen to you."
"And yet I did everything I could to please her; and I don't think
any boy ever loved an old woman better than I did her."
"That was while she used to send you cakes, and ham, and jam to
school, Mr. Hugh."
"Of course it was, and while she sent me flannel waistcoats to
Oxford. But when I didn't care any longer for cakes or flannel then
she got tired of me. It is much better as it is, if she'll only be
good to Dorothy."
"She never was bad to anybody, Mr. Hugh. But I don't think an old
lady like her ever takes to a young woman as she does to a young man,
if only he'll let her have a little more of her own way than you
would. It's my belief that you might have had it all for your own
some day, if you'd done as you ought."
"That's nonsense, Martha. She means to leave it all to the Burgesses.
I've heard her say so."
"Say so; yes. People don't always do what they say. If you'd managed
rightly you might have it all;--and so you might now."
"I'll tell you what, old girl; I shan't try. Live for the next twenty
years under her apron strings, that I may have the chance at the end
of it of cutting some poor devil out of his money! Do you know the
meaning of making a score off your own bat, Martha?"
"No, I don't; and if it's anything you're like to do, I don't think I
should be the better for learning,--by all accounts. And now if you
please, I'll go in."
"Good night, Martha. My love to them both, and say I'll be there
to-morrow exactly at half-past nine. You'd better take it. It won't
turn to slate-stone. It hasn't come from the old gentleman."
"I don't want anything of that kind, Mr. Hugh;--indeed I don't."
"Nonsense. If you don't take it you'll offend me. I believe you think
I'm not much better than a schoolboy still."
"I don't think you're half so good, Mr. Hugh," said the old servant,
sticking the sovereign which Hugh had given her in under her glove as
she spoke.
On the next morning that other visit was made at the brick house, and
Miss Stanbury was again in a fuss. On this occasion, however, she was
in a much better humour than before, and was full of little jokes as
to the nature of the visitation. Of course, she was not to see her
nephew herself, and no message was to be delivered from her, and none
was to be given to her from him. But an accurate report was to be
made to her as to his appearance, and Dorothy was to be enabled to
answer a variety of questions respecting him after he was gone. "Of
course, I don't want to know anything about his money," Miss Stanbury
said, "only I should like to know how much these people can afford
to pay for their penny trash." On this occasion she had left the
room and gone up-stairs before the knock came at the door, but she
managed, by peeping over the balcony, to catch a glimpse of the
"flipperty-flopperty" hat which her nephew certainly had with him on
this occasion.
Hugh Stanbury had great news for his sister. The cottage in which
Mrs. Stanbury lived at Nuncombe Putney, was the tiniest little
dwelling in which a lady and her two daughters ever sheltered
themselves. There was, indeed, a sitting-room, two bed-rooms, and a
kitchen; but they were all so diminutive in size that the cottage was
little more than a cabin. But there was a house in the village, not
large indeed, but eminently respectable, three stories high, covered
with ivy, having a garden behind it, and generally called the Clock
House, because there had once been a clock upon it. This house
had been lately vacated, and Hugh informed his sister that he was
thinking of taking it for his mother's accommodation. Now, the
late occupants of the Clock House, at Nuncombe Putney, had been
people with five or six hundred a year. Had other matters been in
accordance, the house would almost have entitled them to consider
themselves as county people. A gardener had always been kept
there,--and a cow!
"The Clock House for mamma!"
"Well, yes. Don't say a word about it as yet to Aunt Stanbury, as
she'll think that I've sold myself altogether to the old gentleman."
"But, Hugh, how can mamma live there?"
"The fact is, Dorothy, there is a secret. I can't tell you quite
yet. Of course, you'll know it, and everybody will know it, if the
thing comes about. But as you won't talk, I will tell you what most
concerns ourselves."
"And am I to go back?"
"Certainly not,--if you will take my advice. Stick to your aunt. You
don't want to smoke pipes, and wear Tom-and-Jerry hats, and write for
the penny newspapers."
Now Hugh Stanbury's secret was this;--that Louis Trevelyan's wife and
sister-in-law were to leave the house in Curzon Street, and come and
live at Nuncombe Putney, with Mrs. Stanbury and Priscilla. Such, at
least, was the plan to be carried out, if Hugh Stanbury should be
successful in his present negotiations.
CHAPTER XIII.
THE HONOURABLE MR. GLASCOCK.
[Illustration]
By the end of July Mrs. Trevelyan with her sister was established in
the Clock House, at Nuncombe Putney, under the protection of Hugh's
mother; but before the reader is made acquainted with any of the
circumstances of their life there, a few words must be said of an
occurrence which took place before those two ladies left Curzon
Street.
As to the quarrel between Trevelyan and his wife things went from bad
to worse. Lady Milborough continued to interfere, writing letters
to Emily which were full of good sense, but which, as Emily said
herself, never really touched the point of dispute. "Am I, who am
altogether unconscious of having done anything amiss, to confess that
I have been in the wrong? If it were about a small matter, I would
not mind, for the sake of peace. But when it concerns my conduct in
reference to another man I would rather die first." That had been
Mrs. Trevelyan's line of thought and argument in the matter; but
then old Lady Milborough in her letters spoke only of the duty of
obedience as promised at the altar. "But I didn't promise to tell a
lie," said Mrs. Trevelyan. And there were interviews between Lady
Milborough and Trevelyan, and interviews between Lady Milborough and
Nora Rowley. The poor dear old dowager was exceedingly busy and full
of groans, prescribing Naples, prescribing a course of extra prayers,
prescribing a general course of letting by-gones be by-gones,--to
which, however, Trevelyan would by no means assent without some
assurance, which he might regard as a guarantee,--prescribing
retirement to a small town in the west of France if Naples would not
suffice; but she could effect nothing.
Mrs. Trevelyan, indeed, did a thing which was sure of itself to
render any steps taken for a reconciliation ineffectual. In the midst
of all this turmoil,--while she and her husband were still living in
the same house, but apart because of their absurd quarrel respecting
Colonel Osborne, she wrote another letter to that gentleman. The
argument by which she justified this to herself, and to her sister
after it was done, was the real propriety of her own conduct
throughout her whole intimacy with Colonel Osborne. "But that is
just what Louis doesn't want you to do," Nora had said, filled with
anger and dismay. "Then let Louis give me an order to that effect,
and behave to me like a husband, and I will obey him," Emily had
answered. And she had gone on to plead that in her present condition
she was under no orders from her husband. She was left to judge for
herself, and,--judging for herself,--she knew, as she said, that it
was best that she should write to Colonel Osborne. Unfortunately
there was no ground for hoping that Colonel Osborne was ignorant
of this insane jealousy on the part of her husband. It was better,
therefore, she said, that she should write to him,--whom on the
occasion she took care to name to her sister as "papa's old
friend,"--and explain to him what she would wish him to do, and what
not to do. Colonel Osborne answered the letter very quickly, throwing
much more of demonstrative affection than he should have done into
his "Dear Emily," and his "Dearest Friend." Of course Mrs. Trevelyan
had burned this answer, and of course Mr. Trevelyan had been told of
the correspondence. His wife, indeed, had been especially careful
that there should be nothing secret about the matter,--that it should
be so known in the house that Mr. Trevelyan should be sure to hear
of it. And he had heard of it, and been driven almost mad by it. He
had flown off to Lady Milborough, and had reduced his old friend to
despair by declaring that, after all, he began to fear that his wife
was--was--was--infatuated by that d---- scoundrel. Lady Milborough
forgave the language, but protested that he was wrong in his
suspicion. "To continue to correspond with him after what I have said
to her!" exclaimed Trevelyan. "Take her to Naples at once,"--said
Lady Milborough;--"at once!" "And have him after me?" said Trevelyan.
Lady Milborough had no answer ready, and not having thought of
this looked very blank. "I should find it harder to deal with her
there even than here," continued Trevelyan. Then it was that Lady
Milborough spoke of the small town in the west of France, urging
as her reason that such a man as Colonel Osborne would certainly
not follow them there; but Trevelyan had become indignant at this,
declaring that if his wife's good name could be preserved in no other
manner than that, it would not be worth preserving at all. Then Lady
Milborough had begun to cry, and had continued crying for a very long
time. She was very unhappy,--as unhappy as her nature would allow
her to be. She would have made almost any sacrifice to bring the two
young people together;--would have willingly given her time, her
money, her labour in the cause;--would probably herself have gone
to the little town in the west of France, had her going been of any
service. But, nevertheless, after her own fashion, she extracted no
small enjoyment out of the circumstances of this miserable quarrel.
The Lady Milboroughs of the day hate the Colonel Osbornes from the
very bottoms of their warm hearts and pure souls; but they respect
the Colonel Osbornes almost as much as they hate them, and find it
to be an inestimable privilege to be brought into some contact with
these roaring lions.
But there arose to dear Lady Milborough a great trouble out of this
quarrel, irrespective of the absolute horror of the separation of a
young husband from his young wife. And the excess of her trouble on
this head was great proof of the real goodness of her heart. For, in
this matter, the welfare of Trevelyan himself was not concerned;--but
rather that of the Rowley family. Now the Rowleys had not given Lady
Milborough any special reason for loving them. When she had first
heard that her dear young friend Louis was going to marry a girl from
the Mandarins, she had been almost in despair. It was her opinion
that had he properly understood his own position, he would have
promoted his welfare by falling in love with the daughter of some
English country gentleman,--or some English peer, to which honour,
with his advantages, Lady Milborough thought that he might have
aspired. Nevertheless, when the girl from the Mandarins had been
brought home as Mrs. Trevelyan, Lady Milborough had received her with
open arms,--had received even the sister-in-law with arms partly
open. Had either of them shown any tendency to regard her as a
mother, she would have showered motherly cares upon them. For Lady
Milborough was like an old hen, in her capacity for taking many
under her wings. The two sisters had hardly done more than bear
with her,--Nora, indeed, bearing with her more graciously than Mrs.
Trevelyan; and in return, even for this, the old dowager was full of
motherly regard. Now she knew well that Mr. Glascock was over head
and ears in love with Nora Rowley. It only wanted the slightest
management and the easiest discretion to bring him on his knees, with
an offer of his hand. And, then, how much that hand contained!--how
much, indeed, as compared with that other hand, which was to be given
in return, and which was,--to speak the truth,--completely empty! Mr.
Glascock was the heir to a peer, was the heir to a rich peer, was the
heir to a very, very old peer. He was in Parliament. The world spoke
well of him. He was not, so to say, by any means an old man himself.
He was good-tempered, reasonable, easily led, and yet by no means
despicable. On all subjects connected with land, he held an opinion
that was very much respected, and was supposed to be a thoroughly
good specimen of an upper-class Englishman. Here was a suitor! But it
was not to be supposed that such a man as Mr. Glascock would be so
violently in love as to propose to a girl whose nearest known friend
and female relation was misbehaving herself.
Only they who have closely watched the natural uneasiness of human
hens can understand how great was Lady Milborough's anxiety on
this occasion. Marriage to her was a thing always delightful to
contemplate. Though she had never been sordidly a match-maker, the
course of the world around her had taught her to regard men as fish
to be caught, and girls as the anglers who ought to catch them. Or,
rather, could her mind have been accurately analysed, it would have
been found that the girl was regarded as half-angler and half-bait.
Any girl that angled visibly with her own hook, with a manifestly
expressed desire to catch a fish, was odious to her. And she was very
gentle-hearted in regard to the fishes, thinking that every fish
in the river should have the hook and bait presented to him in the
mildest, pleasantest form. But still, when the trout was well in
the basket, her joy was great; and then came across her unlaborious
mind some half-formed idea that a great ordinance of nature was
being accomplished in the teeth of difficulties. For,--as she well
knew,--there is a difficulty in the catching of fish.
Lady Milborough, in her kind anxiety on Nora's behalf,--that the fish
should be landed before Nora might be swept away in her sister's
ruin,--hardly knew what step she might safely take. Mrs. Trevelyan
would not see her again,--having already declared that any further
interview would be painful and useless. She had spoken to Trevelyan,
but Trevelyan had declared that he could do nothing. What was there
that he could have done? He could not, as he said, overlook the gross
improprieties of his wife's conduct, because his wife's sister had,
or might possibly have, a lover. And then as to speaking to Mr.
Glascock himself,--nobody knew better than Lady Milborough how very
apt fish are to be frightened.
But at last Lady Milborough did speak to Mr. Glascock,--making no
allusion whatever to the hook prepared for himself, but saying a word
or two as to the affairs of that other fish, whose circumstances, as
he floundered about in the bucket of matrimony, were not as happy as
they might have been. The care, the discretion, nay, the wisdom with
which she did this were most excellent. She had become aware that
Mr. Glascock had already heard of the unfortunate affair in Curzon
Street. Indeed, every one who knew the Trevelyans had heard of it,
and a great many who did not know them. No harm, therefore, could
be done by mentioning the circumstance. Lady Milborough did mention
it, explaining that the only person really in fault was that odious
destroyer of the peace of families, Colonel Osborne, of whom
Lady Milborough, on that occasion, said some very severe things
indeed. Poor dear Mrs. Trevelyan was foolish, obstinate, and
self-reliant;--but as innocent as the babe unborn. That things would
come right before long no one who knew the affair,--and she knew it
from beginning to end,--could for a moment doubt. The real victim
would be that sweetest of all girls, Nora Rowley. Mr. Glascock
innocently asked why Nora Rowley should be a victim. "Don't you
understand, Mr. Glascock, how the most remote connection with a
thing of that kind tarnishes a young woman's standing in the world?"
Mr. Glascock was almost angry with the well-pleased Countess as he
declared that he could not see that Miss Rowley's standing was at all
tarnished; and old Lady Milborough, when he got up and left her, felt
that she had done a good morning's work. If Nora could have known it
all, Nora ought to have been very grateful, for Mr. Glascock got into
a cab in Eccleston Square and had himself driven direct to Curzon
Street. He himself believed that he was at that moment only doing the
thing which he had for some time past resolved that he would do; but
we perhaps may be justified in thinking that the actual resolution
was first fixed by the discretion of Lady Milborough's communication.
At any rate he arrived in Curzon Street with his mind fully resolved,
and had spent the minutes in the cab considering how he had better
perform the business in hand.
He was at once shown into the drawing-room, where he found the two
sisters, and Mrs. Trevelyan, as soon as she saw him, understood the
purpose of his coming. There was an air of determination about him, a
manifest intention of doing something, an absence of that vagueness
which almost always flavours a morning visit. This was so strongly
marked that Mrs. Trevelyan felt that she would have been almost
justified in getting up and declaring that, as this visit was paid
to her sister, she would retire. But any such declaration on her
part was unnecessary, as Mr. Glascock had not been in the room three
minutes before he asked her to go. By some clever device of his own,
he got her into the back room and whispered to her that he wanted to
say a few words in private to her sister.
"Oh, certainly," said Mrs. Trevelyan, smiling.
"I dare say you may guess what they are," said he. "I don't know what
chance I may have."
"I can tell you nothing about that," she replied, "as I know nothing.
But you have my good wishes."
And then she went.
It may be presumed that gradually some idea of Mr. Glascock's
intention had made its way into Nora's mind by the time that she
found herself alone with that gentleman. Why else had he brought into
the room with him that manifest air of a purpose? Why else had he
taken the very strong step of sending the lady of the house out of
her own drawing-room? Nora, beginning to understand this, put herself
into an attitude of defence. She had never told herself that she
would refuse Mr. Glascock. She had never acknowledged to herself
that there was another man whom she liked better than she liked Mr.
Glascock. But had she ever encouraged any wish for such an interview,
her feelings at this moment would have been very different from what
they were. As it was, she would have given much to postpone it, so
that she might have asked herself questions, and have discovered
whether she could reconcile herself to do that which, no doubt, all
her friends would commend her for doing. Of course, it was clear
enough to the mind of the girl that she had her fortune to make, and
that her beauty and youth were the capital on which she had to found
it. She had not lived so far from all taint of corruption as to feel
any actual horror at the idea of a girl giving herself to a man,--not
because the man had already, by his own capacities in that direction,
forced her heart from her,--but because he was one likely to be at
all points a good husband. Had all this affair concerned any other
girl, any friend of her own, and had she known all the circumstances
of the case, she would have had no hesitation in recommending that
other girl to marry Mr. Glascock. A girl thrown out upon the world
without a shilling must make her hay while the sun shines. But,
nevertheless, there was something within her bosom which made her
long for a better thing than this. She had dreamed, if she had not
thought, of being able to worship a man; but she could hardly worship
Mr. Glascock. She had dreamed, if she had not thought, of leaning
upon a man all through life with her whole weight, as though that
man had been specially made to be her staff, her prop, her support,
her wall of comfort and protection. She knew that if she were to
marry Mr. Glascock and become Lady Peterborough, in due course she
must stand a good deal by her own strength, and live without that
comfortable leaning. Nevertheless, when she found herself alone with
the man, she by no means knew whether she would refuse him or not.
But she knew that she must pluck up courage for an important moment,
and she collected herself, braced her muscles, as it were, for a
fight, and threw her mind into an attitude of contest.
Mr. Glascock, as soon as the door was shut behind Mrs. Trevelyan's
back, took a chair and placed it close beside the head of the sofa on
which Nora was sitting. "Miss Rowley," he said, "you and I have known
each other now for some months, and I hope you have learned to regard
me as a friend."
"Oh, yes, indeed," said Nora, with some spirit.
"It has seemed to me that we have met as friends, and I can most
truly say for myself, that I have taken the greatest possible
pleasure in your acquaintance. It is not only that I admire you very
much,"--he looked straight before him as he said this, and moved
about the point of the stick which he was holding in both his
hands,--"it is not only that,--perhaps not chiefly that, though I do
admire you very much; but the truth is, that I like everything about
you."
Nora smiled, but she said nothing. It was better, she thought, to let
him tell his story; but his mode of telling it was not without its
efficacy. It was not the simple praise which made its way with her
but a certain tone in the words which seemed to convince her that
they were true. If he had really found her, or fancied her to be what
he said, there was a manliness in his telling her so in the plainest
words that pleased her much.
"I know," continued he, "that this is a very bald way of telling--of
pleading--my cause; but I don't know whether a bald way may not
be the best, if it can only make itself understood to be true. Of
course, Miss Rowley, you know what I mean. As I said before, you have
all those things which not only make me love you, but which make me
like you also. If you think that you can love me, say so; and, as
long as I live, I will do my best to make you happy as my wife."
There was a clearness of expression in this, and a downright
surrender of himself, which so flattered her and so fluttered her
that she was almost reduced to the giving of herself up because she
could not reply to such an appeal in language less courteous than
that of agreement. After a moment or two she found herself remaining
silent, with a growing feeling that silence would be taken as
conveying consent. There floated quickly across her brain an idea of
the hardness of a woman's lot, in that she should be called upon to
decide her future fate for life in half a minute. He had had weeks to
think of this,--weeks in which it would have been almost unmaidenly
in her so to think of it as to have made up her mind to accept the
man. Had she so made up her mind, and had he not come to her, where
would she have been then? But he had come to her. There he was, still
poking about with his stick, waiting for her, and she must answer
him. And he was the eldest son of a peer,--an enormous match for her,
very proper in all respects; such a man, that if she should accept
him, everybody around her would regard her fortune in life as
miraculously successful. He was not such a man that any one would
point at her and say,--"There; see another of them who has sold
herself for money and a title!" Mr. Glascock was not an Apollo, not
an admirable Crichton; but he was a man whom any girl might have
learned to love. Now he had asked her to be his wife, and it was
necessary that she should answer him. He sat there waiting for her
very patiently, still poking about the point of his stick.
Did she really love him? Though she was so pressed by consideration
of time, she did find a moment in which to ask herself the question.
With a quick turn of an eye she glanced at him, to see what he was
like. Up to this moment, though she knew him well, she could have
given no details of his personal appearance. He was a better-looking
man than Hugh Stanbury,--so she told herself with a passing thought;
but he lacked--he lacked; what was it that he lacked? Was it youth,
or spirit, or strength; or was it some outward sign of an inward gift
of mind? Was it that he was heavy while Hugh was light? Was it that
she could find no fire in his eye, while Hugh's eyes were full of
flashing? Or was it that for her, especially for her, Hugh was the
appointed staff and appropriate wall of protection? Be all that as it
might, she knew at the moment that she did love, not this man, but
that other who was writing articles for the Daily Record. She must
refuse the offer that was so brilliant, and give up the idea of
reigning as queen at Monkhams.
"Oh, Mr. Glascock," she said, "I ought to answer you more quickly."
"No, dearest; not more quickly than suits you. Nothing ever in this
world can be more important both to you and to me. If you want more
time to think of it, take more time."
"No, Mr. Glascock; I do not. I don't know why I should have paused.
Is not the truth best?"
"Yes,--certainly the truth is best."
"I do not--love you. Pray, pray understand me."
"I understand it too well, Miss Rowley." The stick was still going,
and the eyes more intently fixed than ever on something opposite.
"I do like you; I like you very much. And I am so grateful! I cannot
understand why such a man as you should want to make me your wife."
"Because I love you better than all the others; simply that. That
reason, and that only, justifies a man in wanting to marry a girl."
What a good fellow he was, and how flattering were his words! Did he
not deserve what he wanted, even though it could not be given without
a sacrifice? But yet she did not love him. As she looked at him again
she could not there recognise her staff. As she looked at him she was
more than ever convinced that that other staff ought to be her staff.
"May I come again,--after a month, say?" he asked, when there had
been another short period of silence.
"No, no. Why should you trouble yourself? I am not worth it."
"It is for me to judge of that, Miss Rowley."
"All the same, I know that I am not worth it. And I could not tell
you to do that."
"Then I will wait, and come again without your telling me."
"Oh, Mr. Glascock, I did not mean that; indeed I did not. Pray do not
think that. Take what I say as final. I like you more than I can say;
and I feel a gratitude to you that I cannot express,--which I shall
never forget. I have never known any one who has seemed to be so good
as you. But-- It is just what I said before." And then she fairly
burst into tears.
"Miss Rowley," he said, very slowly, "pray do not think that I want
to ask any question which it might embarrass you to answer. But my
happiness is so greatly at stake; and, if you will allow me to say
so, your happiness, too, is so greatly concerned, that it is most
important that we should not come to a conclusion too quickly. If I
thought that your heart were vacant I would wait patiently. I have
been thinking of you as my possible wife for weeks past,--for months
past. Of course you have not had such thoughts about me." As he said
this she almost loved him for his considerate goodness. "It has
sometimes seemed to me odd that girls should love men in such a
hurry. If your heart be free, I will wait. And if you esteem me, you
can see, and try whether you cannot learn to love me."
"I do esteem you."
"It depends on that question, then?" he said, slowly.
She sat silent for fully a minute, with her hands clasped; and then
she answered him in a whisper. "I do not know," she said.
He also was silent for a while before he spoke again. He ceased to
poke with his stick, and got up from his chair, and stood a little
apart from her, not looking at her even yet.
"I see," he said at last. "I understand. Well, Miss Rowley, I quite
perceive that I cannot press my suit any further now. But I shall not
despair altogether. I know this, that if I might possibly succeed, I
should be a very happy man. Good-bye, Miss Rowley."
She took his offered hand and pressed it so warmly, that had he not
been manly and big-hearted, he would have taken such pressure as a
sign that she wished him to ask her again. But such was his nature.
"God bless you," he said, "and make you happy, whatever you may
choose to do."
Then he left her, and she heard him walk down the stairs with heavy
slow steps, and she thought that she could perceive from the sound
that he was sad at heart, but that he was resolved not to show his
sadness outwardly.
When she was alone she began to think in earnest of what she had
done. If the reader were told that she regretted the decision which
she had been forced to make so rapidly, a wrong impression would
be given of the condition of her thoughts. But there came upon her
suddenly a strange capacity for counting up and making a mental
inventory of all that might have been hers. She knew,--and where is
the girl so placed that does not know?--that it is a great thing to
be an English peeress. Now, as she stood there thinking of it all,
she was Nora Rowley without a shilling in the world, and without a
prospect of a shilling. She had often heard her mother speak fearful
words of future possible days, when colonial governing should no
longer be within the capacity of Sir Marmaduke. She had been taught
from a very early age that all the material prosperity of her life
must depend on matrimony. She could never be comfortably disposed of
in the world, unless some fitting man who possessed those things of
which she was so bare, should wish to make her his wife. Now there
had come a man so thoroughly fitting, so marvellously endowed, that
no worldly blessing would have been wanting. Mr. Glascock had more
than once spoken to her of the glories of Monkhams. She thought of
Monkhams now more than she had ever thought of the place before.
It would have been a great privilege to be the mistress of an old
time-honoured mansion, to call oaks and elms her own, to know that
acres of gardens were submitted to her caprices, to look at herds
of cows and oxen, and be aware that they lowed on her own pastures.
And to have been the mother of a future peer of England, to
have the nursing, and sweet custody and very making of a future
senator,--would not that have been much? And the man himself who
would have been her husband was such a one that any woman might have
trusted herself to him with perfect confidence. Now that he was
gone she almost fancied that she did love him. Then she thought of
Hugh Stanbury, sitting as he had described himself, in a little
dark closet at the office of the "D. R.," in a very old inky
shooting-coat, with a tarnished square-cut cloth cap upon his head,
with a short pipe in his mouth, writing at midnight for the next
morning's impression, this or that article according to the order
of his master, "the tallow-chandler;"--for the editor of the Daily
Record was a gentleman whose father happened to be a grocer in the
City, and Hugh had been accustomed thus to describe the family
trade. And she might certainly have had the peer, and the acres of
garden, and the big house, and the senatorial honours; whereas the
tallow-chandler's journeyman had never been so out-spoken. She told
herself from moment to moment that she had done right; that she would
do the same a dozen times, if a dozen times the experiment could
be repeated; but still, still, there was the remembrance of all
that she had lost. How would her mother look at her, her anxious,
heavily-laden mother, when the story should be told of all that had
been offered to her and all that had been refused?
[Illustration: To have been the mother of a future peer!]
As she was thinking of this Mrs. Trevelyan came into the room. Nora
felt that though she might dread to meet her mother, she could be
bold enough on such an occasion before her sister. Emily had not
done so well with her own affairs, as to enable her to preach with
advantage about marriage.
"He has gone?" said Mrs. Trevelyan, as she opened the door.
"Yes, he has gone."
"Well? Do not pretend, Nora, that you will not tell me."
"There is nothing worth the telling, Emily."
"What do you mean? I am sure he has proposed. He told me in so many
words that it was his intention."
"Whatever has happened, dear, you may be quite sure that I shall
never be Mrs. Glascock."
"Then you have refused him,--because of Hugh Stanbury!"
"I have refused him, Emily, because I did not love him. Pray let that
be enough."
Then she walked out of the room with something of stateliness in her
gait,--as might become a girl who had had it in her power to be the
future Lady Peterborough; but as soon as she reached the sacredness
of her own chamber, she gave way to an agony of tears. It would,
indeed, be much to be a Lady Peterborough. And she had, in truth,
refused it all because of Hugh Stanbury! Was Hugh Stanbury worth so
great a sacrifice?
CHAPTER XIV.
THE CLOCK HOUSE AT NUNCOMBE PUTNEY.
It was not till a fortnight had passed after the transaction recorded
in the last chapter, that Mrs. Trevelyan and Nora Rowley first heard
the proposition that they should go to live at Nuncombe Putney. From
bad to worse the quarrel between the husband and the wife had gone
on, till Trevelyan had at last told his friend Lady Milborough
that he had made up his mind that they must live apart. "She is so
self-willed,--and perhaps I am the same," he had said, "that it
is impossible that we should live together." Lady Milborough had
implored and called to witness all testimonies, profane and sacred,
against such a step,--had almost gone down on her knees. Go to
Naples,--why not Naples? Or to the quiet town in the west of France,
which was so dull that a wicked roaring lion, fond of cities and
gambling, and eating and drinking, could not live in such a place!
Oh, why not go to the quiet town in the west of France? Was not
anything better than this flying in the face of God and man? Perhaps
Trevelyan did not himself like the idea of the quiet dull French
town. Perhaps he thought that the flying in the face of God and man
was all done by his wife, not by him; and that it was right that his
wife should feel the consequences. After many such entreaties, many
such arguments, it was at last decided that the house in Curzon
Street should be given up, and that he and his wife live apart.
"And what about Nora Rowley?" asked Lady Milborough, who had become
aware by this time of Nora's insane folly in having refused Mr.
Glascock.
"She will go with her sister, I suppose."
"And who will maintain her? Dear, dear, dear! It does seem as though
some young people were bent upon cutting their own throats, and all
their family's."
Poor Lady Milborough just at this time went as near to disliking the
Rowleys as was compatible with her nature. It was not possible to her
to hate anybody. She thought that she hated the Colonel Osbornes; but
even that was a mistake. She was very angry, however, with both Mrs.
Trevelyan and her sister, and was disposed to speak of them as though
they had been born to create trouble and vexation.
Trevelyan had not given any direct answer to that question about Nora
Rowley's maintenance, but he was quite prepared to bear all necessary
expense in that direction, at any rate till Sir Marmaduke should have
arrived. At first there had been an idea that the two sisters should
go to the house of their aunt, Mrs. Outhouse. Mrs. Outhouse was the
wife,--as the reader may perhaps remember,--of a clergyman living
in the east of London. St. Diddulph's-in-the-East was very much in
the east indeed. It was a parish outside the City, lying near the
river, very populous, very poor, very low in character, and very
uncomfortable. There was a rectory-house, queerly situated at the
end of a little blind lane, with a gate of its own, and a so-called
garden about twenty yards square. But the rectory of St. Diddulph's
cannot be said to have been a comfortable abode. The neighbourhood
was certainly not alluring. Of visiting society within a distance
of three or four miles there was none but what was afforded by the
families of other East-end clergymen. And then Mr. Outhouse himself
was a somewhat singular man. He was very religious, devoted to
his work, most kind to the poor; but he was unfortunately a
strongly-biased man, and at the same time very obstinate withal. He
had never allied himself very cordially with his wife's brother,
Sir Marmaduke, allowing himself to be carried away by a prejudice
that people living at the West-end, who frequented clubs, and
were connected in any way with fashion, could not be appropriate
companions for himself. The very title which Sir Marmaduke had
acquired was repulsive to him, and had induced him to tell his
wife more than once that Sir this or Sir that could not be fitting
associates for a poor East-end clergyman. Then his wife's niece had
married a man of fashion,--a man supposed at St. Diddulph's to be
very closely allied to fashion; and Mr. Outhouse had never been
induced even to dine in the house in Curzon Street. When, therefore,
he heard that Mr. and Mrs. Trevelyan were to be separated within two
years of their marriage, it could not be expected that he should be
very eager to lend to the two sisters the use of his rectory.
There had been interviews between Mr. Outhouse and Trevelyan, and
between Mrs. Outhouse and her niece; and then there was an interview
between Mr. Outhouse and Emily, in which it was decided that Mrs.
Trevelyan would not go to the parsonage of St. Diddulph's. She had
been very outspoken to her uncle, declaring that she by no means
intended to carry herself as a disgraced woman. Mr. Outhouse had
quoted St. Paul to her; "Wives, obey your husbands." Then she had
got up and had spoken very angrily. "I look for support from you,"
she said, "as the man who is the nearest to me, till my father
shall come." "But I cannot support you in what is wrong," said the
clergyman. Then Mrs. Trevelyan had left the room, and would not see
her uncle again.
She carried things altogether with a high hand at this time. When old
Mr. Bideawhile called upon her, her husband's ancient family lawyer,
she told that gentleman that if it was her husband's will that they
should live apart, it must be so. She could not force him to remain
with her. She could not compel him to keep up the house in Curzon
Street. She had certain rights, she believed. She spoke then, she
said, of pecuniary rights,--not of those other rights which her
husband was determined, and was no doubt able, to ignore. She did not
really know what those pecuniary rights might be, nor was she careful
to learn their exact extent. She would thank Mr. Bideawhile to see
that things were properly arranged. But of this her husband, and Mr.
Bideawhile, might be quite sure;--she would take nothing as a favour.
She would not go to her uncle's house. She declined to tell Mr.
Bideawhile why she had so decided; but she had decided. She was ready
to listen to any suggestion that her husband might make as to her
residence, but she must claim to have some choice in the matter. As
to her sister, of course she intended to give Nora a home as long as
such a home might be wanted. It would be very sad for Nora, but in
existing circumstances such an arrangement would be expedient. She
would not go into details as to expense. Her husband was driving
her away from him, and it was for him to say what proportion of his
income he would choose to give for her maintenance,--for hers and
for that of their child. She was not desirous of anything beyond the
means of decent living, but of course she must for the present find
a home for her sister as well as for herself. When speaking of her
baby she had striven hard so to speak that Mr. Bideawhile should find
no trace of doubt in the tones of her voice. And yet she had been
full of doubt,--full of fear. As Mr. Bideawhile had uttered nothing
antagonistic to her wishes in this matter,--had seemed to agree
that wherever the mother went thither the child would go also,--Mrs.
Trevelyan had considered herself to be successful in this interview.
The idea of a residence at Nuncombe Putney had occurred first to
Trevelyan himself, and he had spoken of it to Hugh Stanbury. There
had been some difficulty in this, because he had snubbed Stanbury
grievously when his friend had attempted to do some work of gentle
interference between him and his wife; and when he began the
conversation, he took the trouble of stating, in the first instance,
that the separation was a thing fixed,--so that nothing might be
urged on that subject. "It is to be. You will understand that,"
he said; "and if you think that your mother would agree to the
arrangement, it would be satisfactory to me, and might, I think,
be made pleasant to her. Of course, your mother would be made to
understand that the only fault with which my wife is charged is that
of indomitable disobedience to my wishes."
"Incompatibility of temper," suggested Stanbury.
"You may call it that if you please;--though I must say for myself
that I do not think that I have displayed any temper to which a
woman has a right to object." Then he had gone on to explain what
he was prepared to do about money. He would pay, through Stanbury's
hands, so much for maintenance and so much for house rent, on the
understanding that the money was not to go into his wife's hands.
"I shall prefer," he said, "to make myself, on her behalf, what
disbursements may be necessary. I will take care that she receives a
proper sum quarterly through Mr. Bideawhile for her own clothes,--and
for those of our poor boy." Then Stanbury had told him of the Clock
House, and there had been an agreement made between them;--an
agreement which was then, of course, subject to the approval of
the ladies at Nuncombe Putney. When the suggestion was made to Mrs.
Trevelyan,--with a proposition that the Clock House should be taken
for one year, and that for that year, at least, her boy should remain
with her,--she assented to it. She did so with all the calmness that
she was able to assume; but, in truth, almost everything seemed to
have been gained, when she found that she was not to be separated
from her baby. "I have no objection to living in Devonshire if Mr.
Trevelyan wishes it," she said, in her most stately manner; "and
certainly no objection to living with Mr. Stanbury's mother." Then
Mr. Bideawhile explained to her that Nuncombe Putney was not a large
town,--was, in fact, a very small and a very remote village. "That
will make no difference whatsoever as far as I am concerned," she
answered; "and as for my sister, she must put up with it till my
father and my mother are here. I believe the scenery at Nuncombe
Putney is very pretty." "Lovely!" said Mr. Bideawhile, who had a
general idea that Devonshire is supposed to be a picturesque
county. "With such a life before me as I must lead," continued Mrs.
Trevelyan, "an ugly neighbourhood, one that would itself have had
no interest for a stranger, would certainly have been an additional
sorrow." So it had been settled, and by the end of July, Mrs.
Trevelyan, with her sister and baby, was established at the Clock
House, under the protection of Mrs. Stanbury. Mrs. Trevelyan had
brought down her own maid and her own nurse, and had found that the
arrangements made by her husband had, in truth, been liberal. The
house in Curzon Street had been given up, the furniture had been sent
to a warehouse, and Mr. Trevelyan had gone into lodgings. "There
never were two young people so insane since the world began," said
Lady Milborough to her old friend, Mrs. Fairfax, when the thing was
done.
"They will be together again before next April," Mrs. Fairfax had
replied. But Mrs. Fairfax was a jolly dame who made the best of
everything. Lady Milborough raised her hands in despair, and shook
her head. "I don't suppose, though, that Mr. Glascock will go to
Devonshire after his lady love," said Mrs. Fairfax. Lady Milborough
again raised her hands, and again shook her head.
Mrs. Stanbury had given an easy assent when her son proposed to her
this new mode of life, but Priscilla had had her doubts. Like all
women, she thought that when a man was to be separated from his wife,
the woman must be in the wrong. And though it must be doubtless
comfortable to go from the cottage to the Clock House, it
would, she said, with much prudence, be very uncomfortable
to go back from the Clock House to the cottage. Hugh replied
very cavalierly,--generously, that is, rashly, and somewhat
impetuously,--that he would guarantee them against any such
degradation.
"We don't want to be a burden upon you, my dear," said the mother.
"You would be a great burden on me," he replied, "if you were living
uncomfortably while I am able to make you comfortable."
Mrs. Stanbury was soon won over by Mrs. Trevelyan, by Nora, and
especially by the baby; and even Priscilla, after a week or two,
began to feel that she liked their company. Priscilla was a young
woman who read a great deal, and even had some gifts of understanding
what she read. She borrowed books from the clergyman, and paid a
penny a week to the landlady of the Stag and Antlers for the hire
during half a day of the weekly newspaper. But now there came a box
of books from Exeter, and a daily paper from London, and,--to improve
all this,--both the new comers were able to talk with her about the
things she read. She soon declared to her mother that she liked
Miss Rowley much the best of the two. Mrs. Trevelyan was too fond
of having her own way. She began to understand, she would say to
her mother, that a man might find it difficult to live with Mrs.
Trevelyan. "She hardly ever yields about anything," said Priscilla.
As Miss Priscilla Stanbury was also very fond of having her own way,
it was not surprising that she should object to that quality in this
lady, who had come to live under the same roof with her.
The country about Nuncombe Putney is perhaps as pretty as any in
England. It is beyond the river Teign, between that and Dartmoor,
and is so lovely in all its variations of rivers, rivulets, broken
ground, hills and dales, old broken, battered, time-worn timber,
green knolls, rich pastures, and heathy common, that the wonder is
that English lovers of scenery know so little of it. At the Stag and
Antlers old Mrs. Crocket, than whom no old woman in the public line
was ever more generous, more peppery, or more kind, kept two clean
bed-rooms, and could cook a leg of Dartmoor mutton and make an apple
pie against any woman in Devonshire. "Drat your fish!" she would say,
when some self-indulgent and exacting traveller would wish for more
than these accustomed viands. "Cock you up with dainties! If you
can't eat your victuals without fish, you must go to Exeter. And
then you'll get it stinking mayhap." Now Priscilla Stanbury and Mrs.
Crocket were great friends, and there had been times of deep want,
in which Mrs. Crocket's friendship had been very serviceable to the
ladies at the cottage. The three young women had been to the inn one
morning to ask after a conveyance from Nuncombe Putney to Princetown,
and had found that a four-wheeled open carriage with an old horse
and a very young driver could be hired there. "We have never dreamed
of such a thing," Priscilla Stanbury had said, "and the only time
I was at Princetown I walked there and back." So they had called at
the Stag and Antlers, and Mrs. Crocket had told them her mind upon
several matters.
"What a dear old woman!" said Nora, as they came away, having made
their bargain for the open carriage.
"I think she takes quite enough upon herself, you know," said Mrs.
Trevelyan.
"She is a dear old woman," said Priscilla, not attending at all to
the last words that had been spoken. "She is one of the best friends
I have in the world. If I were to say the best out of my own family,
perhaps I should not be wrong."
"But she uses such very odd language for a woman," said Mrs.
Trevelyan. Now Mrs. Crocket had certainly "dratted" and "darned" the
boy, who wouldn't come as fast as she had wished, and had laughed
at Mrs. Trevelyan very contemptuously, when that lady had suggested
that the urchin, who was at last brought forth, might not be a safe
charioteer down some of the hills.
"I suppose I'm used to it," said Priscilla. "At any rate I know I
like it. And I like her."
"I dare say she's a good sort of woman," said Mrs. Trevelyan,
"only--"
"I am not saying anything about her being a good woman now," said
Priscilla, interrupting the other with some vehemence, "but only that
she is my friend."
"I liked her of all things," said Nora. "Has she lived here always?"
"Yes; all her life. The house belonged to her father and to her
grandfather before her, and I think she says she has never slept
out of it a dozen times in her life. Her husband is dead, and her
daughters are married away, and she has the great grief and trouble
of a ne'er-do-well son. He's away now, and she's all alone." Then
after a pause, she continued; "I dare say it seems odd to you, Mrs.
Trevelyan, that we should speak of the innkeeper as a dear friend;
but you must remember that we have been poor among the poorest--and
are so indeed now. We only came into our present house to receive
you. That is where we used to live," and she pointed to the tiny
cottage, which now that it was dismantled and desolate, looked to be
doubly poor. "There have been times when we should have gone to bed
very hungry if it had not been for Mrs. Crocket."
Later in the day Mrs. Trevelyan, finding Priscilla alone, had
apologized for what she had said about the old woman. "I was very
thoughtless and forgetful, but I hope you will not be angry with me.
I will be ever so fond of her if you will forgive me."
"Very well," said Priscilla, smiling; "on those conditions I will
forgive you." And from that time there sprang up something like
a feeling of friendship between Priscilla and Mrs. Trevelyan.
Nevertheless Priscilla was still of opinion that the Clock House
arrangement was dangerous, and should never have been made; and Mrs.
Stanbury, always timid of her own nature, began to fear that it must
be so, as soon as she was removed from the influence of her son. She
did not see much even of the few neighbours who lived around her, but
she fancied that people looked at her in church as though she had
done that which she ought not to have done, in taking herself to a
big and comfortable house for the sake of lending her protection to a
lady who was separated from her husband. It was not that she believed
that Mrs. Trevelyan had been wrong; but that, knowing herself to be
weak, she fancied that she and her daughter would be enveloped in the
danger and suspicion which could not but attach themselves to the
lady's condition, instead of raising the lady out of the cloud,--as
would have been the case had she herself been strong. Mrs. Trevelyan,
who was sharpsighted and clear-witted, soon saw that it was so, and
spoke to Priscilla on the subject before she had been a fortnight in
the house. "I am afraid your mother does not like our being here,"
she said.
"How am I to answer that?" Priscilla replied.
"Just tell the truth."
"The truth is so uncivil. At first I did not like it. I disliked it
very much."
"Why did you give way?"
"I didn't give way. Hugh talked my mother over. Mamma does what I
tell her, except when Hugh tells her something else. I was afraid,
because, down here, knowing nothing of the world, I didn't wish
that we, little people, should be mixed up in the quarrels and
disagreements of those who are so much bigger."
"I don't know who it is that is big in this matter."
"You are big,--at any rate by comparison. But now it must go on. The
house has been taken, and my fears are over as regards you. What you
observe in mamma is only the effect, not yet quite worn out, of what
I said before you came. You may be quite sure of this,--that we
neither of us believe a word against you. Your position is a very
unfortunate one; but if it can be remedied by your staying here with
us, pray stay with us."
"It cannot be remedied," said Emily; "but we could not be anywhere
more comfortable than we are here."
CHAPTER XV.
WHAT THEY SAID ABOUT IT IN THE CLOSE.
When Miss Stanbury, in the Close at Exeter, was first told of the
arrangement that had been made at Nuncombe Putney, she said some very
hard words as to the thing that had been done. She was quite sure
that Mrs. Trevelyan was no better than she should be. Ladies who were
separated from their husbands never were any better than they should
be. And what was to be thought of any woman, who, when separated from
her husband, would put herself under the protection of such a Paladin
as Hugh Stanbury? She heard the tidings of course from Dorothy, and
spoke her mind even to Dorothy plainly enough; but it was to Martha
that she expressed herself with her fullest vehemence.
"We always knew," she said, "that my brother had married an
addle-pated, silly woman, one of the most unsuited to be the mistress
of a clergyman's house that ever a man set eyes on; but I didn't
think she'd allow herself to be led into such a stupid thing as
this."
"I don't suppose the lady has done anything amiss,--any more than
combing her husband's hair, and the like of that," said Martha.
"Don't tell me! Why, by their own story, she has got a lover."
"But he ain't to come after her down here, I suppose. And as for
lovers, ma'am, I'm told that the most of 'em have 'em up in London.
But it don't mean much, only just idle talking and gallivanting."
"When women can't keep themselves from idle talking with strange
gentlemen, they are very far gone on the road to the devil. That's
my notion. And that was everybody's notion a few years ago. But now,
what with divorce bills, and women's rights, and penny papers, and
false hair, and married women being just like giggling girls, and
giggling girls knowing just as much as married women, when a woman
has been married a year or two she begins to think whether she mayn't
have more fun for her money by living apart from her husband."
"Miss Dorothy says--"
"Oh, bother what Miss Dorothy says! Miss Dorothy only knows what
it has suited that scamp, her brother, to tell her. I understand
this woman has come away because of a lover; and if that's so, my
sister-in-law is very wrong to receive her. The temptation of the
Clock House has been too much for her. It's not my doing; that's
all."
That evening Miss Stanbury and Dorothy went out to tea at the house
of Mrs. MacHugh, and there the matter was very much discussed. The
family of the Trevelyans was known by name in these parts, and the
fact of Mrs. Trevelyan having been sent to live in a Devonshire
village, with Devonshire ladies who had a relation in Exeter so
well esteemed as Miss Stanbury of the Close, were circumstances of
themselves sufficient to ensure a considerable amount of prestige
at the city tea-table for the tidings of this unfortunate family
quarrel. Some reticence was of course necessary because of the
presence of Miss Stanbury and of Dorothy. To Miss Stanbury herself
Mrs. MacHugh and Mrs. Crumbie, of Cronstadt House, did not scruple
to express themselves very plainly, and to whisper a question as to
what was to be done should the lover make his appearance at Nuncombe
Putney; but they who spoke of the matter before Dorothy, were at
first more charitable, or, at least, more forbearing. Mr. Gibson,
who was one of the minor canons, and the two Miss Frenches from
Heavitree, who had the reputation of hunting unmarried clergymen in
couples, seemed to have heard all about it. When Mrs. MacHugh and
Miss Stanbury, with Mr. and Mrs. Crumbie, had seated themselves at
their whist-table, the younger people were able to express their
opinions without danger of interruption or of rebuke. It was known
to all Exeter by this time, that Dorothy Stanbury's mother had gone
to the Clock House, and that she had done so in order that Mrs.
Trevelyan might have a home. But it was not yet known whether anybody
had called upon them. There was Mrs. Merton, the wife of the present
parson of Nuncombe, who had known the Stanburys for the last twenty
years; and there was Mrs. Ellison of Lessboro', who lived only four
miles from Nuncombe, and who kept a pony-carriage. It would be a
great thing to know how these ladies had behaved in so difficult and
embarrassing a position. Mrs. Trevelyan and her sister had now been
at Nuncombe Putney for more than a fortnight, and something in that
matter of calling must have been done,--or have been left undone. In
answer to an ingeniously-framed question asked by Camilla French,
Dorothy at once set the matter at rest. "Mrs. Merton," said Camilla
French, "must find it a great thing to have two new ladies come to
the village, especially now that she has lost you, Miss Stanbury?"
"Mamma tells me," said Dorothy, "that Mrs. Trevelyan and Miss Rowley
do not mean to know anybody. They have given it out quite plainly, so
that there should be no mistake."
"Dear, dear," said Camilla French.
"I dare say it's for the best," said Arabella French, who was the
elder, and who looked very meek and soft. Miss French almost always
looked meek and soft.
"I'm afraid it will make it very dull for your mother,--not seeing
her old friends," said Mr. Gibson.
"Mamma won't feel that at all," said Dorothy.
"Mrs. Stanbury, I suppose, will see her own friends at her own house
just the same," said Camilla.
"There would be great difficulty in that, when there is a lady who is
to remain unknown," said Arabella. "Don't you think so, Mr. Gibson?"
Mr. Gibson replied that perhaps there might be a difficulty, but he
wasn't sure. The difficulty, he thought, might be got over if the
ladies did not always occupy the same room.
"You have never seen Mrs. Trevelyan, have you, Miss Stanbury?" asked
Camilla.
"Never."
"She is not an old family friend, then,--or anything of that sort?"
"Oh, dear, no."
"Because," said Arabella, "it is so odd how different people get
together sometimes." Then Dorothy explained that Mr. Trevelyan and
her brother Hugh had long been friends.
"Oh!--of Mr. Trevelyan," said Camilla. "Then it is he that has sent
his wife to Nuncombe, not she that has come there?"
"I suppose there has been some agreement," said Dorothy.
"Just so; just so," said Arabella, the meek. "I should like to see
her. They say that she is very beautiful; don't they?"
"My brother says that she is handsome."
"Exceedingly lovely, I'm told," said Camilla. "I should like to see
her,--shouldn't you, Mr. Gibson?"
"I always like to see a pretty woman," said Mr. Gibson, with a polite
bow, which the sisters shared between them.
"I suppose she'll go to church," said Camilla.
"Very likely not," said Arabella. "Ladies of that sort very often
don't go to church. I dare say you'll find that she'll never stir
out of the place at all, and that not a soul in Nuncombe will ever
see her except the gardener. It is such a thing for a woman to be
separated from her husband! Don't you think so, Mr. Gibson?"
"Of course it is," said he, with a shake of his head, which was
intended to imply that the censure of the church must of course
attend any sundering of those whom the church had bound together; but
which implied also by the absence from it of any intense clerical
severity, that as the separated wife was allowed to live with so very
respectable a lady as Mrs. Stanbury, there must probably be some
mitigating circumstances attending this special separation.
"I wonder what he is like?" said Camilla, after a pause.
"Who?" asked Arabella.
"The gentleman," said Camilla.
"What gentleman?" demanded Arabella.
"I don't mean Mr. Trevelyan," said Camilla.
"I don't believe there really is,--eh,--is there?" said Mr. Gibson,
very timidly.
"Oh, dear, yes," said Arabella.
"I'm afraid there's something of the kind," said Camilla. "I've heard
that there is, and I've heard his name." Then she whispered very
closely into the ear of Mr. Gibson the words, "Colonel Osborne," as
though her lips were by far too pure to mention aloud any sound so
full of iniquity.
"Indeed!" said Mr. Gibson.
"But he's quite an old man," said Dorothy, "and knew her father
intimately before she was born. And, as far as I can understand, her
husband does not suspect her in the least. And it's only because
there's a misunderstanding between them, and not at all because of
the gentleman."
"Oh!" exclaimed Camilla.
"Ah!" exclaimed Arabella.
"That would make a difference," said Mr. Gibson.
"But for a married woman to have her name mentioned at all with a
gentleman,--it is so bad; is it not, Mr. Gibson?" And then Arabella
also had her whisper into the clergyman's ear,--very closely. "I'm
afraid there's not a doubt about the Colonel. I'm afraid not. I am
indeed."
"Two by honours and the odd, and it's my deal," said Miss Stanbury,
briskly, and the sharp click with which she put the markers down
upon the table was heard all through the room. "I don't want anybody
to tell me," she said, "that when a young woman is parted from her
husband, the chances are ten to one that she has been very foolish."
"But what's a woman to do, if her husband beats her?" said Mrs.
Crumbie.
"Beat him again," said Mrs. MacHugh.
"And the husband will be sure to have the worst of it," said Mr.
Crumbie. "Well, I declare, if you haven't turned up an honour again,
Miss Stanbury!"
"It was your wife that cut it to me, Mr. Crumbie." Then they were
again at once immersed in the play, and the name neither of Trevelyan
nor Osborne was heard till Miss Stanbury was marking her double under
the candlestick; but during all pauses in the game the conversation
went back to the same topic, and when the rubber was over they
who had been playing it lost themselves for ten minutes in the
allurements of the interesting subject. It was so singular a
coincidence that the lady should have gone to Nuncombe Putney of
all villages in England, and to the house of Mrs. Stanbury of all
ladies in England. And then was she innocent, or was she guilty; and
if guilty, in what degree? That she had been allowed to bring her
baby with her was considered to be a great point in her favour. Mr.
Crumbie's opinion was that it was "only a few words." Mrs. Crumbie
was afraid that she had been a little light. Mrs. MacHugh said that
there was never fire without smoke. And Miss Stanbury, as she took
her departure, declared that the young women of the present day
didn't know what they were after. "They think that the world should
be all frolic and dancing, and they have no more idea of doing their
duty and earning their bread than a boy home for the holidays has of
doing lessons."
Then, as she went home with Dorothy across the Close, she spoke a
word which she intended to be very serious. "I don't mean to say
anything against your mother for what she has done as yet. Somebody
must take the woman in, and perhaps it was natural. But if that
Colonel What's-his-name makes his way down to Nuncombe Putney, your
mother must send her packing, if she has any respect either for
herself or for Priscilla."
CHAPTER XVI.
DARTMOOR.
[Illustration]
The well-weighed decision of Miss Stanbury respecting the
Stanbury-Trevelyan arrangement at Nuncombe Putney had been
communicated to Dorothy as the two walked home at night across the
Close from Mrs. MacHugh's house, and it was accepted by Dorothy
as being wise and proper. It amounted to this. If Mrs. Trevelyan
should behave herself with propriety in her retirement at the Clock
House, no further blame in the matter should be attributed to Mrs.
Stanbury for receiving her,--at any rate in Dorothy's hearing. The
existing scheme, whether wise or foolish, should be regarded as an
accepted scheme. But if Mrs. Trevelyan should be indiscreet,--if,
for instance, Colonel Osborne should show himself at Nuncombe
Putney,--then, for the sake of the family, Miss Stanbury would speak
out, and would speak out very loudly. All this Dorothy understood,
and she could perceive that her aunt had strong suspicion that there
would be indiscretion.
"I never knew one like her," said Miss Stanbury, "who, when she'd got
away from one man, didn't want to have another dangling after her."
A week had hardly passed after the party at Mrs. MacHugh's, and Mrs.
Trevelyan had hardly been three weeks at Nuncombe Putney, before the
tidings which Miss Stanbury almost expected reached her ears.
"The Colonel's been at the Clock House, ma'am," said Martha.
Now, it was quite understood in the Close by this time that "the
Colonel" meant Colonel Osborne.
"No!"
"I'm told he has though, ma'am, for sure and certain."
"Who says so?"
"Giles Hickbody was down at Lessboro', and see'd him hisself,--a
portly, middle-aged man,--not one of your young scampish-like
lovers."
"That's the man."
"Oh, yes. He went over to Nuncombe Putney, as sure as
anything;--hired Mrs. Clegg's chaise and pair, and asked for Mrs.
Trevelyan's house as open as anything. When Giles asked in the yard,
they told him as how that was the married lady's young man."
"I'd like to be at his tail,--so I would,--with a mop-handle," said
Miss Stanbury, whose hatred for those sins by which the comfort and
respectability of the world are destroyed, was not only sincere, but
intense. "Well; and what then?"
"He came back and slept at Mrs. Clegg's that night,--at least, that
was what he said he should do."
Miss Stanbury, however, was not so precipitate or uncharitable as
to act strongly upon information such as this. Before she even said
a word to Dorothy, she made further inquiry. She made very minute
inquiry, writing even to her very old and intimate friend Mrs.
Ellison, of Lessboro',--writing to that lady a most cautious and
guarded letter. At last it became a fact proved to her mind that
Colonel Osborne had been at the Clock House, had been received there,
and had remained there for hours,--had been allowed access to Mrs.
Trevelyan, and had slept the night at the inn at Lessboro'. The thing
was so terrible to Miss Stanbury's mind, that even false hair, Dr.
Colenso, and penny newspapers did not account for it.
"I shall begin to believe that the Evil One has been allowed to come
among us in person because of our sins," she said to Martha;--and she
meant it.
In the meantime, Mrs. Trevelyan, as may be remembered, had hired Mrs.
Crocket's open carriage, and the three young women, Mrs. Trevelyan,
Nora, and Priscilla, made a little excursion to Princetown, somewhat
after the fashion of a picnic. At Princetown, in the middle of
Dartmoor, about nine miles from Nuncombe Putney, is the prison
establishment at which are kept convicts undergoing penal servitude.
It is regarded by all the country round with great interest, chiefly
because the prisoners now and again escape, and then there comes a
period of interesting excitement until the escaped felon shall have
been again taken. How can you tell where he may be, or whether it may
not suit him to find his rest in your own cupboard, or under your own
bed? And then, as escape without notice will of course be the felon's
object, to attain that he will probably cut your throat, and the
throat of everybody belonging to you. All which considerations give
an interest to Princetown, and excite in the hearts of the Devonians
of these parts a strong affection for the Dartmoor prison. Of those
who visit Princetown comparatively few effect an entrance within the
walls of the gaol. They look at the gloomy place with a mysterious
interest, feeling something akin to envy for the prisoners who have
enjoyed the privilege of solving the mysteries of prison life, and
who know how men feel when they have their hair cut short, and are
free from moral responsibility for their own conduct, and are moved
about in gangs, and treated like wild beasts.
But the journey to Princetown, from whatever side it is approached,
has the charm of wild and beautiful scenery. The spot itself is ugly
enough; but you can go not thither without breathing the sweetest,
freshest air, and encountering that delightful sense of romance which
moorland scenery always produces. The idea of our three friends was
to see the Moor rather than the prison, to learn something of the
country around, and to enjoy the excitement of eating a sandwich
sitting on a hillock, in exchange for the ordinary comforts of a good
dinner with chairs and tables. A bottle of sherry and water and a
paper of sandwiches contained their whole banquet; for ladies, though
they like good things at picnics, and, indeed, at other times, almost
as well as men like them, very seldom prepare dainties for themselves
alone. Men are wiser and more thoughtful, and are careful to have the
good things, even if they are to be enjoyed without companionship.
Mrs. Crocket's boy, though he was only about three feet high, was a
miracle of skill and discretion. He used the machine, as the patent
drag is called, in going down the hills with the utmost care. He
never forced the beast beyond a walk if there was the slightest rise
in the ground; and as there was always a rise, the journey was slow.
But the three ladies enjoyed it thoroughly, and Mrs. Trevelyan was in
better spirits than she herself had thought to be possible for her
in her present condition. Most of us have recognised the fact that
a dram of spirits will create,--that a so-called nip of brandy will
create hilarity, or, at least, alacrity, and that a glass of sherry
will often "pick up" and set in order the prostrate animal and mental
faculties of the drinker. But we are not sufficiently alive to
the fact that copious draughts of fresh air,--of air fresh and
unaccustomed,--will have precisely the same effect. We do know that
now and again it is very essential to "change the air;" but we
generally consider that to do that with any chance of advantage, it
is necessary to go far afield; and we think also that such change of
the air is only needful when sickness of the body has come upon us,
or when it threatens to come. We are seldom aware that we may imbibe
long potations of pleasure and healthy excitement without perhaps
going out of our own county; that such potations are within a day's
journey of most of us; and that they are to be had for half-a-crown
a head, all expenses told. Mrs. Trevelyan probably did not know that
the cloud was lifted off her mind, and the load of her sorrow made
light to her, by the special vigour of the air of the Moor; but
she did know that she was enjoying herself, and that the world was
pleasanter to her than it had been for months past.
When they had sat upon their hillocks, and eaten their
sandwiches,--regretting that the basket of provisions had not been
bigger,--and had drunk their sherry and water out of the little horn
mug which Mrs. Crocket had lent them, Nora started off across the
moorland alone. The horse had been left to be fed in Princetown, and
they had walked back to a bush under which they had rashly left their
basket of provender concealed. It happened, however, that on that day
there was no escaped felon about to watch what they had done, and
the food and the drink had been found secure. Nora had gone off, and
as her sister and Priscilla sat leaning against their hillocks with
their backs to the road, she could be seen standing now on one little
eminence and now on another, thinking, doubtless, as she stood on the
one how good it would be to be Lady Peterborough, and, as she stood
on the other, how much better to be Mrs. Hugh Stanbury. Only,--before
she could be Mrs. Hugh Stanbury it would be necessary that Mr. Hugh
Stanbury should share her opinion,--and necessary also that he should
be able to maintain a wife. "I should never do to be a very poor
man's wife," she said to herself; and remembered as she said it, that
in reference to the prospect of her being Lady Peterborough, the man
who was to be Lord Peterborough was at any rate ready to make her his
wife, and on that side there were none of those difficulties about
house, and money, and position which stood in the way of the Hugh
Stanbury side of the question. She was not, she thought, fit to be
the wife of a very poor man; but she conceived of herself that she
would do very well as a future Lady Peterborough in the drawing-rooms
of Monkhams. She was so far vain as to fancy that she could look,
and speak, and move, and have her being after the fashion which is
approved for the Lady Peterboroughs of the world. It was not clear
to her that Nature had not expressly intended her to be a Lady
Peterborough; whereas, as far as she could see, Nature had not
intended her to be a Mrs. Hugh Stanbury, with a precarious income of
perhaps ten guineas a week when journalism was doing well. So she
moved on to another little eminence to think of it there. It was
clear to her that if she should accept Mr. Glascock she would sell
herself, and not give herself away; and she had told herself scores
of times before this, that a young woman should give herself away,
and not sell herself;--should either give herself away, or keep
herself to herself as circumstances might go. She had been quite sure
that she would never sell herself. But this was a lesson which she
had taught herself when she was very young, before she had come to
understand the world and its hard necessities. Nothing, she now told
herself, could be worse than to hang like a mill-stone round the neck
of a poor man. It might be a very good thing to give herself away for
love,--but it would not be a good thing to be the means of ruining
the man she loved, even if that man were willing to be so ruined.
And then she thought that she could also love that other man a
little,--could love him sufficiently for comfortable domestic
purposes. And it would undoubtedly be very pleasant to have all the
troubles of her life settled for her. If she were Mrs. Glascock,
known to the world as the future Lady Peterborough, would it not be
within her power to bring her sister and her sister's husband again
together? The tribute of the Monkhams' authority and influence to her
sister's side of the question would be most salutary. She tried to
make herself believe that in this way she would be doing a good deed.
Upon the whole, she thought that if Mr. Glascock should give her
another chance she would accept him. And he had distinctly promised
that he would give her another chance. It might be that this
unfortunate quarrel in the Trevelyan family would deter him. People
do not wish to ally themselves with family quarrels. But if the
chance came in her way she would accept it. She had made up her mind
to that, when she turned round from off the last knoll on which she
had stood, to return to her sister and Priscilla Stanbury.
[Illustration: Nora tries to make herself believe.]
They two had sat still under the shade of a thorn bush, looking at
Nora as she was wandering about, and talking together more freely
than they had ever done before on the circumstances that had brought
them together. "How pretty she looks," Priscilla had said, as Nora
was standing with her figure clearly marked by the light.
"Yes; she is very pretty, and has been much admired. This terrible
affair of mine is a cruel blow to her."
"You mean that it is bad for her to come and live here--without
society."
"Not exactly that,--though of course it would be better for her to go
out. And I don't know how a girl is ever to get settled in the world
unless she goes out. But it is always an injury to be connected in
any way with a woman who is separated from her husband. It must be
bad for you."
"It won't hurt me," said Priscilla. "Nothing of that kind can hurt
me."
"I mean that people say such ill-natured things."
"I stand alone, and can take care of myself," said Priscilla. "I defy
the evil tongues of all the world to hurt me. My personal cares are
limited to an old gown and bread and cheese. I like a pair of gloves
to go to church with, but that is only the remnant of a prejudice.
The world has so very little to give me, that I am pretty nearly sure
that it will take nothing away."
"And you are contented?"
"Well, no; I can't say that I am contented. I hardly think that
anybody ought to be contented. Should my mother die and Dorothy
remain with my aunt, or get married, I should be utterly alone in the
world. Providence, or whatever you call it, has made me a lady after
a fashion, so that I can't live with the ploughmen's wives, and at
the same time has so used me in other respects, that I can't live
with anybody else."
"Why should not you get married, as well as Dorothy?"
"Who would have me? And if I had a husband I should want a good
one,--a man with a head on his shoulders, and a heart. Even if I
were young and good-looking, or rich, I doubt whether I could please
myself. As it is I am as likely to be taken bodily to heaven, as to
become any man's wife."
"I suppose most women think so of themselves at some time, and yet
they are married."
"I am not fit to marry. I am often cross, and I like my own way, and
I have a distaste for men. I never in my life saw a man whom I wished
even to make my intimate friend. I should think any man an idiot who
began to make soft speeches to me, and I should tell him so."
"Ah; you might find it different when he went on with it."
"But I think," said Priscilla, "that when a woman is married there is
nothing to which she should not submit on behalf of her husband."
"You mean that for me."
"Of course I mean it for you. How should I not be thinking of you,
living as you are under the same roof with us? And I am thinking of
Louey." Louey was the baby. "What are you to do when after a year or
two his father shall send for him to have him under his own care?"
"Nothing shall separate me from my child," said Mrs. Trevelyan
eagerly.
"That is easily said; but I suppose the power of doing as he pleased
would be with him."
"Why should it be with him? I do not at all know that it would be
with him. I have not left his house. It is he that has turned me
out."
"There can, I think, be very little doubt what you should do," said
Priscilla, after a pause, during which she had got up from her seat
under the thorn bush.
"What should I do?" asked Mrs. Trevelyan.
"Go back to him."
"I will to-morrow if he will write and ask me. Nay; how could I help
myself? I am his creature, and must go or come as he bids me. I am
here only because he has sent me."
"You should write and ask him to take you."
"Ask him to forgive me because he has ill-treated me?"
"Never mind about that," said Priscilla, standing over her companion,
who was still lying under the bush. "All that is twopenny-halfpenny
pride, which should be thrown to the winds. The more right you have
been hitherto the better you can afford to go on being right. What is
it that we all live upon but self-esteem? When we want praise it is
only because praise enables us to think well of ourselves. Every one
to himself is the centre and pivot of all the world."
"It's a very poor world that goes round upon my pivot," said Mrs.
Trevelyan.
"I don't know how this quarrel came up," exclaimed Priscilla, "and
I don't care to know. But it seems a trumpery quarrel,--as to who
should beg each other's pardon first, and all that kind of thing.
Sheer and simple nonsense! Ask him to let it all be forgotten. I
suppose he loves you?"
"How can I know? He did once."
"And you love him?"
"Yes. I love him certainly."
"I don't see how you can have a doubt. Here is Jack with the
carriage, and if we don't mind he'll pass us by without seeing us."
Then Mrs. Trevelyan got up, and when they had succeeded in diverting
Jack's attention for a moment from the horse, they called to Nora,
who was still moving about from one knoll to another, and who showed
no desire to abandon the contemplations in which she had been
engaged.
It had been mid-day before they left home in the morning, and they
were due to be at home in time for tea,--which is an epoch in the
day generally allowed to be more elastic than some others. When Mrs.
Stanbury lived in the cottage her hour for tea had been six; this had
been stretched to half-past seven when she received Mrs. Trevelyan at
the Clock House; and it was half-past eight before Jack landed them
at their door. It was manifest to them all as they entered the house
that there was an air of mystery in the face of the girl who had
opened the door for them. She did not speak, however, till they were
all within the passage. Then she uttered a few words very solemnly.
"There be a gentleman come," she said.
"A gentleman!" said Mrs. Trevelyan, thinking in the first moment of
her husband, and in the second of Colonel Osborne.
"He be for you, miss," said the girl, bobbing her head at Nora.
Upon hearing this Nora sank speechless into the chair which stood in
the passage.
CHAPTER XVII.
A GENTLEMAN COMES TO NUNCOMBE PUTNEY.
It soon became known to them all as they remained clustered in the
hall that Mr. Glascock was in the house. Mrs. Stanbury came out to
them and informed them that he had been at Nuncombe Putney for the
last five hours, and that he had asked for Mrs. Trevelyan when he
called. It became evident as the affairs of the evening went on, that
Mrs. Stanbury had for a few minutes been thrown into a terrible state
of amazement, thinking that "the Colonel" had appeared. The strange
gentleman, however, having obtained admittance, explained who he was,
saying that he was very desirous of seeing Mrs. Trevelyan,--and Miss
Rowley. It may be presumed that a glimmer of light did make its way
into Mrs. Stanbury's mind on the subject; but up to the moment at
which the three travellers arrived, she had been in doubt on the
subject. Mr. Glascock had declared that he would take a walk, and
in the course of the afternoon had expressed high approval of Mrs.
Crocket's culinary skill. When Mrs. Crocket heard that she had
entertained the son of a lord, she was very loud in her praise of the
manner in which he had eaten two mutton chops and called for a third.
He had thought it no disgrace to apply himself to the second half
of an apple pie, and had professed himself to be an ardent admirer
of Devonshire cream. "It's them counter-skippers as turns up their
little noses at the victuals as is set before them," said Mrs.
Crocket.
After his dinner Mr. Glascock had returned to the Clock House, and
had been sitting there for an hour with Mrs. Stanbury, not much to
her delight or to his, when the carriage was driven up to the door.
"He is to go back to Lessboro' to-night," said Mrs. Stanbury in a
whisper.
"Of course you must see him before he goes," said Mrs. Trevelyan to
her sister. There had, as was natural, been very much said between
the two sisters about Mr. Glascock. Nora had abstained from asserting
in any decided way that she disliked the man, and had always
absolutely refused to allow Hugh Stanbury's name to be mixed up with
the question. Whatever might be her own thoughts about Hugh Stanbury
she had kept them even from her sister. When her sister had told her
that she had refused Mr. Glascock because of Hugh, she had shown
herself to be indignant, and had since that said one or two fine
things as to her capacity to refuse a brilliant offer simply because
the man who had made it was indifferent to her. Mrs. Trevelyan had
learned from her that her suitor had declared his intention to
persevere; and here was perseverance with a vengeance! "Of course you
must see him,--at once," said Mrs. Trevelyan. Nora for a few seconds
had remained silent, and then had run up to her room. Her sister
followed her instantly.
"What is the meaning of it all?" said Priscilla to her mother.
"I suppose he is in love with Miss Rowley," said Mrs. Stanbury.
"But who is he?"
Then Mrs. Stanbury told all that she knew. She had seen from his
card that he was an Honourable Mr. Glascock. She had collected from
what he had said that he was an old friend of the two ladies. Her
conviction was strong in Mr. Glascock's favour,--thinking, as she
expressed herself, that everything was right and proper,--but she
could hardly explain why she thought so.
"I do wish that they had never come," said Priscilla, who could not
rid herself of an idea that there must be danger in having to do with
women who had men running after them.
"Of course I'll see him," said Nora to her sister. "I have not
refused to see him. Why do you scold me?"
"I have not scolded you, Nora; but I do want you to think how
immensely important this is."
"Of course it is important."
"And so much the more so because of my misfortunes! Think how good he
must be, how strong must be his attachment, when he comes down here
after you in this way."
"But I have to think of my own feelings."
"You know you like him. You have told me so. And only fancy what
mamma will feel! Such a position! And the man so excellent! Everybody
says that he hasn't a fault in any way."
"I hate people without faults."
"Oh, Nora, Nora, that is foolish! There, there; you must go down.
Pray,--pray do not let any absurd fancy stand in your way, and
destroy everything. It will never come again, Nora. And, only think;
it is all now your own, if you will only whisper one word."
"Ah!--one word,--and that a falsehood!"
"No,--no. Say you will try to love him, and that will be enough. And
you do love him?"
"Do I?"
"Yes, you do. It is only the opposition of your nature that makes you
fight against him. Will you go now?"
"Let me be for two minutes by myself," said Nora, "and then I'll come
down. Tell him that I'm coming." Mrs. Trevelyan stooped over her,
kissed her, and then left her.
Nora, as soon as she was alone, stood upright in the middle of the
room and held her hands up to her forehead. She had been far from
thinking, when she was considering the matter easily among the
hillocks, that the necessity for an absolute decision would come upon
her so instantaneously. She had told herself only this morning that
it would be wise to accept the man, if he should ever ask a second
time;--and he had come already. He had been waiting for her in the
village while she had been thinking whether he would ever come across
her path again. She thought that it would have been easier for her
now to have gone down with a "yes" in her mouth, if her sister had
not pressed her so hard to say that "yes." The very pressure from her
sister seemed to imply that such pressure ought to be resisted. Why
should there have been pressure, unless there were reasons against
her marrying him? And yet, if she chose to take him, who would have
a right to complain of her? Hugh Stanbury had never spoken to her a
word that would justify her in even supposing that he would consider
himself to be ill-used. All others of her friends would certainly
rejoice, would applaud her, pat her on the back, cover her with
caresses, and tell her that she had been born under a happy star. And
she did like the man. Nay;--she thought she loved him. She withdrew
her hands from her brow, assured herself that her lot in life was
cast, and with hurrying fingers attempted to smooth her hair and to
arrange her ribbons before the glass. She would go to the encounter
boldly and accept him honestly. It was her duty to do so. What might
she not do for brothers and sisters as the wife of Lord Peterborough
of Monkhams? She saw that that arrangement before the glass could be
of no service, and she stepped quickly to the door. If he did not
like her as she was, he need not ask her. Her mind was made up, and
she would do it. But as she went down the stairs to the room in which
she knew that he was waiting for her, there came over her a cold
feeling of self-accusation,--almost of disgrace. "I do not care,"
she said. "I know that I'm right." She opened the door quickly, that
there might be no further doubt, and found that she was alone with
him.
"Miss Rowley," he said, "I am afraid you will think that I am
persecuting you."
"I have no right to think that," she answered.
"I'll tell you why I have come. My dear father, who has always been
my best friend, is very ill. He is at Naples, and I must go to him.
He is very old, you know,--over eighty; and will never live to come
back to England. From what I hear, I think it probable that I may
remain with him till everything is over."
"I did not know that he was so old as that."
"They say that he can hardly live above a month or two. He will never
see my wife,--if I can have a wife; but I should like to tell him, if
it were possible,--that,--that--"
"I understand you, Mr. Glascock."
"I told you that I should come to you again, and as I may possibly
linger at Naples all the winter, I could not go without seeing you.
Miss Rowley, may I hope that you can love me?"
She did not answer him a word, but stood looking away from him with
her hands clasped together. Had he asked her whether she would be his
wife, it is possible that the answer which she had prepared would
have been spoken. But he had put the question in another form. Did
she love him? If she could only bring herself to say that she could
love him, she might be lady of Monkhams before the next summer had
come round.
"Nora," he said, "do you think that you can love me?"
"No," she said, and there was something almost of fierceness in the
tone of her voice as she answered him.
"And must that be your final answer to me?"
"Mr. Glascock, what can I say?" she replied. "I will tell you the
honest truth:--I will tell you everything. I came into this room
determined to accept you. But you are so good, and so kind, and so
upright, that I cannot tell you a falsehood. I do not love you. I
ought not to take what you offer me. If I did, it would be because
you are rich, and a lord; and not because I love you. I love some one
else. There;--pray, pray do not tell of me; but I do." Then she flung
away from him and hid her face in a corner of the sofa out of the
light.
Her lover stood silent, not knowing how to go on with the
conversation, not knowing how to bring it to an end. After what
she had now said to him it was impossible that he should press her
further. It was almost impossible that he should wish to do so. When
a lady is frank enough to declare that her heart is not her own to
give, a man can hardly wish to make further prayer for the gift. "If
so," he said, "of course I have nothing to hope."
She was sobbing, and could not answer him. She was half repentant,
partly proud of what she had done,--half repentant in that she had
lost what had seemed to her to be so good, and full of remorse in
that she had so unnecessarily told her secret.
"Perhaps," said he, "I ought to assure you that what you have told me
shall never be repeated by my lips."
She thanked him for this by a motion of her head and hand, not by
words;--and then he was gone. How he managed to bid adieu to Mrs.
Stanbury and her sister, or whether he saw them as he left the house,
she never knew. In her corner of the sofa, weeping in the dark,
partly proud and partly repentant, she remained till her sister came
to her. "Emily," she said, jumping up, "say nothing about it; not
a word. It is of no use. The thing is done and over, and let it
altogether be forgotten."
"It is done and over, certainly," said Mrs. Trevelyan.
"Exactly;--and I suppose a girl may do what she likes with herself in
that way. If I choose to decline to take anything that is pleasant,
and nice, and comfortable, nobody has a right to scold me. And I
won't be scolded."
"But, my child, who is scolding you?"
"You mean to scold me. But it is of no use. The man has gone, and
there is an end of it. Nothing that you can say or I can think will
bring him back again. I don't want anybody to tell me that it would
be better to be Lady Peterborough, with everything that the world has
to give, than to live here without a soul to speak to, and to have to
go back to those horrible islands next year. You can't think that I
am very comfortable."
"But what did you say to him, Nora?"
"What did I say to him? What could I say to him? Why didn't he ask me
to be his wife without saying anything about love? He asked me if I
loved him. Of course I don't love him. I would have said I did, but
it stuck in my throat. I am willing enough, I believe, to sell myself
to the devil, but I don't know how to do it. Never mind. It's done,
and now I'll go to bed."
She did go to bed, and Mrs. Trevelyan explained to the two ladies as
much as was necessary of what had occurred. When Mrs. Stanbury came
to understand that the gentleman who had been closeted with her
would, probably, in a few months be a lord himself, that he was a
very rich man, a member of Parliament, and one of those who are
decidedly born with gold spoons in their mouths, and understood also
that Nora Rowley had refused him, she was lost in amazement. Mr.
Glascock was about forty years of age, and appeared to Nora Rowley,
who was nearly twenty years his junior, to be almost an old man.
But to Mrs. Stanbury, who was over sixty, Mr. Glascock seemed to be
quite in the flower of his age. The bald place at the top of his head
simply showed that he had passed his boyhood, and the grey hairs at
the back of his whiskers were no more than outward signs of manly
discretion. She could not understand why any girl should refuse such
an offer, unless the man were himself bad in morals, or in temper.
But Mrs. Trevelyan had told her while Nora and Mr. Glascock were
closeted together, that he was believed by them all to be good and
gentle. Nevertheless she felt a considerable increase of respect for
a young lady who had refused the eldest son of a lord. Priscilla,
when she heard what had occurred, expressed to her mother a moderated
approval. According to her views a girl would much more often be
right to refuse an offer of marriage than to accept it, let him who
made the offer be who he might. And the fact of the man having been
sent away with a refusal somewhat softened Priscilla's anger at his
coming there at all.
"I suppose he is a goose," said she to her mother, "and I hope there
won't be any more of this kind running after them while they are with
us."
Nora, when she was alone, wept till her heart was almost broken. It
was done, and the man was gone, and the thing was over. She had quite
sufficient knowledge of the world to realise perfectly the difference
between such a position as that which had been offered to her, and
the position which in all probability she would now be called upon to
fill. She had had her chance, and Fortune had placed great things at
her disposal. It must be said of her also that the great things which
Fortune had offered to her were treasures very valuable in her eyes.
Whether it be right and wise to covet or to despise wealth and rank,
there was no doubt but that she coveted them. She had been instructed
to believe in them, and she did believe in them. In some mysterious
manner of which she herself knew nothing, taught by some preceptor
the nobility of whose lessons she had not recognised though she had
accepted them, she had learned other things also,--to revere truth
and love, and to be ambitious as regarded herself of conferring the
gift of her whole heart upon some one whom she could worship as a
hero. She had spoken the simple truth when she had told her sister
that she had been willing to sell herself to the devil, but that
she had failed in her attempt to execute the contract. But now as
she lay weeping on her bed, tearing herself with remorse, picturing
to herself in the most vivid colours all that she had thrown away,
telling herself of all that she might have done and all that she
might have been, had she not allowed the insane folly of a moment
to get the better of her, she received little or no comfort from
the reflection that she had been true to her better instincts. She
had told the man that she had refused him because she loved Hugh
Stanbury;--at least, as far as she could remember what had passed,
she had so told him. And how mean it was of her to allow herself to
be actuated by an insane passion for a man who had never spoken to
her of love, and how silly of her afterwards to confess it! Of what
service could such a passion be to her life? Even were it returned,
she could not marry such a one as Hugh Stanbury. She knew enough of
herself to be quite sure that were he to ask her to do so to-morrow,
she would refuse him. Better go and be scorched, and bored to
death, and buried at the Mandarins, than attempt to regulate a poor
household which, as soon as she made one of its number, would be on
the sure road to ruin!
For a moment there came upon her, not a thought, hardly an
idea,--something of a waking dream that she would write to Mr.
Glascock and withdraw all that she had said. Were she to do so he
would probably despise her, and tell her that he despised her;--but
there might be a chance. It was possible that such a declaration
would bring him back to her;--and did it not bring him back to her
she would only be where she was, a poor lost, shipwrecked creature,
who had flung herself upon the rocks and thrown away her only chance
of a prosperous voyage across the ocean of life; her only chance, for
she was not like other girls, who at any rate remain on the scene
of action, and may refit their spars and still win their way. For
there were to be no more seasons in London, no more living in Curzon
Street, no renewed power of entering the ball-rooms and crowded
staircases in which high-born wealthy lovers can be conquered. A
great prospect had been given to her, and she had flung it aside!
That letter of retractation was, however, quite out of the question.
The reader must not suppose that she had ever thought that she could
write it. She thought of nothing but of coming misery and remorse. In
her wretchedness she fancied that she had absolutely disclosed to the
man who loved her the name of him whom she had been mad enough to say
that she loved. But what did it matter? Let it be as it might, she
was destroyed.
The next morning she came down to breakfast pale as a ghost; and they
who saw her knew at once that she had done that which had made her a
wretched woman.
CHAPTER XVIII.
THE STANBURY CORRESPONDENCE.
Half an hour after the proper time, when the others had finished
their tea and bread and butter, Nora Rowley came down among them pale
as a ghost. Her sister had gone to her while she was dressing, but
she had declared that she would prefer to be alone. She would be down
directly, she had said, and had completed her toilet without even the
assistance of her maid. She drank her cup of tea and pretended to eat
her toast; and then sat herself down, very wretchedly, to think of
it all again. It had been all within her grasp,--all of which she
had ever dreamed! And now it was gone! Each of her three companions
strove from time to time to draw her into conversation, but she
seemed to be resolute in her refusal. At first, till her utter
prostration had become a fact plainly recognised by them all, she
made some little attempt at an answer when a direct question was
asked of her; but after a while she only shook her head, and was
silent, giving way to absolute despair.
Late in the evening she went out into the garden, and Priscilla
followed her. It was now the end of July, and the summer was in its
glory. The ladies, during the day, would remain in the drawing-room
with the windows open and the blinds down, and would sit in the
evening reading and working, or perhaps pretending to read and work,
under the shade of a cedar which stood upon the lawn. No retirement
could possibly be more secluded than was that of the garden of the
Clock House. No stranger could see into it, or hear sounds from out
of it. Though it was not extensive, it was so well furnished with
those charming garden shrubs which, in congenial soils, become large
trees, that one party of wanderers might seem to be lost from another
amidst its walls. On this evening Mrs. Stanbury and Mrs. Trevelyan
had gone out as usual, but Priscilla had remained with Nora Rowley.
After a while Nora also got up and went through the window all alone.
Priscilla, having waited for a few minutes, followed her; and caught
her in a long green walk that led round the bottom of the orchard.
"What makes you so wretched?" she said.
"Why do you say I am wretched?"
"Because it's so visible. How is one to go on living with you all day
and not notice it?"
"I wish you wouldn't notice it. I don't think it kind of you to
notice it. If I wanted to talk of it, I would say so."
"It is better generally to speak of a trouble than to keep it to
oneself," said Priscilla.
"All the same, I would prefer not to speak of mine," said Nora.
Then they parted, one going one way and one the other, and Priscilla
was certainly angry at the reception which had been given to the
sympathy which she had proffered. The next day passed almost without
a word spoken between the two. Mrs. Stanbury had not ventured as yet
to mention to her guest the subject of the rejected lover, and had
not even said much on the subject to Mrs. Trevelyan. Between the two
sisters there had been, of course, some discussion on the matter. It
was impossible that it should be allowed to pass without it; but such
discussions always resulted in an assertion on the part of Nora that
she would not be scolded. Mrs. Trevelyan was very tender with her,
and made no attempt to scold her,--tried, at last, simply to console
her; but Nora was so continually at work scolding herself, that every
word spoken to her on the subject of Mr. Glascock's visit seemed to
her to carry with it a rebuke.
But on the second day she herself accosted Priscilla Stanbury. "Come
into the garden," she said, when they two were for a moment alone
together; "I want to speak to you." Priscilla, without answering,
folded up her work and put on her hat. "Come down to the green walk,"
said Nora. "I was savage to you last night, and I want to beg your
pardon."
"You were savage," said Priscilla, smiling, "and you shall have my
pardon. Who would not pardon you any offence, if you asked it?"
"I am so miserable!" she said.
"But why?"
"I don't know. I can't tell. And it is of no use talking about it
now, for it is all over. But I ought not to have been cross to you,
and I am very sorry."
"That does not signify a straw; only so far, that when I have been
cross, and have begged a person's pardon,--which I don't do as often
as I ought,--I always feel that it begets kindness. If I could help
you in your trouble I would."
"You can't fetch him back again."
"You mean Mr. Glascock. Shall I go and try?"
Nora smiled and shook her head. "I wonder what he would say if you
asked him. But if he came I should do the same thing."
"I do not in the least know what you have done, my dear. I only see
that you mope about, and are more down in the mouth than any one
ought to be, unless some great trouble has come."
"A great trouble has come."
"I suppose you have had your choice,--either to accept your lover or
to reject him."
"No; I have not had my choice."
"It seems to me that no one has dictated to you; or, at least, that
you have obeyed no dictation."
"Of course, I can't explain it to you. It is impossible that I
should."
"If you mean that you regret what you have done because you have been
false to the man, I can sympathise with you. No one has ever a right
to be false, and if you are repenting a falsehood, I will willingly
help you to eat your ashes and to wear your sackcloth. But if you are
repenting a truth--"
"I am."
"Then you must eat your ashes by yourself, for me; and I do not think
that you will ever be able to digest them."
"I do not want anybody to help me," said Nora proudly.
"Nobody can help you, if I understand the matter rightly. You have
got to get the better of your own covetousness and evil desires, and
you are in the fair way to get the better of them if you have already
refused to be this man's wife because you could not bring yourself to
commit the sin of marrying him when you did not love him. I suppose
that is about the truth of it; and indeed, indeed, I do sympathise
with you. If you have done that, though it is no more than the
plainest duty, I will love you for it. One finds so few people that
will do any duty that taxes their self-indulgence."
"But he did not ask me to marry him."
"Then I do not understand anything about it."
"He asked me to love him."
"But he meant you to be his wife?"
"Oh yes;--he meant that of course."
"And what did you say?" asked Priscilla.
"That I didn't love him," replied Nora.
"And that was the truth?"
"Yes;--it was the truth."
"And what do you regret?--that you didn't tell him a lie?"
"No;--not that," said Nora slowly.
"What then? You cannot regret that you have not basely deceived a man
who has treated you with a loving generosity?" They walked on silent
for a few yards, and then Priscilla repeated her question. "You
cannot mean that you are sorry that you did not persuade yourself to
do evil?"
"I don't want to go back to the islands, and to lose myself there,
and to be nobody;--that is what I mean. And I might have been so
much! Could one step from the very highest rung of the ladder to the
very lowest and not feel it?"
"But you have gone up the ladder,--if you only knew it," said
Priscilla. "There was a choice given to you between the foulest mire
of the clay of the world, and the sun-light of the very God. You have
chosen the sun-light, and you are crying after the clay! I cannot
pity you; but I can esteem you, and love you, and believe in you. And
I do. You'll get yourself right at last, and there's my hand on it,
if you'll take it." Nora took the hand that was offered to her, held
it in her own for some seconds, and then walked back to the house and
up to her own room in silence.
The post used to come into Nuncombe Putney at about eight in the
morning, carried thither by a wooden-legged man who rode a donkey.
There is a general understanding that the wooden-legged men in
country parishes should be employed as postmen, owing to the great
steadiness of demeanour which a wooden leg is generally found to
produce. It may be that such men are slower in their operations than
would be biped postmen; but as all private employers of labour demand
labourers with two legs, it is well that the lame and halt should
find a refuge in the less exacting service of the government. The
one-legged man who rode his donkey into Nuncombe Putney would reach
his post-office not above half an hour after his proper time; but he
was very slow in stumping round the village, and seldom reached the
Clock House much before ten. On a certain morning two or three days
after the conversation just recorded it was past ten when he brought
two letters to the door, one for Mrs. Trevelyan, and one for Mrs.
Stanbury. The ladies had finished their breakfast, and were seated
together at an open window. As was usual, the letters were given into
Priscilla's hands, and the newspaper which accompanied them into
those of Mrs. Trevelyan, its undoubted owner. When her letter was
handed to her, she looked at the address closely and then walked away
with it into her own room.
"I think it's from Louis," said Nora, as soon as the door was closed.
"If so, he is telling her to come back."
"Mamma, this is for you," said Priscilla. "It is from Aunt Stanbury.
I know her handwriting."
"From your aunt? What can she be writing about? There is something
wrong with Dorothy." Mrs. Stanbury held the letter but did not open
it. "You had better read it, my dear. If she is ill, pray let her
come home."
But the letter spoke of nothing amiss as regarded Dorothy, and did
not indeed even mention Dorothy's name. Luckily Priscilla read
the letter in silence, for it was an angry letter. "What is it,
Priscilla? Why don't you tell me? Is anything wrong?" said Mrs.
Stanbury.
"Nothing is wrong, mamma,--except that my aunt is a silly woman."
"Goodness me! what is it?"
"It is a family matter," said Nora smiling, "and I will go."
"What can it be?" demanded Mrs. Stanbury again as soon as Nora had
left the room.
"You shall hear what it can be. I will read it you," said Priscilla.
"It seems to me that of all the women that ever lived my Aunt
Stanbury is the most prejudiced, the most unjust, and the most given
to evil thinking of her neighbours. This is what she has thought fit
to write to you, mamma." Then Priscilla read her aunt's letter, which
was as follows:--
The Close, Exeter, July 31, 186--.
DEAR SISTER STANBURY,
I am informed that the lady who is living with you because
she could not continue to live under the same roof with
her lawful husband, has received a visit at your house
from a gentleman who was named as her lover before she
left her own. I am given to understand that it was because
of this gentleman's visits to her in London, and because
she would not give up seeing him, that her husband would
not live with her any longer.
"But the man has never been here at all," said Mrs. Stanbury, in
dismay.
"Of course he has not been here. But let me go on."
I have got nothing to do with your visitors, [continued
the letter] and I should not interfere but for the credit
of the family. There ought to be somebody to explain to
you that much of the abominable disgrace of the whole
proceeding will rest upon you, if you permit such goings
on in your house. I suppose it is your house. At any rate
you are regarded as the mistress of the establishment, and
it is for you to tell the lady that she must go elsewhere.
I do hope that you have done so, or at least that you
will do so now. It is intolerable that the widow of my
brother,--a clergyman,--should harbour a lady who is
separated from her husband and who receives visits from
a gentleman who is reputed to be her lover. I wonder
much that your eldest daughter should countenance such a
proceeding.
Yours truly,
JEMIMA STANBURY.
Mrs. Stanbury, when the letter had been read to her, held up both her
hands in despair. "Dear, dear," she exclaimed. "Oh, dear!"
"She had such pleasure in writing it," said Priscilla, "that one
ought hardly to begrudge it her." The blackest spot in the character
of Priscilla Stanbury was her hatred for her aunt in Exeter. She knew
that her aunt had high qualities, and yet she hated her aunt. She was
well aware that her aunt was regarded as a shining light by very many
good people in the county, and yet she hated her aunt. She could not
but acknowledge that her aunt had been generous to her brother, and
was now very generous to her sister, and yet she hated her aunt. It
was now a triumph to her that her aunt had fallen into so terrible
a quagmire, and she was by no means disposed to let the sinning old
woman easily out of it.
"It is as pretty a specimen," she said, "as I ever knew of malice and
eaves-dropping combined."
"Don't use such hard words, my dear."
"Look at her words to us," said Priscilla. "What business has she to
talk to you about the credit of the family and abominable disgrace?
You have held your head up in poverty, while she has been rolling in
money."
"She has been very good to Hugh,--and now to Dorothy."
"If I were Dorothy I would have none of her goodness. She likes some
one to trample on,--some one of the name to patronise. She shan't
trample on you and me, mamma."
Then there was a discussion as to what should be done; or rather
a discourse in which Priscilla explained what she thought fit to
do. Nothing, she decided, should be said to Mrs. Trevelyan on the
subject; but an answer should be sent to Aunt Stanbury. Priscilla
herself would write this answer, and herself would sign it. There was
some difference of opinion on this point, as Mrs. Stanbury thought
that if she might be allowed to put her name to it, even though
Priscilla should write it, the wording of it would be made, in some
degree, mild,--to suit her own character. But her daughter was
imperative, and she gave way.
"It shall be mild enough in words," said Priscilla, "and very short."
Then she wrote her letter as follows:--
Nuncombe Putney, August 1, 186--.
DEAR AUNT STANBURY,
You have found a mare's nest. The gentleman you speak of
has never been here at all, and the people who bring you
news have probably hoaxed you. I don't think that mamma
has ever disgraced the family, and you can have no reason
for thinking that she ever will. You should, at any rate,
be sure of what you are saying before you make such cruel
accusations.
Yours truly,
PRISCILLA STANBURY.
P.S.--Another gentleman did call here,--not to see Mrs.
Trevelyan; but I suppose mamma's house need not be closed
against all visitors.
Poor Dorothy had passed evil hours from the moment in which her
aunt had so far certified herself as to Colonel Osborne's visit to
Nuncombe as to make her feel it to be incumbent on her to interfere.
After much consideration Miss Stanbury had told her niece the
dreadful news, and had told also what she intended to do. Dorothy,
who was in truth horrified at the iniquity of the fact which was
related, and who never dreamed of doubting the truth of her aunt's
information, hardly knew how to interpose. "I am sure mamma won't let
there be anything wrong," she had said.
"And you don't call this wrong?" said Miss Stanbury, in a tone of
indignation.
"But perhaps mamma will tell them to go."
"I hope she will. I hope she has. But he was allowed to be there
for hours. And now three days have passed and there is no sign of
anything being done. He came and went and may come again when he
pleases." Still Dorothy pleaded. "I shall do my duty," said Miss
Stanbury.
"I am quite sure mamma will do nothing wrong," said Dorothy. But the
letter was written and sent, and the answer to the letter reached the
house in the Close in due time.
When Miss Stanbury had read and re-read the very short reply which
her niece had written, she became at first pale with dismay, and
then red with renewed vigour and obstinacy. She had made herself, as
she thought, quite certain of her facts before she had acted on her
information. There was some equivocation, some most unworthy deceit
in Priscilla's letter. Or could it be possible that she herself had
been mistaken? Another gentleman had been there;--not, however, with
the object of seeing Mrs. Trevelyan! So said Priscilla. But she had
made herself sure that the man in question was a man from London,
a middle-aged man from London, who had specially asked for Mrs.
Trevelyan, and who had at once been known to Mrs. Clegg, at the
Lessboro' inn, to be Mrs. Trevelyan's lover. Miss Stanbury was
very unhappy, and at last sent for Giles Hickbody. Giles Hickbody
had never pretended to know the name. He had seen the man and had
described him, "Quite a swell, ma'am; and a Lon'oner, and one as'd
be up to anything; but not a young 'un; no, not just a young 'un,
zartainly." He was cross-examined again now, and said that all he
knew about the man's name was that there was a handle to it. This was
ended by Miss Stanbury sending him down to Lessboro' to learn the
very name of the gentleman, and by his coming back with that of the
Honourable George Glascock written on a piece of paper. "They says
now as he was arter the other young 'ooman," said Giles Hickbody.
Then was the confusion of Miss Stanbury complete.
It was late when Giles returned from Lessboro', and nothing could
be done that night. It was too late to write a letter for the
next morning's post. Miss Stanbury, who was as proud of her own
discrimination as she was just and true, felt that a day of
humiliation had indeed come for her. She hated Priscilla almost as
vigorously as Priscilla hated her. To Priscilla she would not write
to own her fault; but it was incumbent on her to confess it to Mrs.
Stanbury. It was incumbent on her also to confess it to Dorothy. All
that night she did not sleep, and the next morning she went about
abashed, wretched, hardly mistress of her own maids. She must confess
it also to Martha, and Martha would be very stern to her. Martha had
pooh-poohed the whole story of the lover, seeming to think that there
could be no reasonable objection to a lover past fifty.
"Dorothy," she said at last, about noon, "I have been over
hasty about your mother and this man. I am sorry for it, and
must--beg--everybody's--pardon."
"I knew mamma would do nothing wrong," said Dorothy.
"To do wrong is human, and she, I suppose, is not more free than
others; but in this matter I was misinformed. I shall write and beg
her pardon; and now I beg your pardon."
"Not mine, Aunt Stanbury."
"Yes, yours and your mother's, and the lady's also,--for against her
has the fault been most grievous. I shall write to your mother and
express my contrition." She put off the evil hour of writing as long
as she could, but before dinner the painful letter had been written,
and carried by herself to the post. It was as follows:--
The Close, August 3, 186--.
DEAR SISTER STANBURY,
I have now learned that the information was false on which
my former letter was based. I am heartily sorry for any
annoyance I may have given you. I can only inform you
that my intentions were good and upright. Nevertheless, I
humbly beg your pardon.
Yours truly,
JEMIMA STANBURY.
Mrs. Stanbury, when she received this, was inclined to let the matter
drop. That her sister-in-law should express such abject contrition
was to her such a lowering of the great ones of the earth, that the
apology conveyed to her more pain than pleasure. She could not hinder
herself from sympathising with all that her sister-in-law had felt
when she had found herself called upon to humiliate herself. But
it was not so with Priscilla. Mrs. Stanbury did not observe that
her daughter's name was scrupulously avoided in the apology; but
Priscilla observed it. She would not let the matter drop, without
an attempt at the last word. She therefore wrote back again as
follows;--
Nuncombe Putney, August 4, 186--.
DEAR AUNT STANBURY,
I am glad you have satisfied yourself about the gentleman
who has so much disquieted you. I do not know that the
whole affair would be worth a moment's consideration, were
it not that mamma and I, living as we do so secluded a
life, are peculiarly apt to feel any attack upon our good
name,--which is pretty nearly all that is left to us. If
ever there were women who should be free from attack,
at any rate from those of their own family, we are such
women. We never interfere with you, or with anybody; and I
think you might abstain from harassing us by accusations.
Pray do not write to mamma in such a strain again, unless
you are quite sure of your ground.
Yours truly,
PRISCILLA STANBURY.
"Impudent!" said Miss Stanbury to Martha, when she had read the
letter. "Ill-conditioned, impudent vixen!"
"She was provoked, miss," said Martha.
"Well; yes; yes;--and I suppose it is right that you should tell me
of it. I dare say it is part of what I ought to bear for being an old
fool, and too cautious about my own flesh and blood. I will bear it.
There. I was wrong, and I will say that I have been justly punished.
There,--there!"
How very much would Miss Stanbury's tone have been changed had
she known that at that very moment Colonel Osborne was eating his
breakfast at Mrs. Crocket's inn, in Nuncombe Putney!
CHAPTER XIX.
BOZZLE, THE EX-POLICEMAN.
[Illustration]
When Mr. Trevelyan had gone through the miserable task of breaking up
his establishment in Curzon Street, and had seen all his furniture
packed, including his books, his pictures, and his pet Italian
ornaments, it was necessary that he should go and live somewhere. He
was very wretched at this time,--so wretched that life was a burden
to him. He was a man who loved his wife;--to whom his child was very
dear; and he was one too to whom the ordinary comforts of domestic
life were attractive and necessary. There are men to whom release
from the constraint imposed by family ties will be, at any rate for
a time, felt as a release. But he was not such a man. There was no
delight to him in being able to dine at his club, and being free to
go whither he pleased in the evening. As it was, it pleased him to
go no whither in the evenings; and his mornings were equally blank
to him. He went so often to Mr. Bideawhile, that the poor old lawyer
became quite tired of the Trevelyan family quarrel. Even Lady
Milborough, with all her power of sympathising, began to feel that
she would almost prefer on any morning that her dear young friend,
Louis Trevelyan, should not be announced. Nevertheless, she always
saw him when he came, and administered comfort according to her
light. Of course he would have his wife back before long. That was
the only consolation she was able to offer; and she offered it so
often that he began gradually to feel that something might be done
towards bringing about so desirable an event. After what had occurred
they could not live again in Curzon Street,--nor even in London for
awhile; but Naples was open to them. Lady Milborough said so much to
him of the advantages which always came in such circumstances from
going to Naples, that he began to regard such a trip as almost the
natural conclusion of his adventure. But then there came that very
difficult question;--what step should be first taken? Lady Milborough
proposed that he should go boldly down to Nuncombe Putney, and make
the arrangement. "She will only be too glad to jump into your arms,"
said Lady Milborough. Trevelyan thought that if he went to Nuncombe
Putney, his wife might perhaps jump into his arms; but what would
come after that? How would he stand then in reference to his
authority? Would she own that she had been wrong? Would she promise
to behave better in future? He did not believe that she was yet
sufficiently broken in spirit to make any such promise. And he told
himself again and again that it would be absurd in him to allow her
to return to him without such subjection, after all that he had gone
through in defence of his marital rights. If he were to write to her
a long letter, argumentative, affectionate, exhaustive, it might be
better. He was inclined to believe of himself that he was good at
writing long, affectionate, argumentative, and exhaustive letters.
But he would not do even this as yet. He had broken up his house, and
scattered all his domestic gods to the winds, because she had behaved
badly to him; and the thing done was too important to allow of
redress being found so easily.
So he lived on a wretched life in London. He could hardly endure to
show himself at his club, fearing that every one would be talking of
him as the man who was separated from his wife,--perhaps as the man
of whose wife Colonel Osborne was the dear friend. No doubt for a day
or two there had been much of such conversation; but it had died away
from the club long before his consciousness had become callous. At
first he had gone into a lodging in Mayfair; but this had been but
for a day or two. After that he had taken a set of furnished chambers
in Lincoln's Inn, immediately under those in which Stanbury lived;
and thus it came to pass that he and Stanbury were very much thrown
together. As Trevelyan would always talk of his wife this was rather
a bore; but our friend bore with it, and would even continue to
instruct the world through the columns of the D. R. while Trevelyan
was descanting on the peculiar cruelty of his own position.
"I wish to be just, and even generous; and I do love her with all my
heart," he said one afternoon, when Hugh was very hard at work.
"'It is all very well for gentlemen to call themselves reformers,'"
Hugh was writing, "'but have these gentlemen ever realised to
themselves the meaning of that word? We think that they have never
done so as long as--' Of course you love her," said Hugh, with his
eyes still on the paper, still leaning on his pen, but finding by the
cessation of sound that Trevelyan had paused, and therefore knowing
that it was necessary that he should speak.
"As much as ever," said Trevelyan, with energy.
"'As long as they follow such a leader, in such a cause, into
whichever lobby he may choose to take them--' Exactly so,--exactly,"
said Stanbury; "just as much as ever."
"You are not listening to a word," said Trevelyan.
"I haven't missed a single expression you have used," said Stanbury.
"But a fellow has to do two things at a time when he's on the daily
press."
"I beg your pardon for interrupting you," said Trevelyan, angrily,
getting up, taking his hat, and stalking off to the house of Lady
Milborough. In this way he became rather a bore to his friends. He
could not divest his mind of the injury which had accrued to him from
his wife's conduct, nor could he help talking of the grief with which
his mind was laden. And he was troubled with sore suspicions, which,
as far as they concerned his wife, had certainly not been merited. It
had seemed to him that she had persisted in her intimacy with Colonel
Osborne in a manner that was not compatible with that wife-like
indifference which he regarded as her duty. Why had she written to
him and received letters from him when her husband had plainly told
her that any such communication was objectionable? She had done
so, and as far as Trevelyan could remember her words, had plainly
declared that she would continue to do so. He had sent her away into
the most remote retirement he could find for her; but the post was
open to her. He had heard much of Mrs. Stanbury, and of Priscilla,
from his friend Hugh, and thoroughly believed that his wife was in
respectable hands. But what was to prevent Colonel Osborne from
going after her, if he chose to do so? And if he did so choose,
Mrs. Stanbury could not prevent their meeting. He was racked with
jealousy, and yet he did not cease to declare to himself that he knew
his wife too well to believe that she would sin. He could not rid
himself of his jealousy, but he tried with all his might to make the
man whom he hated the object of it, rather than the woman whom he
loved.
He hated Colonel Osborne with all his heart. It was a regret to him
that the days of duelling were over, so that he could not shoot the
man. And yet, had duelling been possible to him, Colonel Osborne had
done nothing that would have justified him in calling his enemy out,
or would even have enabled him to do so with any chance of inducing
his enemy to fight. Circumstances, he thought, were cruel to him
beyond compare, in that he should have been made to suffer so great
torment without having any of the satisfaction of revenge. Even Lady
Milborough, with all her horror as to the Colonel, could not tell
him that the Colonel was amenable to any punishment. He was advised
that he must take his wife away and live at Naples because of this
man,--that he must banish himself entirely if he chose to repossess
himself of his wife and child;--and yet nothing could be done to
the unprincipled rascal by whom all his wrongs and sufferings were
occasioned! Thinking it very possible that Colonel Osborne would
follow his wife, he had a watch set upon the Colonel. He had found a
retired policeman,--a most discreet man, as he was assured,--who, for
a consideration, undertook the management of interesting jobs of this
kind. The man was one Bozzle, who had not lived without a certain
reputation in the police courts. In these days of his madness,
therefore, he took Mr. Bozzle into his pay; and after a while he got
a letter from Bozzle with the Exeter post-mark. Colonel Osborne had
left London with a ticket for Lessboro'. Bozzle also had taken a
place by the same train for that small town. The letter was written
in the railway carriage, and, as Bozzle explained, would be posted by
him as he passed through Exeter. A further communication should be
made by the next day's post, in a letter which Mr. Bozzle proposed to
address to Z. A., Post-office, Waterloo Place.
On receiving this first letter, Trevelyan was in an agony of
doubt, as well as misery. What should he do? Should he go to Lady
Milborough, or to Stanbury; or should he at once follow Colonel
Osborne and Mr. Bozzle to Lessboro'? It ended in his resolving at
last to wait for the letter which was to be addressed to Z. A. But he
spent an interval of horrible suspense, and of insane rage. Let the
laws say what they might, he would have the man's blood, if he found
that the man had even attempted to wrong him. Then, at last, the
second letter reached him. Colonel Osborne and Mr. Bozzle had each of
them spent the day in the neighbourhood of Lessboro', not exactly in
each other's company, but very near to each other. "The Colonel" had
ordered a gig, on the day after his arrival at Lessboro', for the
village of Cockchaffington; and, for all Mr. Bozzle knew, the Colonel
had gone to Cockchaffington. Mr. Bozzle was ultimately inclined
to think that the Colonel had really spent his day in going to
Cockchaffington. Mr. Bozzle himself, knowing the wiles of such
men as Colonel Osborne, and thinking at first that that journey
to Cockchaffington might only be a deep ruse, had walked over to
Nuncombe Putney. There he had had a pint of beer and some bread and
cheese at Mrs. Crocket's house, and had asked various questions, to
which he did not receive very satisfactory answers. But he inspected
the Clock House very minutely, and came to a decided opinion as to
the point at which it would be attacked, if burglary were the object
of the assailants. And he observed the iron gates, and the steps,
and the shape of the trees, and the old pigeon-house-looking fabric
in which the clock used to be placed. There was no knowing when
information might be wanted, or what information might not be of use.
But he made himself tolerably sure that Colonel Osborne did not visit
Nuncombe Putney on that day; and then he walked back to Lessboro'.
Having done this, he applied himself to the little memorandum book in
which he kept the records of these interesting duties, and entered a
claim against his employer for a conveyance to Nuncombe Putney and
back, including driver and ostler; and then he wrote his letter.
After that he had a hot supper, with three glasses of brandy and
water, and went to bed with a thorough conviction that he had earned
his bread on that day.
The letter to Z. A. did not give all these particulars, but it
did explain that Colonel Osborne had gone off, apparently, to
Cockchaffington, and that he,--Bozzle,--had himself visited Nuncombe
Putney. "The hawk hasn't been nigh the dovecot as yet," said Mr.
Bozzle in his letter, meaning to be both mysterious and facetious.
It would be difficult to say whether the wit or the mystery disgusted
Trevelyan the most. He had felt that he was defiling himself with
dirt when he first went to Mr. Bozzle. He knew that he was having
recourse to means that were base and low,--which could not be other
than base or low, let the circumstances be what they might. But Mr.
Bozzle's conversation had not been quite so bad as Mr. Bozzle's
letters; as it may have been that Mr. Bozzle's successful activity
was more insupportable than his futile attempts. But, nevertheless,
something must be done. It could not be that Colonel Osborne should
have gone down to the close neighbourhood of Nuncombe Putney without
the intention of seeing the lady whom his obtrusive pertinacity had
driven to that seclusion. It was terrible to Trevelyan that Colonel
Osborne should be there, and not the less terrible because such a one
as Mr. Bozzle was watching the Colonel on his behalf. Should he go to
Nuncombe Putney himself? And if so, when he got to Nuncombe Putney
what should he do there? At last, in his suspense and his grief, he
resolved that he would tell the whole to Hugh Stanbury.
"Do you mean," said Hugh, "that you have put a policeman on his
track?"
"The man was a policeman once."
"What we call a private detective. I can't say I think you were
right."
"But you see that it was necessary," said Trevelyan.
"I can't say that it was necessary. To speak out, I can't understand
that a wife should be worth watching who requires watching."
"Is a man to do nothing then? And even now it is not my wife whom I
doubt."
"As for Colonel Osborne, if he chooses to go to Lessboro', why
shouldn't he? Nothing that you can do, or that Bozzle can do, can
prevent him. He has a perfect right to go to Lessboro'."
"But he has not a right to go to my wife."
"And if your wife refuses to see him; or having seen him,--for a man
may force his way in anywhere with a little trouble,--if she sends
him away with a flea in his ear, as I believe she would--"
"She is so frightfully indiscreet."
"I don't see what Bozzle can do."
"He has found out at any rate that Osborne is there," said Trevelyan.
"I am not more fond of dealing with such fellows than you are
yourself. But I think it is my duty to know what is going on. What
ought I to do now?"
"I should do nothing,--except dismiss Bozzle."
"You know that that is nonsense, Stanbury."
"Whatever I did I should dismiss Bozzle." Stanbury was now quite in
earnest, and, as he repeated his suggestion for the dismissal of the
policeman, pushed his writing things away from him. "If you ask my
opinion, you know, I must tell you what I think. I should get rid of
Bozzle as a beginning. If you will only think of it, how can your
wife come back to you if she learns that you have set a detective to
watch her?"
"But I haven't set the man to watch her."
"Colonel Osborne is nothing to you, except as he is concerned with
her. This man is now down in her neighbourhood; and, if she learns
that, how can she help feeling it as a deep insult? Of course the man
watches her as a cat watches a mouse."
"But what am I to do? I can't write to the man and tell him to come
away. Osborne is down there, and I must do something. Will you go
down to Nuncombe Putney yourself, and let me know the truth?"
After much debating of the subject, Hugh Stanbury said that he would
himself go down to Nuncombe Putney alone. There were difficulties
about the D. R.; but he would go to the office of the newspaper and
overcome them. How far the presence of Nora Rowley at his mother's
house may have assisted in bringing him to undertake the journey,
perhaps need not be accurately stated. He acknowledged to himself
that the claims of friendship were strong upon him; and that as he
had loudly disapproved of the Bozzle arrangement, he ought to lend a
hand to some other scheme of action. Moreover, having professed his
conviction that no improper visiting could possibly take place under
his mother's roof, he felt bound to shew that he was not afraid to
trust to that conviction himself. He declared that he would be ready
to proceed to Nuncombe Putney to-morrow;--but only on condition that
he might have plenary power to dismiss Bozzle.
"There can be no reason why you should take any notice of the man,"
said Trevelyan.
"How can I help noticing him when I find him prowling about the
place? Of course I shall know who he is."
"I don't see that you need know anything about him."
"My dear Trevelyan, you cannot have two ambassadors engaged in
the same service without communication with each other. And any
communication with Mr. Bozzle, except that of sending him back to
London, I will not have." The controversy was ended by the writing of
a letter from Trevelyan to Bozzle, which was confided to Stanbury, in
which the ex-policeman was thanked for his activity and requested to
return to London for the present. "As we are now aware that Colonel
Osborne is in the neighbourhood," said the letter, "my friend Mr.
Stanbury will know what to do."
As soon as this was settled, Stanbury went to the office of the D. R.
and made arrangement as to his work for three days. Jones could do
the article on the Irish Church upon a pinch like this, although he
had not given much study to the subject as yet; and Puddlethwaite,
who was great in City matters, would try his hand on the present
state of society in Rome, a subject on which it was essential that
the D. R. should express itself at once. Having settled these little
troubles Stanbury returned to his friend, and in the evening they
dined together at a tavern.
"And now, Trevelyan, let me know fairly what it is that you wish,"
said Stanbury.
"I wish to have my wife back again."
"Simply that. If she will agree to come back, you will make no
difficulty."
"No; not quite simply that. I shall desire that she shall be guided
by my wishes as to any intimacies she may form."
"That is all very well; but is she to give any undertaking? Do you
intend to exact any promise from her? It is my opinion that she will
be willing enough to come back, and that when she is with you there
will be no further cause for quarrelling. But I don't think she will
bind herself by any exacted promise; and certainly not through a
third person."
"Then say nothing about it. Let her write a letter to me proposing to
come,--and she shall come."
"Very well. So far I understand. And now what about Colonel Osborne?
You don't want me to quarrel with him I suppose?"
"I should like to keep that for myself," said Trevelyan, grimly.
"If you will take my advice you will not trouble yourself about him,"
said Stanbury. "But as far as I am concerned, I am not to meddle or
make with him? Of course," continued Stanbury, after a pause, "if I
find that he is intruding himself in my mother's house, I shall tell
him that he must not come there."
"But if you find him installed in your mother's house as a
visitor,--how then?"
"I do not regard that as possible."
"I don't mean living there," said Trevelyan, "but coming backwards
and forwards;--going on in habits of intimacy with,--with--?" His
voice trembled so as he asked these questions, that he could not
pronounce the word which was to complete them.
"With Mrs. Trevelyan, you mean."
"Yes; with my wife. I don't say that it is so; but it may be so. You
will be bound to tell me the truth."
"I will certainly tell you the truth."
"And the whole truth."
"Yes; the whole truth."
"Should it be so I will never see her again,--never. And as for
him;--but never mind." Then there was another short period of
silence, during which Stanbury smoked his pipe and sipped his whisky
toddy. "You must see," continued Trevelyan, "that it is absolutely
necessary that I should do something. It is all very well for you to
say that you do not like detectives. Neither do I like them. But what
was I to do? When you condemn me you hardly realise the difficulties
of my position."
"It is the deuce of a nuisance certainly," said Stanbury, through the
cloud of smoke,--thinking now not at all of Mrs. Trevelyan, but of
Mrs. Trevelyan's sister.
"It makes a man almost feel that he had better not marry at all,"
said Trevelyan.
"I don't see that. Of course there may come troubles. The tiles may
fall on your head, you know, as you walk through the streets. As far
as I can see, women go straight enough nineteen times out of twenty.
But they don't like being,--what I call looked after."
"And did I look after my wife more than I ought?"
"I don't mean that; but if I were married,--which I never shall be,
for I shall never attain to the respectability of a fixed income,--I
fancy I shouldn't look after my wife at all. It seems to me that
women hate to be told about their duties."
"But if you saw your wife, quite innocently, falling into an improper
intimacy,--taking up with people she ought not to know,--doing that
in ignorance, which could not but compromise yourself;--wouldn't you
speak a word then?"
"Oh! I might just say, in an off-hand way, that Jones was a rascal,
or a liar, or a fool, or anything of that sort. But I would never
caution her against Jones. By George, I believe a woman can stand
anything better than that."
"You have never tried it, my friend."
"And I don't suppose I ever shall. As for me, I believe Aunt Stanbury
was right when she said that I was a radical vagabond. I dare say I
shall never try the thing myself, and therefore it's very easy to
have a theory. But I must be off. Good night, old fellow. I'll do the
best I can; and, at any rate, I'll let you know the truth."
There had been a question during the day as to whether Stanbury
should let his sister know by letter that he was expected; but it had
been decided that he should appear at Nuncombe without any previous
notification of his arrival. Trevelyan had thought that this was very
necessary, and when Stanbury had urged that such a measure seemed
to imply suspicion, he had declared that in no other way could the
truth be obtained. He, Trevelyan, simply wanted to know the facts
as they were occurring. It was a fact that Colonel Osborne was down
in the neighbourhood of Nuncombe Putney. That, at least, had been
ascertained. It might very possibly be the case that he would be
refused admittance to the Clock House,--that all the ladies there
would combine to keep him out. But,--so Trevelyan urged,--the truth
on this point was desired. It was essentially necessary to his
happiness that he should know what was being done.
"Your mother and sister," said he, "cannot be afraid of your coming
suddenly among them."
Stanbury, so urged, had found it necessary to yield, but yet he had
felt that he himself was almost acting like a detective policeman, in
purposely falling down upon them without a word of announcement. Had
chance circumstances made it necessary that he should go in such a
manner he would have thought nothing of it. It would simply have been
a pleasant joke to him.
As he went down by the train on the following day, he almost felt
ashamed of the part which he had been called upon to perform.
CHAPTER XX.
SHEWING HOW COLONEL OSBORNE WENT TO COCKCHAFFINGTON.
Together with Miss Stanbury's first letter to her sister-in-law a
letter had also been delivered to Mrs. Trevelyan. Nora Rowley, as her
sister had left the room with this in her hand, had expressed her
opinion that it had come from Trevelyan; but it had in truth been
written by Colonel Osborne. And when that second letter from Miss
Stanbury had been received at the Clock House,--that in which she in
plain terms begged pardon for the accusation conveyed in her first
letter,--Colonel Osborne had started on his deceitful little journey
to Cockchaffington, and Mr. Bozzle, the ex-policeman who had him in
hand, had already asked his way to Nuncombe Putney.
When Colonel Osborne learned that Louis Trevelyan had broken up his
establishment in Curzon Street, and had sent his wife away into a
barbarous retirement in Dartmoor,--for such was the nature of the
information on the subject which was spread among Trevelyan's friends
in London;--and when he was made aware also that all this was done
on his account,--because he was so closely intimate with Trevelyan's
wife, and because Trevelyan's wife was, and persisted in continuing
to be, so closely intimate with him,--his vanity was gratified.
Although it might be true,--and no doubt was true,--that he said much
to his friends and to himself of the deep sorrow which he felt that
such a trouble should befall his old friend and his old friend's
daughter; nevertheless, as he curled his grey whiskers before the
glass, and made the most of such remnant of hair as was left on
the top of his head, as he looked to the padding of his coat, and
completed a study of the wrinkles beneath his eyes, so that in
conversation they might be as little apparent as possible, he felt
more of pleasure than of pain in regard to the whole affair. It was
very sad that it should be so, but it was human. Had it been in his
power to set the whole matter right by a word, he would probably have
spoken that word; but as this was not possible, as Trevelyan had in
his opinion made a gross fool of himself, as Emily Trevelyan was
very nice, and not the less nice in that she certainly was fond
of himself, as great tyranny had been used towards her, and as he
himself had still the plea of old family friendship to protect his
conscience,--to protect his conscience unless he went so far as to
make that plea an additional sting to his conscience,--he thought
that, as a man, he must follow up the matter. Here was a young, and
fashionable, and very pretty woman banished to the wilds of Dartmoor
for his sake. And, as far as he could understand, she would not have
been so banished had she consented to say that she would give up
her acquaintance with him. In such circumstances as these was it
possible that he should do nothing? Various ideas ran through his
head. He began to think that if Trevelyan were out of the way, he
might,--might perhaps be almost tempted to make this woman his wife.
She was so nice that he almost thought that he might be rash enough
for that, although he knew well the satisfaction of being a bachelor;
but as the thought suggested itself to him, he was well aware that
he was thinking of a thing quite distant from him. The reader is not
to suppose that Colonel Osborne meditated any making-away with the
husband. Our Colonel was certainly not the man for a murder. Nor did
he even think of running away with his friend's daughter. Though he
told himself that he could dispose of his wrinkles satisfactorily,
still he knew himself and his powers sufficiently to be aware that
he was no longer fit to be the hero of such a romance as that. He
acknowledged to himself that there was much labour to be gone through
in running away with another man's wife; and that the results, in
respect to personal comfort, are not always happy. But what if Mrs.
Trevelyan were to divorce herself from her husband on the score of
her husband's cruelty? Various horrors were related as to the man's
treatment of his wife. By some it was said that she was in the prison
on Dartmoor,--or, if not actually in the prison, an arrangement which
the prison discipline might perhaps make difficult,--that she was in
the custody of one of the prison warders who possessed a prim cottage
and a grim wife, just outside the prison walls. Colonel Osborne did
not himself believe even so much as this, but he did believe that
Mrs. Trevelyan had been banished to some inhospitable region, to some
dreary comfortless abode, of which, as the wife of a man of fortune,
she would have great ground to complain. So thinking, he did not
probably declare to himself that a divorce should be obtained,
and that, in such event, he would marry the lady,--but ideas came
across his mind in that direction. Trevelyan was a cruel Bluebeard;
Emily,--as he was studious to call Mrs. Trevelyan,--was a dear
injured saint. And as for himself, though he acknowledged to himself
that the lumbago pinched him now and again, so that he could not rise
from his chair with all the alacrity of youth, yet, when he walked
along Pall Mall with his coat properly buttoned, he could not but
observe that a great many young women looked at him with admiring
eyes.
It was thus with no settled scheme that the Colonel went to work,
and made inquiries, and ascertained Mrs. Trevelyan's address in
Devonshire. When he learned it, he thought that he had done much;
though, in truth, there had been no secrecy in the matter. Scores
of people knew Mrs. Trevelyan's address besides the newsvendor who
supplied her paper, from whose boy Colonel Osborne's servant obtained
the information. But when the information had been obtained, it was
expedient that it should be used; and therefore Colonel Osborne wrote
the following letter:--
Acrobats Club, July 31, 186--.
DEAR EMILY,
Twice the Colonel wrote Dearest Emily, and twice he tore the sheet on
which the words were written. He longed to be ardent, but still it
was so necessary to be prudent! He was not quite sure of the lady.
Women sometimes tell their husbands, even when they have quarrelled
with them. And, although ardent expressions in writing to pretty
women are pleasant to male writers, it is not pleasant for a
gentleman to be asked what on earth he means by that sort of thing at
his time of life. The Colonel gave half an hour to the consideration,
and then began the letter, Dear Emily. If prudence be the soul
of valour, may it not be considered also the very mainspring, or,
perhaps, the pivot of love?
DEAR EMILY,
I need hardly tell you with what dismay I have heard of
all that has taken place in Curzon Street. I fear that you
must have suffered much, and that you are suffering now.
It is an inexpressible relief to me to hear that you have
your child with you, and Nora. But, nevertheless, to
have your home taken away from you, to be sent out of
London, to be banished from all society! And for what?
The manner in which the minds of some men work is quite
incomprehensible.
As for myself, I feel that I have lost the company of
a friend, whom indeed I can very ill spare. I have a
thousand things to say to you, and among them one or
two which I feel that I must say,--that I ought to say.
As it happens, an old schoolfellow of mine is Vicar of
Cockchaffington, a village which I find by the map is
very near to Nuncombe Putney. I saw him in town last
spring, and he then asked me to pay him a visit. There is
something in his church which people go to see, and though
I don't understand churches much, I shall go and see it.
I shall run down on Wednesday, and shall sleep at the inn
at Lessboro'. I see that Lessboro' is a market town, and
I suppose there is an inn. I shall go over to my friend on
the Thursday, but shall return to Lessboro'. Though a man
be ever so eager to see a church door-way, he need not
sleep at the parsonage. On the following day, I will get
over to Nuncombe Putney, and I hope that you will see me.
Considering my long friendship with you, and my great
attachment to your father and mother, I do not think
that the strictest martinet would tell you that you need
hesitate in the matter.
I have seen Mr. Trevelyan twice at the club, but he has
not spoken to me. Under such circumstances I could not of
course speak to him. Indeed, I may say that my feelings
towards him just at present are of such a nature as
to preclude me from doing so with any appearance of
cordiality.
Dear Emily,
Believe me now, as always, your affectionate friend,
FREDERIC OSBORNE.
When he read that letter over to himself a second time he felt quite
sure that he had not committed himself. Even if his friend were to
send the letter to her husband, it could not do him any harm. He was
aware that he might have dilated more on the old friendship between
himself and Sir Marmaduke, but he experienced a certain distaste to
the mention of things appertaining to years long past. It did not
quite suit him in his present frame of mind to speak of his regard in
those quasi-paternal terms which he would have used had it satisfied
him to represent himself simply as her father's friend. His language
therefore had been a little doubtful, so that the lady might, if
she were so minded, look upon him in that tender light in which her
husband had certainly chosen to regard him.
When the letter was handed to Mrs. Trevelyan, she at once took it
with her up to her own room, so that she might be alone when she read
it. The handwriting was quite familiar to her, and she did not choose
that even her sister should see it. She had told herself twenty times
over that, while living at Nuncombe Putney, she was not living under
the guardianship of Mrs. Stanbury. She would consent to live under
the guardianship of no one, as her husband did not choose to remain
with her and protect her. She had done no wrong, and she would submit
to no other authority, than that of her legal lord and master. Nor,
according to her views of her own position, was it in his power to
depute that authority to others. He had caused the separation, and
now she must be the sole judge of her own actions. In itself, a
correspondence between her and her father's old friend was in no
degree criminal or even faulty. There was no reason, moral, social,
or religious, why an old man, over fifty, who had known her all her
life, should not write to her. But yet she could not say aloud before
Mrs. Stanbury, and Priscilla, and her sister, that she had received a
letter from Colonel Osborne. She felt that the colour had come to her
cheek, and that she could not even walk out of the room as though the
letter had been a matter of indifference to her.
And would it have been a matter of indifference had there been nobody
there to see her? Mrs. Trevelyan was certainly not in love with
Colonel Osborne. She was not more so now than she had been when her
father's friend, purposely dressed for the occasion, had kissed her
in the vestry of the church in which she was married, and had given
her a blessing, which was then intended to be semi-paternal,--as from
an old man to a young woman. She was not in love with him,--never
would be, never could be in love with him. Reader, you may believe
in her so far as that. But where is the woman, who, when she is
neglected, thrown over, and suspected by the man that she loves, will
not feel the desire of some sympathy, some solicitude, some show of
regard from another man? This woman's life, too, had not hitherto
been of such a nature that the tranquillity of the Clock House at
Nuncombe Putney afforded to her all that she desired. She had been
there now a month, and was almost sick from the want of excitement.
And she was full of wrath against her husband. Why had he sent her
there to break her heart in a disgraceful retirement, when she had
never wronged him? From morning to night she had no employment, no
amusement, nothing to satisfy her cravings. Why was she to be doomed
to such an existence? She had declared that as long as she could
have her boy with her, she would be happy. She was allowed to have
her boy; but she was anything but happy. When she received Colonel
Osborne's letter,--while she held it in her hand still unopened, she
never for a moment thought that that could make her happy. But there
was in it something of excitement. And she painted the man to herself
in brighter colours now than she had ever given to him in her former
portraits. He cared for her. He was gracious to her. He appreciated
her talents, her beauty, and her conduct. He knew that she deserved
a treatment very different from that accorded to her by her husband.
Why should she reject the sympathy of her father's oldest friend,
because her husband was madly jealous about an old man? Her husband
had chosen to send her away, and to leave her, so that she must act
on her own judgment. Acting on her own judgment, she read Colonel
Osborne's letter from first to last. She knew that he was wrong to
speak of coming to Nuncombe Putney; but yet she thought that she
would see him. She had a dim perception that she was standing on the
edge of a precipice, on broken ground which might fall under her
without a moment's warning, and yet she would not retreat from the
danger. Though Colonel Osborne was wrong, very wrong in coming to see
her, yet she liked him for coming. Though she would be half afraid
to tell her news to Mrs. Stanbury, and more than half afraid to tell
Priscilla, yet she liked the excitement of the fear. Nora would scold
her; but Nora's scolding she thought she could answer. And then it
was not the fact that Colonel Osborne was coming down to Devonshire
to see her. He was coming as far as Lessboro' to see his friend at
Cockchaffington. And when at Lessboro', was it likely that he should
leave the neighbourhood without seeing the daughter of his old ally?
And why should he do so? Was he to be unnatural in his conduct,
uncivil and unfriendly, because Mr. Trevelyan had been foolish,
suspicious, and insane?
So arguing with herself, she answered Colonel Osborne's letter before
she had spoken on the subject to any one in the house,--and this was
her answer:--
MY DEAR COLONEL OSBORNE,
I must leave it to your own judgment to decide whether you
will come to Nuncombe Putney or not. There are reasons
which would seem to make it expedient that you should stay
away,--even though circumstances are bringing you into
the immediate neighbourhood. But of these reasons I will
leave you to be the judge. I will never let it be said
that I myself have had cause to dread the visit of any old
friend. Nevertheless, if you stay away, I shall understand
why you do so.
Personally, I shall be glad to see you,--as I have always
been. It seems odd to me that I cannot write in warmer
tones to my father's and mother's oldest friend. Of
course, you will understand that though I shall readily
see you if you call, I cannot ask you to stay. In the
first place, I am not now living in my own house. I am
staying with Mrs. Stanbury, and the place is called the
Clock House.
Yours very sincerely,
EMILY TREVELYAN.
The Clock House, Nuncombe Putney, Monday.
Soon after she had written it, Nora came into her room, and at once
asked concerning the letter which she had seen delivered to her
sister that morning.
"It was from Colonel Osborne," said Mrs. Trevelyan.
"From Colonel Osborne! How very wrong!"
"I don't see that it is wrong at all. Because Louis is foolish and
mad, that cannot make another man wrong for doing the most ordinary
thing in the world."
"I had hoped it had been from Louis," said Nora.
"Oh dear, no. He is by no means so considerate. I do not suppose I
shall hear from him, till he chooses to give some fresh order about
myself or my child. He will hardly trouble himself to write to me,
unless he takes up some new freak to show me that he is my master."
"And what does Colonel Osborne say?"
"He is coming here."
"Coming here?" almost shouted Nora.
"Yes; absolutely here. Does it sound to you as if Lucifer himself
were about to show his face? The fact is, he happens to have a friend
in the neighbourhood whom he has long promised to visit; and as he
must be at Lessboro', he does not choose to go away without the
compliment of a call. It will be as much to you as to me."
"I don't want to see him in the least," said Nora.
"There is his letter. As you seem to be so suspicious, you had better
read it."
Then Nora read it.
"And there is a copy of my answer," said Mrs. Trevelyan. "I shall
keep both, because I know so well what ill-natured things people will
say."
"Dear Emily, do not send it," said Nora.
"Indeed I shall. I will not be frightened by bugbears. And I will
not be driven to confess to any man on earth that I am afraid to see
him. Why should I be afraid of Colonel Osborne? I will not submit to
acknowledge that there can be any danger in Colonel Osborne. Were
I to do so I should be repeating the insult against myself. If my
husband wished to guide me in such matters, why did he not stay with
me?"
Then she went out into the village and posted the letter. Nora
meanwhile was thinking whether she would call in the assistance of
Priscilla Stanbury; but she did not like to take any such a step in
opposition to her sister.
CHAPTER XXI.
SHEWING HOW COLONEL OSBORNE WENT TO NUNCOMBE PUTNEY.
Colonel Osborne was expected at Nuncombe Putney on the Friday, and
it was Thursday evening before either Mrs. Stanbury or Priscilla was
told of his coming. Emily had argued the matter with Nora, declaring
that she would make the communication herself, and that she would
make it when she pleased and how she pleased. "If Mrs. Stanbury
thinks," said she, "that I am going to be treated as a prisoner, or
that I will not judge myself as to whom I may see, or whom I may not
see, she is very much mistaken." Nora felt that were she to give
information to those ladies in opposition to her sister's wishes,
she would express suspicion on her own part by doing so; and she was
silent. On that same Thursday Priscilla had written her last defiant
letter to her aunt,--that letter in which she had cautioned her aunt
to make no further accusations without being sure of her facts. To
Priscilla's imagination that coming of Lucifer in person, of which
Mrs. Trevelyan had spoken, would hardly have been worse than the
coming of Colonel Osborne. When, therefore, Mrs. Trevelyan declared
the fact on the Thursday evening, vainly endeavouring to speak of
the threatened visit in an ordinary voice, and as of an ordinary
circumstance, it was as though a thunderbolt had fallen upon them.
"Colonel Osborne coming here!" said Priscilla, mindful of the
Stanbury correspondence,--mindful of the evil tongues of the world.
"And why not?" demanded Mrs. Trevelyan, who had heard nothing of the
Stanbury correspondence.
"Oh dear, oh dear!" ejaculated Mrs. Stanbury, who, of course, was
aware of all that had passed between the Clock House and the house in
the Close, though the letters had been written by her daughter.
Nora was determined to stand up for her sister, whatever might be the
circumstances of the case. "I wish Colonel Osborne were not coming,"
said she, "because it makes a foolish fuss; but I cannot understand
how anybody can suppose it to be wrong that Emily should see papa's
very oldest friend in the world."
"But why is he coming?" demanded Priscilla.
"Because he wants to see an acquaintance at Cockchaffington," said
Mrs. Trevelyan; "and there is a wonderful church-door there."
"A church-fiddlestick!" said Priscilla.
The matter was debated throughout all the evening. At one time
there was a great quarrel between the ladies, and then there was a
reconciliation. The point on which Mrs. Trevelyan stood with the
greatest firmness was this,--that it did not become her, as a married
woman whose conduct had always been good and who was more careful as
to that than she was even of her name, to be ashamed to meet any man.
"Why should I not see Colonel Osborne, or Colonel anybody else who
might call here with the same justification for calling which his old
friendship gives him?" Priscilla endeavoured to explain to her that
her husband's known wishes ought to hinder her from doing so. "My
husband should have remained with me to express his wishes," Mrs.
Trevelyan replied.
Neither could Mrs. Stanbury nor could Priscilla bring herself to say
that the man should not be admitted into the house. In the course of
the debate, in the heat of her anger, Mrs. Trevelyan declared that
were any such threat held out to her, she would leave the house and
see Colonel Osborne in the street, or at the inn.
"No, Emily; no," said Nora.
"But I will. I will not submit to be treated as a guilty woman, or as
a prisoner. They may say what they like; but I won't be shut up."
"No one has tried to shut you up," said Priscilla.
"You are afraid of that old woman at Exeter," said Mrs. Trevelyan;
for by this time the facts of the Stanbury correspondence had
all been elicited in general conversation; "and yet you know how
uncharitable and malicious she is."
"We are not afraid of her," said Priscilla. "We are afraid of nothing
but of doing wrong."
"And will it be wrong to let an old gentleman come into the house,"
said Nora, "who is nearly sixty, and who has known us ever since we
were born?"
"If he is nearly sixty, Priscilla," said Mrs. Stanbury, "that does
seem to make a difference." Mrs. Stanbury herself was only just
sixty, and she felt herself to be quite an old woman.
"They may be devils at eighty," said Priscilla.
"Colonel Osborne is not a devil at all," said Nora.
"But mamma is so foolish," said Priscilla. "The man's age does not
matter in the least."
"I beg your pardon, my dear," said Mrs. Stanbury, very humbly.
At that time the quarrel was raging, but afterwards came the
reconciliation. Had it not been for the Stanbury correspondence the
fact of Colonel Osborne's threatened visit would have been admitted
as a thing necessary--as a disagreeable necessity; but how was
the visit to be admitted and passed over in the teeth of that
correspondence? Priscilla felt very keenly the peculiar cruelty
of her position. Of course Aunt Stanbury would hear of the visit.
Indeed, any secrecy in the matter was not compatible with Priscilla's
ideas of honesty. Her aunt had apologised humbly for having said
that Colonel Osborne had been at Nuncombe. That apology, doubtless,
had been due. Colonel Osborne had not been at Nuncombe when the
accusation had been made, and the accusation had been unjust and
false. But his coming had been spoken of by Priscilla in her own
letters as an occurrence which was quite out of the question. Her
anger against her aunt had been for saying that the man had come,
not for objecting to such a visit. And now the man was coming, and
Aunt Stanbury would know all about it. How great, how terrible, how
crushing would be Aunt Stanbury's triumph!
"I must write and tell her," said Priscilla.
"I am sure I shall not object," said Mrs. Trevelyan.
"And Hugh must be told," said Mrs. Stanbury.
"You may tell all the world, if you like," said Mrs. Trevelyan.
In this way it was settled among them that Colonel Osborne was to
be received. On the next morning, Friday morning, Colonel Osborne,
doubtless having heard something of Mrs. Crocket from his friend
at Cockchaffington, was up early, and had himself driven over to
Nuncombe Putney before breakfast. The ever-watchful Bozzle was, of
course, at his heels,--or rather, not at his heels on the first two
miles of the journey; for Bozzle, with painful zeal, had made himself
aware of all the facts, and had started on the Nuncombe Putney road
half an hour before the Colonel's fly was in motion. And when the
fly passed him he was lying discreetly hidden behind an old oak. The
driver, however, had caught a glimpse of him as he was topping a
hill, and having seen him about on the previous day, and perceiving
that he was dressed in a decent coat and trousers, and that,
nevertheless, he was not a gentleman, began to suspect that he
was--somebody. There was a great deal said afterwards about Bozzle in
Mrs. Clegg's yard at Lessboro'; but the Lessboro' mind was never able
to satisfy itself altogether respecting Bozzle and his mission. As
to Colonel Osborne and his mission, the Lessboro' mind did satisfy
itself with much certainty. The horse was hardly taken from out of
Colonel Osborne's fly in Mrs. Crocket's yard when Bozzle stepped
into the village by a path which he had already discovered, and soon
busied himself among the tombs in the churchyard. Now, one corner of
the churchyard was immediately opposite to the iron gate leading into
the Clock House. "Drat 'un," said the wooden-legged postman, still
sitting on his donkey, to Mrs. Crocket's ostler, "if there be'ant the
chap as was here yesterday when I was a starting, and I zeed 'un in
Lezbro' street thick very morning." "He be'ant arter no good, that
'un," said the ostler. After that a close watch was kept upon the
watcher.
[Illustration: The wooden-legged postman of Nuncombe Putney.]
In the meantime, Colonel Osborne had ordered his breakfast at the
Stag and Antlers, and had asked questions as to the position of the
Clock House. He was altogether ignorant of Mr. Bozzle, although Mr.
Bozzle had been on his track now for two days and two nights. He had
determined, as he came on to Nuncombe Putney, that he would not be
shame-faced about his visit to Mrs. Trevelyan. It is possible that
he was not so keen in the matter as he had been when he planned his
journey in London; and, it may be, that he really tried to make
himself believe that he had come all the way to the confines of
Dartmoor to see the porch of Cockchaffington Church. The session
in London was over, and it was necessary for such a man as Colonel
Osborne that he should do something with himself before he went down
to the Scotch grouse. He had long desired to see something of the
most picturesque county in England; and now, as he sat eating his
breakfast in Mrs. Crocket's parlour, he almost looked upon his dear
Emily as a subsidiary attraction. "Oh, that's the Clock House,"
he said to Mrs. Crocket. "No, I have not the pleasure of knowing
Mrs. Stanbury; very respectable lady, so I have heard; widow of a
clergyman; ah, yes; son up in London; I know him;--always writing
books is he? Very clever, I dare say. But there's a lady,--indeed two
ladies,--whom I do know. Mrs. Trevelyan is there, I think,--and Miss
Rowley."
"You be'ant Muster Trevelyan, be you?" said Mrs. Crocket, looking at
him very hard.
"No, I'm not Mr. Trevelyan."
"Nor yet 'the Colonel' they doo be talking about?"
"Well, yes, I am a colonel. I don't know why anybody should talk
about me. I'll just step out now, however, and see my friends."
"It's madam's lover," said Mrs. Crocket to herself, "as sure as eggs
is eggs." As she said so, Colonel Osborne boldly walked across the
village and pulled the bell at the iron gate, while Bozzle, crouching
among the tombs, saw the handle in his hand. "There he is," said
Priscilla. Everybody in the Clock House had known that the fly,
which they had seen, had brought "the Colonel" into Nuncombe Putney.
Everybody had known that he had breakfasted at the Stag and Antlers.
And everybody now knew that he was at the gate ringing the bell.
"Into the drawing-room," said Mrs. Stanbury, with a fearful,
tremulous whisper, to the girl who went across the little garden
in front to open the iron gate. The girl felt as though Apollyon
were there, and as though she were called upon to admit Apollyon.
Mrs. Stanbury having uttered her whisper, hurried away up-stairs.
Priscilla held her ground in the parlour, determined to be near the
scene of action if there might be need. And it must be acknowledged
that she peeped from behind the curtain, anxious to catch a glimpse
of the terrible man, whose coming to Nuncombe Putney she regarded as
so severe a misfortune.
The plan of the campaign had all been arranged. Mrs. Trevelyan and
Nora together received Colonel Osborne in the drawing-room. It was
understood that Nora was to remain there during the whole visit. "It
is horrible to think that such a precaution should be necessary,"
Mrs. Trevelyan had said, "but perhaps it may be best. There is no
knowing what the malice of people may not invent."
"My dear girls," said the Colonel, "I am delighted to see you," and
he gave a hand to each.
"We are not very cheerful here," said Mrs. Trevelyan, "as you may
imagine."
"But the scenery is beautiful," said Nora, "and the people we are
living with are kind and nice."
"I am very glad of that," said the Colonel. Then there was a pause,
and it seemed, for a moment or two, that none of them knew how to
begin a general conversation. Colonel Osborne was quite sure, by this
time, that he had come down to Devonshire with the express object of
seeing the door of the church at Cockchaffington, and Mrs. Trevelyan
was beginning to think that he certainly had not come to see her.
"Have you heard from your father since you have been here?" asked the
Colonel.
Then there was an explanation about Sir Marmaduke and Lady Rowley.
Mr. Trevelyan's name was not mentioned; but Mrs. Trevelyan stated
that she had explained to her mother all the painful circumstances of
her present life. Sir Marmaduke, as Colonel Osborne was aware, was
expected to be in England in the spring, and Lady Rowley would, of
course, come with him. Nora thought that they might probably now come
before that time; but Mrs. Trevelyan declared that it was out of the
question that they should do so. She was sure that her father could
not leave the islands except when he did so in obedience to official
orders. The expense of doing so would be ruinous to him. And what
good would he do? In this way there was a great deal of family
conversation, in which Colonel Osborne was able to take a part; but
not a word was said about Mr. Trevelyan.
Nor did "the Colonel" find an opportunity of expressing a spark of
that sentiment, for the purpose of expressing which he had made
this journey to Devonshire. It is not pleasant to make love in the
presence of a third person, even when that love is all fair and above
board; but it is quite impracticable to do so to a married lady, when
that married lady's sister is present. No more futile visit than
this of Colonel Osborne's to the Clock House was ever made. And yet,
though not a word was spoken to which Mr. Trevelyan himself could
have taken the slightest exception, the visit, futile as it was,
could not but do an enormous deal of harm. Mrs. Crocket had already
guessed that the fine gentleman down from London was the lover of the
married lady at the Clock House, who was separated from her husband.
The wooden-legged postman and the ostler were not long in connecting
the man among the tombstones with the visitor to the house.
Trevelyan, as we are aware, already knew that Colonel Osborne was in
the neighbourhood. And poor Priscilla Stanbury was now exposed to the
terrible necessity of owning the truth to her aunt. "The Colonel,"
when he had sat an hour with his young friends, took his leave; and,
as he walked back to Mrs. Crocket's, and ordered that his fly might
be got ready for him, his mind was heavy with the disagreeable
feeling that he had made an ass of himself. The whole affair had
been a failure; and though he might be able to pass off the porch at
Cockchaffington among his friends, he could not but be aware himself
that he had spent his time, his trouble, and his money for nothing.
He became aware, as he returned to Lessboro', that had he intended to
make any pleasant use whatever of his position in reference to Mrs.
Trevelyan, the tone of his letter and his whole mode of proceeding
should have been less patriarchal. And he should have contrived a
meeting without the presence of Nora Rowley.
As soon as he had left them, Mrs. Trevelyan went to her own room, and
Nora at once rejoined Priscilla.
"Is he gone?" asked Priscilla.
"Oh, yes;--he has gone."
"What would I have given that he had never come!"
"And yet," said Nora, "what harm has he done? I wish he had not come,
because, of course, people will talk! But nothing was more natural
than that he should come over to see us when he was so near us."
"Nora!"
"What do you mean?"
"You don't believe all that? In the neighbourhood! I believe he came
on purpose to see your sister, and I think that it was a dastardly
and most ungentleman-like thing to do."
"I am quite sure you are wrong, then,--altogether wrong," said Nora.
"Very well. We must have our own opinions. I am glad you can be so
charitable. But he should not have come here,--to this house, even
though imperative business had brought him into the very village.
But men in their vanity never think of the injury they may do to a
woman's name. Now I must go and write to my aunt. I am not going to
have it said hereafter that I deceived her. And then I shall write to
Hugh. Oh dear; oh dear!"
"I am afraid we are a great trouble to you."
"I will not deceive you, because I like you. This is a great trouble
to me. I have meant to be so prudent, and with all my prudence I have
not been able to keep clear of rocks. And I have been so indignant
with Aunt Stanbury! Now I must go and eat humble-pie."
Then she eat humble-pie,--after the following fashion:--
DEAR AUNT STANBURY,
After what has passed between us, I think it right to tell
you that Colonel Osborne has been at Nuncombe Putney, and
that he called at the Clock House this morning. We did not
see him. But Mrs. Trevelyan and Miss Rowley, together, did
see him. He remained here perhaps an hour.
I should not have thought it necessary to mention this to
you, the matter being one in which you are not concerned,
were it not for our former correspondence. When I last
wrote, I had no idea that he was coming,--nor had mamma.
And when you first wrote, he was not even expected by
Mrs. Trevelyan. The man you wrote about was another
gentleman;--as I told you before. All this is most
disagreeable and tiresome;--and would be quite
nonsensical, but that circumstances seem to make it
necessary.
As for Colonel Osborne, I wish he had not been here; but
his coming would do no harm,--only that it will be talked
about.
I think you will understand how it is that I feel myself
constrained to write to you. I do hope that you will spare
mamma, who is disturbed and harassed when she gets angry
letters. If you have anything to say to myself, I don't
mind it.
Yours truly,
PRISCILLA STANBURY.
The Clock House, Friday, August 5.
She wrote also to her brother Hugh; but Hugh himself reached Nuncombe
Putney before the letter reached him.
Mr. Bozzle watched the Colonel out of the house, and watched him
out of the village. When the Colonel was fairly started, Mr. Bozzle
walked back to Lessboro'.
CHAPTER XXII.
SHEWING HOW MISS STANBURY BEHAVED TO HER TWO NIECES.
[Illustration]
The triumph of Miss Stanbury when she received her niece's letter was
certainly very great,--so great that in its first flush she could not
restrain herself from exhibiting it to Dorothy. "Well,--well,--what
do you think, Dolly?"
"About what, aunt? I don't know who the letter is from."
"Nobody writes to me now so constant as your sister Priscilla. The
letter is from Priscilla. Colonel Osborne has been at the Clock
House, after all. I knew that he would be there. I knew it! I knew
it!"
Dorothy, when she heard this, was dumbfounded. She had rested her
defence of her mother and sister on the impossibility of any such
visit being admitted. According to her lights the coming of Colonel
Osborne, after all that had been said, would be like the coming of
Lucifer himself. The Colonel was, to her imagination, a horrible
roaring lion. She had no idea that the erratic manoeuvres of such
a beast might be milder and more innocent than the wooing of any
turtle-dove. She would have asked whether the roaring lion had gone
away again, and, if so, whether he had taken his prey with him,
were it not that she was too much frightened at the moment to ask
any question. That her mother and sister should have been wilfully
concerned in such iniquity was quite incredible to her, but yet she
did not know how to defend them. "But are you quite sure of it, Aunt
Stanbury? May there not be another mistake?"
"No mistake this time, I think, my dear. Any way, Priscilla says that
he is there." Now in this there was a mistake. Priscilla had said
nothing of the kind.
"You don't mean that he is staying at the Clock House, Aunt
Stanbury?"
"I don't know where he is now. I'm not his keeper. And, I'm glad to
say, I'm not the lady's keeper either. Ah, me! It's a bad business.
You can't touch pitch and not be defiled, my dear. If your mother
wanted the Clock House, I would sooner have taken it for her myself
than that all this should have happened,--for the family's sake."
But Miss Stanbury, when she was alone, and when she had read her
niece's three letters again and again, began to understand something
of Priscilla's honesty, and began also to perceive that there might
have been a great difficulty respecting the Colonel, for which
neither her niece nor her sister-in-law could fairly be held to
be responsible. It was perhaps the plainest characteristic of all
the Stanburys that they were never wilfully dishonest. Ignorant,
prejudiced, and passionate they might be. In her anger Miss Stanbury,
of Exeter, could be almost malicious; and her niece at Nuncombe
Putney was very like her aunt. Each could say most cruel things, most
unjust things, when actuated by a mistaken consciousness of perfect
right on her own side. But neither of them could lie,--even by
silence. Let an error be brought home to either of them,--so as to
be acknowledged at home,--and the error would be assuredly confessed
aloud. And, indeed, with differences in the shades, Hugh and Dorothy
were of the same nature. They were possessed of sweeter tempers than
their aunt and sister, but they were filled with the same eager
readiness to believe themselves to be right,--and to own themselves
to others to be wrong, when they had been constrained to make such
confession to themselves. The chances of life, and something probably
of inner nature, had made Dorothy mild and obedient; whereas, in
regard to Hugh, the circumstances of his life and disposition had
made him obstinate and self-reliant. But in all was to be found the
same belief in self,--which amounted almost to conceit,--the same
warmth of affection, and the same love of justice.
When Miss Stanbury had again perused the correspondence, and had come
to see, dimly, how things had gone at Nuncombe Putney,--when the
conviction came upon her mind that Priscilla had entertained a horror
as to the coming of this Colonel equal to that which she herself
had felt,--when her imagination painted to her all that her niece
had suffered, her heart was softened somewhat. She had declared to
Dorothy that pitch, if touched, would certainly defile; and she had,
at first, intended to send the same opinion, couched in very forcible
words, to her correspondents at the Clock House. They should not
continue to go astray for want of being told that they were going
astray. It must be acknowledged, too, that there was a certain
amount of ignoble wrath in the bosom of Miss Stanbury because her
sister-in-law had taken the Clock House. She had never been told, and
had not even condescended to ask Dorothy, whether the house was taken
and paid for by her nephew on behalf of his mother, or whether it
was paid for by Mr. Trevelyan on behalf of his wife. In the latter
case, Mrs. Stanbury would, she thought, be little more than an
upper servant, or keeper,--as she expressed it to herself. Such an
arrangement appeared to her to be quite disgraceful in a Stanbury;
but yet she believed that such must be the existing arrangement, as
she could not bring herself to conceive that Hugh Stanbury could keep
such an establishment over his mother's head out of money earned by
writing for a penny newspaper. There would be a triumph of democracy
in this which would vanquish her altogether. She had, therefore, been
anxious enough to trample on Priscilla and upon all the affairs of
the Clock House; but yet she had been unable to ignore the nobility
of Priscilla's truth, and having acknowledged it to herself she found
herself compelled to acknowledge it aloud. She sat down to think in
silence, and it was not till she had fortified herself by her first
draught of beer, and till she had finished her first portion of bread
and cheese, that she spoke. "I have written to your sister herself,
this time," she said. "I don't know that I ever wrote a line to her
before in my life."
"Poor Priscilla!" Dorothy did not mean to be severe on her aunt,
either in regard to the letters which had not been written, or to the
one letter which now had been written. But Dorothy pitied her sister,
whom she felt to be in trouble.
"Well; I don't know about her being so poor. Priscilla, I'll be
bound, thinks as well of herself as any of us do."
"She'd cut her fingers off before she'd mean to do wrong," said
Dorothy.
"But what does that come to? What's the good of that? It isn't
meaning to do right that will save us. For aught I know, the Radicals
may mean to do right. Mr. Beales means to do right--perhaps."
"But, aunt,--if everybody did the best they could?"
"Tush, my dear! you are getting beyond your depth. There are such
things still, thank God! as spiritual pastors and masters. Entrust
yourself to them. Do what they think right." Now if aught were known
in Exeter of Miss Stanbury, this was known,--that if any clergyman
volunteered to give to her, unasked and uninvited, counsel, either
ghostly or bodily, that clergyman would be sent from her presence
with a wigging which he would not soon forget. The thing had been
tried more than once, and the wigging had been complete. There was no
more attentive listener in church than Miss Stanbury; and she would,
now and again, appeal to a clergyman on some knotty point. But for
the ordinary authority of spiritual pastors and masters she shewed
more of abstract reverence than of practical obedience.
"I'm sure Priscilla does the best she can," said Dorothy, going back
to the old subject.
"Ah,--well,--yes. What I want to say about Priscilla is this. It is a
thousand pities she is so obstinate, so pig-headed, so certain that
she can manage everything for herself better than anybody else can
for her." Miss Stanbury was striving to say something good of her
niece, but found the task to be difficult and distasteful to her.
"She has managed for mamma ever so many years; and since she took it
we have hardly ever been in debt," said Dorothy.
"She'll do all that, I don't doubt. I don't suppose she cares much
for ribbons and false hair for herself."
"Who? Priscilla! The idea of Priscilla with false hair!"
"I dare say not;--I dare say not. I do not think she'd spend her
mother's money on things of that kind."
"Aunt Stanbury, you don't know her."
"Ah; very well. Perhaps I don't. But, come, my dear, you are very
hard upon me, and very anxious to take your sister's part. And
what is it all about? I've just written to her as civil a letter
as one woman ever wrote to another. And if I had chosen, I could
have,--could have,--h--m--m." Miss Stanbury, as she hesitated for
words in which to complete her sentence, revelled in the strength of
the vituperation which she could have poured upon her niece's head,
had she chosen to write her last letter about Colonel Osborne in her
severe strain.
"If you have written kindly to her, I am so much obliged to you,"
said Dorothy.
"The truth is, Priscilla has meant to be right. Meaning won't go
for much when the account is taken, unless the meaning comes from a
proper source. But the poor girl has done as well as she has known
how. I believe it is Hugh's fault more than anybody else's." This
accusation was not pleasant to Dorothy, but she was too intent just
now on Priscilla's case to defend her brother. "That man never ought
to have been there; and that woman never ought to have been there.
There cannot be a doubt about that. If Priscilla were sitting there
opposite to me, she would own as much. I am sure she would." Miss
Stanbury was quite right if she meant to assert that Priscilla had
owned as much to herself. "And because I think so, I am willing to
forgive her part in the matter. To me, personally, she has always
been rude,--most uncourteous,--and,--and,--and unlike a younger woman
to an older one, and an aunt, and all that. I suppose it is because
she hates me."
"Oh, no, Aunt Stanbury!"
"My dear, I suppose it is. Why else should she treat me in such a
way? But I do believe of her that she would rather eat an honest, dry
crust, than dishonest cake and ale."
"She would rather starve than pick up a crumb that was dishonest,"
said Dorothy, fairly bursting out into tears.
"I believe it. I do believe it. There; what more can I say? Clock
House, indeed! What matter what house you live in, so that you can
pay the rent of it honestly?"
"But the rent is paid--honestly," said Dorothy, amidst her sobs.
"It's paid, I don't doubt. I dare say the woman's husband and your
brother see to that among them. Oh, that my boy, Hugh, as he used
to be, should have brought us all to this! But there's no knowing
what they won't do among them. Reform, indeed! Murder, sacrilege,
adultery, treason, atheism;--that's what Reform means; besides every
kind of nastiness under the sun." In which latter category Miss
Stanbury intended especially to include bad printer's ink, and paper
made of straw.
The reader may as well see the letter which was as civil a letter
as ever one woman wrote to another, so that the collection of the
Stanbury correspondence may be made perfect.
The Close, August 6, 186--.
MY DEAR NIECE,
Your letter has not astonished me nearly as much as you
expected it would. I am an older woman than you, and,
though you will not believe it, I have seen more of the
world. I knew that the gentleman would come after the
lady. Such gentlemen always do go after their ladies.
As for yourself, I can see all that you have done, and
pretty nearly hear all that you have said, as plain as a
pike-staff. I do you the credit of believing that the plan
is none of your making. I know who made the plan, and a
very bad plan it is.
As to my former letters and the other man, I understand
all about it. You were very angry that I should accuse you
of having this man at the house; and you were right to be
angry. I respect you for having been angry. But what does
all that say as to his coming,--now that he has come?
If you will consent to take an old woman's advice, get rid
of the whole boiling of them. I say it in firm love and
friendship, for I am,--
Your affectionate aunt,
JEMIMA STANBURY.
The special vaunted courtesy of this letter consisted, no doubt, in
the expression of respect which it contained, and in that declaration
of affection with which it terminated. The epithet was one which
Miss Stanbury would by no means use promiscuously in writing to her
nearest relatives. She had not intended to use it when she commenced
her letter to Priscilla. But the respect of which she had spoken
had glowed, and had warmed itself into something of temporary love;
and feeling at the moment that she was an affectionate aunt, Miss
Stanbury had so put herself down in her letter. Having done such a
deed she felt that Dorothy, though Dorothy knew nothing about it,
ought in her gratitude to listen patiently to anything that she might
now choose to say against Priscilla.
But Dorothy was in truth very miserable, and in her misery wrote a
long letter that afternoon to her mother,--which, however, it will
not be necessary to place entire among the Stanbury records,--begging
that she might be informed as to the true circumstances of the case.
She did not say a word of censure in regard either to her mother or
sister; but she expressed an opinion in the mildest words which she
could use, that if anything had happened which had compromised their
names since their residence at the Clock House, she, Dorothy, had
better go home and join them. The meaning of which was that it would
not become her to remain in the house in the Close, if the house in
the Close would be disgraced by her presence. Poor Dorothy had taught
herself to think that the iniquity of roaring lions spread itself
very widely.
In the afternoon she made some such proposition to her aunt in
ambiguous terms. "Go home!" said Miss Stanbury. "Now?"
"If you think it best, Aunt Stanbury."
"And put yourself in the middle of all this iniquity and abomination!
I don't suppose you want to know the woman?"
"No, indeed!"
"Or the man?"
"Oh, Aunt Stanbury!"
"It's my belief that no decent gentleman in Exeter would look at you
again if you were to go and live among them at Nuncombe Putney while
all this is going on. No, no. Let one of you be saved out of it, at
least."
Aunt Stanbury had more than once made use of expressions which
brought the faintest touch of gentle pink up to her niece's cheeks.
We must do Dorothy the justice of saying that she had never dreamed
of being looked at by any gentleman, whether decent or indecent. Her
life at Nuncombe Putney had been of such a nature, that though she
knew that other girls were looked at, and even made love to, and that
they got married and had children, no dim vision of such a career
for herself had ever presented itself to her eyes. She had known
very well that her mother and sister and herself were people
apart,--ladies, and yet so extremely poor, that they could only
maintain their rank by the most rigid seclusion. To live, and work
unseen, was what the world had ordained for her. Then her call
to Exeter had come upon her, and she had conceived that she was
henceforth to be the humble companion of a very imperious old aunt.
Her aunt, indeed, was imperious, but did not seem to require humility
in her companion. All the good things that were eaten and drunk were
divided between them with the strictest impartiality. Dorothy's
cushion and hassock in the church and in the cathedral were the same
as her aunt's. Her bed-room was made very comfortable for her. Her
aunt never gave her any orders before company, and always spoke of
her before the servants as one whom they were to obey and respect.
Gradually Dorothy came to understand the meaning of this;--but her
aunt would sometimes say things about young men which she did not
quite understand. Could it be that her aunt supposed that any young
man would come and wish to marry her,--her, Dorothy Stanbury? She
herself had not quite so strong an aversion to men in general as that
which Priscilla felt, but she had not as yet found that any of those
whom she had seen at Exeter were peculiarly agreeable to her. Before
she went to bed that night her aunt said a word to her which startled
her more than she had ever been startled before. On that evening Miss
Stanbury had a few friends to drink tea with her. There were Mr. and
Mrs. Crumbie, and Mrs. MacHugh of course, and the Cheritons from
Alphington, and the Miss Apjohns from Helion Villa, and old Mr. Powel
all the way from Haldon, and two of the Wrights from their house
in the Northernhay, and Mr. Gibson;--but the Miss Frenches from
Heavitree were not there. "Why don't you have the Miss Frenches,
aunt?" Dorothy had asked.
"Bother the Miss Frenches! I'm not bound to have them every time.
There's Camilla has been and got herself a band-box on the back of
her head a great deal bigger than the place inside where her brains
ought to be." But the band-box at the back of Camilla French's head
was not the sole cause of the omission of the two sisters from the
list of Miss Stanbury's visitors on this occasion.
The party went off very much as usual. There were two whist tables,
for Miss Stanbury could not bear to cut out. At other houses than her
own, when there was cutting out, it was quite understood that Miss
Stanbury was to be allowed to keep her place. "I'll go away, and sit
out there by myself, if you like," she would say. But she was never
thus banished; and at her own house she usually contrived that
there should be no system of banishment. She would play dummy whist,
preferring it to the four-handed game; and, when hard driven, and
with a meet opponent, would not even despise double-dummy. It was
told of her and of Mrs. MacHugh that they had played double-dummy
for a whole evening together; and they who were given to calumny
had declared that the candles on that evening had been lighted very
early. On the present occasion a great many sixpenny points were
scored, and much tea and cake were consumed. Mr. Gibson never played
whist,--nor did Dorothy. That young John Wright and Mary Cheriton
should do nothing but talk to each other was a thing of course,
as they were to be married in a month or two. Then there was Ida
Cheriton, who could not very well be left at home; and Mr. Gibson
made himself pleasant to Dorothy and Ida Cheriton, instead of making
himself pleasant to the two Miss Frenches. Gentlemen in provincial
towns quite understand that, from the nature of social circumstances
in the provinces, they should always be ready to be pleasant at least
to a pair at a time. At a few minutes before twelve they were all
gone, and then came the shock.
"Dolly, my dear, what do you think of Mr. Gibson?"
"Think of him, Aunt Stanbury?"
"Yes; think of him;--think of him. I suppose you know how to think?"
"He seems to me always to preach very drawling sermons."
"Oh, bother his sermons! I don't care anything about his sermons now.
He is a very good clergyman, and the Dean thinks very much about
him."
"I am glad of that, Aunt Stanbury."
Then came the shock. "Don't you think it would be a very good thing
if you were to become Mrs. Gibson?"
It may be presumed that Miss Stanbury had assured herself that she
could not make progress with Dorothy by "beating about the bush."
There was an inaptitude in her niece to comprehend the advantages
of the situations, which made some direct explanation absolutely
necessary. Dorothy stood half-smiling, half-crying, when she heard
the proposition, her cheeks suffused with that pink colour, and with
both her hands extended with surprise.
"I've been thinking about it ever since you've been here," said Miss
Stanbury.
"I think he likes Miss French," said Dorothy, in a whisper.
"Which of them? I don't believe he likes them at all. Maybe, if they
go on long enough, they may be able to toss up for him. But I don't
think it of him. Of course they're after him, but he'll be too wise
for them. And he's more of a fool than I take him to be if he don't
prefer you to them." Dorothy remained quite silent. To such an
address as this it was impossible that she should reply a word. It
was incredible to her that any man should prefer herself to either of
the young women in question; but she was too much confounded for the
expression even of her humility. "At any rate you're wholesome, and
pleasant and modest," said Miss Stanbury.
Dorothy did not quite like being told that she was wholesome; but,
nevertheless, she was thankful to her aunt.
"I'll tell you what it is," continued Miss Stanbury; "I hate all
mysteries, especially with those I love. I've saved two thousand
pounds, which I've put you down for in my will. Now, if you and he
can make it up together, I'll give you the money at once. There's no
knowing how often an old woman may alter her will; but when you've
got a thing, you've got it. Mr. Gibson would know the meaning of a
bird in the hand as well as anybody. Now those girls at Heavitree
will never have above a few hundreds each, and not that while
their mother lives." Dorothy made one little attempt at squeezing
her aunt's hand, wishing to thank her aunt for this affectionate
generosity; but she had hardly accomplished the squeeze, when she
desisted, feeling strangely averse to any acknowledgment of such a
boon as that which had been offered to her. "And now, good night, my
dear. If I did not think you a very sensible young woman, I should
not trust you by saying all this." Then they parted, and Dorothy soon
found herself alone in her bedroom.
To have a husband of her own, a perfect gentleman too, and a
clergyman;--and to go to him with a fortune! She believed that two
thousand pounds represented nearly a hundred a year. It was a large
fortune in those parts,--according to her understanding of ladies'
fortunes. And that she, the humblest of the humble, should be
selected for so honourable a position! She had never quite known,
quite understood as yet, whether she had made good her footing in
her aunt's house in a manner pleasant to her aunt. More than once or
twice she had spoken even of going back to her mother, and things
had been said which had almost made her think that her aunt had been
angry with her. But now, after a month or two of joint residence, her
aunt was offering to her--two thousand pounds and a husband!
But was it within her aunt's power to offer to her the husband? Mr.
Gibson had always been very civil to her. She had spoken more to Mr.
Gibson than to any other man in Exeter. But it had never occurred to
her for a moment that Mr. Gibson had any special liking for her. Was
it probable that he would ever entertain any feeling of that kind
for her? It certainly had occurred to her before now that Mr. Gibson
was sometimes bored by the Miss Frenches;--but then gentlemen do get
bored by ladies.
And at last she asked herself another question,--had she any special
liking for Mr. Gibson? As far as she understood such matters
everything was blank there. Thinking of that other question, she went
to sleep.
CHAPTER XXIII.
COLONEL OSBORNE AND MR. BOZZLE RETURN TO LONDON.
Hugh Stanbury went down on the Saturday, by the early express to
Exeter, on his road to Lessboro'. He took his ticket through to
Lessboro', not purposing to stay at Exeter; but, from the exigencies
of the various trains, it was necessary that he should remain for
half an hour at the Exeter Station. This took place on the Saturday,
and Colonel Osborne's visit to the Clock House had been made on the
Friday. Colonel Osborne had returned to Lessboro', had slept again
at Mrs. Clegg's house, and returned to London on the Saturday. It so
happened that he also was obliged to spend half an hour at the Exeter
Station, and that his half-hour, and Hugh Stanbury's half-hour, were
one and the same. They met, therefore, as a matter of course, upon
the platform. Stanbury was the first to see the other, and he found
that he must determine on the spur of the moment what he would say,
and what he would do. He had received no direct commission from
Trevelyan as to his meeting with Colonel Osborne. Trevelyan had
declared that, as to the matter of quarrelling, he meant to retain
the privilege of doing that for himself; but Stanbury had quite
understood that this was only the vague expression of an angry man.
The Colonel had taken a glass of sherry, and had lighted a cigar,
and was quite comfortable,--having thrown aside, for a time, that
consciousness of the futility of his journey which had perplexed
him,--when Stanbury accosted him.
"What! Mr. Stanbury,--how do you do? Fine day, isn't it? Are you
going up or down?"
"I'm going to see my own people at Nuncombe Putney, a village beyond
Lessboro'," said Hugh.
"Ah;--indeed." Colonel Osborne of course perceived at once that as
this man was going to the house at which he had just been visiting,
it would be better that he should himself explain what he had done.
If he were to allow this mention of Nuncombe Putney to pass without
saying that he himself had been there, he would be convicted of
at least some purpose of secrecy in what he had been doing. "Very
strange," said he; "I was at Nuncombe Putney myself yesterday."
"I know you were," said Stanbury.
"And how did you know it?" There had been a tone of anger in
Stanbury's voice which Colonel Osborne had at once appreciated, and
which made him assume a similar tone. As they spoke there was a man
standing in a corner close by the bookstall, with his eye upon them,
and that man was Bozzle, the ex-policeman,--who was doing his duty
with sedulous activity by seeing "the Colonel" back to London. Now
Bozzle did not know Hugh Stanbury, and was angry with himself that he
should be so ignorant. It is the pride of a detective ex-policeman to
know everybody that comes in his way.
"Well, I had been so informed. My friend Trevelyan knew that you were
there,--or that you were going there."
"I don't care who knew that I was going there," said the Colonel.
"I won't pretend to understand how that may be, Colonel Osborne; but
I think you must be aware, after what took place in Curzon Street,
that it would have been better that you should not have attempted to
see Mrs. Trevelyan. Whether you have seen her I do not know."
"What business is it of yours, Mr. Stanbury, whether I have seen that
lady or not?"
"Unhappily for me, her husband has made it my business."
"Very unhappily for you, I should say."
"And the lady is staying at my mother's house."
"I presume the lady is not a prisoner in your mother's house, and
that your mother's hospitality is not so restricted but that her
guest may see an old friend under her roof." This Colonel Osborne
said with an assumed look of almost righteous indignation, which
was not at all lost upon Bozzle. They had returned back towards the
bookstall, and Bozzle, with his eyes fixed on a copy of the "D. R."
which he had just bought, was straining his ears to the utmost to
catch what was being said.
"You best know whether you have seen her or not."
"I have seen her."
"Then I shall take leave to tell you, Colonel Osborne, that you have
acted in a most unfriendly way, and have done that which must tend to
keep an affectionate husband apart from his wife."
"Sir, I don't at all understand this kind of thing addressed to me.
The father of the lady you are speaking of has been my most intimate
friend for thirty years." After all, the Colonel was a mean man when
he could take pride in his youth, and defend himself on the score of
his age, in one and the same proceeding.
"I have nothing further to say," replied Stanbury.
"You have said too much already, Mr. Stanbury."
"I think not, Colonel Osborne. You have, I fear, done an incredible
deal of mischief by going to Nuncombe Putney; and, after all that
you have heard on the subject, you must have known that it would be
mischievous. I cannot understand how you can force yourself about a
man's wife against the man's expressed wish."
"Sir, I didn't force myself upon anybody. Sir, I went down to see an
old friend,--and a remarkable piece of antiquity. And, when another
old friend was in the neighbourhood, close by,--one of the oldest
friends I have in the world,--wasn't I to go and see her? God bless
my soul! What business is it of yours? I never heard such impudence
in my life!" Let the charitable reader suppose that Colonel Osborne
did not know that he was lying,--that he really thought, when he
spoke, that he had gone down to Lessboro' to see the remarkable piece
of antiquity.
"Good morning," said Hugh Stanbury, turning on his heels and walking
away. Colonel Osborne shook himself, inflated his cheeks, and blew
forth the breath out of his mouth, put his thumbs up to the armholes
of his waistcoat, and walked about the platform as though he thought
it to be incumbent on him to show that he was somebody,--somebody
that ought not to be insulted,--somebody, perhaps, whom a very pretty
woman might prefer to her own husband, in spite of a small difference
in age. He was angry, but not quite so much angry as proud. And he
was safe, too. He thought that he was safe. When he should come to
account for himself and his actions to his old friend, Sir Marmaduke,
he felt that he would be able to show that he had been, in all
respects, true to friendship. Sir Marmaduke had unfortunately given
his daughter to a jealous, disagreeable fellow, and the fault all
lay in that. As for Hugh Stanbury,--he would simply despise Hugh
Stanbury, and have done with it.
Mr. Bozzle, though he had worked hard in the cause, had heard but a
word or two. Eaves-droppers seldom do hear more than that. A porter
had already told him who was Hugh Stanbury,--that he was Mr. Hugh
Stanbury, and that his aunt lived at Exeter. And Bozzle, knowing that
the lady about whom he was concerned was living with a Mrs. Stanbury
at the house he had been watching, put two and two together with
his natural cleverness. "God bless my soul! what business is it of
yours?" Those words were nearly all that Bozzle had been able to
hear; but even those sufficiently indicated a quarrel. "The lady" was
living with Mrs. Stanbury, having been so placed by her husband; and
young Stanbury was taking the lady's part! Bozzle began to fear that
the husband had not confided in him with that perfect faith which he
felt to be essentially necessary to the adequate performance of the
duties of his great profession. A sudden thought, however, struck
him. Something might be done on the journey up to London. He at
once made his way back to the ticket-window and exchanged his
ticket,--second-class for first-class. It was a noble deed, the
expense falling all upon his own pocket; for, in the natural course
of things, he would have charged his employers with the full
first-class fare. He had seen Colonel Osborne seat himself in a
carriage, and within two minutes he was occupying the opposite place.
The Colonel was aware that he had noticed the man's face lately, but
did not know where.
"Very fine summer weather, sir," said Bozzle.
"Very fine," said the Colonel, burying himself behind a newspaper.
"They is getting up their wheat nicely in these parts, sir."
The answer to this was no more than a grunt. But Bozzle was not
offended. Not to be offended is the special duty of all policemen, in
and out of office; and the journey from Exeter to London was long,
and was all before him.
"A very nice little secluded village is Nuncombe Putney," said
Bozzle, as the train was leaving the Salisbury Station.
At Salisbury two ladies had left the carriage, no one else had got
in, and Bozzle was alone with the Colonel.
"I dare say," said the Colonel, who by this time had relinquished his
shield, and who had begun to compose himself for sleep, or to pretend
to compose himself, as soon as he heard Bozzle's voice. He had been
looking at Bozzle, and though he had not discovered the man's trade,
had told himself that his companion was a thing of dangers,--a thing
to be avoided, by one engaged, as had been he himself, on a special
and secret mission.
"Saw you there,--calling at the Clock House," said Bozzle.
"Very likely," said the Colonel, throwing his head well back into the
corner, shutting his eyes, and uttering a slight preliminary snore.
"Very nice family of ladies at the Clock House," said Bozzle. The
Colonel answered him by a more developed snore. "Particularly Mrs.
T----" said Bozzle.
The Colonel could not stand this. He was so closely implicated with
Mrs. Trevelyan at the present moment that he could not omit to notice
an address so made to him. "What the devil is that to you, sir?" said
he, jumping up and confronting Bozzle in his wrath.
But policemen have always this advantage in their difficulties, that
they know to a fraction what the wrath of men is worth, and what it
can do. Sometimes it can dismiss a policeman, and sometimes break
his head. Sometimes it can give him a long and troublesome job, and
sometimes it may be wrath to the death. But in nineteen out of twenty
cases it is not a fearful thing, and the policeman knows well when
he need not fear it. On the present occasion Bozzle was not at all
afraid of Colonel Osborne's wrath.
"Well, sir, not much, indeed, if you come to that. Only you was
there, sir."
"Of course I was there," said the Colonel.
"And a very nice young gentleman is Mr. Stanbury," said Bozzle.
To this Colonel Osborne made no reply, but again had resort to his
newspaper in the most formal manner.
"He's going down to his family, no doubt," continued Bozzle.
"He may be going to the devil for what I know," said the Colonel, who
could not restrain himself.
"I suppose they're all friends of Mrs. T.'s?" asked Bozzle.
"Sir," said the Colonel, "I believe that you're a spy."
"No, Colonel, no; no, no; I'm no spy. I wouldn't demean myself to be
such. A spy is a man as has no profession, and nothing to justify his
looking into things. Things must be looked into, Colonel; or how's a
man to know where he is? or how's a lady to know where she is? But
as for spies, except in the way of evidence, I don't think nothing
of 'em." Soon after this two more passengers entered the train, and
nothing more was said between Bozzle and the Colonel.
The Colonel, as soon as he reached London, went home to his lodgings,
and then to his club, and did his best to enjoy himself. On the
following Monday he intended to start for Scotland. But he could not
quite enjoy himself,--because of Bozzle. He felt that he was being
watched; and there is nothing that any man hates so much as that,
especially when a lady is concerned. Colonel Osborne knew that his
visit to Nuncombe Putney had been very innocent; but he did not like
the feeling that even his innocence had been made the subject of
observation.
Bozzle went away at once to Trevelyan, whom he found at his chambers.
He himself had had no very deep-laid scheme in his addresses to
Colonel Osborne. He had begun to think that very little would come of
the affair,--especially after Hugh Stanbury had appeared upon the
scene,--and had felt that there was nothing to be lost by presenting
himself before the eyes of the Colonel. It was necessary that he
should make a report to his employer, and the report might be made
a little more full after a few words with the man whom he had been
"looking into." "Well, Mr. Trewillian," he said, seating himself
on a chair close against the wall, and holding his hat between the
knees,--"I've seen the parties, and know pretty much all about it."
"All I want to know, Mr. Bozzle, is, whether Colonel Osborne has been
at the Clock House?"
"He has been there, Mr. Trewillian. There is no earthly doubt about
that. From hour to hour I can tell you pretty nearly where he's been
since he left London." Then Bozzle took out his memorandum-book.
"I don't care about all that," said Trevelyan.
"I dare say not, sir; but it may be wanted all the same. Any
gentleman acting in our way can't be too particular,--can't have
too many facts. The smallest little,--tiddly things,"--and Bozzle
as he said this seemed to enjoy immensely the flavour of his own
epithet,--"the smallest little 'tiddly' things do so often turn up
trumps when you get your evidence into court."
"I'm not going to get any evidence into court."
"Maybe not, sir. A gentleman and lady is always best out of court as
long as things can hang on any way;--but sometimes things won't hang
on no way."
Trevelyan, who was conscious that the employment of Bozzle was
discreditable, and whose affairs in Devonshire were now in the hands
of, at any rate, a more honourable ally, was at present mainly
anxious to get rid of the ex-policeman. "I have no doubt you've been
very careful, Mr. Bozzle," said he.
"There isn't no one in the business could be more so, Mr.
Trewillian."
"And you have found out what it was necessary that I should know.
Colonel Osborne did go to the Clock House?"
"Was let in at the front door on Friday the 5th, by Sarah French, the
housemaid, at 10.37 a.m., and was let out again by the same young
woman at 11.41 a.m. Perhaps you'd like to have a copy of the entry,
Mr. Trewillian?"
"No, no, no."
"It doesn't matter. Of course it'll be with me when it's wanted. Who
was with him, exactly, at that time, I can't say. There is things,
Mr. Trewillian, one can't see. But I don't think as he saw neither
Mrs. Stanbury, nor Miss Stanbury,--not to speak to. I did just have
one word, promiscuous, with Sarah French, after he was gone. Whether
the other young lady was with 'em or not, and if so for how long,
I--can't--say. There is things, Mr. Trewillian, which one can't see."
How Trevelyan hated the man as he went on with his odious
details,--details not one of which possessed the slightest
importance. "It's all right, I dare say, Mr. Bozzle. And now about
the account."
"Quite so, Mr. Trewillian. But there was one question;--just one
question."
"What question?" said Trevelyan, almost angrily.
"And there's another thing I must tell you, too, Mr. Trewillian. I
come back to town in the same carriage with the Colonel. I thought it
better."
"You did not tell him who you were?"
"No, Mr. Trewillian; I didn't tell him that. I don't think he'd say
if you was to ask him that I told him much of anything. No, Mr.
Trewillian, I didn't tell him nothing. I don't often tell folks much
till the time comes. But I thought it better, and I did have a word
or two with the gent,--just a word or two. He's not so very downy,
isn't the Colonel;--for one that's been at it so long, Mr.
Trewillian."
"I dare say not. But if you could just let me have the account, Mr.
Bozzle,--"
"The account? Oh, yes;--that is necessary; ain't it? These sort of
inquiries do come a little expensive, Mr. Trewillian; because time
goes for so much; and when one has to be down on a thing, sharp, you
know, and sure, so that counsel on the other side can't part you from
it, though he shakes you like a dog does a rat,--and one has to get
oneself up ready for all that, you know, Mr. Trewillian,--as I was
saying, one can't count one's shillings when one has such a job as
this in hand. Clench your nail;--that's what I say; be it even so.
Clench your nail;--that's what you've got to do."
"I dare say we shan't quarrel about the money, Mr. Bozzle."
"Oh dear no. I find I never has any words about the money. But
there's that one question. There's a young Mr. Stanbury has gone
down, as knows all about it. What's he up to?"
"He's my particular friend," said Trevelyan.
"Oh--h. He do know all about it, then?"
"We needn't talk about that, if you please, Mr. Bozzle."
"Because there was words between him and the Colonel upon the
platform;--and very angry words. The young man went at the Colonel
quite open-mouthed,--savage-like. It's not the way such things should
be done, Mr. Trewillian; and though of course it's not for me to
speak;--she's your lady,--still, when you has got a thing of this
kind in hand, one head is better than a dozen. As for myself,
Mr. Trewillian, I never wouldn't look at a case,--not if I knew
it,--unless I was to have it all to myself. But of course there was
no bargain, and so I says nothing."
After considerable delay the bill was made out on the spot, Mr.
Bozzle copying down the figures painfully from his memorandum-book,
with his head much inclined on one side. Trevelyan asked him, almost
in despair, to name the one sum; but this Bozzle declined to do,
saying that right was right. He had a scale of pilfering of his own,
to which he had easily reconciled his conscience; and beyond that
he prided himself on the honesty of his accounts. At last the bill
was made out, was paid, and Bozzle was gone. Trevelyan, when he was
alone, threw himself back on a sofa, and almost wept in despair. To
what a depth of degradation had he not been reduced!
CHAPTER XXIV.
NIDDON PARK.
As Hugh Stanbury went over to Lessboro', and from thence to Nuncombe
Putney, he thought more of himself and Nora Rowley than he did of Mr.
and Mrs. Trevelyan. As to Mrs. Trevelyan and Colonel Osborne, he felt
that he knew everything that it was necessary that he should know.
The man had been there, and had seen Mrs. Trevelyan. Of that there
could be no doubt. That Colonel Osborne had been wickedly indifferent
to the evil consequences of such a visit, and that all the women
concerned had been most foolish in permitting him to make it, was his
present conviction. But he did not for a moment doubt that the visit
had in itself been of all things the most innocent. Trevelyan had
sworn that if his wife received the man at Nuncombe Putney, he
would never see her again. She had seen him, and this oath would be
remembered, and there would be increased difficulties. But these
difficulties, whatever they might be, must be overcome. When he had
told himself this, then he allowed his mind to settle itself on Nora
Rowley.
Hitherto he had known Miss Rowley only as a fashionable girl living
with the wife of an intimate friend of his own in London. He had
never been staying in the same house with her. Circumstances had
never given to him the opportunity of assuming the manner of an
intimate friend, justifying him in giving advice, and authorising
him to assume that semi-paternal tone which is by far the easiest
preliminary to love-making. When a man can tell a young lady what
she ought to read, what she ought to do, and whom she ought to know,
nothing can be easier than to assure her that, of all her duties,
her first duty is to prefer himself to all the world. And any young
lady who has consented to receive lessons from such a teacher, will
generally be willing to receive this special lesson among others.
But Stanbury had hitherto had no such opportunities. In London Miss
Rowley had been a fashionable young lady, living in Mayfair, and he
had been,--well, anything but a fashionable young man. Nevertheless,
he had seen her often, had sat by her very frequently, was quite sure
that he loved her dearly, and had, perhaps, some self-flattering
idea in his mind that had he stuck to his honourable profession as a
barrister, and were he possessed of some comfortable little fortune
of his own, he might, perhaps, have been able, after due siege
operations, to make this charming young woman his own. Things were
quite changed now. For the present, Miss Rowley certainly could not
be regarded as a fashionable London young lady. The house in which he
would see her was, in some sort, his own. He would be sleeping under
the same roof with her, and would have all the advantages which such
a position could give him. He would have no difficulty now in asking,
if he should choose to ask; and he thought that she might be somewhat
softer, somewhat more likely to yield at Nuncombe Putney, than she
would have been in London. She was at Nuncombe in weak circumstances,
to a certain degree friendless; with none of the excitement of
society around her, with no elder sons buzzing about her and
filling her mind, if not her heart, with the glories of luxurious
primogeniture. Hugh Stanbury certainly did not dream that any
special elder son had as yet been so attracted as to have made a
journey to Nuncombe Putney on Nora's behalf. But should he on this
account,--because she would be, as it were, without means of defence
from his attack,--should he therefore take advantage of her weakness?
She would, of course, go back to her London life after some short
absence, and would again, if free, have her chance among the favoured
ones of the earth. What had he to offer to her? He had taken the
Clock House for his mother, and it would be quite as much as he could
do, when Mrs. Trevelyan should have left the village, to keep up that
establishment and maintain himself in London,--quite as much as he
could do, even though the favours of the "D. R." should flow upon
him with their fullest tides. In such circumstances, would it be
honourable in him to ask a girl to love him because he found her
defenceless in his mother's house?
"If there bain't another for Nuncombe," said Mrs. Clegg's Ostler to
Mrs. Clegg's Boots, as Stanbury was driven off in a gig.
"That be young Stanbury, a-going of whome."
"They be all a-going for the Clock House. Since the old 'ooman took
to thick there house, there be folk a-comin' and a-goin' every day
loike."
"It's along of the madam that they keeps there, Dick," said the
Boots.
"I didn't care if there'd be madams allays. They're the best as is
going for trade anyhow," said the ostler. What the ostler said was
true. When there comes to be a feeling that a woman's character is in
any way tarnished, there comes another feeling that everybody on the
one side may charge double, and that everybody on the other side must
pay double, for everything. Hugh Stanbury could not understand why he
was charged a shilling a mile, instead of ninepence, for the gig to
Nuncombe Putney. He got no satisfactory answer, and had to pay the
shilling. The truth was, that gigs to Nuncombe Putney had gone up,
since a lady, separated from her husband, with a colonel running
after her, had been taken in at the Clock House.
"Here's Hugh!" said Priscilla, hurrying to the front door. And Mrs.
Stanbury hurried after her. Her son Hugh was the apple of her eye,
the best son that ever lived, generous, noble, a thorough
man,--almost a god!
"Dear, dear, oh dear! Who'd have expected it? God bless you, my boy!
Why didn't you write? Priscilla, what is there in the house that he
can eat?"
"Plenty of bread and cheese," said Priscilla, laughing, with her hand
inside her brother's arm. For though Priscilla hated all other men,
she did not hate her brother Hugh. "If you wanted things nice to eat
directly you got here, you ought to have written."
"I shall want my dinner, like any other Christian,--in due time,"
said Hugh. "And how is Mrs. Trevelyan,--and how is Miss Rowley?"
He soon found himself in company with those two ladies, and
experienced some immediate difficulty in explaining the cause of his
sudden coming. But this was soon put aside by Mrs. Trevelyan.
"When did you see my husband?" she asked.
"I saw him yesterday. He was quite well."
"Colonel Osborne has been here," she said.
"I know that he has been here. I met him at the station at Exeter.
Perhaps I should not say so, but I wish he had remained away."
"We all wish it," said Priscilla.
Then Nora spoke. "But what could we do, Mr. Stanbury? It seemed so
natural that he should call when he was in the neighbourhood. We have
known him so long; and how could we refuse to see him?"
"I will not let any one think that I'm afraid to see any man on
earth," said Mrs. Trevelyan. "If he had ever in his life said a word
that he should not have said, a word that would have been an insult,
of course it would have been different. But the notion of it is
preposterous. Why should I not have seen him?"
"I think he was wrong to come," said Hugh.
"Of course he was wrong;--wickedly wrong," said Priscilla.
Stanbury, finding that the subject was openly discussed between
them, declared plainly the mission that had brought him to Nuncombe.
"Trevelyan heard that he was coming, and asked me to let him know the
truth."
"Now you can tell him the truth," said Mrs. Trevelyan, with something
of indignation in her tone, as though she thought that Stanbury had
taken upon himself a task of which he ought to be ashamed.
"But Colonel Osborne came specially to pay a visit to
Cockchaffington," said Nora, "and not to see us. Louis ought to know
that."
"Nora, how can you demean yourself to care about such trash?" said
Mrs. Trevelyan. "Who cares why he came here? His visit to me was a
thing of course. If Mr. Trevelyan disapproves of it, let him say so,
and not send secret messengers."
"Am I a secret messenger?" said Hugh Stanbury.
"There has been a man here, inquiring of the servants," said
Priscilla. So that odious Bozzle had made his foul mission known
to them! Stanbury, however, thought it best to say nothing of
Bozzle,--not to acknowledge that he had ever heard of Bozzle. "I am
sure Mrs. Trevelyan does not mean you," said Priscilla.
"I do not know what I mean," said Mrs. Trevelyan. "I am so harassed
and fevered by these suspicions that I am driven nearly mad." Then
she left the room for a minute and returned with two letters. "There,
Mr. Stanbury; I got that note from Colonel Osborne, and wrote to him
that reply. You know all about it now. Can you say that I was wrong
to see him?"
"I am sure that he was wrong to come," said Hugh.
"Wickedly wrong," said Priscilla, again.
"You can keep the letters, and show them to my husband," said Mrs.
Trevelyan; "then he will know all about it." But Stanbury declined to
keep the letters.
He was to remain the Sunday at Nuncombe Putney and return to London
on the Monday. There was, therefore, but one day on which he could
say what he had to say to Nora Rowley. When he came down to breakfast
on the Sunday morning he had almost made up his mind that he had
nothing to say to her. As for Nora, she was in a state of mind much
less near to any fixed purpose. She had told herself that she loved
this man,--had indeed done so in the clearest way, by acknowledging
the fact of her love to another suitor, by pleading to that other
suitor the fact of her love as an insuperable reason why he should
be rejected. There was no longer any doubt about it to her. When
Priscilla had declared that Hugh Stanbury was at the door, her heart
had gone into her mouth. Involuntarily she had pressed her hands to
her sides, and had held her breath. Why had he come there? Had he
come there for her? Oh! if he had come there for her, and if she
might dare to forget all the future, how sweet,--sweetest of all
things in heaven or earth,--might be an August evening with him among
the lanes! But she, too, had endeavoured to be very prudent. She
had told herself that she was quite unfit to be the wife of a poor
man,--that she would be only a burden round his neck, and not an aid
to him. And in so telling herself, she had told herself also that she
had been a fool not to accept Mr. Glascock. She should have dragged
out from her heart the image of this man who had never even whispered
a word of love in her ears, and should have constrained herself to
receive with affection a man in loving whom there ought to be no
difficulty. But when she had been repeating those lessons to herself,
Hugh Stanbury had not been in the house. Now he was there;--and what
must be her answer if he should whisper that word of love? She had an
idea that it would be treason in her to disown the love she felt, if
questioned concerning her heart by the man to whom it had been given.
They all went to church on the Sunday morning, and up to that time
Nora had not been a moment alone with the man. It had been decided
that they should dine early, and then ramble out, when the evening
would be less hot than the day had been, to a spot called Niddon
Park. This was nearly three miles from Nuncombe, and was a beautiful
wild slope of ground, full of ancient, blighted, blasted, but still
half-living oaks,--oaks that still brought forth leaves,--overlooking
a bend of the river Teign. Park, in the usual sense of the word,
there was none, nor did they who lived round Nuncombe Putney know
whether Niddon Park had ever been enclosed. But of all the spots in
that lovely neighbourhood, Priscilla Stanbury swore that it was the
loveliest; and, as it had never yet been seen by Mrs. Trevelyan or
her sister, it was determined that they would walk there on this
August afternoon. There were four of them,--and, as was natural, they
fell into parties of two and two. But Priscilla walked with Nora, and
Hugh Stanbury walked with his friend's wife. Nora was talkative, but
demure in her manner, and speaking now and again as though she were
giving words and not thoughts. She felt that there was something to
hide, and was suffering from disappointment that their party should
not have been otherwise divided. Had Hugh spoken to her and asked her
to be his wife, she could not have accepted him, because she knew
that they were both poor, and that she was not fit to keep a poor
man's house. She had declared to herself most plainly that that must
be her course;--but yet she was disappointed, and talked on with the
knowledge that she had something to conceal.
[Illustration: Niddon Park.]
When they were seated beneath an old riven, withered oak, looking
down upon the river, they were still divided in the same way. In
seating herself she had been very anxious not to disarrange that
arrangement,--almost equally anxious not to seem to adhere to it
with any special purpose. She was very careful that there should be
nothing seen in her manner that was in any way special,--but in the
meantime she was suffering an agony of trouble. He did not care for
her in the least. She was becoming sure of that. She had given all
her love to a man who had none to give her in return. As she thought
of this she almost longed for the offer of that which she knew she
could not have accepted had it been offered to her. But she talked
on about the scenery, about the weather,--descanting on the pleasure
of living where such loveliness was within reach. Then there came a
pause for a moment. "Nora," said Priscilla, "I do not know what you
are thinking about, but it is not of the beauty of Niddon Park." Then
there came a faint sound as of an hysterical sob, and then a gurgle
in the throat, and then a pretence at laughter.
"I don't believe I am thinking of anything at all," said Nora.
After which Hugh insisted on descending to the bank of the river,
but, as the necessity of re-climbing the slope was quite manifest,
none of the girls would go with him. "Come, Miss Rowley," said he,
"will you not show them that a lady can go up and down a hill as well
as a man?"
"I had rather not go up and down the hill," said she.
Then he understood that she was angry with him; and in some sort
surmised the cause of her anger. Not that he believed that she loved
him; but it seemed possible to him that she resented the absence of
his attention. He went down, and scrambled out on the rocks into
the bed of the river, while the girls above looked down upon him,
watching the leaps that he made. Priscilla and Mrs. Trevelyan called
to him, bidding him beware; but Nora called not at all. He was
whistling as he made his jumps, but still he heard their voices, and
knew that he did not hear Nora's voice. He poised himself on the edge
of a rock in the middle of the stream, and looked up the river and
down the river, turning himself carefully on his narrow foothold; but
he was thinking only of Nora. Could there be anything nobler than to
struggle on with her, if she only would be willing? But then she was
young; and should she yield to such a request from him, she would not
know what she was yielding. He turned again, jumping from rock to
rock till he reached the bank, and then made his way again up to the
withered oak.
"You would not have repented it if you had come down with me," he
said to Nora.
"I am not so sure of that," she answered.
When they started to return she stepped on gallantly with Priscilla;
but Priscilla was stopped by some chance, having some word to say to
her brother, having some other word to say to Mrs. Trevelyan. Could
it be that her austerity had been softened, and that in kindness she
contrived that Nora should be left some yards behind them with her
brother? Whether it were kindness, or an unkind error, so it was.
Nora, when she perceived what destiny was doing for her, would not
interfere with destiny. If he chose to speak to her she would hear
him and would answer him. She knew very well what answer she would
give him. She had her answer quite ready at her fingers' ends. There
was no doubt about her answer.
They had walked half a mile together and he had spoken of nothing but
the scenery. She had endeavoured to appear to be excited. Oh, yes,
the scenery of Devonshire was delightful. She hardly wanted anything
more to make her happy. If only this misery respecting her sister
could be set right!
"And you, you yourself," said he, "do you mean that there is nothing
you want in leaving London?"
"Not much, indeed."
"It sometimes seemed to me that that kind of life was,--was very
pleasant to you."
"What kind of life, Mr. Stanbury?"
"The life that you were living,--going out, being admired, and having
the rich and dainty all around you."
"I don't dislike people because they are rich," she said.
"No; nor do I; and I despise those who affect to dislike them. But
all cannot be rich."
"Nor all dainty, as you choose to call them."
"But they who have once been dainty,--as I call them,--never like
to divest themselves of their daintiness. You have been one of the
dainty, Miss Rowley."
"Have I?"
"Certainly; I doubt whether you would be happy if you thought that
your daintiness had departed from you."
"I hope, Mr. Stanbury, that nothing nice and pleasant has departed
from me. If I have ever been dainty, dainty I hope I may remain. I
will never, at any rate, give it up of my own accord." Why she said
this, she could never explain to herself. She had certainly not
intended to rebuff him when she had been saying it. But he spoke not
a word to her further as they walked home, either of her mode of life
or of his own.
CHAPTER XXV.
HUGH STANBURY SMOKES HIS PIPE.
[Illustration]
Nora Rowley, when she went to bed, after her walk to Niddon Park in
company with Hugh Stanbury, was full of wrath against him. But she
could not own her anger to herself, nor could she even confess to
herself,--though she was breaking her heart,--that there really
existed for her the slightest cause of grief. But why had he been so
stern to her? Why had he gone out of his way to be uncivil to her? He
had called her "dainty," meaning to imply by the epithet that she was
one of the butterflies of the day, caring for nothing but sunshine
and an opportunity of fluttering her silly wings. She had understood
well what he meant. Of course he was right to be cold to her if
his heart was cold, but he need not have insulted her by his
ill-concealed rebukes. Had he been kind to her, he might have rebuked
her as much as he liked. She quite appreciated the delightful
intimacy of a loving word of counsel from the man she loved,--how
nice it is, as it were, to play at marriage, and to hear beforehand
something of the pleasant weight of gentle marital authority. But
there had been nothing of that in his manner to her. He had told her
that she was dainty,--and had so told it her, as she thought, that
she might learn thereby, that under no circumstances would he have
any other tale to tell her. If he had no other tale, why had he not
been silent? Did he think that she was subject to his rebuke merely
because she lived under his mother's roof? She would soon shew him
that her residence at the Clock House gave him no such authority over
her. Then, amidst her wrath and despair, she cried herself asleep.
While she was sobbing in bed, he was sitting, with a short, black
pipe stuck into his mouth, on the corner of the churchyard wall
opposite. Before he had left the house he and Priscilla had spoken
together for some minutes about Mrs. Trevelyan. "Of course she was
wrong to see him," said Priscilla. "I hesitate to wound her by so
saying, because she has been ill-used,--though I did tell her so,
when she asked me. She could have lost nothing by declining his
visit."
"The worst of it is that Trevelyan swears that he will never receive
her again if she received him."
"He must unswear it," said Priscilla, "that is all. It is out of the
question that a man should take a girl from her home, and make her
his wife, and then throw her off for so little of an offence as this.
She might compel him by law to take her back."
"What would she get by that?"
"Little enough," said Priscilla; "and it was little enough she got by
marrying him. She would have had bread, and meat, and raiment without
being married, I suppose."
"But it was a love-match."
"Yes;--and now she is at Nuncombe Putney, and he is roaming about in
London. He has to pay ever so much a year for his love-match, and she
is crushed into nothing by it. How long will she have to remain here,
Hugh?"
"How can I say? I suppose there is no reason against her remaining as
far as you are concerned?"
"For me personally, none. Were she much worse than I think she is, I
should not care in the least for myself, if I thought that we were
doing her good,--helping to bring her back. She can't hurt me. I am
so fixed, and dry, and established, that nothing anybody says will
affect me. But mamma doesn't like it."
"What is it she dislikes?"
"The idea that she is harbouring a married woman, of whom people say,
at least, that she has a lover."
"Is she to be turned out because people are slanderers?"
"Why should mamma suffer because this woman, who is a stranger to
her, has been imprudent? If she were your wife, Hugh--"
"God forbid!"
"If we were in any way bound to her, of course we would do our duty.
But if it makes mamma unhappy I am sure you will not press it. I
think Mrs. Merton has spoken to her. And then Aunt Stanbury has
written such letters!"
"Who cares for Aunt Jemima?"
"Everybody cares for her,--except you and I. And now this man who has
been here asking the servant questions has upset her greatly. Even
your coming has done so, knowing, as she does, that you have come,
not to see us, but to make inquiries about Mrs. Trevelyan. She is so
annoyed by it, that she does not sleep."
"Do you wish her to be taken away at once?" asked Hugh, almost in an
angry tone.
"Certainly not. That would be impossible. We have agreed to take her,
and must bear with it. And I would not have her moved from this, if I
thought that if she stayed awhile it might be arranged that she might
return from us direct to her husband."
"I shall try that, of course;--now."
"But if he will not have her;--if he be so obstinate, so foolish, and
so wicked, do not leave her here longer than you can help." Then Hugh
explained that Sir Marmaduke and Lady Rowley were to be in England in
the spring, and that it would be very desirable that the poor woman
should not be sent abroad to look for a home before that. "If it must
be so, it must," said Priscilla. "But eight months is a long time."
Hugh went out to smoke his pipe on the church-wall in a moody,
unhappy state of mind. He had hoped to have done so well in regard
to Mrs. Trevelyan! Till he had met Colonel Osborne, he felt sure,
almost sure, that she would have refused to see that pernicious
troubler of the peace of families. In this he found that he had been
disappointed; but he had not expected that Priscilla would have been
so much opposed to the arrangement which he had made about the house,
and then he had been buoyed up by the anticipation of some delight in
meeting Nora Rowley. There was, at any rate, the excitement of seeing
her to keep his spirits from flagging. He had seen her, and had had
the opportunity of which he had so long been thinking. He had seen
her, and had had every possible advantage on his side. What could any
man desire better than the privilege of walking home with the girl
he loved through country lanes of a summer evening? They had been an
hour together,--or might have been, had he chosen to prolong the
interview. But the words which had been spoken between them had had
not the slightest interest,--unless it were that they had tended to
make the interval between him and her wider than ever. He had asked
her,--he thought that he had asked,--whether it would grieve her to
abandon that delicate, dainty mode of life to which she had been
accustomed; and she had replied, that she would never abandon it of
her own accord. Of course she had intended him to take her at her
word.
He blew forth quick clouds of heavy smoke, as he attempted to make
himself believe that this was all for the best. What would such a one
as he was do with a wife? Or, seeing as he did see, that marriage
itself was quite out of the question, how could it be good either for
him or her that they should be tied together by a long engagement?
Such a future would not at all suit the purpose of his life. In his
life absolute freedom would be needed;--freedom from unnecessary
ties, freedom from unnecessary burdens. His income was most
precarious, and he certainly would not make it less so by submission
to any closer literary thraldom. And he believed himself to be a
Bohemian,--too much of a Bohemian to enjoy a domestic fireside with
children and slippers. To be free to go where he liked, and when he
liked; to think as he pleased; to be driven nowhere by conventional
rules; to use his days, Sundays as well as Mondays, as he pleased
to use them; to turn Republican, if his mind should take him that
way,--or Quaker, or Mormon, or Red Indian, if he wished it, and in so
turning to do no damage to any one but himself;--that was the life
which he had planned for himself. His Aunt Stanbury had not read
his character altogether wrongly, as he thought, when she had once
declared that decency and godliness were both distasteful to him.
Would it not be destruction to such a one as he was, to fall into an
interminable engagement with any girl, let her be ever so sweet?
But yet, he felt as he sat there, filling pipe after pipe, smoking
away till past midnight, that though he could not bear the idea of
trammels, though he was totally unfit for matrimony, either present
or in prospect,--he felt that he had within his breast a double
identity, and that that other division of himself would be utterly
crushed if it were driven to divest itself of the idea of love.
Whence was to come his poetry, the romance of his life, the springs
of clear water in which his ignoble thoughts were to be dipped till
they should become pure, if love was to be banished altogether from
the list of delights that were possible to him? And then he began
to speculate on love,--that love of which poets wrote, and of which
he found that some sparkle was necessary to give light to his life.
Was it not the one particle of divine breath given to man, of which
he had heard since he was a boy? And how was this love to be come
at, and was it to be a thing of reality, or merely an idea? Was
it a pleasure to be attained, or a mystery that charmed by the
difficulties of the distance,--a distance that never could be so
passed that the thing should really be reached? Was love to be
ever a delight, vague as is that feeling of unattainable beauty
which far-off mountains give, when you know that you can never
place yourself amidst their unseen valleys? And if love could be
reached,--the love of which the poets sing, and of which his own
heart was ever singing,--what were to be its pleasures? To press a
hand, to kiss a lip, to clasp a waist, to hear even the low voice of
the vanquished, confessing loved one as she hides her blushing cheek
upon your shoulder,--what is it all but to have reached the once
mysterious valley of your far-off mountain, and to have found that it
is as other valleys,--rocks and stones, with a little grass, and a
thin stream of running water? But beyond that pressure of the hand,
and that kissing of the lips,--beyond that short-lived pressure of
the plumage which is common to birds and men,--what could love do
beyond that? There were children with dirty faces, and household
bills, and a wife who must, perhaps, always darn the stockings,--and
be sometimes cross. Was love to lead only to this,--a dull life, with
a woman who had lost the beauty from her cheeks, and the gloss from
her hair, and the music from her voice, and the fire from her eye,
and the grace from her step, and whose waist an arm should no longer
be able to span? Did the love of the poets lead to that, and that
only? Then, through the cloud of smoke, there came upon him some
dim idea of self-abnegation,--that the mysterious valley among
the mountains, the far-off prospect of which was so charming to
him,--which made the poetry of his life, was, in fact, the capacity
of caring more for other human beings than for himself. The beauty of
it all was not so much in the thing loved as in the loving. "Were she
a cripple, hunchbacked, eyeless," he said to himself, "it might be
the same. Only she must be a woman." Then he blew off a great cloud
of smoke, and went into bed lost amidst poetry, philosophy, love, and
tobacco.
It had been arranged over-night that he was to start the next morning
at half-past seven, and Priscilla had promised to give him his
breakfast before he went. Priscilla, of course, kept her word. She
was one of those women who would take a grim pleasure in coming
down to make the tea at any possible hour,--at five, at four, if it
were needed,--and who would never want to go to bed again when the
ceremony was performed. But when Nora made her appearance,--Nora, who
had been called dainty,--both Priscilla and Hugh were surprised. They
could not say why she was there,--nor could Nora tell herself. She
had not forgiven him. She had no thought of being gentle and loving
to him. She declared to herself that she had no wish of saying
good-bye to him once again. But yet she was in the room, waiting
for him, when he came down to his breakfast. She had been unable to
sleep, and had reasoned with herself as to the absurdity of lying in
bed awake, when she preferred to be up and out of the house. It was
true that she had not been out of her bed at seven any morning since
she had been at Nuncombe Putney; but that was no reason why she
should not be more active on this special morning. There was a noise
in the house, and she never could sleep when there was a noise. She
was quite sure that she was not going down because she wished to see
Hugh Stanbury, but she was equally sure that it would be a disgrace
to her to be deterred from going down, simply because the man was
there. So she descended to the parlour, and was standing near the
open window when Stanbury bustled into the room, some quarter of
an hour after the proper time. Priscilla was there also, guessing
something of the truth, and speculating whether these two young
people, should they love each other, would be the better or the worse
for such love. There must be marriages,--if only that the world
might go on in accordance with the Creator's purpose. But, as far
as Priscilla could see, blessed were they who were not called upon
to assist in the scheme. To her eyes all days seemed to be days of
wrath, and all times, times of tribulation. And it was all mere
vanity and vexation of spirit. To go on and bear it till one
was dead,--helping others to bear it, if such help might be of
avail,--that was her theory of life. To make it pleasant by eating,
and drinking, and dancing, or even by falling in love, was, to her
mind, a vain crunching of ashes between the teeth. Not to have ill
things said of her and of hers, not to be disgraced, not to be
rendered incapable of some human effort, not to have actually to
starve,--such was the extent of her ambition in this world. And for
the next,--she felt so assured of the goodness of God that she could
not bring herself to doubt of happiness in a world that was to be
eternal. Her doubt was this, whether it was really the next world
which would be eternal. Of eternity she did not doubt;--but might
there not be many worlds? These things, however, she kept almost
entirely to herself. "You down!" Priscilla had said.
"Well, yes; I could not sleep when I heard you all moving. And the
morning is so fine, and I thought that perhaps you would go out and
walk after your brother has gone." Priscilla promised that she would
walk, and then the tea was made.
"Your sister and I are going out for an early walk," said Nora, when
she was greeted by Stanbury. Priscilla said nothing, but thought she
understood it all.
"I wish I were going with you," said Hugh. Nora, remembering how very
little he had made of his opportunity on the evening before, did not
believe him.
The eggs and fried bacon were eaten in a hurry, and very little was
said. Then there came the moment for parting. The brother and sister
kissed each other, and Hugh took Nora by the hand. "I hope you make
yourself happy here," he said.
"Oh, yes;--if it were only for myself I should want nothing."
"I will do the best I can with Trevelyan."
"The best will be to make him, and every one, understand that the
fault is altogether his, and not Emily's."
"The best will be to make each think that there has been no real
fault," said Hugh.
"There should be no talking of faults," said Priscilla. "Let the
husband take his wife back,--as he is bound to do."
These words occupied hardly a minute in the saying, but during that
minute Hugh Stanbury held Nora by the hand. He held it fast. She
would not attempt to withdraw it, but neither would she return his
pressure by the muscle of a single finger. What right had he to press
her hand; or to make any sign of love, any pretence of loving, when
he had gone out of his way to tell her that she was not good enough
for him? Then he started, and Nora and Priscilla put on their hats
and left the house.
"Let us go to Niddon Park," said Nora.
"To Niddon Park again?"
"Yes; it is so beautiful! And I should like to see it by the morning
light. There is plenty of time."
So they walked to Niddon Park in the morning, as they had done on the
preceding evening. Their conversation at first regarded Trevelyan and
his wife, and the old trouble; but Nora could not keep herself from
speaking of Hugh Stanbury.
"He would not have come," she said, "unless Louis had sent him."
"He would not have come now, I think."
"Of course not;--why should he?--before Parliament was hardly over,
too? But he won't remain in town now,--will he?"
"He says somebody must remain,--and I think he will be in London till
near Christmas."
"How disagreeable! But I suppose he doesn't care. It's all the same
to a man like him. They don't shut the clubs up, I dare say. Will he
come here at Christmas?"
"Either then or for the New Year;--just for a day or two."
"We shall be gone then, I suppose?" said Nora.
"That must depend on Mr. Trevelyan," said Priscilla.
"What a life for two women to lead;--to depend upon the caprice of a
man who must be mad! Do you think that Mr. Trevelyan will care for
what your brother says to him?"
"I do not know Mr. Trevelyan."
"He is very fond of your brother, and I suppose men friends do listen
to each other. They never seem to listen to women. Don't you think
that, after all, they despise women? They look on them as dainty,
foolish things."
"Sometimes women despise men," said Priscilla.
"Not very often;--do they? And then women are so dependent on men. A
woman can get nothing without a man."
"I manage to get on somehow," said Priscilla.
"No, you don't, Miss Stanbury,--if you think of it. You want mutton.
And who kills the sheep?"
"But who cooks it?"
"But the men-cooks are the best," said Nora; "and the men-tailors,
and the men to wait at table, and the men-poets, and the
men-painters, and the men-nurses. All the things that women do, men
do better."
"There are two things they can't do," said Priscilla.
"What are they?"
"They can't suckle babies, and they can't forget themselves."
"About the babies, of course not. As for forgetting themselves,--I am
not quite so sure that I can forget myself.--That is just where your
brother went down last night."
They had at this moment reached the top of the steep slope below
which the river ran brawling among the rocks, and Nora seated herself
exactly where she had sat on the previous evening.
"I have been down scores of times," said Priscilla.
"Let us go now."
"You wouldn't go when Hugh asked you yesterday."
"I didn't care then. But do come now,--if you don't mind the climb."
Then they went down the slope and reached the spot from whence Hugh
Stanbury had jumped from rock to rock across the stream. "You have
never been out there, have you?" said Nora.
"On the rocks? Oh, dear, no! I should be sure to fall."
"But he went; just like a goat."
"That's one of the things that men can do, I suppose," said
Priscilla. "But I don't see any great glory in being like a goat."
"I do. I should like to be able to go, and I think I'll try. It is so
mean to be dainty and weak."
"I don't think it at all dainty to keep dry feet."
"But he didn't get his feet wet," said Nora. "Or if he did, he didn't
mind. I can see at once that I should be giddy and tumble down if I
tried it."
"Of course you would."
"But he didn't tumble down."
"He has been doing it all his life," said Priscilla.
"He can't do it up in London. When I think of myself, Miss Stanbury,
I am so ashamed. There is nothing that I can do. I couldn't write an
article for a newspaper."
"I think I could. But I fear no one would read it."
"They read his," said Nora, "or else he wouldn't be paid for writing
them." Then they climbed back again up the hill, and during the
climbing there were no words spoken. The slope was not much of a
hill,--was no more than the fall from the low ground of the valley to
the course which the river had cut for itself; but it was steep while
it lasted; and both the young women were forced to pause for a minute
before they could proceed upon their journey. As they walked home
Priscilla spoke of the scenery, and of the country, and of the
nature of the life which she and her mother and sister had passed at
Nuncombe Putney. Nora said but little till they were just entering
the village, and then she went back to the subject of her thoughts.
"I would sooner," said she, "write for a newspaper than do anything
else in the world."
"Why so?"
"Because it is so noble to teach people everything! And then a man
who writes for a newspaper must know so many things himself! I
believe there are women who do it, but very few. One or two have done
it, I know."
"Go and tell that to Aunt Stanbury, and hear what she will say about
such women."
"I suppose she is very,--prejudiced."
"Yes; she is; but she is a clever woman. I am inclined to think women
had better not write for newspapers."
"And why not?" Nora asked.
"My reasons would take me a week to explain, and I doubt whether I
have them very clear in my own head. In the first place there is that
difficulty about the babies. Most of them must get married you know."
"But not all," said Nora.
"No; thank God; not all."
"And if you are not married you might write for a newspaper. At any
rate, if I were you, I should be very proud of my brother."
"Aunt Stanbury is not at all proud of her nephew," said Priscilla, as
they entered the house.
CHAPTER XXVI.
A THIRD PARTY IS SO OBJECTIONABLE.
Hugh Stanbury went in search of Trevelyan immediately on his return
to London, and found his friend at his rooms in Lincoln's Inn.
"I have executed my commission," said Hugh, endeavouring to speak of
what he had done in a cheery voice.
"I am much obliged to you, Stanbury; very much;--but I do not know
that I need trouble you to tell me anything about it."
"And why not?"
"I have learned it all from that--man."
"What man?"
"From Bozzle. He has come back, and has been with me, and has learned
everything."
"Look here, Trevelyan;--when you asked me to go down to Devonshire,
you promised me that there should be nothing more about Bozzle. I
expect you to put that rascal, and all that he has told you, out of
your head altogether. You are bound to do so for my sake, and you
will be very wise to do so for your own."
"I was obliged to see him when he came."
"Yes, and to pay him, I do not doubt. But that is all done, and
should be forgotten."
"I can't forget it. Is it true or untrue that he found that man down
there? Is it true or untrue that my wife received Colonel Osborne at
your mother's house? Is it true or untrue that Colonel Osborne went
down there with the express object of seeing her? Is it true or
untrue that they had corresponded? It is nonsense to bid me to forget
all this. You might as well ask me to forget that I had desired her
neither to write to him, nor to see him."
"If I understand the matter," said Trevelyan, "you are incorrect in
one of your assertions."
"In which?"
"You must excuse me if I am wrong, Trevelyan; but I don't think you
ever did tell your wife not to see this man, or not to write to him?"
"I never told her! I don't understand what you mean."
"Not in so many words. It is my belief that she has endeavoured to
obey implicitly every clear instruction that you have given her."
"You are wrong;--absolutely and altogether wrong. Heaven and earth!
Do you mean to tell me now, after all that has taken place, that she
did not know my wishes?"
"I have not said that. But you have chosen to place her in such a
position, that though your word would go for much with her, she
cannot bring herself to respect your wishes."
"And you call that being dutiful and affectionate!"
"I call it human and reasonable; and I think that it is compatible
with duty and affection. Have you consulted her wishes?"
"Always!"
"Consult them now then, and bid her come back to you."
"No;--never! As far as I can see, I will never do so. The moment she
is away from me this man goes to her, and she receives him. She must
have known that she was wrong,--and you must know it."
"I do not think that she is half so wrong as you yourself," said
Stanbury. To this Trevelyan made no answer, and they both remained
silent some minutes. Stanbury had a communication to make before he
went, but it was one which he wished to delay as long as there was a
chance that his friend's heart might be softened;--one which he need
not make if Trevelyan would consent to receive his wife back to his
house. There was the day's paper lying on the table, and Stanbury had
taken it up and was reading it,--or pretending to read it.
"I will tell you what I propose to do," said Trevelyan.
"Well."
"It is best both for her and for me that we should be apart."
"I cannot understand how you can be so mad as to say so."
"You don't understand what I feel. Heaven and earth! To have a man
coming and going--. But, never mind. You do not see it, and nothing
will make you see it. And there is no reason why you should."
"I certainly do not see it. I do not believe that your wife cares
more for Colonel Osborne, except as an old friend of her father's,
than she does for the fellow that sweeps the crossing. It is a matter
in which I am bound to tell you what I think."
"Very well. Now, if you have freed your mind, I will tell you my
purpose. I am bound to do so, because your people are concerned in
it. I shall go abroad."
"And leave her in England?"
"Certainly. She will be safer here than she can be abroad,--unless
she should choose to go back with her father to the islands."
"And take the boy?"
"No;--I could not permit that. What I intend is this. I will give
her £800 a year, as long as I have reason to believe that she has no
communication whatever, either by word of mouth or by letter, with
that man. If she does, I will put the case immediately into the hands
of my lawyer, with instructions to him to ascertain from counsel what
severest steps I can take."
"How I hate that word severe, when applied to a woman."
"I dare say you do,--when applied to another man's wife. But there
will be no severity in my first proposition. As for the child,--if
I approve of the place in which she lives, as I do at present,--he
shall remain with her for nine months in the year till he is
six years old. Then he must come to me. And he shall come to me
altogether if she sees or hears from that man. I believe that £800
a year will enable her to live with all comfort under your mother's
roof."
"As to that," said Stanbury, slowly, "I suppose I had better tell you
at once, that the Nuncombe Putney arrangement cannot be considered as
permanent."
"Why not?"
"Because my mother is timid and nervous, and altogether unused to the
world."
"That unfortunate woman is to be sent away,--even from Nuncombe
Putney!"
"Understand me, Trevelyan."
"I understand you. I understand you most thoroughly. Nor do I wonder
at it in the least. Do not suppose that I am angry with your mother,
or with you, or with your sister. I have no right to expect that they
should keep her after that man has made his way into their house. I
can well conceive that no honest, high-minded lady would do so."
"It is not that at all."
"But it is that. How can you tell me that it isn't? And yet you would
have me believe that I am not disgraced!" As he said this Trevelyan
got up, and walked about the room, tearing his hair with his hands.
He was in truth a wretched man, from whose mind all expectation of
happiness was banished, who regarded his own position as one of
incurable ignominy, looking upon himself as one who had been made
unfit for society by no fault of his own. What was he to do with the
wretched woman who could be kept from the evil of her pernicious
vanity by no gentle custody, whom no most distant retirement
would make safe from the effects of her own ignorance, folly, and
obstinacy? "When is she to go?" he asked in a low, sepulchral
tone,--as though these new tidings that had come upon him had been
fatal--laden with doom, and finally subversive of all chance even of
tranquillity.
"When you and she may please."
"That is all very well;--but let me know the truth. I would not have
your mother's house--contaminated; but may she remain there for a
week?"
Stanbury jumped from his seat with an oath. "I tell you what it
is, Trevelyan;--if you speak of your wife in that way, I will not
listen to you. It is unmanly and untrue to say that her presence
can--contaminate any house."
"That is very fine. It may be chivalrous in you to tell me on her
behalf that I am a liar,--and that I am not a man."
"You drive me to it."
"But what am I to think when you are forced to declare that this
unfortunate woman can not be allowed to remain at your mother's
house,--a house which has been especially taken with reference to a
shelter for her? She has been received,--with the idea that she would
be discreet. She has been indiscreet, past belief, and she is to be
turned out,--most deservedly. Heaven and earth! Where shall I find
a roof for her head?" Trevelyan as he said this was walking about
the room with his hands stretched up towards the ceiling; and as
his friend was attempting to make him comprehend that there was no
intention on the part of any one to banish Mrs. Trevelyan from the
Clock House, at least for some months to come,--not even till after
Christmas unless some satisfactory arrangement could be sooner
made,--the door of the room was opened by the boy, who called himself
a clerk, and who acted as Trevelyan's servant in the chambers, and
a third person was shown into the room. That third person was Mr.
Bozzle. As no name was given, Stanbury did not at first know Mr.
Bozzle, but he had not had his eye on Mr. Bozzle for half a minute
before he recognised the ex-policeman by the outward attributes
and signs of his profession. "Oh, is that you, Mr. Bozzle?" said
Trevelyan, as soon as the great man had made his bow of salutation.
"Well;--what is it?"
[Illustration: That third person was Mr. Bozzle.]
"Mr. Hugh Stanbury, I think," said Bozzle, making another bow to the
young barrister.
"That's my name," said Stanbury.
"Exactly so, Mr. S. The identity is one as I could prove on oath in
any court in England. You was on the railway platform at Exeter on
Saturday when we was waiting for the 12 express 'buss;--wasn't you
now, Mr. S.?"
"What's that to you?"
"Well;--as it do happen, it is something to me. And, Mr. S., if you
was asked that question in hany court in England or before even one
of the metropolitan bekes, you wouldn't deny it."
"Why the devil should I deny it? What's all this about, Trevelyan?"
"Of course you can't deny it, Mr. S. When I'm down on a fact, I am
down on it. Nothing else wouldn't do in my profession."
"Have you anything to say to me, Mr. Bozzle?" asked Trevelyan.
"Well;--I have; just a word."
"About your journey to Devonshire?"
"Well;--in a way it is about my journey to Devonshire. It's all along
of the same job, Mr. Trewillian."
"You can speak before my friend here," said Trevelyan. Bozzle had
taken a great dislike to Hugh Stanbury, regarding the barrister with
a correct instinct as one who was engaged for the time in the same
service with himself, and who was his rival in that service. When
thus instigated to make as it were a party of three in this delicate
and most confidential matter, and to take his rival into his
confidence, he shook his head slowly and looked Trevelyan hard in the
face,--"Mr. Stanbury is my particular friend," said Trevelyan, "and
knows well the circumstances of this unfortunate affair. You can say
anything before him."
Bozzle shook his head again. "I'd rayther not, Mr. Trewillian," said
he. "Indeed I'd rayther not. It's something very particular."
"If you take my advice," said Stanbury, "you will not hear him
yourself."
"That's your advice, Mr. S.?" asked Mr. Bozzle.
"Yes;--that's my advice. I'd never have anything to do with such a
fellow as you as long as I could help it."
"I dare say not, Mr. S.; I dare say not. We're hexpensive, and we're
haccurate;--neither of which is much in your line, Mr. S., if I
understand about it rightly."
"Mr. Bozzle, if you've got anything to tell, tell it," said Trevelyan
angrily.
"A third party is so objectionable," pleaded Bozzle.
"Never mind. That is my affair."
"It is your affair, Mr. Trewillian. There's not a doubt of that. The
lady is your wife."
"Damnation!" shouted Trevelyan.
"But the credit, sir," said Bozzle. "The credit is mine. And here
is Mr. S. has been down a interfering with me, and doing no 'varsal
good, as I'll undertake to prove by evidence before the affair is
over."
"The affair is over," said Stanbury.
"That's as you think, Mr. S. That's where your information goes to,
Mr. S. Mine goes a little beyond that, Mr. S. I've means as you can
know nothing about, Mr. S. I've irons in the fire, what you're as
ignorant on as the babe as isn't born."
"No doubt you have, Mr. Bozzle," said Stanbury.
"I has. And now if it be that I must speak before a third party, Mr.
Trewillian, I'm ready. It ain't that I'm no ways ashamed. I've done
my duty, and knows how to do it. And let a counsel be ever so sharp,
I never yet was so 'posed but what I could stand up and hold my own.
The Colonel, Mr. Trewillian, got,--a letter,--from your lady,--this
morning."
"I don't believe it," said Stanbury, sharply.
"Very likely not, Mr. S. It ain't in my power to say anything
whatever about you believing or not believing. But Mr. T.'s lady
has wrote the letter; and the Colonel,--he has received it. You
don't look after these things, Mr. S. You don't know the ways of
'em. But it's my business. The lady has wrote the letter, and the
Colonel,--why, he has received it." Trevelyan had become white with
rage when Bozzle first mentioned this continued correspondence
between his wife and Colonel Osborne. It never occurred to him to
doubt the correctness of the policeman's information, and he regarded
Stanbury's assertion of incredulity as being simply of a piece with
his general obstinacy in the matter. At this moment he began to
regret that he had called in the assistance of his friend, and that
he had not left the affair altogether in the hands of that much more
satisfactory, but still more painful, agent, Mr. Bozzle. He had again
seated himself, and for a moment or two remained silent on his chair.
"It ain't my fault, Mr. Trewillian," continued Bozzle, "if this
little matter oughtn't never to have been mentioned before a third
party."
"It is of no moment," said Trevelyan, in a low voice. "What does it
signify who knows it now?"
"Do not believe it, Trevelyan," said Stanbury.
"Very well, Mr. S. Very well. Just as you like. Don't believe it.
Only it's true, and it's my business to find them things out. It's
my business, and I finds 'em out. Mr. Trewillian can do as he likes
about it. If it's right, why, then it is right. It ain't for me to
say nothing about that. But there's the fact. The lady, she has wrote
another letter; and the Colonel,--why, he has received it. There
ain't nothing wrong about the post-office. If I was to say what was
inside of that billydou,--why, then I should be proving what I didn't
know; and when it came to standing up in court, I shouldn't be able
to hold my own. But as for the letter, the lady wrote it, and the
Colonel,--he received it."
"That will do, Mr. Bozzle," said Trevelyan.
"Shall I call again, Mr. Trewillian?"
"No;--yes. I'll send to you, when I want you. You shall hear from
me."
"I suppose I'd better be keeping my eyes open about the Colonel's
place, Mr. Trewillian?"
"For God's sake, Trevelyan, do not have anything more to do with this
man!"
"That's all very well for you, Mr. S.," said Bozzle. "The lady ain't
your wife."
"Can you imagine anything more disgraceful than all this?" said
Stanbury.
"Nothing; nothing; nothing!" answered Trevelyan.
"And I'm to keep stirring, and be on the move?" again suggested
Bozzle, who prudently required to be fortified by instructions before
he devoted his time and talents even to so agreeable a pursuit as
that in which he had been engaged.
"You shall hear from me," said Trevelyan.
"Very well;--very well. I wish you good-day, Mr. Trewillian. Mr. S.,
yours most obedient. There was one other point, Mr. Trewillian."
"What point?" asked Trevelyan, angrily.
"If the lady was to join the Colonel--"
"That will do, Mr. Bozzle," said Trevelyan, again jumping up from
his chair. "That will do." So saying, he opened the door, and Bozzle,
with a bow, took his departure. "What on earth am I to do? How am I
to save her?" said the wretched husband, appealing to his friend.
Stanbury endeavoured with all his eloquence to prove that this latter
piece of information from the spy must be incorrect. If such a letter
had been written by Mrs. Trevelyan to Colonel Osborne, it must have
been done while he, Stanbury, was staying at the Clock House. This
seemed to him to be impossible; but he could hardly explain why
it should be impossible. She had written to the man before, and
had received him when he came to Nuncombe Putney. Why was it even
improbable that she should have written to him again? Nevertheless,
Stanbury felt sure that she had sent no such letter. "I think I
understand her feelings and her mind," said he; "and if so, any such
correspondence would be incompatible with her previous conduct."
Trevelyan only smiled at this,--or pretended to smile. He would
not discuss the question; but believed implicitly what Bozzle had
told him in spite of all Stanbury's arguments. "I can say nothing
further," said Stanbury.
"No, my dear fellow. There is nothing further to be said, except
this, that I will have my unfortunate wife removed from the decent
protection of your mother's roof with the least possible delay. I
feel that I owe Mrs. Stanbury the deepest apology for having sent
such an inmate to trouble her repose."
"Nonsense!"
"That is what I feel."
"And I say that it is nonsense. If you had never sent that wretched
blackguard down to fabricate lies at Nuncombe Putney, my mother's
repose would have been all right. As it is, Mrs. Trevelyan can remain
where she is till after Christmas. There is not the least necessity
for removing her at once. I only meant to say that the arrangement
should not be regarded as altogether permanent. I must go to my work
now. Good-bye."
"Good-bye, Stanbury."
Stanbury paused at the door, and then once more turned round. "I
suppose it is of no use my saying anything further; but I wish you to
understand fully that I regard your wife as a woman much ill-used,
and I think you are punishing her, and yourself, too, with a cruel
severity for an indiscretion of the very slightest kind."
CHAPTER XXVII.
MR. TREVELYAN'S LETTER TO HIS WIFE.
Trevelyan, when he was left alone, sat for above a couple of hours
contemplating the misery of his position, and endeavouring to teach
himself by thinking what ought to be his future conduct. It never
occurred to him during these thoughts that it would be well that he
should at once take back his wife, either as a matter of duty, or of
welfare, for himself or for her. He had taught himself to believe
that she had disgraced him; and, though this feeling of disgrace
made him so wretched that he wished that he were dead, he would
allow himself to make no attempt at questioning the correctness of
his conviction. Though he were to be shipwrecked for ever, even
that seemed to be preferable to supposing that he had been wrong.
Nevertheless, he loved his wife dearly, and, in the white heat of his
anger endeavoured to be merciful to her. When Stanbury accused him
of severity, he would not condescend to defend himself; but he told
himself then of his great mercy. Was he not as fond of his own boy
as any other father, and had he not allowed her to take the child
because he had felt that a mother's love was more imperious, more
craving in its nature, than the love of a father? Had that been
severe? And had he not resolved to allow her every comfort which
her unfortunate position,--the self-imposed misfortune of her
position,--would allow her to enjoy? She had come to him without
a shilling; and yet, bad as her treatment of him had been, he was
willing to give enough not only to support her, but her sister also,
with every comfort. Severe! No; that, at least, was an undeserved
accusation. He had been anything but severe. Foolish he might have
been, in taking a wife from a home in which she had been unable to
learn the discretion of a matron; too trusting he had been, and too
generous,--but certainly not severe. But, of course, as he said to
himself, a young man like Stanbury would take the part of a woman
with whose sister he was in love. Then he turned his thoughts upon
Bozzle, and there came over him a crushing feeling of ignominy,
shame, moral dirt, and utter degradation, as he reconsidered his
dealings with that ingenious gentleman. He was paying a rogue to
watch the steps of a man whom he hated, to pry into the home secrets,
to read the letters, to bribe the servants, to record the movements
of this rival, this successful rival, in his wife's affections! It
was a filthy thing,--and yet what could he do? Gentlemen of old, his
own grandfather, or his father, would have taken such a fellow as
Colonel Osborne by the throat and have caned him, and afterwards
would have shot him, or have stood to be shot. All that was changed
now,--but it was not his fault that it was changed. He was willing
enough to risk his life, could any opportunity of risking it in this
cause be obtained for him. But were he to cudgel Colonel Osborne,
he would be simply arrested, and he would then be told that he had
disgraced himself foully by striking a man old enough to be his
father!
How was he to have avoided the employment of some such man as Bozzle?
He had also employed a gentleman, his friend, Stanbury; and what was
the result? The facts were not altered. Even Stanbury did not attempt
to deny that there had been a correspondence, and that there had been
a visit. But Stanbury was so blind to all impropriety, or pretended
such blindness, that he defended that which all the world agreed
in condemning. Of what use had Stanbury been to him? He had wanted
facts, not advice. Stanbury had found out no facts for him; but
Bozzle, either by fair means or foul, did get at the truth. He did
not doubt but that Bozzle was right about that letter written only
yesterday, and received on that very morning. His wife, who had
probably been complaining of her wrongs to Stanbury, must have
retired from that conversation to her chamber, and immediately have
written this letter to her lover! With such a woman as that what can
be done in these days otherwise than by the aid of such a one as
Bozzle? He could not confine his wife in a dungeon. He could not
save himself from the disgrace of her misconduct, by any rigours of
surveillance on his own part. As wives are managed now-a-days, he
could not forbid to her the use of the post-office,--could not hinder
her from seeing this hypocritical scoundrel, who carried on his
wickedness under the false guise of family friendship. He had given
her every chance to amend her conduct: but, if she were resolved
on disobedience, he had no means of enforcing obedience. The facts,
however, it was necessary that he should know.
And now, what should he do? How should he go to work to make her
understand that she could not write even a letter without his knowing
it; and that if she did either write to the man or see him he would
immediately take the child from her, and provide for her only in such
fashion as the law should demand from him? For himself, and for his
own life, he thought that he had determined what he would do. It was
impossible that he should continue to live in London. He was ashamed
to enter a club. He had hardly a friend to whom it was not an agony
to speak. They who knew him, knew also of his disgrace, and no longer
asked him to their houses. For days past he had eaten alone, and sat
alone, and walked alone. All study was impossible to him. No pursuit
was open to him. He spent his time in thinking of his wife, and of
the disgrace which she had brought upon him. Such a life as this, he
knew, was unmanly and shameful, and it was absolutely necessary for
him that he should in some way change it. He would go out of England,
and would travel,--if only he could so dispose of his wife that she
might be safe from any possible communication with Colonel Osborne.
If that could be effected, nothing that money could do should be
spared for her. If that could not be effected he would remain at
home,--and crush her.
That night before he went to bed he wrote a letter to his wife, which
was as follows;--
DEAR EMILY,
I have learned, beyond the shadow of a doubt, that you
have corresponded with Colonel Osborne since you have been
at Nuncombe Putney, and also that you have seen him there.
This has been done in direct opposition to my expressed
wishes, and I feel myself compelled to tell you that such
conduct is disgraceful to you, and disgracing to me. I am
quite at a loss to understand how you can reconcile to
yourself so flagrant a disobedience of my instructions,
and so perverse a disregard to the opinion of the world at
large.
But I do not write now for the sake of finding fault with
you. It is too late for me to have any hope that I can do
so with good effect, either as regards your credit or my
happiness. Nevertheless, it is my duty to protect both you
and myself from further shame; and I wish to tell you what
are my intentions with that view. In the first place, I
warn you that I keep a watch on you. The doing so is very
painful to me, but it is absolutely necessary. You cannot
see Colonel Osborne, or write to him, without my knowing
it. I pledge you my word that in either case,--that is, if
you correspond with him or see him,--I will at once take
our boy away from you. I will not allow him to remain,
even with a mother, who shall so misconduct herself.
Should Colonel Osborne address a letter to you, I desire
that you will put it under an envelope addressed to me.
If you obey my commands on this head I will leave our boy
with you nine months out of every year till he shall be
six years old. Such, at least, is my present idea, though
I will not positively bind myself to adhere to it. And I
will allow you £800 per year for your own maintenance and
that of your sister. I am greatly grieved to find from
my friend Mr. Stanbury that your conduct in reference to
Colonel Osborne has been such as to make it necessary that
you should leave Mrs. Stanbury's house. I do not wonder
that it should be so. I shall immediately seek for a
future home for you, and when I have found one that is
suitable, I will have you conveyed to it.
I must now further explain my purposes,--and I must beg
you to remember that I am driven to do so by your direct
disobedience to my expressed wishes. Should there be any
further communication between you and Colonel Osborne,
not only will I take your child away from you, but I will
also limit the allowance to be made to you to a bare
sustenance. In such case, I shall put the matter into the
hands of a lawyer, and shall probably feel myself driven
to take steps towards freeing myself from a connection
which will be disgraceful to my name.
For myself, I shall live abroad during the greater part of
the year. London has become to me uninhabitable, and all
English pleasures are distasteful.
Yours affectionately,
LOUIS TREVELYAN.
When he had finished this he read it twice, and believed that he had
written, if not an affectionate, at any rate a considerate letter.
He had no bounds to the pity which he felt for himself in reference
to the injury which was being done to him, and he thought that the
offers which he was making, both in respect to his child and the
money, were such as to entitle him to his wife's warmest gratitude.
He hardly recognised the force of the language which he used when he
told her that her conduct was disgraceful, and that she had disgraced
his name. He was quite unable to look at the whole question between
him and his wife from her point of view. He conceived it possible
that such a woman as his wife should be told that her conduct would
be watched, and that she should be threatened with the Divorce Court,
with an effect that should, upon the whole, be salutary. There
be men, and not bad men either, and men neither uneducated, or
unintelligent, or irrational in ordinary matters, who seem to be
absolutely unfitted by nature to have the custody or guardianship of
others. A woman in the hands of such a man can hardly save herself or
him from endless trouble. It may be that between such a one and his
wife, events shall flow on so evenly that no ruling, no constraint
is necessary,--that even the giving of advice is never called for
by the circumstances of the day. If the man be happily forced to
labour daily for his living till he be weary, and the wife be laden
with many ordinary cares, the routine of life may run on without
storms;--but for such a one, if he be without work, the management
of a wife will be a task full of peril. The lesson may be learned at
last; he may after years come to perceive how much and how little of
guidance the partner of his life requires at his hands; and he may be
taught how that guidance should be given;--but in the learning of the
lesson there will be sorrow and gnashing of teeth. It was so now with
this man. He loved his wife. To a certain extent he still trusted
her. He did not believe that she would be faithless to him after the
fashion of women who are faithless altogether. But he was jealous of
authority, fearful of slights, self-conscious, afraid of the world,
and utterly ignorant of the nature of a woman's mind.
He carried the letter with him in his pocket throughout the next
morning, and in the course of the day he called upon Lady Milborough.
Though he was obstinately bent on acting in accordance with his own
views, yet he was morbidly desirous of discussing the grievousness of
his position with his friends. He went to Lady Milborough, asking for
her advice, but desirous simply of being encouraged by her to do that
which he was resolved to do on his own judgment.
"Down,--after her,--to Nuncombe Putney!" said Lady Milborough,
holding up both her hands.
"Yes; he has been there. And she has been weak enough to see him."
"My dear Louis, take her to Naples at once,--at once."
"It is too late for that now, Lady Milborough."
"Too late! Oh, no. She has been foolish, indiscreet,
disobedient,--what you will of that kind. But, Louis, don't send her
away; don't send your young wife away from you. Those whom God has
joined together, let no man put asunder."
"I cannot consent to live with a wife with whom neither my wishes
nor my word have the slightest effect. I may believe of her what I
please, but, think what the world will believe! I cannot disgrace
myself by living with a woman who persists in holding intercourse
with a man whom the world speaks of as her lover."
"Take her to Naples," said Lady Milborough, with all the energy of
which she was capable.
"I can take her nowhere, nor will I see her, till she has given proof
that her whole conduct towards me has been altered. I have written a
letter to her, and I have brought it. Will you excuse me if I ask you
to take the trouble to read it?"
Then he handed Lady Milborough the letter, which she read very
slowly, and with much care.
"I don't think I would--would--would--"
"Would what?" demanded Trevelyan.
"Don't you think that what you say is a little,--just a little prone
to make,--to make the breach perhaps wider?"
"No, Lady Milborough. In the first place, how can it be wider?"
"You might take her back, you know; and then if you could only get to
Naples!"
"How can I take her back while she is corresponding with this man?"
"She wouldn't correspond with him at Naples."
Trevelyan shook his head and became cross. His old friend would not
at all do as old friends are expected to do when called upon for
advice.
"I think," said he, "that what I have proposed is both just and
generous."
"But, Louis, why should there be any separation?"
"She has forced it upon me. She is headstrong, and will not be
ruled."
"But this about disgracing you. Do you think that you must say that?"
"I think I must, because it is true. If I do not tell her the truth,
who is there that will do so? It may be bitter now, but I think that
it is for her welfare."
"Dear, dear, dear!"
"I want nothing for myself, Lady Milborough."
"I am sure of that, Louis."
"My whole happiness was in my home. No man cared less for going out
than I did. My child and my wife were everything to me. I don't
suppose that I was ever seen at a club in the evening once throughout
a season. And she might have had anything that she liked,--anything!
It is hard, Lady Milborough; is it not?"
Lady Milborough, who had seen the angry brow, did not dare to suggest
Naples again. But yet, if any word might be spoken to prevent this
utter wreck of a home, how good a thing it would be! He had got up to
leave her, but she stopped him by holding his hand. "For better, for
worse, Louis; remember that."
"Why has she forgotten it?"
"She is flesh of your flesh, bone of your bone. And for the boy's
sake! Think of your boy, Louis. Do not send that letter. Sleep on it,
Louis, and think of it."
"I have slept on it."
"There is no promise in it of forgiveness after a while. It is
written as though you intended that she should never come back to
you."
"That shall be as she behaves herself."
"But tell her so. Let there be some one bright spot in what you say
to her, on which her mind may fix itself. If she be not altogether
hardened, that letter will drive her to despair."
But Trevelyan would not give up the letter, nor indicate by a word
that he would reconsider the question of its propriety. He escaped as
soon as he could from Lady Milborough's room, and almost declared as
he did so, that he would never enter her doors again. She had utterly
failed to see the matter in the proper light. When she talked of
Naples she must surely have been unable to comprehend the extent
of the ill-usage to which he, the husband, had been subjected. How
was it possible that he should live under the same roof with a wife
who claimed to herself the right of receiving visitors of whom he
disapproved,--a visitor,--a gentleman,--one whom the world called her
lover? He gnashed his teeth and clenched his fist as he thought of
his old friend's ignorance of the very first law in a married man's
code of laws.
But yet when he was out in the streets he did not post his letter at
once; but thought of it throughout the whole day, trying to prove
the weight of every phrase that he had used. Once or twice his heart
almost relented. Once he had the letter in his hand, that he might
tear it. But he did not tear it. He put it back into his pocket, and
thought again of his grievance. Surely it was his first duty in such
an emergency to be firm!
It was certainly a wretched life that he was leading. In the evening
he went all alone to an eating-house for his dinner, and then,
sitting with a miserable glass of sherry before him, he again read
and re-read the epistle which he had written. Every harsh word that
it contained was, in some sort, pleasant to his ear. She had hit
him hard, and should he not hit her again? And then, was it not his
bounden duty to let her know the truth? Yes; it was his duty to be
firm.
So he went out and posted the letter.
CHAPTER XXVIII.
GREAT TRIBULATION.
[Illustration]
Trevelyan's letter to his wife fell like a thunderbolt among them at
Nuncombe Putney. Mrs. Trevelyan was altogether unable to keep it to
herself;--indeed she made no attempt at doing so. Her husband had
told her that she was to be banished from the Clock House because her
present hostess was unable to endure her misconduct, and of course
she demanded the reasons of the charge that was thus brought against
her. When she first read the letter, which she did in the presence of
her sister, she towered in her passion.
"Disgraced him! I have never disgraced him. It is he that has
disgraced me. Correspondence! Yes;--he shall see it all. Unjust,
ignorant, foolish man! He does not remember that the last
instructions he really gave me, were to bid me see Colonel Osborne.
Take my boy away! Yes. Of course, I am a woman and must suffer. I
will write to Colonel Osborne, and will tell him the truth, and will
send my letter to Louis. He shall know how he has ill-treated me! I
will not take a penny of his money;--not a penny. Maintain you! I
believe he thinks that we are beggars. Leave this house because of my
conduct! What can Mrs. Stanbury have said? What can any of them have
said? I will demand to be told. Free himself from the connection!
Oh, Nora, Nora! that it should come to this!--that I should be thus
threatened, who have been as innocent as a baby! If it were not for
my child, I think that I should destroy myself!"
Nora said what she could to comfort her sister, insisting chiefly on
the promise that the child should not be taken away. There was no
doubt as to the husband's power in the mind of either of them; and
though, as regarded herself, Mrs. Trevelyan would have defied her
husband, let his power be what it might, yet she acknowledged to
herself that she was in some degree restrained by the fear that she
would find herself deprived of her only comfort.
"We must just go where he bids us,--till papa comes," said Nora.
"And when papa is here, what help will there be then? He will not let
me go back to the islands,--with my boy. For myself I might die, or
get out of his way anywhere. I can see that. Priscilla Stanbury is
right when she says that no woman should trust herself to any man.
Disgraced! That I should live to be told by my husband that I had
disgraced him,--by a lover!"
There was some sort of agreement made between the two sisters as to
the manner in which Priscilla should be interrogated respecting the
sentence of banishment which had been passed. They both agreed that
it would be useless to make inquiry of Mrs. Stanbury. If anything had
really been said to justify the statement made in Mr. Trevelyan's
letter, it must have come from Priscilla, and have reached Trevelyan
through Priscilla's brother. They, both of them, had sufficiently
learned the ways of the house to be sure that Mrs. Stanbury had not
been the person active in the matter. They went down, therefore,
together, and found Priscilla seated at her desk in the parlour.
Mrs. Stanbury was also in the room, and it had been presumed between
the sisters that the interrogations should be made in that lady's
absence; but Mrs. Trevelyan was too hot in the matter for restraint,
and she at once opened out her budget of grievance.
"I have a letter from my husband," she said,--and then paused. But
Priscilla, seeing from the fire in her eyes that she was much moved,
made no reply, but turned to listen to what might further be said. "I
do not know why I should trouble you with his suspicions," continued
Mrs. Trevelyan, "or read to you what he says about--Colonel Osborne."
As she spoke she was holding her husband's letter open in her
hands. "There is nothing in it that you do not know. He says
I have corresponded with him. So I have;--and he shall see the
correspondence. He says that Colonel Osborne visited me. He did come
to see me and Nora."
"As any other old man might have done," said Nora.
"It was not likely that I should openly confess myself to be afraid
to see my father's old friend. But the truth is, my husband does not
know what a woman is."
She had begun by declaring that she would not trouble her friend with
any statement of her husband's complaints against her; but now she
had made her way to the subject, and could hardly refrain herself.
Priscilla understood this, and thought that it would be wise to
interrupt her by a word that might bring her back to her original
purpose. "Is there anything," said she, "which we can do to help
you?"
"To help me? No;--God only can help me. But Louis informs me that I
am to be turned out of this house, because you demand that we should
go."
"Who says that?" exclaimed Mrs. Stanbury.
"My husband. Listen; this is what he says:--'I am greatly grieved to
hear from my friend Mr. Stanbury that your conduct in reference to
Colonel Osborne has been such as to make it necessary that you should
leave Mrs. Stanbury's house.' Is that true? Is that true?" In her
general mode of carrying herself, and of enduring the troubles of
her life, Mrs. Trevelyan was a strong woman; but now her grief was
too much for her, and she burst out into tears. "I am the most
unfortunate woman that ever was born!" she sobbed out through her
tears.
"I never said that you were to go," said Mrs. Stanbury.
"But your son has told Mr. Trevelyan that we must go," said Nora,
who felt that her sense of injury against Hugh Stanbury was greatly
increased by what had taken place. To her mind he was the person most
important in the matter. Why had he desired that they should be sent
away from the Clock House? She was very angry with him, and declared
to herself that she hated him with all her heart. For this man she
had sent away that other lover,--a lover who had really loved her!
And she had even confessed that it was so!
"There is a misunderstanding about this," said Priscilla.
"It must be with your brother, then," said Nora.
"I think not," said Priscilla. "I think that it has been with Mr.
Trevelyan." Then she went on to explain, with much difficulty,
but still with a slow distinctness that was peculiar to her, what
had really taken place. "We have endeavoured," she said, "to show
you,--my mother and I,--that we have not misjudged you; but it
is certainly true that I told my brother that I did not think
the arrangement a good one,--quite as a permanence." It was very
difficult, and her cheeks were red as she spoke, and her lips
faltered. It was an exquisite pain to her to have to give the pain
which her words would convey; but there was no help for it,--as she
said to herself more than once at the time,--there was nothing to be
done but to tell the truth.
"I never said so," blurted out Mrs. Stanbury, with her usual
weakness.
"No, mother. It was my saying. In discussing what was best for us
all, with Hugh, I told him,--what I have just now explained."
"Then of course we must go," said Mrs. Trevelyan, who had gulped down
her sobs and was resolved to be firm,--to give way to no more tears,
to bear all without sign of womanly weakness.
"You will stay with us till your father comes," said Priscilla.
"Of course you will," said Mrs. Stanbury,--"you and Nora. We have got
to be such friends, now."
"No," said Mrs. Trevelyan. "As to friendship for me, it is out of
the question. We must pack up, Nora, and go somewhere. Heaven knows
where!"
Nora was now sobbing. "Why your brother--should want to turn us
out,--after he has sent us here--!"
"My brother wants nothing of the kind," said Priscilla. "Your sister
has no better friend than my brother."
"It will be better, Nora, to discuss the matter no further," said
Mrs. Trevelyan. "We must go away,--somewhere; and the sooner the
better. To be an unwelcome guest is always bad; but to be unwelcome
for such a reason as this is terrible."
"There is no reason," said Mrs. Stanbury; "indeed there is none."
"Mrs. Trevelyan will understand us better when she is less excited,"
said Priscilla. "I am not surprised that she should be indignant now.
I can only say again that we hope you will stay with us till Sir
Marmaduke Rowley shall be in England."
"That is not what your brother means," said Nora.
"Nor is it what I mean," said Mrs. Trevelyan. "Nora, we had better
go to our own room. I suppose I must write to my husband; indeed,
of course I must, that I may send him--the correspondence. I fear
I cannot walk out into the street, Mrs. Stanbury, and make you quit
of me, till I hear from him. And if I were to go to an inn at once,
people would speak evil of me;--and I have no money."
"My dear, how can you think of such a thing!" said Mrs. Stanbury.
"But you may be quite sure that we shall be gone within three
days,--or four at the furthest. Indeed, I will pledge myself not to
remain longer than that,--even though I should have to go to the
poor-house. Neither I nor my sister will stay in any family,--to
contaminate it. Come, Nora." And so speaking she sailed out of the
room, and her sister followed her.
"Why did you say anything about it? Oh dear, oh dear! why did you
speak to Hugh? See what you have done!"
"I am sorry that I did speak," replied Priscilla slowly.
"Sorry! Of course you are sorry; but what good is that?"
"But, mother, I do not think that I was wrong. I feel sure that the
real fault in all this is with Mr. Trevelyan, as it has been all
through. He should not have written to her as he has done."
"I suppose Hugh did tell him."
"No doubt;--and I told Hugh; but not after the fashion in which he
has told her. I blame myself mostly for this,--that we ever consented
to come to this house. We had no business here. Who is to pay the
rent?"
"Hugh insisted upon taking it."
"Yes;--and he will pay the rent; and we shall be a drag upon him, as
though he had been fool enough to have a wife and a family of his
own. And what good have we done? We had not strength enough to say
that that wicked man should not see her when he came;--for he is a
wicked man."
"If we had done that she would have been as bad then as she is now."
"Mother, we had no business to meddle either with her badness or
her goodness. What had we to do with the wife of such a one as Mr.
Trevelyan, or with any woman who was separated from her husband?"
"It was Hugh who thought we should be of service to them."
"Yes;--and I do not blame him. He is in a position to be of service
to people. He can do work and earn money, and has a right to think
and to speak. We have a right to think only for ourselves, and we
should not have yielded to him. How are we to get back again out of
this house to our cottage?"
"They are pulling the cottage down, Priscilla."
"To some other cottage, mother. Do you not feel while we are living
here that we are pretending to be what we are not? After all, Aunt
Stanbury was right, though it was not her business to meddle with us.
We should never have come here. That poor woman now regards us as her
bitter enemies."
"I meant to do for the best," said Mrs. Stanbury.
"The fault was mine, mother."
"But you meant it for the best, my dear."
"Meaning for the best is trash. I don't know that I did mean it for
the best. While we were at the cottage we paid our way and were
honest. What is it people say of us now?"
"They can't say any harm."
"They say that we are paid by the husband to keep his wife, and paid
again by the lover to betray the husband."
"Priscilla!"
"Yes;--it is shocking enough. But that comes of people going out
of their proper course. We were too humble and low to have a right
to take any part in such a matter. How true it is that while one
crouches on the ground, one can never fall."
The matter was discussed in the Clock House all day, between Mrs.
Stanbury and Priscilla, and between Mrs. Trevelyan and Nora, in their
rooms and in the garden; but nothing could come of such discussions.
No change could be made till further instructions should have been
received from the angry husband; nor could any kind of argument be
even invented by Priscilla which might be efficacious in inducing the
two ladies to remain at the Clock House, even should Mr. Trevelyan
allow them to do so. They all felt the intolerable injustice, as
it appeared to them,--of their subjection to the caprice of an
unreasonable and ill-conditioned man; but to all of them it seemed
plain enough that in this matter the husband must exercise his own
will,--at any rate till Sir Marmaduke should be in England. There
were many difficulties throughout the day. Mrs. Trevelyan would not
go down to dinner, sending word that she was ill, and that she would,
if she were allowed, have some tea in her own room. And Nora said
that she would remain with her sister. Priscilla went to them more
than once; and late in the evening they all met in the parlour. But
any conversation seemed to be impossible; and Mrs. Trevelyan, as she
went up to her room at night, again declared that she would rid the
house of her presence as soon as possible.
One thing, however, was done on that melancholy day. Mrs. Trevelyan
wrote to her husband, and enclosed Colonel Osborne's letter to
herself, and a copy of her reply. The reader will hardly require to
be told that no such further letter had been written by her as that
of which Bozzle had given information to her husband. Men whose
business it is to detect hidden and secret things, are very apt to
detect things which have never been done. What excuse can a detective
make even to himself for his own existence if he can detect nothing?
Mr. Bozzle was an active-minded man, who gloried in detecting, and
who, in the special spirit of his trade, had taught himself to
believe that all around him were things secret and hidden, which
would be within his power of unravelling if only the slightest clue
were put in his hand. He lived by the crookednesses of people, and
therefore was convinced that straight doings in the world were quite
exceptional. Things dark and dishonest, fights fought and races run
that they might be lost, plants and crosses, women false to their
husbands, sons false to their fathers, daughters to their mothers,
servants to their masters, affairs always secret, dark, foul, and
fraudulent, were to him the normal condition of life. It was to be
presumed that Mrs. Trevelyan should continue to correspond with her
lover,--that old Mrs. Stanbury should betray her trust by conniving
at the lover's visit,--that everybody concerned should be steeped to
the hips in lies and iniquity. When, therefore, he found at Colonel
Osborne's rooms that the Colonel had received a letter with the
Lessboro' post-mark, addressed in the handwriting of a woman, he
did not scruple to declare that Colonel Osborne had received, on
that morning, a letter from Mr. Trevelyan's "lady." But in sending
to her husband what she called with so much bitterness, "the
correspondence," Mrs. Trevelyan had to enclose simply the copy of one
sheet note from herself.
But she now wrote again to Colonel Osborne, and enclosed to her
husband, not a copy of what she had written, but the note itself. It
was as follows:--
Nuncombe Putney, Wednesday, August 10.
MY DEAR COLONEL OSBORNE,
My husband has desired me not to see you, or to write to
you, or to hear from you again. I must therefore beg you
to enable me to obey him,--at any rate till papa comes to
England.
Yours truly,
EMILY TREVELYAN.
And then she wrote to her husband, and in the writing of this letter
there was much doubt, much labour, and many changes. We will give it
as it was written when completed:--
I have received your letter, and will obey your commands
to the best of my power. In order that you may not be
displeased by any further unavoidable correspondence
between me and Colonel Osborne, I have written to him a
note, which I now send to you. I send it that you may
forward it. If you do not choose to do so, I cannot be
answerable either for his seeing me, or for his writing to
me again.
I send also copies of all the correspondence I have had
with Colonel Osborne since you turned me out of your
house. When he came to call on me, Nora remained with me
while he was here. I blush while I write this;--not for
myself, but that I should be so suspected as to make such
a statement necessary.
You say that I have disgraced you and myself. I have
done neither. I am disgraced;--but it is you that have
disgraced me. I have never spoken a word or done a thing,
as regards you, of which I have cause to be ashamed.
I have told Mrs. Stanbury that I and Nora will leave her
house as soon as we can be made to know where we are to
go. I beg that this may be decided instantly, as else we
must walk out into the street without a shelter. After
what has been said, I cannot remain here.
My sister bids me say that she will relieve you of all
burden respecting herself as soon as possible. She will
probably be able to find a home with my aunt, Mrs.
Outhouse, till papa comes to England. As for myself, I can
only say that till he comes, I shall do exactly what you
order.
EMILY TREVELYAN.
Nuncombe Putney, August 10.
CHAPTER XXIX.
MR. AND MRS. OUTHOUSE.
Both Mr. Outhouse and his wife were especially timid in taking upon
themselves the cares of other people. Not on that account is it to be
supposed that they were bad or selfish. They were both given much to
charity, and bestowed both in time and money more than is ordinarily
considered necessary, even from persons in their position. But what
they gave, they gave away from their own quiet hearth. Had money
been wanting to the daughters of his wife's brother, Mr. Outhouse
would have opened such small coffer as he had with a free hand. But
he would have much preferred that his benevolence should be used
in a way that would bring upon him no further responsibility and
no questionings from people whom he did not know and could not
understand.
The Rev. Oliphant Outhouse had been Rector of St.
Diddulph's-in-the-East for the last fifteen years, having married
the sister of Sir Marmaduke Rowley,--then simply Mr. Rowley, with a
colonial appointment in Jamaica of £120 per annum,--twelve years
before his promotion, while he was a curate in one of the populous
borough parishes. He had thus been a London clergyman all his life;
but he knew almost as little of London society as though he had held
a cure in a Westmoreland valley. He had worked hard, but his work had
been altogether among the poor. He had no gift of preaching, and had
acquired neither reputation nor popularity. But he could work;--and
having been transferred because of that capability to the temporary
curacy of St. Diddulph's,--out of one diocese into another,--he had
received the living from the bishop's hands when it became vacant.
A dreary place was the parsonage of St. Diddulph's-in-the-East for
the abode of a gentleman. Mr. Outhouse had not, in his whole parish,
a parishioner with whom he could consort. The greatest men around
him were the publicans, and the most numerous were men employed in
and around the docks. Dredgers of mud, navvies employed on suburban
canals, excavators, loaders and unloaders of cargo, cattle drivers,
whose driving, however, was done mostly on board ship,--such and
such like were the men who were the fathers of the families of St.
Diddulph's-in-the-East. And there was there, not far removed from the
muddy estuary of a little stream that makes its black way from the
Essex marshes among the houses of the poorest of the poor into the
Thames, a large commercial establishment for turning the carcasses of
horses into manure. Messrs. Flowsem and Blurt were in truth the great
people of St. Diddulph's-in-the-East; but the closeness of their
establishment was not an additional attraction to the parsonage.
They were liberal, however, with their money, and Mr. Outhouse was
disposed to think,--custom perhaps having made the establishment
less objectionable to him than it was at first,--that St.
Diddulph's-in-the-East would be more of a Pandemonium than it now
was, if by any sanitary law Messrs. Flowsem and Blurt were compelled
to close their doors. "Non olet," he would say with a grim smile when
the charitable cheque of the firm would come punctually to hand on
the first Saturday after Christmas.
But such a house as his would be, as he knew, but a poor residence
for his wife's nieces. Indeed, without positively saying that he
was unwilling to receive them, he had, when he first heard of the
breaking up of the house in Curzon Street, shewn that he would rather
not take upon his shoulders so great a responsibility. He and his
wife had discussed the matter between them, and had come to the
conclusion that they did not know what kind of things might have been
done in Curzon Street. They would think no evil, they said; but the
very idea of a married woman with a lover was dreadful to them. It
might be that their niece was free from blame. They hoped so. And
even though her sin had been of ever so deep a dye, they would take
her in,--if it were indeed necessary. But they hoped that such help
from them might not be needed. They both knew how to give counsel to
a poor woman, how to rebuke a poor man,--how to comfort, encourage,
or to upbraid the poor. Practice had told them how far they might go
with some hope of doing good;--and at what stage of demoralisation
no good from their hands was any longer within the scope of fair
expectation. But all this was among the poor. With what words to
encourage such a one as their niece Mrs. Trevelyan,--to encourage her
or to rebuke her, as her conduct might seem to make necessary,--they
both felt that they were altogether ignorant. To them Mrs. Trevelyan
was a fine lady. To Mr. Outhouse, Sir Marmaduke had ever been a fine
gentleman, given much to worldly things, who cared more for whist and
a glass of wine than for anything else, and who thought that he had
a good excuse for never going to church in England because he was
called upon, as he said, to show himself in the governor's pew always
once on Sundays, and frequently twice, when he was at the seat of his
government. Sir Marmaduke manifestly looked upon church as a thing
in itself notoriously disagreeable. To Mr. Outhouse it afforded the
great events of the week. And Mrs. Outhouse would declare that to
hear her husband preach was the greatest joy of her life. It may
be understood therefore that though the family connection between
the Rowleys and the Outhouses had been kept up with a semblance of
affection, it had never blossomed forth into cordial friendship.
When therefore the clergyman of St. Diddulph's received a letter from
his niece, Nora, begging him to take her into his parsonage till Sir
Marmaduke should arrive in the course of the spring, and hinting
also a wish that her uncle Oliphant should see Mr. Trevelyan and
if possible arrange that his other niece should also come to the
parsonage, he was very much perturbed in spirit. There was a long
consultation between him and his wife before anything could be
settled, and it may be doubted whether anything would have been
settled, had not Mr. Trevelyan himself made his way to the parsonage,
on the second day of the family conference. Mr. and Mrs. Outhouse had
both seen the necessity of sleeping upon the matter. They had slept
upon it, and the discourse between them on the second day was so
doubtful in its tone that more sleeping would probably have been
necessary had not Mr. Trevelyan appeared and compelled them to a
decision.
"You must remember that I make no charge against her," said
Trevelyan, after the matter had been discussed for about an hour.
"Then why should she not come back to you?" said Mr. Outhouse,
timidly.
"Some day she may,--if she will be obedient. But it cannot be now.
She has set me at defiance; and even yet it is too clear from the
tone of her letter to me that she thinks that she has been right to
do so. How could we live together in amity when she addresses me as a
cruel tyrant?"
"Why did she go away at first?" asked Mrs. Outhouse.
"Because she would compromise my name by an intimacy which I did not
approve. But I do not come here to defend myself, Mrs. Outhouse. You
probably think that I have been wrong. You are her friend; and to
you, I will not even say that I have been right. What I want you to
understand is this. She cannot come back to me now. It would not be
for my honour that she should do so."
"But, sir,--would it not be for your welfare, as a Christian?" asked
Mr. Outhouse.
"You must not be angry with me, if I say that I will not discuss that
just now. I did not come here to discuss it."
"It is very sad for our poor niece," said Mrs. Outhouse.
"It is very sad for me," said Trevelyan, gloomily;--"very sad,
indeed. My home is destroyed; my life is made solitary; I do not even
see my own child. She has her boy with her, and her sister. I have
nobody."
"I can't understand, for the life of me, why you should not live
together just like any other people," said Mrs. Outhouse, whose
woman's spirit was arising in her bosom. "When people are married,
they must put up with something;--at least, most always." This she
added, lest it might be for a moment imagined that she had had any
cause for complaint with her Mr. Outhouse.
"Pray excuse me, Mrs. Outhouse; but I cannot discuss that. The
question between us is this,--can you consent to receive your two
nieces till their father's return;--and if so, in what way shall I
defray the expense of their living? You will of course understand
that I willingly undertake the expense not only of my wife's
maintenance and of her sister's also, but that I will cheerfully
allow anything that may be required either for their comfort or
recreation."
"I cannot take my nieces into my house as lodgers," said Mr.
Outhouse.
"No, not as lodgers; but of course you can understand that it is for
me to pay for my own wife. I know I owe you an apology for mentioning
it;--but how else could I make my request to you?"
"If Emily and Nora come here they must come as our guests," said Mrs.
Outhouse.
"Certainly," said the clergyman. "And if I am told they are in want
of a home they shall find one here till their father comes. But I am
bound to say that as regards the elder I think her home should be
elsewhere."
"Of course it should," said Mrs. Outhouse. "I don't know anything
about the law, but it seems to me very odd that a young woman should
be turned out in this way. You say she has done nothing?"
"I will not argue the matter," said Trevelyan.
"That's all very well, Mr. Trevelyan," said the lady, "but she's my
own niece, and if I don't stand up for her I don't know who will. I
never heard such a thing in my life as a wife being sent away after
such a fashion as that. We wouldn't treat a cookmaid so; that we
wouldn't. As for coming here, she shall come if she pleases, but I
shall always say that it's the greatest shame I ever heard of."
Nothing came of this visit at last. The lady grew in her anger; and
Mr. Trevelyan, in his own defence, was driven to declare that his
wife's obstinate intimacy with Colonel Osborne had almost driven
him out of his senses. Before he left the parsonage he was brought
even to tears by his own narration of his own misery;--whereby Mr.
Outhouse was considerably softened, although Mrs. Outhouse became
more and more stout in the defence of her own sex. But nothing at
last came of it. Trevelyan insisted on paying for his wife, wherever
she might be placed; and when he found that this would not be
permitted to him at the parsonage, he was very anxious to take some
small furnished house in the neighbourhood, in which the two sisters
might live for the next six months under the wings of their uncle
and aunt. But even Mr. Outhouse was moved to pleasantry by this
suggestion, as he explained the nature of the tenements which were
common at St. Diddulph's. Two rooms, front and back, they might
have for about five-and-sixpence a week in a house with three other
families. "But perhaps that is not exactly what you'd like," said Mr.
Outhouse. The interview ended with no result, and Mr. Trevelyan took
his leave, declaring to himself that he was worse off than the foxes,
who have holes in which to lay their heads;--but it must be presumed
that his sufferings in this respect were to be by attorney; as it was
for his wife, and not for himself, that the necessary hole was now
required.
As soon as he was gone Mrs. Outhouse answered Nora's letter, and
without meaning to be explicit, explained pretty closely what had
taken place. The spare bedroom at the parsonage was ready to receive
either one or both of the sisters till Sir Marmaduke should be in
London, if one or both of them should choose to come. And though
there was no nursery at the parsonage,--for Mr. and Mrs. Outhouse had
been blessed with no children,--still room should be made for the
little boy. But they must come as visitors,--"as our own nieces,"
said Mrs. Outhouse. And she went on to say that she would have
nothing to do with the quarrel between Mr. Trevelyan and his wife.
All such quarrels were very bad,--but as to this quarrel she could
take no part either one side or the other. Then she stated that Mr.
Trevelyan had been at the parsonage, but that no arrangement had been
made, because Mr. Trevelyan had insisted on paying for their board
and lodging.
This letter reached Nuncombe Putney before any reply was received by
Mrs. Trevelyan from her husband. This was on the Saturday morning,
and Mrs. Trevelyan had pledged herself to Mrs. Stanbury that she
would leave the Clock House on the Monday. Of course, there was no
need that she should do so. Both Mrs. Stanbury and Priscilla would
now have willingly consented to their remaining till Sir Marmaduke
should be in England. But Mrs. Trevelyan's high spirit revolted
against this after all that had been said. She thought that she
should hear from her husband on the morrow, but the post on Sunday
brought no letter from Trevelyan. On the Saturday they had finished
packing up,--so certain was Mrs. Trevelyan that some instructions as
to her future destiny would be sent to her by her lord.
At last they decided on the Sunday that they would both go at once
to St. Diddulph's; or perhaps it would be more correct to say that
this was the decision of the elder sister. Nora would willingly have
yielded to Priscilla's entreaties, and have remained. But Emily
declared that she could not, and would not, stay in the house. She
had a few pounds,--what would suffice for her journey; and as Mr.
Trevelyan had not thought proper to send his orders to her, she would
go without them. Mrs. Outhouse was her aunt, and her nearest relative
in England. Upon whom else could she lean in this time of her great
affliction? A letter, therefore, was written to Mrs. Outhouse, saying
that the whole party, including the boy and nurse, would be at St.
Diddulph's on the Monday evening, and the last cord was put to the
boxes.
"I suppose that he is very angry," Mrs. Trevelyan said to her sister,
"but I do not feel that I care about that now. He shall have nothing
to complain of in reference to any gaiety on my part. I will see no
one. I will have no--correspondence. But I will not remain here after
what he has said to me, let him be ever so angry. I declare, as I
think of it, it seems to me that no woman was ever so cruelly treated
as I have been." Then she wrote one further line to her husband.
Not having received any orders from you, and having
promised Mrs. Stanbury that I would leave this house
on Monday, I go with Nora to my aunt, Mrs. Outhouse,
to-morrow.
E. T.
On the Sunday evening the four ladies drank tea together, and they
all made an effort to be civil, and even affectionate, to each other.
Mrs. Trevelyan had at last allowed Priscilla to explain how it had
come to pass that she had told her brother that it would be better
both for her mother and for herself that the existing arrangements
should be brought to an end, and there had come to be an agreement
between them that they should all part in amity. But the conversation
on the Sunday evening was very difficult.
"I am sure we shall always think of you both with the greatest
kindness," said Mrs. Stanbury.
"As for me," said Priscilla, "your being with us has been a delight
that I cannot describe;--only it has been wrong."
"I know too well," said Mrs. Trevelyan, "that in our present
circumstances we are unable to carry delight with us anywhere."
"You hardly understand what our life has been," said Priscilla; "but
the truth is that we had no right to receive you in such a house as
this. It has not been our way of living, and it cannot continue to be
so. It is not wonderful that people should talk of us. Had it been
called your house, it might have been better."
"And what will you do now?" asked Nora.
"Get out of this place as soon as we can. It is often hard to go
back to the right path; but it may always be done,--or at least
attempted."
"It seems to me that I take misery with me wherever I go," said Mrs.
Trevelyan.
"My dear, it has not been your fault," said Mrs. Stanbury.
"I do not like to blame my brother," said Priscilla, "because he has
done his best to be good to us all;--and the punishment will fall
heaviest upon him, because he must pay for it."
"He should not be allowed to pay a shilling," said Mrs. Trevelyan.
Then the morning came, and at seven o'clock the two sisters, with the
nurse and child, started for Lessboro' Station in Mrs. Crocket's open
carriage, the luggage having been sent on in a cart. There were many
tears shed, and any one looking at the party would have thought that
very dear friends were being torn asunder.
"Mother," said Priscilla, as soon as the parlour door was shut, and
the two were alone together, "we must take care that we never are
brought again into such a mistake as that. They who protect the
injured should be strong themselves."
CHAPTER XXX.
DOROTHY MAKES UP HER MIND.
It was true that most ill-natured things had been said at Lessboro'
and at Nuncombe Putney about Mrs. Stanbury and the visitors at the
Clock House, and that these ill-natured things had spread themselves
to Exeter. Mrs. Ellison of Lessboro', who was not the most
good-natured woman in the world, had told Mrs. Merton of Nuncombe
that she had been told that the Colonel's visit to the lady had been
made by express arrangement between the Colonel and Mrs. Stanbury.
Mrs. Merton, who was very good-natured, but not the wisest woman
in the world, had declared that any such conduct on the part of
Mrs. Stanbury was quite impossible. "What does it matter which it
is,--Priscilla or her mother?" Mrs. Ellison had said. "These are the
facts. Mrs. Trevelyan has been sent there to be out of the way of
this Colonel; and the Colonel immediately comes down and sees her at
the Clock House. But when people are very poor they do get driven to
do almost anything."
Mrs. Merton, not being very wise, had conceived it to be her duty
to repeat this to Priscilla; and Mrs. Ellison, not being very
good-natured, had conceived it to be hers to repeat it to Mrs.
MacHugh at Exeter. And then Bozzle's coming had become known.
"Yes, Mrs. MacHugh, a policeman in mufti down at Nuncombe! I wonder
what our friend in the Close here will think about it! I have always
said, you know, that if she wanted to keep things straight at
Nuncombe, she should have opened her purse-strings."
From all which it may be understood, that Priscilla Stanbury's desire
to go back to their old way of living had not been without reason.
It may be imagined that Miss Stanbury of the Close did not receive
with equanimity the reports which reached her. And, of course, when
she discussed the matter either with Martha or with Dorothy, she fell
back upon her own early appreciation of the folly of the Clock House
arrangement. Nevertheless, she had called Mrs. Ellison very bad
names, when she learned from her friend Mrs. MacHugh what reports
were being spread by the lady from Lessboro'.
"Mrs. Ellison! Yes; we all know Mrs. Ellison. The bitterest tongue in
Devonshire, and the falsest! There are some people at Lessboro' who
would be well pleased if she paid her way there as well as those poor
women do at Nuncombe. I don't think much of what Mrs. Ellison says."
"But it is bad about the policeman," said Mrs. MacHugh.
"Of course it's bad. It's all bad. I'm not saying that it's not bad.
I'm glad I've got this other young woman out of it. It's all that
young man's doing. If I had a son of my own, I'd sooner follow him to
the grave than hear him call himself a Radical."
Then, on a sudden, there came to the Close news that Mrs. Trevelyan
and her sister were gone. On the very Monday on which they went,
Priscilla sent a note on to her sister, in which no special allusion
was made to Aunt Stanbury, but which was no doubt written with the
intention that the news should be communicated.
"Gone; are they? As it is past wishing that they hadn't come, it's
the best thing they could do now. And who is to pay the rent of the
house, now they have gone?" As this was a point on which Dorothy was
not prepared to trouble herself at present, she made no answer to the
question.
Dorothy at this time was in a state of very great perturbation on her
own account. The reader may perhaps remember that she had been much
startled by a proposition that had been made to her in reference
to her future life. Her aunt had suggested to her that she should
become--Mrs. Gibson. She had not as yet given any answer to that
proposition, and had indeed found it to be quite impossible to speak
about it at all. But there can be no doubt that the suggestion had
opened out to her altogether new views of life. Up to the moment
of her aunt's speech to her, the idea of her becoming a married
woman had never presented itself to her. In her humility it had
not occurred to her that she should be counted as one among the
candidates for matrimony. Priscilla had taught her to regard
herself,--indeed, they had both so regarded themselves,--as born to
eat and drink, as little as might be, and then to die. Now, when she
was told that she could, if she pleased, become Mrs. Gibson, she was
almost lost in a whirl of new and confused ideas. Since her aunt had
spoken, Mr. Gibson himself had dropped a hint or two which seemed to
her to indicate that he also must be in the secret. There had been
a party, with a supper, at Mrs. Crumbie's, at which both the Miss
Frenches had been present. But Mr. Gibson had taken her, Dorothy
Stanbury, out to supper, leaving both Camilla and Arabella behind
him in the drawing-room! During the quarter of an hour afterwards
in which the ladies were alone while the gentlemen were eating
and drinking, both Camilla and Arabella continued to wreak their
vengeance. They asked questions about Mrs. Trevelyan, and suggested
that Mr. Gibson might be sent over to put things right. But Miss
Stanbury had heard them, and had fallen upon them with a heavy hand.
"There's a good deal expected of Mr. Gibson, my dears," she said,
"which it seems to me Mr. Gibson is not inclined to perform."
"It is quite indifferent to us what Mr. Gibson may be inclined to
perform," said Arabella. "I'm sure we shan't interfere with Miss
Dorothy."
As this was said quite out loud before all the other ladies, Dorothy
was overcome with shame. But her aunt comforted her when they were
again at home.
"Laws, my dear; what does it matter? When you're Mrs. Gibson, you'll
be proud of it all."
Was it then really written in the book of the Fates that she, Dorothy
Stanbury, was to become Mrs. Gibson? Poor Dorothy began to feel
that she was called upon to exercise an amount of thought and
personal decision to which she had not been accustomed. Hitherto,
in the things which she had done, or left undone, she had received
instructions which she could obey. Had her mother and Priscilla
told her positively not to go to her aunt's house, she would have
remained at Nuncombe without complaint. Had her aunt since her coming
given her orders as to her mode of life,--enjoined, for instance,
additional church attendances, or desired her to perform menial
services in the house,--she would have obeyed, from custom, without a
word. But when she was told that she was to marry Mr. Gibson, it did
seem to her to be necessary to do something more than obey. Did she
love Mr. Gibson? She tried hard to teach herself to think that she
might learn to love him. He was a nice-looking man enough, with sandy
hair, and a head rather bald, with thin lips, and a narrow nose, who
certainly did preach drawling sermons; but of whom everybody said
that he was a very excellent clergyman. He had a house and an income,
and all Exeter had long since decided that he was a man who would
certainly marry. He was one of those men of whom it may be said that
they have no possible claim to remain unmarried. He was fair game,
and unless he surrendered himself to be bagged before long, would
subject himself to just and loud complaint. The Miss Frenches had
been aware of this, and had thought to make sure of him among them.
It was a little hard upon them that the old maid of the Close, as
they always called Miss Stanbury, should interfere with them when
their booty was almost won. And they felt it to be the harder because
Dorothy Stanbury was, as they thought, so poor a creature. That
Dorothy herself should have any doubt as to accepting Mr. Gibson, was
an idea that never occurred to them. But Dorothy had her doubts. When
she came to think of it, she remembered that she had never as yet
spoken a word to Mr. Gibson, beyond such little trifling remarks as
are made over a tea-table. She might learn to love him, but she did
not think that she loved him as yet.
"I don't suppose all this will make any difference to Mr. Gibson,"
said Miss Stanbury to her niece, on the morning after the receipt of
Priscilla's note stating that the Trevelyans had left Nuncombe.
Dorothy always blushed when Mr. Gibson's name was mentioned, and she
blushed now. But she did not at all understand her aunt's allusion.
"I don't know what you mean, aunt," she said.
"Well, you know, my dear, what they say about Mrs. Trevelyan and the
Clock House is not very nice. If Mr. Gibson were to turn round and
say that the connection wasn't pleasant, no one would have a right to
complain."
The faint customary blush on Dorothy's cheeks which Mr. Gibson's name
had produced now covered her whole face even up to the roots of her
hair. "If he believes bad of mamma, I'm sure, Aunt Stanbury, I don't
want to see him again."
"That's all very fine, my dear, but a man has to think of himself,
you know."
"Of course he thinks of himself. Why shouldn't he? I dare say he
thinks of himself more than I do."
"Dorothy, don't be a fool. A good husband isn't to be caught every
day."
"Aunt Stanbury, I don't want to catch any man."
"Dorothy, don't be a fool."
"I must say it. I don't suppose Mr. Gibson thinks of me the least in
the world."
"Psha! I tell you he does."
"But as for mamma and Priscilla, I never could like anybody for a
moment who would be ashamed of them."
She was most anxious to declare that, as far as she knew herself
and her own wishes at present, she entertained no partiality for Mr.
Gibson,--no feeling which could become partiality even if Mr. Gibson
was to declare himself willing to accept her mother and her sister
with herself. But she did not dare to say so. There was an instinct
within her which made it almost impossible to her to express an
objection to a suitor before the suitor had declared himself to be
one. She could speak out as touching her mother and her sister,--but
as to her own feelings she could express neither assent nor dissent.
"I should like to have it settled soon," said Miss Stanbury, in a
melancholy voice. Even to this Dorothy could make no reply. What did
soon mean? Perhaps in the course of a year or two. "If it could be
arranged by the end of this week, it would be a great comfort to me."
Dorothy almost fell off her chair, and was stricken altogether dumb.
"I told you, I think, that Brooke Burgess is coming here?"
"You said he was to come some day."
"He is to be here on Monday. I haven't seen him for more than twelve
years; and now he's to be here next week? Dear, dear! When I think
sometimes of all the hard words that have been spoken, and the harder
thoughts that have been in people's minds, I often regret that the
money ever came to me at all. I could have done without it, very
well,--very well."
"But all the unpleasantness is over now, aunt."
"I don't know about that. Unpleasantness of that kind is apt to
rankle long. But I wasn't going to give up my rights. Nobody but a
coward does that. They talked of going to law and trying the will,
but they wouldn't have got much by that. And then they abused me for
two years. When they had done and got sick of it, I told them they
should have it all back again as soon as I am dead. It won't be long
now. This Burgess is the elder nephew, and he shall have it all."
"Is not he grateful?"
"No. Why should he be grateful? I don't do it for special love of
him. I don't want his gratitude; nor anybody's gratitude. Look at
Hugh. I did love him."
"I am grateful, Aunt Stanbury."
"Are you, my dear? Then show it by being a good wife to Mr. Gibson,
and a happy wife. I want to get everything settled while Burgess is
here. If he is to have it, why should I keep him out of it whilst I
live? I wonder whether Mr. Gibson would mind coming and living here,
Dolly?"
The thing was coming so near to her that Dorothy began to feel that
she must, in truth, make up her mind, and let her aunt know also how
it had been made up. She was sensible enough to perceive that if
she did not prepare herself for the occasion she would find herself
hampered by an engagement simply because her aunt had presumed that
it was out of the question that she should not acquiesce. She would
drift into marriage with Mr. Gibson against her will. Her greatest
difficulty was the fact that her aunt clearly had no doubt on the
subject. And as for herself, hitherto her feelings did not, on either
side, go beyond doubts. Assuredly it would be a very good thing for
her to become Mrs. Gibson, if only she could create for herself some
attachment for the man. At the present moment her aunt said nothing
more about Mr. Gibson, having her mind much occupied with the coming
of Mr. Brooke Burgess.
"I remember him twenty years ago and more; as nice a boy as you would
wish to see. His father was the fourth of the brothers. Dear, dear!
Three of them are gone; and the only one remaining is old Barty, whom
no one ever loved."
The Burgesses had been great people in Exeter, having been both
bankers and brewers there, but the light of the family had paled;
and though Bartholomew Burgess, of whom Miss Stanbury declared that
no one had ever loved him, still had a share in the bank, it was
well understood in the city that the real wealth in the firm of
Cropper and Burgess belonged to the Cropper family. Indeed the most
considerable portion of the fortune that had been realised by old
Mr. Burgess had come into the possession of Miss Stanbury herself.
Bartholomew Burgess had never forgiven his brother's will, and
between him and Jemima Stanbury the feud was irreconcileable. The
next brother, Tom Burgess, had been a solicitor at Liverpool, and had
done well there. But Miss Stanbury knew nothing of the Tom Burgesses
as she called them. The fourth brother, Harry Burgess, had been a
clergyman, and this Brooke Burgess, Junior, who was now coming to
the Close, had been left with a widowed mother, the eldest of a
large family. It need not now be told at length how there had been
ill-blood also between this clergyman and the heiress. There had been
attempts at friendship, and at one time Miss Stanbury had received
the Rev. Harry Burgess and all his family at the Close;--but the
attempts had not been successful; and though our old friend had never
wavered in her determination to leave the money all back to some one
of the Burgess family, and with this view had made a pilgrimage to
London some twelve years since, and had renewed her acquaintance
with the widow and the children, still there had been no comfortable
relations between her and any of the Burgess family. Old Barty
Burgess, whom she met in the Close, or saw in the High Street every
day of her life, was her great enemy. He had tried his best,--so at
least she was convinced,--to drive her out of the pale of society,
years upon years ago, by saying evil things of her. She had conquered
in that combat. Her victory had been complete, and she had triumphed
after a most signal fashion. But this triumph did not silence Barty's
tongue, nor soften his heart. When she prayed to be forgiven, as she
herself forgave others, she always exempted Barty Burgess from her
prayers. There are things which flesh and blood cannot do. She had
not liked Harry Burgess' widow, nor for the matter of that, Harry
Burgess himself. When she had last seen the children she had not
liked any of them much, and had had her doubts even as to Brooke. But
with that branch of the family she was willing to try again. Brooke
was now coming to the Close, having received, however, an intimation,
that if, during his visit to Exeter, he chose to see his Uncle Barty,
any such intercourse must be kept quite in the background. While he
remained in Miss Stanbury's house he was to remain there as though
there were no such person as Mr. Bartholomew Burgess in Exeter.
At this time Brooke Burgess was a man just turned thirty, and was
a clerk in the Ecclesiastical Record Office, in Somerset House. No
doubt the peculiar nature and name of the public department to which
he was attached had done something to recommend him to Miss Stanbury.
Ecclesiastical records were things greatly to be reverenced in her
eyes, and she felt that a gentleman who handled them and dealt with
them would probably be sedate, gentlemanlike, and conservative.
Brooke Burgess, when she had last seen him, was just about to enter
upon the duties of the office. Then there had come offence, and she
had in truth known nothing of him from that day to this. The visitor
was to be at Exeter on the following Monday, and very much was done
in preparation of his coming. There was to be a dinner party on that
very day, and dinner parties were not common with Miss Stanbury. She
had, however, explained to Martha that she intended to put her best
foot forward. Martha understood perfectly that Mr. Brooke Burgess
was to be received as the heir of property. Sir Peter Mancrudy, the
great Devonshire chemist, was coming to dinner, and Mr. and Mrs.
Powel from Haldon,--people of great distinction in that part of the
county,--Mrs. MacHugh of course; and, equally of course, Mr. Gibson.
There was a deep discussion between Miss Stanbury and Martha
as to asking two of the Cliffords, and Mr. and Mrs. Noel from
Doddiscombeleigh. Martha had been very much in favour of having
twelve. Miss Stanbury had declared that with twelve she must have two
waiters from the greengrocer's, and that two waiters would overpower
her own domesticities below stairs. Martha had declared that she
didn't care about them any more than if they were puppy dogs. But
Miss Stanbury had been quite firm against twelve. She had consented
to have ten,--for the sake of artistic arrangement at the table;
"They should be pantaloons and petticoats alternate, you know," she
had said to Martha,--and had therefore asked the Cliffords. But the
Cliffords could not come, and then she had declined to make any
further attempt. Indeed, a new idea had struck her. Brooke Burgess,
her guest, should sit at one end of the table, and Mr. Gibson, the
clergyman, at the other. In this way the proper alternation would be
effected. When Martha heard this, Martha quite understood the extent
of the good fortune that was in store for Dorothy. If Mr. Gibson was
to be welcomed in that way, it could only be in preparation of his
becoming one of the family.
And Dorothy herself became aware that she must make up her mind. It
was not so declared to her, but she came to understand that it was
very probable that something would occur on the coming Monday which
would require her to be ready with her answer on that day. And she
was greatly tormented by feeling that if she could not bring herself
to accept Mr. Gibson,--should Mr. Gibson propose to her, as to which
she continued to tell herself that the chance of such a thing must
be very remote indeed,--but that if he should propose to her, and if
she could not accept him, her aunt ought to know that it would be so
before the moment came. But yet she could not bring herself to speak
to her aunt as though any such proposition were possible.
It happened that during the week, on the Saturday, Priscilla came
into Exeter. Dorothy met her sister at the railway station, and then
the two walked together two miles and back along the Crediton Road.
Aunt Stanbury had consented to Priscilla coming to the Close, even
though it was not the day appointed for such visits; but the walk
had been preferred, and Dorothy felt that she would be able to ask
for counsel from the only human being to whom she could have brought
herself to confide the fact that a gentleman was expected to ask her
to marry him. But it was not till they had turned upon their walk,
that she was able to open her mouth on the subject even to her
sister. Priscilla had been very full of their own cares at Nuncombe,
and had said much of her determination to leave the Clock House and
to return to the retirement of some small cottage. She had already
written to Hugh to this effect, and during their walk had said much
of her own folly in having consented to so great a change in their
mode of life. At last Dorothy struck in with her story.
"Aunt Stanbury wants me to make a change too."
"What change?" asked Priscilla anxiously.
"It is not my idea, Priscilla, and I don't think that there can be
anything in it. Indeed, I'm sure there isn't. I don't see how it's
possible that there should be."
"But what is it, Dolly?"
"I suppose there can't be any harm in my telling you."
"If it's anything concerning yourself, I should say not. If it
concerns Aunt Stanbury, I dare say she'd rather you held your
tongue."
"It concerns me most," said Dorothy.
"She doesn't want you to leave her, does she?"
"Well; yes; no. By what she said last,--I shouldn't leave her at all
in that way. Only I'm sure it's not possible."
"I am the worst hand in the world, Dolly, at guessing a riddle."
"You've heard of that Mr. Gibson, the clergyman;--haven't you?"
"Of course I have."
"Well--. Mind, you know, it's only what Aunt Stanbury says. He has
never so much as opened his lips to me himself, except to say, 'How
do you do?' and that kind of thing."
"Aunt Stanbury wants you to marry him?"
"Yes!"
"Well?"
"Of course it's out of the question," said Dorothy, sadly.
"I don't see why it should be out of the question," said Priscilla
proudly. "Indeed, if Aunt Stanbury has said much about it, I should
say that Mr. Gibson himself must have spoken to her."
"Do you think he has?"
"I do not believe that my aunt would raise false hopes," said
Priscilla.
"But I haven't any hopes. That is to say, I had never thought about
such a thing."
"But you think about it now, Dolly?"
"I should never have dreamed about it, only for Aunt Stanbury."
"But, dearest, you are dreaming of it now, are you not?"
"Only because she says that it is to be so. You don't know how
generous she is. She says that if it should be so, she will give me
ever so much money;--two thousand pounds!"
"Then I am quite sure that she and Mr. Gibson must understand each
other."
"Of course," said Dorothy, sadly, "if he were to think of such a
thing at all, it would only be because the money would be
convenient."
"Not at all," said Priscilla, sternly,--with a sternness that was
very comfortable to her listener. "Not at all. Why should not Mr.
Gibson love you as well as any man ever loved any woman? You are
nice-looking,"--Dorothy blushed beneath her hat even at her sister's
praise,--"and good-tempered, and lovable in every way. And I think
you are just fitted to make a good wife. And you must not suppose,
Dolly, that because Mr. Gibson wouldn't perhaps have asked you
without the money, that therefore he is mercenary. It so often
happens that a gentleman can't marry unless the lady has some money!"
"But he hasn't asked me at all."
"I suppose he will, dear."
"I only know what Aunt Stanbury says."
"You may be sure that he will ask you."
"And what must I say, Priscilla?"
"What must you say? Nobody can tell you that, dear, but yourself. Do
you like him?"
"I don't dislike him."
"Is that all?"
"I know him so very little, Priscilla. Everybody says he is very
good;--and then it's a great thing, isn't it, that he should be a
clergyman?"
"I don't know about that."
"I think it is. If it were possible that I should ever marry any one,
I should like a clergyman so much the best."
"Then you do know what to say to him."
"No, I don't, Priscilla. I don't know at all."
"Look here, dearest. What my aunt offers to you is a very great
step in life. If you can accept this gentleman I think you would be
happy;--and I think, also, which should be of more importance for
your consideration, that you would make him happy. It is a brighter
prospect, dear Dolly, than to live either with us at Nuncombe, or
even with Aunt Stanbury as her niece."
"But if I don't love him, Priscilla?"
"Then give it up, and be as you are, my own own, dearest sister."
"So I will," said Dorothy, and at that time her mind was made up.
[Illustration: Dorothy makes up her mind.]
CHAPTER XXXI.
MR. BROOKE BURGESS.
[Illustration]
The hour at which Mr. Brooke Burgess was to arrive had come round,
and Miss Stanbury was in a twitter, partly of expectation, and
partly, it must be confessed, of fear. Why there should be any fear
she did not herself know, as she had much to give and nothing to
expect. But she was afraid, and was conscious of it, and was out
of temper because she was ashamed of herself. Although it would be
necessary that she should again dress for dinner at six, she had put
on a clean cap at four, and appeared at that early hour in one of
her gowns which was not customarily in use for home purposes at that
early hour. She felt that she was "an old fool" for her pains, and
was consequently cross to poor Dorothy. And there were other reasons
for some display of harshness to her niece. Mr. Gibson had been at
the house that very morning, and Dorothy had given herself airs. At
least, so Miss Stanbury thought. And during the last three or four
days, whenever Mr. Gibson's name had been mentioned, Dorothy had
become silent, glum, and almost obstructive. Miss Stanbury had been
at the trouble of explaining that she was specially anxious to have
that little matter of the engagement settled at once. She knew that
she was going to behave with great generosity;--that she was going to
sacrifice, not her money only, of which she did not think much, but a
considerable portion of her authority, of which she did think a great
deal; and that she was about to behave in a manner which demanded
much gratitude. But it seemed to her that Dorothy was not in
the least grateful. Hugh had proved himself to be "a mass of
ingratitude," as she was in the habit of saying. None of the
Burgesses had ever shown to her any gratitude for promises made to
them, or, indeed, for any substantial favours conferred upon them.
And now Dorothy, to whom a very seventh heaven of happiness had been
opened,--a seventh heaven, as it must be computed in comparison with
her low expectations,--now Dorothy was already shewing how thankless
she could become. Mr. Gibson had not yet declared his passion, but he
had freely admitted to Miss Stanbury that he was prepared to do so.
Priscilla had been quite right in her suggestion that there was a
clear understanding between the clergyman and her aunt.
"I don't think he is come after all," said Miss Stanbury, looking
at her watch. Had the train arrived at the moment that it was due,
had the expectant visitor jumped out of the railway carriage into
a fly, and had the driver galloped up to the Close, it might have
been possible that the wheels should have been at the door as Miss
Stanbury spoke.
"It's hardly time yet, aunt."
"Nonsense; it is time. The train comes in at four. I dare say he
won't come at all."
"He is sure to come, aunt."
"I've no doubt you know all about it better than any one else. You
usually do." Then five minutes were passed in silence. "Heaven and
earth! what shall I do with these people that are coming? And I told
them especially that it was to meet this young man! It's the way I am
always treated by everybody that I have about me."
"The train might be ten minutes late, Aunt Stanbury."
"Yes;--and monkeys might chew tobacco. There;--there's the omnibus at
the Cock and Bottle; the omnibus up from the train. Now, of course,
he won't come."
"Perhaps he's walking, Aunt Stanbury."
"Walking,--with his luggage on his shoulders? Is that your idea of
the way in which a London gentleman goes about? And there are two
flies,--coming up from the train, of course." Miss Stanbury was
obliged to fix the side of her chair very close to the window in
order that she might see that part of the Close in which the vehicles
of which she had spoken were able to pass.
"Perhaps they are not coming from the train, Aunt Stanbury."
"Perhaps a fiddlestick! You have lived here so much longer than
I have done that, of course, you must know all about it." Then
there was an interval of another ten minutes, and even Dorothy was
beginning to think that Mr. Burgess was not coming. "I've given him
up now," said Miss Stanbury. "I think I'll send and put them all
off." Just at that moment there came a knock at the door. But there
was no cab. Dorothy's conjecture had been right. The London gentleman
had walked, and his portmanteau had been carried behind him by a boy.
"How did he get here?" exclaimed Miss Stanbury, as she heard the
strange voice speaking to Martha down-stairs. But Dorothy knew better
than to answer the question.
"Miss Stanbury, I am very glad to see you," said Mr. Brooke Burgess,
as he entered the room. Miss Stanbury courtesied, and then took
him by both hands. "You wouldn't have known me, I dare say," he
continued. "A black beard and a bald head do make a difference."
"You are not bald at all," said Miss Stanbury.
"I am beginning to be thin enough at the top. I am so glad to come to
you, and so much obliged to you for having me! How well I remember
the old room!"
"This is my niece, Miss Dorothy Stanbury, from Nuncombe Putney."
Dorothy was about to make some formal acknowledgment of the
introduction, when Brooke Burgess came up to her, and shook her hand
heartily. "She lives with me," continued the aunt.
"And what has become of Hugh?" said Brooke.
"We never talk of him," said Miss Stanbury gravely.
"I hope there's nothing wrong? I hear of him very often in London."
"My aunt and he don't agree;--that's all," said Dorothy.
"He has given up his profession as a barrister,--in which he might
have lived like a gentleman," said Miss Stanbury, "and has taken to
writing for a--penny newspaper."
"Everybody does that now, Miss Stanbury."
"I hope you don't, Mr. Burgess."
"I! Nobody would print anything that I wrote. I don't write for
anything, certainly."
"I'm very glad to hear it," said Miss Stanbury.
Brooke Burgess, or Mr. Brooke, as he came to be called very shortly
by the servants in the house, was a good-looking man, with black
whiskers and black hair, which, as he said, was beginning to be thin
on the top of his head, and pleasant small bright eyes. Dorothy
thought that next to her brother Hugh he was the most good-natured
looking man she had ever seen. He was rather below the middle height,
and somewhat inclined to be stout. But he would boast that he could
still walk his twelve miles in three hours, and would add that as
long as he could do that he would never recognise the necessity of
putting himself on short commons. He had a well-cut nose, not quite
aquiline, but tending that way, a chin with a dimple on it, and as
sweet a mouth as ever declared the excellence of a man's temper.
Dorothy immediately began to compare him with her brother Hugh, who
was to her, of all men, the most godlike. It never occurred to her to
make any comparison between Mr. Gibson and Mr. Burgess. Her brother
Hugh was the most godlike of men; but there was something godlike
also about the new comer. Mr. Gibson, to Dorothy's eyes, was by no
means divine.
"I used to call you Aunt Stanbury," said Brooke Burgess to the old
lady; "am I to go on doing it now?"
"You may call me what you like," said Miss Stanbury. "Only,--dear
me;--I never did see anybody so much altered." Before she went up to
dress herself for dinner, Miss Stanbury was quite restored to her
good humour, as Dorothy could perceive.
The dinner passed off well enough. Mr. Gibson, at the head of the
table, did, indeed, look very much out of his element, as though he
conceived that his position revealed to the outer world those ideas
of his in regard to Dorothy, which ought to have been secret for a
while longer. There are few men who do not feel ashamed of being
paraded before the world as acknowledged suitors, whereas ladies
accept the position with something almost of triumph. The lady
perhaps regards herself as the successful angler, whereas the
gentleman is conscious of some similitude to the unsuccessful fish.
Mr. Gibson, though he was not yet gasping in the basket, had some
presentiment of this feeling, which made his present seat of honour
unpleasant to him. Brooke Burgess, at the other end of the table,
was as gay as a lark. Mrs. MacHugh sat on one side of him, and
Miss Stanbury on the other, and he laughed at the two old ladies,
reminding them of his former doings in Exeter,--how he had hunted
Mrs. MacHugh's cat, and had stolen Aunt Stanbury's best apricot jam,
till everybody began to perceive that he was quite a success. Even
Sir Peter Mancrudy laughed at his jokes, and Mrs. Powel, from the
other side of Sir Peter, stretched her head forward so that she might
become one of the gay party.
"There isn't a word of it true," said Miss Stanbury. "It's all pure
invention, and a great scandal. I never did such a thing in my life."
"Didn't you though?" said Brooke Burgess. "I remember it as well
as if it was yesterday, and old Dr. Ball, the prebendary, with the
carbuncles on his nose, saw it too."
"Dr. Ball had no carbuncles on his nose," said Mrs. MacHugh. "You'll
say next that I have carbuncles on my nose."
"He had three. I remember each of them quite well, and so does Sir
Peter."
Then everybody laughed; and Martha, who was in the room, knew that
Brooke Burgess was a complete success.
In the meantime Mr. Gibson was talking to Dorothy; but Dorothy was
endeavouring to listen to the conversation at the other end of the
table. "I found it very dirty on the roads to-day outside the city,"
said Mr. Gibson.
"Very dirty," said Dorothy, looking round at Mr. Burgess as she
spoke.
"But the pavement in the High Street was dry enough."
"Quite dry," said Dorothy. Then there came a peal of laughter from
Mrs. MacHugh and Sir Peter, and Dorothy wondered whether anybody
before had ever made those two steady old people laugh after that
fashion.
"I should so like to get a drive with you up to the top of Haldon
Hill," said Mr. Gibson. "When the weather gets fine, that is. Mrs.
Powel was talking about it."
"It would be very nice," said Dorothy.
"You have never seen the view from Haldon Hill yet?" asked Mr.
Gibson. But to this question Dorothy could make no answer. Miss
Stanbury had lifted one of the table-spoons, as though she was going
to strike Mr. Brooke Burgess with the bowl of it. And this during
a dinner party! From that moment Dorothy turned herself round, and
became one of the listeners to the fun at the other end of the table.
Poor Mr. Gibson soon found himself "nowhere."
"I never saw a man so much altered in my life," said Mrs. MacHugh, up
in the drawing-room. "I don't remember that he used to be clever."
"He was a bright boy," said Miss Stanbury.
"But the Burgesses all used to be such serious, strait-laced people,"
said Mrs. MacHugh. "Excellent people," she added, remembering the
source of her friend's wealth; "but none of them like that."
"I call him a very handsome man," said Mrs. Powel. "I suppose he's
not married yet?"
"Oh, dear, no," said Miss Stanbury. "There's time enough for him
yet."
"He'll find plenty here to set their caps at him," said Mrs. MacHugh.
"He's a little old for my girls," said Mrs. Powel, laughing. Mrs.
Powel was the happy mother of four daughters, of whom the eldest was
only twelve.
"There are others who are more forward," said Mrs. MacHugh. "What a
chance it would be for dear Arabella French!"
"Heaven forbid!" said Miss Stanbury.
"And then poor Mr. Gibson wouldn't be any longer like the donkey
between two bundles of hay," said Mrs. Powel. Dorothy was quite
determined that she would never marry a man who was like a donkey
between two bundles of hay.
When the gentlemen came up into the drawing-room, Dorothy was seated
behind the urn and tea-things at a large table, in such a position as
to be approached only at one side. There was one chair at her left
hand, but at her right hand there was no room for a seat,--only room
for some civil gentleman to take away full cups and bring them back
empty. Dorothy was not sufficiently ready-witted to see the danger of
this position till Mr. Gibson had seated himself in the chair. Then
it did seem cruel to her that she should be thus besieged for the
rest of the evening as she had been also at dinner. While the tea
was being consumed Mr. Gibson assisted at the service, asking ladies
whether they would have cake or bread and butter; but when all that
was over Dorothy was still in her prison, and Mr. Gibson was still
the jailer at the gate. She soon perceived that everybody else was
chatting and laughing, and that Brooke Burgess was the centre of a
little circle which had formed itself quite at a distance from her
seat. Once, twice, thrice she meditated an escape, but she had not
the courage to make the attempt. She did not know how to manage it.
She was conscious that her aunt's eye was upon her, and that her aunt
would expect her to listen to Mr. Gibson. At last she gave up all
hope of moving, and was anxious simply that Mr. Gibson should confine
himself to the dirt of the paths and the noble prospect from Haldon
Hill.
"I think we shall have more rain before we are done with it," he
said. Twice before during the evening he had been very eloquent about
the rain.
"I dare say we shall," said Dorothy. And then there came the sound
of loud laughter from Sir Peter, and Dorothy could see that he was
poking Brooke Burgess in the ribs. There had never been anything so
gay before since she had been in Exeter, and now she was hemmed up in
that corner, away from it all, by Mr. Gibson!
"This Mr. Burgess seems to be different from the other Burgesses,"
said Mr. Gibson.
"I think he must be very clever," said Dorothy.
"Well;--yes; in a sort of a way. What people call a Merry Andrew."
"I like people who make me laugh and laugh themselves," said Dorothy.
"I quite agree with you that laughter is a very good thing,--in
its place. I am not at all one of those who would make the world
altogether grave. There are serious things, and there must be serious
moments."
"Of course," said Dorothy.
"And I think that serious conversation upon the whole has more
allurements than conversation which when you come to examine it is
found to mean nothing. Don't you?"
"I suppose everybody should mean something when he talks."
"Just so. That is exactly my idea," said Mr. Gibson. "On all such
subjects as that I should be so sorry if you and I did not agree. I
really should." Then he paused, and Dorothy was so confounded by what
she conceived to be the dangers of the coming moment that she was
unable even to think what she ought to say. She heard Mrs. MacHugh's
clear, sharp, merry voice, and she heard her aunt's tone of pretended
anger, and she heard Sir Peter's continued laughter, and Brooke
Burgess as he continued the telling of some story; but her own
trouble was too great to allow of her attending to what was going on
at the other end of the room. "There is nothing as to which I am so
anxious as that you and I should agree about serious things," said
Mr. Gibson.
"I suppose we do agree about going to church," said Dorothy. She knew
that she could have made no speech more stupid, more senseless, more
inefficacious;--but what was she to say in answer to such an
assurance?
"I hope so," said Mr. Gibson; "and I think so. Your aunt is a most
excellent woman, and her opinion has very great weight with me on all
subjects,--even as to matters of church discipline and doctrine, in
which, as a clergyman, I am of course presumed to be more at home.
But your aunt is a woman among a thousand."
"Of course I think she is very good."
"And she is so right about this young man and her property. Don't you
think so?"
"Quite right, Mr. Gibson."
"Because you know, to you, of course, being her near relative, and
the one she has singled out as the recipient of her kindness, it
might have been cause for some discontent."
"Discontent to me, Mr. Gibson!"
"I am quite sure your feelings are what they ought to be. And for
myself, if I ever were,--that is to say, supposing I could be in any
way interested--. But perhaps it is premature to make any suggestion
on that head at present."
"I don't at all understand what you mean, Mr. Gibson."
"I thought that perhaps I might take this opportunity of
expressing--. But, after all, the levity of the moment is hardly in
accordance with the sentiments which I should wish to express."
"I think that I ought to go to my aunt now, Mr. Gibson, as perhaps
she might want something." Then she did push back her chair, and
stand upon her legs,--and Mr. Gibson, after pausing for a moment,
allowed her to escape. Soon after that the visitors went, and Brooke
Burgess was left in the drawing-room with Miss Stanbury and Dorothy.
"How well I recollect all the people," said Brooke; "Sir Peter, and
old Mrs. MacHugh, and Mrs. Powel, who then used to be called the
beautiful Miss Noel. And I remember every bit of furniture in the
room."
"Nothing changed except the old woman, Brooke," said Miss Stanbury.
"Upon my word, you are the least changed of all,--except that you
don't seem to be so terrible as you were then."
"Was I very terrible, Brooke?"
"My mother had told me, I fancy, that I was never to make a noise,
and be sure not to break any of the china. You were always very
good-natured, and when you gave me a silver watch I could hardly
believe the extent of my own bliss."
"You wouldn't care about a watch from an old woman now, Brooke?"
"You try me. But what rakes you are here! It's past eleven o'clock,
and I must go and have a smoke."
"Have a what?" said Miss Stanbury, with a startled air.
"A smoke. You needn't be frightened; I don't mean in the house."
"No;--I hope you don't mean that."
"But I may take a turn round the Close with a pipe;--mayn't I?"
"I suppose all young men do smoke now," said Miss Stanbury,
sorrowfully.
"Every one of them; and they tell me that the young women mean to
take to it before long."
"If I saw a young woman smoking, I should blush for my sex; and
though she were the nearest and dearest that I had, I would never
speak to her;--never. Dorothy, I don't think Mr. Gibson smokes."
"I'm sure I don't know, aunt."
"I hope he doesn't. I do hope that he does not. I cannot understand
what pleasure it is that men take in making chimneys of themselves,
and going about smelling so that no one can bear to come near them."
Brooke merely laughed at this, and went his way, and smoked his pipe
out in the Close, while Martha sat up to let him in when he had
finished it. Then Dorothy escaped at once to her room, fearful of
being questioned by her aunt about Mr. Gibson. She had, she thought
now, quite made up her mind. There was nothing in Mr. Gibson that
she liked. She was by no means so sure as she had been when she was
talking to her sister, that she would prefer a clergyman to any one
else. She had formed no strong ideas on the subject of love-making,
but she did think that any man who really cared for her, would find
some other way of expressing his love than that which Mr. Gibson had
adopted. And then Mr. Gibson had spoken to her about her aunt's money
in a way that was distasteful to her. She thought that she was quite
sure that if he should ask her, she would not accept him.
She was nearly undressed, nearly safe for the night, when there came
a knock at the door, and her aunt entered the room. "He has come in,"
said Miss Stanbury.
"I suppose he has had his pipe, then."
"I wish he didn't smoke. I do wish he didn't smoke. But I suppose an
old woman like me is only making herself a fool to care about such
things. If they all do it I can't prevent them. He seems to be a very
nice young man--in other things; does he not, Dolly?"
"Very nice indeed, Aunt Stanbury."
"And he has done very well in his office. And as for his saying that
he must smoke, I like that a great deal better than doing it on the
sly."
"I don't think Mr. Burgess would do anything on the sly, aunt."
"No, no; I don't think he would. Dear me; he's not at all like what I
fancied."
"Everybody seemed to like him very much."
"Didn't they? I never saw Sir Peter so much taken. And there was
quite a flirtation between him and Mrs. MacHugh. And now, my dear,
tell me about Mr. Gibson."
"There is nothing to tell, Aunt Stanbury."
"Isn't there? From what I saw going on, I thought there would be
something to tell. He was talking to you the whole evening."
"As it happened he was sitting next to me,--of course."
"Indeed he was sitting next to you;--so much so that I thought
everything would be settled."
"If I tell you something, Aunt Stanbury, you mustn't be angry with
me."
"Tell me what? What is it you have to tell me?"
"I don't think I shall ever care for Mr. Gibson;--not in that way."
"Why not, Dorothy?"
"I'm sure he doesn't care for me. And I don't think he means it."
"I tell you he does mean it. Mean it! Why, I tell you it has all been
settled between us. Since I first spoke to you I have explained to
him exactly what I intend to do. He knows that he can give up his
house and come and live here. I am sure he must have said something
about it to you to-night."
"Not a word, Aunt Stanbury."
"Then he will."
"Dear aunt, I do so wish you would prevent it. I don't like him. I
don't indeed."
"Not like him!"
"No;--I don't care for him a bit, and I never shall. I can't help
it, Aunt Stanbury. I thought I would try, but I find it would be
impossible. You can't want me to marry a man if I don't love him."
"I never heard of such a thing in my life. Not love him! And why
shouldn't you love him? He's a gentleman. Everybody respects him.
He'll have plenty to make you comfortable all your life! And then why
didn't you tell me before?"
"I didn't know, Aunt Stanbury. I thought that perhaps--"
"Perhaps what?"
"I could not say all at once that I didn't care for him, when I had
never so much as thought about it for a moment before."
"You haven't told him this?"
"No, I have not told him. I couldn't begin by telling him, you know."
"Then I must pray that you will think about it again. Have you
imagined what a great thing for you it would be to be established for
life,--so that you should never have any more trouble again about a
home, or about money, or anything? Don't answer me now, Dorothy, but
think of it. It seemed to me that I was doing such an excellent thing
for both of you." So saying Miss Stanbury left the room, and Dorothy
was enabled to obey her, at any rate, in one matter. She did think of
it. She laid awake thinking of it almost all the night. But the more
she thought of it, the less able was she to realise to herself any
future comfort or happiness in the idea of becoming Mrs. Gibson.
CHAPTER XXXII.
THE "FULL MOON" AT ST. DIDDULPH'S.
The receipt of Mrs. Trevelyan's letter on that Monday morning was a
great surprise both to Mr. and Mrs. Outhouse. There was no time for
any consideration, no opportunity for delaying their arrival till
they should have again referred the matter to Mr. Trevelyan. Their
two nieces were to be with them on that evening, and even the
telegraph wires, if employed with such purpose, would not be quick
enough to stop their coming. The party, as they knew, would have left
Nuncombe Putney before the arrival of the letter at the parsonage of
St. Diddulph's. There would have been nothing in this to have caused
vexation, had it not been decided between Trevelyan and Mr. Outhouse
that Mrs. Trevelyan was not to find a home at the parsonage. Mr.
Outhouse was greatly afraid of being so entangled in the matter as to
be driven to take the part of the wife against the husband; and Mrs.
Outhouse, though she was full of indignation against Trevelyan, was
at the same time not free from anger in regard to her own niece.
She more than once repeated that most unjust of all proverbs, which
declares that there is never smoke without fire, and asserted broadly
that she did not like to be with people who could not live at
home, husbands with wives, and wives with husbands, in a decent,
respectable manner. Nevertheless the preparations went on busily, and
when the party arrived at seven o'clock in the evening, two rooms had
been prepared close to each other, one for the two sisters, and the
other for the child and nurse, although poor Mr. Outhouse himself was
turned out of his own little chamber in order that the accommodation
might be given. They were all very hot, very tired, and very dusty,
when the cab reached the parsonage. There had been the preliminary
drive from Nuncombe Putney to Lessboro'. Then the railway journey
from thence to the Waterloo Bridge Station had been long. And it had
seemed to them that the distance from the station to St. Diddulph's
had been endless. When the cabman was told whither he was to go, he
looked doubtingly at his poor old horse, and then at the luggage
which he was required to pack on the top of his cab, and laid himself
out for his work with a full understanding that it would not be
accomplished without considerable difficulty. The cabman made it
twelve miles from Waterloo Bridge to St. Diddulph's, and suggested
that extra passengers and parcels would make the fare up to ten and
six. Had he named double as much Mrs. Trevelyan would have assented.
So great was the fatigue, and so wretched the occasion, that there
was sobbing and crying in the cab, and when at last the parsonage was
reached, even the nurse was hardly able to turn her hand to anything.
The poor wanderers were made welcome on that evening without a word
of discussion as to the cause of their coming. "I hope you are not
angry with us, Uncle Oliphant," Emily Trevelyan had said, with tears
in her eyes. "Angry with you, my dear;--for coming to our house!
How could I be angry with you?" Then the travellers were hurried
up-stairs by Mrs. Outhouse, and the master of the parsonage was left
alone for a while. He certainly was not angry, but he was ill at
ease, and unhappy. His guests would probably remain with him for
six or seven months. He had resolutely refused all payment from Mr.
Trevelyan, but, nevertheless, he was a poor man. It is impossible
to conceive that a clergyman in such a parish as St. Diddulph's,
without a private income, should not be a poor man. It was but a
hand-to-mouth existence which he lived, paying his way as his money
came to him, and sharing the proceeds of his parish with the poor.
He was always more or less in debt. That was quite understood among
the tradesmen. And the butcher who trusted him, though he was a
bad churchman, did not look upon the parson's account as he did on
other debts. He would often hint to Mr. Outhouse that a little money
ought to be paid, and then a little money would be paid. But it was
never expected that the parsonage bill should be settled. In such a
household the arrival of four guests, who were expected to remain for
an almost indefinite number of months, could not be regarded without
dismay. On that first evening, Emily and Nora did come down to tea,
but they went up again to their rooms almost immediately afterwards;
and Mr. Outhouse found that many hours of solitary meditation were
allowed to him on the occasion. "I suppose your brother has been told
all about it," he said to his wife, as soon as they were together on
that evening.
"Yes;--he has been told. She did not write to her mother till after
she had got to Nuncombe Putney. She did not like to speak about her
troubles while there was a hope that things might be made smooth."
"You can't blame her for that, my dear."
"But there was a month lost, or nearly. Letters go only once a month.
And now they can't hear from Marmaduke or Bessy,"--Lady Rowley's name
was Bessy,--"till the beginning of September."
"That will be in a fortnight."
"But what can my brother say to them? He will suppose that they are
still down in Devonshire."
"You don't think he will come at once?"
"How can he, my dear? He can't come without leave, and the expense
would be ruinous. They would stop his pay, and there would be all
manner of evils. He is to come in the spring, and they must stay
here till he comes." The parson of St. Diddulph's sighed and groaned.
Would it not have been almost better that he should have put his
pride in his pocket, and have consented to take Mr. Trevelyan's
money?
On the second morning Hugh Stanbury called at the parsonage, and was
closeted for a while with the parson. Nora had heard his voice in the
passage, and every one in the house knew who it was that was talking
to Mr. Outhouse, in the little back parlour that was called a study.
Nora was full of anxiety. Would he ask to see them,--to see her? And
why was he there so long? "No doubt he has brought a message from Mr.
Trevelyan," said her sister. "I dare say he will send word that I
ought not to have come to my uncle's house." Then, at last, both Mr.
Outhouse and Hugh Stanbury came into the room in which they were all
sitting. The greetings were cold and unsatisfactory, and Nora barely
allowed Hugh to touch the tip of her fingers. She was very angry with
him, and yet she knew that her anger was altogether unreasonable.
That he had caused her to refuse a marriage that had so much to
attract her was not his sin;--not that; but that, having thus
overpowered her by his influence, he should then have stopped. And
yet Nora had told herself twenty times that it was quite impossible
that she should become Hugh Stanbury's wife;--and that, were Hugh
Stanbury to ask her, it would become her to be indignant with him,
for daring to make a proposition so outrageous. And now she was sick
at heart, because he did not speak to her!
He had, of course, come to St. Diddulph's with a message from
Trevelyan, and his secret was soon told to them all. Trevelyan
himself was up-stairs in the sanded parlour of the Full Moon
public-house, round the corner. Mrs. Trevelyan, when she heard this,
clasped her hands and bit her lips. What was he there for? If he
wanted to see her, why did he not come boldly to the parsonage? But
it soon appeared that he had no desire to see his wife. "I am to take
Louey to him," said Hugh Stanbury, "if you will allow me."
"What;--to be taken away from me!" exclaimed the mother. But Hugh
assured her that no such idea had been formed; that he would have
concerned himself in no such stratagem, and that he would himself
undertake to bring the boy back again within an hour. Emily was, of
course, anxious to be informed what other message was to be conveyed
to her; but there was no other message--no message either of love or
of instruction.
"Mr. Stanbury," said the parson, "has left something in my hands for
you." This "something" was given over to her as soon as Stanbury
had left the house, and consisted of cheques for various small sums,
amounting in all to £200. "And he hasn't said what I am to do with
it?" Emily asked of her uncle. Mr. Outhouse declared that the cheques
had been given to him without any instructions on that head. Mr.
Trevelyan had simply expressed his satisfaction that his wife should
be with her uncle and aunt, had sent the money, and had desired to
see the child.
The boy was got ready, and Hugh walked with him in his arms round the
corner, to the Full Moon. He had to pass by the bar, and the barmaid
and the potboy looked at him very hard. "There's a young 'ooman has
to do with that ere little game," said the potboy. "And it's two to
one the young 'ooman has the worst of it," said the barmaid. "They
mostly does," said the potboy, not without some feeling of pride in
the immunities of his sex. "Here he is," said Hugh, as he entered
the parlour. "My boy, there's papa." The child at this time was more
than a year old, and could crawl about and use his own legs with the
assistance of a finger to his little hand, and could utter a sound
which the fond mother interpreted to mean papa; for with all her hot
anger against her husband, the mother was above all things anxious
that her child should be taught to love his father's name. She
would talk of her separation from her husband as though it must be
permanent; she would declare to her sister how impossible it was that
they should ever again live together; she would repeat to herself
over and over the tale of the injustice that had been done to her,
assuring herself that it was out of the question that she should ever
pardon the man; but yet, at the bottom of her heart, there was a hope
that the quarrel should be healed before her boy would be old enough
to understand the nature of quarrelling. Trevelyan took the child on
to his knee, and kissed him; but the poor little fellow, startled by
his transference from one male set of arms to another, confused by
the strangeness of the room, and by the absence of things familiar
to his sight, burst out into loud tears. He had stood the journey
round the corner in Hugh's arms manfully, and, though he had looked
about him with very serious eyes, as he passed through the bar,
he had borne that, and his carriage up the stairs; but when he
was transferred to his father, whose air, as he took the boy, was
melancholy and lugubrious in the extreme, the poor little fellow
could endure no longer a mode of treatment so unusual, and, with a
grimace which for a moment or two threatened the coming storm, burst
out with an infantine howl. "That's how he has been taught," said
Trevelyan.
[Illustration: The "Full Moon" at St. Diddulph's.]
"Nonsense," said Stanbury. "He's not been taught at all. It's
Nature."
"Nature that he should be afraid of his own father! He did not cry
when he was with you."
"No;--as it happened, he did not. I played with him when I was at
Nuncombe; but, of course, one can't tell when a child will cry, and
when it won't."
"My darling, my dearest, my own son!" said Trevelyan, caressing the
child, and trying to comfort him; but the poor little fellow only
cried the louder. It was now nearly two months since he had seen his
father, and, when age is counted by months only, almost everything
may be forgotten in six weeks. "I suppose you must take him back
again," said Trevelyan, sadly.
"Of course I must take him back again. Come along, Louey, my boy."
"It is cruel;--very cruel," said Trevelyan. "No man living could love
his child better than I love mine;--or, for the matter of that, his
wife. It is very cruel."
"The remedy is in your own hands, Trevelyan," said Stanbury, as he
marched off with the boy in his arms.
Trevelyan had now become so accustomed to being told by everybody
that he was wrong, and was at the same time so convinced that he was
right, that he regarded the perversity of his friends as a part of
the persecution to which he was subjected. Even Lady Milborough,
who objected to Colonel Osborne quite as strongly as did Trevelyan
himself, even she blamed him now, telling him that he had done
wrong to separate himself from his wife. Mr. Bideawhile, the old
family lawyer, was of the same opinion. Trevelyan had spoken to Mr.
Bideawhile as to the expediency of making some lasting arrangement
for a permanent maintenance for his wife; but the attorney had told
him that nothing of the kind could be held to be lasting. It was
clearly the husband's duty to look forward to a reconciliation, and
Mr. Bideawhile became quite severe in the tone of rebuke which he
assumed. Stanbury treated him almost as though he were a madman. And
as for his wife herself--when she wrote to him she would not even
pretend to express any feeling of affection. And yet, as he thought,
no man had ever done more for a wife. When Stanbury had gone with the
child, he sat waiting for him in the parlour of the public-house, as
miserable a man as one could find. He had promised himself something
that should be akin to pleasure in seeing his boy;--but it had been
all disappointment and pain. What was it that they expected him to
do? What was it that they desired? His wife had behaved with such
indiscretion as almost to have compromised his honour; and in return
for that he was to beg her pardon, confess himself to have done
wrong, and allow her to return in triumph! That was the light in
which he regarded his own position; but he promised to himself that
let his own misery be what it might he would never so degrade him.
The only person who had been true to him was Bozzle. Let them all
look to it. If there were any further intercourse between his wife
and Colonel Osborne, he would take the matter into open court, and
put her away publicly, let Mr. Bideawhile say what he might. Bozzle
should see to that;--and as to himself, he would take himself out of
England and hide himself abroad. Bozzle should know his address, but
he would give it to no one else. Nothing on earth should make him
yield to a woman who had ill-treated him,--nothing but confession
and promise of amendment on her part. If she would acknowledge and
promise, then he would forgive all, and the events of the last four
months should never again be mentioned by him. So resolving he sat
and waited till Stanbury should return to him.
When Stanbury got back to the parsonage with the boy he had nothing
to do but to take his leave. He would fain have asked permission to
come again, could he have invented any reason for doing so. But the
child was taken from him at once by its mother, and he was left alone
with Mr. Outhouse. Nora Rowley did not even show herself, and he
hardly knew how to express sympathy and friendship for the guests at
the parsonage, without seeming to be untrue to his friend Trevelyan.
"I hope all this may come to an end soon," he said.
"I hope it may, Mr. Stanbury," said the clergyman; "but to tell you
the truth, it seems to me that Mr. Trevelyan is so unreasonable a
man, so much like a madman indeed, that I hardly know how to look
forward to any future happiness for my niece." This was spoken with
the utmost severity that Mr. Outhouse could assume.
"And yet no man loves his wife more tenderly."
"Tender love should show itself by tender conduct, Mr. Stanbury. What
has he done to his wife? He has blackened her name among all his
friends and hers, he has turned her out of his house, he has reviled
her,--and then thinks to prove how good he is by sending her money.
The only possible excuse is that he must be mad."
Stanbury went back to the Full Moon, and retraced his steps with his
friend towards Lincoln's Inn. Two minutes took him from the parsonage
to the public-house, but during these two minutes he resolved that
he would speak his mind roundly to Trevelyan as they returned home.
Trevelyan should either take his wife back again at once, or else he,
Stanbury, would have no more to do with him. He said nothing till
they had threaded together the maze of streets which led them from
the neighbourhood of the Church of St. Diddulph's into the straight
way of the Commercial Road. Then he began. "Trevelyan," said he, "you
are wrong in all this from beginning to end."
"What do you mean?"
"Just what I say. If there was anything in what your wife did to
offend you, a soft word from you would have put it all right."
"A soft word! How do you know what soft words I used?"
"A soft word now would do it. You have only to bid her come back to
you, and let bygones be bygones, and all would be right. Can't you be
man enough to remember that you are a man?"
"Stanbury, I believe you want to quarrel with me."
"I tell you fairly that I think that you are wrong."
"They have talked you over to their side."
"I know nothing about sides. I only know that you are wrong."
"And what would you have me do?"
"Go and travel together for six months." Here was Lady Milborough's
receipt again! "Travel together for a year if you will. Then come
back and live where you please. People will have forgotten it;--or if
they remember it, what matters? No sane person can advise you to go
on as you are doing now."
But it was of no avail. Before they had reached the Bank the two
friends had quarrelled and had parted. Then Trevelyan felt that there
was indeed no one left to him but Bozzle. On the following morning he
saw Bozzle, and on the evening of the next day he was in Paris.
CHAPTER XXXIII.
HUGH STANBURY SMOKES ANOTHER PIPE.
Trevelyan was gone, and Bozzle alone knew his address. During the
first fortnight of her residence at St. Diddulph's Mrs. Trevelyan
received two letters from Lady Milborough, in both of which she
was recommended, indeed tenderly implored, to be submissive to
her husband. "Anything," said Lady Milborough, "is better than
separation." In answer to the second letter Mrs. Trevelyan told the
old lady that she had no means by which she could shew any submission
to her husband, even if she were so minded. Her husband had gone
away, she did not know whither, and she had no means by which she
could communicate with him. And then came a packet to her from her
father and mother, despatched from the islands after the receipt by
Lady Rowley of the melancholy tidings of the journey to Nuncombe
Putney. Both Sir Marmaduke and Lady Rowley were full of anger against
Trevelyan, and wrote as though the husband could certainly be brought
back to a sense of his duty, if they only were present. This packet
had been at Nuncombe Putney, and contained a sealed note from Sir
Marmaduke addressed to Mr. Trevelyan. Lady Rowley explained that it
was impossible that they should get to England earlier than in the
spring. "I would come myself at once and leave papa to follow," said
Lady Rowley, "only for the children. If I were to bring them, I
must take a house for them, and the expense would ruin us. Papa has
written to Mr. Trevelyan in a way that he thinks will bring him to
reason."
But how was this letter, by which the husband was to be brought to
reason, to be put into the husband's hands? Mrs. Trevelyan applied
to Mr. Bideawhile and to Lady Milborough, and to Stanbury, for
Trevelyan's address; but was told by each of them that nothing was
known of his whereabouts. She did not apply to Mr. Bozzle, although
Mr. Bozzle was more than once in her neighbourhood; but as yet she
knew nothing of Mr. Bozzle. The replies from Mr. Bideawhile and from
Lady Milborough came by the post; but Hugh Stanbury thought that duty
required him to make another journey to St. Diddulph's and carry his
own answer with him.
And on this occasion Fortune was either very kind to him,--or very
unkind. Whichever it was, he found himself alone for a few seconds
in the parsonage parlour with Nora Rowley. Mr. Outhouse was away at
the time. Emily had gone up-stairs for the boy; and Mrs. Outhouse,
suspecting nothing, had followed her. "Miss Rowley," said he, getting
up from his seat, "if you think it will do any good I will follow
Trevelyan till I find him."
"How can you find him? Besides, why should you give up your own
business?"
"I would do anything--to serve your sister." This he said with
hesitation in his voice, as though he did not dare to speak all that
he desired to have spoken.
"I am sure that Emily is very grateful," said Nora; "but she would
not wish to give you such trouble as that."
"I would do anything for your sister," he repeated, "--for your sake,
Miss Rowley." This was the first time that he had ever spoken a word
to her in such a strain, and it would be hardly too much to say that
her heart was sick for some such expression. But now that it had
come, though there was a sweetness about it that was delicious to
her, she was absolutely silenced by it. And she was at once not only
silent, but stern, rigid, and apparently cold. Stanbury could not but
feel as he looked at her that he had offended her. "Perhaps I ought
not to say as much," said he; "but it is so."
"Mr. Stanbury," said she, "that is nonsense. It is of my sister, not
of me, that we are speaking."
Then the door was opened and Emily came in with her child, followed
by her aunt. There was no other opportunity, and perhaps it was well
for Nora and for Hugh that there should have been no other. Enough
had been said to give her comfort; and more might have led to his
discomposure. As to that matter on which he was presumed to have come
to St. Diddulph's, he could do nothing. He did not know Trevelyan's
address, but did know that Trevelyan had abandoned the chambers in
Lincoln's Inn. And then he found himself compelled to confess that he
had quarrelled with Trevelyan, and that they had parted in anger on
the day of their joint visit to the East. "Everybody who knows him
must quarrel with him," said Mrs. Outhouse. Hugh when he took his
leave was treated by them all as a friend who had been gained. Mrs.
Outhouse was gracious to him. Mrs. Trevelyan whispered a word to him
of her own trouble. "If I can hear anything of him, you may be sure
that I will let you know," he said. Then it was Nora's turn to bid
him adieu. There was nothing to be said. No word could be spoken
before others that should be of any avail. But as he took her hand
in his he remembered the reticence of her fingers on that former day,
and thought that he was sure there was a difference.
On this occasion he made his journey back to the end of Chancery Lane
on the top of an omnibus; and as he lit his little pipe, disregarding
altogether the scrutiny of the public, thoughts passed through his
mind similar to those in which he had indulged as he sat smoking on
the corner of the churchyard wall at Nuncombe Putney. He declared to
himself that he did love this girl; and as it was so, would it not be
better, at any rate more manly, that he should tell her so honestly,
than go on groping about with half-expressed words when he saw her,
thinking of her and yet hardly daring to go near her, bidding himself
to forget her although he knew that such forgetting was impossible,
hankering after the sound of her voice and the touch of her hand, and
something of the tenderness of returned affection,--and yet regarding
her as a prize altogether out of his reach! Why should she be out
of his reach? She had no money, and he had not a couple of hundred
pounds in the world. But he was earning an income which would give
them both shelter and clothes and bread and cheese.
What reader is there, male or female, of such stories as is this, who
has not often discussed in his or her own mind the different sides of
this question of love and marriage? On either side enough may be said
by any arguer to convince at any rate himself. It must be wrong for a
man, whose income is both insufficient and precarious also, not only
to double his own cares and burdens, but to place the weight of that
doubled burden on other shoulders besides his own,--on shoulders that
are tender and soft, and ill adapted to the carriage of any crushing
weight. And then that doubled burden,--that burden of two mouths to
be fed, of two backs to be covered, of two minds to be satisfied, is
so apt to double itself again and again. The two so speedily become
four, and six! And then there is the feeling that that kind of
semi-poverty, which has in itself something of the pleasantness of
independence, when it is borne by a man alone, entails the miseries
of a draggle-tailed and querulous existence when it is imposed on a
woman who has in her own home enjoyed the comforts of affluence. As a
man thinks of all this, if he chooses to argue with himself on that
side, there is enough in the argument to make him feel that not only
as a wise man but as an honest man, he had better let the young lady
alone. She is well as she is, and he sees around him so many who have
tried the chances of marriage and who are not well! Look at Jones
with his wan, worn wife and his five children, Jones who is not yet
thirty, of whom he happens to know that the wretched man cannot look
his doctor in the face, and that the doctor is as necessary to the
man's house as is the butcher! What heart can Jones have for his work
with such a burden as this upon his shoulders? And so the thinker,
who argues on that side, resolves that the young lady shall go her
own way for him.
But the arguments on the other side are equally cogent, and so much
more alluring! And they are used by the same man with reference to
the same passion, and are intended by him to put himself right in his
conduct in reference to the same dear girl. Only the former line of
thoughts occurred to him on a Saturday, when he was ending his week
rather gloomily, and this other way of thinking on the same subject
has come upon him on a Monday, as he is beginning his week with
renewed hope. Does this young girl of his heart love him? And if so,
their affection for each other being thus reciprocal, is she not
entitled to an expression of her opinion and her wishes on this
difficult subject? And if she be willing to run the risk and to
encounter the dangers,--to do so on his behalf, because she is
willing to share everything with him,--is it becoming in him, a man,
to fear what she does not fear? If she be not willing let her say so.
If there be any speaking, he must speak first;--but she is entitled,
as much as he is, to her own ideas respecting their great outlook
into the affairs of the world. And then is it not manifestly God's
ordinance that a man should live together with a woman? How poor
a creature does the man become who has shirked his duty in this
respect, who has done nothing to keep the world going, who has been
willing to ignore all affection so that he might avoid all burdens,
and who has put into his own belly every good thing that has come to
him, either by the earning of his own hands or from the bounty and
industry of others! Of course there is a risk; but what excitement is
there in anything in which there is none? So on the Tuesday he speaks
his mind to the young lady, and tells her candidly that there will be
potatoes for the two of them,--sufficient, as he hopes, of potatoes,
but no more. As a matter of course the young lady replies that
she for her part will be quite content to take the parings for her
own eating. Then they rush deliciously into each other's arms and
the matter is settled. For, though the convictions arising from
the former line of argument may be set aside as often as need be,
those reached from the latter are generally conclusive. That such
a settlement will always be better for the young gentleman and the
young lady concerned than one founded on a sterner prudence is more
than one may dare to say; but we do feel sure that that country will
be most prosperous in which such leaps in the dark are made with the
greatest freedom.
Our friend Hugh, as he sat smoking on the knife-board of the omnibus,
determined that he would risk everything. If it were ordained that
prudence should prevail, the prudence should be hers. Why should he
take upon himself to have prudence enough for two, seeing that she
was so very discreet in all her bearings? Then he remembered the
touch of her hand, which he still felt upon his palm as he sat
handling his pipe, and he told himself that after that he was bound
to say a word more. And moreover he confessed to himself that he was
compelled by a feeling that mastered him altogether. He could not get
through an hour's work without throwing down his pen and thinking of
Nora Rowley. It was his destiny to love her,--and there was, to his
mind, a mean, pettifogging secrecy, amounting almost to daily lying,
in his thus loving her and not telling her that he loved her. It
might well be that she should rebuke him; but he thought that he
could bear that. It might well be that he had altogether mistaken
that touch of her hand. After all it had been the slightest possible
motion of no more than one finger. But he would at any rate know the
truth. If she would tell him at once that she did not care for him,
he thought that he could get over it; but life was not worth having
while he lived in this shifty, dubious, and uncomfortable state. So
he made up his mind that he would go to St. Diddulph's with his heart
in his hand.
In the mean time, Mr. Bozzle had been twice to St. Diddulph's;--and
now he made a third journey there, two days after Stanbury's visit.
Trevelyan, who, in truth, hated the sight of the man, and who
suffered agonies in his presence, had, nevertheless, taught himself
to believe that he could not live without his assistance. That it
should be so was a part of the cruelty of his lot. Who else was there
that he could trust? His wife had renewed her intimacy with Colonel
Osborne the moment that she had left him. Mrs. Stanbury, who had been
represented to him as the most correct of matrons, had at once been
false to him and to her trust, in allowing Colonel Osborne to enter
her house. Mr. and Mrs. Outhouse, with whom his wife had now located
herself, not by his orders, were, of course, his enemies. His old
friend, Hugh Stanbury, had gone over to the other side, and had
quarrelled with him purposely, with malice prepense, because he would
not submit himself to the caprices of the wife who had injured him.
His own lawyer had refused to act for him; and his fast and oldest
ally, the very person who had sounded in his ear the earliest warning
note against that odious villain, whose daily work it was to destroy
the peace of families,--even Lady Milborough had turned against him!
Because he would not follow the stupid prescription which she, with
pig-headed obstinacy, persisted in giving,--because he would not
carry his wife off to Naples,--she was ill-judging and inconsistent
enough to tell him that he was wrong! Who was then left to him but
Bozzle? Bozzle was very disagreeable. Bozzle said things, and made
suggestions to him which were as bad as pins stuck into his flesh.
But Bozzle was true to his employer, and could find out facts. Had
it not been for Bozzle, he would have known nothing of the Colonel's
journey to Devonshire. Had it not been for Bozzle, he would never
have heard of the correspondence; and, therefore, when he left
London, he gave Bozzle a roving commission; and when he went to
Paris, and from Paris onwards, over the Alps into Italy, he furnished
Bozzle with his address. At this time, in the midst of all his
misery, it never occurred to him to inquire of himself whether
it might be possible that his old friends were right, and that
he himself was wrong. From morning to night he sang to himself
melancholy silent songs of inward wailing, as to the cruelty of his
own lot in life;--and, in the mean time, he employed Bozzle to find
out for him how far that cruelty was carried.
Mr. Bozzle was, of course, convinced that the lady whom he was
employed to watch was--no better than she ought to be. That is the
usual Bozzlian language for broken vows, secrecy, intrigue, dirt, and
adultery. It was his business to obtain evidence of her guilt. There
was no question to be solved as to her innocency. The Bozzlian mind
would have regarded any such suggestion as the product of a green
softness, the possession of which would have made him quite unfit for
his profession. He was aware that ladies who are no better than they
should be are often very clever,--so clever, as to make it necessary
that the Bozzles who shall at last confound them should be first-rate
Bozzles, Bozzles quite at the top of their profession,--and,
therefore, he went about his work with great industry and much
caution. Colonel Osborne was at the present moment in Scotland.
Bozzle was sure of that. He was quite in the north of Scotland.
Bozzle had examined his map, and had found that Wick, which was the
Colonel's post-town, was very far north indeed. He had half a mind to
run down to Wick, as he was possessed by a certain honest zeal, which
made him long to do something hard and laborious; but his experience
told him that it was very easy for the Colonel to come up to the
neighbourhood of St. Diddulph's, whereas the lady could not go down
to Wick, unless she were to decide upon throwing herself into her
lover's arms,--whereby Bozzle's work would be brought to an end. He,
therefore, confined his immediate operations to St. Diddulph's.
He made acquaintance with one or two important persons in and about
Mr. Outhouse's parsonage. He became very familiar with the postman.
He arranged terms of intimacy, I am sorry to say, with the housemaid;
and, on the third journey, he made an alliance with the potboy at the
Full Moon. The potboy remembered well the fact of the child being
brought to "our 'ouse," as he called the Full Moon; and he was
enabled to say, that the same "gent as had brought the boy backards
and forrards," had since that been at the parsonage. But Bozzle
was quite quick enough to perceive that all this had nothing to do
with the Colonel. He was led, indeed, to fear that his "governor,"
as he was in the habit of calling Trevelyan in his half-spoken
soliloquies,--that his governor was not as true to him as he was to
his governor. What business had that meddling fellow Stanbury at St.
Diddulph's?--for Trevelyan had not thought it necessary to tell his
satellite that he had quarrelled with his friend. Bozzle was grieved
in his mind when he learned that Stanbury's interference was still
to be dreaded; and wrote to his governor, rather severely, to
that effect; but, when so writing, he was able to give no further
information. Facts, in such cases, will not unravel themselves
without much patience on the part of the investigators.
CHAPTER XXXIV.
PRISCILLA'S WISDOM.
[Illustration]
On the night after the dinner party in the Close, Dorothy was not the
only person in the house who laid awake thinking of what had taken
place. Miss Stanbury also was full of anxiety, and for hour after
hour could not sleep as she remembered the fruitlessness of her
efforts on behalf of her nephew and niece.
It had never occurred to her, when she had first proposed to herself
that Dorothy should become Mrs. Gibson that Dorothy herself would
have any objection to such a step in life. Her fear had been that
Dorothy would have become over-radiant with triumph at the idea of
having a husband, and going to that husband with a fortune of her
own. That Mr. Gibson might hesitate she had thought very likely.
It is thus in general that women regard the feelings, desires, and
aspirations of other women. You will hardly ever meet an elderly lady
who will not speak of her juniors as living in a state of breathless
anxiety to catch husbands. And the elder lady will speak of
the younger as though any kind of choice in such catching was
quite disregarded. The man must be a gentleman,--or, at least,
gentlemanlike,--and there must be bread. Let these things be given,
and what girl won't jump into what man's arms? Female reader, is it
not thus that the elders of your sex speak of the younger? When old
Mrs. Stanbury heard that Nora Rowley had refused Mr. Glascock, the
thing was to her unintelligible; and it was now quite unintelligible
to Miss Stanbury that Dorothy should prefer a single life to
matrimony with Mr. Gibson.
It must be acknowledged, on Aunt Stanbury's behalf, that Dorothy was
one of those yielding, hesitating, submissive young women, trusting
others, but doubting ever of themselves, as to whom it is natural
that their stronger friends should find it expedient to decide for
them. Miss Stanbury was almost justified in thinking that unless she
were to find a husband for her niece, her niece would never find
one for herself. Dorothy would drift into being an old maid, like
Priscilla, simply because she would never assert herself,--never
put her best foot foremost. Aunt Stanbury had therefore taken upon
herself to put out a foot; and having carefully found that Mr.
Gibson was "willing," had conceived that all difficulties were over.
She would be enabled to do her duty by her niece, and establish
comfortably in life, at any rate, one of her brother's children. And
now Dorothy was taking upon herself to say that she did not like
the gentleman! Such conduct was almost equal to writing for a penny
newspaper!
On the following morning, after breakfast, when Brooke Burgess was
gone out to call upon his uncle,--which he insisted upon doing
openly, and not under the rose, in spite of Miss Stanbury's great
gravity on the occasion,--there was a very serious conversation, and
poor Dorothy had found herself to be almost silenced. She did argue
for a time; but her arguments seemed, even to herself, to amount to
so little! Why shouldn't she love Mr. Gibson? That was a question
which she found it impossible to answer. And though she did not
actually yield, though she did not say that she would accept the man,
still, when she was told that three days were to be allowed to her
for consideration, and that then the offer would be made to her
in form, she felt that, as regarded the anti-Gibson interest, she
had not a leg to stand upon. Why should not such an insignificant
creature, as was she, love Mr. Gibson,--or any other man who had
bread to give her, and was in some degree like a gentleman? On that
night, she wrote the following letter to her sister:--
The Close, Tuesday.
DEAREST PRISCILLA,
I do so wish that you could be with me, so that I could
talk to you again. Aunt Stanbury is the most affectionate
and kindest friend in the world; but she has always been
so able to have her own way, because she is both clever
and good, that I find myself almost like a baby with her.
She has been talking to me again about Mr. Gibson; and it
seems that Mr. Gibson really does mean it. It is certainly
very strange; but I do think now that it is true. He is to
come on Friday. It seems very odd that it should all be
settled for him in that way; but then Aunt Stanbury is so
clever at settling things!
He sat next to me almost all the evening yesterday; but
he didn't say anything about it, except that he hoped I
agreed with him about going to church, and all that. I
suppose I do; and I am quite sure that if I were to be a
clergyman's wife, I should endeavour to do whatever my
husband thought right about religion. One ought to try
to do so, even if the clergyman is not one's husband.
Mr. Burgess has come, and he was so very amusing all the
evening, that perhaps that was the reason Mr. Gibson said
so little. Mr. Burgess is a very nice man, and I think
Aunt Stanbury is more fond of him than of anybody. He is
not at all the sort of person that I expected.
But if Mr. Gibson does come on Friday, and does really
mean it, what am I to say to him? Aunt Stanbury will be
very angry if I do not take her advice. I am quite sure
that she intends it all for my happiness; and then, of
course, she knows so much more about the world than I do.
She asks me what it is that I expect. Of course, I do not
expect anything. It is a great compliment from Mr. Gibson,
who is a clergyman, and thought well of by everybody. And
nothing could be more respectable. Aunt Stanbury says
that with the money she would give us we should be quite
comfortable; and she wants us to live in this house. She
says that there are thirty girls round Exeter who would
give their eyes for such a chance; and, looking at it
in that light, of course, it is a very great thing for
me. Only think how poor we have been! And then, dear
Priscilla, perhaps he would let me be good to you and dear
mamma!
But of course he will ask me whether I--love him; and what
am I to say? Aunt Stanbury says that I am to love him.
"Begin to love him at once," she said this morning. I
would if I could, partly for her sake, and because I do
feel that it would be so respectable. When I think of it,
it does seem such a pity that poor I should throw away
such a chance. And I must say that Mr. Gibson is very
good and most obliging; and everybody says that he has
an excellent temper, and that he is a most prudent,
well-dispositioned man. I declare, dear Priscilla, when I
think of it, I cannot bring myself to believe that such a
man should want me to be his wife.
But what ought I to do? I suppose when a girl is in love
she is very unhappy if the gentleman does not propose to
her. I am sure it would not make me at all unhappy if I
were told that Mr. Gibson had changed his mind.
Dearest Priscilla, you must write at once, because he is
to be here on Friday. Oh, dear; Friday does seem to be so
near! And I shall never know what to say to him, either
one way or the other.
Your most affectionate sister,
DOROTHY STANBURY.
P.S.--Give my kindest love to mamma; but you need not tell
her unless you think it best.
Priscilla received this letter on the Wednesday morning, and felt
herself bound to answer it on that same afternoon. Had she postponed
her reply for a day, it would still have been in Dorothy's hands
before Mr. Gibson could have come to her on the dreaded Friday
morning. But still that would hardly give her time enough to consider
the matter with any degree of deliberation after she should have been
armed with what wisdom Priscilla might be able to send her. The post
left Nuncombe Putney at three; and therefore the letter had to be
written before their early dinner.
So Priscilla went into the garden and sat herself down under an old
cedar that she might discuss the matter with herself in all its
bearings. She felt that no woman could be called upon to write a
letter that should be of more importance. The whole welfare in life
of the person who was dearest to her would probably depend upon it.
The weight upon her was so great that she thought for a while she
would take counsel with her mother; but she felt sure that her mother
would recommend the marriage; and that if she afterwards should find
herself bound to oppose it, then her mother would be a miserable
woman. There could be no use to her in taking counsel with her
mother, because her mother's mind was known to her beforehand. The
responsibility was thrown upon her, and she alone must bear it.
She tried hard to persuade herself to write at once and tell her
sister to marry the man. She knew her sister's heart so well as to be
sure that Dorothy would learn to love the man who was her husband. It
was almost impossible that Dorothy should not love those with whom
she lived. And then her sister was so well adapted to be a wife and
a mother. Her temper was so sweet, she was so pure, so unselfish, so
devoted, and so healthy withal! She was so happy when she was acting
for others; and so excellent in action when she had another one to
think for her! She was so trusting and trustworthy that any husband
would adore her! Then Priscilla walked slowly into the house, got
her prayer-book, and returning to her seat under the tree read the
marriage service. It was one o'clock when she went up-stairs to write
her letter, and it had not yet struck eleven when she first seated
herself beneath the tree. Her letter, when written, was as follows:--
Nuncombe Putney, August 25, 186--.
DEAREST DOROTHY,
I got your letter this morning, and I think it is better
to answer it at once, as the time is very short. I have
been thinking about it with all my mind, and I feel almost
awe-stricken lest I should advise you wrongly. After all,
I believe that your own dear sweet truth and honesty would
guide you better than anybody else can guide you. You may
be sure of this, that whichever way it is, I shall think
that you have done right. Dearest sister, I suppose there
can be no doubt that for most women a married life is
happier than a single one. It is always thought so, as we
may see by the anxiety of others to get married; and when
an opinion becomes general, I think that the world is most
often right. And then, my own one, I feel sure that you
are adapted both for the cares and for the joys of married
life. You would do your duty as a married woman happily,
and would be a comfort to your husband;--not a thorn in
his side, as are so many women.
But, my pet, do not let that reasoning of Aunt Stanbury's
about the thirty young girls who would give their eyes for
Mr. Gibson, have any weight with you. You should not take
him because thirty other young girls would be glad to have
him. And do not think too much of that respectability
of which you speak. I would never advise my Dolly to
marry any man unless she could be respectable in her new
position; but that alone should go for nothing. Nor should
our poverty. We shall not starve. And even if we did, that
would be but a poor excuse.
I can find no escape from this,--that you should love him
before you say that you will take him. But honest, loyal
love need not, I take it, be of that romantic kind which
people write about in novels and poetry. You need not
think him to be perfect, or the best or grandest of men.
Your heart will tell you whether he is dear to you. And
remember, Dolly, that I shall remember that love itself
must begin at some precise time. Though you had not
learned to love him when you wrote on Tuesday, you may
have begun to do so when you get this on Thursday.
If you find that you love him, then say that you will be
his wife. If your heart revolts from such a declaration
as being false;--if you cannot bring yourself to feel
that you prefer him to others as the partner of your
life,--then tell him, with thanks for his courtesy, that
it cannot be as he would have it.
Yours always and ever most affectionately,
PRISCILLA.
CHAPTER XXXV.
MR. GIBSON'S GOOD FORTUNE.
"I'll bet you half-a-crown, my lad, you're thrown over at last, like
the rest of them. There's nothing she likes so much as taking some
one up in order that she may throw him over afterwards." It was thus
that Mr. Bartholomew Burgess cautioned his nephew Brooke.
"I'll take care that she shan't break my heart, Uncle Barty. I will
go my way and she may go hers, and she may give her money to the
hospital if she pleases."
On the morning after his arrival Brooke Burgess had declared aloud
in Miss Stanbury's parlour that he was going over to the bank to see
his uncle. Now there was in this almost a breach of contract. Miss
Stanbury, when she invited the young man to Exeter, had stipulated
that there should be no intercourse between her house and the bank.
"Of course, I shall not need to know where you go or where you don't
go," she had written; "but after all that has passed there must not
be any positive intercourse between my house and the bank." And now
he had spoken of going over to C and B, as he called them, with the
utmost indifference. Miss Stanbury had looked very grave, but had
said nothing. She had determined to be on her guard, so that she
should not be driven to quarrel with Brooke if she could avoid it.
Bartholomew Burgess was a tall, thin, ill-tempered old man, as
well-known in Exeter as the cathedral, and respected after a fashion.
No one liked him. He said ill-natured things of all his neighbours,
and had never earned any reputation for doing good-natured acts. But
he had lived in Exeter for nearly seventy years, and had achieved
that sort of esteem which comes from long tenure. And he had
committed no great iniquities in the course of his fifty years of
business. The bank had never stopped payment, and he had robbed no
one. He had not swallowed up widows and orphans, and had done his
work in the firm of Cropper and Burgess after the old-fashioned safe
manner, which leads neither to riches nor to ruin. Therefore he was
respected. But he was a discontented, sour old man, who believed
himself to have been injured by all his own friends, who disliked
his own partners because they had bought that which had, at any rate,
never belonged to him;--and whose strongest passion it was to hate
Miss Stanbury of the Close.
"She's got a parson by the hand, now," said the uncle, as he
continued his caution to the nephew.
"There was a clergyman there last night."
"No doubt, and she'll play him off against you, and you against him;
and then she'll throw you both over. I know her."
"She has got a right to do what she likes with her own, Uncle Barty."
"And how did she get it? Never mind. I'm not going to set you against
her, if you're her favourite for the moment. She has a niece with her
there,--hasn't she?"
"One of her brother's daughters."
"They say she's going to make that clergyman marry her."
"What;--Mr. Gibson?"
"Yes. They tell me he was as good as engaged to another girl,--one of
the Frenches of Heavitree. And therefore dear Jemima could do nothing
better than interfere. When she has succeeded in breaking the girl's
heart--"
"Which girl's heart, Uncle Barty?"
"The girl the man was to have married; when that's done she'll throw
Gibson over. You'll see. She'll refuse to give the girl a shilling.
She took the girl's brother by the hand ever so long, and then she
threw him over. And she'll throw the girl over too, and send her back
to the place she came from. And then she'll throw you over."
"According to you, she must be the most malicious old woman that ever
was allowed to live!"
"I don't think there are many to beat her, as far as malice goes. But
you'll find out for yourself. I shouldn't be surprised if she were to
tell you before long that you were to marry the niece."
"I shouldn't think that such very hard lines either," said Brooke
Burgess.
"I've no doubt you may have her if you like," said Barty, "in spite
of Mr. Gibson. Only I should recommend you to take care and get the
money first."
When Brooke went back to the house in the Close, Miss Stanbury was
quite fussy in her silence. She would have given much to have been
told something about Barty, and, above all, to have learned what
Barty had said about herself. But she was far too proud even to
mention the old man's name of her own accord. She was quite sure that
she had been abused. She guessed, probably with tolerable accuracy,
the kind of things that had been said of her, and suggested to
herself what answer Brooke would make to such accusations. But she
had resolved to cloak it all in silence, and pretended for a while
not to remember the young man's declared intention when he left the
house. "It seems odd to me," said Brooke, "that Uncle Barty should
always live alone as he does. He must have a dreary time of it."
"I don't know anything about your Uncle Barty's manner of living."
"No;--I suppose not. You and he are not friends."
"By no means, Brooke."
"He lives there all alone in that poky bank-house, and nobody ever
goes near him. I wonder whether he has any friends in the city?"
"I really cannot tell you anything about his friends. And, to tell
you the truth, Brooke, I don't want to talk about your uncle. Of
course, you can go to see him when you please, but I'd rather you
didn't tell me of your visits afterwards."
"There is nothing in the world I hate so much as a secret," said he.
He had no intention in this of animadverting upon Miss Stanbury's
secret enmity, nor had he purposed to ask any question as to her
relations with the old man. He had alluded to his dislike of having
secrets of his own. But she misunderstood him.
"If you are anxious to know--" she said, becoming very red in the
face.
"I am not at all curious to know. You quite mistake me."
"He has chosen to believe,--or to say that he believed,--that I
wronged him in regard to his brother's will. I nursed his brother
when he was dying,--as I considered it to be my duty to do. I cannot
tell you all that story. It is too long, and too sad. Romance is very
pretty in novels, but the romance of a life is always a melancholy
matter. They are most happy who have no story to tell."
"I quite believe that."
"But your Uncle Barty chose to think,--indeed, I hardly know what
he thought. He said that the will was a will of my making. When it
was made I and his brother were apart; we were not even on speaking
terms. There had been a quarrel, and all manner of folly. I am not
very proud when I look back upon it. It is not that I think myself
better than others; but your Uncle Brooke's will was made before we
had come together again. When he was ill it was natural that I should
go to him,--after all that had passed between us. Eh, Brooke?"
"It was womanly."
"But it made no difference about the will. Mr. Bartholomew Burgess
might have known that at once, and must have known it afterwards. But
he has never acknowledged that he was wrong;--never even yet."
"He could not bring himself to do that, I should say."
"The will was no great triumph to me. I could have done without it.
As God is my judge, I would not have lifted up my little finger to
get either a part or the whole of poor Brooke's money. If I had known
that a word would have done it, I would have bitten my tongue out
before it should have been spoken." She had risen from her seat, and
was speaking with a solemnity that almost filled her listener with
awe. She was a woman short of stature; but now, as she stood over
him, she seemed to be tall and majestic. "But when the man was dead,"
she continued, "and the will was there,--the property was mine,
and I was bound in duty to exercise the privileges and bear the
responsibilities which the dead man had conferred upon me. It was
Barty, then, who sent a low attorney to me, offering me a compromise.
What had I to compromise? Compromise! No. If it was not mine by all
the right the law could give, I would sooner have starved than have
had a crust of bread out of the money." She had now clenched both her
fists, and was shaking them rapidly as she stood over him, looking
down upon him.
"Of course it was your own."
"Yes. Though they asked me to compromise, and sent messages to me to
frighten me;--both Barty and your Uncle Tom; ay, and your father too,
Brooke; they did not dare to go to law. To law, indeed! If ever there
was a good will in the world, the will of your Uncle Brooke was good.
They could talk, and malign me, and tell lies as to dates, and strive
to make my name odious in the county; but they knew that the will was
good. They did not succeed very well in what they did attempt."
"I would try to forget it all now, Aunt Stanbury."
"Forget it! How is that to be done? How can the mind forget the
history of its own life? No,--I cannot forget it. I can forgive it."
"Then why not forgive it?"
"I do. I have. Why else are you here?"
"But forgive old Uncle Barty also!"
"Has he forgiven me? Come now. If I wished to forgive him, how should
I begin? Would he be gracious if I went to him? Does he love me,
do you think,--or hate me? Uncle Barty is a good hater. It is the
best point about him. No, Brooke, we won't try the farce of a
reconciliation after a long life of enmity. Nobody would believe us,
and we should not believe each other."
"Then I certainly would not try."
"I do not mean to do so. The truth is, Brooke, you shall have it
all when I'm gone, if you don't turn against me. You won't take to
writing for penny newspapers, will you, Brooke?" As she asked the
question she put one of her hands softly on his shoulder.
"I certainly shan't offend in that way."
"And you won't be a Radical?"
"No, not a Radical."
"I mean a man to follow Beales and Bright, a republican, a
putter-down of the Church, a hater of the Throne. You won't take up
that line, will you, Brooke?"
"It isn't my way at present, Aunt Stanbury. But a man shouldn't
promise."
"Ah me! It makes me sad when I think what the country is coming
to. I'm told there are scores of members of Parliament who don't
pronounce their h's. When I was young, a member of Parliament used to
be a gentleman;--and they've taken to ordaining all manner of people.
It used to be the case that when you met a clergyman you met a
gentleman. By-the-bye, Brooke, what do you think of Mr. Gibson?"
"Mr. Gibson! To tell the truth, I haven't thought much about him."
"But you must think about him. Perhaps you haven't thought about my
niece, Dolly Stanbury?"
"I think that she's an uncommonly nice girl."
"She's not to be nice for you, young man. She's to be married to Mr.
Gibson."
"Are they engaged?"
"Well, no; but I intend that they shall be. You won't begrudge that I
should give my little savings to one of my own name?"
"You don't know me, Aunt Stanbury, if you think that I should
begrudge anything that you might do with your money."
"Dolly has been here a month or two. I think it's three months since
she came, and I do like her. She's soft and womanly, and hasn't taken
up those vile, filthy habits which almost all the girls have adopted.
Have you seen those Frenches with the things they have on their
heads?"
"I was speaking to them yesterday."
"Nasty sluts! You can see the grease on their foreheads when they try
to make their hair go back in the dirty French fashion. Dolly is not
like that;--is she?"
"She is not in the least like either of the Miss Frenches."
"And now I want her to become Mrs. Gibson. He is quite taken."
"Is he?"
"Oh dear, yes. Didn't you see him the other night at dinner and
afterwards? Of course he knows that I can give her a little bit of
money, which always goes for something, Brooke. And I do think it
would be such a nice thing for Dolly."
"And what does Dolly think about it?"
"There's the difficulty. She likes him well enough; I'm sure of that.
And she has no stuck-up ideas about herself. She isn't one of those
who think that almost nothing is good enough for them. But--"
"She has an objection."
"I don't know what it is. I sometimes think she is so bashful and
modest she doesn't like to talk of being married,--even to an old
woman like me."
"Dear me! That's not the way of the age;--is it, Aunt Stanbury?"
"It's coming to that, Brooke, that the girls will ask the men soon.
Yes,--and that they won't take a refusal either. I do believe that
Camilla French did ask Mr. Gibson."
"And what did Mr. Gibson say?"
"Ah;--I can't tell you that. He knows too well what he's about to
take her. He's to come here on Friday at eleven, and you must be out
of the way. I shall be out of the way too. But if Dolly says a word
to you before that, mind you make her understand that she ought to
accept Gibson."
"She's too good for him, according to my thinking."
"Don't you be a fool. How can any young woman be too good for
a gentleman and a clergyman? Mr. Gibson is a gentleman. Do you
know,--only you must not mention this,--that I have a kind of idea
that we could get Nuncombe Putney for him. My father had the living,
and my brother; and I should like it to go on in the family."
No opportunity came in the way of Brooke Burgess to say anything in
favour of Mr. Gibson to Dorothy Stanbury. There did come to be very
quickly a sort of intimacy between her and her aunt's favourite; but
she was one not prone to talk about her own affairs. And as to such
an affair as this,--a question as to whether she should or should not
give herself in marriage to her suitor,--she, who could not speak
of it even to her own sister without a blush, who felt confused
and almost confounded when receiving her aunt's admonitions and
instigations on the subject, would not have endured to hear Brooke
Burgess speak on the matter. Dorothy did feel that a person easier to
know than Brooke had never come in her way. She had already said as
much to him as she had spoken to Mr. Gibson in the three months that
she had made his acquaintance. They had talked about Exeter, and
about Mrs. MacHugh, and the cathedral, and Tennyson's poems, and the
London theatres, and Uncle Barty, and the family quarrel. They had
become quite confidential with each other on some matters. But on
this heavy subject of Mr. Gibson and his proposal of marriage not
a word had been said. When Brooke once mentioned Mr. Gibson on the
Thursday morning, Dorothy within a minute had taken an opportunity of
escaping from the room.
But circumstances did give him an opportunity of speaking to Mr.
Gibson. On the Wednesday afternoon both he and Mr. Gibson were
invited to drink tea at Mrs. French's house on that evening. Such
invitations at Exeter were wont to be given at short dates, and both
the gentlemen had said that they would go. Then Arabella French had
called in the Close and had asked Miss Stanbury and Dorothy. It was
well understood by Arabella that Miss Stanbury herself would not
drink tea at Heavitree. And it may be that Dorothy's company was not
in truth desired. The ladies both declined. "Don't you stay at home
for me, my dear," Miss Stanbury said to her niece. But Dorothy had
not been out without her aunt since she had been at Exeter, and
understood perfectly that it would not be wise to commence the
practice at the house of the Frenches. "Mr. Brooke is coming, Miss
Stanbury; and Mr. Gibson," Miss French said. And Miss Stanbury had
thought that there was some triumph in her tone. "Mr. Brooke can go
where he pleases, my dear," Miss Stanbury replied. "And as for Mr.
Gibson, I am not his keeper." The tone in which Miss Stanbury
spoke would have implied great imprudence, had not the two ladies
understood each other so thoroughly, and had not each known that it
was so.
There was the accustomed set of people in Mrs. French's
drawing-room;--the Crumbies, and the Wrights, and the Apjohns. And
Mrs. MacHugh came also,--knowing that there would be a rubber. "Their
naked shoulders don't hurt me," Mrs. MacHugh said, when her friend
almost scolded her for going to the house. "I'm not a young man. I
don't care what they do to themselves." "You might say as much if
they went naked altogether," Miss Stanbury had replied in anger. "If
nobody else complained, I shouldn't," said Mrs. MacHugh. Mrs. MacHugh
got her rubber; and as she had gone for her rubber, on a distinct
promise that there should be a rubber, and as there was a rubber, she
felt that she had no right to say ill-natured things. "What does it
matter to me," said Mrs. MacHugh, "how nasty she is? She's not going
to be my wife." "Ugh!" exclaimed Miss Stanbury, shaking her head both
in anger and disgust.
Camilla French was by no means so bad as she was painted by Miss
Stanbury, and Brooke Burgess rather liked her than otherwise. And it
seemed to him that Mr. Gibson did not at all dislike Arabella, and
felt no repugnance at either the lady's noddle or shoulders now that
he was removed from Miss Stanbury's influence. It was clear enough
also that Arabella had not given up the attempt, although she must
have admitted to herself that the claims of Dorothy Stanbury were
very strong. On this evening it seemed to have been specially
permitted to Arabella, who was the elder sister, to take into her own
hands the management of the case. Beholders of the game had hitherto
declared that Mr. Gibson's safety was secured by the constant
coupling of the sisters. Neither would allow the other to hunt
alone. But a common sense of the common danger had made some special
strategy necessary, and Camilla hardly spoke a word to Mr. Gibson
during the evening. Let us hope that she found some temporary
consolation in the presence of the stranger.
"I hope you are going to stay with us ever so long, Mr. Burgess?"
said Camilla.
"A month. That is ever so long;--isn't it? Why I mean to see all
Devonshire within that time. I feel already that I know Exeter
thoroughly and everybody in it."
"I'm sure we are very much flattered."
"As for you, Miss French, I've heard so much about you all my life,
that I felt that I knew you before I came here."
"Who can have spoken to you about me?"
"You forget how many relatives I have in the city. Do you think my
Uncle Barty never writes to me?"
"Not about me."
"Does he not? And do you suppose I don't hear from Miss Stanbury?"
"But she hates me. I know that."
"And do you hate her?"
"No, indeed. I've the greatest respect for her. But she is a little
odd; isn't she, now, Mr. Burgess? We all like her ever so much; and
we've known her ever so long, six or seven years,--since we were
quite young things. But she has such queer notions about girls."
"What sort of notions?"
"She'd like them all to dress just like herself; and she thinks that
they should never talk to young men. If she was here she'd say I was
flirting with you, because we're sitting together."
"But you are not; are you?"
"Of course I am not."
"I wish you would," said Brooke.
"I shouldn't know how to begin. I shouldn't indeed. I don't know what
flirting means, and I don't know who does know. When young ladies and
gentlemen go out, I suppose they are intended to talk to each other."
"But very often they don't, you know."
"I call that stupid," said Camilla. "And yet, when they do, all the
old maids say that the girls are flirting. I'll tell you one thing,
Mr. Burgess. I don't care what any old maid says about me. I always
talk to people that I like, and if they choose to call me a flirt,
they may. It's my opinion that still waters run the deepest."
"No doubt the noisy streams are very shallow," said Brooke.
"You may call me a shallow stream if you like, Mr. Burgess."
"I meant nothing of the kind."
"But what do you call Dorothy Stanbury? That's what I call still
water. She runs deep enough."
"The quietest young lady I ever saw in my life."
"Exactly. So quiet, but so--clever. What do you think of Mr. Gibson?"
"Everybody is asking me what I think of Mr. Gibson."
"You know what they say. They say he is to marry Dorothy Stanbury.
Poor man! I don't think his own consent has ever been asked
yet;--but, nevertheless, it's settled."
"Just at present he seems to me to be,--what shall I say?--I oughtn't
to say flirting with your sister; ought I?"
"Miss Stanbury would say so if she were here, no doubt. But the fact
is, Mr. Burgess, we've known him almost since we were infants, and
of course we take an interest in his welfare. There has never been
anything more than that. Arabella is nothing more to him than I am.
Once, indeed--; but, however--; that does not signify. It would be
nothing to us, if he really liked Dorothy Stanbury. But as far as we
can see,--and we do see a good deal of him,--there is no such feeling
on his part. Of course we haven't asked. We should not think of such
a thing. Mr. Gibson may do just as he likes for us. But I am not
quite sure that Dorothy Stanbury is just the girl that would make
him a good wife. Of course when you've known a person seven or eight
years you do get anxious about his happiness. Do you know, we think
her,--perhaps a little,--sly."
In the meantime, Mr. Gibson was completely subject to the individual
charms of Arabella. Camilla had been quite correct in a part of
her description of their intimacy. She and her sister had known Mr.
Gibson for seven or eight years; but nevertheless the intimacy could
not with truth be said to have commenced during the infancy of the
young ladies, even if the word were used in its legal sense. Seven or
eight years, however, is a long acquaintance; and there was, perhaps,
something of a real grievance in this Stanbury intervention. If it
be a recognised fact in society that young ladies are in want of
husbands, and that an effort on their part towards matrimony is not
altogether impossible, it must be recognised also that failure will
be disagreeable, and interference regarded with animosity. Miss
Stanbury the elder was undoubtedly interfering between Mr. Gibson
and the Frenches; and it is neither manly nor womanly to submit
to interference with one's dearest prospects. It may, perhaps, be
admitted that the Miss Frenches had shown too much open ardour in
their pursuit of Mr. Gibson. Perhaps there should have been no ardour
and no pursuit. It may be that the theory of womanhood is right which
forbids to women any such attempts,--which teaches them that they
must ever be pursued, never the pursuers. As to that there shall be
no discourse at present. But it must be granted that whenever the
pursuit has been attempted, it is not in human nature to abandon it
without an effort. That the French girls should be very angry with
Miss Stanbury, that they should put their heads together with the
intention of thwarting her, that they should think evil things of
poor Dorothy, that they should half despise Mr. Gibson, and yet
resolve to keep their hold upon him as a chattel and a thing of value
that was almost their own, was not perhaps much to their discredit.
"You are a good deal at the house in the Close now," said Arabella,
in her lowest voice,--in a voice so low that it was almost
melancholy.
"Well; yes. Miss Stanbury, you know, has always been a staunch friend
of mine. And she takes an interest in my little church." People say
that girls are sly; but men can be sly, too, sometimes.
"It seems that she has taken you so much away from us, Mr. Gibson."
"I don't know why you should say that, Miss French."
"Perhaps I am wrong. One is apt to be sensitive about one's friends.
We seem to have known you so well. There is nobody else in Exeter
that mamma regards as she does you. But, of course, if you are happy
with Miss Stanbury that is everything."
"I am speaking of the old lady," said Mr. Gibson, who, in spite of
his slyness, was here thrown a little off his guard.
"And I am speaking of the old lady too," said Arabella. "Of whom else
should I be speaking?"
"No;--of course not."
"Of course," continued Arabella, "I hear what people say about the
niece. One cannot help what one hears, you know, Mr. Gibson; but I
don't believe that, I can assure you." As she said this, she looked
into his face, as though waiting for an answer; but Mr. Gibson had no
answer ready. Then Arabella told herself that if anything was to be
done it must be done at once. What use was there in beating round
the bush, when the only chance of getting the game was to be had by
dashing at once into the thicket. "I own I should be glad," she said,
turning her eyes away from him, "if I could hear from your own mouth
that it is not true."
Mr. Gibson's position was one not to be envied. Were he willing to
tell the very secrets of his soul to Miss French with the utmost
candour, he could not answer her question either one way or the
other, and he was not willing to tell her any of his secrets. It was
certainly the fact, too, that there had been tender passages between
him and Arabella. Now, when there have been such passages, and the
gentleman is cross-examined by the lady, as Mr. Gibson was being
cross-examined at the present moment,--the gentleman usually teaches
himself to think that a little falsehood is permissible. A gentleman
can hardly tell a lady that he has become tired of her, and has
changed his mind. He feels the matter, perhaps, more keenly even than
she does; and though, at all other times he may be a very Paladin in
the cause of truth, in such strait as this he does allow himself some
latitude.
"You are only joking, of course," he said.
"Indeed, I am not joking. I can assure you, Mr. Gibson, that the
welfare of the friends whom I really love can never be a matter of
joke to me. Mrs. Crumbie says that you positively are engaged to
marry Dorothy Stanbury."
"What does Mrs. Crumbie know about it?"
"I dare say, nothing. It is not so;--is it?"
"Certainly not."
"And there is nothing in it;--is there?"
"I wonder why people make these reports," said Mr. Gibson,
prevaricating.
[Illustration: "I wonder why people make these reports."]
"It is a fabrication from beginning to end then," said Arabella,
pressing the matter quite home. At this time she was very close to
him, and though her words were severe, the glance from her eyes was
soft. And the scent from her hair was not objectionable to him, as
it would have been to Miss Stanbury. And the mode of her head-dress
was not displeasing to him. And the folds of her dress, as they fell
across his knee, were welcome to his feelings. He knew that he was as
one under temptation, but he was not strong enough to bid the tempter
avaunt. "Say that it is so, Mr. Gibson!"
"Of course, it is not so," said Mr. Gibson--lying.
"I am so glad. For of course, Mr. Gibson, when we heard it we thought
a great deal about it. A man's happiness depends so much on whom he
marries;--doesn't it? And a clergyman's more than anybody else's. And
we didn't think she was quite the sort of woman that you would like.
You see, she has had no advantages, poor thing. She has been shut up
in a little country cottage all her life;--just a labourer's hovel,
no more;--and though it wasn't her fault, of course, and we all
pitied her, and were so glad when Miss Stanbury brought her to
the Close;--still, you know, though one was very glad of her as
an acquaintance, yet, you know, as a wife,--and for such a dear,
dear friend--" She went on, and said many other things with equal
enthusiasm, and then wiped her eyes, and then smiled and laughed.
After that she declared that she was quite happy,--so happy; and so
she left him. The poor man, after the falsehood had been extracted
from him, said nothing more; but sat, in patience, listening to the
raptures and enthusiasm of his friend. He knew that he had disgraced
himself, and he knew also that his disgrace would be known, if
Dorothy Stanbury should accept his offer on the morrow. And yet how
hardly he had been used! What answer could he have given compatible
both with the truth and with his own personal dignity?
About half an hour afterwards he was walking back to Exeter with
Brooke Burgess, and then Brooke did ask him a question or two.
"Nice girls those Frenches, I think," said Brooke.
"Very nice," said Mr. Gibson.
"How Miss Stanbury does hate them," says Brooke.
"Not hate them, I hope," said Mr. Gibson.
"She doesn't love them;--does she?"
"Well, as for love;--yes; in one sense,--I hope she does. Miss
Stanbury, you know, is a woman who expresses herself strongly."
"What would she say, if she were told that you and I were going to
marry those two girls? We are both favourites, you know."
"Dear me! What a very odd supposition," said Mr. Gibson.
"For my part, I don't think I shall," said Brooke.
"I don't suppose I shall either," said Mr. Gibson, with a gravity
which was intended to convey some smattering of rebuke.
"A fellow might do worse, you know," said Brooke. "For my part, I
rather like girls with chignons, and all that sort of get-up. But the
worst of it is, one can't marry two at a time."
"That would be bigamy," said Mr. Gibson.
"Just so," said Brooke.
CHAPTER XXXVI.
MISS STANBURY'S WRATH.
Punctually at eleven o'clock on the Friday morning Mr. Gibson
knocked at the door of the house in the Close. The reader must not
imagine that he had ever wavered in his intention with regard to
Dorothy Stanbury, because he had been driven into a corner by the
pertinacious ingenuity of Miss French. He never for a moment thought
of being false to Miss Stanbury the elder. Falseness of that nature
would have been ruinous to him,--would have made him a marked man in
the city all his days, and would probably have reached even to the
bishop's ears. He was neither bad enough, nor audacious enough, nor
foolish enough, for such perjury as that. And, moreover, though the
wiles of Arabella had been potent with him, he very much preferred
Dorothy Stanbury. Seven years of flirtation with a young lady is more
trying to the affection than any duration of matrimony. Arabella had
managed to awaken something of the old glow, but Mr. Gibson, as soon
as he was alone, turned from her mentally in disgust. No! Whatever
little trouble there might be in his way, it was clearly his duty
to marry Dorothy Stanbury. She had the sweetest temper in the world,
and blushed with the prettiest blush! She would have, moreover, two
thousand pounds on the day she married, and there was no saying what
other and greater pecuniary advantages might follow. His mind was
quite made up; and during the whole morning he had been endeavouring
to drive all disagreeable reminiscences of Miss French from his
memory, and to arrange the words with which he would make his offer
to Dorothy. He was aware that he need not be very particular about
his words, as Dorothy, from the bashfulness of her nature, would be
no judge of eloquence at such a time. But still, for his own sake,
there should be some form of expression, some propriety of diction.
Before eleven o'clock he had it all by heart, and had nearly freed
himself from the uneasiness of his falsehood to Arabella. He had
given much serious thought to the matter, and had quite resolved that
he was right in his purpose, and that he could marry Dorothy with a
pure conscience, and with a true promise of a husband's love. "Dear
Dolly!" he said to himself, with something of enthusiasm as he walked
across the Close. And he looked up to the house as he came to it.
There was to be his future home. There was not one of the prebends
who had a better house. And there was a dove-like softness about
Dorothy's eyes, and a winning obedience in her manner, that were
charming. His lines had fallen to him in very pleasant places.
Yes;--he would go up to her, and take her at once by the hand, and
ask her whether she would be his, now and for ever. He would not
let go her hand till he had brought her so close to him that she
could hide her blushes on his shoulder. The whole thing had been so
well conceived, had become so clear to his mind, that he felt no
hesitation or embarrassment as he knocked at the door. Arabella
French would, no doubt, hear of it soon. Well;--she must hear of it.
After all she could do him no injury.
He was shown up at once into the drawing-room, and there he
found--Miss Stanbury the elder. "Oh, Mr. Gibson!" she said at once.
"Is anything the matter with--dear Dorothy?"
"She is the most obstinate, pig-headed young woman I ever came across
since the world began."
"You don't say so! But what is it, Miss Stanbury?"
"What is it? Why just this. Nothing on earth that I can say to her
will induce her to come down and speak to you."
"Have I offended her?"
"Offended a fiddlestick! Offence indeed! An offer from an honest man,
with her friends' approval, and a fortune at her back, as though she
had been born with a gold spoon in her mouth! And she tells me that
she can't, and won't, and wouldn't, and shouldn't, as though I were
asking her to walk the streets. I declare I don't know what has come
to the young women;--or what it is they want. One would have thought
that butter wouldn't melt in her mouth."
"But what is the reason, Miss Stanbury?"
"Oh, reason! You don't suppose people give reasons in these days.
What reason have they when they dress themselves up with bandboxes on
their sconces? Just simply the old reason--'I do not like thee, Dr.
Fell;--why I cannot tell.'"
"May I not see her myself, Miss Stanbury?"
"I can't make her come down-stairs to you. I've been at her the whole
morning, Mr. Gibson. Ever since daylight, pretty nearly. She came
into my room before I was up, and told me she had made up her mind.
I've coaxed, and scolded, and threatened, and cried;--but if she'd
been a milestone it couldn't have been of less use. I told her she
might go back to Nuncombe, and she just went off to pack up."
"But she's not to go?"
"How can I say what such a young woman will do? I'm never allowed a
way of my own for a moment. There's Brooke Burgess been scolding me
at that rate I didn't know whether I stood on my head or my heels.
And I don't know now."
Then there was a pause, while Mr. Gibson was endeavouring to decide
what would now be his best course of action. "Don't you think she'll
ever come round, Miss Stanbury?"
"I don't think she'll ever come any way that anybody wants her to
come, Mr. Gibson."
"I didn't think she was at all like that," said Mr. Gibson, almost in
tears.
"No,--nor anybody else. I've been seeing it come all the same. It's
just the Stanbury perversity. If I'd wanted to keep her by herself,
to take care of me, and had set my back up at her if she spoke to
a man, and made her understand that she wasn't to think of getting
married, she'd have been making eyes at every man that came into the
house. It's just what one gets for going out of one's way. I did
think she'd be so happy, Mr. Gibson, living here as your wife. She
and I between us could have managed for you so nicely."
Mr. Gibson was silent for a minute or two, during which he walked up
and down the room,--contemplating, no doubt, the picture of married
life which Miss Stanbury had painted for him,--a picture which, as
it seemed, was not to be realised. "And what had I better do, Miss
Stanbury?" he asked at last.
"Do! I don't know what you're to do. I'm groom enough to bring a mare
to water, but I can't make her drink."
"Will waiting be any good?"
"How can I say? I'll tell you one thing not to do. Don't go and
philander with those girls at Heavitree. It's my belief that Dorothy
has been thinking of them. People talk to her, of course."
"I wish people would hold their tongues. People are so indiscreet.
People don't know how much harm they may do."
"You've given them some excuse, you know, Mr. Gibson."
This was very ill-natured, and was felt by Mr. Gibson to be so rude,
that he almost turned upon his patroness in anger. He had known Dolly
for not more than three months, and had devoted himself to her, to
the great anger of his older friends. He had come this morning true
to his appointment, expecting that others would keep their promises
to him, as he was ready to keep those which he had made;--and now he
was told that it was his fault! "I do think that's rather hard, Miss
Stanbury," he said.
"So you have," said she;--"nasty, slatternly girls, without an idea
inside their noddles. But it's no use your scolding me."
"I didn't mean to scold, Miss Stanbury."
"I've done all that I could."
"And you think she won't see me for a minute?"
"She says she won't. I can't bid Martha carry her down."
"Then, perhaps, I had better leave you for the present," said Mr.
Gibson, after another pause. So he went, a melancholy, blighted man.
Leaving the Close, he passed through into Southernhay, and walked
across by the new streets towards the Heavitree road. He had no
design in taking this route, but he went on till he came in sight
of the house in which Mrs. French lived. As he walked slowly by it,
he looked up at the windows, and something of a feeling of romance
came across his heart. Were his young affections buried there, or
were they not? And, if so, with which of those fair girls were
they buried? For the last two years, up to last night, Camilla had
certainly been in the ascendant. But Arabella was a sweet young
woman; and there had been a time,--when those tender passages were
going on,--in which he had thought that no young woman ever was so
sweet. A period of romance, an era of enthusiasm, a short-lived,
delicious holiday of hot-tongued insanity had been permitted to him
in his youth;--but all that was now over. And yet here he was, with
three strings to his bow,--so he told himself,--and he had not as yet
settled for himself the great business of matrimony. He was inclined
to think, as he walked on, that he would walk his life alone, an
active, useful, but a melancholy man. After such experiences as
his, how should he ever again speak of his heart to a woman? During
this walk, his mind recurred frequently to Dorothy Stanbury; and,
doubtless, he thought that he had often spoken of his heart to her.
He was back at his lodgings before three, at which hour he ate an
early dinner, and then took the afternoon cathedral service at four.
The evening he spent at home, thinking of the romance of his early
days. What would Miss Stanbury have said, had she seen him in his
easy chair behind the "Exeter Argus,"--with a pipe in his mouth?
In the meantime, there was an uncomfortable scene in progress between
Dorothy and her aunt. Brooke Burgess, as desired, had left the house
before eleven, having taken upon himself, when consulted, to say in
the mildest terms, that he thought that, in general, young women
should not be asked to marry if they did not like to;--which opinion
had been so galling to Miss Stanbury that she had declared that he
had so scolded her, that she did not know whether she was standing
on her head or her heels. As soon as Mr. Gibson left her, she sat
herself down, and fairly cried. She had ardently desired this thing,
and had allowed herself to think of her desire as of one that would
certainly be accomplished. Dorothy would have been so happy as the
wife of a clergyman! Miss Stanbury's standard for men and women was
not high. She did not expect others to be as self-sacrificing, as
charitable, and as good as herself. It was not that she gave to
herself credit for such virtues; but she thought of herself as one
who, from the peculiar circumstances of life, was bound to do much
for others. There was no end to her doing good for others,--if only
the others would allow themselves to be governed by her. She did not
think that Mr. Gibson was a great divine; but she perceived that he
was a clergyman, living decently,--of that secret pipe Miss Stanbury
knew nothing,--doing his duty punctually, and, as she thought, very
much in want of a wife. Then there was her niece, Dolly,--soft,
pretty, feminine, without a shilling, and much in want of some one
to comfort and take care of her. What could be better than such a
marriage! And the overthrow to the girls with the big chignons would
be so complete! She had set her mind upon it, and now Dorothy said
that it couldn't, and it wouldn't, and it shouldn't be accomplished!
She was to be thrown over by this chit of a girl, as she had been
thrown over by the girl's brother! And, when she complained, the girl
simply offered to go away!
At about twelve Dorothy came creeping down into the room in which her
aunt was sitting, and pretended to occupy herself on some piece of
work. For a considerable time,--for three minutes perhaps,--Miss
Stanbury did not speak. She had resolved that she would not speak
to her niece again,--at least, not for that day. She would let the
ungrateful girl know how miserable she had been made. But at the
close of the three minutes her patience was exhausted. "What are you
doing there?" she said.
"I am quilting your cap, Aunt Stanbury."
"Put it down. You shan't do anything for me. I won't have you touch
my things any more. I don't like pretended service."
"It is not pretended, Aunt Stanbury."
"I say it is pretended. Why did you pretend to me that you would have
him when you had made up your mind against it all the time?"
"But I hadn't--made up my mind."
"If you had so much doubt about it, you might have done what I wanted
you."
"I couldn't, Aunt Stanbury."
"You mean you wouldn't. I wonder what it is you do expect."
"I don't expect anything, Aunt Stanbury."
"No; and I don't expect anything. What an old fool I am ever to look
for any comfort. Why should I think that anybody would care for me?"
"Indeed, I do care for you."
"In what sort of way do you show it? You're just like your brother
Hugh. I've disgraced myself to that man,--promising what I could not
perform. I declare it makes me sick when I think of it. Why did you
not tell me at once?" Dorothy said nothing further, but sat with the
cap on her lap. She did not dare to resume her needle, and she did
not like to put the cap aside, as by doing so it would seem as though
she had accepted her aunt's prohibition against her work. For half
an hour she sat thus, during which time Miss Stanbury dropped asleep.
She woke with a start, and began to scold again. "What's the good of
sitting there all the day, with your hands before you, doing
nothing?"
But Dorothy had been very busy. She had been making up her mind,
and had determined to communicate her resolution to her aunt. "Dear
aunt," she said, "I have been thinking of something."
"It's too late now," said Miss Stanbury.
"I see I've made you very unhappy."
"Of course you have."
"And you think that I'm ungrateful. I'm not ungrateful, and I don't
think that Hugh is."
"Never mind Hugh."
"Only because it seems so hard that you should take so much trouble
about us, and that then there should be so much vexation."
"I find it very hard."
"So I think that I'd better go back to Nuncombe."
"That's what you call gratitude."
"I don't like to stay here and make you unhappy. I can't think that I
ought to have done what you asked me, because I did not feel at all
in that way about Mr. Gibson. But as I have only disappointed you,
it will be better that I should go home. I have been very happy
here,--very."
"Bother!" exclaimed Miss Stanbury.
"I have,--and I do love you, though you won't believe it. But I am
sure I oughtn't to remain to make you unhappy. I shall never forget
all that you have done for me; and though you call me ungrateful, I
am not. But I know that I ought not to stay, as I cannot do what you
wish. So, if you please, I will go back to Nuncombe."
"You'll not do anything of the kind," said Miss Stanbury.
"But it will be better."
"Yes, of course; no doubt. I suppose you're tired of us all."
"It is not that I'm tired, Aunt Stanbury. It isn't that at all."
Dorothy had now become red up to the roots of her hair, and her eyes
were full of tears. "But I cannot stay where people think that I
am ungrateful. If you please, Aunt Stanbury, I will go." Then, of
course, there was a compromise. Dorothy did at last consent to remain
in the Close, but only on condition that she should be forgiven for
her sin in reference to Mr. Gibson, and be permitted to go on with
her aunt's cap.
CHAPTER XXXVII.
MONT CENIS.
[Illustration]
The night had been fine and warm, and it was now noon on a fine
September day when the train from Paris reached St. Michael, on the
route to Italy by Mont Cenis,--as all the world knows St. Michael
is, or was a year or two back, the end of railway travelling in
that direction. At the time Mr. Fell's grand project of carrying a
line of rails over the top of the mountain was only in preparation,
and the journey from St. Michael to Susa was still made by the
diligences,--those dear old continental coaches which are now nearly
as extinct as our own, but which did not deserve death so fully as
did our abominable vehicles. The coupé of a diligence, or better
still, the banquette, was a luxurious mode of travelling as compared
with anything that our coaches offered. There used indeed to be a
certain halo of glory round the occupant of the box of a mail-coach.
The man who had secured that seat was supposed to know something
about the world, and to be such a one that the passengers sitting
behind him would be proud to be allowed to talk to him. But the
prestige of the position was greater than the comfort. A night on
the box of a mail-coach was but a bad time, and a night inside a
mail-coach was a night in purgatory. Whereas a seat up above, on the
banquette of a diligence passing over the Alps, with room for the
feet, and support for the back, with plenty of rugs and plenty of
tobacco, used to be on the Mont Cenis, and still is on some other
mountain passes, a very comfortable mode of seeing a mountain route.
For those desirous of occupying the coupé, or the three front seats
of the body of the vehicle, it must be admitted that difficulties
frequently arose; and that such difficulties were very common at
St. Michael. There would be two or three of those enormous vehicles
preparing to start for the mountain, whereas it would appear that
twelve or fifteen passengers had come down from Paris armed with
tickets assuring them that this preferable mode of travelling should
be theirs. And then assertions would be made, somewhat recklessly,
by the officials, to the effect that all the diligence was coupé.
It would generally be the case that some middle-aged Englishman who
could not speak French would go to the wall, together with his wife.
Middle-aged Englishmen with their wives, who can't speak French, can
nevertheless be very angry, and threaten loudly, when they suppose
themselves to be ill-treated. A middle-aged Englishman, though he
can't speak a word of French, won't believe a French official who
tells him that the diligence is all coupé, when he finds himself
with his unfortunate partner in a roundabout place behind with two
priests, a dirty man who looks like a brigand, a sick maid-servant,
and three agricultural labourers. The attempt, however, was
frequently made, and thus there used to be occasionally a little
noise round the bureau at St. Michael.
On the morning of which we are speaking two Englishmen had just made
good their claim, each independently of the other, each without
having heard or seen the other, when two American ladies, coming up
very tardily, endeavoured to prove their rights. The ladies were
without other companions, and were not fluent with their French,
but were clearly entitled to their seats. They were told that the
conveyance was all coupé, but perversely would not believe the
statement. The official shrugged his shoulders and signified that
his ultimatum had been pronounced. What can an official do in such
circumstances, when more coupé passengers are sent to him than the
coupés at his command will hold? "But we have paid for the coupé,"
said the elder American lady, with considerable indignation, though
her French was imperfect;--for American ladies understand their
rights. "Bah; yes; you have paid and you shall go. What would you
have?" "We would have what we have paid for," said the American lady.
Then the official rose from his stool and shrugged his shoulders
again, and made a motion with both his hands, intended to shew that
the thing was finished. "It is a robbery," said the elder American
lady to the younger. "I should not mind, only you are so unwell."
"It will not kill me, I dare say," said the younger. Then one of
the English gentlemen declared that his place was very much at the
service of the invalid,--and the other Englishman declared that his
also was at the service of the invalid's companion. Then, and not
till then, the two men recognised each other. One was Mr. Glascock,
on his way to Naples, and the other was Mr. Trevelyan, on his
way,--he knew not whither.
Upon this, of course, they spoke to each other. In London they had
been well acquainted, each having been an intimate guest at the house
of old Lady Milborough. And each knew something of the other's recent
history. Mr. Glascock was aware, as was all the world, that Trevelyan
had quarrelled with his wife; and Trevelyan was aware that Mr.
Glascock had been spoken of as a suitor to his own sister-in-law. Of
that visit which Mr. Glascock had made to Nuncombe Putney, and of
the manner in which Nora had behaved to her lover, Trevelyan knew
nothing. Their greetings spoken, their first topic of conversation
was, of course, the injury proposed to be done to the American
ladies, and which would now fall upon them. They went into the
waiting-room together, and during such toilet as they could make
there, grumbled furiously. They would take post horses over the
mountain, not from any love of solitary grandeur, but in order that
they might make the company pay for its iniquity. But it was soon
apparent to them that they themselves had no ground of complaint, and
as everybody was very civil, and as a seat in the banquette over the
heads of the American ladies was provided for them, and as the man
from the bureau came and apologised, they consented to be pacified,
and ended, of course, by tipping half-a-dozen of the servants about
the yard. Mr. Glascock had a man of his own with him, who was very
nearly being put on to the same seat with his master as an extra
civility; but this inconvenience was at last avoided. Having settled
these little difficulties, they went into breakfast in the buffet.
There could be no better breakfast than used to be given in the
buffet at the railway terminus at St. Michael. The company might
occasionally be led into errors about that question of coupé seats,
but in reference to their provisions, they set an example which might
be of great use to us here in England. It is probably the case that
breakfasts for travellers are not so frequently needed here as they
are on the Continent; but, still, there is often to be found a crowd
of people ready to eat if only the wherewithal were there. We are
often told in our newspapers that England is disgraced by this and
by that; by the unreadiness of our army, by the unfitness of our
navy, by the irrationality of our laws, by the immobility of our
prejudices, and what not; but the real disgrace of England is the
railway sandwich,--that whited sepulchre, fair enough outside, but
so meagre, poor, and spiritless within, such a thing of shreds and
parings, such a dab of food, telling us that the poor bone whence it
was scraped had been made utterly bare before it was sent into the
kitchen for the soup pot. In France one does get food at the railway
stations, and at St. Michael the breakfast was unexceptional.
Our two friends seated themselves near to the American ladies, and
were, of course, thanked for their politeness. American women are
taught by the habits of their country to think that men should give
way to them more absolutely than is in accordance with the practices
of life in Europe. A seat in a public conveyance in the States, when
merely occupied by a man, used to be regarded by any woman as being
at her service as completely as though it were vacant. One woman
indicating a place to another would point with equal freedom to a man
or a space. It is said that this is a little altered now, and that
European views on this subject are spreading themselves. Our two
ladies, however, who were pretty, clever-looking, and attractive even
after the night's journey, were manifestly more impressed with the
villainy of the French officials than they were with the kindness of
their English neighbours.
"And nothing can be done to punish them?" said the younger of them to
Mr. Glascock.
"Nothing, I should think," said he. "Nothing will, at any rate."
"And you will not get back your money?" said the elder,--who, though
the elder, was probably not much above twenty.
"Well;--no. Time is money, they say. It would take thrice the value
of the time in money, and then one would probably fail. They have
done very well for us, and I suppose there are difficulties."
"It couldn't have taken place in our country," said the younger lady.
"All the same, we are very much obliged to you. It would not have
been nice for us to have to go up into the banquette."
"They would have put you into the interior."
"And that would have been worse. I hate being put anywhere,--as if I
were a sheep. It seems so odd to us, that you here should be all so
tame."
"Do you mean the English or the French, or the world in general on
this side of the Atlantic?"
"We mean Europeans," said the younger lady, who was better after
her breakfast. "But then we think that the French have something
of compensation, in their manners, and their ways of life, their
climate, the beauty of their cities, and their general management of
things."
"They are very great in many ways, no doubt," said Mr. Glascock.
"They do understand living better than you do," said the elder.
"Everything is so much brighter with them," said the younger.
"They contrive to give a grace to every-day existence," said the
elder.
"There is such a welcome among them for strangers," said the younger.
"Particularly in reference to places taken in the coupé," said
Trevelyan, who had hardly spoken before.
"Ah, that is an affair of honesty," said the elder. "If we want
honesty, I believe we must go back to the stars and stripes."
Mr. Glascock looked up from his plate almost aghast. He said nothing,
however, but called for the waiter, and paid for his breakfast.
Nevertheless, there was a considerable amount of travelling
friendship engendered between the ladies and our two friends
before the diligence had left the railway yard. They were two Miss
Spaldings, going on to Florence, at which place they had an uncle,
who was minister from the States to the kingdom of Italy; and they
were not at all unwilling to receive such little civilities as
gentlemen can give to ladies when travelling. The whole party
intended to sleep at Turin that night, and they were altogether on
good terms with each other when they started on the journey from St.
Michael.
"Clever women those," said Mr. Glascock, as soon as they had arranged
their legs and arms in the banquette.
"Yes, indeed."
"American women always are clever,--and are almost always pretty."
"I do not like them," said Trevelyan,--who in these days was in a
mood to like nothing. "They are exigeant;--and then they are so hard.
They want the weakness that a woman ought to have."
"That comes from what they would call your insular prejudice. We
are accustomed to less self-assertion on the part of women than is
customary with them. We prefer women to rule us by seeming to yield.
In the States, as I take it, the women never yield, and the men have
to fight their own battles with other tactics."
"I don't know what their tactics are."
"They keep their distance. The men live much by themselves, as though
they knew they would not have a chance in the presence of their wives
and daughters. Nevertheless they don't manage these things badly. You
very rarely hear of an American being separated from his wife."
The words were no sooner out of his mouth, than Mr. Glascock knew,
and remembered, and felt what he had said. There are occasions in
which a man sins so deeply against fitness and the circumstances
of the hour, that it becomes impossible for him to slur over his
sin as though it had not been committed. There are certain little
peccadilloes in society which one can manage to throw behind
one,--perhaps with some difficulty, and awkwardness; but still they
are put aside, and conversation goes on, though with a hitch. But
there are graver offences, the gravity of which strikes the offender
so seriously that it becomes impossible for him to seem even to
ignore his own iniquity. Ashes must be eaten publicly, and sackcloth
worn before the eyes of men. It was so now with poor Mr. Glascock. He
thought about it for a moment,--whether or no it was possible that
he should continue his remarks about the American ladies, without
betraying his own consciousness of the thing that he had done; and
he found that it was quite impossible. He knew that he was red up to
his hairs, and hot, and that his blood tingled. His blushes, indeed,
would not be seen in the seclusion of the banquette; but he could not
overcome the heat and the tingling. There was silence for about three
minutes, and then he felt that it would be best for him to confess
his own fault. "Trevelyan," he said, "I am very sorry for the
allusion that I made. I ought to have been less awkward, and I beg
your pardon."
"It does not matter," said Trevelyan. "Of course I know that
everybody is talking of it behind my back. I am not to expect that
people will be silent because I am unhappy."
"Nevertheless I beg your pardon," said the other.
There was but little further conversation between them till they
reached Lanslebourg, at the foot of the mountain, at which place they
occupied themselves with getting coffee for the two American ladies.
The Miss Spaldings took their coffee almost with as much grace as
though it had been handed to them by Frenchmen. And indeed they were
very gracious,--as is the nature of American ladies in spite of that
hardness of which Trevelyan had complained. They assume an intimacy
readily, with no appearance of impropriety, and are at their ease
easily. When, therefore, they were handed out of their carriage by
Mr. Glascock, the bystanders at Lanslebourg might have thought that
the whole party had been travelling together from New York. "What
should we have done if you hadn't taken pity on us?" said the elder
lady. "I don't think we could have climbed up into that high place;
and look at the crowd that have come out of the interior. A man has
some advantages after all."
"I am quite in the dark as to what they are," said Mr. Glascock.
"He can give up his place to a lady, and can climb up into a
banquette."
"And he can be a member of Congress," said the younger. "I'd sooner
be senator from Massachusetts than be the Queen of England."
"So would I," said Mr. Glascock. "I'm glad we can agree about one
thing."
The two gentlemen agreed to walk up the mountain together, and with
some trouble induced the conductor to permit them to do so. Why
conductors of diligences should object to such relief to their horses
the ordinary Englishman can hardly understand. But in truth they
feel so deeply the responsibility which attaches itself to their
shepherding of their sheep, that they are always fearing lest some
poor lamb should go astray on the mountain side. And though the road
be broad and very plainly marked, the conductor never feels secure
that his passenger will find his way safely to the summit. He likes
to know that each of his flock is in his right place, and disapproves
altogether of an erratic spirit. But Mr. Glascock at last prevailed,
and the two men started together up the mountain. When the permission
has been once obtained the walker may be sure that his guide and
shepherd will not desert him.
"Of course I know," said Trevelyan, when the third twist up the
mountain had been overcome, "that people talk about me and my wife.
It is a part of the punishment for the mistake that one makes."
"It is a sad affair altogether."
"The saddest in the world. Lady Milborough has no doubt spoken to you
about it."
"Well;--yes; she has."
"How could she help it? I am not such a fool as to suppose that
people are to hold their tongues about me more than they do about
others. Intimate as she is with you, of course she has spoken to
you."
"I was in hopes that something might have been done by this time."
"Nothing has been done. Sometimes I think I shall put an end to
myself, it makes me so wretched."
"Then why don't you agree to forget and forgive and have done with
it?"
"That is so easily said;--so easily said." After this they walked on
in silence for a considerable distance. Mr. Glascock was not anxious
to talk about Trevelyan's wife, but he did wish to ask a question or
two about Mrs. Trevelyan's sister, if only this could be done without
telling too much of his own secret. "There's nothing I think so
grand, as walking up a mountain," he said after a while.
"It's all very well," said Trevelyan, in a tone which seemed to
imply that to him in his present miserable condition all recreations,
exercises, and occupations were mere leather and prunella.
"I don't mean, you know, in the Alpine Club way," said Glascock. "I'm
too old and too stiff for that. But when the path is good, and the
air not too cold, and when it is neither snowing, nor thawing, nor
raining, and when the sun isn't hot, and you've got plenty of time,
and know that you can stop any moment you like and be pushed up by a
carriage, I do think walking up a mountain is very fine,--if you've
got proper shoes, and a good stick, and it isn't too soon after
dinner. There's nothing like the air of Alps." And Mr. Glascock
renewed his pace, and stretched himself against the hill at the rate
of three miles an hour.
"I used to be very fond of Switzerland," said Trevelyan, "but I don't
care about it now. My eye has lost all its taste."
"It isn't the eye," said Glascock.
"Well; no. The truth is that when one is absolutely unhappy one
cannot revel in the imagination. I don't believe in the miseries of
poets."
"I think myself," said Glascock, "that a poet should have a good
digestion. By-the-bye, Mrs. Trevelyan and her sister went down to
Nuncombe Putney, in Devonshire."
"They did go there."
"Have they moved since? A very pretty place is Nuncombe Putney."
"You have been there then?"
Mr. Glascock blushed again. He was certainly an awkward man, saying
things that he ought not to say, and telling secrets which ought not
to have been told. "Well;--yes. I have been there,--as it happens."
"Just lately do you mean?"
Mr. Glascock paused, hoping to find his way out of the scrape, but
soon perceived that there was no way out. He could not lie, even
in an affair of love, and was altogether destitute of those honest
subterfuges,--subterfuges honest in such position,--of which a dozen
would have been at once at the command of any woman, and with one
of which, sufficient for the moment, most men would have been able
to arm themselves. "Indeed, yes," he said, almost stammering as
he spoke. "It was lately;--since your wife went there." Trevelyan,
though he had been told of the possibility of Mr. Glascock's
courtship, felt himself almost aggrieved by this man's intrusion
on his wife's retreat. Had he not sent her there that she might
be private; and what right had any one to invade such privacy? "I
suppose I had better tell the truth at once," said Mr. Glascock. "I
went to see Miss Rowley."
"Oh, indeed."
"My secret will be safe with you, I know."
"I did not know that there was a secret," said Trevelyan. "I should
have thought that they would have told me."
"I don't see that. However, it doesn't matter much. I got nothing by
my journey. Are the ladies still at Nuncombe Putney?"
"No, they have moved from there to London."
"Not back to Curzon Street?"
"Oh dear, no. There is no house in Curzon Street for them now." This
was said in a tone so sad that it almost made Mr. Glascock weep.
"They are staying with an aunt of theirs,--out to the east of the
city."
"At St. Diddulph's?"
"Yes;--with Mr. Outhouse, the clergyman there. You can't conceive
what it is not to be able to see your own child; and yet, how can I
take the boy from her?"
"Of course not. He's only a baby."
"And yet all this is brought on me solely by her obstinacy. God
knows, however, I don't want to say a word against her. People choose
to say that I am to blame, and they may say so for me. Nothing that
any one may say can add anything to the weight that I have to bear."
Then they walked to the top of the mountain in silence, and in due
time were picked up by their proper shepherd and carried down to Susa
at a pace that would give an English coachman a concussion of the
brain.
Why passengers for Turin, who reach Susa dusty, tired, and sleepy,
should be detained at that place for an hour and a half instead of
being forwarded to their beds in the great city, is never made very
apparent. All travelling officials on the continent of Europe are
very slow in their manipulation of luggage; but as they are equally
correct we will find the excuse for their tardiness in the latter
quality. The hour and a half, however, is a necessity, and it is very
grievous. On this occasion the two Miss Spaldings ate their supper,
and the two gentlemen waited on them. The ladies had learned to
regard at any rate Mr. Glascock as their own property, and received
his services, graciously indeed, but quite as a matter of course.
When he was sent from their peculiar corner of the big, dirty
refreshment room to the supper-table to fetch an apple, and then
desired to change it because the one which he had brought was
spotted, he rather liked it. And when he sat down with his knees
near to theirs, actually trying to eat a large Italian apple himself
simply because they had eaten one, and discussed with them the
passage over the Mont Cenis, he began to think that Susa was, after
all, a place in which an hour and a half might be whiled away without
much cause for complaint.
"We only stay one night at Turin," said Caroline Spalding, the elder.
"And we shall have to start at ten,--to get through to Florence
to-morrow," said Olivia, the younger. "Isn't it cruel, wasting all
this time when we might be in bed?"
"It is not for me to complain of the cruelty," said Mr. Glascock.
"We should have fared infinitely worse if we hadn't met you," said
Caroline Spalding.
"But our republican simplicity won't allow us to assert that even
your society is better than going to bed, after a journey of thirty
hours," said Olivia.
In the meantime Trevelyan was roaming about the station moodily by
himself, and the place is one not apt to restore cheerfulness to a
moody man by any resources of its own. When the time for departure
came Mr. Glascock sought him and found him; but Trevelyan had chosen
a corner for himself in a carriage, and declared that he would rather
avoid the ladies for the present. "Don't think me uncivil to leave
you," he said, "but the truth is, I don't like American ladies."
"I do rather," said Mr. Glascock.
"You can say that I've got a headache," said Trevelyan. So Mr.
Glascock returned to his friends, and did say that Mr. Trevelyan had
a headache. It was the first time that a name had been mentioned
between them.
"Mr. Trevelyan! What a pretty name. It sounds like a novel," said
Olivia.
"A very clever man," said Mr. Glascock, "and much liked by his own
circle. But he has had trouble, and is unhappy."
"He looks unhappy," said Caroline.
"The most miserable looking man I ever saw in my life," said Olivia.
Then it was agreed between them as they went up to Trompetta's hotel,
that they would go on together by the ten o'clock train to Florence.
CHAPTER XXXVIII.
VERDICT OF THE JURY--"MAD, MY LORD."
Trevelyan was left alone at Turin when Mr. Glascock went on to
Florence with his fair American friends. It was imperatively
necessary that he should remain at Turin, though he had no business
there of any kind whatever, and did not know a single person in the
city. And of all towns in Italy Turin has perhaps less of attraction
to offer to the solitary visitor than any other. It is new and
parallelogrammatic as an American town, is very cold in cold weather,
very hot in hot weather, and now that it has been robbed of its life
as a capital, is as dull and uninteresting as though it were German
or English. There is the Armoury, and the river Po, and a good hotel.
But what are these things to a man who is forced to live alone in a
place for four days, or perhaps a week? Trevelyan was bound to remain
at Turin till he should hear from Bozzle. No one but Bozzle knew his
address; and he could do nothing till Bozzle should have communicated
to him tidings of what was being done at St. Diddulph's.
There is perhaps no great social question so imperfectly understood
among us at the present day as that which refers to the line which
divides sanity from insanity. That this man is sane and that other
unfortunately mad we do know well enough; and we know also that one
man may be subject to various hallucinations,--may fancy himself to
be a teapot, or what not,--and yet be in such a condition of mind as
to call for no intervention either on behalf of his friends, or of
the law; while another may be in possession of intellectual faculties
capable of lucid exertion for the highest purposes, and yet be so mad
that bodily restraint upon him is indispensable. We know that the
sane man is responsible for what he does, and that the insane man
is irresponsible; but we do not know,--we only guess wildly, at the
state of mind of those, who now and again act like madmen, though no
court or council of experts has declared them to be mad. The bias of
the public mind is to press heavily on such men till the law attempts
to touch them, as though they were thoroughly responsible; and
then, when the law interferes, to screen them as though they were
altogether irresponsible. The same juryman who would find a man mad
who has murdered a young woman, would in private life express a
desire that the same young man should be hung, crucified, or skinned
alive, if he had moodily and without reason broken his faith to the
young woman in lieu of killing her. Now Trevelyan was, in truth, mad
on the subject of his wife's alleged infidelity. He had abandoned
everything that he valued in the world, and had made himself wretched
in every affair of life, because he could not submit to acknowledge
to himself the possibility of error on his own part. For that, in
truth, was the condition of his mind. He had never hitherto believed
that she had been false to her vow, and had sinned against him
irredeemably; but he had thought that in her regard for another man
she had slighted him; and, so thinking, he had subjected her to a
severity of rebuke which no high-spirited woman could have borne. His
wife had not tried to bear it,--in her indignation had not striven to
cure the evil. Then had come his resolution that she should submit,
or part from him; and, having so resolved, nothing could shake him.
Though every friend he possessed was now against him,--including
even Lady Milborough,--he was certain that he was right. Had not his
wife sworn to obey him, and was not her whole conduct one tissue of
disobedience? Would not the man who submitted to this find himself
driven to submit to things worse? Let her own her fault, let her
submit, and then she should come back to him.
He had not considered, when his resolutions to this effect were first
forming themselves, that a separation between a man and his wife once
effected cannot be annulled, and as it were cured, so as to leave no
cicatrice behind. Gradually, as he spent day after day in thinking on
this one subject, he came to feel that even were his wife to submit,
to own her fault humbly, and to come back to him, this very coming
back would in itself be a new wound. Could he go out again with
his wife on his arm to the houses of those who knew that he had
repudiated her because of her friendship with another man? Could
he open again that house in Curzon Street, and let things go on
quietly as they had gone before? He told himself that it was
impossible;--that he and she were ineffably disgraced;--that, if
reunited, they must live buried out of sight in some remote distance.
And he told himself, also, that he could never be with her again
night or day without thinking of the separation. His happiness had
been shipwrecked.
Then he had put himself into the hands of Mr. Bozzle, and Mr. Bozzle
had taught him that women very often do go astray. Mr. Bozzle's idea
of female virtue was not high, and he had opportunities of implanting
his idea on his client's mind. Trevelyan hated the man. He was filled
with disgust by Bozzle's words, and was made miserable by Bozzle's
presence. Yet he came gradually to believe in Bozzle. Bozzle alone
believed in him. There were none but Bozzle who did not bid him to
submit himself to his disobedient wife. And then, as he came to
believe in Bozzle, he grew to be more and more assured that no one
but Bozzle could tell him facts. His chivalry, and love, and sense of
woman's honour, with something of manly pride on his own part,--so
he told himself,--had taught him to believe it to be impossible that
his wife should have sinned. Bozzle, who knew the world, thought
otherwise. Bozzle, who had no interest in the matter, one way or the
other, would find out facts. What if his chivalry, and love, and
manly pride had deceived him? There were women who sinned. Then he
prayed that his wife might not be such a woman; and got up from his
prayers almost convinced that she was a sinner.
His mind was at work upon it always. Could it be that she was so base
as this--so vile a thing, so abject, such dirt, pollution, filth? But
there were such cases. Nay, were they not almost numberless? He found
himself reading in the papers records of such things from day to
day, and thought that in doing so he was simply acquiring experience
necessary for himself. If it were so, he had indeed done well to
separate himself from a thing so infamous. And if it were not so,
how could it be that that man had gone to her in Devonshire? He had
received from his wife's hands a short note addressed to the man, in
which the man was desired by her not to go to her, or to write to
her again, because of her husband's commands. He had shown this to
Bozzle, and Bozzle had smiled. "It's just the sort of thing they
does," Bozzle had said. "Then they writes another by post." He had
consulted Bozzle as to the sending on of that letter, and Bozzle had
been strongly of opinion that it should be forwarded, a copy having
been duly taken and attested by himself. It might be very pretty
evidence by-and-by. If the letter were not forwarded, Bozzle thought
that the omission to do so might be given in evidence against his
employer. Bozzle was very careful, and full of "evidence." The letter
therefore was sent on to Colonel Osborne. "If there's billy-dous
going between 'em we shall nobble 'em," said Bozzle. Trevelyan tore
his hair in despair, but believed that there would be billy-dous.
He came to believe everything; and, though he prayed fervently that
his wife might not be led astray, that she might be saved at any
rate from utter vice, yet he almost came to hope that it might be
otherwise;--not, indeed, with the hope of the sane man, who desires
that which he tells himself to be for his advantage; but with the
hope of the insane man, who loves to feed his grievance, even though
the grief should be his death. They who do not understand that a man
may be brought to hope that which of all things is the most grievous
to him, have not observed with sufficient closeness the perversity of
the human mind. Trevelyan would have given all that he had to save
his wife; would, even now, have cut his tongue out before he would
have expressed to anyone,--save to Bozzle,--a suspicion that she
could in truth have been guilty; was continually telling himself that
further life would be impossible to him, if he, and she, and that
child of theirs, should be thus disgraced;--and yet he expected it,
believed it, and, after a fashion, he almost hoped it.
He was to wait at Turin till tidings should come from Bozzle, and
after that he would go on to Venice; but he would not move from Turin
till he should have received his first communication from England.
When he had been three days at Turin they came to him, and, among
other letters in Bozzle's packet, there was a letter addressed in his
wife's handwriting. The letter was simply directed to Bozzle's house.
In what possible way could his wife have found out ought of his
dealings with Bozzle,--where Bozzle lived, or could have learned that
letters intended for him should be sent to the man's own residence?
Before, however, we inspect the contents of Mr. Bozzle's dispatch, we
will go back and see how Mrs. Trevelyan had discovered the manner of
forwarding a letter to her husband.
The matter of the address was, indeed, very simple. All letters for
Trevelyan were to be redirected from the house in Curzon Street, and
from the chambers in Lincoln's Inn, to the Acrobats' Club; to the
porter of the Acrobats' Club had been confided the secret, not of
Bozzle's name, but of Bozzle's private address, No. 55, Stony Walk,
Union Street, Borough. Thus all letters reaching the Acrobats' were
duly sent to Mr. Bozzle's house. It may be remembered that Hugh
Stanbury, on the occasion of his last visit to the parsonage of St.
Diddulph's, was informed that Mrs. Trevelyan had a letter from her
father for her husband, and that she knew not whither to send it.
It may well be that, had the matter assumed no other interest in
Stanbury's eyes than that given to it by Mrs. Trevelyan's very
moderate anxiety to have the letter forwarded, he would have thought
nothing about it; but having resolved, as he sat upon the knife-board
of the omnibus,--the reader will, at any rate, remember those
resolutions made on the top of the omnibus while Hugh was smoking his
pipe,--having resolved that a deed should be done at St. Diddulph's,
he resolved also that it should be done at once. He would not allow
the heat of his purpose to be cooled by delay. He would go to St.
Diddulph's at once, with his heart in his hand. But it might, he
thought, be as well that he should have an excuse for his visit.
So he called upon the porter at the Acrobats', and was successful
in learning Mr. Trevelyan's address. "Stony Walk, Union Street,
Borough," he said to himself, wondering; then it occurred to him
that Bozzle, and Bozzle only among Trevelyan's friends, could
live at Stony Walk in the Borough. Thus armed, he set out for St.
Diddulph's;--and, as one of the effects of his visit to the East, Sir
Marmaduke's note was forwarded to Louis Trevelyan at Turin.
CHAPTER XXXIX.
MISS NORA ROWLEY IS MALTREATED.
Hugh Stanbury, when he reached the parsonage, found no difficulty
in making his way into the joint presence of Mrs. Outhouse, Mrs.
Trevelyan, and Nora. He was recognised by the St. Diddulph's party
as one who had come over to their side, as a friend of Trevelyan
who had found himself constrained to condemn his friend in spite of
his friendship, and was consequently very welcome. And there was
no difficulty about giving the address. The ladies wondered how it
came to pass that Mr. Trevelyan's letters should be sent to such
a locality, and Hugh expressed his surprise also. He thought it
discreet to withhold his suspicions about Mr. Bozzle, and simply
expressed his conviction that letters sent in accordance with the
directions given by the club-porter would reach their destination.
Then the boy was brought down, and they were all very confidential
and very unhappy together. Mrs. Trevelyan could see no end to the
cruelty of her position, and declared that her father's anger against
her husband was so great that she anticipated his coming with almost
more of fear than of hope. Mrs. Outhouse expressed an opinion that
Mr. Trevelyan must surely be mad; and Nora suggested that the
possibility of such perversity on the part of a man made it almost
unwise in any woman to trust herself to the power of a husband. "But
there are not many like him, thank God," said Mrs. Outhouse, bridling
in her wrath. Thus they were very friendly together, and Hugh
was allowed to feel that he stood upon comfortable terms in the
parsonage;--but he did not as yet see how he was to carry out his
project for the present day.
At last Mrs. Trevelyan went away with the child. Hugh felt that he
ought to go, but stayed courageously. He thought he could perceive
that Nora suspected the cause of his assiduity; but it was quite
evident that Mrs. Outhouse did not do so. Mrs. Outhouse, having
reconciled herself to the young man, was by no means averse to his
presence. She went on talking about the wickedness of Trevelyan, and
her brother's anger, and the fate of the little boy, till at last the
little boy's mother came back into the room. Then Mrs. Outhouse went.
They must excuse her for a few minutes, she said. If only she would
have gone a few minutes sooner, how well her absence might have been
excused. Nora understood it all now; and though she became almost
breathless, she was not surprised, when Hugh got up from his chair
and asked her sister to go away. "Mrs. Trevelyan," he said, "I want
to speak a few words to your sister. I hope you will give me the
opportunity."
"Nora!" exclaimed Mrs. Trevelyan.
"She knows nothing about it," said Hugh.
"Am I to go?" said Mrs. Trevelyan to her sister. But Nora said never
a word. She sat perfectly fixed, not turning her eyes from the object
on which she was gazing.
[Illustration: "Am I to go?"]
"Pray,--pray do," said Hugh.
"I cannot think that it will be for any good," said Mrs. Trevelyan;
"but I know that she may be trusted. And I suppose it ought to be so,
if you wish it."
"I do wish it, of all things," said Hugh, still standing up, and
almost turning the elder sister out of the room by the force of his
look and voice. Then, with another pause of a moment, Mrs. Trevelyan
rose from her chair and left the room, closing the door after her.
Hugh, when he found that the coast was clear for him, immediately
began his task with a conviction that not a moment was to be lost.
He had told himself a dozen times that the matter was hopeless,
that Nora had shown him by every means in her power that she was
indifferent to him, that she with all her friends would know that
such a marriage was out of the question; and he had in truth come
to believe that the mission which he had in hand was one in which
success was not possible. But he thought that it was his duty to go
on with it. "If a man love a woman, even though it be the king and
the beggar-woman reversed,--though it be a beggar and a queen, he
should tell her of it. If it be so, she has a right to know it and to
take her choice. And he has a right to tell her, and to say what he
can for himself." Such was Hugh's doctrine in the matter; and, acting
upon it, he found himself alone with his mistress.
"Nora," he said, speaking perhaps with more energy than the words
required, "I have come here to tell you that I love you, and to ask
you to be my wife."
Nora, for the last ten minutes, had been thinking that this would
come,--that it would come at once; and yet she was not at all
prepared with an answer. It was now weeks since she had confessed to
herself frankly that nothing else but this,--this one thing which was
now happening, this one thing which had now happened,--that nothing
else could make her happy, or could touch her happiness. She had
refused a man whom she otherwise would have taken, because her heart
had been given to Hugh Stanbury. She had been bold enough to tell
that other suitor that it was so, though she had not mentioned the
rival's name. She had longed for some expression of love from this
man when they had been at Nuncombe together, and had been fiercely
angry with him because no such expression had come from him. Day
after day, since she had been with her aunt, she had told herself
that she was a broken-hearted woman, because she had given away all
that she had to give and had received nothing in return. Had he said
a word that might have given her hope, how happy could she have been
in hoping. Now he had come to her with a plain-spoken offer, telling
her that he loved her, and asking her to be his wife,--and she was
altogether unable to answer. How could she consent to be his wife,
knowing as she did that there was no certainty of an income on which
they could live? How could she tell her father and mother that she
had engaged herself to marry a man who might or might not make £400 a
year, and who already had a mother and sister depending on him?
In truth, had he come more gently to her, his chance of a happy
answer,--of an answer which might be found to have in it something
of happiness,--would have been greater. He might have said a word
which she could not but have answered softly;--and then from that
constrained softness other gentleness would have followed, and so
he would have won her in spite of her discretion. She would have
surrendered gradually, accepting on the score of her great love all
the penalties of a long and precarious engagement. But when she
was asked to come and be his wife, now and at once, she felt that
in spite of her love it was impossible that she could accede to a
request so sudden, so violent, so monstrous. He stood over her as
though expecting an instant answer; and then, when she had sat dumb
before him for a minute, he repeated his demand. "Tell me, Nora, can
you love me? If you knew how thoroughly I have loved you, you would
at least feel something for me."
To tell him that she did not love him was impossible to her. But how
was she to refuse him without telling him either a lie, or the truth?
Some answer she must give him; and as to that matter of marrying him,
the answer must be a negative. Her education had been of that nature
which teaches girls to believe that it is a crime to marry a man
without an assured income. Assured morality in a husband is a great
thing. Assured good temper is very excellent. Assured talent,
religion, amiability, truth, honesty, are all desirable. But an
assured income is indispensable. Whereas, in truth, the income may
come hereafter; but the other things, unless they be there already,
will hardly be forthcoming. "Mr. Stanbury," she said, "your
suddenness has quite astounded me."
"Ah, yes; but how should I not be sudden? I have come here on purpose
to say this to you. If I do not say it now--"
"You heard what Emily said."
"No;--what did she say?"
"She said that it would not be for good that you should speak to me
thus."
"Why not for good? But she is unhappy, and looks gloomily at things."
"Yes, indeed."
"But all the world need not be sad for ever because she has been
unfortunate."
"Not all the world, Mr. Stanbury;--but you must not be surprised if
it affects me."
"But would that prevent your loving me,--if you did love me? But,
Nora, I do not expect you to love me,--not yet. I do not say that I
expect it,--ever. But if you would--. Nora, I can do no more than
tell you the simple truth. Just listen to me for a minute. You know
how I came to be intimate with you all in Curzon Street. The first
day I saw you I loved you; and there has come no change yet. It is
months now since I first knew that I loved you. Well; I told myself
more than once,--when I was down at Nuncombe for instance,--that I
had no right to speak to you. What right can a poor devil like me
have, who lives from hand to mouth, to ask such a girl as you to be
his wife? And so I said nothing,--though it was on my lips every
moment that I was there." Nora remembered at the moment how she had
looked to his lips, and had not seen the words there. "But I think
there is something unmanly in this. If you cannot give me a grain
of hope;--if you tell me that there never can be hope, it is my
misfortune. It will be very grievous, but I will bear it. But that
will be better than puling and moping about without daring to tell my
tale. I am not ashamed of it. I have fallen in love with you, Nora,
and I think it best to come for an answer."
He held out his arms as though he thought that she might perhaps come
to him. Indeed he had no idea of any such coming on her part; but
she, as she looked at him, almost thought that it was her duty to go.
Had she a right to withhold herself from him, she who loved him so
dearly? Had he stepped forward and taken her in his arms it might be
that all power of refusal would soon have been beyond her power.
"Mr. Stanbury," she said, "you have confessed yourself that it is
impossible."
"But do you love me;--do you think that it is possible that you
should ever love me?"
"You know, Mr. Stanbury, that you should not say anything further.
You know that it cannot be."
"But do you love me?"
"You are ungenerous not to take an answer without driving me to be
uncourteous."
"I do not care for courtesy. Tell me the truth. Can you ever love me?
With one word of hope I will wait, and work, and feel myself to be a
hero. I will not go till you tell me that you cannot love me."
"Then I must tell you so."
"What is it you will tell me, Nora? Speak it. Say it. If I knew that
a girl disliked me, nothing should make me press myself upon her. Am
I odious to you, Nora?"
"No; not odious,--but very, very unfair."
"I will have the truth if I be ever so unfair," he said. And by this
time probably some inkling of the truth had reached his intelligence.
There was already a tear in Nora's eye, but he did not pity her. She
owed it to him to tell him the truth, and he would have it from her
if it was to be reached. "Nora," he said, "listen to me again. All my
heart and soul are in this. It is everything to me. If you can love
me you are bound to say so. By Jove, I will believe you do unless you
swear to me that it is not so!" He was now holding her by the hand
and looking closely into her face.
"Mr. Stanbury," she said, "let me go; pray, pray let me go."
"Not till you say that you love me. Oh, Nora, I believe that you love
me. You do; yes; you do love me. Dearest, dearest Nora, would you not
say a word to make me the happiest man in the world?" And now he had
his arm round her waist.
"Let me go," she said, struggling through her tears and covering her
face with her hands. "You are very, very wicked. I will never speak
to you again. Nay, but you shall let me go!" And then she was out of
his arms and had escaped from the room before he had managed to touch
her face with his lips.
As he was thinking how he also might escape now,--might escape
and comfort himself with his triumph,--Mrs. Outhouse returned to
the chamber. She was very demure, and her manner towards him was
considerably changed since she had left the chamber. "Mr. Stanbury,"
she said, "this kind of thing mustn't go any further indeed;--at
least not in my house."
"What kind of thing, Mrs. Outhouse?"
"Well;--what my elder niece has told me. I have not seen Miss Rowley
since she left you. I am quite sure she has behaved with discretion."
"Indeed she has, Mrs. Outhouse."
"The fact is my nieces are in grief and trouble, and this is no time
or place for love-making. I am sorry to be uncivil, but I must ask
you not to come here any more."
"I will stay away from this house, certainly, if you bid me."
"I am very sorry; but I must bid you. Sir Marmaduke will be home in
the spring, and if you have anything to say to him of course you can
see him."
Then Hugh Stanbury took his leave of Mrs. Outhouse; but as he went
home, again on the knifeboard of an omnibus, he smoked the pipe of
triumph rather than the pipe of contemplation.
CHAPTER XL.
"C. G."
The Miss Spaldings were met at the station at Florence by their
uncle, the American Minister, by their cousin, the American Secretary
of Legation, and by three or four other dear friends and relations,
who were there to welcome the newcomers to sunny Italy. Mr. Glascock,
therefore, who ten minutes since had been, and had felt himself to
be, quite indispensable to their comfort, suddenly became as though
he were nothing and nobody. Who is there that has not felt these
sudden disruptions to the intimacies and friendships of a long
journey? He bowed to them, and they to him, and then they were
whirled away in their grandeur. He put himself into a small, open
hackney-carriage, and had himself driven to the York Hotel, feeling
himself to be deserted and desolate. The two Miss Spaldings were
the daughters of a very respectable lawyer at Boston, whereas Mr.
Glascock was heir to a peerage, to an enormous fortune, and to one of
the finest places in England. But he thought nothing of this at the
time. As he went he was meditating which young woman was the most
attractive, Nora Rowley or Caroline Spalding. He had no doubt but
that Nora was the prettier, the pleasanter in manner, the better
dressed, the more engaging in all that concerned the outer woman;
but he thought that he had never met any lady who talked better than
Caroline Spalding. And what was Nora Rowley's beauty to him? Had she
not told him that she was the property of some one else; or, for the
matter of that, what was Miss Spalding to him? They had parted, and
he was going on to Naples in two days. He had said some half-defined
word as to calling at the American Embassy, but it had not been taken
up by either of the ladies. He had not pressed it, and so they had
parted without an understanding as to a future meeting.
The double journey, from Turin to Bologna and from Bologna to
Florence, is very long, and forms ample time for a considerable
intimacy. There had, too, been a long day's journeying together
before that; and with no women is a speedy intimacy so possible, or
indeed so profitable, as with Americans. They fear nothing,--neither
you nor themselves; and talk with as much freedom as though they
were men. It may, perhaps, be assumed to be true as a rule that
women's society is always more agreeable to men than that of other
men,--except for the lack of ease. It undoubtedly is so when the
women be young and pretty. There is a feeling, however, among pretty
women in Europe that such freedom is dangerous, and it is withheld.
There is such danger, and more or less of such withholding is
expedient: but the American woman does not recognise the danger; and,
if she withhold the grace of her countenance and the pearls of her
speech, it is because she is not desirous of the society which is
proffered to her. These two American sisters had not withholden their
pearls from Mr. Glascock. He was much their senior in age; he was
gentle in his manners, and they probably recognised him to be a safe
companion. They had no idea who he was, and had not heard his name
when they parted from him. But it was not probable that they should
have been with him so long, and that they should leave him without
further thought of him, without curiosity or a desire to know more
of him. They had seen "C. G." in large letters on his dressing-bag,
and that was all they had learned as to his identity. He had known
their names well, and had once called Olivia by hers, in the
hurry of speaking to her sister. He had apologised, and there had
been a little laugh, and a discussion about the use of Christian
names,--such as is very conducive to intimacy between gentlemen and
ladies. When you can talk to a young lady about her own Christian
name, you are almost entitled for the nonce to use it.
Mr. Glascock went to his hotel, and was very moody and desolate. His
name was very soon known there, and he received the honours due to
his rank and station. "I should like to travel in America," he said
to himself, "if I could be sure that no one would find out who I
was." He had received letters at Turin, stating that his father was
better, and, therefore, he intended to remain two days at Florence.
The weather was still very hot, and Florence in the middle of
September is much preferable to Naples.
That night, when the two Miss Spaldings were alone together, they
discussed their fellow-traveller thoroughly. Something, of course,
had been said about him to their uncle the minister, to their aunt
the minister's wife, and to their cousin the secretary of legation.
But travellers will always observe that the dear new friends they
have made on their journey are not interesting to the dear old
friends whom they meet afterwards. There may be some touch of
jealousy in this; and then, though you, the traveller, are fully
aware that there has been something special in the case which has
made this new friendship more peculiar than others that have sprung
up in similar circumstances, fathers and brothers and wives and
sisters do not see it in that light. They suspect, perhaps, that
the new friend was a bagman, or an opera dancer, and think that the
affair need not be made of importance. The American Minister had
cast his eye on Mr. Glascock during that momentary parting, and had
not thought much of Mr. Glascock. "He was certainly a gentleman,"
Caroline had said. "There are a great many English gentlemen," the
minister had replied.
"I thought you would have asked him to call," Olivia said to her
sister. "He did offer."
"I know he did. I heard it."
"Why didn't you tell him he might come?"
"Because we are not in Boston, Livy. It might be the most horrible
thing in the world to do here in Florence; and it may make a
difference, because Uncle Jonas is minister."
"Why should that make a difference? Do you mean that one isn't to see
one's own friends? That must be nonsense."
"But he isn't a friend, Livy."
"It seems to me as if I'd known him for ever. That soft, monotonous
voice, which never became excited and never disagreeable, is as
familiar to me as though I had lived with it all my life."
"I thought him very pleasant."
"Indeed you did, Carry. And he thought you pleasant too. Doesn't it
seem odd? You were mending his glove for him this very afternoon,
just as if he were your brother."
"Why shouldn't I mend his glove?"
"Why not, indeed? He was entitled to have everything mended after
getting us such a good dinner at Bologna. By-the-bye, you never paid
him."
"Yes, I did,--when you were not by."
"I wonder who he is! C. G.! That fine man in the brown coat was his
servant, you know. I thought at first that C. G. must have been
cracked, and that the tall man was his keeper."
"I never knew any one less like a madman."
"No;--but the man was so queer. He did nothing, you know. We hardly
saw him, if you remember, at Turin. All he did was to tie the shawls
at Bologna. What can any man want with another man about with him
like that, unless he is cracked either in body or mind?"
"You'd better ask C. G. yourself."
"I shall never see C. G. again, I suppose. I should like to see him
again. I guess you would too, Carry. Eh?"
"Of course, I should;--why not?"
"I never knew a man so imperturbable, and who had yet so much to say
for himself. I wonder what he is! Perhaps he's on business, and that
man was a kind of a clerk."
"He had livery buttons on," said Carry.
"And does that make a difference?"
"I don't think they put clerks into livery, even in England."
"Nor yet mad doctors," said Olivia. "Well, I like him very much; and
the only thing against him is that he should have a man, six feet
high, going about with him doing nothing."
"You'll make me angry, Livy, if you talk in that way. It's
uncharitable."
"In what way?"
"About a mad doctor."
"It's my belief," said Olivia, "that he's an English swell, a lord,
or a duke;--and it's my belief, too, that he's in love with you."
"It's my belief, Livy, that you're a regular ass;"--and so the
conversation was ended on that occasion.
On the next day, about noon, the American Minister, as a part of the
duty which he owed to his country, read in a publication of that day,
issued for the purpose, the names of the new arrivals at Florence.
First and foremost was that of the Honourable Charles Glascock, with
his suite, at the York Hotel, en route to join his father, Lord
Peterborough, at Naples. Having read the news first to himself, the
minister read it out loud in the presence of his nieces.
"That's our friend C. G.," said Livy.
"I should think not," said the minister, who had his own ideas about
an English lord.
"I'm sure it is, because of the tall man with the buttons," said
Olivia.
"It's very unlikely," said the secretary of legation. "Lord
Peterborough is a man of immense wealth, very old, indeed. They say
he is dying at Naples. This man is his eldest son."
"Is that any reason why he shouldn't have been civil to us?" asked
Olivia.
"I don't think he is the sort of man likely to sit up in the
banquette; and he would have posted over the Alps. Moreover, he had
his suite with him."
"His suite was Buttons," said Olivia. "Only fancy, Carry, we've been
waited on for two days by a lord as is to be, and didn't know it! And
you have mended the tips of his lordship's glove!" But Carry said
nothing at all.
Late on that same evening, they met Mr. Glascock close to the Duomo,
under the shade of the Campanile. He had come out as they had done,
to see by moonlight that loveliest of all works made by man's hands.
They were with the minister, but Mr. Glascock came up and shook hands
with them.
"I would introduce you to my uncle, Mr. Spalding," said
Olivia,--"only,--as it happens,--we have never yet heard your name."
"My name is Mr. Glascock," said he, smiling. Then the introduction
was made; and the American Minister took off his hat, and was very
affable.
"Only think, Carry," said Olivia, when they were alone that evening,
"if you were to become the wife of an English lord!"
CHAPTER XLI.
SHEWING WHAT TOOK PLACE AT ST. DIDDULPH'S.
[Illustration]
Nora Rowley, when she escaped from the violence of her lover, at once
rushed up to her own room, and managed to fasten herself in before
she had been seen by any one. Her elder sister had at once gone to
her aunt when, at Hugh's request, she had left the room, thinking it
right that Mrs. Outhouse should know what was being done in her own
house. Mrs. Outhouse had considered the matter patiently for awhile,
giving the lovers the benefit of her hesitation, and had then spoken
her mind to Stanbury, as we have already heard. He had, upon the
whole, been so well pleased with what had occurred, that he was not
in the least angry with the parson's wife when he left the parsonage.
As soon as he was gone Mrs. Outhouse was at once joined by her elder
niece, but Nora remained for a while alone in her room.
Had she committed herself; and if so, did she regret it? He had
behaved very badly to her, certainly, taking her by the hand and
putting his arm round her waist. And then had he not even attempted
to kiss her? He had done all this, although she had been resolute in
refusing to speak to him one word of kindness,--though she had told
him with all the energy and certainty of which she was mistress, that
she would never be his wife. If a girl were to be subjected to such
treatment as this when she herself had been so firm, so discreet,
so decided, then indeed it would be unfit that a girl should trust
herself with a man. She had never thought that he had been such a one
as that, to ill-use her, to lay a hand on her in violence, to refuse
to take an answer. She threw herself on the bed and sobbed, and
then hid her face,--and was conscious that in spite of this acting
before herself she was the happiest girl alive. He had behaved very
badly;--of course, he had behaved most wickedly, and she would tell
him so some day. But was he not the dearest fellow living? Did ever
man speak with more absolute conviction of love in every tone of
his voice? Was it not the finest, noblest heart that ever throbbed
beneath a waistcoat? Had not his very wickedness come from the
overpowering truth of his affection for her? She would never quite
forgive him because it had been so very wrong; but she would be
true to him for ever and ever. Of course they could not marry.
What!--would she go to him and be a clog round his neck, and a weight
upon him for ever, bringing him down to the gutter by the burden of
her own useless and unworthy self? No. She would never so injure
him. She would not even hamper him by an engagement. But yet she
would be true to him. She had an idea that in spite of all her
protestations,--which, as she looked back upon them, appeared to her
to have been louder than they had been,--that through the teeth of
her denials, something of the truth had escaped from her. Well,--let
it be so. It was the truth, and why should he not know it? Then
she pictured to herself a long romance, in which the heroine lived
happily on the simple knowledge that she had been beloved. And
the reader may be sure that in this romance Mr. Glascock with his
splendid prospects filled one of the characters.
She had been so wretched at Nuncombe Putney when she had felt herself
constrained to admit to herself that this man for whom she had
sacrificed herself did not care for her, that she could not now but
enjoy her triumph. After she had sobbed upon the bed, she got up and
walked about the room smiling; and she would now press her hands to
her forehead, and then shake her tresses, and then clasp her own left
hand with her right, as though he were still holding it. Wicked man!
Why had he been so wicked and so violent? And why, why, why had she
not once felt his lips upon her brow?
And she was pleased with herself. Her sister had rebuked her because
she had refused to make her fortune by marrying Mr. Glascock; and,
to own the truth, she had rebuked herself on the same score when she
found that Hugh Stanbury had not had a word of love to say to her. It
was not that she regretted the grandeur which she had lost, but that
she should, even within her own thoughts, with the consciousness of
her own bosom, have declared herself unable to receive another man's
devotion because of her love for this man who neglected her. Now
she was proud of herself. Whether it might be accounted as good or
ill-fortune that she had ever seen Hugh Stanbury, it must at any rate
be right that she should be true to him now that she had seen him
and had loved him. To know that she loved and that she was not loved
again had nearly killed her. But such was not her lot. She too had
been successful with her quarry, and had struck her game, and brought
down her dear. He had been very violent with her, but his violence
had at least made the matter clear. He did love her. She would
be satisfied with that, and would endeavour so to live that that
alone should make life happy for her. How should she get his
photograph,--and a lock of his hair?--and when again might she have
the pleasure of placing her own hand within his great, rough, violent
grasp? Then she kissed the hand which he had held, and opened the
door of her room, at which her sister was now knocking.
"Nora, dear, will you not come down?"
"Not yet, Emily. Very soon I will."
"And what has happened, dearest?"
"There is nothing to tell, Emily."
"There must be something to tell. What did he say to you?"
"Of course you know what he said."
"And what answer did you make?"
"I told him that it could not be."
"And did he take that,--as final, Nora?"
"Of course not. What man ever takes a No as final?"
"When you said No to Mr. Glascock he took it."
"That was different, Emily."
"But how different? I don't see the difference, except that if you
could have brought yourself to like Mr. Glascock, it would have been
the greatest thing in the world for you, and for all of them."
"Would you have me take a man, Emily, that I didn't care one straw
for, merely because he was a lord? You can't mean that."
"I'm not talking about Mr. Glascock now, Nora."
"Yes, you are. And what's the use? He is gone, and there's an end of
it."
"And is Mr. Stanbury gone?"
"Of course."
"In the same way?" asked Mrs. Trevelyan.
"How can I tell about his ways? No; it is not in the same way. There!
He went in a very different way."
"How was it different, Nora?"
"Oh, so different. I can't tell you how. Mr. Glascock will never come
back again."
"And Mr. Stanbury will?" said the elder sister. Nora made no reply,
but after a while nodded her head. "And you want him to come back?"
She paused again, and again nodded her head. "Then you have accepted
him?"
"I have not accepted him. I have refused him. I have told him that it
was impossible."
"And yet you wish him back again!" Nora again nodded her head.
"That is a state of things I cannot at all understand," said Mrs.
Trevelyan, "and would not believe unless you told me so yourself."
"And you think me very wrong, of course. I will endeavour to do
nothing wrong, but it is so. I have not said a word of encouragement
to Mr. Stanbury; but I love him with all my heart. Ought I to tell
you a lie when you question me? Or is it natural that I should never
wish to see again a person whom I love better than all the world? It
seems to me that a girl can hardly be right if she have any choice of
her own. Here are two men, one rich and the other poor. I shall fall
to the ground between them. I know that. I have fallen to the ground
already. I like the one I can't marry. I don't care a straw for the
one who could give me a grand house. That is falling to the ground.
But I don't see that it is hard to understand, or that I have
disgraced myself."
"I said nothing of disgrace, Nora."
"But you looked it."
"I did not intend to look it, dearest."
"And remember this, Emily, I have told you everything because you
asked me. I do not mean to tell anybody else, at all. Mamma would not
understand me. I have not told him, and I shall not."
"You mean Mr. Stanbury?"
"Yes; I mean Mr. Stanbury. As to Mr. Glascock, of course I shall tell
mamma that. I have no secret there. That is his secret, and I suppose
mamma should know it. But I will have nothing told about the other.
Had I accepted him, or even hinted to him that I cared for him, I
would tell mamma at once."
After that there came something of a lecture, or something, rather,
of admonition, from Mrs. Outhouse. That lady did not attempt to
upbraid, or to find any fault; but observed that as she understood
that Mr. Stanbury had no means whatever, and as Nora herself had
none, there had better be no further intercourse between them, till,
at any rate, Sir Marmaduke and Lady Rowley should be in London. "So
I told him that he must not come here any more, my dear," said Mrs.
Outhouse.
"You are quite right, aunt. He ought not to come here."
"I am so glad that you agree with me."
"I agree with you altogether. I think I was bound to see him when he
asked to see me; but the thing is altogether out of the question. I
don't think he'll come any more, aunt." Then Mrs. Outhouse was quite
satisfied that no harm had been done.
A month had now passed since anything had been heard at St.
Diddulph's from Mr. Trevelyan, and it seemed that many months might
go on in the same dull way. When Mrs. Trevelyan first found herself
in her uncle's house, a sum of two hundred pounds had been sent to
her; and since that she had received a letter from her husband's
lawyer saying that a similar amount would be sent to her every three
months, as long as she was separated from her husband. A portion
of this she had given over to Mr. Outhouse; but this pecuniary
assistance by no means comforted that unfortunate gentleman in his
trouble. "I don't want to get into debt," he said, "by keeping a lot
of people whom I haven't the means to feed. And I don't want to board
and lodge my nieces and their family at so much a head. It's very
hard upon me either way." And so it was. All the comfort of his home
was destroyed, and he was driven to sacrifice his independence by
paying his tradesmen with a portion of Mrs. Trevelyan's money. The
more he thought of it all, and the more he discussed the matter with
his wife, the more indignant they became with the truant husband. "I
can't believe," he said, "but what Mr. Bideawhile could make him come
back, if he chose to do his duty."
"But they say that Mr. Trevelyan is in Italy, my dear."
"And if I went to Italy, might I leave you to starve, and take my
income with me?"
"He doesn't leave her quite to starve, my dear."
"But isn't a man bound to stay with his wife? I never heard of such a
thing,--never. And I'm sure that there must be something wrong. A man
can't go away and leave his wife to live with her uncle and aunt. It
isn't right."
"But what can we do?"
Mr. Outhouse was forced to acknowledge that nothing could be done. He
was a man to whom the quiescence of his own childless house was the
one pleasure of his existence. And of that he was robbed because this
wicked madman chose to neglect all his duties, and leave his wife
without a house to shelter her. "Supposing that she couldn't have
come here, what then?" said Mr. Outhouse. "I did tell him, as plain
as words could speak, that we couldn't receive them." "But here they
are," said Mrs. Outhouse, "and here they must remain till my brother
comes to England." "It's the most monstrous thing that I ever heard
of in all my life," said Mr. Outhouse. "He ought to be locked
up;--that's what he ought."
It was hard, and it became harder, when a gentleman, whom Mr.
Outhouse certainly did not wish to see, called upon him about the
latter end of September. Mr. Outhouse was sitting alone, in the
gloomy parlour of his parsonage,--for his own study had been given
up to other things, since this great inroad had been made upon his
family;--he was sitting alone on one Saturday morning, preparing for
the duties of the next day, with various manuscript sermons lying on
the table around him, when he was told that a gentleman had called
to see him. Had Mr. Outhouse been an incumbent at the West-end of
London, or had his maid been a West-end servant, in all probability
the gentleman's name would have been demanded; but Mr. Outhouse was a
man who was not very ready in foreseeing and preventing misfortunes,
and the girl who opened the door was not trained to discreet
usages in such matters. As she announced the fact that there was a
gentleman, she pointed to the door, to show that the gentleman was
there; and before Mr. Outhouse had been able to think whether it
would be prudent for him to make some preliminary inquiry, Colonel
Osborne was in the room. Now, as it happened, these two men had never
hitherto met each other, though one was the brother-in-law of Sir
Marmaduke Rowley, and the other had been his very old friend. "My
name, Mr. Outhouse, is Colonel Osborne," said the visitor, coming
forward, with his hand out. The clergyman, of course, took his hand,
and asked him to be seated. "We have known each other's names very
long," continued the Colonel, "though I do not think we have ever yet
had an opportunity of becoming acquainted."
[Illustration: At St. Diddulph's.]
"No," said Mr. Outhouse; "we have never been acquainted, I believe."
He might have added, that he had no desire whatever to make such
acquaintance; and his manner, over which he himself had no control,
did almost say as much. Indeed, this coming to his house of the
suspected lover of his niece appeared to him to be a heavy addition
to his troubles; for, although he was disposed to take his niece's
part against her husband to any possible length,--even to the locking
up of the husband as a madman, if it were possible,--nevertheless, he
had almost as great a horror of the Colonel, as though the husband's
allegation as to the lover had been true as gospel. Because Trevelyan
had been wrong altogether, Colonel Osborne was not the less wrong.
Because Trevelyan's suspicions were to Mr. Outhouse wicked and
groundless, he did not the less regard the presumed lover to be an
iniquitous roaring lion, going about seeking whom he might devour.
Elderly unmarried men of fashion generally, and especially colonels,
and majors, and members of parliament, and such like, were to him
as black sheep or roaring lions. They were "fruges consumere nati;"
men who stood on club doorsteps talking naughtily and doing nothing,
wearing sleek clothing, for which they very often did not pay, and
never going to church. It seemed to him,--in his ignorance,--that
such men had none of the burdens of this world upon their shoulders,
and that, therefore, they stood in great peril of the burdens of the
next. It was, doubtless, his special duty to deal with men in such
peril;--but those wicked ones with whom he was concerned were those
whom he could reach. Now, the Colonel Osbornes of the earth were
not to be got at by any clergyman, or, as far as Mr. Outhouse could
see, by any means of grace. That story of the rich man and the camel
seemed to him to be specially applicable to such people. How was such
a one as Colonel Osborne to be shewn the way through the eye of a
needle? To Mr. Outhouse, his own brother-in-law, Sir Marmaduke, was
almost of the same class,--for he frequented clubs when in London,
and played whist, and talked of the things of the world,--such as the
Derby, and the levées, and West-end dinner parties,--as though they
were all in all to him. He, to be sure, was weighted with so large
a family that there might be hope for him. The eye of the needle
could not be closed against him as a rich man; but he savoured of
the West-end, and was worldly, and consorted with such men as this
Colonel Osborne. When Colonel Osborne introduced himself to Mr.
Outhouse, it was almost as though Apollyon had made his way into the
parsonage of St. Diddulph's.
"Mr. Outhouse," said the Colonel, "I have thought it best to come
to you the very moment that I got back to town from Scotland." Mr.
Outhouse bowed, and was bethinking himself slowly what manner of
speech he would adopt. "I leave town again to-morrow for Dorsetshire.
I am going down to my friends, the Brambers, for partridge shooting."
Mr. Outhouse knitted his thick brows, in further inward condemnation.
Partridge shooting! yes;--this was September, and partridge shooting
would be the probable care and occupation of such a man at such a
time. A man without a duty in the world! Perhaps, added to this there
was a feeling that, whereas Colonel Osborne could shoot Scotch grouse
in August, and Dorsetshire partridges in September, and go about
throughout the whole year like a roaring lion, he, Mr. Outhouse,
was forced to remain at St. Diddulph's-in-the-East, from January to
December, with the exception of one small parson's week spent at
Margate, for the benefit of his wife's health. If there was such a
thought, or rather, such a feeling, who will say that it was not
natural? "But I could not go through London without seeing you,"
continued the Colonel. "This is a most frightful infatuation of
Trevelyan!"
"Very frightful, indeed," said Mr. Outhouse.
"And, on my honour as a gentleman, not the slightest cause in the
world."
"You are old enough to be the lady's father," said Mr. Outhouse,
managing in that to get one blow at the gallant Colonel.
"Just so. God bless my soul!" Mr. Outhouse shrunk visibly at this
profane allusion to the Colonel's soul. "Why, I've known her father
ever so many years. As you say, I might almost be her father myself."
As far as age went, such certainly might have been the case, for the
Colonel was older than Sir Marmaduke. "Look here, Mr. Outhouse, here
is a letter I got from Emily--"
"From Mrs. Trevelyan?"
"Yes, from Mrs. Trevelyan; and as well as I can understand, it must
have been sent to me by Trevelyan himself. Did you ever hear of such
a thing? And now I'm told he has gone away, nobody knows where, and
has left her here."
"He has gone away,--nobody knows where."
"Of course, I don't ask to see her."
"It would be imprudent, Colonel Osborne; and could not be permitted
in this house."
"I don't ask it. I have known Emily Trevelyan since she was an
infant, and have always loved her. I'm her godfather, for aught I
know,--though one forgets things of that sort." Mr. Outhouse again
knit his eyebrows and shuddered visibly. "She and I have been fast
friends,--and why not? But, of course, I can't interfere."
"If you ask me, Colonel Osborne, I should say that you can do nothing
in the matter;--except to remain away from her. When Sir Marmaduke is
in England, you can see him, if you please."
"See him;--of course, I shall see him. And, by George, Louis
Trevelyan will have to see him, too! I shouldn't like to have to
stand up before Rowley if I had treated a daughter of his in such a
fashion. You know Rowley, of course?"
"Oh, yes; I know him."
"He's not the sort of man to bear this sort of thing. He'll about
tear Trevelyan in pieces if he gets hold of him. God bless my soul--"
the eyebrows went to work again,--"I never heard of such a thing in
all my life! Does he pay anything for them, Mr. Outhouse?"
This was dreadful to the poor clergyman. "That is a subject which
we surely need not discuss," said he. Then he remembered that
such speech on his part was like to a subterfuge, and he found it
necessary to put himself right. "I am repaid for the maintenance here
of my nieces, and the little boy, and their attendants. I do not know
why the question should be asked, but such is the fact."
"Then they are here by agreement between you and him?"
"No, sir; they are not. There is no such agreement. But I do not like
these interrogatives from a stranger as to matters which should be
private."
"You cannot wonder at my interest, Mr. Outhouse."
"You had better restrain it, sir, till Sir Marmaduke arrives. I shall
then wash my hands of the affair."
"And she is pretty well;--Emily, I mean?"
"Mrs. Trevelyan's health is good."
"Pray tell her though I could not--might not ask to see her, I came
to inquire after her the first moment that I was in London. Pray
tell her how much I feel for her;--but she will know that. When Sir
Marmaduke is here, of course, we shall meet. When she is once more
under her father's wing, she need not be restrained by any absurd
commands from a husband who has deserted her. At present, of course,
I do not ask to see her."
"Of course, you do not, Colonel Osborne."
"And give my love to Nora;--dear little Nora! There can be no reason
why she and I should not shake hands."
"I should prefer that it should not be so in this house," said the
clergyman, who was now standing,--in expectation that his unwelcome
guest would go.
"Very well;--so be it. But you will understand I could not be in
London without coming and asking after them." Then the Colonel at
last took his leave, and Mr. Outhouse was left to his solitude and
his sermons.
Mrs. Outhouse was very angry when she heard of the visit. "Men of
that sort," she said, "think it a fine thing, and talk about it. I
believe the poor girl is as innocent as I am, but he isn't innocent.
He likes it."
"'It is easier,'" said Mr. Outhouse solemnly, "'for a camel to go
through the eye of a needle, than for a rich man to enter the kingdom
of God.'"
"I don't know that he is a rich man," said Mrs. Outhouse; "but he
wouldn't have come here if he had been honest."
Mrs. Trevelyan was told of the visit, and simply said that of course
it was out of the question that she should have seen Colonel Osborne.
Nevertheless she seemed to think it quite natural that he should have
called, and defended him with some energy when her aunt declared that
he had been much to blame. "He is not bound to obey Mr. Trevelyan
because I am," said Emily.
"He is bound to abstain from evil doing," said Mrs. Outhouse; "and he
oughtn't to have come. There; let that be enough, my dear. Your uncle
doesn't wish to have it talked about." Nevertheless it was talked
about between the two sisters. Nora was of opinion that Colonel
Osborne had been wrong, whereas Emily defended him. "It seems to me
to have been the most natural thing in life," said she.
Had Colonel Osborne made the visit as Sir Marmaduke's friend, feeling
himself to be an old man, it might have been natural. When a man has
come to regard himself as being, on the score of age, about as fit to
be a young lady's lover as though he were an old woman instead of an
old man,--which some men will do when they are younger even than was
Colonel Osborne,--he is justified in throwing behind him as utterly
absurd the suspicions of other people. But Colonel Osborne cannot be
defended altogether on that plea.
CHAPTER XLII.
MISS STANBURY AND MR. GIBSON BECOME TWO.
There came to be a very gloomy fortnight at Miss Stanbury's house
in the Close. For two or three days after Mr. Gibson's dismissal at
the hands of Miss Stanbury herself, Brooke Burgess was still in the
house, and his presence saved Dorothy from the full weight of her
aunt's displeasure. There was the necessity of looking after Brooke,
and scolding him, and of praising him to Martha, and of dispraising
him, and of seeing that he had enough to eat, and of watching whether
he smoked in the house, and of quarrelling with him about everything
under the sun, which together so employed Miss Stanbury that she
satisfied herself with glances at Dorothy which were felt to be full
of charges of ingratitude. Dorothy was thankful that it should be so,
and bore the glances with abject submission. And then there was a
great comfort to her in Brooke's friendship. On the second day after
Mr. Gibson had gone she found herself talking to Brooke quite openly
upon the subject. "The fact was, Mr. Burgess, that I didn't really
care for him. I know he's very good and all that, and of course Aunt
Stanbury meant it all for the best. And I would have done it if I
could, but I couldn't." Brooke patted her on the back,--not in the
flesh but in the spirit,--and told her that she was quite right. And
he expressed an opinion too that it was not expedient to yield too
much to Aunt Stanbury. "I would yield to her in anything that was
possible to me," said Dorothy. "I won't," said he; "and I don't think
I should do any good if I did. I like her, and I like her money. But
I don't like either well enough to sell myself for a price."
A great part too of the quarrelling which went on from day to day
between Brooke and Miss Stanbury was due to the difference of their
opinions respecting Dorothy and her suitor. "I believe you put her up
to it," said Aunt Stanbury.
"I neither put her up nor down, but I think that she was quite
right."
"You've robbed her of a husband, and she'll never have another
chance. After what you've done, you ought to take her yourself."
"I shall be ready to-morrow," said Brooke.
"How can you tell such a lie?" said Aunt Stanbury.
But after two or three days Brooke was gone to make a journey through
the distant part of the county, and see the beauties of Devonshire.
He was to be away for a fortnight, and then come back for a day or
two before he returned to London. During that fortnight things did
not go well with poor Dorothy at Exeter.
"I suppose you know your own business best," her aunt said to her
one morning. Dorothy uttered no word of reply. She felt it to be
equally impossible to suggest either that she did or that she did
not know her own business best. "There may be reasons which I don't
understand," exclaimed Aunt Stanbury; "but I should like to know what
it is you expect."
"Why should I expect anything, Aunt Stanbury?"
"That's nonsense. Everybody expects something. You expect to have
your dinner by-and-by,--don't you?"
"I suppose I shall," said Dorothy, to whom it occurred at the moment
that such expectation was justified by the fact that on every day of
her life hitherto some sort of a dinner had come in her way.
"Yes,--and you think it comes from heaven, I suppose."
"It comes by God's goodness and your bounty, Aunt Stanbury."
"And how will it come when I'm dead? Or how will it come if things
should go in such a way that I can't stay here any longer? You don't
ever think of that."
"I should go back to mamma, and Priscilla."
"Psha! As if two mouths were not enough to eat all the meal there is
in that tub. If there was a word to say against the man, I wouldn't
ask you to have him; if he drank, or smoked, or wasn't a gentleman,
or was too poor, or anything you like. But there's nothing. It's all
very well to tell me you don't love him, but why don't you love him?
I don't like a girl to go and throw herself at a man's head, as those
Frenches have done; but when everything has been prepared for you
and made proper, it seems to me to be like turning away from good
victuals." Dorothy could only offer to go home if she had offended
her aunt, and then Miss Stanbury scolded her for making the offer. As
this kind of thing went on at the house in the Close for a fortnight,
during which there was no going out, and no society at home, Dorothy
began to be rather tired of it.
At the end of the fortnight, on the morning of the day on which
Brooke Burgess was expected back, Dorothy, slowly moving into the
sitting room with her usual melancholy air, found Mr. Gibson talking
to her aunt. "There she is herself," said Miss Stanbury, jumping
up briskly, "and now you can speak to her. Of course I have no
authority,--none in the least. But she knows what my wishes are."
And, having so spoken, Miss Stanbury left the room.
It will be remembered that hitherto no word of affection had been
whispered by Mr. Gibson into Dorothy's ears. When he came before to
press his suit, she had been made aware of his coming, and had fled,
leaving her answer with her aunt. Mr. Gibson had then expressed
himself as somewhat injured, in that no opportunity of pouring forth
his own eloquence had been permitted to him. On that occasion Miss
Stanbury, being in a snubbing humour, had snubbed him. She had in
truth scolded him almost as much as she had scolded Dorothy, telling
him that he went about the business in hand as though butter wouldn't
melt in his mouth. "You're stiff as a chair-back," she had said to
him, with a few other compliments, and these amenities had for a
while made him regard the establishment at Heavitree as being, at
any rate, pleasanter than that in the Close. But since that cool
reflection had come. The proposal was not that he should marry Miss
Stanbury, senior, who certainly could be severe on occasions, but
Miss Stanbury, junior, whose temper was as sweet as primroses in
March. That which he would have to take from Miss Stanbury, senior,
was a certain sum of money, as to which her promise was as good as
any bond in the world. Things had come to such a pass with him in
Exeter,--from the hints of his friend the Prebend, from a word or two
which had come to him from the Dean, from certain family arrangements
proposed to him by his mother and sisters,--things had come to such
a pass that he was of a mind that he had better marry some one. He
had, as it were, three strings to his bow. There were the two French
strings, and there was Dorothy. He had not breadth of genius enough
to suggest to himself that yet another woman might be found. There
was a difficulty on the French score even about Miss Stanbury; but
it was clear to him that, failing her, he was due to one of the
two Miss Frenches. Now it was not only that the Miss Frenches were
empty-handed, but he was beginning to think himself that they were
not as nice as they might have been in reference to the arrangement
of their head-gear. Therefore, having given much thought to the
matter, and remembering that he had never yet had play for his own
eloquence with Dorothy, he had come to Miss Stanbury asking that he
might have another chance. It had been borne in upon him that he had
perhaps hitherto regarded Dorothy as too certainly his own since she
had been offered to him by her aunt,--as being a prize that required
no eloquence in the winning; and he thought that if he could have an
opportunity of amending that fault, it might even yet be well with
his suit. So he prepared himself, and asked permission, and now found
himself alone with the young lady.
"When last I was in this house, Miss Stanbury," he began, "I was not
fortunate enough to be allowed an opportunity of pleading my cause to
yourself." Then he paused, and Dorothy was left to consider how best
she might answer him. All that her aunt had said to her had not been
thrown away upon her. The calls upon that slender meal-tub at home
she knew were quite sufficient. And Mr. Gibson was, she believed, a
good man. And how better could she dispose of herself in life? And
what was she that she should scorn the love of an honest gentleman?
She would take him, she thought,--if she could. But then there came
upon her, unconsciously, without work of thought, by instinct rather
than by intelligence, a feeling of the closeness of a wife to her
husband. Looking at it in general she could not deny that it would
be very proper that she should become Mrs. Gibson. But when there
came upon her a remembrance that she would be called upon for
demonstration of her love,--that he would embrace her, and hold her
to his heart, and kiss her,--she revolted and shuddered. She believed
that she did not want to marry any man, and that such a state of
things would not be good for her. "Dear young lady," continued Mr.
Gibson, "you will let me now make up for the loss which I then
experienced?"
"I thought it was better not to give you trouble," said Dorothy.
"Trouble, Miss Stanbury! How could it be trouble? The labour we
delight in physics pain. But to go back to the subject-matter. I hope
you do not doubt that my affection for you is true and honest, and
genuine."
"I don't want to doubt anything, Mr. Gibson; but--"
"You needn't, dearest Miss Stanbury; indeed you needn't. If you
could read my heart you would see written there true love very
plainly;--very plainly. And do you not think it a duty that people
should marry?" It may be surmised that he had here forgotten some
connecting link which should have joined without abruptness the
declaration of his own love, and his social view as to the general
expediency of matrimony. But Dorothy did not discover the hiatus.
"Certainly,--when they like each other, and if their friends think it
proper."
"Our friends think it proper, Miss Stanbury,--may I say Dorothy?--all
of them. I can assure you that on my side you will be welcomed by a
mother and sisters only too anxious to receive you with open arms.
And as regards your own relations, I need hardly allude to your
revered aunt. As to your own mother and sister,--and your brother,
who, I believe, gives his mind chiefly to other things,--I am assured
by Miss Stanbury that no opposition need be feared from them. Is that
true, dearest Dorothy?"
"It is true."
"Does not all that plead in my behalf? Tell me, Dorothy."
"Of course it does."
"And you will be mine?" As far as eloquence could be of service, Mr.
Gibson was sufficiently eloquent. To Dorothy his words appeared good,
and true, and affecting. All their friends did wish it. There were
many reasons why it should be done. If talking could have done it,
his talking was good enough. Though his words were in truth cold,
and affected, and learned by rote, they did not offend her; but his
face offended her; and the feeling was strong within her that if she
yielded, it would soon be close to her own. She couldn't do it. She
didn't love him, and she wouldn't do it. Priscilla would not grudge
her her share out of that meagre meal-tub. Had not Priscilla told her
not to marry the man if she did not love him? She found that she was
further than ever from loving him. She would not do it. "Say that you
will be mine," pleaded Mr. Gibson, coming to her with both his hands
outstretched.
"Mr. Gibson, I can't," she said. She was sobbing now, and was half
choked by tears.
"And why not, Dorothy?"
"I don't know, but I can't. I don't feel that I want to be married at
all."
"But it is honourable."
"It's no use, Mr. Gibson; I can't, and you oughtn't to ask me any
more."
"Must this be your very last answer?"
"What's the good of going over it all again and again? I can't do
it."
"Never, Miss Stanbury?"
"No;--never."
"That is cruel, very cruel. I fear that you doubt my love."
"It isn't cruel, Mr. Gibson. I have a right to have my own feelings,
and I can't. If you please, I'll go away now." Then she went, and
he was left standing alone in the room. His first feeling was one
of anger. Then there came to be mixed with that a good deal of
wonder,--and then a certain amount of doubt. He had during the last
fortnight discussed the matter at great length with a friend, a
gentleman who knew the world, and who took upon himself to say that
he specially understood female nature. It was by advice from this
friend that he had been instigated to plead his own cause. "Of course
she means to accept you," the friend had said. "Why the mischief
shouldn't she? But she has some flimsy, old-fashioned country idea
that it isn't maidenly to give in at first. You tell her roundly that
she must marry you." Mr. Gibson was just reaching that roundness
which his friend had recommended when the lady left him and he was
alone.
Mr. Gibson was no doubt very much in love with Dorothy Stanbury. So
much, we may take for granted. He, at least, believed that he was in
love with her. He would have thought it wicked to propose to her had
he not been in love with her. But with his love was mingled a certain
amount of contempt which had induced him to look upon her as an easy
conquest. He had been perhaps a little ashamed of himself for being
in love with Dorothy, and had almost believed the Frenches when they
had spoken of her as a poor creature, a dependant, one born to be
snubbed,--as a young woman almost without an identity of her own.
When, therefore, she so pertinaciously refused him, he could not but
be angry. And it was natural that he should be surprised. Though he
was to have received a fortune with Dorothy, the money was not hers.
It was to be hers,--or rather theirs,--only if she would accept him.
Mr. Gibson thoroughly understood this point. He knew that Dorothy had
nothing of her own. The proposal made to her was as rich as though
he had sought her down at Nuncombe Putney, with his preferment, plus
the £2,000, in his own pocket. And his other advantages were not
hidden from his own eyes. He was a clergyman, well thought of, not
bad-looking certainly, considerably under forty,--a man, indeed, who
ought to have been, in the eyes of Dorothy, such an Orlando as she
would have most desired. He could not therefore but wonder. And then
came the doubt. Could it be possible that all those refusals were
simply the early pulses of hesitating compliance produced by maidenly
reserve? Mr. Gibson's friend had expressed a strong opinion that
almost any young woman would accept any young man if he put his
"com 'ether" upon her strong enough. For Mr. Gibson's friend was an
Irishman. As to Dorothy the friend had not a doubt in the world. Mr.
Gibson, as he stood alone in the room after Dorothy's departure,
could not share his friend's certainty; but he thought it just
possible that the pulsations of maidenly reserve were yet at work. As
he was revolving these points in his mind, Miss Stanbury entered the
room.
"It's all over now," she said.
"As how, Miss Stanbury?"
"As how! She's given you an answer; hasn't she?"
"Yes, Miss Stanbury, she has given me an answer. But it has occurred
to me that young ladies are sometimes,--perhaps a little--"
"She means it, Mr. Gibson; you may take my word for that. She is
quite in earnest. She can take the bit between her teeth as well as
another, though she does look so mild and gentle. She's a Stanbury
all over."
"And must this be the last of it, Miss Stanbury?"
"Upon my word, I don't know what else you can do,--unless you send
the Dean and Chapter to talk her over. She's a pig-headed, foolish
young woman;--but I can't help that. The truth is, you didn't make
enough of her at first, Mr. Gibson. You thought the plum would tumble
into your mouth."
This did seem cruel to the poor man. From the first day in which
the project had been opened to him by Miss Stanbury, he had yielded
a ready acquiescence,--in spite of those ties which he had at
Heavitree,--and had done his very best to fall into her views. "I
don't think that is at all fair, Miss Stanbury," he said, with some
tone of wrath in his voice.
"It's true,--quite true. You always treated her as though she were
something beneath you." Mr. Gibson stood speechless, with his mouth
open. "So you did. I saw it all. And now she's had spirit enough to
resent it. I don't wonder at it; I don't, indeed. It's no good your
standing there any longer. The thing is done."
Such intolerable ill-usage Mr. Gibson had never suffered in his life.
Had he been untrue, or very nearly untrue, to those dear girls at
Heavitree for this? "I never treated her as anything beneath me," he
said at last.
"Yes, you did. Do you think that I don't understand? Haven't I eyes
in my head, and ears? I'm not deaf yet, nor blind. But there's an
end of it. If any young woman ever meant anything, she means it. The
truth is, she don't like you."
Was ever a lover despatched in so uncourteous a way! Then, too, he
had been summoned thither as a lover, had been specially encouraged
to come there as a lover, had been assured of success in a peculiar
way, had had the plum actually offered to him! He had done all that
this old woman had bidden him,--something, indeed, to the prejudice
of his own heart; he had been told that the wife was ready for
him; and now, because this foolish young woman didn't know her own
mind,--this was Mr. Gibson's view of the matter,--he was reviled
and abused, and told that he had behaved badly to the lady. "Miss
Stanbury," he said, "I think that you are forgetting yourself."
"Highty, tighty!" said Miss Stanbury. "Forgetting myself! I shan't
forget you in a hurry, Mr. Gibson."
"Nor I you, Miss Stanbury. Good morning, Miss Stanbury." Mr. Gibson,
as he went from the hall-door into the street, shook the dust off his
feet, and resolved that for the future he and Miss Stanbury should be
two. There would arise great trouble in Exeter, but, nevertheless, he
and Miss Stanbury must be two. He could justify himself in no other
purpose after such conduct as he had received.
CHAPTER XLIII.
LABURNUM COTTAGE.
There had been various letters passing, during the last six weeks,
between Priscilla Stanbury and her brother, respecting the Clock
House at Nuncombe Putney. The ladies at Nuncombe had, certainly, gone
into the Clock House on the clear understanding that the expenses of
the establishment were to be incurred on behalf of Mrs. Trevelyan.
Priscilla had assented to the movement most doubtingly. She had
disliked the idea of taking the charge of a young married woman who
was separated from her husband, and she had felt that a going down
after such an uprising,--a fall from the Clock House back to a
cottage,--would be very disagreeable. She had, however, allowed her
brother's arguments to prevail, and there they were. The annoyance
which she had anticipated from the position of their late guest had
fallen upon them: it had been felt grievously, from the moment in
which Colonel Osborne called at the house; and now that going back
to the cottage must be endured. Priscilla understood that there had
been a settlement between Trevelyan and Stanbury as to the cost of
the establishment so far;--but that must now be at an end. In their
present circumstances she would not continue to live there, and had
already made inquiries as to some humble roof for their shelter. For
herself she would not have cared had it been necessary for her to
hide herself in a hut,--for herself, as regarded any feeling as to
her own standing in the village. For herself, she was ashamed of
nothing. But her mother would suffer, and she knew what Aunt Stanbury
would say to Dorothy. To Dorothy at the present moment, if Dorothy
should think of accepting her suitor, the change might be very
deleterious; but still it should be made. She could not endure
to live there on the very hard-earned proceeds of her brother's
pen,--proceeds which were not only hard-earned, but precarious. She
gave warning to the two servants who had been hired, and consulted
with Mrs. Crocket as to a cottage, and was careful to let it be known
throughout Nuncombe Putney that the Clock House was to be abandoned.
The Clock House had been taken furnished for six months, of which
half were not yet over; but there were other expenses of living there
much greater than the rent, and go she would. Her mother sighed and
assented; and Mrs. Crocket, having strongly but fruitlessly advised
that the Clock House should be inhabited at any rate for the six
months, promised her assistance. "It has been a bad business, Mrs.
Crocket," said Priscilla; "and all we can do now is to get out of
it as well as we can. Every mouthful I eat chokes me while I stay
there." "It ain't good, certainly, miss, not to know as you're all
straight the first thing as you wakes in the morning," said Mrs.
Crocket,--who was always able to feel when she woke that everything
was straight with her.
Then there came the correspondence between Priscilla and Hugh.
Priscilla was at first decided, indeed, but mild in the expression
of her decision. To this, and to one or two other missives
couched in terms of increasing decision, Hugh answered with manly,
self-asserting, overbearing arguments. The house was theirs till
Christmas; between this and then he would think about it. He could
very well afford to keep the house on till next Midsummer, and then
they might see what had best be done. There was plenty of money, and
Priscilla need not put herself into a flutter. In answer to that word
flutter, Priscilla wrote as follows:--
Clock House, September 16, 186--.
DEAR HUGH,
I know very well how good you are, and how generous, but
you must allow me to have feelings as well as yourself. I
will not consent to have myself regarded as a grand lady
out of your earnings. How should I feel when some day I
heard that you had run yourself into debt? Neither mamma
nor I could endure it. Dorothy is provided for now, at any
rate for a time, and what we have is enough for us. You
know I am not too proud to take anything you can spare to
us, when we are ourselves placed in a proper position: but
I could not live in this great house, while you are paying
for everything,--and I will not. Mamma quite agrees with
me, and we shall go out of it on Michaelmas-day. Mrs.
Crocket says she thinks she can get you a tenant for the
three months, out of Exeter,--if not for the whole rent,
at least for part of it. I think we have already got a
small place for eight shillings a week, a little out of
the village, on the road to Cockchaffington. You will
remember it. Old Soames used to live there. Our old
furniture will be just enough. There is a mite of a
garden, and Mrs. Crocket says she thinks we can get it for
seven shillings, or perhaps for six and sixpence, if we
stay there. We shall go in on the 29th. Mrs. Crocket will
see about having somebody to take care of the house.
Your most affectionate sister,
PRISCILLA.
On the receipt of this letter, Hugh proceeded to Nuncombe. At this
time he was making about ten guineas a week, and thought that
he saw his way to further work. No doubt the ten guineas were
precarious;--that is, the "Daily Record" might discontinue his
services to-morrow, if the "Daily Record" thought fit to do so. The
greater part of his earnings came from the "D. R.," and the editor
had only to say that things did not suit any longer, and there would
be an end of it. He was not as a lawyer or a doctor with many clients
who could not all be supposed to withdraw their custom at once; but
leading articles were things wanted with at least as much regularity
as physic or law, and Hugh Stanbury, believing in himself, did not
think it probable that an editor, who knew what he was about, would
withdraw his patronage. He was proud of his weekly ten guineas,
feeling sure that a weekly ten guineas would not as yet have been
his had he stuck to the Bar as a profession. He had calculated, when
Mrs. Trevelyan left the Clock House, that two hundred a year would
enable his mother to continue to reside there, the rent of the place
furnished, or half-furnished, being only eighty; and he thought
that he could pay the two hundred easily. He thought so still, when
he received Priscilla's last letter; but he knew something of the
stubbornness of his dear sister, and he, therefore, went down to
Nuncombe Putney, in order that he might use the violence of his logic
on his mother.
He had heard of Mr. Gibson from both Priscilla and from Dorothy,
and was certainly desirous that "dear old Dolly," as he called her,
should be settled comfortably. But when dear old Dolly wrote to him
declaring that it could not be so, that Mr. Gibson was a very nice
gentleman, of whom she could not say that she was particularly
fond,--"though I really do think that he is an excellent man, and if
it was any other girl in the world, I should recommend her to take
him,"--and that she thought that she would rather not get married, he
wrote to her the kindest brotherly letter in the world, telling her
that she was "a brick," and suggesting to her that there might come
some day some one who would suit her taste better than Mr. Gibson.
"I'm not very fond of parsons myself," said Hugh, "but you must not
tell that to Aunt Stanbury." Then he suggested that as he was going
down to Nuncombe, Dorothy should get leave of absence and come over
and meet him at the Clock House. Dorothy demanded the leave of
absence somewhat imperiously, and was at home at the Clock House when
Hugh arrived.
"And so that little affair couldn't come off?" said Hugh at their
first family meeting.
"It was a pity," said Mrs. Stanbury, plaintively. She had been very
plaintive on the subject. What a thing it would have been for her,
could she have seen Dorothy so well established!
"There's no help for spilt milk, mother," said Hugh. Mrs. Stanbury
shook her head.
"Dorothy was quite right," said Priscilla.
"Of course she was right," said Hugh. "Who doubts her being right?
Bless my soul! What's any girl to do if she don't like a man except
to tell him so? I honour you, Dolly,--not that I ever should have
doubted you. You're too much of a chip of the old block to say you
liked a man when you didn't."
"He is a very excellent young man," said Mrs. Stanbury.
"An excellent fiddlestick, mother. Loving and liking don't go by
excellence. Besides, I don't know about his being any better than
anybody else, just because he's a clergyman."
"A clergyman is more likely to be steady than other men," said the
mother.
"Steady, yes; and as selfish as you please."
"Your father was a clergyman, Hugh."
"I don't mean to say that they are not as good as others; but I won't
have it that they are better. They are always dealing with the Bible,
till they think themselves apostles. But when money comes up, or
comfort, or, for the matter of that either, a pretty woman with a
little money, then they are as human as the rest of us."
If the truth had been told on that occasion, Hugh Stanbury would have
had to own that he had written lately two or three rather stinging
articles in the "Daily Record," as "to the assumed merits and actual
demerits of the clergy of the Church of England." It is astonishing
how fluent a man is on a subject when he has lately delivered himself
respecting it in this fashion.
Nothing on that evening was said about the Clock House, or about
Priscilla's intentions. Priscilla was up early on the next morning,
intending to discuss it in the garden with Hugh before breakfast; but
Hugh was aware of her purpose and avoided her. It was his intention
to speak first to his mother; and though his mother was, as he knew,
very much in awe of her daughter, he thought that he might carry his
point, at any rate for the next three months, by forcing an assent
from the elder lady. So he managed to waylay Mrs. Stanbury before she
descended to the parlour.
"We can't afford it, my dear;--indeed we can't," said Mrs. Stanbury.
"That's not the question, mother. The rent must be paid up to
Christmas, and you can live here as cheap as you can anywhere."
"But Priscilla--"
"Oh, Priscilla! Of course we know what Priscilla says. Priscilla has
been writing to me about it in the most sensible manner in the world;
but what does it all come to? If you are ashamed of taking assistance
from me, I don't know who is to do anything for anybody. You are
comfortable here?"
"Very comfortable; only Priscilla feels--"
"Priscilla is a tyrant, mother; and a very stern one. Just make up
your mind to stay here till Christmas. If I tell you that I can
afford it, surely that ought to be enough." Then Dorothy entered the
room, and Hugh appealed to her. Dorothy had come to Nuncombe only on
the day before, and had not been consulted on the subject. She had
been told that the Clock House was to be abandoned, and had been
taken down to inspect the cottage in which old Soames had lived;--but
her opinion had not been asked. Priscilla had quite made up her mind,
and why should she ask an opinion of any one? But now Dorothy's
opinion was demanded. "It's what I call the rhodomontade of
independence," said Hugh.
"I suppose it is very expensive," suggested Dorothy.
"The house must be paid for," said Hugh;--"and if I say that I've got
the money, is not that enough? A miserable, dirty little place, where
you'll catch your death of lumbago, mother."
"Of course it's not a comfortable house," said Mrs. Stanbury,--who,
of herself, was not at all indifferent to the comforts of her present
residence.
"And it is very dirty," said Dorothy.
"The nastiest place I ever saw in my life. Come, mother; if I say
that I can afford it, ought not that to be enough for you? If you
think you can't trust me, there's an end of everything, you know."
And Hugh, as he thus expressed himself, assumed an air of injured
virtue.
Mrs. Stanbury had very nearly yielded, when Priscilla came in among
them. It was impossible not to continue the conversation, though Hugh
would much have preferred to have forced an assent from his mother
before he opened his mouth on the subject to his sister. "My mother
agrees with me," said he abruptly, "and so does Dolly, that it will
be absurd to move away from this house at present."
"Mamma!" exclaimed Priscilla.
"I don't think I said that, Hugh," murmured Dorothy, softly.
"I'm sure I don't want anything for myself," said Mrs. Stanbury.
"It's I that want it," said Hugh. "And I think that I've a right to
have my wishes respected, so far as that goes."
"My dear Hugh," said Priscilla, "the cottage is already taken, and we
shall certainly go into it. I spoke to Mrs. Crocket yesterday about
a cart for moving the things. I'm sure mamma agrees with me. What
possible business can people have to live in such a house as this
with about twenty-four shillings a week for everything? I won't do
it. And as the thing is settled, it is only making trouble to disturb
it."
"I suppose, Priscilla," said Hugh, "you'll do as your mother
chooses?"
"Mamma chooses to go. She has told me so already."
"You have talked her into it."
"We had better go, Hugh," said Mrs. Stanbury. "I'm sure we had better
go."
"Of course we shall go," said Priscilla. "Hugh is very kind and very
generous, but he is only giving trouble for nothing about this. Had
we not better go down to breakfast?"
And so Priscilla carried the day. They went down to breakfast, and
during the meal Hugh would speak to nobody. When the gloomy meal
was over he took his pipe and walked out to the cottage. It was an
untidy-looking, rickety place, small and desolate, with a pretension
about it of the lowest order, a pretension that was evidently ashamed
of itself. There was a porch. And the one sitting-room had what the
late Mr. Soames had always called his bow window. But the porch
looked as though it were tumbling down, and the bow window looked
as though it were tumbling out. The parlour and the bedroom over it
had been papered;--but the paper was torn and soiled, and in sundry
places was hanging loose. There was a miserable little room called a
kitchen to the right as you entered the door, in which the grate was
worn out, and behind this was a shed with a copper. In the garden
there remained the stumps and stalks of Mr. Soames's cabbages, and
there were weeds in plenty, and a damp hole among some elder bushes
called an arbour. It was named Laburnum Cottage, from a shrub that
grew at the end of the house. Hugh Stanbury shuddered as he stood
smoking among the cabbage-stalks. How could a man ask such a girl
as Nora Rowley to be his wife, whose mother lived in a place like
this? While he was still standing in the garden, and thinking of
Priscilla's obstinacy and his own ten guineas a week, and the sort of
life which he lived in London,--where he dined usually at his club,
and denied himself nothing in the way of pipes, beer, and beefsteaks,
he heard a step behind him, and turning round, saw his elder sister.
"Hugh," she said, "you must not be angry with me."
"But I am angry with you."
"I know you are; but you are unjust. I am doing what I am sure is
right."
"I never saw such a beastly hole as this in all my life."
"I don't think it beastly at all. You'll find that I'll make it nice.
Whatever we want here you shall give us. You are not to think that I
am too proud to take anything at your hands. It is not that."
"It's very like it."
"I have never refused anything that is reasonable, but it is quite
unreasonable that we should go on living in such a place as that, as
though we had three or four hundred a year of our own. If mamma got
used to the comfort of it, it would be hard then upon her to move.
You shall give her what you can afford, and what is reasonable; but
it is madness to think of living there. I couldn't do it."
"You're to have your way at any rate, it seems."
"But you must not quarrel with me, Hugh. Give me a kiss. I don't have
you often with me; and yet you are the only man in the world that I
ever speak to, or even know. I sometimes half think that the bread is
so hard and the water so bitter, that life will become impossible. I
try to get over it; but if you were to go away from me in anger, I
should be so beaten for a week or two that I could do nothing."
"Why won't you let me do anything?"
"I will;--whatever you please. But kiss me." Then he kissed her, as
he stood among Mr. Soames's cabbage-stalks. "Dear Hugh; you are such
a god to me!"
"You don't treat me like a divinity."
"But I think of you as one when you are absent. The gods were never
obeyed when they showed themselves. Let us go and have a walk.
Come;--shall we get as far as Ridleigh Mill?" Then they started
together, and all unpleasantness was over between them when they
returned to the Clock House.
CHAPTER XLIV.
BROOKE BURGESS TAKES LEAVE OF EXETER.
[Illustration]
The time had arrived at which Brooke Burgess was to leave Exeter. He
had made his tour through the county, and returned to spend his two
last nights at Miss Stanbury's house. When he came back Dorothy was
still at Nuncombe, but she arrived in the Close the day before his
departure. Her mother and sister had wished her to stay at Nuncombe.
"There is a bed for you now, and a place to be comfortable in,"
Priscilla had said, laughing, "and you may as well see the last of
us." But Dorothy declared that she had named a day to her aunt, and
that she would not break her engagement. "I suppose you can stay if
you like," Priscilla had urged. But Dorothy was of opinion that she
ought not to stay. She said not a word about Brooke Burgess; but it
may be that it would have been matter of regret to her not to shake
hands with him once more. Brooke declared to her that had she not
come back he would have gone over to Nuncombe to see her; but Dorothy
did not consider herself entitled to believe that.
On the morning of the last day Brooke went over to his uncle's
office. "I've come to say good-bye, Uncle Barty," he said.
"Good-bye, my boy. Take care of yourself."
"I mean to try."
"You haven't quarrelled with the old woman,--have you?" said Uncle
Barty.
"Not yet;--that is to say, not to the knife."
"And you still believe that you are to have her money?"
"I believe nothing one way or the other. You may be sure of this,--I
shall never count it mine till I've got it; and I shall never make
myself so sure of it as to break my heart because I don't get it. I
suppose I've got as good a right to it as anybody else, and I don't
see why I shouldn't take it if it come in my way."
"I don't think it ever will," said the old man, after a pause.
"I shall be none the worse," said Brooke.
"Yes, you will. You'll be a broken-hearted man. And she means to
break your heart. She does it on purpose. She has no more idea of
leaving you her money than I have. Why should she?"
"Simply because she takes the fancy."
"Fancy! Believe me, there is very little fancy about it. There isn't
one of the name she wouldn't ruin if she could. She'd break all our
hearts if she could get at them. Look at me and my position. I'm
little more than a clerk in the concern. By God;--I'm not so well off
as a senior clerk in many a bank. If there came a bad time, I must
lose as the others would lose;--but a clerk never loses. And my share
in the business is almost a nothing. It's just nothing,--compared to
what it would have been, only for her."
Brooke had known that his uncle was a disappointed, or at least
a discontented man; but he had never known much of the old man's
circumstances, and certainly had not expected to hear him speak in
the strain that he had now used. He had heard often that his Uncle
Barty disliked Miss Stanbury, and had not been surprised at former
sharp, biting little words spoken in reference to that lady's
character. But he had not expected such a tirade of abuse as the
banker had now poured out. "Of course I know nothing about the bank,"
said he; "but I did not suppose that she had had anything to do with
it."
"Where do you think the money came from that she has got? Did
you ever hear that she had anything of her own? She never had a
penny,--never a penny. It came out of this house. It is the capital
on which this business was founded, and on which it ought to be
carried on to this day. My brother had thrown her off; by heavens,
yes;--had thrown her off. He had found out what she was, and had got
rid of her."
"But he left her his money."
"Yes;--she got near him when he was dying, and he did leave her his
money;--his money, and my money, and your father's money."
"He could have given her nothing, Uncle Barty, that wasn't his own."
"Of course that's true;--it's true in one way. You might say the same
of a man who was cozened into leaving every shilling away from his
own children. I wasn't in Exeter when the will was made. We none
of us were here. But she was here; and when we came to see him die,
there we found her. She had had her revenge upon him, and she means
to have it on all of us. I don't believe she'll ever leave you a
shilling, Brooke. You'll find her out yet, and you'll talk of her to
your nephews as I do to you."
Brooke made some ordinary answer to this, and bade his uncle adieu.
He had allowed himself to entertain a half chivalrous idea that he
could produce a reconciliation between Miss Stanbury and his uncle
Barty; and since he had been at Exeter he had said a word, first to
the one and then to the other, hinting at the subject; but his hints
had certainly not been successful. As he walked from the bank into
the High Street he could not fail to ask himself whether there were
any grounds for the terrible accusations which he had just heard from
his uncle's lips. Something of the same kind, though in form much
less violent, had been repeated to him very often by others of the
family. Though he had as a boy known Miss Stanbury well, he had been
taught to regard her as an ogress. All the Burgesses had regarded
Miss Stanbury as an ogress since that unfortunate will had come
to light. But she was an ogress from whom something might be
gained,--and the ogress had still persisted in saying that a Burgess
should be her heir. It had therefore come to pass that Brooke had
been brought up half to revere her and half to abhor her. "She is a
dreadful woman," said his branch of the family, "who will not scruple
at anything evil. But as it seems that you may probably reap the
advantage of the evil that she does, it will become you to put up
with her iniquity." As he had become old enough to understand the
nature of her position, he had determined to judge for himself;--but
his judgment hitherto simply amounted to this,--that Miss Stanbury
was a very singular old woman, with a kind heart and good instincts,
but so capricious withal that no sensible man would risk his
happiness on expectations formed on her promises. Guided by this
opinion, he had resolved to be attentive to her and, after a certain
fashion, submissive; but certainly not to become her slave. She had
thrown over her nephew. She was constantly complaining to him of her
niece. Now and again she would say a very bitter word to him about
himself. When he had left Exeter on his little excursion, no one was
so much in favour with her as Mr. Gibson. On his return he found that
Mr. Gibson had been altogether discarded, and was spoken of in terms
of almost insolent abuse. "If I were ever so humble to her," he had
said to himself, "it would do no good; and there is nothing I hate so
much as humility." He had thus determined to take the goods the gods
provided, should it ever come to pass that such godlike provision was
laid before him out of Miss Stanbury's coffers;--but not to alter
his mode of life or put himself out of his way in obedience to her
behests, as a man might be expected to do who was destined to receive
so rich a legacy. Upon this idea he had acted, still believing the
old woman to be good, but believing at the same time that she was
very capricious. Now he had heard what his Uncle Bartholomew Burgess
had had to say upon the matter, and he could not refrain from asking
himself whether his uncle's accusations were true.
In a narrow passage between the High Street and the Close he met Mr.
Gibson. There had come to be that sort of intimacy between the two
men which grows from closeness of position rather than from any
social desire on either side, and it was natural that Burgess should
say a word of farewell. On the previous evening Miss Stanbury
had relieved her mind by turning Mr. Gibson into ridicule in her
description to Brooke of the manner in which the clergyman had
carried on his love affair; and she had at the same time declared
that Mr. Gibson had been most violently impertinent to herself. He
knew, therefore, that Miss Stanbury and Mr. Gibson had become two,
and would on this occasion have passed on without a word relative
to the old lady had Mr. Gibson allowed him to do so. But Mr. Gibson
spoke his mind freely.
"Off to-morrow, are you?" he said. "Good-bye. I hope we may meet
again; but not in the same house, Mr. Burgess."
"There or anywhere I shall be very happy," said Brooke.
"Not there, certainly. While you were absent Miss Stanbury treated me
in such a way that I shall certainly never put my foot in her house
again."
"Dear me! I thought that you and she were such great friends."
"I knew her very well, of course;--and respected her. She is a good
churchwoman, and is charitable in the city; but she has got such a
tongue in her head that there is no bearing it when she does what she
calls giving you a bit of her mind."
"She has been indulgent to me, and has not given me much of it."
"Your time will come, I've no doubt," continued Mr. Gibson.
"Everybody has always told me that it would be so. Even her oldest
friends knew it. You ask Mrs. MacHugh, or Mrs. French, at Heavitree."
"Mrs. French!" said Brooke, laughing. "That would hardly be fair
evidence."
"Why not? I don't know a better judge of character in all Exeter than
Mrs. French. And she and Miss Stanbury have been intimate all their
lives. Ask your uncle at the bank."
"My uncle and Miss Stanbury never were friends," said Brooke.
"Ask Hugh Stanbury what he thinks of her. But don't suppose I want
to say a word against her. I wouldn't for the world do such a thing.
Only, as we've met there and all that, I thought it best to let you
know that she had treated me in such a way, and has been altogether
so violent, that I never will go there again." So saying, Mr.
Gibson passed on, and was of opinion that he had spoken with great
generosity of the old woman who had treated him so badly.
In the afternoon Brooke Burgess went over to the further end of the
Close, and called on Mrs. MacHugh; and from thence he walked across
to Heavitree, and called on the Frenches. It may be doubted whether
he would have been so well behaved to these ladies had they not been
appealed to by Mr. Gibson as witnesses to the character of Miss
Stanbury. He got very little from Mrs. MacHugh. That lady was kind
and cordial, and expressed many wishes that she might see him again
in Exeter. When he said a few words about Mr. Gibson, Mrs. MacHugh
only laughed, and declared that the gentleman would soon find a
plaister for that sore. "There are more fishes than one in the sea,"
she said.
"But I'm afraid they've quarrelled, Mrs. MacHugh."
"So they tell me. What should we have to talk about here if somebody
didn't quarrel sometimes? She and I ought to get up a quarrel for the
good of the public;--only they know that I never can quarrel with
anybody. I never see anybody interesting enough to quarrel with." But
Mrs. MacHugh said nothing about Miss Stanbury, except that she sent
over a message with reference to a rubber of whist for the next night
but one.
He found the two French girls sitting with their mother, and they all
expressed their great gratitude to him for coming to say good-bye
before he went. "It's so very nice of you, Mr. Burgess," said
Camilla, "and particularly just at present."
"Yes, indeed," said Arabella, "because you know things have been so
unpleasant."
"My dears, never mind about that," said Mrs. French. "Miss Stanbury
has meant everything for the best, and it is all over now."
"I don't know what you mean by its being all over, mamma," said
Camilla. "As far as I can understand, it has never been begun."
"My dear, the least said the soonest mended," said Mrs. French.
"That's of course, mamma," said Camilla; "but yet one can't hold
one's tongue altogether. All the city is talking about it, and I dare
say Mr. Burgess has heard as much as anybody else."
"I've heard nothing at all," said Brooke.
"Oh yes, you have," continued Camilla. Arabella conceived herself
at this moment to be situated in so delicate a position, that it
was best that her sister should talk about it, and that she herself
should hold her tongue,--with the exception, perhaps, of a hint here
and there which might be of assistance; for Arabella completely
understood that the prize was now to be hers, if the prize could be
rescued out of the Stanbury clutches. She was aware,--no one better
aware,--how her sister had interfered with her early hopes, and was
sure, in her own mind, that all her disappointment had come from
fratricidal rivalry on the part of Camilla. It had never, however,
been open to her to quarrel with Camilla. There they were, linked
together, and together they must fight their battles. As two pigs may
be seen at the same trough, each striving to take the delicacies of
the banquet from the other, and yet enjoying always the warmth of
the same dunghill in amicable contiguity, so had these young ladies
lived in sisterly friendship, while each was striving to take a
husband from the other. They had understood the position, and,
though for years back they had talked about Mr. Gibson, they had
never quarrelled; but now, in these latter days of the Stanbury
interference, there had come tacitly to be something of an
understanding between them that, if any fighting were still possible
on the subject, one must be put forward and the other must yield.
There had been no spoken agreement, but Arabella quite understood
that she was to be put forward. It was for her to take up the
running, and to win, if possible, against the Stanbury filly. That
was her view, and she was inclined to give Camilla credit for acting
in accordance with it with honesty and zeal. She felt, therefore,
that her words on the present occasion ought to be few. She sat back
in her corner of the sofa, and was intent on her work, and shewed by
the pensiveness of her brow that there were thoughts within her bosom
of which she was not disposed to speak. "You must have heard a great
deal," said Camilla, laughing. "You must know how poor Mr. Gibson has
been abused, because he wouldn't--"
"Camilla, don't be foolish," said Mrs. French.
"Because he wouldn't what?" asked Brooke. "What ought he to have done
that he didn't do?"
"I don't know anything about ought," said Camilla. "That's a matter
of taste altogether."
"I'm the worst hand in the world at a riddle," said Brooke.
"How sly you are," continued Camilla, laughing; "as if dear Aunt
Stanbury hadn't confided all her hopes to you."
"Camilla, dear,--don't," said Arabella.
"But when a gentleman is hunted, and can't be caught, I don't think
he ought to be abused to his face."
"But who hunted him, and who abused him?" asked Brooke.
"Mind, I don't mean to say a word against Miss Stanbury, Mr. Burgess.
We've known her and loved her all our lives;--haven't we, mamma?"
"And respected her," said Arabella.
"Quite so," continued Camilla. "But you know, Mr. Burgess, that she
likes her own way."
"I don't know anybody that does not," said Brooke.
"And when she's disappointed, she shows it. There's no doubt she is
disappointed now, Mr. Burgess."
"What's the good of going on, Camilla?" said Mrs. French. Arabella
sat silent in her corner, with a conscious glow of satisfaction, as
she reflected that the joint disappointment of the elder and the
younger Miss Stanbury had been caused by a tender remembrance of her
own charms. Had not dear Mr. Gibson told her, in the glowing language
of truth, that there was nothing further from his thoughts than the
idea of taking Dorothy Stanbury for his wife?
"Well, you know," continued Camilla, "I think that when a person
makes an attempt, and comes by the worst of it, that person should
put up with the defeat, and not say all manner of ill-natured things.
Everybody knows that a certain gentleman is very intimate in this
house."
"Don't, dear," said Arabella, in a whisper.
"Yes, I shall," said Camilla. "I don't know why people should hold
their tongues, when other people talk so loudly. I don't care a bit
what anybody says about the gentleman and us. We have known him for
ever so many years, and mamma is very fond of him."
"Indeed I am, Camilla," said Mrs. French.
"And for the matter of that, so am I,--very," said Camilla, laughing
bravely. "I don't care who knows it."
"Don't be so silly, child," said Arabella. Camilla was certainly
doing her best, and Arabella was grateful.
"We don't care what people may say," continued Camilla again.
"Of course we heard, as everybody else heard too, that a certain
gentleman was to be married to a certain lady. It was nothing to us
whether he was married or not."
"Nothing at all," said Arabella.
"We never spoke ill of the young lady. We did not interfere. If the
gentleman liked the young lady, he was quite at liberty to marry
her, as far as we were concerned. We had been in the habit of seeing
him here, almost as a brother, and perhaps we might feel that a
connection with that particular young lady would take him from us;
but we never hinted so much even as that,--to him or to anyone else.
Why should we? It was nothing to us. Now it turns out that the
gentleman never meant anything of the kind, whereupon he is pretty
nearly kicked out of the house, and all manner of ill-natured things
are said about us everywhere." By this time Camilla had become quite
excited, and was speaking with much animation.
"How can you be so foolish, Camilla?" said Arabella.
"Perhaps I am foolish," said Camilla, "to care what anybody says."
"What can it all be to Mr. Burgess?" said Mrs. French.
"Only this, that as we all like Mr. Burgess, and as he is almost one
of the family in the Close, I think he ought to know why we are not
quite so cordial as we used to be. Now that the matter is over I have
no doubt things will get right again. And as for the young lady, I'm
sure we feel for her. We think it was the aunt who was indiscreet."
"And then she has such a tongue," said Arabella.
Our friend Brooke, of course, knew the whole truth;--knew the nature
of Mr. Gibson's failure, and knew also how Dorothy had acted in the
affair. He was inclined, moreover, to believe that the ladies who
were now talking to him were as well instructed on the subject as
was he himself. He had heard, too, of the ambition of the two young
ladies now before him, and believed that that ambition was not yet
dead. But he did not think it incumbent on him to fight a battle even
on behalf of Dorothy. He might have declared that Dorothy, at least,
had not been disappointed, but he thought it better to be silent
about Dorothy. "Yes," he said, "Miss Stanbury has a tongue; but I
think it speaks as much good as it does evil, and perhaps that is a
great deal to say for any lady's tongue."
"We never speak evil of anybody," said Camilla; "never. It is a rule
with us." Then Brooke took his leave, and the three ladies were
cordial and almost affectionate in their farewell greetings.
Brooke was to start on the following morning before anybody would
be up except Martha, and Miss Stanbury was very melancholy during
the evening. "We shall miss him very much; shall we not?" she said,
appealing to Dorothy. "I am sure you will miss him very much," said
Dorothy. "We are so stupid here alone," said Miss Stanbury. When they
had drank their tea, she sat nearly silent for half an hour, and then
summoned him up into her own room. "So you are going, Brooke?" she
said.
"Yes; I must go now. They would dismiss me if I stayed an hour
longer."
"It was good of you to come to the old woman; and you must let me
hear of you from time to time."
"Of course I'll write."
"And, Brooke,--"
"What is it, Aunt Stanbury?"
"Do you want any money, Brooke?"
"No;--none, thank you. I've plenty for a bachelor."
"When you think of marrying, Brooke, mind you tell me."
"I'll be sure to tell you;--but I can't promise yet when that will
be." She said nothing more to him, though she paused once more as
though she were going to speak. She kissed him and bade him good-bye,
saying that she would not go down-stairs again that evening. He was
to tell Dorothy to go to bed. And so they parted.
But Dorothy did not go to bed for an hour after that. When Brooke
came down into the parlour with his message she intended to go at
once, and put up her work, and lit her candle, and put out her hand
to him, and said good-bye to him. But, for all that, she remained
there for an hour with him. At first she said very little, but by
degrees her tongue was loosened, and she found herself talking with a
freedom which she could hardly herself understand. She told him how
thoroughly she believed her aunt to be a good woman,--how sure she
was that her aunt was at any rate honest. "As for me," said Dorothy,
"I know that I have displeased her about Mr. Gibson;--and I would go
away, only that I think she would be so desolate." Then Brooke begged
her never to allow the idea of leaving Miss Stanbury to enter her
head. Because Miss Stanbury was capricious, he said, not on that
account should her caprices either be indulged or permitted. That
was his doctrine respecting Miss Stanbury, and he declared that, as
regarded himself, he would never be either disrespectful to her or
submissive. "It is a great mistake," he said, "to think that anybody
is either an angel or a devil." When Dorothy expressed an opinion
that with some people angelic tendencies were predominant, and with
others diabolic tendencies, he assented; but declared that it was not
always easy to tell the one tendency from the other. At last, when
Dorothy had made about five attempts to go, Mr. Gibson's name was
mentioned. "I am very glad that you are not going to be Mrs. Gibson,"
said he.
[Illustration: Brooke Burgess takes his leave.]
"I don't know why you should be glad."
"Because I should not have liked your husband,--not as your husband."
"He is an excellent man, I'm sure," said Dorothy.
"Nevertheless I am very glad. But I did not think you would accept
him, and I congratulate you on your escape. You would have been
nothing to me as Mrs. Gibson."
"Shouldn't I?" said Dorothy, not knowing what else to say.
"But now I think we shall always be friends."
"I'm sure I hope so, Mr. Burgess. But indeed I must go now. It is
ever so late, and you will hardly get any sleep. Good night." Then he
took her hand, and pressed it very warmly, and referring to a promise
before made to her, he assured her that he would certainly make
acquaintance with her brother as soon as he was back in London.
Dorothy, as she went up to bed, was more than ever satisfied with
herself, in that she had not yielded in reference to Mr. Gibson.
CHAPTER XLV.
TREVELYAN AT VENICE.
Trevelyan passed on moodily and alone from Turin to Venice, always
expecting letters from Bozzle, and receiving from time to time the
dispatches which that functionary forwarded to him, as must be
acknowledged, with great punctuality. For Mr. Bozzle did his work,
not only with a conscience, but with a will. He was now, as he had
declared more than once, altogether devoted to Mr. Trevelyan's
interest; and as he was an active, enterprising man, always on the
alert to be doing something, and as he loved the work of writing
dispatches, Trevelyan received a great many letters from Bozzle. It
is not exaggeration to say that every letter made him for the time
a very wretched man. This ex-policeman wrote of the wife of his
bosom,--of her who had been the wife of his bosom, and who was the
mother of his child, who was at this very time the only woman whom he
loved,--with an entire absence of delicacy. Bozzle would have thought
reticence on his part to be dishonest. We remember Othello's demand
of Iago. That was the demand which Bozzle understood that Trevelyan
had made of him, and he was minded to obey that order. But Trevelyan,
though he had in truth given the order, was like Othello also in
this,--that he would have preferred before all the prizes of the
world to have had proof brought home to him exactly opposite to that
which he demanded. But there was nothing so terrible to him as the
grinding suspicion that he was to be kept in the dark. Bozzle could
find out facts. Therefore he gave, in effect, the same order that
Othello gave;--and Bozzle went to work determined to obey it. There
came many dispatches to Venice, and at last there came one, which
created a correspondence which shall be given here at length. The
first is a letter from Mr. Bozzle to his employer:--
55, Stony Walk, Union Street, Borough,
September 29, 186--, 4.30 P.M.
HOND. SIR,
Since I wrote yesterday morning, something has occurred
which, it may be, and I think it will, will help to bring
this melancholy affair to a satisfactory termination and
conclusion. I had better explain, Mr. Trewilyan, how I
have been at work from the beginning about watching the
Colonel. I couldn't do nothing with the porter at the
Albany, which he is always mostly muzzled with beer, and
he wouldn't have taken my money, not on the square. So,
when it was tellegrammed to me as the Colonel was on the
move in the North, I put on two boys as knows the Colonel,
at eighteenpence a day, at each end, one Piccadilly end,
and the other Saville Row end, and yesterday morning,
as quick as ever could be, after the Limited Express
Edinburgh Male Up was in, there comes the Saville Row End
Boy here to say as the Colonel was lodged safe in his
downey. Then I was off immediate myself to St. Diddulph's,
because I knows what it is to trust to Inferiors when
matters gets delicate. Now, there hadn't been no letters
from the Colonel, nor none to him as I could make out,
though that mightn't be so sure. She might have had 'em
addressed to A. Z., or the like of that, at any of the
Post-offices as was distant, as nobody could give the
notice to 'em all. Barring the money, which I know ain't
an object when the end is so desirable, it don't do to be
too ubiketous, because things will go astray. But I've
kept my eye uncommon open, and I don't think there have
been no letters since that last which was sent, Mr.
Trewilyan, let any of 'em, parsons, or what not, say what
they will. And I don't see as parsons are better than
other folk when they has to do with a lady as likes her
fancy-man.
Trevelyan, when he had read as far as this, threw down the letter and
tore his hair in despair. "My wife," he exclaimed, "Oh, my wife!" But
it was essential that he should read Bozzle's letter, and he
persevered.
Well; I took to the ground myself as soon as ever I heard
that the Colonel was among us, and I hung out at the Full
Moon. They had been quite on the square with me at the
Full Moon, which I mention, because, of course, it has
to be remembered, and it do come up as a hitem. And I'm
proud, Mr. Trewilyan, as I did take to the ground myself;
for what should happen but I see the Colonel as large as
life ringing at the parson's bell at 1.47 p.m. He was let
in at 1.49, and he was let out at 2.17. He went away in a
cab which it was kept, and I followed him till he was put
down at the Arcade, and I left him having his 'ed washed
and greased at Trufitt's rooms, half-way up. It was a
wonder to me when I see this, Mr. Trewilyan, as he didn't
have his 'ed done first, as they most of 'em does when
they're going to see their ladies; but I couldn't make
nothing of that, though I did try to put too and too
together, as I always does.
What he did at the parson's, Mr. Trewilyan, I won't
say I saw, and I won't say I know. It's my opinion the
young woman there isn't on the square, though she's
been remembered too, and is a hitem of course. And, Mr.
Trewilyan, it do go against the grain with me when they're
remembered and ain't on the square. I doesn't expect too
much of Human Nature, which is poor, as the saying goes;
but when they're remembered and ain't on the square after
that, it's too bad for Human Nature. It's more than poor.
It's what I calls beggarly.
He ain't been there since, Mr. Trewilyan, and he goes out
of town to-morrow by the 1.15 p.m. express to Bridport. So
he lets on; but of course I shall see to that. That he's
been at St. Diddulph's, in the house from 1.47 to 2.17,
you may take as a fact. There won't be no shaking of that,
because I have it in my mem. book, and no Counsel can get
the better of it. Of course he went there to see her, and
it's my belief he did. The young woman as was remembered
says he didn't, but she isn't on the square. They never is
when a lady wants to see her gentleman, though they comes
round afterwards, and tells up everything when it comes
before his ordinary lordship.
If you ask me, Mr. Trewilyan, I don't think it's ripe yet
for the court, but we'll have it ripe before long. I'll
keep a look-out, because it's just possible she may leave
town. If she do, I'll be down upon them together, and no
mistake.
Yours most respectful,
S. BOZZLE.
Every word in the letter had been a dagger to Trevelyan, and yet he
felt himself to be under an obligation to the man who had written
it. No one else would or could make facts known to him. If she were
innocent, let him know that she were innocent, and he would proclaim
her innocence, and believe in her innocence,--and sacrifice himself
to her innocence, if such sacrifice were necessary. But if she were
guilty, let him also know that. He knew how bad it was, all that
bribing of postmen and maidservants, who took his money, and her
money also, very likely. It was dirt, all of it. But who had put him
into the dirt? His wife had, at least, deceived him,--had deceived
him and disobeyed him, and it was necessary that he should know the
facts. Life without a Bozzle would now have been to him a perfect
blank.
The Colonel had been to the parsonage at St. Diddulph's, and had
been admitted! As to that he had no doubt. Nor did he really doubt
that his wife had seen the visitor. He had sent his wife first
into a remote village on Dartmoor, and there she had been visited
by her--lover! How was he to use any other word? Iago;--oh, Iago!
The pity of it, Iago! Then, when she had learned that this was
discovered, she had left the retreat in which he had placed
her,--without permission from him,--and had taken herself to
the house of a relative of hers. Here she was visited again by
her--lover! Oh, Iago; the pity of it, Iago! And then there had been
between them an almost constant correspondence. So much he had
ascertained as fact; but he did not for a moment believe that Bozzle
had learned all the facts. There might be correspondence, or even
visits, of which Bozzle could learn nothing. How could Bozzle know
where Mrs. Trevelyan was during all those hours which Colonel Osborne
passed in London? That which he knew, he knew absolutely, and on
that he could act; but there was, of course, much of which he knew
nothing. Gradually the truth would unveil itself, and then he would
act. He would tear that Colonel into fragments, and throw his wife
from him with all the ignominy which the law made possible to him.
But in the meantime he wrote a letter to Mr. Outhouse. Colonel
Osborne, after all that had been said, had been admitted at the
parsonage, and Trevelyan was determined to let the clergyman know
what he thought about it. The oftener he turned the matter in his
mind, as he walked slowly up and down the piazza of St. Mark, the
more absurd it appeared to him to doubt that his wife had seen the
man. Of course she had seen him. He walked there nearly the whole
night, thinking of it, and as he dragged himself off at last to his
inn, had almost come to have but one desire,--namely, that he should
find her out, that the evidence should be conclusive, that it should
be proved, and so brought to an end. Then he would destroy her, and
destroy that man,--and afterwards destroy himself, so bitter to him
would be his ignominy. He almost revelled in the idea of the tragedy
he would make. It was three o'clock before he was in his bedroom, and
then he wrote his letter to Mr. Outhouse before he took himself to
his bed. It was as follows:--
Venice, Oct. 4, 186--.
SIR,
Information of a certain kind, on which I can place a
firm reliance, has reached me, to the effect that Colonel
Osborne has been allowed to visit at your house during
the sojourn of my wife under your roof. I will thank you
to inform me whether this be true; as, although I am
confident of my facts, it is necessary, in reference to my
ulterior conduct, that I should have from you either an
admission or a denial of my assertion. It is of course
open to you to leave my letter unanswered. Should you
think proper to do so, I shall know also how to deal with
that fact.
As to your conduct in admitting Colonel Osborne into your
house while my wife is there,--after all that has passed,
and all that you know that has passed,--I am quite unable
to speak with anything like moderation of feeling. Had the
man succeeded in forcing himself into your residence, you
should have been the first to give me notice of it. As it
is, I have been driven to ascertain the fact from other
sources. I think that you have betrayed the trust that a
husband has placed in you, and that you will find from the
public voice that you will be regarded as having disgraced
yourself as a clergyman.
In reference to my wife herself, I would wish her to know,
that after what has now taken place, I shall not feel
myself justified in leaving our child longer in her hands,
even tender as are his years. I shall take steps for
having him removed. What further I shall do to vindicate
myself, and extricate myself as far as may be possible
from the slough of despond in which I have been submerged,
she and you will learn in due time.
Your obedient servant,
L. TREVELYAN.
A letter addressed "poste restante, Venice," will reach me
here.
If Trevelyan was mad when he wrote this letter, Mr. Outhouse was
very nearly as mad when he read it. He had most strongly desired
to have nothing to do with his wife's niece when she was separated
from her husband. He was a man honest, charitable, and sufficiently
affectionate; but he was timid, and disposed to think ill of those
whose modes of life were strange to him. Actuated by these feelings,
he would have declined to offer the hospitality of his roof to Mrs.
Trevelyan, had any choice been left to him. But there had been no
choice. She had come thither unasked, with her boy and baggage, and
he could not send her away. His wife had told him that it was his
duty to protect these women till their father came, and he recognised
the truth of what his wife said. There they were, and there they must
remain throughout the winter. It was hard upon him,--especially as
the difficulties and embarrassments as to money were so disagreeable
to him;--but there was no help for it. His duty must be done though
it were ever so painful. Then that horrid Colonel had come. And now
had come this letter, in which he was not only accused of being an
accomplice between his married niece and her lover, but was also
assured that he should be held up to public ignominy and disgrace.
Though he had often declared that Trevelyan was mad, he would not
remember that now. Such a letter as he had received should have been
treated by him as the production of a madman. But he was not sane
enough himself to see the matter in that light. He gnashed his teeth,
and clenched his fist, and was almost beside himself as he read the
letter a second time.
There had been a method in Trevelyan's madness; for though he had
declared to himself that without doubt Bozzle had been right in
saying that as the Colonel had been at the parsonage, therefore, as a
certainty, Mrs. Trevelyan had met the Colonel there, yet he had not
so stated in his letter. He had merely asserted that Colonel Osborne
had been at the house, and had founded his accusation upon that
alleged fact. The alleged fact had been in truth a fact. So far
Bozzle had been right. The Colonel had been at the parsonage; and the
reader knows how far Mr. Outhouse had been to blame for his share
in the matter! He rushed off to his wife with the letter, declaring
at first that Mrs. Trevelyan, Nora, and the child, and the servant,
should be sent out of the house at once. But at last Mrs. Outhouse
succeeded in showing him that he would not be justified in ill-using
them because Trevelyan had ill-used him. "But I will write to him,"
said Mr. Outhouse. "He shall know what I think about it." And he did
write his letter that day, in spite of his wife's entreaties that
he would allow the sun to set upon his wrath. And his letter was as
follows:--
St. Diddulph's, October 8, 186--.
SIR,
I have received your letter of the 4th, which is more
iniquitous, unjust, and ungrateful, than anything I ever
before saw written. I have been surprised from the first
at your gross cruelty to your unoffending wife; but even
that seems to me more intelligible than your conduct in
writing such words as those which you have dared to send
to me.
For your wife's sake, knowing that she is in a great
degree still in your power, I will condescend to tell
you what has happened. When Mrs. Trevelyan found herself
constrained to leave Nuncombe Putney by your aspersions
on her character, she came here, to the protection of her
nearest relatives within reach, till her father and mother
should be in England. Sorely against my will I received
them into my home, because they had been deprived of other
shelter by the cruelty or madness of him who should have
been their guardian. Here they are, and here they shall
remain till Sir Marmaduke Rowley arrives. The other day,
on the 29th of September, Colonel Osborne, who is their
father's old friend, called, not on them, but on me. I may
truly say that I did not wish to see Colonel Osborne. They
did not see him, nor did he ask to see them. If his coming
was a fault,--and I think it was a fault,--they were
not implicated in it. He came, remained a few minutes,
and went without seeing any one but myself. That is the
history of Colonel Osborne's visit to my house.
I have not thought fit to show your letter to your wife,
or to make her acquainted with this further proof of your
want of reason. As to the threats which you hold out
of removing her child from her, you can of course do
nothing except by law. I do not think that even you will
be sufficiently audacious to take any steps of that
description. Whatever protection the law may give her
and her child from your tyranny and misconduct cannot be
obtained till her father shall be here.
I have only further to request that you will not address
any further communication to me. Should you do so, it will
be refused.
Yours in deep indignation,
OLIPHANT OUTHOUSE.
Trevelyan had also written two other letters to England, one to Mr.
Bideawhile and the other to Bozzle. In the former he acquainted the
lawyer that he had discovered that his wife still maintained her
intercourse with Colonel Osborne, and that he must therefore remove
his child from her custody. He then inquired what steps would be
necessary to enable him to obtain possession of his little boy.
In the letter to Bozzle he sent a cheque, and his thanks for the
ex-policeman's watchful care. He desired Bozzle to continue his
precautions, and explained his intentions about his son. Being
somewhat afraid that Mr. Bideawhile might not be zealous on his
behalf, and not himself understanding accurately the extent of his
power with regard to his own child, or the means whereby he might
exercise it, he was anxious to obtain assistance from Bozzle also on
this point. He had no doubt that Bozzle knew all about it. He had
great confidence in Bozzle. But still he did not like to consult the
ex-policeman. He knew that it became him to have some regard for his
own dignity. He therefore put the matter very astutely to Bozzle,
asking no questions, but alluding to his difficulty in a way that
would enable Bozzle to offer advice.
And where was he to get a woman to take charge of his child? If Lady
Milborough would do it, how great would be the comfort! But he was
almost sure that Lady Milborough would not do it. All his friends had
turned against him, and Lady Milborough among the number. There was
nobody left to him, but Bozzle. Could he entrust Bozzle to find some
woman for him who would take adequate charge of the little fellow,
till he himself could see to the child's education? He did not put
this question to Bozzle in plain terms; but he was very astute, and
wrote in such a fashion that Bozzle could make a proposal, if any
proposal were within his power.
The answer from Mr. Outhouse came first. To this Mr. Trevelyan paid
very little attention. It was just what he expected. Of course Mr.
Outhouse's assurance about Colonel Osborne went for nothing. A man
who would permit intercourse in his house between a married lady and
her lover would not scruple to deny that he had permitted it. Then
came Mr. Bideawhile's answer, which was very short. Mr. Bideawhile
said that nothing could be done about the child till Mr. Trevelyan
should return to England;--and that he could give no opinion as to
what should be done then till he knew more of the circumstances. It
was quite clear to Trevelyan that he must employ some other lawyer.
Mr. Bideawhile had probably been corrupted by Colonel Osborne. Could
Bozzle recommend a lawyer?
From Bozzle himself there came no other immediate reply than, "his
duty, and that he would make further inquiries."
CHAPTER XLVI.
THE AMERICAN MINISTER.
In the second week in October, Mr. Glascock returned to Florence,
intending to remain there till the weather should have become
bearable at Naples. His father was said to be better, but was in
such a condition as hardly to receive much comfort from his son's
presence. His mind was gone, and he knew no one but his nurse; and,
though Mr. Glascock was unwilling to put himself altogether out of
the reach of returning at a day's notice, he did not find himself
obliged to remain in Naples during the heat of the autumn. So Mr.
Glascock returned to the hotel at Florence, accompanied by the tall
man who wore the buttons. The hotel-keeper did not allow such a light
to remain long hidden under a bushel, and it was soon spread far and
wide that the Honourable Charles Glascock and his suite were again in
the beautiful city.
And the fact was soon known to the American Minister and his family.
Mr. Spalding was a man who at home had been very hostile to English
interests. Many American gentlemen are known for such hostility. They
make anti-English speeches about the country, as though they thought
that war with England would produce certain triumph to the States,
certain increase to American trade, and certain downfall to a tyranny
which no Anglo-Saxon nation ought to endure. But such is hardly their
real opinion. There, in the States, as also here in England, you
shall from day to day hear men propounding, in very loud language,
advanced theories of political action, the assertion of which
is supposed to be necessary to the end which they have in view.
Men whom we know to have been as mild as sucking doves in the
political aspiration of their whole lives, suddenly jump up,
and with infuriated gestures declare themselves the enemies
of everything existing. When they have attained their little
purpose,--or have failed to do so,--they revert naturally into their
sucking-dove elements. It is so with Americans as frequently as
with ourselves,--and there is no political subject on which it is
considered more expedient to express pseudo-enthusiasm than on that
of the sins of England. It is understood that we do not resent it.
It is presumed that we regard it as the Irishman regarded his wife's
cuffs. In the States a large party, which consists chiefly of those
who have lately left English rule, and who are keen to prove to
themselves how wise they have been in doing so, is pleased by this
strong language against England; and, therefore, the strong language
is spoken. But the speakers, who are, probably, men knowing something
of the world, mean it not at all; they have no more idea of war with
England than they have of war with all Europe; and their respect for
England and for English opinion is unbounded. In their political
tones of speech and modes of action they strive to be as English as
possible. Mr. Spalding's aspirations were of this nature. He had
uttered speeches against England which would make the hair stand on
end on the head of an uninitiated English reader. He had told his
countrymen that Englishmen hugged their chains, and would do so until
American hammers had knocked those chains from off their wounded
wrists and bleeding ankles. He had declared that, if certain American
claims were not satisfied, there was nothing left for Americans to do
but to cross the ferry with such a sheriff's officer as would be able
to make distraint on the great English household. He had declared
that the sheriff's officer would have very little trouble. He had
spoken of Canada as an outlying American territory, not yet quite
sufficiently redeemed from savage life to be received into the Union
as a State. There is a multiplicity of subjects of this kind ready
to the hand of the American orator. Mr. Spalding had been quite
successful, and was now Minister at Florence; but, perhaps, one of
the greatest pleasures coming to him from his prosperity was the
enjoyment of the society of well-bred Englishmen, in the capital to
which he had been sent. When, therefore, his wife and nieces pointed
out to him the fact that it was manifestly his duty to call upon Mr.
Glascock after what had passed between them on that night under the
Campanile, he did not rebel for an instant against the order given
to him. His mind never reverted for a moment to that opinion which
had gained for him such a round of applause, when expressed on the
platform of the Temperance Hall at Nubbly Creek, State of Illinois,
to the effect that the English aristocrat, thorough-born and
thorough-bred, who inherited acres and titles from his father, could
never be fitting company for a thoughtful Christian American citizen.
He at once had his hat brushed, and took up his best gloves and
umbrella, and went off to Mr. Glascock's hotel. He was strictly
enjoined by the ladies to fix a day on which Mr. Glascock would come
and dine at the American embassy.
"'C. G.' has come back to see you," said Olivia to her elder sister.
They had always called him "C. G." since the initials had been seen
on the travelling bag.
"Probably," said Carry. "There is so very little else to bring people
to Florence, that there can hardly be any other reason for his
coming. They do say it's terribly hot at Naples just now; but that
can have had nothing to do with it."
"We shall see," said Livy. "I'm sure he's in love with you. He looked
to me just like a proper sort of lover for you, when I saw his long
legs creeping up over our heads into the banquette."
"You ought to have been very much obliged to his long legs;--so sick
as you were at the time."
"I like him amazingly," said Livy, "legs and all. I only hope Uncle
Jonas won't bore him, so as to prevent his coming."
"His father is very ill," said Carry, "and I don't suppose we shall
see him at all."
But the American Minister was successful. He found Mr. Glascock
sitting in his dressing-gown, smoking a cigar, and reading a
newspaper. The English aristocrat seemed very glad to see his
visitor, and assumed no airs at all. The American altogether forgot
his speech at Nubbly Creek, and found the aristocrat's society to
be very pleasant. He lit a cigar, and they talked about Naples,
Rome, and Florence. Mr. Spalding, when the marbles of old Rome were
mentioned, was a little too keen in insisting on the merits of Story,
Miss Hosmer, and Hiram Powers, and hardly carried his listener with
him in the parallel which he drew between Greenough and Phidias; and
he was somewhat repressed by the apathetic curtness of Mr. Glascock's
reply, when he suggested that the victory gained by the gunboats at
Vicksburg, on the Mississippi, was vividly brought to his mind by
an account which he had just been reading of the battle of Actium;
but he succeeded in inducing Mr. Glascock to accept an invitation to
dinner for the next day but one, and the two gentlemen parted on the
most amicable terms.
Everybody meets everybody in Florence every day. Carry and Livy
Spalding had met Mr. Glascock twice before the dinner at their
uncle's house, so that they met at dinner quite as intimate friends.
Mrs. Spalding had very large rooms, up three flights of stairs, on
the Lungarno. The height of her abode was attributed by Mrs. Spalding
to her dread of mosquitoes. She had not yet learned that people in
Florence require no excuse for being asked to walk up three flights
of stairs. The rooms, when they were reached, were very lofty,
floored with what seemed to be marble, and were of a nature almost to
warrant Mrs. Spalding in feeling that nature had made her more akin
to an Italian countess than to a matron of Nubbly Creek, State of
Illinois, where Mr. Spalding had found her and made her his own.
There was one other Englishman present, Mr. Harris Hyde Granville
Gore, from the Foreign Office, now serving temporarily at the English
Legation in Florence; and an American, Mr. Jackson Unthank, a man of
wealth and taste, who was resolved on having such a collection of
pictures at his house in Baltimore that no English private collection
should in any way come near to it; and a Tuscan, from the Italian
Foreign Office, to whom nobody could speak except Mr. Harris Hyde
Granville Gore,--who did not indeed seem to enjoy the efforts of
conversation which were expected of him. The Italian, who had a
handle to his name,--he was a Count Buonarosci,--took Mrs. Spalding
in to dinner. Mrs. Spalding had been at great trouble to ascertain
whether this was proper, or whether she should not entrust herself
to Mr. Glascock. There were different points to be considered in
the matter. She did not quite know whether she was in Italy or in
America. She had glimmerings on the subject of her privilege to carry
her own nationality into her own drawing-room. And then she was
called upon to deal between an Italian Count with an elder brother,
and an English Honourable, who had no such incumbrance. Which of the
two was possessed of the higher rank? "I've found it all out, Aunt
Mary," said Livy. "You must take the Count." For Livy wanted to give
her sister every chance. "How have you found it out?" said the aunt.
"You may be sure it is so," said Livy. And the lady in her doubt
yielded the point. Mrs. Spalding, as she walked along the passage on
the Count's arm, determined that she would learn Italian. She would
have given all Nubbly Creek to have been able to speak a word to
Count Buonarosci. To do her justice, it must be admitted that she had
studied a few words. But her courage failed her, and she could not
speak them. She was very careful, however, that Mr. H. H. G. Gore was
placed in the chair next to the Count.
"We are very glad to see you here," said Mr. Spalding, addressing
himself especially to Mr. Glascock, as he stood up at his own seat at
the round table. "In leaving my own country, sir, there is nothing
that I value more than the privilege of becoming acquainted with
those whose historic names and existing positions are of such
inestimable value to the world at large." In saying this, Mr.
Spalding was not in the least insincere, nor did his conscience at
all prick him in reference to that speech at Nubbly Creek. On both
occasions he half thought as he spoke,--or thought that he thought
so. Unless it be on subjects especially endeared to us the thoughts
of but few of us go much beyond this.
Mr. Glascock, who sat between Mrs. Spalding and her niece, was soon
asked by the elder lady whether he had been in the States. No; he
had not been in the States. "Then you must come, Mr. Glascock," said
Mrs. Spalding, "though I will not say, dwelling as we now are in the
metropolis of the world of art, that we in our own homes have as much
of the outer beauty of form to charm the stranger as is to be found
in other lands. Yet I think that the busy lives of men, and the
varied institutions of a free country, must always have an interest
peculiarly their own." Mr. Glascock declared that he quite agreed
with her, and expressed a hope that he might some day find himself in
New York.
"You wouldn't like it at all," said Carry; "because you are an
aristocrat. I don't mean that it would be your fault."
"Why should that prevent my liking it,--even if I were an
aristocrat?"
"One half of the people would run after you, and the other half would
run away from you," said Carry.
"Then I'd take to the people who ran after me, and would not regard
the others."
"That's all very well,--but you wouldn't like it. And then you would
become unfair to what you saw. When some of our speechifying people
talked to you about our institutions through their noses, you would
think that the institutions themselves must be bad. And we have
nothing to show except our institutions."
"What are American institutions?" asked Mr. Glascock.
"Everything is an institution. Having iced water to drink in every
room of the house is an institution. Having hospitals in every town
is an institution. Travelling altogether in one class of railway
cars is an institution. Saying sir, is an institution. Teaching all
the children mathematics is an institution. Plenty of food is an
institution. Getting drunk is an institution in a great many towns.
Lecturing is an institution. There are plenty of them, and some are
very good;--but you wouldn't like it."
"At any rate, I'll go and see," said Mr. Glascock.
"If you do, I hope we may be at home," said Miss Spalding.
Mr. Spalding, in the mean time, with the assistance of his
countryman, the man of taste, was endeavouring to explain a certain
point in American politics to the Count. As, in doing this, they
called upon Mr. Gore to translate every speech they made into
Italian, and as Mr. Gore had never offered his services as an
interpreter, and as the Italian did not quite catch the subtle
meanings of the Americans in Mr. Gore's Tuscan version, and did not
in the least wish to understand the things that were explained to
him, Mr. Gore and the Italian began to think that the two Americans
were bores. "The truth is, Mr. Spalding," said Mr. Gore, "I've got
such a cold in my head, that I don't think I can explain it any
more." Then Livy Spalding laughed aloud, and the two American
gentlemen began to eat their dinner. "It sounds ridiculous, don't
it?" said Mr. Gore, in a whisper.
"I ought not to have laughed, I know," said Livy.
"The very best thing you could have done. I shan't be troubled any
more now. The fact is, I know just nine words of Italian. Now there
is a difficulty in having to explain the whole theory of American
politics to an Italian, who doesn't want to know anything about it,
with so very small a repertory of words at one's command."
"How well you did it!"
"Too well. I felt that. So well that, unless I had stopped it, I
shouldn't have been able to say a word to you all through dinner.
Your laughter clenched it, and Buonarosci and I will be grateful to
you for ever."
After the ladies went there was rather a bad half hour for Mr.
Glascock. He was button-holed by the minister, and found it
oppressive before he was enabled to escape into the drawing-room.
"Mr. Glascock," said the minister, "an English gentleman, sir,
like you, who has the privilege of an hereditary seat in your
parliament,"--Mr. Glascock was not quite sure whether he were being
accused of having an hereditary seat in the House of Commons, but he
would not stop to correct any possible error on that point,--"and who
has been born to all the gifts of fortune, rank, and social eminence,
should never think that his education is complete till he has visited
our great cities in the west." Mr. Glascock hinted that he by no
means conceived his education to be complete; but the minister went
on without attending to this. "Till you have seen, sir, what men
can do who are placed upon the earth with all God's gifts of free
intelligence, free air, and a free soil, but without any of those
other good things which we are accustomed to call the gifts of
fortune, you can never become aware of the infinite ingenuity of
man." There had been much said before, but just at this moment Mr.
Gore and the American left the room, and the Italian followed them
briskly. Mr. Glascock at once made a decided attempt to bolt; but the
minister was on the alert, and was too quick for him. And he was by
no means ashamed of what he was doing. He had got his guest by the
coat, and openly declared his intention of holding him. "Let me keep
you for a few minutes, sir," said he, "while I dilate on this point
in one direction. In the drawing-room female spells are too potent
for us male orators. In going among us, Mr. Glascock, you must not
look for luxury or refinement, for you will find them not. Nor must
you hope to encounter the highest order of erudition. The lofty
summits of acquired knowledge tower in your country with an altitude
we have not reached yet."
"It's very good of you to say so," said Mr. Glascock.
"No, sir. In our new country and in our new cities we still lack the
luxurious perfection of fastidious civilisation. But, sir, regard our
level. That is what I say to every unprejudiced Britisher that comes
among us; look at our level. And when you have looked at our level,
I think that you will confess that we live on the highest table-land
that the world has yet afforded to mankind. You follow my meaning,
Mr. Glascock?" Mr. Glascock was not sure that he did, but the
minister went on to make that meaning clear. "It is the multitude
that with us is educated. Go into their houses, sir, and see how they
thumb their books. Look at the domestic correspondence of our helps
and servants, and see how they write and spell. We haven't got the
mountains, sir, but our table-lands are the highest on which the
bright sun of our Almighty God has as yet shone with its illuminating
splendour in this improving world of ours! It is because we are a
young people, sir,--with nothing as yet near to us of the decrepitude
of age. The weakness of age, sir, is the penalty paid by the folly of
youth. We are not so wise, sir, but what we too shall suffer from its
effects as years roll over our heads." There was a great deal more,
but at last Mr. Glascock did escape into the drawing-room.
"My uncle has been saying a few words to you perhaps," said Carry
Spalding.
"Yes; he has," said Mr. Glascock.
"He usually does," said Carry Spalding.
CHAPTER XLVII.
ABOUT FISHING, AND NAVIGATION, AND HEAD-DRESSES.
[Illustration]
The feud between Miss Stanbury and Mr. Gibson raged violently in
Exeter, and produced many complications which were very difficult
indeed of management. Each belligerent party felt that a special
injury had been inflicted upon it. Mr. Gibson was quite sure that he
had been grossly misused by Miss Stanbury the elder, and strongly
suspected that Miss Stanbury the younger had had a hand in this
misconduct. It had been positively asserted to him,--at least so he
thought, but in this was probably in error,--that the lady would
accept him if he proposed to her. All Exeter had been made aware of
the intended compact. He, indeed, had denied its existence to Miss
French, comforting himself, as best he might, with the reflection
that all is fair in love and war; but when he counted over his
injuries he did not think of this denial. All Exeter, so to say, had
known of it. And yet, when he had come with his proposal, he had been
refused without a moment's consideration, first by the aunt, and then
by the niece;--and, after that, had been violently abused, and at
last turned out of the house! Surely, no gentleman had ever before
been subjected to ill-usage so violent! But Miss Stanbury the elder
was quite as assured that the injury had been done to her. As to the
matter of the compact itself, she knew very well that she had been as
true as steel. She had done everything in her power to bring about
the marriage. She had been generous in her offers of money. She had
used all her powers of persuasion on Dorothy, and she had given
every opportunity to Mr. Gibson. It was not her fault if he had not
been able to avail himself of the good things which she had put in
his way. He had first been, as she thought, ignorant and arrogant,
fancying that the good things ought to be made his own without any
trouble on his part;--and then awkward, not knowing how to take the
trouble when trouble was necessary. And as to that matter of abusive
language and turning out of the house, Miss Stanbury was quite
convinced that she was sinned against, and not herself the sinner.
She declared to Martha, more than once, that Mr. Gibson had used such
language to her that, coming out of a clergyman's mouth, it had quite
dismayed her. Martha, who knew her mistress, probably felt that Mr.
Gibson had at least received as good as he gave; but she had made no
attempt to set her mistress right on that point.
But the cause of Miss Stanbury's sharpest anger was not to be found
in Mr. Gibson's conduct either before Dorothy's refusal of his offer,
or on the occasion of his being turned out of the house. A base
rumour was spread about the city that Dorothy Stanbury had been
offered to Mr. Gibson, that Mr. Gibson had civilly declined the
offer,--and that hence had arisen the wrath of the Juno of the Close.
Now this was not to be endured by Miss Stanbury. She had felt even
in the moment of her original anger against Mr. Gibson that she was
bound in honour not to tell the story against him. She had brought
him into the little difficulty, and she at least would hold her
tongue. She was quite sure that Dorothy would never boast of her
triumph. And Martha had been strictly cautioned,--as indeed, also,
had Brooke Burgess. The man had behaved like an idiot, Miss Stanbury
said; but he had been brought into a little dilemma, and nothing
should be said about it from the house in the Close. But when the
other rumour reached Miss Stanbury's ears, when Mrs. Crumbie condoled
with her on her niece's misfortune, when Mrs. MacHugh asked whether
Mr. Gibson had not behaved rather badly to the young lady, then our
Juno's celestial mind was filled with a divine anger. But even then
she did not declare the truth. She asked a question of Mrs. Crumbie,
and was enabled, as she thought, to trace the falsehood to the
Frenches. She did not think that Mr. Gibson could on a sudden have
become so base a liar. "Mr. Gibson fast and loose with my niece!" she
said to Mrs. MacHugh. "You have not got the story quite right, my
dear friend. Pray, believe me;--there has been nothing of that sort."
"I dare say not," said Mrs. MacHugh, "and I'm sure I don't care. Mr.
Gibson has been going to marry one of the French girls for the last
ten years, and I think he ought to make up his mind and do it at
last."
"I can assure you he is quite welcome as far as Dorothy is
concerned," said Miss Stanbury.
Without a doubt the opinion did prevail throughout Exeter that Mr.
Gibson, who had been regarded time out of mind as the property of
the Miss Frenches, had been angled for by the ladies in the Close,
that he had nearly been caught, but that he had slipped the hook
out of his mouth, and was now about to subside quietly into the net
which had been originally prepared for him. Arabella French had not
spoken loudly on the subject, but Camilla had declared in more than
one house that she had most direct authority for stating that the
gentleman had never dreamed of offering to the young lady. "Why he
should not do so if he pleases, I don't know," said Camilla. "Only
the fact is that he has not pleased. The rumour of course has reached
him, and, as we happen to be very old friends, we have authority for
denying it altogether." All this came round to Miss Stanbury, and she
was divine in her wrath.
"If they drive me to it," she said to Dorothy, "I'll have the whole
truth told by the bellman through the city, or I'll publish it in the
County Gazette."
"Pray don't say a word about it, Aunt Stanbury."
"It is those odious girls. He's there now every day."
"Why shouldn't he go there, Aunt Stanbury?"
"If he's fool enough, let him go. I don't care where he goes. But
I do care about these lies. They wouldn't dare to say it only they
think my mouth is closed. They've no honour themselves, but they
screen themselves behind mine."
"I'm sure they won't find themselves mistaken in what they trust to,"
said Dorothy, with a spirit that her aunt had not expected from her.
Miss Stanbury at this time had told nobody that the offer to her
niece had been made and repeated and finally rejected;--but she found
it very difficult to hold her tongue.
In the meantime Mr. Gibson spent a good deal of his time at
Heavitree. It should not perhaps be asserted broadly that he had made
up his mind that marriage would be good for him; but he had made up
his mind, at least, to this, that it was no longer to be postponed
without a balance of disadvantage. The Charybdis in the Close drove
him helpless into the whirlpool of the Heavitree Scylla. He had no
longer an escape from the perils of the latter shore. He had been so
mauled by the opposite waves, that he had neither spirit nor skill
left to him to keep in the middle track. He was almost daily at
Heavitree, and did not attempt to conceal from himself the approach
of his doom.
But still there were two of them. He knew that he must become a prey,
but was there any choice left to him as to which siren should have
him? He had been quite aware in his more gallant days, before he had
been knocked about on that Charybdis rock, that he might sip, and
taste, and choose between the sweets. He had come to think lately
that the younger young lady was the sweeter. Eight years ago indeed
the passages between him and the elder had been tender; but Camilla
had then been simply a romping girl, hardly more than a year or two
beyond her teens. Now, with her matured charms, Camilla was certainly
the more engaging as far as outward form went. Arabella's cheeks
were thin and long, and her front teeth had come to show themselves.
Her eyes were no doubt still bright, and what she had of hair was
soft and dark. But it was very thin in front, and what there was of
supplemental mass behind,--the bandbox by which Miss Stanbury was
so much aggrieved,--was worn with an indifference to the lines of
beauty, which Mr. Gibson himself found to be very depressing. A man
with a fair burden on his back is not a grievous sight; but when
we see a small human being attached to a bale of goods which he
can hardly manage to move, we feel that the poor fellow has been
cruelly overweighted. Mr. Gibson certainly had that sensation about
Arabella's chignon. And as he regarded it in a nearer and a dearer
light,--as a chignon that might possibly become his own, as a burden
which in one sense he might himself be called upon to bear, as a
domestic utensil which he himself might be called upon to inspect,
and perhaps to aid the shifting on and the shifting off, he did begin
to think that that side of the Scylla gulf ought to be avoided if
possible. And probably this propensity on his part, this feeling that
he would like to reconsider the matter dispassionately before he
gave himself up for good to his old love, may have been increased by
Camilla's apparent withdrawal of her claims. He felt mildly grateful
to the Heavitree household in general for accepting him in this time
of his affliction, but he could not admit to himself that they had a
right to decide upon him in private conclave, and allot him either to
the one or to the other nuptials without consultation with himself.
To be swallowed up by Scylla he now recognised as his doom; but he
thought he ought to be asked on which side of the gulf he would
prefer to go down. The way in which Camilla spoke of him as a thing
that wasn't hers, but another's; and the way in which Arabella looked
at him, as though he were hers and could never be another's, wounded
his manly pride. He had always understood that he might have his
choice, and he could not understand that the little mishap which had
befallen him in the Close was to rob him of that privilege.
He used to drink tea at Heavitree in those days. On one evening on
going in he found himself alone with Arabella. "Oh, Mr. Gibson," she
said, "we weren't sure whether you'd come. And mamma and Camilla have
gone out to Mrs. Camadge's." Mr. Gibson muttered some word to the
effect that he hoped he had kept nobody at home; and, as he did so,
he remembered that he had distinctly said that he would come on
this evening. "I don't know that I should have gone," said Arabella,
"because I am not quite,--not quite myself at present. No, not ill;
not at all. Don't you know what it is, Mr. Gibson, to be,--to be,--to
be,--not quite yourself?" Mr. Gibson said that he had very often felt
like that. "And one can't get over it;--can one?" continued Arabella.
"There comes a presentiment that something is going to happen, and
a kind of belief that something has happened, though you don't know
what; and the heart refuses to be light, and the spirit becomes
abashed, and the mind, though it creates new thoughts, will not
settle itself to its accustomed work. I suppose it's what the novels
have called Melancholy."
"I suppose it is," said Mr. Gibson. "But there's generally some cause
for it. Debt for instance--"
"It's nothing of that kind with me. It's no debt, at least, that can
be written down in the figures of ordinary arithmetic. Sit down, Mr.
Gibson, and we will have some tea." Then, as she stretched forward to
ring the bell, he thought that he never in his life had seen anything
so unshapely as that huge wen at the back of her head. "Monstrum
horrendum, informe, ingens!" He could not help quoting the words to
himself. She was dressed with some attempt at being smart, but her
ribbons were soiled, and her lace was tawdry, and the fabric of her
dress was old and dowdy. He was quite sure that he would feel no
pride in calling her Mrs. Gibson, no pleasure in having her all to
himself at his own hearth. "I hope we shall escape the bitterness of
Miss Stanbury's tongue if we drink tea tête-à-tête," she said, with
her sweetest smile.
"I don't suppose she'll know anything about it."
"She knows about everything, Mr. Gibson. It's astonishing what she
knows. She has eyes and ears everywhere. I shouldn't care, if she
didn't see and hear so very incorrectly. I'm told now that she
declares--; but it doesn't signify."
"Declares what?" asked Mr. Gibson.
"Never mind. But wasn't it odd how all Exeter believed that you were
going to be married in that house, and to live there all the rest of
your life, and be one of Miss Stanbury's slaves. I never believed
it, Mr. Gibson." This she said with a sad smile, that ought to have
brought him on his knees, in spite of the chignon.
"One can't help these things," said Mr. Gibson.
"I never could have believed it;--not even if you had not given me an
assurance so solemn, and so sweet, that there was nothing in it." The
poor man had given the assurance, and could not deny the solemnity
and the sweetness. "That was a happy moment for us, Mr. Gibson;
because, though we never believed it, when it was dinned into our
ears so frequently, when it was made such a triumph in the Close, it
was impossible not to fear that there might be something in it." He
felt that he ought to make some reply, but he did not know what to
say. He was thoroughly ashamed of the lie he had told, but he could
not untell it. "Camilla reproached me afterwards for asking you,"
whispered Arabella, in her softest, tenderest voice. "She said
that it was unmaidenly. I hope you did not think it unmaidenly, Mr.
Gibson?"
"Oh dear no;--not at all," said he.
Arabella French was painfully alive to the fact that she must do
something. She had her fish on the hook; but of what use is a fish
on your hook, if you cannot land him? When could she have a better
opportunity than this of landing the scaly darling out of the fresh
and free waters of his bachelor stream, and sousing him into the pool
of domestic life, to be ready there for her own household purposes?
"I had known you so long, Mr. Gibson," she said, "and had valued your
friendship so--so deeply." As he looked at her he could see nothing
but the shapeless excrescence to which his eyes had been so painfully
called by Miss Stanbury's satire. It is true that he had formerly
been very tender with her, but she had not then carried about with
her that distorted monster. He did not believe himself to be at all
bound by anything which had passed between them in circumstances
so very different. But yet he ought to say something. He ought to
have said something; but he said nothing. She was patient, however,
very patient; and she went on playing him with her hook. "I am so
glad that I did not go out to-night with mamma. It has been such a
pleasure to me to have this conversation with you. Camilla, perhaps,
would say that I am--unmaidenly."
"I don't think so."
"That is all that I care for, Mr. Gibson. If you acquit me, I do
not mind who accuses. I should not like to suppose that you thought
me unmaidenly. Anything would be better than that; but I can throw
all such considerations to the wind when true--true--friendship is
concerned. Don't you think that one ought, Mr. Gibson?"
If it had not been for the thing at the back of her head, he would
have done it now. Nothing but that gave him courage to abstain.
It grew bigger and bigger, more shapeless, monstrous, absurd, and
abominable, as he looked at it. Nothing should force upon him the
necessity of assisting to carry such an abortion through the world.
"One ought to sacrifice everything to friendship," said Mr. Gibson,
"except self-respect."
He meant nothing personal. Something special, in the way of an
opinion, was expected of him; and, therefore, he had striven to
say something special. But she was in tears in a moment. "Oh, Mr.
Gibson," she exclaimed; "oh, Mr. Gibson!"
"What is the matter, Miss French?"
"Have I lost your respect? Is it that that you mean?"
"Certainly not, Miss French."
"Do not call me Miss French, or I shall be sure that you condemn me.
Miss French sounds so very cold. You used to call me--Bella." That
was quite true; but it was long ago, thought Mr. Gibson,--before the
monster had been attached. "Will you not call me Bella now?"
He thought that he had rather not; and yet, how was he to avoid it?
On a sudden he became very crafty. Had it not been for the sharpness
of his mother wit, he would certainly have been landed at that
moment. "As you truly observed just now," he said, "the tongues
of people are so malignant. There are little birds that hear
everything."
"I don't care what the little birds hear," said Miss French, through
her tears. "I am a very unhappy girl;--I know that; and I don't care
what anybody says. It is nothing to me what anybody says. I know what
I feel." At this moment there was some dash of truth about her. The
fish was so very heavy on hand that, do what she would, she could
not land him. Her hopes before this had been very low,--hopes that
had once been high; but they had been depressed gradually; and, in
the slow, dull routine of her daily life, she had learned to bear
disappointment by degrees, without sign of outward suffering, without
consciousness of acute pain. The task of her life had been weary,
and the wished-for goal was ever becoming more and more distant;
but there had been still a chance, and she had fallen away into a
lethargy of lessening expectation, from which joy, indeed, had been
banished, but in which there had been nothing of agony. Then had
come upon the whole house at Heavitree the great Stanbury peril, and,
arising out of that, had sprung new hopes to Arabella, which made her
again capable of all the miseries of a foiled ambition. She could
again be patient, if patience might be of any service; but in such a
condition an eternity of patience is simply suicidal. She was willing
to work hard, but how could she work harder than she had worked. Poor
young woman,--perishing beneath an incubus which a false idea of
fashion had imposed on her!
"I hope I have said nothing that makes you unhappy," pleaded Mr.
Gibson. "I'm sure I haven't meant it."
"But you have," she said. "You make me very unhappy. You condemn me.
I see you do. And if I have done wrong it has been all because-- Oh
dear, oh dear, oh dear!"
"But who says you have done wrong?"
"You won't call me Bella,--because you say the little birds will hear
it. If I don't care for the little birds, why should you?"
There is no question more difficult than this for a gentleman to
answer. Circumstances do not often admit of its being asked by a lady
with that courageous simplicity which had come upon Miss French in
this moment of her agonising struggle; but nevertheless it is one
which, in a more complicated form, is often put, and to which some
reply, more or less complicated, is expected. "If I, a woman, can
dare, for your sake, to encounter the public tongue, will you, a man,
be afraid?" The true answer, if it could be given, would probably
be this; "I am afraid, though a man, because I have much to lose
and little to get. You are not afraid, though a woman, because you
have much to get and little to lose." But such an answer would be
uncivil, and is not often given. Therefore men shuffle and lie, and
tell themselves that in love,--love here being taken to mean all
antenuptial contests between man and woman,--everything is fair. Mr.
Gibson had the above answer in his mind, though he did not frame
it into words. He was neither sufficiently brave nor sufficiently
cruel to speak to her in such language. There was nothing for him,
therefore, but that he must shuffle and lie.
"I only meant," said he, "that I would not for worlds do anything to
make you uneasy."
She did not see how she could again revert to the subject of her own
Christian name. She had made her little tender, loving request, and
it had been refused. Of course she knew that it had been refused as a
matter of caution. She was not angry with him because of his caution,
as she had expected him to be cautious. The barriers over which
she had to climb were no more than she had expected to find in her
way;--but they were so very high and so very difficult! Of course she
was aware that he would escape if he could. She was not angry with
him on that account. Anger could not have helped her. Indeed, she did
not price herself highly enough to make her feel that she would be
justified in being angry. It was natural enough that he shouldn't
want her. She knew herself to be a poor, thin, vapid, tawdry
creature, with nothing to recommend her to any man except a sort
of second-rate, provincial-town fashion which,--infatuated as she
was,--she attributed in a great degree to the thing she carried on
her head. She knew nothing. She could do nothing. She possessed
nothing. She was not angry with him because he so evidently wished to
avoid her. But she thought that if she could only be successful she
would be good and loving and obedient,--and that it was fair for her
at any rate to try. Each created animal must live and get its food
by the gifts which the Creator has given to it, let those gifts be
as poor as they may,--let them be even as distasteful as they may to
other members of the great created family. The rat, the toad, the
slug, the flea, must each live according to its appointed mode of
existence. Animals which are parasites by nature can only live by
attaching themselves to life that is strong. To Arabella Mr. Gibson
would be strong enough, and it seemed to her that if she could fix
herself permanently upon his strength, that would be her proper
mode of living. She was not angry with him because he resisted
the attempt, but she had nothing of conscience to tell her that
she should spare him as long as there remained to her a chance of
success. And should not her plea of excuse, her justification be
admitted? There are tormentors as to which no man argues that they
are iniquitous, though they be very troublesome. He either rids
himself of them, or suffers as quiescently as he may.
"We used to be such--great--friends," she said, still crying, "and I
am afraid you don't like me a bit now."
"Indeed I do;--I have always liked you. But--"
"But what? Do tell me what the but means. I will do anything that you
bid me."
Then it occurred to him that if, after such a promise, he were to
confide to her his feeling that the chignon which she wore was ugly
and unbecoming, she would probably be induced to change her mode of
head-dress. It was a foolish idea, because, had he followed it out,
he would have seen that compliance on her part in such a matter could
only be given with the distinct understanding that a certain reward
should be the consequence. When an unmarried gentleman calls upon an
unmarried lady to change the fashion of her personal adornments, the
unmarried lady has a right to expect that the unmarried gentleman
means to make her his wife. But Mr. Gibson had no such meaning; and
was led into error by the necessity for sudden action. When she
offered to do anything that he might bid her do, he could not take up
his hat and go away. She looked up into his face, expecting that he
would give her some order;--and he fell into the temptation that was
spread for him.
"If I might say a word,--" he began.
"You may say anything," she exclaimed.
"If I were you I don't think--"
"You don't think what, Mr. Gibson?"
He found it to be a matter very difficult of approach. "Do you know,
I don't think the fashion that has come up about wearing your hair
quite suits you,--not so well as the way you used to do it." She
became on a sudden very red in the face, and he thought that she was
angry. Vexed she was, but still, accompanying her vexation, there
was a remembrance that she was achieving victory even by her own
humiliation. She loved her chignon; but she was ready to abandon even
that for him. Nevertheless she could not speak for a moment or two,
and he was forced to continue his criticism. "I have no doubt those
things are very becoming and all that, and I dare say they are
comfortable."
"Oh, very," she said.
"But there was a simplicity that I liked about the other."
Could it be then that for the last five years he had stood aloof from
her because she had arrayed herself in fashionable attire? She was
still very red in the face, still suffering from wounded vanity,
still conscious of that soreness which affects us all when we are
made to understand that we are considered to have failed there, where
we have most thought that we excelled. But her womanly art enabled
her quickly to conceal the pain. "I have made a promise," she said,
"and you will find that I will keep it."
"What promise?" asked Mr. Gibson.
"I said that I would do as you bade me, and so I will. I would have
done it sooner if I had known that you wished it. I would never have
worn it at all if I had thought that you disliked it."
"I think that a little of them is very nice," said Mr. Gibson. Mr.
Gibson was certainly an awkward man. But there are men so awkward
that it seems to be their especial province to say always the very
worst thing at the very worst moment.
She became redder than ever as she was thus told of the hugeness of
her favourite ornament. She was almost angry now. But she restrained
herself, thinking perhaps of how she might teach him taste in days to
come as he was teaching her now. "I will change it to-morrow," she
said with a smile. "You come and see to-morrow."
Upon this he got up and took his hat and made his escape, assuring
her that he would come and see her on the morrow. She let him go now
without any attempt at further tenderness. Certainly she had gained
much during the interview. He had as good as told her in what had
been her offence, and of course, when she had remedied that offence,
he could hardly refuse to return to her. She got up as soon as she
was alone, and looked at her head in the glass, and told herself that
the pity would be great. It was not that the chignon was in itself
a thing of beauty, but that it imparted so unmistakable an air of
fashion! It divested her of that dowdiness which she feared above
all things, and enabled her to hold her own among other young women,
without feeling that she was absolutely destitute of attraction.
There had been a certain homage paid to it, which she had recognised
and enjoyed. But it was her ambition to hold her own, not among
young women, but among clergymen's wives, and she would certainly
obey his orders. She could not make the attempt now because of the
complications; but she certainly would make it before she laid her
head on the pillow,--and would explain to Camilla that it was a
little joke between herself and Mr. Gibson.
CHAPTER XLVIII.
MR. GIBSON IS PUNISHED.
Miss Stanbury was divine in her wrath, and became more and more so
daily as new testimony reached her of dishonesty on the part of
the Frenches and of treachery on the part of Mr. Gibson. And these
people, so empty, so vain, so weak, were getting the better of her,
were conquering her, were robbing her of her prestige and her ancient
glory, simply because she herself was too generous to speak out and
tell the truth! There was a martyrdom to her in this which was almost
unendurable.
Now there came to her one day at luncheon time,--on the day
succeeding that on which Miss French had promised to sacrifice her
chignon,--a certain Mrs. Clifford from Budleigh Salterton, to whom
she was much attached. Perhaps the distance of Budleigh Salterton
from Exeter added somewhat to this affection, so that Mrs. Clifford
was almost closer to our friend's heart even than Mrs. MacHugh, who
lived just at the other end of the cathedral. And in truth Mrs.
Clifford was a woman more serious in her mode of thought than Mrs.
MacHugh, and one who had more in common with Miss Stanbury than that
other lady. Mrs. Clifford had been a Miss Noel of Doddiscombe Leigh,
and she and Miss Stanbury had been engaged to be married at the same
time,--each to a man of fortune. One match had been completed in the
ordinary course of matches. What had been the course of the other we
already know. But the friendship had been maintained on very close
terms. Mrs. MacHugh was a Gallio at heart, anxious chiefly to remove
from herself,--and from her friends also,--all the troubles of life,
and make things smooth and easy. She was one who disregarded great
questions; who cared little or nothing what people said of her; who
considered nothing worth the trouble of a fight;--Epicuri de grege
porca. But there was nothing swinish about Mrs. Clifford of Budleigh
Salterton. She took life thoroughly in earnest. She was a Tory who
sorrowed heartily for her country, believing that it was being
brought to ruin by the counsels of evil men. She prayed daily to
be delivered from dissenters, radicals, and wolves in sheep's
clothing,--by which latter bad name she meant especially a certain
leading politician of the day who had, with the cunning of the
devil, tempted and perverted the virtue of her own political friends.
And she was one who thought that the slightest breath of scandal
on a young woman's name should be stopped at once. An antique,
pure-minded, anxious, self-sacrificing matron was Mrs. Clifford, and
very dear to the heart of Miss Stanbury.
After lunch was over on the day in question Mrs. Clifford got Miss
Stanbury into some closet retirement, and there spoke her mind as
to the things which were being said. It had been asserted in her
presence by Camilla French that she, Camilla, was authorised by Mr.
Gibson to declare that he had never thought of proposing to Dorothy
Stanbury, and that Miss Stanbury had been "labouring under some
strange misapprehension in the matter." "Now, my dear, I don't care
very much for the young lady in question," said Mrs. Clifford,
alluding to Camilla French.
"Very little, indeed, I should think," said Miss Stanbury, with a
shake of her head.
"Quite true, my dear,--but that does not make the words out of her
mouth the less efficacious for evil. She clearly insinuated that you
had endeavoured to make up a match between this gentleman and your
niece, and that you had failed." So much was at least true. Miss
Stanbury felt this, and felt also that she could not explain the
truth, even to her dear old friend. In the midst of her divine wrath
she had acknowledged to herself that she had brought Mr. Gibson into
his difficulty, and that it would not become her to tell any one
of his failure. And in this matter she did not herself accuse Mr.
Gibson. She believed that the lie originated with Camilla French, and
it was against Camilla that her wrath raged the fiercest.
"She is a poor, mean, disappointed thing," said Miss Stanbury.
"Very probably;--but I think I should ask her to hold her tongue
about Miss Dorothy," said Mrs. Clifford.
The consultation in the closet was carried on for about half-an-hour,
and then Miss Stanbury put on her bonnet and shawl and descended into
Mrs. Clifford's carriage. The carriage took the Heavitree road, and
deposited Miss Stanbury at the door of Mrs. French's house. The walk
home from Heavitree would be nothing, and Mrs. Clifford proceeded on
her way, having given this little help in counsel and conveyance to
her friend. Mrs. French was at home, and Miss Stanbury was shown up
into the room in which the three ladies were sitting.
[Illustration: Miss Stanbury visits the Frenches.]
The reader will doubtless remember the promise which Arabella had
made to Mr. Gibson. That promise she had already fulfilled,--to the
amazement of her mother and sister;--and when Miss Stanbury entered
the room the elder daughter of the family was seen without her
accustomed head-gear. If the truth is to be owned, Miss Stanbury gave
the poor young woman no credit for her new simplicity, but put down
the deficiency to the charge of domestic slatternliness. She was
unjust enough to declare afterwards that she had found Arabella
French only half dressed at between three and four o'clock in the
afternoon! From which this lesson may surely be learned,--that though
the way down Avernus may be, and customarily is, made with great
celerity, the return journey, if made at all, must be made slowly. A
young woman may commence in chignons by attaching any amount of an
edifice to her head; but the reduction should be made by degrees.
Arabella's edifice had, in Miss Stanbury's eyes, been the ugliest
thing in art that she had known; but, now, its absence offended her,
and she most untruly declared that she had come upon the young woman
in the middle of the day just out of her bed-room and almost in her
dressing-gown.
And the whole French family suffered a diminution of power from the
strange phantasy which had come upon Arabella. They all felt, in
sight of the enemy, that they had to a certain degree lowered their
flag. One of the ships, at least, had shown signs of striking,
and this element of weakness made itself felt through the whole
fleet. Arabella, herself, when she saw Miss Stanbury, was painfully
conscious of her head, and wished that she had postponed the
operation till the evening. She smiled with a faint watery smile, and
was aware that something ailed her.
The greetings at first were civil, but very formal, as are those
between nations which are nominally at peace, but which are waiting
for a sign at which each may spring at the other's throat. In this
instance the Juno from the Close had come quite prepared to declare
her casus belli as complete, and to fling down her gauntlet, unless
the enemy should at once yield to her everything demanded with an
abject submission. "Mrs. French," she said, "I have called to-day
for a particular purpose, and I must address myself chiefly to Miss
Camilla."
"Oh, certainly," said Mrs. French.
"I shall be delighted to hear anything from you, Miss Stanbury," said
Camilla,--not without an air of bravado. Arabella said nothing, but
she put her hand up almost convulsively to the back of her head.
"I have been told to-day by a friend of mine, Miss Camilla," began
Miss Stanbury, "that you declared yourself, in her presence,
authorised by Mr. Gibson to make a statement about my niece Dorothy."
"May I ask who was your friend?" demanded Mrs. French.
"It was Mrs. Clifford, of course," said Camilla. "There is nobody
else would try to make difficulties."
"There need be no difficulty at all, Miss Camilla," said Miss
Stanbury, "if you will promise me that you will not repeat the
statement. It can't be true."
"But it is true," said Camilla.
"What is true?" asked Miss Stanbury, surprised by the audacity of the
girl.
"It is true that Mr. Gibson authorised us to state what I did state
when Mrs. Clifford heard me."
"And what was that?"
"Only this,--that people had been saying all about Exeter that he
was going to be married to a young lady, and that as the report was
incorrect, and as he had never had the remotest idea in his mind of
making the young lady his wife,--" Camilla, as she said this, spoke
with a great deal of emphasis, putting forward her chin and shaking
her head,--"and as he thought it was uncomfortable both for the young
lady and for himself, and as there was nothing in it the least in the
world,--nothing at all, no glimmer of a foundation for the report, it
would be better to have it denied everywhere. That is what I said;
and we had authority from the gentleman himself. Arabella can say
the same, and so can mamma;--only mamma did not hear him." Nor had
Camilla heard him, but that incident she did not mention.
The circumstances were, in Miss Stanbury's judgment, becoming very
remarkable. She did not for a moment believe Camilla. She did not
believe that Mr. Gibson had given to either of the Frenches any
justification for the statement just made. But Camilla had been so
much more audacious than Miss Stanbury had expected, that that lady
was for a moment struck dumb. "I'm sure, Miss Stanbury," said Mrs.
French, "we don't want to give any offence to your niece,--very far
from it."
"My niece doesn't care about it two straws," said Miss Stanbury. "It
is I that care. And I care very much. The things that have been said
have been altogether false."
"How false, Miss Stanbury?" asked Camilla.
"Altogether false,--as false as they can be."
"Mr. Gibson must know his own mind," said Camilla.
"My dear, there's a little disappointment," said Miss French, "and it
don't signify."
"There's no disappointment at all," said Miss Stanbury, "and it does
signify very much. Now that I've begun, I'll go to the bottom of it.
If you say that Mr. Gibson told you to make these statements, I'll go
to Mr. Gibson. I'll have it out somehow."
"You may have what you like out for us, Miss Stanbury," said Camilla.
"I don't believe Mr. Gibson said anything of the kind."
"That's civil," said Camilla.
"But why shouldn't he?" asked Arabella.
"There were the reports, you know," said Mrs. French.
"And why shouldn't he deny them when there wasn't a word of truth
in them?" continued Camilla. "For my part I think the gentleman is
bound for the lady's sake to declare that there's nothing in it when
there is nothing in it." This was more than Miss Stanbury could bear.
Hitherto the enemy had seemed to have the best of it. Camilla was
firing broadside after broadside, as though she was assured of
victory. Even Mrs. French was becoming courageous; and Arabella was
forgetting the place where her chignon ought to have been. "I really
do not know what else there is for me to say," remarked Camilla, with
a toss of her head, and an air of impudence that almost drove poor
Miss Stanbury frantic.
It was on her tongue to declare the whole truth, but she refrained.
She had schooled herself on this subject vigorously. She would not
betray Mr. Gibson. Had she known all the truth,--or had she believed
Camilla French's version of the story,--there would have been no
betrayal. But looking at the matter with such knowledge as she had
at present, she did not even yet feel herself justified in declaring
that Mr. Gibson had offered his hand to her niece, and had been
refused. She was, however, sorely tempted. "Very well, ladies," she
said. "I shall now see Mr. Gibson, and ask him whether he did give
you authority to make such statements as you have been spreading
abroad everywhere." Then the door of the room was opened, and in a
moment Mr. Gibson was among them. He was true to his promise, and had
come to see Arabella with her altered head-dress;--but he had come
at this hour thinking that escape in the morning would be easier and
quicker than it might have been in the evening. His mind had been
full of Arabella and her head-dress even up to the moment of his
knocking at the door; but all that was driven out of his brain at
once when he saw Miss Stanbury.
"Here is Mr. Gibson himself," said Mrs. French.
"How do you do, Mr. Gibson?" said Miss Stanbury, with a very stately
courtesy. They had never met since the day on which he had been, as
he stated, turned out of Miss Stanbury's house. He now bowed to her;
but there was no friendly greeting, and the Frenches were able to
congratulate themselves on the apparent loyalty to themselves of
the gentleman who stood among them. "I have come here, Mr. Gibson,"
continued Miss Stanbury, "to put a small matter right in which you
are concerned."
"It seems to me to be the most insignificant thing in the world,"
said Camilla.
"Very likely," said Miss Stanbury. "But it is not insignificant
to me. Miss Camilla French has asserted publicly that you have
authorised her to make a statement about my niece Dorothy."
Mr. Gibson looked into Camilla's face doubtingly, inquisitively,
almost piteously. "You had better let her go on," said Camilla. "She
will make a great many mistakes, no doubt, but you had better let her
go on to the end."
"I have made no mistake as yet, Miss Camilla. She so asserted, Mr.
Gibson, in the hearing of a friend of mine, and she repeated the
assertion here in this room to me just before you came in. She says
that you have authorised her to declare that--that--that,--I had
better speak it out plainly at once."
"Much better," said Camilla.
"That you never entertained an idea of offering your hand to my
niece." Miss Stanbury paused, and Mr. Gibson's jaw fell visibly. But
he was not expected to speak as yet; and Miss Stanbury continued her
accusation. "Beyond that, I don't want to mention my niece's name, if
it can be avoided."
"But it can't be avoided," said Camilla.
"If you please, I will continue. Mr. Gibson will understand me.
I will not, if I can help it, mention my niece's name again, Mr.
Gibson. But I still have that confidence in you that I do not think
that you would have made such a statement in reference to yourself
and any young lady,--unless it were some young lady who had
absolutely thrown herself at your head." And in saying this she
paused, and looked very hard at Camilla.
"That's just what Dorothy Stanbury has been doing," said Camilla.
"She has been doing nothing of the kind, and you know she hasn't,"
said Miss Stanbury, raising her arm as though she were going to
strike her opponent. "But I am quite sure, Mr. Gibson, that you
never could have authorised these young ladies to make such an
assertion publicly on your behalf. Whatever there may have been of
misunderstanding between you and me, I can't believe that of you."
Then she paused for a reply. "If you will be good enough to set us
right on that point, I shall be obliged to you."
Mr. Gibson's position was one of great discomfort. He had given no
authority to any one to make such a statement. He had said nothing
about Dorothy Stanbury to Camilla; but he had told Arabella, when
hard pressed by that lady, that he did not mean to propose to
Dorothy. He could not satisfy Miss Stanbury because he feared
Arabella. He could not satisfy the Frenches because he feared Miss
Stanbury. "I really do not think," said he, "that we ought to talk
about a young lady in this way."
"That's my opinion, too," said Camilla; "but Miss Stanbury will."
"Exactly so. Miss Stanbury will," said that lady. "Mr. Gibson,
I insist upon it, that you tell me whether you did give any such
authority to Miss Camilla French, or to Miss French."
"I wouldn't answer her, if I were you," said Camilla.
"I really don't think this can do any good," said Mrs. French.
"And it is so very harassing to our nerves," said Arabella.
"Nerves! Pooh!" exclaimed Miss Stanbury. "Now, Mr. Gibson, I am
waiting for an answer."
"My dear Miss Stanbury, I really think it better,--the situation
is so peculiar, and, upon my word, I hardly know how not to give
offence, which I wouldn't do for the world."
"Do you mean to tell me that you won't answer my question?" demanded
Miss Stanbury.
"I really think that I had better hold my tongue," pleaded Mr.
Gibson.
"You are quite right, Mr. Gibson," said Camilla.
"Indeed, it is wisest," said Mrs. French.
"I don't see what else he can do," said Arabella.
Then was Miss Stanbury driven altogether beyond her powers of
endurance. "If that be so," said she, "I must speak out, though I
should have preferred to hold my tongue. Mr. Gibson did offer to my
niece the week before last,--twice, and was refused by her. My niece,
Dorothy, took it into her head that she did not like him; and, upon
my word, I think she was right. We should have said nothing about
this,--not a word; but when these false assertions are made on Mr.
Gibson's alleged authority, and Mr. Gibson won't deny it, I must
tell the truth." Then there was silence among them for a few seconds,
and Mr. Gibson struggled hard, but vainly, to clothe his face in
a pleasant smile. "Mr. Gibson, is that true?" said Miss Stanbury.
But Mr. Gibson made no reply. "It is as true as heaven," said Miss
Stanbury, striking her hand upon the table. "And now you had better,
all of you, hold your tongues about my niece, and she will hold her
tongue about you. And as for Mr. Gibson,--anybody who wants him
after this is welcome to him for us. Good-morning, Mrs. French;
good-morning, young ladies." And so she stalked out of the room, and
out of the house, and walked back to her house in the Close.
"Mamma," said Arabella, as soon as the enemy was gone, "I have got
such a headache that I think I will go up-stairs."
"And I will go with you, dear," said Camilla.
Mr. Gibson, before he left the house, confided his secret to the
maternal ears of Mrs. French. He certainly had been allured into
making an offer to Dorothy Stanbury, but was ready to atone for
this crime by marrying her daughter,--Camilla,--as soon as might
be convenient. He was certainly driven to make this declaration by
intense cowardice,--not to excuse himself, for in that there could
be no excuse;--but how else should he dare to suggest that he might
as well leave the house? "Shall I tell the dear girl?" asked Mrs.
French. But Mr. Gibson requested a fortnight, in which to consider
how the proposition had best be made.
CHAPTER XLIX.
MR. BROOKE BURGESS AFTER SUPPER.
Brooke Burgess was a clerk in the office of the Ecclesiastical
Commissioners in London, and as such had to do with things very
solemn, grave, and almost melancholy. He had to deal with the rents
of episcopal properties, to correspond with clerical claimants,
and to be at home with the circumstances of underpaid vicars and
perpetual curates with much less than £300 a-year; but yet he was
as jolly and pleasant at his desk as though he were busied about
the collection of the malt tax, or wrote his letters to admirals
and captains instead of to deans and prebendaries. Brooke Burgess
had risen to be a senior clerk, and was held in some respect in his
office; but it was not perhaps for the amount of work he did, nor yet
on account of the gravity of his demeanour, nor for the brilliancy of
his intellect. But if not clever, he was sensible; though he was not
a dragon of official virtue, he had a conscience;--and he possessed
those small but most valuable gifts by which a man becomes popular
among men. And thus it had come to pass in all those battles as to
competitive merit which had taken place in his as in other public
offices, that no one had ever dreamed of putting a junior over
the head of Brooke Burgess. He was tractable, easy, pleasant, and
therefore deservedly successful. All his brother clerks called him
Brooke,--except the young lads who, for the first year or two of
their service, still denominated him Mr. Burgess.
"Brooke," said one of his juniors, coming into his room and standing
before the fireplace with a cigar in his mouth, "have you heard who
is to be the new Commissioner?"
"Colenso, to be sure," said Brooke.
"What a lark that would be. And I don't see why he shouldn't. But it
isn't Colenso. The name has just come down."
"And who is it?"
"Old Proudie, from Barchester."
"Why, we had him here years ago, and he resigned."
"But he's to come on again now for a spell. It always seems to me
that the bishops ain't a bit of use here. They only get blown up, and
snubbed, and shoved into corners by the others."
"You young reprobate,--to talk of shoving an archbishop into a
corner."
"Well,--don't they? It's only for the name of it they have them.
There's the Bishop of Broomsgrove;--he's always sauntering about the
place, looking as though he'd be so much obliged if somebody would
give him something to do. He's always smiling, and so gracious,--just
as if he didn't feel above half sure that he had any right to be
where he is, and he thought that perhaps somebody was going to kick
him."
"And so old Proudie is coming up again," said Brooke. "It certainly
is very much the same to us whom they send. He'll get shoved into a
corner, as you call it,--only that he'll go into the corner without
any shoving." Then there came in a messenger with a card, and Brooke
learned that Hugh Stanbury was waiting for him in the strangers'
room. In performing the promise made to Dorothy, he had called upon
her brother as soon as he was back in London, but had not found him.
This now was the return visit.
"I thought I was sure to find you here," said Hugh.
"Pretty nearly sure from eleven till five," said Brooke. "A hard
stepmother like the Civil Service does not allow one much chance of
relief. I do get across to the club sometimes for a glass of sherry
and a biscuit,--but here I am now, at any rate; and I'm very glad
you have come." Then there was some talk between them about affairs
at Exeter; but as they were interrupted before half an hour was
over their heads by a summons brought for Burgess from one of
the secretaries, it was agreed that they should dine together at
Burgess's club on the following day. "We can manage a pretty good
beef-steak," said Brooke, "and have a fair glass of sherry. I don't
think you can get much more than that anywhere nowadays,--unless you
want a dinner for eight at three guineas a head. The magnificence of
men has become so intolerable now that one is driven to be humble in
one's self-defence." Stanbury assured his acquaintance that he was
anything but magnificent in his own ideas, that cold beef and beer
was his usual fare, and at last allowed the clerk to wait upon the
secretary.
"I wouldn't have any other fellow to meet you," said Brooke as they
sat at their dinners, "because in this way we can talk over the dear
old woman at Exeter. Yes, our fellow does make good soup, and it's
about all that he does do well. As for getting a potato properly
boiled, that's quite out of the question. Yes, it is a good glass
of sherry. I told you we'd a fairish tap of sherry on. Well, I was
there, backwards and forwards, for nearly six weeks."
"And how did you get on with the old woman?"
"Like a house on fire," said Brooke.
"She didn't quarrel with you?"
"No,--upon the whole she did not. I always felt that it was touch
and go. She might or she might not. Every now and then she looked at
me, and said a sharp word, as though it was about to come. But I had
determined when I went there altogether to disregard that kind of
thing."
"It's rather important to you,--is it not?"
"You mean about her money?"
"Of course, I mean about her money," said Stanbury.
"It is important;--and so it was to you."
"Not in the same degree, or nearly so. And as for me, it was not on
the cards that we shouldn't quarrel. I am so utterly a Bohemian in
all my ideas of life, and she is so absolutely the reverse, that not
to have quarrelled would have been hypocritical on my part or on
hers. She had got it into her head that she had a right to rule
my life; and, of course, she quarrelled with me when I made her
understand that she should do nothing of the kind. Now, she won't
want to rule you."
"I hope not."
"She has taken you up," continued Stanbury, "on altogether a
different understanding. You are to her the representative of a
family to whom she thinks she owes the restitution of the property
which she enjoys. I was simply a member of her own family, to which
she owes nothing. She thought it well to help one of us out of what
she regarded as her private purse, and she chose me. But the matter
is quite different with you."
"She might have given everything to you, as well as to me," said
Brooke.
"That's not her idea. She conceives herself bound to leave all she
has back to a Burgess, except anything she may save,--as she says,
off her own back, or out of her own belly. She has told me so a score
of times."
"And what did you say?"
"I always told her that, let her do as she would, I should never ask
any question about her will."
"But she hates us all like poison,--except me," said Brooke. "I never
knew people so absurdly hostile as are your aunt and my uncle Barty.
Each thinks the other the most wicked person in the world."
"I suppose your uncle was hard upon her once."
"Very likely. He is a hard man,--and has, very warmly, all the
feelings of an injured man. I suppose my uncle Brooke's will was a
cruel blow to him. He professes to believe that Miss Stanbury will
never leave me a shilling."
"He is wrong, then," said Stanbury.
"Oh yes;--he's wrong, because he thinks that that's her present
intention. I don't know that he's wrong as to the probable result."
"Who will have it, then?"
"There are ever so many horses in the race," said Brooke. "I'm one."
"You're the favourite," said Stanbury.
"For the moment I am. Then there's yourself."
"I've been scratched, and am altogether out of the betting."
"And your sister," continued Brooke.
"She's only entered to run for the second money; and, if she'll trot
over the course quietly, and not go the wrong side of the posts,
she'll win that."
"She may do more than that. Then there's Martha."
"My aunt will never leave her money to a servant. What she may give
to Martha would come from her own savings."
"The next is a dark horse, but one that wins a good many races of
this kind. He's apt to come in with a fatal rush at the end."
"Who is it?"
"The hospitals. When an old lady finds in her latter days that she
hates everybody, and fancies that the people around her are all
thinking of her money, she's uncommon likely to indulge herself in a
little bit of revenge, and solace herself with large-handed charity."
"But she's so good a woman at heart," said Hugh.
"And what can a good woman do better than promote hospitals?"
"She'll never do that. She's too strong. It's a maudlin sort of
thing, after all, for a person to leave everything to a hospital."
"But people are maudlin when they're dying," said Brooke,--"or even
when they think they're dying. How else did the Church get the
estates, of which we are now distributing so bountifully some of the
last remnants down at our office? Come into the next room, and we'll
have a smoke."
They had their smoke, and then they went at half-price to the play;
and, after the play was over, they eat three or four dozen of oysters
between them. Brooke Burgess was a little too old for oysters at
midnight in September; but he went through his work like a man. Hugh
Stanbury's powers were so great, that he could have got up and done
the same thing again, after he had been an hour in bed, without any
serious inconvenience.
But, in truth, Brooke Burgess had still another word or two to say
before he went to his rest. They supped somewhere near the Haymarket,
and then he offered to walk home with Stanbury, to his chambers in
Lincoln's Inn. "Do you know that Mr. Gibson at Exeter?" he asked, as
they passed through Leicester Square.
"Yes; I knew him. He was a sort of tame-cat parson at my aunt's
house, in my days."
"Exactly;--but I fancy that has come to an end now. Have you heard
anything about him lately?"
"Well;--yes I have," said Stanbury, feeling that dislike to speak
of his sister which is common to most brothers when in company with
other men.
"I suppose you've heard of it, and, as I was in the middle of it all,
of course I couldn't but know all about it too. Your aunt wanted him
to marry your sister."
"So I was told."
"But your sister didn't see it," said Brooke.
"So I understand," said Stanbury. "I believe my aunt was exceedingly
liberal, and meant to do the best she could for poor Dorothy; but, if
she didn't like him, I suppose she was right not to have him," said
Hugh.
"Of course she was right," said Brooke, with a good deal of
enthusiasm.
"I believe Gibson to be a very decent sort of fellow," said Stanbury.
"A mean, paltry dog," said Brooke. There had been a little
whisky-toddy after the oysters, and Mr. Burgess was perhaps moved to
a warmer expression of feeling than he might have displayed had he
discussed this branch of the subject before supper. "I knew from the
first that she would have nothing to say to him. He is such a poor
creature!"
"I always thought well of him," said Stanbury, "and was inclined to
think that Dolly might have done worse."
"It is hard to say what is the worst a girl might do; but I think she
might do, perhaps, a little better."
"What do you mean?" said Hugh.
"I think I shall go down, and ask her to take myself."
"Do you mean it in earnest?"
"I do," said Brooke. "Of course, I hadn't a chance when I was there.
She told me--"
"Who told you;--Dorothy?"
"No, your aunt;--she told me that Mr. Gibson was to marry your
sister. You know your aunt's way. She spoke of it as though the thing
were settled as soon as she had got it into her own head; and she was
as hot upon it as though Mr. Gibson had been an archbishop. I had
nothing to do then but to wait and see."
"I had no idea of Dolly being fought for by rivals."
"Brothers never think much of their sisters," said Brooke Burgess.
"I can assure you I think a great deal of Dorothy," said Hugh. "I
believe her to be as sweet a woman as God ever made. She hardly knows
that she has a self belonging to herself."
"I am sure she doesn't," said Brooke.
"She is a dear, loving, sweet-tempered creature, who is only too
ready to yield in all things."
"But she wouldn't yield about Gibson," said Brooke.
"How did she and my aunt manage?"
"Your sister simply said she couldn't,--and then that she wouldn't. I
never thought from the first moment that she'd take that fellow. In
the first place he can't say boo to a goose."
"But Dolly wouldn't want a man to say--boo."
"I'm not so sure of that, old fellow. At any rate I mean to try
myself. Now,--what'll the old woman say?"
"She'll be pleased as Punch, I should think," said Stanbury.
"Either that;--or else she'll swear that she'll never speak another
word to either of us. However, I shall go on with it."
"Does Dorothy know anything of this?" asked Stanbury.
"Not a word," said Brooke. "I came away a day or so after Gibson was
settled; and as I had been talked to all through the affair by both
of them, I couldn't turn round and offer myself the moment he was
gone. You won't object;--will you?"
"Who; I?" said Stanbury. "I shall have no objection as long as Dolly
pleases herself. Of course you know that we haven't as much as a
brass farthing among us?"
"That won't matter if the old lady takes it kindly," said Brooke.
Then they parted, at the corner of Lincoln's Inn Fields, and Hugh as
he went up to his own rooms, reflected with something of wonderment
on the success of Dorothy's charms. She had always been the poor one
of the family, the chick out of the nest which would most require
assistance from the stronger birds; but it now appeared that she
would become the first among all the Stanburys. Wealth had first
flowed down upon the Stanbury family from the will of old Brooke
Burgess; and it now seemed probable that poor Dolly would ultimately
have the enjoyment of it all.
CHAPTER L.
CAMILLA TRIUMPHANT.
[Illustration]
It was now New Year's day, and there was some grief and perhaps more
excitement in Exeter,--for it was rumoured that Miss Stanbury lay
very ill at her house in the Close. But in order that our somewhat
uneven story may run as smoothly as it may be made to do, the little
history of the French family for the intervening months shall be told
in this chapter, in order that it may be understood how matters were
with them when the tidings of Miss Stanbury's severe illness first
reached their house at Heavitree.
After that terrible scene in which Miss Stanbury had so dreadfully
confounded Mr. Gibson by declaring the manner in which he had been
rebuffed by Dorothy, the unfortunate clergyman had endeavoured to
make his peace with the French family by assuring the mother that in
very truth it was the dearest wish of his heart to make her daughter
Camilla his wife. Mrs. French, who had ever been disposed to favour
Arabella's ambition, well knowing its priority and ancient right,
and who of late had been taught to consider that even Camilla had
consented to waive any claim that she might have once possessed,
could not refrain from the expression of some surprise. That he
should be recovered at all out of the Stanbury clutches was very
much to Mrs. French,--was so much that, had time been given her for
consideration, she would have acknowledged to herself readily that
the property had best be secured at once to the family, without
incurring that amount of risk which must unquestionably attend any
attempt on her part to direct Mr. Gibson's purpose hither or thither.
But the proposition came so suddenly that time was not allowed to her
to be altogether wise. "I thought it was poor Bella," she said, with
something of a piteous whine in her voice. At the moment Mr. Gibson
was so humble, that he was half inclined to give way even on that
head. He felt himself to have been brought so low in the market by
that terrible story of Miss Stanbury's,--which he had been unable
either to contradict or to explain,--that there was but little power
of fighting left in him. He was, however, just able to speak a word
for himself, and that sufficed. "I hope there has been no mistake,"
he said; "but really it is Camilla that has my heart." Mrs. French
made no rejoinder to this. It was so much to her to know that Mr.
Gibson's heart was among them at all after what had occurred in
the Close, that she acknowledged to herself after that moment of
reflection that Arabella must be sacrificed for the good of the
family interests. Poor, dear, loving, misguided, and spiritless
mother! She would have given the blood out of her bosom to get
husbands for her daughters, though it was not of her own experience
that she had learned that of all worldly goods a husband is the best.
But it was the possession which they had from their earliest years
thought of acquiring, which they first expected, for which they had
then hoped, and afterwards worked and schemed and striven with every
energy,--and as to which they had at last almost despaired. And now
Arabella's fire had been rekindled with a new spark, which, alas,
was to be quenched so suddenly! "And am I to tell them?" asked
Mrs. French, with a tremor in her voice. To this, however, Mr.
Gibson demurred. He said that for certain reasons he should like a
fortnight's grace; and that at the end of the fortnight he would
be prepared to speak. The interval was granted without further
questions, and Mr. Gibson was allowed to leave the house.
After that Mrs. French was not very comfortable at home. As soon as
Mr. Gibson had departed, Camilla at once returned to her mother and
desired to know what had taken place. Was it true that the perjured
man had proposed to that young woman in the Close? Mrs. French was
not clever at keeping a secret, and she could not keep this by her
own aid. She told all that happened to Camilla, and between them
they agreed that Arabella should be kept in ignorance till the fatal
fortnight should have passed. When Camilla was interrogated as to
her own purpose, she said she should like a day to think of it. She
took the twenty-four hours, and then made the following confession
of her passion to her mother. "You see, mamma, I always liked Mr.
Gibson,--always."
"So did Arabella, my dear,--before you thought of such things."
"I dare say that may be true, mamma; but that is not my fault. He
came here among us on such sweetly intimate terms that the feeling
grew up with me before I knew what it meant. As to any idea of
cutting out Arabella, my conscience is quite clear. If I thought
there had been anything really between them I would have gone
anywhere,--to the top of a mountain,--rather than rob my sister of a
heart that belonged to her."
"He has been so slow about it," said Mrs. French.
"I don't know about that," said Camilla. "Gentlemen have to be
slow, I suppose, when they think of their incomes. He only got St.
Peter's-cum-Pumpkin three years ago, and didn't know for the first
year whether he could hold that and the minor canonry together. Of
course a gentleman has to think of these things before he comes
forward."
"My dear, he has been very backward."
"If I'm to be Mrs. Gibson, mamma, I beg that I mayn't hear anything
said against him. Then there came all this about that young woman;
and when I saw that Arabella took on so,--which I must say was very
absurd,--I'm sure I put myself out of the way entirely. If I'd buried
myself under the ground I couldn't have done it more. And it's my
belief that what I've said, all for Arabella's sake, has put the old
woman into such a rage that it has made a quarrel between him and the
niece; otherwise that wouldn't be off. I don't believe a word of her
refusing him, and never shall. Is it in the course of things, mamma?"
Mrs. French shook her head. "Of course not. Then when you question
him,--very properly,--he says that he's devoted to--poor me. If I was
to refuse him, he wouldn't put up with Bella."
"I suppose not," said Mrs. French.
"He hates Bella. I've known it all along, though I wouldn't say
so. If I were to sacrifice myself ever so it wouldn't be of any
good,--and I shan't do it." In this way the matter was arranged.
At the end of the fortnight, however, Mr. Gibson did not come,--nor
at the end of three weeks. Inquiries had of course been made, and it
was ascertained that he had gone into Cornwall for a parson's holiday
of thirteen days. That might be all very well. A man might want the
recruiting vigour of some change of air after such scenes as those
Mr. Gibson had gone through with the Stanburys, and before his
proposed encounter with new perils. And he was a man so tied by the
leg that his escape could not be for any long time. He was back
on the appointed Sunday, and on the Wednesday Mrs. French, under
Camilla's instruction, wrote to him a pretty little note. He replied
that he would be with her on the Saturday. It would then be nearly
four weeks after the great day with Miss Stanbury, but no one would
be inclined to quarrel with so short a delay as that. Arabella in the
meantime had become fidgety and unhappy. She seemed to understand
that something was expected, being quite unable to guess what that
something might be. She was true throughout these days to the
simplicity of head-gear which Mr. Gibson had recommended to her,
and seemed in her questions to her mother and to Camilla to be more
fearful of Dorothy Stanbury than of any other enemy. "Mamma, I think
you ought to tell her," said Camilla more than once. But she had not
been told when Mr. Gibson came on the Saturday. It may truly be said
that the poor mother's pleasure in the prospects of one daughter was
altogether destroyed by the anticipation of the other daughter's
misery. Had Mr. Gibson made Dorothy Stanbury his wife they could
have all comforted themselves together by the heat of their joint
animosity.
He came on the Saturday, and it was so managed that he was closeted
with Camilla before Arabella knew that he was in the house. There
was a quarter of an hour during which his work was easy, and perhaps
pleasant. When he began to explain his intention, Camilla, with the
utmost frankness, informed him that her mother had told her all about
it. Then she turned her face on one side and put her hand in his; he
got his arm round her waist, gave her a kiss, and the thing was done.
Camilla was fully resolved that after such a betrothal it should not
be undone. She had behaved with sisterly forbearance, and would not
now lose the reward of virtue. Not a word was said of Arabella at
this interview till he was pressed to come and drink tea with them
all that night. He hesitated a moment; and then Camilla declared,
with something perhaps of imperious roughness in her manner, that he
had better face it all at once. "Mamma will tell her, and she will
understand," said Camilla. He hesitated again, but at last promised
that he would come.
Whilst he was yet in the house Mrs. French had told the whole story
to her poor elder daughter. "What is he doing with Camilla?" Arabella
had asked with feverish excitement.
"Bella, darling;--don't you know?" said the mother.
"I know nothing. Everybody keeps me in the dark, and I am badly used.
What is it that he is doing?" Then Mrs. French tried to take the
poor young woman in her arms, but Arabella would not submit to be
embraced. "Don't!" she exclaimed. "Leave me alone. Nobody likes me,
or cares a bit about me! Why is Cammy with him there, all alone?"
"I suppose he is asking her--to be--his wife." Then Arabella threw
herself in despair upon the bed, and wept without any further attempt
at control over her feelings. It was a death-blow to her last hope,
and all the world, as she looked upon the world then, was over for
her. "If I could have arranged it the other way, you know that I
would," said the mother.
"Mamma," said Arabella, jumping up, "he shan't do it. He hasn't a
right. And as for her,-- Oh, that she should treat me in this way!
Didn't he tell me the other night, when he drank tea here with me
alone--"
"What did he tell you, Bella?"
"Never mind. Nothing shall ever make me speak to him again;--not if
he married her three times over; nor to her. She is a nasty, sly,
good-for-nothing thing!"
"But, Bella--"
"Don't talk to me, mamma. There never was such a thing done before
since people--were--people at all. She has been doing it all the
time. I know she has."
Nevertheless Arabella did sit down to tea with the two lovers that
night. There was a terrible scene between her and Camilla; but
Camilla held her own; and Arabella, being the weaker of the two, was
vanquished by the expenditure of her own small energies. Camilla
argued that as her sister's chance was gone, and as the prize had
come in her own way, there was no good reason why it should be lost
to the family altogether, because Arabella could not win it. When
Arabella called her a treacherous vixen and a heartless, profligate
hussy, she spoke out freely, and said that she wasn't going to be
abused. A gentleman to whom she was attached had asked her for her
hand, and she had given it. If Arabella chose to make herself a fool
she might,--but what would be the effect? Simply that all the world
would know that she, Arabella, was disappointed. Poor Bella at last
gave way, put on her discarded chignon, and came down to tea. Mr.
Gibson was already in the room when she entered it. "Arabella," he
said, getting up to greet her, "I hope you will congratulate me."
He had planned his little speech and his manner of making it, and
had wisely decided that in this way might he best get over the
difficulty.
"Oh yes;--of course," she said, with a little giggle, and then a sob,
and then a flood of tears.
"Dear Bella feels these things so strongly," said Mrs. French.
"We have never been parted yet," said Camilla. Then Arabella tapped
the head of the sofa three or four times sharply with her knuckles.
It was the only protest against the reading of the scene which
Camilla had given of which she was capable at that moment. After that
Mrs. French gave out the tea, Arabella curled herself upon the sofa
as though she were asleep, and the two lovers settled down to proper
lover-like conversation.
The reader may be sure that Camilla was not slow in making the fact
of her engagement notorious through the city. It was not probably
true that the tidings of her success had anything to do with Miss
Stanbury's illness; but it was reported by many that such was the
case. It was in November that the arrangement was made, and it
certainly was true that Miss Stanbury was rather ill about the same
time. "You know, you naughty Lothario, that you did give her some
ground to hope that she might dispose of her unfortunate niece," said
Camilla playfully to her own one, when this illness was discussed
between them. "But you are caught now, and your wings are clipped,
and you are never to be a naughty Lothario again." The clerical
Don Juan bore it all, awkwardly indeed, but with good humour, and
declared that all his troubles of that sort were over, now and for
ever. Nevertheless he did not name the day, and Camilla began to feel
that there might be occasion for a little more of that imperious
roughness which she had at her command.
November was nearly over and nothing had been fixed about the day.
Arabella never condescended to speak to her sister on the subject;
but on more than one occasion made some inquiry of her mother. And
she came to perceive, or to think that she perceived, that her mother
was still anxious on the subject. "I shouldn't wonder if he wasn't
off some day now," she said at last to her mother.
"Don't say anything so dreadful, Bella."
"It would serve Cammy quite right, and it's just what he's likely to
do."
"It would kill me," said the mother.
"I don't know about killing," said Arabella; "it's nothing to what
I've had to go through. I shouldn't pretend to be sorry if he were to
go to Hong-Kong to-morrow."
But Mr. Gibson had no idea of going to Hong-Kong. He was simply
carrying out his little scheme for securing the advantages of a "long
day." He was fully resolved to be married, and was contented to think
that his engagement was the best thing for him. To one or two male
friends he spoke of Camilla as the perfection of female virtue, and
entertained no smallest idea of ultimate escape. But a "long day" is
often a convenience. A bill at three months sits easier on a man than
one at sixty days; and a bill at six months is almost as little of a
burden as no bill at all.
But Camilla was resolved that some day should be fixed. "Thomas," she
said to her lover one morning, as they were walking home together
after service at the cathedral, "isn't this rather a fool's Paradise
of ours?"
"How a fool's Paradise?" asked the happy Thomas.
"What I mean is, dearest, that we ought to fix something. Mamma is
getting uneasy about her own plans."
"In what way, dearest?"
"About a thousand things. She can't arrange anything till our plans
are made. Of course there are little troubles about money when people
ain't rich." Then it occurred to her that this might seem to be a
plea for postponing rather than for hurrying the marriage, and she
mended her argument. "The truth is, Thomas, she wants to know when
the day is to be fixed, and I've promised to ask. She said she'd ask
you herself, but I wouldn't let her do that."
"We must think about it, of course," said Thomas.
"But, my dear, there has been plenty of time for thinking. What do
you say to January?" This was on the last day of November.
"January!" exclaimed Thomas, in a tone that betrayed no triumph. "I
couldn't get my services arranged for in January."
"I thought a clergyman could always manage that for his marriage,"
said Camilla.
"Not in January. Besides, I was thinking you would like to be away in
warmer weather."
They were still in November, and he was thinking of postponing it
till the summer! Camilla immediately perceived how necessary it was
that she should be plain with him. "We shall not have warm weather,
as you call it, for a very long time, Thomas;--and I don't think that
it would be wise to wait for the weather at all. Indeed, I've begun
to get my things for doing it in the winter. Mamma said that she was
sure January would be the very latest. And it isn't as though we had
to get furniture or anything of that kind. Of course a lady shouldn't
be pressing." She smiled sweetly and leaned on his arm as she said
this. "But I hate all girlish nonsense and that kind of thing. It is
such a bore to be kept waiting. I'm sure there's nothing to prevent
it coming off in February."
The 31st of March was fixed before they reached Heavitree, and
Camilla went into her mother's house a happy woman. But Mr. Gibson,
as he went home, thought that he had been hardly used. Here was a
girl who hadn't a shilling of money,--not a shilling till her mother
died,--and who already talked about his house, and his furniture,
and his income, as if it were all her own! Circumstanced as she was,
what right had she to press for an early day? He was quite sure that
Arabella would have been more discreet and less exacting. He was very
angry with his dear Cammy as he went across the Close to his house.
CHAPTER LI.
SHEWING WHAT HAPPENED DURING MISS STANBURY'S ILLNESS.
It was on Christmas-day that Sir Peter Mancrudy, the highest
authority on such matters in the west of England, was sent for to see
Miss Stanbury; and Sir Peter had acknowledged that things were very
serious. He took Dorothy on one side, and told her that Mr. Martin,
the ordinary practitioner, had treated the case, no doubt, quite
wisely throughout; that there was not a word to be said against
Mr. Martin, whose experience was great, and whose discretion was
undeniable; but, nevertheless,--at least it seemed to Dorothy that
this was the only meaning to be attributed to Sir Peter's words,--Mr.
Martin had in this case taken one line of treatment, when he ought
to have taken another. The plan of action was undoubtedly changed,
and Mr. Martin became very fidgety, and ordered nothing without Sir
Peter's sanction. Miss Stanbury was suffering from bronchitis, and a
complication of diseases about her throat and chest. Barty Burgess
declared to more than one acquaintance in the little parlour behind
the bank, that she would go on drinking four or five glasses of
new port wine every day, in direct opposition to Martin's request.
Camilla French heard the report, and repeated it to her lover, and
perhaps another person or two, with an expression of her assured
conviction that it must be false,--at any rate, as regarded the
fifth glass. Mrs. MacHugh, who saw Martha daily, was much frightened.
The peril of such a friend disturbed equally the repose and the
pleasures of her life. Mrs. Clifford was often at Miss Stanbury's
bed-side,--and would have sat there reading for hours together,
had she not been made to understand by Martha that Miss Stanbury
preferred that Miss Dorothy should read to her. The sick woman
received the Sacrament weekly,--not from Mr. Gibson, but from the
hands of another minor canon; and, though she never would admit her
own danger, or allow others to talk to her of it, it was known to
them all that she admitted it to herself because she had, with much
personal annoyance, caused a codicil to be added to her will. "As
you didn't marry that man," she said to Dorothy, "I must change it
again." It was in vain that Dorothy begged her not to trouble herself
with such thoughts. "That's trash," said Miss Stanbury, angrily. "A
person who has it is bound to trouble himself about it. You don't
suppose I'm afraid of dying;--do you?" she added. Dorothy answered
her with some commonplace,--declaring how strongly they all expected
to see her as well as ever. "I'm not a bit afraid to die," said the
old woman, wheezing, struggling with such voice as she possessed;
"I'm not afraid of it, and I don't think I shall die this time; but
I'm not going to have mistakes when I'm gone." This was on the eve
of the new year, and on the same night she asked Dorothy to write to
Brooke Burgess, and request him to come to Exeter. This was Dorothy's
letter:--
Exeter, 31st December, 186--.
MY DEAR MR. BURGESS,
Perhaps I ought to have written before, to say that Aunt
Stanbury is not as well as we could wish her; but, as I
know that you cannot very well leave your office, I have
thought it best not to say anything to frighten you. But
to-night Aunt herself has desired me to tell you that she
thinks you ought to know that she is ill, and that she
wishes you to come to Exeter for a day or two, if it is
possible. Sir Peter Mancrudy has been here every day
since Christmas-day, and I believe he thinks she may get
over it. It is chiefly in the throat;--what they call
bronchitis,--and she has got to be very weak with it, and
at the same time very liable to inflammation. So I know
that you will come if you can.
Yours very truly,
DOROTHY STANBURY.
Perhaps I ought to tell you that she had her lawyer here
with her the day before yesterday; but she does not seem
to think that she herself is in danger. I read to her a
good deal, and I think she is generally asleep; when I
stop she wakes, and I don't believe she gets any other
rest at all.
When it was known in Exeter that Brooke Burgess had been sent for,
then the opinion became general that Miss Stanbury's days were
numbered. Questions were asked of Sir Peter at every corner of the
street; but Sir Peter was a discreet man, who could answer such
questions without giving any information. If it so pleased God, his
patient would die; but it was quite possible that she might live.
That was the tenor of Sir Peter's replies,--and they were read in any
light, according to the idiosyncracies of the reader. Mrs. MacHugh
was quite sure that the danger was over, and had a little game of
cribbage on the sly with old Miss Wright;--for, during the severity
of Miss Stanbury's illness, whist was put on one side in the vicinity
of the Close. Barty Burgess was still obdurate, and shook his head.
He was of opinion that they might soon gratify their curiosity, and
see the last crowning iniquity of this wickedest of old women. Mrs.
Clifford declared that it was all in the hands of God; but that
she saw no reason why Miss Stanbury should not get about again. Mr.
Gibson thought that it was all up with his late friend; and Camilla
wished that at their last interview there had been more of charity
on the part of one whom she had regarded in past days with respect
and esteem. Mrs. French, despondent about everything, was quite
despondent in this case. Martha almost despaired, and already was
burdened with the cares of a whole wardrobe of solemn funereal
clothing. She was seen peering in for half-an-hour at the windows and
doorway of a large warehouse for the sale of mourning. Giles Hickbody
would not speak above his breath, and took his beer standing; but
Dorothy was hopeful, and really believed that her aunt would recover.
Perhaps Sir Peter had spoken to her in terms less oracular than those
which he used towards the public.
Brooke Burgess came, and had an interview with Sir Peter, and to
him Sir Peter was under some obligation to speak plainly, as being
the person whom Miss Stanbury recognised as her heir. So Sir Peter
declared that his patient might perhaps live, and perhaps might die.
"The truth is, Mr. Burgess," said Sir Peter, "a doctor doesn't know
so very much more about these things than other people." It was
understood that Brooke was to remain three days in Exeter, and then
return to London. He would, of course, come again if--if anything
should happen. Sir Peter had been quite clear in his opinion, that no
immediate result was to be anticipated,--either in the one direction
or the other. His patient was doomed to a long illness; she might get
over it, or she might succumb to it.
Dorothy and Brooke were thus thrown much together during these three
days. Dorothy, indeed, spent most of her hours beside her aunt's bed,
instigating sleep by the reading of a certain series of sermons in
which Miss Stanbury had great faith; but nevertheless, there were
some minutes in which she and Brooke were necessarily together. They
eat their meals in each other's company, and there was a period in
the evening, before Dorothy began her night-watch in her aunt's room,
at which she took her tea while Martha was nurse in the room above.
At this time of the day she would remain an hour or more with Brooke;
and a great deal may be said between a man and a woman in an hour
when the will to say it is there. Brooke Burgess had by no means
changed his mind since he had declared it to Hugh Stanbury under the
midnight lamps of Long Acre, when warmed by the influence of oysters
and whisky toddy. The whisky toddy had in that instance brought out
truth and not falsehood,--as is ever the nature of whisky toddy and
similar dangerous provocatives. There is no saying truer than that
which declares that there is truth in wine. Wine is a dangerous
thing, and should not be made the exponent of truth, let the truth
be good as it may; but it has the merit of forcing a man to show his
true colours. A man who is a gentleman in his cups may be trusted to
be a gentleman at all times. I trust that the severe censor will not
turn upon me, and tell me that no gentleman in these days is ever to
be seen in his cups. There are cups of different degrees of depth;
and cups do exist, even among gentlemen, and seem disposed to hold
their own let the censor be ever so severe. The gentleman in his cups
is a gentleman always; and the man who tells his friend in his cups
that he is in love, does so because the fact has been very present
to himself in his cooler and calmer moments. Brooke Burgess, who
had seen Hugh Stanbury on two or three occasions since that of the
oysters and toddy, had not spoken again of his regard for Hugh's
sister; but not the less was he determined to carry out his plan and
make Dorothy his wife if she would accept him. But could he ask her
while the old lady was, as it might be, dying in the house? He put
this question to himself as he travelled down to Exeter, and had told
himself that he must be guided for an answer by circumstances as
they might occur. Hugh had met him at the station as he started for
Exeter, and there had been a consultation between them as to the
propriety of bringing about, or of attempting to bring about, an
interview between Hugh and his aunt. "Do whatever you like," Hugh had
said. "I would go down to her at a moment's warning, if she should
express a desire to see me."
On the first night of Brooke's arrival this question had been
discussed between him and Dorothy. Dorothy had declared herself
unable to give advice. If any message were given to her she would
deliver it to her aunt, but she thought that anything said to her
aunt on the subject had better come from Brooke himself. "You
evidently are the person most important to her," Dorothy said, "and
she would listen to you when she would not let any one else say a
word." Brooke promised that he would think of it; and then Dorothy
tripped up to relieve Martha, dreaming nothing at all of that other
doubt to which the important personage downstairs was now subject.
Dorothy was, in truth, very fond of the new friend she had made; but
it had never occurred to her that he might be a possible suitor to
her. Her old conception of herself,--that she was beneath the notice
of any man,--had only been partly disturbed by the absolute fact of
Mr. Gibson's courtship. She had now heard of his engagement with
Camilla French, and saw in that complete proof that the foolish man
had been induced to offer his hand to her by the promise of her
aunt's money. If there had been a moment of exaltation,--a period in
which she had allowed herself to think that she was, as other women,
capable of making herself dear to a man,--it had been but a moment.
And now she rejoiced greatly that she had not acceded to the wishes
of one to whom it was so manifest that she had not made herself in
the least dear.
On the second day of his visit, Brooke was summoned to Miss
Stanbury's room at noon. She was forbidden to talk, and during a
great portion of the day could hardly speak without an effort; but
there would be half hours now and again in which she would become
stronger than usual, at which time nothing that Martha and Dorothy
could say would induce her to hold her tongue. When Brooke came to
her on this occasion he found her sitting up in bed with a great
shawl round her; and he at once perceived she was much more like her
own self than on the former day. She told him that she had been an
old fool for sending for him, that she had nothing special to say
to him, that she had made no alteration in her will in regard to
him,--"except that I have done something for Dolly that will have to
come out of your pocket, Brooke." Brooke declared that too much could
not be done for a person so good, and dear, and excellent as Dorothy
Stanbury, let it come out of whose pocket it might. "She is nothing
to you, you know," said Miss Stanbury.
"She is a great deal to me," said Brooke.
"What is she?" asked Miss Stanbury.
"Oh;--a friend; a great friend."
"Well; yes. I hope it may be so. But she won't have anything that
I haven't saved," said Miss Stanbury. "There are two houses at St.
Thomas's; but I bought them myself, Brooke;--out of the income."
Brooke could only declare that as the whole property was hers, to do
what she liked with it as completely as though she had inherited it
from her own father, no one could have any right to ask questions
as to when or how this or that portion of the property had accrued.
"But I don't think I'm going to die yet, Brooke," she said. "If it is
God's will, I am ready. Not that I'm fit, Brooke. God forbid that I
should ever think that. But I doubt whether I shall ever be fitter. I
can go without repining if He thinks best to take me." Then he stood
up by her bedside, with his hand upon hers, and after some hesitation
asked her whether she would wish to see her nephew Hugh. "No," said
she, sharply. Brooke went on to say how pleased Hugh would have been
to come to her. "I don't think much of death-bed reconciliations,"
said the old woman, grimly. "I loved him dearly, but he didn't love
me, and I don't know what good we should do each other." Brooke
declared that Hugh did love her; but he could not press the matter,
and it was dropped.
On that evening at eight Dorothy came down to her tea. She had dined
at the same table with Brooke that afternoon, but a servant had been
in the room all the time and nothing had been said between them. As
soon as Brooke had got his tea he began to tell the story of his
failure about Hugh. He was sorry, he said, that he had spoken on the
subject, as it had moved Miss Stanbury to an acrimony which he had
not expected.
"She always declares that he never loved her," said Dorothy. "She has
told me so twenty times."
"There are people who fancy that nobody cares for them," said Brooke.
"Indeed there are, Mr. Burgess; and it is so natural."
"Why natural?"
"Just as it is natural that there should be dogs and cats that are
petted and loved and made much of, and others that have to crawl
through life as they can, cuffed and kicked and starved."
"That depends on the accident of possession," said Brooke.
"So does the other. How many people there are that don't seem to
belong to anybody,--and if they do, they're no good to anybody.
They're not cuffed exactly, or starved; but--"
"You mean that they don't get their share of affection?"
"They get perhaps as much as they deserve," said Dorothy.
"Because they're cross-grained, or ill-tempered, or disagreeable?"
"Not exactly that."
"What then?" asked Brooke.
"Because they're just nobodies. They are not anything particular to
anybody, and so they go on living till they die. You know what I
mean, Mr. Burgess. A man who is a nobody can perhaps make himself
somebody,--or, at any rate, he can try; but a woman has no means of
trying. She is a nobody, and a nobody she must remain. She has her
clothes and her food, but she isn't wanted anywhere. People put up
with her, and that is about the best of her luck. If she were to die
somebody perhaps would be sorry for her, but nobody would be worse
off. She doesn't earn anything or do any good. She is just there and
that's all."
Brooke had never heard her speak after this fashion before, had never
known her to utter so many consecutive words, or to put forward any
opinion of her own with so much vigour. And Dorothy herself, when she
had concluded her speech, was frightened by her own energy and grew
red in the face, and showed very plainly that she was half ashamed
of herself. Brooke thought that he had never seen her look so pretty
before, and was pleased by her enthusiasm. He understood perfectly
that she was thinking of her own position, though she had entertained
no idea that he would so read her meaning; and he felt that it was
incumbent on him to undeceive her, and make her know that she was not
one of those women who are "just there and that's all." "One does see
such a woman as that now and again," he said.
"There are hundreds of them," said Dorothy. "And of course it can't
be helped."
"Such as Arabella French," said he, laughing.
"Well,--yes; if she is one. It is very easy to see the difference.
Some people are of use and are always doing things. There are others,
generally women, who have nothing to do, but who can't be got rid of.
It is a melancholy sort of feeling."
"You at least are not one of them."
"I didn't mean to complain about myself," she said. "I have got a
great deal to make me happy."
"I don't suppose you regard yourself as an Arabella French," said he.
"How angry Miss French would be if she heard you. She considers
herself to be one of the reigning beauties of Exeter."
"She has had a very long reign, and dominion of that sort to be
successful ought to be short."
"That is spiteful, Mr. Burgess."
"I don't feel spiteful against her, poor woman. I own I do not love
Camilla. Not that I begrudge Camilla her present prosperity."
"Nor I either, Mr. Burgess."
"She and Mr. Gibson will do very well together, I dare say."
"I hope they will," said Dorothy, "and I do not see any reason
against it. They have known each other a long time."
"A very long time," said Brooke. Then he paused for a minute,
thinking how he might best tell her that which he had now resolved
should be told on this occasion. Dorothy finished her tea and got up
as though she were about to go to her duty up-stairs. She had been as
yet hardly an hour in the room, and the period of her relief was not
fairly over. But there had come something of a personal flavour in
their conversation which prompted her, unconsciously, to leave him.
She had, without any special indication of herself, included herself
among that company of old maids who are born and live and die without
that vital interest in the affairs of life which nothing but family
duties, the care of children, or at least of a husband, will give to
a woman. If she had not meant this she had felt it. He had understood
her meaning, or at least her feeling, and had taken upon himself to
assure her that she was not one of the company whose privations she
had endeavoured to describe. Her instinct rather than her reason put
her at once upon her guard, and she prepared to leave the room. "You
are not going yet," he said.
"I think I might as well. Martha has so much to do, and she comes to
me again at five in the morning."
"Don't go quite yet," he said, pulling out his watch. "I know all
about the hours, and it wants twenty minutes to the proper time."
"There is no proper time, Mr. Burgess."
"Then you can remain a few minutes longer. The fact is, I've got
something I want to say to you."
He was now standing between her and the door, so that she could not
get away from him; but at this moment she was absolutely ignorant of
his purpose, expecting nothing of love from him more than she would
from Sir Peter Mancrudy. Her face had become flushed when she made
her long speech, but there was no blush on it as she answered him
now. "Of course, I can wait," she said, "if you have anything to say
to me."
"Well;--I have. I should have said it before, only that that other
man was here." He was blushing now,--up to the roots of his hair, and
felt that he was in a difficulty. There are men, to whom such moments
of their lives are pleasurable, but Brooke Burgess was not one of
them. He would have been glad to have had it done and over,--so that
then he might take pleasure in it.
"What man?" asked Dorothy, in perfect innocence.
"Mr. Gibson, to be sure. I don't know that there is anybody else."
"Oh, Mr. Gibson. He never comes here now, and I don't suppose he will
again. Aunt Stanbury is so very angry with him."
"I don't care whether he comes or not. What I mean is this. When I
was here before, I was told that you were going--to marry him."
"But I wasn't."
"How was I to know that, when you didn't tell me? I certainly did
know it after I came back from Dartmoor." He paused a moment, as
though she might have a word to say. She had no word to say, and
did not in the least know what was coming. She was so far from
anticipating the truth, that she was composed and easy in her mind.
"But all that is of no use at all," he continued. "When I was here
before Miss Stanbury wanted you to marry Mr. Gibson; and, of course,
I had nothing to say about it. Now I want you--to marry me."
"Mr. Burgess!"
"Dorothy, my darling, I love you better than all the world. I do,
indeed." As soon as he had commenced his protestations he became
profuse enough with them, and made a strong attempt to support them
by the action of his hands. But she retreated from him step by step,
till she had regained her chair by the tea-table, and there she
seated herself,--safely, as she thought; but he was close to her,
over her shoulder, still continuing his protestations, offering up
his vows, and imploring her to reply to him. She, as yet, had not
answered him by a word, save by that one half-terrified exclamation
of his name. "Tell me, at any rate, that you believe me, when I
assure you that I love you," he said. The room was going round with
Dorothy, and the world was going round, and there had come upon her
so strong a feeling of the disruption of things in general, that she
was at the moment anything but happy. Had it been possible for her to
find that the last ten minutes had been a dream, she would at this
moment have wished that it might become one. A trouble had come upon
her, out of which she did not see her way. To dive among the waters
in warm weather is very pleasant; there is nothing pleasanter. But
when the young swimmer first feels the thorough immersion of his
plunge, there comes upon him a strong desire to be quickly out again.
He will remember afterwards how joyous it was; but now, at this
moment, the dry land is everything to him. So it was with Dorothy.
She had thought of Brooke Burgess as one of those bright ones of the
world, with whom everything is happy and pleasant, whom everybody
loves, who may have whatever they please, whose lines have been laid
in pleasant places. She thought of him as a man who might some day
make some woman very happy as his wife. To be the wife of such a man
was, in Dorothy's estimation, one of those blessed chances which come
to some women, but which she never regarded as being within her own
reach. Though she had thought much about him, she had never thought
of him as a possible possession for herself; and now that he was
offering himself to her, she was not at once made happy by his love.
Her ideas of herself and of her life were all dislocated for the
moment, and she required to be alone, that she might set herself in
order, and try herself all over, and find whether her bones were
broken. "Say that you believe me," he repeated.
[Illustration: The world was going round with Dorothy.]
"I don't know what to say," she whispered.
"I'll tell you what to say. Say at once that you will be my wife."
"I can't say that, Mr. Burgess."
"Why not? Do you mean that you cannot love me?"
"I think, if you please, I'll go up to Aunt Stanbury. It is time for
me; indeed it is; and she will be wondering, and Martha will be put
out. Indeed I must go up."
"And will you not answer me?"
"I don't know what to say. You must give me a little time to
consider. I don't quite think you're serious."
"Heaven and earth!" began Brooke.
"And I'm sure it would never do. At any rate, I must go now. I must,
indeed."
And so she escaped, and went up to her aunt's room, which she reached
at ten minutes after her usual time, and before Martha had begun
to be put out. She was very civil to Martha, as though Martha had
been injured; and she put her hand on her aunt's arm, with a soft,
caressing, apologetic touch, feeling conscious that she had given
cause for offence. "What has he been saying to you?" said her aunt,
as soon as Martha had closed the door. This was a question which
Dorothy, certainly, could not answer. Miss Stanbury meant nothing
by it,--nothing beyond a sick woman's desire that something of the
conversation of those who were not sick should be retailed to her;
but to Dorothy the question meant so much! How should her aunt have
known that he had said anything? She sat herself down and waited,
giving no answer to the question. "I hope he gets his meals
comfortably," said Miss Stanbury.
"I am sure he does," said Dorothy, infinitely relieved. Then, knowing
how important it was that her aunt should sleep, she took up the
volume of Jeremy Taylor, and, with so great a burden on her mind,
she went on painfully and distinctly with the second sermon on the
Marriage Ring. She strove valiantly to keep her mind to the godliness
of the discourse, so that it might be of some possible service to
herself; and to keep her voice to the tone that might be of service
to her aunt. Presently she heard the grateful sound which indicated
her aunt's repose, but she knew of experience that were she to stop,
the sound and the sleep would come to an end also. For a whole hour
she persevered, reading the sermon of the Marriage Ring with such
attention to the godly principles of the teaching as she could
give,--with that terrible burden upon her mind.
"Thank you;--thank you; that will do, my dear. Shut it up," said
the sick woman. "It's time now for the draught." Then Dorothy moved
quietly about the room, and did her nurse's work with soft hand, and
soft touch, and soft tread. After that her aunt kissed her, and bade
her sit down and sleep.
"I'll go on reading, aunt, if you'll let me," said Dorothy. But
Miss Stanbury, who was not a cruel woman, would have no more of the
reading, and Dorothy's mind was left at liberty to think of the
proposition that had been made to her. To one resolution she came
very quickly. The period of her aunt's illness could not be a proper
time for marriage vows, or the amenities of love-making. She did not
feel that he, being a man, had offended; but she was quite sure that
were she, a woman, the niece of so kind an aunt, the nurse at the
bed-side of such an invalid,--were she at such a time to consent to
talk of love, she would never deserve to have a lover. And from this
resolve she got great comfort. It would give her an excuse for making
no more assured answer at present, and would enable her to reflect
at leisure as to the reply she would give him, should he ever, by
any chance, renew his offer. If he did not,--and probably he would
not,--then it would have been very well that he should not have been
made the victim of a momentary generosity. She had complained of the
dulness of her life, and that complaint from her had produced his
noble, kind, generous, dear, enthusiastic benevolence towards her.
As she thought of it all,--and by degrees she took great pleasure in
thinking of it,--her mind bestowed upon him all manner of eulogies.
She could not persuade herself that he really loved her, and yet she
was full at heart of gratitude to him for the expression of his love.
And as for herself, could she love him? We who are looking on of
course know that she loved him;--that from this moment there was
nothing belonging to him, down to his shoe-tie, that would not be
dear to her heart and an emblem so tender as to force a tear from
her. He had already become her god, though she did not know it. She
made comparisons between him and Mr. Gibson, and tried to convince
herself that the judgment, which was always pronounced very clearly
in Brooke's favour, came from anything but her heart. And thus
through the long watches of the night she became very happy, feeling
but not knowing that the whole aspect of the world was changed to her
by those few words which her lover had spoken to her. She thought now
that it would be consolation enough to her in future to know that
such a man as Brooke Burgess had once asked her to be the partner of
his life, and that it would be almost ungenerous in her to push her
advantage further and attempt to take him at his word. Besides, there
would be obstacles. Her aunt would dislike such a marriage for him,
and he would be bound to obey her aunt in such a matter. She would
not allow herself to think that she could ever become Brooke's wife,
but nothing could rob her of the treasure of the offer which he had
made her. Then Martha came to her at five o'clock, and she went to
her bed to dream for an hour or two of Brooke Burgess and her future
life.
On the next morning she met him at breakfast. She went down stairs
later than usual, not till ten, having hung about her aunt's room,
thinking that thus she would escape him for the present. She would
wait till he was gone out, and then she would go down. She did wait;
but she could not hear the front door, and then her aunt murmured
something about Brooke's breakfast. She was told to go down, and she
went. But when on the stairs she slunk back to her own room, and
stood there for awhile, aimless, motionless, not knowing what to do.
Then one of the girls came to her, and told her that Mr. Burgess was
waiting breakfast for her. She knew not what excuse to make, and at
last descended slowly to the parlour. She was very happy, but had it
been possible for her to have run away she would have gone.
"Dear Dorothy," he said at once. "I may call you so,--may I not?"
"Oh, yes."
"And you will love me;--and be my own, own wife?"
"No, Mr. Burgess."
"No?"
"I mean;--that is to say--"
"Do you love me, Dorothy?"
"Only think how ill Aunt Stanbury is, Mr. Burgess;--perhaps dying!
How can I have any thought now except about her? It wouldn't be
right;--would it?"
"You may say that you love me."
"Mr. Burgess, pray, pray don't speak of it now. If you do I must go
away."
"But do you love me?"
"Pray, pray don't, Mr. Burgess!"
There was nothing more to be got from her during the whole day than
that. He told her in the evening that as soon as Miss Stanbury was
well, he would come again;--that in any case he would come again. She
sat quite still as he said this, with a solemn face,--but smiling at
heart, laughing at heart, so happy! When she got up to leave him, and
was forced to give him her hand, he seized her in his arms and kissed
her. "That is very, very wrong," she said, sobbing, and then ran to
her room,--the happiest girl in all Exeter. He was to start early on
the following morning, and she knew that she would not be forced to
see him again. Thinking of him was so much pleasanter than seeing
him!
CHAPTER LII.
MR. OUTHOUSE COMPLAINS THAT IT'S HARD.
Life had gone on during the winter at St. Diddulph's Parsonage in a
dull, weary, painful manner. There had come a letter in November from
Trevelyan to his wife, saying that as he could trust neither her nor
her uncle with the custody of his child, he should send a person
armed with due legal authority, addressed to Mr. Outhouse, for the
recovery of the boy, and desiring that little Louis might be at once
surrendered to the messenger. Then of course there had arisen great
trouble in the house. Both Mrs. Trevelyan and Nora Rowley had learned
by this time that, as regarded the master of the house, they were not
welcome guests at St. Diddulph's. When the threat was shewn to Mr.
Outhouse, he did not say a word to indicate that the child should be
given up. He muttered something, indeed, about impotent nonsense,
which seemed to imply that the threat could be of no avail; but there
was none of that reassurance to be obtained from him which a positive
promise on his part to hold the bairn against all comers would have
given. Mrs. Outhouse told her niece more than once that the child
would be given to no messenger whatever; but even she did not give
the assurance with that energy which the mother would have liked.
"They shall drag him away from me by force if they do take him!" said
the mother, gnashing her teeth. Oh, if her father would but come!
For some weeks she did not let the boy out of her sight; but when no
messenger had presented himself by Christmas time, they all began to
believe that the threat had in truth meant nothing,--that it had been
part of the ravings of a madman.
But the threat had meant something. Early on one morning in January
Mr. Outhouse was told that a person in the hall wanted to see him,
and Mrs. Trevelyan, who was sitting at breakfast, the child being at
the moment up-stairs, started from her seat. The maid described the
man as being "All as one as a gentleman," though she would not go so
far as to say that he was a gentleman in fact. Mr. Outhouse slowly
rose from his breakfast, went out to the man in the passage, and bade
him follow into the little closet that was now used as a study. It is
needless perhaps to say that the man was Bozzle.
"I dare say, Mr. Houthouse, you don't know me," said Bozzle. Mr.
Outhouse, disdaining all complimentary language, said that he
certainly did not. "My name, Mr. Houthouse, is Samuel Bozzle, and I
live at No. 55, Stony Walk, Union Street, Borough. I was in the Force
once, but I work on my own 'ook now."
"What do you want with me, Mr. Bozzle?"
"It isn't so much with you, sir, as it is with a lady as is under
your protection; and it isn't so much with the lady as it is with her
infant."
"Then you may go away, Mr. Bozzle," said Mr. Outhouse, impatiently.
"You may as well go away at once."
"Will you please read them few lines, sir," said Mr. Bozzle. "They
is in Mr. Trewilyan's handwriting, which will no doubt be familiar
characters,--leastways to Mrs. T., if you don't know the gent's
fist." Mr. Outhouse, after looking at the paper for a minute, and
considering deeply what in this emergency he had better do, did take
the paper and read it. The words ran as follows: "I hereby give full
authority to Mr. Samuel Bozzle, of 55, Stony Walk, Union Street,
Borough, to claim and to enforce possession of the body of my child,
Louis Trevelyan; and I require that any person whatsoever who may
now have the custody of the said child, whether it be my wife or any
of her friends, shall at once deliver him up to Mr. Bozzle, on the
production of this authority.--LOUIS TREVELYAN." It may be explained
that before this document had been written there had been much
correspondence on the subject between Bozzle and his employer. To
give the ex-policeman his due, he had not at first wished to meddle
in the matter of the child. He had a wife at home who expressed an
opinion with much vigour that the boy should be left with its mother,
and that he, Bozzle, should he succeed in getting hold of the child,
would not know what to do with it. Bozzle was aware, moreover, that
it was his business to find out facts, and not to perform actions.
But his employer had become very urgent with him. Mr. Bideawhile had
positively refused to move in the matter; and Trevelyan, mad as he
was, had felt a disinclination to throw his affairs into the hands of
a certain Mr. Skint, of Stamford Street, whom Bozzle had recommended
to him as a lawyer. Trevelyan had hinted, moreover, that if Bozzle
would make the application in person, that application, if not
obeyed, would act with usefulness as a preliminary step for further
personal measures to be taken by himself. He intended to return
to England for the purpose, but he desired that the order for the
child's rendition should be made at once. Therefore Bozzle had come.
He was an earnest man, and had now worked himself up to a certain
degree of energy in the matter. He was a man loving power, and
specially anxious to enforce obedience from those with whom he came
in contact by the production of the law's mysterious authority. In
his heart he was ever tapping people on the shoulder, and telling
them that they were wanted. Thus, when he displayed his document to
Mr. Outhouse, he had taught himself at least to desire that that
document should be obeyed.
Mr. Outhouse read the paper and turned up his nose at it. "You had
better go away," said he, as he thrust it back into Bozzle's hand.
"Of course I shall go away when I have the child."
"Psha!" said Mr. Outhouse.
"What does that mean, Mr. Houthouse? I presume you'll not dispute the
paternal parent's legal authority?"
"Go away, sir," said Mr. Outhouse.
"Go away!"
"Yes;--out of this house. It's my belief that you are a knave."
"A knave, Mr. Houthouse?"
"Yes;--a knave. No one who was not a knave would lend a hand towards
separating a little child from its mother. I think you are a knave,
but I don't think you are fool enough to suppose that the child will
be given up to you."
"It's my belief that knave is hactionable," said Bozzle,--whose
respect, however, for the clergyman was rising fast. "Would you mind
ringing the bell, Mr. Houthouse, and calling me a knave again before
the young woman?"
"Go away," said Mr. Outhouse.
"If you have no objection, sir, I should be glad to see the lady
before I goes."
"You won't see any lady here; and if you don't get out of my house
when I tell you, I'll send for a real policeman." Then was Bozzle
conquered; and, as he went, he admitted to himself that he had sinned
against all the rules of his life in attempting to go beyond the
legitimate line of his profession. As long as he confined himself
to the getting up of facts nobody could threaten him with a "real
policeman." But one fact he had learned to-day. The clergyman of St.
Diddulph's, who had been represented to him as a weak, foolish man,
was anything but that. Bozzle was much impressed in favour of Mr.
Outhouse, and would have been glad to have done that gentleman a
kindness had an opportunity come in his way.
"What does he want, Uncle Oliphant?" said Mrs. Trevelyan at the foot
of the stairs, guarding the way up to the nursery. At this moment the
front door had just been closed behind the back of Mr. Bozzle.
"You had better ask no questions," said Mr. Outhouse.
"But is it about Louis?"
"Yes, he came about him."
"Well? Of course you must tell me, Uncle Oliphant. Think of my
condition."
"He had some stupid paper in his hand from your husband, but it meant
nothing."
"He was the messenger, then?"
"Yes, he was the messenger. But I don't suppose he expected to get
anything. Never mind. Go up and look after the child." Then Mrs.
Trevelyan returned to her boy, and Mr. Outhouse went back to his
papers.
It was very hard upon him, Mr. Outhouse thought,--very hard. He
was threatened with an action now, and most probably would become
subject to one. Though he had been spirited enough in presence of the
enemy, he was very much out of spirits at this moment. Though he had
admitted to himself that his duty required him to protect his wife's
niece, he had never taken the poor woman to his heart with a loving,
generous feeling of true guardianship. Though he would not give up
the child to Bozzle, he thoroughly wished that the child was out of
his house. Though he called Bozzle a knave and Trevelyan a madman,
still he considered that Colonel Osborne was the chief sinner, and
that Emily Trevelyan had behaved badly. He constantly repeated to
himself the old adage, that there was no smoke without fire; and
lamented the misfortune that had brought him into close relation
with things and people that were so little to his taste. He sat for
awhile, with a pen in his hand, at the miserable little substitute
for a library table which had been provided for him, and strove to
collect his thoughts and go on with his work. But the effort was in
vain. Bozzle would be there, presenting his document, and begging
that the maid might be rung for, in order that she might hear him
called a knave. And then he knew that on this very day his niece
intended to hand him money, which he could not refuse. Of what use
would it be to refuse it now, after it had been once taken? As he
could not write a word, he rose and went away to his wife.
"If this goes on much longer," said he, "I shall be in Bedlam."
"My dear, don't speak of it in that way!"
"That's all very well. I suppose I ought to say that I like it. There
has been a policeman here who is going to bring an action against
me."
"A policeman!"
"Some one that her husband has sent for the child."
"The boy must not be given up, Oliphant."
"It's all very well to say that, but I suppose we must obey the law.
The parsonage of St. Diddulph's isn't a castle in the Apennines. When
it comes to this, that a policeman is sent here to fetch any man's
child, and threatens me with an action because I tell him to leave my
house, it is very hard upon me, seeing how very little I've had to do
with it. It's all over the parish now that my niece is kept here away
from her husband, and that a lover comes to see her. This about the
policeman will be known now, of course. I only say it is hard; that's
all." The wife did all that she could to comfort him, reminding him
that Sir Marmaduke would be home soon, and that then the burden would
be taken from his shoulders. But she was forced to admit that it was
very hard.
CHAPTER LIII.
HUGH STANBURY IS SHEWN TO BE NO CONJUROR.
[Illustration]
Many weeks had now passed since Hugh Stanbury had paid his visit to
St. Diddulph's, and Nora Rowley was beginning to believe that her
rejection of her lover had been so firm and decided that she would
never see him or hear from him more; and she had long since confessed
to herself that if she did not see him or hear from him soon, life
would not be worth a straw to her. To all of us a single treasure
counts for much more when the outward circumstances of our life are
dull, unvaried, and melancholy, than it does when our days are full
of pleasure, or excitement, or even of business. With Nora Rowley at
St. Diddulph's life at present was very melancholy. There was little
or no society to enliven her. Her sister was sick at heart, and
becoming ill in health under the burden of her troubles. Mr. Outhouse
was moody and wretched; and Mrs. Outhouse, though she did her best
to make her house comfortable to her unwelcome inmates, could not
make it appear that their presence there was a pleasure to her.
Nora understood better than did her sister how distasteful the
present arrangement was to their uncle, and was consequently very
uncomfortable on that score. And in the midst of that unhappiness,
she of course told herself that she was a young woman miserable and
unfortunate altogether. It is always so with us. The heart when it is
burdened, though it may have ample strength to bear the burden, loses
its buoyancy and doubts its own power. It is like the springs of a
carriage which are pressed flat by the superincumbent weight. But,
because the springs are good, the weight is carried safely, and they
are the better afterwards for their required purposes because of the
trial to which they have been subjected.
Nora had sent her lover away, and now at the end of three months
from the day of his dismissal she had taught herself to believe that
he would never come again. Amidst the sadness of her life at St.
Diddulph's some confidence in a lover expected to come again would
have done much to cheer her. The more she thought of Hugh Stanbury,
the more fully she became convinced that he was the man who as a
lover, as a husband, and as a companion, would just suit all her
tastes. She endowed him liberally with a hundred good gifts in the
disposal of which Nature had been much more sparing. She made for
herself a mental portrait of him more gracious in its flattery than
ever was canvas coming from the hand of a Court limner. She gave
him all gifts of manliness, honesty, truth, and energy, and felt
regarding him that he was a Paladin,--such as Paladins are in this
age, that he was indomitable, sure of success, and fitted in all
respects to take the high position which he would certainly win
for himself. But she did not presume him to be endowed with such a
constancy as would make him come to seek her hand again. Had Nora at
this time of her life been living at the West-end of London, and
going out to parties three or four times a week, she would have been
quite easy about his coming. The springs would not have been weighted
so heavily, and her heart would have been elastic.
No doubt she had forgotten many of the circumstances of his visit
and of his departure. Immediately on his going she had told her
sister that he would certainly come again, but had said at the same
time that his coming could be of no use. He was so poor a man; and
she,--though poorer than he,--had been so little accustomed to
poverty of life, that she had then acknowledged to herself that she
was not fit to be his wife. Gradually, as the slow weeks went by her,
there had come a change in her ideas. She now thought that he never
would come again; but that if he did she would confess to him that
her own views about life were changed. "I would tell him frankly
that I could eat a crust with him in any garret in London." But this
was said to herself;--never to her sister. Emily and Mrs. Outhouse
had determined together that it would be wise to abstain from all
mention of Hugh Stanbury's name. Nora had felt that her sister had so
abstained, and this reticence had assisted in producing the despair
which had come upon her. Hugh, when he had left her, had certainly
given her encouragement to expect that he would return. She had been
sure then that he would return. She had been sure of it, though she
had told him that it would be useless. But now, when these sad weeks
had slowly crept over her head, when during the long hours of the
long days she had thought of him continually,--telling herself that
it was impossible that she should ever become the wife of any man if
she did not become his,--she assured herself that she had seen and
heard the last of him. She must surely have forgotten his hot words
and that daring embrace.
Then there came a letter to her. The question of the management of
letters for young ladies is handled very differently in different
houses. In some establishments the post is as free to young ladies
as it is to the reverend seniors of the household. In others it is
considered to be quite a matter of course that some experienced
discretion should sit in judgment on the correspondence of the
daughters of the family. When Nora Rowley was living with her sister
in Curzon Street, she would have been very indignant indeed had it
been suggested to her that there was any authority over her letters
vested in her sister. But now, circumstanced as she was at St.
Diddulph's, she did understand that no letter would reach her
without her aunt knowing that it had come. All this was distasteful
to her,--as were indeed all the details of her life at St.
Diddulph's;--but she could not help herself. Had her aunt told her
that she should never be allowed to receive a letter at all, she must
have submitted till her mother had come to her relief. The letter
which reached her now was put into her hands by her sister, but it
had been given to Mrs. Trevelyan by Mrs. Outhouse. "Nora," said
Mrs. Trevelyan, "here is a letter for you. I think it is from Mr.
Stanbury."
"Give it me," said Nora greedily.
"Of course I will give it you. But I hope you do not intend to
correspond with him."
"If he has written to me I shall answer him of course," said Nora,
holding her treasure.
"Aunt Mary thinks that you should not do so till papa and mamma have
arrived."
"If Aunt Mary is afraid of me let her tell me so, and I will contrive
to go somewhere else." Poor Nora knew that this threat was futile.
There was no house to which she could take herself.
"She is not afraid of you at all, Nora. She only says that she thinks
you should not write to Mr. Stanbury." Then Nora escaped to the cold
but solitary seclusion of her bed-room and there she read her letter.
The reader may remember that Hugh Stanbury when he last left St.
Diddulph's had not been oppressed by any of the gloomy reveries of a
despairing lover. He had spoken his mind freely to Nora, and had felt
himself justified in believing that he had not spoken in vain. He had
had her in his arms, and she had found it impossible to say that she
did not love him. But then she had been quite firm in her purpose to
give him no encouragement that she could avoid. She had said no word
that would justify him in considering that there was any engagement
between them; and, moreover, he had been warned not to come to the
house by its mistress. From day to day he thought of it all, now
telling himself that there was nothing to be done but to trust in
her fidelity till he should be in a position to offer her a fitting
home, and then reflecting that he could not expect such a girl as
Nora Rowley to wait for him, unless he could succeed in making her
understand that he at any rate intended to wait for her. On one day
he would think that good faith and proper consideration for Nora
herself required him to keep silent; on the next he would tell
himself that such maudlin chivalry as he was proposing to himself was
sure to go to the wall and be neither rewarded nor recognised. So at
last he sat down and wrote the following letter:--
Lincoln's Inn Fields, January, 186--.
DEAREST NORA,
Ever since I last saw you at St. Diddulph's, I have been
trying to teach myself what I ought to do in reference
to you. Sometimes I think that because I am poor I ought
to hold my tongue. At others I feel sure that I ought to
speak out loud, because I love you so dearly. You may
presume that just at this moment the latter opinion is in
the ascendant.
As I do write I mean to be very bold; so bold that if I am
wrong you will be thoroughly disgusted with me and will
never willingly see me again. But I think it best to be
true, and to say what I think. I do believe that you love
me. According to all precedent I ought not to say so;--but
I do believe it. Ever since I was at St. Diddulph's that
belief has made me happy,--though there have been moments
of doubt. If I thought that you did not love me, I would
trouble you no further. A man may win his way to love when
social circumstances are such as to throw him and the girl
together; but such is not the case with us; and unless you
love me now, you never will love me.
"I do--I do!" said Nora, pressing the letter to her bosom.
If you do, I think that you owe it me to say so, and
to let me have all the joy and all the feeling of
responsibility which such an assurance will give me.
"I will tell him so," said Nora; "I don't care what may come
afterwards, but I will tell him the truth."
I know [continued Hugh] that an engagement with me now
would be hazardous, because what I earn is both scanty and
precarious; but it seems to me that nothing could ever
be done without some risk. There are risks of different
kinds,--
She wondered whether he was thinking when he wrote this of the rock
on which her sister's barque had been split to pieces;--
and we may hardly hope to avoid them all. For myself,
I own that life would be tame to me, if there were no
dangers to be overcome.
If you do love me, and will say so, I will not ask you
to be my wife till I can give you a proper home; but the
knowledge that I am the master of the treasure which I
desire will give me a double energy, and will make me feel
that when I have gained so much I cannot fail of adding to
it all other smaller things that may be necessary.
Pray,--pray, send me an answer. I cannot reach you except
by writing, as I was told by your aunt not to come to the
house again.
Dearest Nora, pray believe
That I shall always be truly yours only,
HUGH STANBURY.
Write to him! Of course she would write to him. Of course she would
confess to him the truth. "He tells me that I owe it to him to say
so, and I acknowledge the debt," she said aloud to herself. "And as
for a proper home, he shall be the judge of that." She resolved that
she would not be a fine lady, not fastidious, not coy, not afraid
to take her full share of the risk of which he spoke in such manly
terms. "It is quite true. As he has been able to make me love him,
I have no right to stand aloof,--even if I wished it." As she was
walking up and down the room so resolving her sister came to her.
"Well, dear!" said Emily. "May I ask what it is he says?"
Nora paused a moment, holding the letter tight in her hand, and then
she held it out to her sister. "There it is. You may read it." Mrs.
Trevelyan took the letter and read it slowly, during which Nora
stood looking out of the window. She would not watch her sister's
face, as she did not wish to have to reply to any outward signs of
disapproval. "Give it me back," she said, when she heard by the
refolding of the paper that the perusal was finished.
"Of course I shall give it you back, dear."
"Yes;--thanks. I did not mean to doubt you."
"And what will you do, Nora?"
"Answer it of course."
"I would think a little before I answered it," said Mrs. Trevelyan.
"I have thought,--a great deal, already."
"And how will you answer it?"
Nora paused again before she replied. "As nearly as I know how to do
in such words as he would put into my mouth. I shall strive to write
just what I think he would wish me to write."
"Then you will engage yourself to him, Nora?"
"Certainly I shall. I am engaged to him already. I have been ever
since he came here."
"You told me that there was nothing of the kind."
"I told you that I loved him better than anybody in the world, and
that ought to have made you know what it must come to. When I am
thinking of him every day, and every hour, how can I not be glad to
have an engagement settled with him? I couldn't marry anybody else,
and I don't want to remain as I am." The tears came into the married
sister's eyes, and rolled down her cheeks, as this was said to her.
Would it not have been better for her had she remained as she was?
"Dear Emily," said Nora, "you have got Louey still."
"Yes;--and they mean to take him from me. But I do not wish to speak
of myself. Will you postpone your answer till mamma is here?"
"I cannot do that, Emily. What; receive such a letter as that, and
send no reply to it!"
"I would write a line for you, and explain--"
"No, indeed, Emily. I choose to answer my own letters. I have shewn
you that, because I trust you; but I have fully made up my mind as
to what I shall write. It will have been written and sent before
dinner."
"I think you will be wrong, Nora."
"Why wrong! When I came over here to stay with you, would mamma ever
have thought of directing me not to accept any offer till her consent
had been obtained all the way from the Mandarins? She would never
have dreamed of such a thing."
"Will you ask Aunt Mary?"
"Certainly not. What is Aunt Mary to me? We are here in her house for
a time, under the press of circumstances; but I owe her no obedience.
She told Mr. Stanbury not to come here; and he has not come; and I
shall not ask him to come. I would not willingly bring any one into
Uncle Oliphant's house that he and she do not wish to see. But I will
not admit that either of them have any authority over me."
"Then who has, dearest?"
"Nobody;--except papa and mamma; and they have chosen to leave me to
myself."
Mrs. Trevelyan found it impossible to shake her sister's firmness,
and could herself do nothing, except tell Mrs. Outhouse what was the
state of affairs. When she said that she should do this, there almost
came to be a flow of high words between the two sisters; but at last
Nora assented. "As for knowing, I don't care if all the world knows
it. I shall do nothing in a corner. I don't suppose Aunt Mary will
endeavour to prevent my posting my letter."
Emily at last went to seek Mrs. Outhouse, and Nora at once sat
down to her desk. Neither of the sisters felt at all sure that Mrs.
Outhouse would not attempt to stop the emission of the letter from
her house; but, as it happened, she was out, and did not return till
Nora had come back from her journey to the neighbouring post-office.
She would trust her letter, when written, to no hands but her
own; and as she herself dropped it into the safe custody of the
Postmaster-General, it also shall be revealed to the public:--
Parsonage, St. Diddulph's, January, 186--.
DEAR HUGH,
For I suppose I may as well write to you in that way now.
I have been made so happy by your affectionate letter. Is
not that a candid confession for a young lady? But you
tell me that I owe you the truth, and so I tell you the
truth. Nobody will ever be anything to me, except you; and
you are everything. I do love you; and should it ever be
possible, I will become your wife.
I have said so much, because I feel that I ought to obey
the order you have given me; but pray do not try to see me
or write to me till mamma has arrived. She and papa will
be here in the spring,--quite early in the spring, we
hope; and then you may come to us. What they may say, of
course, I cannot tell; but I shall be true to you.
Your own, with truest affection,
NORA.
Of course, you knew that I loved you, and I don't think
that you are a conjuror at all.
[Illustration: Nora's letter.]
As soon as ever the letter was written, she put on her bonnet, and
went forth with it herself to the post-office. Mrs. Trevelyan stopped
her on the stairs, and endeavoured to detain her, but Nora would not
be detained. "I must judge for myself about this," she said. "If
mamma were here, it would be different, but, as she is not here, I
must judge for myself."
What Mrs. Outhouse might have done had she been at home at the time,
it would be useless to surmise. She was told what had happened
when it occurred, and questioned Nora on the subject. "I thought I
understood from you," she said, with something of severity in her
countenance, "that there was to be nothing between you and Mr.
Stanbury--at any rate, till my brother came home?"
"I never pledged myself to anything of the kind, Aunt Mary," Nora
said. "I think he promised that he would not come here, and I don't
suppose that he means to come. If he should do so, I shall not see
him."
With this Mrs. Outhouse was obliged to be content. The letter was
gone, and could not be stopped. Nor, indeed, had any authority been
delegated to her by which she would have been justified in stopping
it. She could only join her husband in wishing that they both
might be relieved, as soon as possible, from the terrible burden
which had been thrown upon them. "I call it very hard," said Mr.
Outhouse;--"very hard, indeed. If we were to desire them to leave
the house, everybody would cry out upon us for our cruelty; and yet,
while they remain here, they will submit themselves to no authority.
As far as I can see, they may, both of them, do just what they
please, and we can't stop it."
CHAPTER LIV.
MR. GIBSON'S THREAT.
Miss Stanbury for a long time persisted in being neither better nor
worse. Sir Peter would not declare her state to be precarious, nor
would he say that she was out of danger; and Mr. Martin had been so
utterly prostrated by the nearly-fatal effects of his own mistake
that he was quite unable to rally himself and talk on the subject
with any spirit or confidence. When interrogated he would simply
reply that Sir Peter said this and Sir Peter said that, and thus
add to, rather than diminish, the doubt, and excitement, and varied
opinion which prevailed through the city. On one morning it was
absolutely asserted within the limits of the Close that Miss Stanbury
was dying,--and it was believed for half a day at the bank that she
was then lying in articulo mortis. There had got about, too, a report
that a portion of the property had only been left to Miss Stanbury
for her life, that the Burgesses would be able to reclaim the
houses in the city, and that a will had been made altogether in
favour of Dorothy, cutting out even Brooke from any share in the
inheritance;--and thus Exeter had a good deal to say respecting
the affairs and state of health of our old friend. Miss Stanbury's
illness, however, was true enough. She was much too ill to hear
anything of what was going on;--too ill to allow Martha to talk to
her at all about the outside public. When the invalid herself would
ask questions about the affairs of the world, Martha would be very
discreet and turn away from the subject. Miss Stanbury, for instance,
ill as she was, exhibited a most mundane interest, not exactly in
Camilla French's marriage, but in the delay which that marriage
seemed destined to encounter. "I dare say he'll slip out of it yet,"
said the sick lady to her confidential servant. Then Martha had
thought it right to change the subject, feeling it to be wrong
that an old lady on her death-bed should be taking joy in the
disappointment of her young neighbour. Martha changed the subject,
first to jelly, and then to the psalms of the day. Miss Stanbury
was too weak to resist; but the last verse of the last psalm of the
evening had hardly been finished before she remarked that she would
never believe it till she saw it. "It's all in the hands of Him as is
on high, mum," said Martha, turning her eyes up to the ceiling, and
closing the book at the same time, with a look strongly indicative of
displeasure.
Miss Stanbury understood it all as well as though she were in perfect
health. She knew her own failings, was conscious of her worldly
tendencies, and perceived that her old servant was thinking of it.
And then sundry odd thoughts, half-digested thoughts, ideas too
difficult for her present strength, crossed her brain. Had it been
wicked of her when she was well to hope that a scheming woman should
not succeed in betraying a man by her schemes into an ill-assorted
marriage; and if not wicked then, was it wicked now because she was
ill? And from that thought her mind travelled on to the ordinary
practices of death-bed piety. Could an assumed devotion be of use to
her now,--such a devotion as Martha was enjoining upon her from hour
to hour, in pure and affectionate solicitude for her soul? She had
spoken one evening of a game of cards, saying that a game of cribbage
would have consoled her. Then Martha, with a shudder, had suggested
a hymn, and had had recourse at once to a sleeping draught. Miss
Stanbury had submitted, but had understood it all. If cards were
wicked, she had indeed been a terrible sinner. What hope could there
be now, on her death-bed, for one so sinful? And she could not repent
of her cards, and would not try to repent of them, not seeing the
evil of them; and if they were innocent, why should she not have the
consolation now,--when she so much wanted it? Yet she knew that the
whole household, even Dorothy, would be in arms against her, were she
to suggest such a thing. She took the hymn and the sleeping draught,
telling herself that it would be best for her to banish such ideas
from her mind. Pastors and masters had laid down for her a mode of
living, which she had followed, but indifferently perhaps, but still
with an intention of obedience. They had also laid down a mode of
dying, and it would be well that she should follow that as closely
as possible. She would say nothing more about cards. She would
think nothing more of Camilla French. But, as she so resolved, with
intellect half asleep, with her mind wandering between fact and
dream, she was unconsciously comfortable with an assurance that if
Mr. Gibson did marry Camilla French, Camilla French would lead him
the very devil of a life.
During three days Dorothy went about the house as quiet as a mouse,
sitting nightly at her aunt's bedside, and tending the sick woman
with the closest care. She, too, had been now and again somewhat
startled by the seeming worldliness of her aunt in her illness. Her
aunt talked to her about rents, and gave her messages for Brooke
Burgess on subjects which seemed to Dorothy to be profane when spoken
of on what might perhaps be a death-bed. And this struck her the more
strongly, because she had a matter of her own on which she would have
much wished to ascertain her aunt's opinion, if she had not thought
that it would have been exceedingly wrong of her to trouble her
aunt's mind at such a time by any such matter. Hitherto she had said
not a word of Brooke's proposal to any living being. At present it
was a secret with herself, but a secret so big that it almost caused
her bosom to burst with the load that it bore. She could not, she
thought, write to Priscilla till she had told her aunt. If she were
to write a word on the subject to any one, she could not fail to make
manifest the extreme longing of her own heart. She could not have
written Brooke's name on paper, in reference to his words to herself,
without covering it with epithets of love. But all that must be known
to no one if her love was to be of no avail to her. And she had an
idea that her aunt would not wish Brooke to marry her,--would think
that Brooke should do better; and she was quite clear that in such a
matter as this her aunt's wishes must be law. Had not her aunt the
power of disinheriting Brooke altogether? And what then if her aunt
should die,--should die now,--leaving Brooke at liberty to do as he
pleased? There was something so distasteful to her in this view of
the matter that she would not look at it. She would not allow herself
to think of any success which might possibly accrue to herself by
reason of her aunt's death. Intense as was the longing in her heart
for permission from those in authority over her to give herself to
Brooke Burgess, perfect as was the earthly Paradise which appeared to
be open to her when she thought of the good thing which had befallen
her in that matter, she conceived that she would be guilty of the
grossest ingratitude were she in any degree to curtail even her own
estimate of her aunt's prohibitory powers because of her aunt's
illness. The remembrance of the words which Brooke had spoken to her
was with her quite perfect. She was entirely conscious of the joy
which would be hers, if she might accept those words as properly
sanctioned; but she was a creature in her aunt's hands,--according to
her own ideas of her own duties; and while her aunt was ill she could
not even learn what might be the behests which she would be called on
to obey.
She was sitting one evening alone, thinking of all this, having left
Martha with her aunt, and was trying to reconcile the circumstances
of her life as it now existed with the circumstances as they had been
with her in the old days at Nuncombe Putney, wondering at herself in
that she should have a lover, and trying to convince herself that for
her this little episode of romance could mean nothing serious, when
Martha crept down into the room to her. Of late days,--the alteration
might perhaps be dated from the rejection of Mr. Gibson,--Martha, who
had always been very kind, had become more respectful in her manner
to Dorothy than had heretofore been usual with her. Dorothy was quite
aware of it, and was not unconscious of a certain rise in the world
which was thereby indicated. "If you please, miss," said Martha, "who
do you think is here?"
"But there is nobody with my aunt?" said Dorothy.
"She is sleeping like a babby, and I came down just for a moment.
Mr. Gibson is here, miss,--in the house! He asked for your aunt, and
when, of course, he could not see her, he asked for you." Dorothy for
a few minutes was utterly disconcerted, but at last she consented to
see Mr. Gibson. "I think it is best," said Martha, "because it is bad
to be fighting, and missus so ill. 'Blessed are the peace-makers,'
miss, 'for they shall be called the children of God.'" Convinced by
this argument, or by the working of her own mind, Dorothy directed
that Mr. Gibson might be shewn into the room. When he came, she found
herself unable to address him. She remembered the last time in which
she had seen him, and was lost in wonder that he should be there. But
she shook hands with him, and went through some form of greeting in
which no word was uttered.
"I hope you will not think that I have done wrong," said he, "in
calling to ask after my old friend's state of health?"
"Oh dear, no," said Dorothy, quite bewildered.
"I have known her for so very long, Miss Dorothy, that now in the
hour of her distress, and perhaps mortal malady, I cannot stop to
remember the few harsh words that she spoke to me lately."
"She never means to be harsh, Mr. Gibson."
"Ah; well; no,--perhaps not. At any rate, I have learned to forgive
and forget. I am afraid your aunt is very ill, Miss Dorothy."
"She is ill, certainly, Mr. Gibson."
"Dear, dear! We are all as the grass of the field, Miss
Dorothy,--here to-day and gone to-morrow, as sparks fly upwards. Just
fit to be cut down and cast into the oven. Mr. Jennings has been with
her, I believe?" Mr. Jennings was the other minor canon.
"He comes three times a week, Mr. Gibson."
"He is an excellent young man,--a very good young man. It has been a
great comfort to me to have Jennings with me. But he's very young,
Miss Dorothy; isn't he?" Dorothy muttered something, purporting to
declare that she was not acquainted with the exact circumstances of
Mr. Jennings' age. "I should be so glad to come if my old friend
would allow me," said Mr. Gibson, almost with a sigh. Dorothy was
clearly of opinion that any change at the present would be bad for
her aunt, but she did not know how to express her opinion; so she
stood silent and looked at him. "There needn't be a word spoken, you
know, about the ladies at Heavitree," said Mr. Gibson.
"Oh dear, no," said Dorothy. And yet she knew well that there would
be such words spoken if Mr. Gibson were to make his way into her
aunt's room. Her aunt was constantly alluding to the ladies at
Heavitree, in spite of all the efforts of her old servant to restrain
her.
"There was some little misunderstanding," said Mr. Gibson; "but all
that should be over now. We both intended for the best, Miss Dorothy;
and I'm sure nobody here can say that I wasn't sincere." But Dorothy,
though she could not bring herself to answer Mr. Gibson plainly,
could not be induced to assent to his proposition. She muttered
something about her aunt's weakness, and the great attention which
Mr. Jennings shewed. Her aunt had become very fond of Mr. Jennings,
and she did at last express her opinion, with some clearness, that
her aunt should not be disturbed by any changes at present. "After
that I should not think of pressing it, Miss Dorothy," said Mr.
Gibson; "but, still, I do hope that I may have the privilege of
seeing her yet once again in the flesh. And touching my approaching
marriage, Miss Dorothy--" He paused, and Dorothy felt that she
was blushing up to the roots of her hair. "Touching my marriage,"
continued Mr. Gibson, "which however will not be solemnized till the
end of March;"--it was manifest that he regarded this as a point that
would in that household be regarded as an argument in his favour,--"I
do hope that you will look upon it in the most favourable light,--and
your excellent aunt also, if she be spared to us."
"I am sure we hope that you will be happy, Mr. Gibson."
"What was I to do, Miss Dorothy? I know that I have been very much
blamed;--but so unfairly! I have never meant to be untrue to a mouse,
Miss Dorothy." Dorothy did not at all understand whether she were the
mouse, or Camilla French, or Arabella. "And it is so hard to find
that one is ill-spoken of because things have gone a little amiss."
It was quite impossible that Dorothy should make any answer to this,
and at last Mr. Gibson left her, assuring her with his last word that
nothing would give him so much pleasure as to be called upon once
more to see his old friend in her last moments.
Though Miss Stanbury had been described as sleeping "like a babby,"
she had heard the footsteps of a strange man in the house, and had
made Martha tell her whose footsteps they were. As soon as Dorothy
went to her, she darted upon the subject with all her old keenness.
"What did he want here, Dolly?"
"He said he would like to see you, aunt,--when you are a little
better, you know. He spoke a good deal of his old friendship and
respect."
"He should have thought of that before. How am I to see people now?"
"But when you are better, aunt--?"
"How do I know that I shall ever be better? He isn't off with those
people at Heavitree,--is he?"
"I hope not, aunt."
"Psha! A poor, weak, insufficient creature;--that's what he is.
Mr. Jennings is worth twenty of him." Dorothy, though she put the
question again in its most alluring form of Christian charity and
forgiveness, could not induce her aunt to say that she would see
Mr. Gibson. "How can I see him, when you know that Sir Peter has
forbidden me to see anybody except Mrs. Clifford and Mr. Jennings?"
Two days afterwards there was an uncomfortable little scene at
Heavitree. It must, no doubt, have been the case, that the same train
of circumstances which had produced Mr. Gibson's visit to the Close,
produced also the scene in question. It was suggested by some who
were attending closely to the matter that Mr. Gibson had already come
to repent his engagement with Camilla French; and, indeed, there were
those who pretended to believe that he was induced, by the prospect
of Miss Stanbury's demise, to transfer his allegiance yet again, and
to bestow his hand upon Dorothy at last. There were many in the city
who could never be persuaded that Dorothy had refused him,--these
being, for the most part, ladies in whose estimation the value of a
husband was counted so great, and a beneficed clergyman so valuable
among suitors, that it was to their thinking impossible that Dorothy
Stanbury should in her sound senses have rejected such an offer. "I
don't believe a bit of it," said Mrs. Crumbie to Mrs. Apjohn; "is
it likely?" The ears of all the French family were keenly alive
to rumours, and to rumours of rumours. Reports of these opinions
respecting Mr. Gibson reached Heavitree, and had their effect.
As long as Mr. Gibson was behaving well as a suitor, they were
inoperative there. What did it matter to them how the prize might
have been struggled for,--might still be struggled for elsewhere,
while they enjoyed the consciousness of possession? But when the
consciousness of possession became marred by a cankerous doubt, such
rumours were very important. Camilla heard of the visit in the Close,
and swore that she would have justice done her. She gave her mother
to understand that, if any trick were played upon her, the diocese
should be made to ring of it, in a fashion that would astonish them
all, from the bishop downwards. Whereupon Mrs. French, putting much
faith in her daughter's threats, sent for Mr. Gibson.
"The truth is, Mr. Gibson," said Mrs. French, when the civilities of
their first greeting had been completed, "my poor child is pining."
"Pining, Mrs. French!"
"Yes;--pining, Mr. Gibson. I am afraid that you little understand
how sensitive is that young heart. Of course, she is your own now.
To her thinking, it would be treason to you for her to indulge in
conversation with any other gentleman; but, then, she expects that
you should spend your evenings with her,--of course!"
"But, Mrs. French,--think of my engagements, as a clergyman."
"We know all about that, Mr. Gibson. We know what a clergyman's calls
are. It isn't like a doctor's, Mr. Gibson."
"It's very often worse, Mrs. French."
"Why should you go calling in the Close, Mr. Gibson?" Here was the
gist of the accusation.
"Wouldn't you have me make my peace with a poor dying sister?"
pleaded Mr. Gibson.
"After what has occurred," said Mrs. French, shaking her head at him,
"and while things are just as they are now, it would be more like an
honest man of you to stay away. And, of course, Camilla feels it. She
feels it very much;--and she won't put up with it neither."
"I think this is the cruellest, cruellest thing I ever heard," said
Mr. Gibson.
"It is you that are cruel, sir."
Then the wretched man turned at bay. "I tell you what it is, Mrs.
French;--if I am treated in this way, I won't stand it. I won't,
indeed. I'll go away. I'm not going to be suspected, nor yet blown
up. I think I've behaved handsomely, at any rate to Camilla."
"Quite so, Mr. Gibson, if you would come and see her on evenings,"
said Mrs. French, who was falling back into her usual state of
timidity.
"But, if I'm to be treated in this way, I will go away. I've thought
of it as it is. I've been already invited to go to Natal, and if I
hear anything more of these accusations, I shall certainly make up
my mind to go." Then he left the house, before Camilla could be down
upon him from her perch on the landing-place.
CHAPTER LV.
THE REPUBLICAN BROWNING.
Mr. Glascock had returned to Naples after his sufferings in the
dining-room of the American Minister, and by the middle of February
was back again in Florence. His father was still alive, and it was
said that the old lord would now probably live through the winter.
And it was understood that Mr. Glascock would remain in Italy. He
had declared that he would pass his time between Naples, Rome, and
Florence; but it seemed to his friends that Florence was, of the
three, the most to his taste. He liked his room, he said, at the York
Hotel, and he liked being in the capital. That was his own statement.
His friends said that he liked being with Carry Spalding, the
daughter of the American Minister; but none of them, then in Italy,
were sufficiently intimate with him to express that opinion to
himself.
It had been expressed more than once to Carry Spalding. The world in
general says such things to ladies more openly than it does to men,
and the probability of a girl's success in matrimony is canvassed
in her hearing by those who are nearest to her with a freedom which
can seldom be used in regard to a man. A man's most intimate friend
hardly speaks to him of the prospect of his marriage till he himself
has told that the engagement exists. The lips of no living person had
suggested to Mr. Glascock that the American girl was to become his
wife; but a great deal had been said to Carry Spalding about the
conquest she had made. Her uncle, her aunt, her sister, and her great
friend Miss Petrie, the poetess,--the Republican Browning as she
was called,--had all spoken to her about it frequently. Olivia had
declared her conviction that the thing was to be. Miss Petrie had,
with considerable eloquence, explained to her friend that that
English title, which was but the clatter of a sounding brass, should
be regarded as a drawback rather than as an advantage. Mrs. Spalding,
who was no poetess, would undoubtedly have welcomed Mr. Glascock as
her niece's husband with all an aunt's energy. When told by Miss
Petrie that old Lord Peterborough was a tinkling cymbal she snapped
angrily at her gifted countrywoman. But she was too honest a woman,
and too conscious also of her niece's strength, to say a word to urge
her on. Mr. Spalding as an American minister, with full powers at the
court of a European sovereign, felt that he had full as much to give
as to receive; but he was well inclined to do both. He would have
been much pleased to talk about his nephew Lord Peterborough, and
he loved his niece dearly. But by the middle of February he was
beginning to think that the matter had been long enough in training.
If the Honourable Glascock meant anything, why did he not speak
out his mind plainly? The American Minister in such matters was
accustomed to fewer ambages than were common in the circles among
which Mr. Glascock had lived.
In the meantime Caroline Spalding was suffering. She had allowed
herself to think that Mr. Glascock intended to propose to her, and
had acknowledged to herself that were he to do so she would certainly
accept him. All that she had seen of him, since the day on which he
had been courteous to her about the seat in the diligence, had been
pleasant to her. She had felt the charm of his manner, his education,
and his gentleness; and had told herself that with all her love for
her own country, she would willingly become an Englishwoman for the
sake of being that man's wife. But nevertheless the warnings of her
great friend, the poetess, had not been thrown away upon her. She
would put away from herself as far as she could any desire to become
Lady Peterborough. There should be no bias in the man's favour on
that score. The tinkling cymbal and the sounding brass should be
nothing to her. But yet,--yet what a chance was there here for her?
"They are dishonest, and rotten at the core," said Miss Petrie,
trying to make her friend understand that a free American should
under no circumstances place trust in an English aristocrat. "Their
country, Carry, is a game played out, while we are still breasting
the hill with our young lungs full of air." Carry Spalding was proud
of her intimacy with the Republican Browning; but nevertheless she
liked Mr. Glascock; and when Mr. Glascock had been ten days in
Florence, on his third visit to the city, and had been four or five
times at the embassy without expressing his intentions in the proper
form, Carry Spalding began to think that she had better save herself
from a heartbreak while salvation might be within her reach. She
perceived that her uncle was gloomy and almost angry when he spoke of
Mr. Glascock, and that her aunt was fretful with disappointment. The
Republican Browning had uttered almost a note of triumph; and had it
not been that Olivia persisted, Carry Spalding would have consented
to go away with Miss Petrie to Rome. "The old stones are rotten too,"
said the poetess; "but their dust tells no lies." That well known
piece of hers--"Ancient Marbles, while ye crumble," was written at
this time, and contained an occult reference to Mr. Glascock and her
friend.
But Livy Spalding clung to the alliance. She probably knew her
sister's heart better than did the others; and perhaps also had a
clearer insight into Mr. Glascock's character. She was at any rate
clearly of opinion that there should be no running away. "Either you
do like him, or you don't. If you do, what are you to get by going to
Rome?" said Livy.
"I shall get quit of doubt and trouble."
"I call that cowardice. I would never run away from a man, Carry.
Aunt Sophie forgets that they don't manage these things in England
just as we do."
"I don't know why there should be a difference."
"Nor do I;--only that there is. You haven't read so many of their
novels as I have."
"Who would ever think of learning to live out of an English novel?"
said Carry.
"I am not saying that. You may teach him to live how you like
afterwards. But if you have anything to do with people it must be
well to know what their manners are. I think the richer sort of
people in England slide into these things more gradually than we do.
You stand your ground, Carry, and hold your own, and take the goods
the gods provide you." Though Caroline Spalding opposed her sister's
arguments, and was particularly hard upon that allusion to "the
richer sort of people,"--which, as she knew, Miss Petrie would have
regarded as evidence of reverence for sounding brasses and tinkling
cymbals,--nevertheless she loved Livy dearly for what she said, and
kissed the sweet counsellor, and resolved that she would for the
present decline the invitation of the poetess. Then was Miss Petrie
somewhat indignant with her friend, and threw out her scorn in those
lines which have been mentioned.
But the American Minister hardly knew how to behave himself when he
met Mr. Glascock, or even when he was called upon to speak of him.
Florence no doubt is a large city, and is now the capital of a great
kingdom; but still people meet in Florence much more frequently
than they do in Paris or in London. It may almost be said that they
whose habit it is to go into society, and whose circumstances bring
them into the same circles, will see each other every day. Now the
American Minister delighted to see and to be seen in all places
frequented by persons of a certain rank and position in Florence.
Having considered the matter much, he had convinced himself that
he could thus best do his duty as minister from the great Republic
of Free States to the newest and,--as he called it,--"the free-est
of the European kingdoms." The minister from France was a marquis;
he from England was an earl; from Spain had come a count,--and so
on. In the domestic privacy of his embassy Mr. Spalding would be
severe enough upon the sounding brasses and the tinkling cymbals,
and was quite content himself to be the Honourable Jonas G.
Spalding,--Honourable because selected by his country for a post of
honour; but he liked to be heard among the cymbals and seen among
the brasses, and to feel that his position was as high as theirs. Mr.
Glascock also was frequently in the same circles, and thus it came
to pass that the two gentlemen saw each other almost daily. That Mr.
Spalding knew well how to bear himself in his high place no one could
doubt; but he did not quite know how to carry himself before Mr.
Glascock. At home at Boston he would have been more completely master
of the situation.
He thought too that he began to perceive that Mr. Glascock avoided
him, though he would hear on his return home that that gentleman had
been at the embassy, or had been walking in the Cascine with his
nieces. That their young ladies should walk in public places with
unmarried gentlemen is nothing to American fathers and guardians.
American young ladies are accustomed to choose their own companions.
But the minister was tormented by his doubts as to the ways of
Englishmen, and as to the phase in which English habits might most
properly exhibit themselves in Italy. He knew that people were
talking about Mr. Glascock and his niece. Why then did Mr. Glascock
avoid him? It was perhaps natural that Mr. Spalding should have
omitted to observe that Mr. Glascock was not delighted by those
lectures on the American constitution which formed so large a part of
his ordinary conversation with Englishmen.
It happened one afternoon that they were thrown together so closely
for nearly an hour that neither could avoid the other. They were both
at the old palace in which the Italian parliament is held, and were
kept waiting during some long delay in the ceremonies of the place.
They were seated next to each other, and during such delay there was
nothing for them but to talk. On the other side of each of them was a
stranger, and not to talk in such circumstances would be to quarrel.
Mr. Glascock began by asking after the ladies.
"They are quite well, sir, thank you," said the minister. "I hope
that Lord Peterborough was pretty well when last you heard from
Naples, Mr. Glascock." Mr. Glascock explained that his father's
condition was not much altered, and then there was silence for a
moment.
"Your nieces will remain with you through the spring I suppose?" said
Mr. Glascock.
"Such is their intention, sir."
"They seem to like Florence, I think."
"Yes;--yes; I think they do like Florence. They see this capital,
sir, perhaps under more favourable circumstances than are accorded
to most of my countrywomen. Our republican simplicity, Mr. Glascock,
has this drawback, that away from home it subjects us somewhat to the
cold shade of unobserved obscurity. That it possesses merits which
much more than compensate for this trifling evil I should be the last
man in Europe to deny." It is to be observed that American citizens
are always prone to talk of Europe. It affords the best counterpoise
they know to that other term, America,--and America and the United
States are of course the same. To speak of France or of England as
weighing equally against their own country seems to an American to be
an absurdity,--and almost an insult to himself. With Europe he can
compare himself, but even this is done generally in the style of the
Republican Browning when she addressed the Ancient Marbles.
"Undoubtedly," said Mr. Glascock, "the family of a minister
abroad has great advantages in seeing the country to which he is
accredited."
"That is my meaning, sir. But, as I was remarking, we carry with us
as a people no external symbols of our standing at home. The wives
and daughters, sir, of the most honoured of our citizens have no
nomenclature different from that which belongs to the least noted
among us. It is perhaps a consequence of this that Europeans who are
accustomed in their social intercourse to the assistance of titles,
will not always trouble themselves to inquire who and what are the
American citizens who may sit opposite to them at table. I have
known, Mr. Glascock, the wife and daughter of a gentleman who has
been thrice sent as senator from his native State to Washington,
to remain as disregarded in the intercourse of a European city, as
though they had formed part of the family of some grocer from your
Russell Square!"
"Let the Miss Spaldings go where they will," said Mr. Glascock, "they
will not fare in that way."
"The Miss Spaldings, sir, are very much obliged to you," said the
minister with a bow.
"I regard it as one of the luckiest chances of my life that I was
thrown in with them at St. Michael as I was," said Mr. Glascock with
something like warmth.
"I am sure, sir, they will never forget the courtesy displayed by you
on that occasion," said the minister bowing again.
"That was a matter of course. I and my friend would have done the
same for the grocer's wife and daughter of whom you spoke. Little
services such as that do not come from appreciation of merit, but are
simply the payment of the debt due by all men to all women."
"Such is certainly the rule of living in our country, sir," said Mr.
Spalding.
"The chances are," continued the Englishman, "that no further
observation follows the payment of such a debt. It has been a thing
of course."
"We delight to think it so, Mr. Glascock, in our own cities."
"But in this instance it has given rise to one of the pleasantest,
and as I hope most enduring friendships that I have ever formed,"
said Mr. Glascock with enthusiasm. What could the American Minister
do but bow again three times? And what other meaning could he attach
to such words than that which so many of his friends had been
attributing to Mr. Glascock for some weeks past? It had occurred to
Mr. Spalding, even since he had been sitting in his present close
proximity to Mr. Glascock, that it might possibly be his duty as an
uncle having to deal with an Englishman, to ask that gentleman what
were his intentions. He would do his duty let it be what it might;
but the asking of such a question would be very disagreeable to him.
For the present he satisfied himself with inviting his neighbour to
come and drink tea with Mrs. Spalding on the next evening but one.
"The girls will be delighted, I am sure," said he, thinking himself
to be justified in this friendly familiarity by Mr. Glascock's
enthusiasm. For Mr. Spalding was clearly of opinion that, let the
value of republican simplicity be what it might, an alliance with the
crumbling marbles of Europe would in his niece's circumstances be not
inexpedient. Mr. Glascock accepted the invitation with alacrity, and
the minister when he was closeted with his wife that evening declared
his opinion that after all the Britisher meant fighting. The aunt
told the girls that Mr. Glascock was coming, and in order that it
might not seem that a net was being specially spread for him, others
were invited to join the party. Miss Petrie consented to be there,
and the Italian, Count Buonarosci, to whose presence, though she
could not speak to him, Mrs. Spalding was becoming accustomed. It
was painful to her to feel that she could not communicate with those
around her, and for that reason she would have avoided Italians. But
she had an idea that she could not thoroughly realise the advantages
of foreign travel unless she lived with foreigners; and, therefore,
she was glad to become intimate at any rate with the outside of Count
Buonarosci.
"I think your uncle is wrong, dear," said Miss Petrie early in the
day to her friend.
"But why? He has done nothing more than what is just civil."
"If Mr. Glascock kept a store in Broadway he would not have thought
it necessary to shew the same civility."
"Yes;--if we all liked the Mr. Glascock who kept the store."
"Caroline," said the poetess with severe eloquence, "can you put your
hand upon your heart and say that this inherited title, this tinkling
cymbal as I call it, has no attraction for you or yours? Is it the
unadorned simple man that you welcome to your bosom, or a thing of
stars and garters, a patch of parchment, the minion of a throne,
the lordling of twenty descents, in which each has been weaker than
that before it, the hero of a scutcheon, whose glory is in his
quarterings, and whose worldly wealth comes from the sweat of serfs
whom the euphonism of an effete country has learned to decorate with
the name of tenants?"
But Caroline Spalding had a spirit of her own, and had already made
up her mind that she would not be talked down by Miss Petrie. "Uncle
Jonas," said she, "asks him because we like him; and would do so
too if he kept the store in Broadway. But if he did keep the store
perhaps we should not like him."
"I trow not," said Miss Petrie.
Livy was much more comfortable in her tactics, and without consulting
anybody sent for a hairdresser. "It's all very well for Wallachia,"
said Livy,--Miss Petrie's name was Wallachia,--"but I know a nice
sort of man when I see him, and the ways of the world are not to be
altered because Wally writes poetry."
When Mr. Glascock was announced Mrs. Spalding's handsome rooms were
almost filled, as rooms in Florence are filled,--obstruction in every
avenue, a crowd in every corner, and a block at every doorway, not
being among the customs of the place. Mr. Spalding immediately caught
him,--intercepting him between the passages and the ladies,--and
engaged him at once in conversation.
"Your John S. Mill is a great man," said the minister.
"They tell me so," said Mr. Glascock. "I don't read what he writes
myself."
This acknowledgment seemed to the minister to be almost disgraceful,
and yet he himself had never read a word of Mr. Mill's writings.
"He is a far-seeing man," continued the minister. "He is one of
the few Europeans who can look forward, and see how the rivers of
civilization are running on. He has understood that women must at
last be put upon an equality with men."
"Can he manage that men shall have half the babies?" said Mr.
Glascock, thinking to escape by an attempt at playfulness.
But the minister was down upon him at once,--had him by the lappet
of his coat, though he knew how important it was for his dear niece
that he should allow Mr. Glascock to amuse himself this evening after
another fashion. "I have an answer ready, sir, for that difficulty,"
he said. "Step aside with me for a moment. The question is important,
and I should be glad if you would communicate my ideas to your great
philosopher. Nature, sir, has laid down certain laws, which are
immutable; and, against them,--"
But Mr. Glascock had not come to Florence for this. There were
circumstances in his present position which made him feel that he
would be gratified in escaping, even at the cost of some seeming
incivility. "I must go in to the ladies at once," he said, "or I
shall never get a word with them." There came across the minister's
brow a momentary frown of displeasure, as though he felt that he were
being robbed of that which was justly his own. For an instant his
grasp fixed itself more tightly to the coat. It was quite within
the scope of his courage to hold a struggling listener by physical
strength;--but he remembered that there was a purpose, and he relaxed
his hold.
"I will take another opportunity," said the minister. "As you have
raised that somewhat trite objection of the bearing of children,
which we in our country, sir, have altogether got over, I must put
you in possession of my views on that subject; but I will find
another occasion." Then Mr. Glascock began to reflect whether an
American lady, married in England, would probably want to see much of
her uncle in her adopted country.
Mrs. Spalding was all smiles when her guest reached her. "We did not
mean to have such a crowd of people," she said, whispering; "but you
know how one thing leads to another, and people here really like
short invitations." Then the minister's wife bowed very low to an
Italian lady, and for the moment wished herself in Beacon Street. It
was a great trouble to her that she could not pluck up courage to
speak a word in Italian. "I know more about it than some that are
glib enough," she would say to her niece Livy, "but these Tuscans are
so particular with their Bocca Toscana."
It was almost spiteful on the part of Miss Petrie,--the manner in
which, on this evening, she remained close to her friend Caroline
Spalding. It is hardly possible to believe that it came altogether
from high principle,--from a determination to save her friend from
an impending danger. One's friend has no right to decide for one
what is, and what is not dangerous. Mr. Glascock after awhile found
himself seated on a fixed couch, that ran along the wall, between
Carry Spalding and Miss Petrie; but Miss Petrie was almost as bad
to him as had been the minister himself. "I am afraid," she said,
looking up into his face with some severity, and rushing upon her
subject with audacity, "that the works of your Browning have not
been received in your country with that veneration to which they are
entitled."
"Do you mean Mr. or Mrs. Browning?" asked Mr. Glascock,--perhaps with
some mistaken idea that the lady was out of her depth, and did not
know the difference.
"Either;--both; for they are one, the same, and indivisible. The
spirit and germ of each is so reflected in the outcome of the other,
that one sees only the result of so perfect a combination, and one
is tempted to acknowledge that here and there a marriage may have
been arranged in Heaven. I don't think that in your country you have
perceived this, Mr. Glascock."
"I am not quite sure that we have," said Mr. Glascock.
"Yours is not altogether an inglorious mission," continued Miss
Petrie.
"I've got no mission," said Mr. Glascock,--"either from the Foreign
Office, or from my own inner convictions."
Miss Petrie laughed with a scornful laugh. "I spoke, sir, of the
mission of that small speck on the earth's broad surface, of which
you think so much, and which we call Great Britain."
"I do think a good deal of it," said Mr. Glascock.
"It has been more thought of than any other speck of the same size,"
said Carry Spalding.
"True," said Miss Petrie, sharply;--"because of its iron and coal.
But the mission I spoke of was this." And she put forth her hand with
an artistic motion as she spoke. "It utters prophecies, though it
cannot read them. It sends forth truth, though it cannot understand
it. Though its own ears are deaf as adders', it is the nursery of
poets, who sing not for their own countrymen, but for the higher
sensibilities and newer intelligences of lands, in which philanthropy
has made education as common as the air that is breathed."
"Wally," said Olivia, coming up to the poetess, in anger that was
almost apparent, "I want to take you, and introduce you to the
Marchesa Pulti."
But Miss Petrie no doubt knew that the eldest son of an English lord
was at least as good as an Italian marchesa. "Let her come here,"
said the poetess, with her grandest smile.
CHAPTER LVI.
WITHERED GRASS.
[Illustration]
When Caroline Spalding perceived how direct an attempt had been made
by her sister to take the poetess away, in order that she might
thus be left alone with Mr. Glascock, her spirit revolted against
the manoeuvre, and she took herself away amidst the crowd. If Mr.
Glascock should wish to find her again he could do so. And there came
across her mind something of a half-formed idea that, perhaps after
all her friend Wallachia was right. Were this man ready to take her
and she ready to be taken, would such an arrangement be a happy one
for both of them? His high-born, wealthy friends might very probably
despise her, and it was quite possible that she also might despise
them. To be Lady Peterborough, and have the spending of a large
fortune, would not suffice for her happiness. She was sure of that.
It would be a leap in the dark, and all such leaps must needs be
dangerous, and therefore should be avoided. But she did like the man.
Her friend was untrue to her and cruel in those allusions to tinkling
cymbals. It might be well for her to get over her liking, and to
think no more of one who was to her a foreigner and a stranger,--of
whose ways of living in his own home she knew so little, whose people
might be antipathetic to her, enemies instead of friends, among whom
her life would be one long misery; but it was not on that ground
that Miss Petrie had recommended her to start for Rome as soon as
Mr. Glascock had reached Florence. "There is no reason," she said to
herself, "why I should not marry a man if I like him, even though
he be a lord. And of him I should not be the least afraid. It's the
women that I fear." And then she called to mind all that she had ever
heard of English countesses and duchesses. She thought that she knew
that they were generally cold and proud, and very little given to
receive outsiders graciously within their ranks. Mr. Glascock had
an aunt who was a Duchess, and a sister who would be a Countess.
Caroline Spalding felt how her back would rise against these new
relations, if it should come to pass that they should look unkindly
upon her when she was taken to her own home;--how she would fight
with them, giving them scorn for scorn; how unutterably miserable
she would be; how she would long to be back among her own equals, in
spite even of her love for her husband. "How grand a thing it is,"
she said, "to be equal with those whom you love!" And yet she was to
some extent allured by the social position of the man. She could
perceive that he had a charm of manner which her countrymen lacked.
He had read, perhaps, less than her uncle;--knew, perhaps, less than
most of those men with whom she had been wont to associate in her
own city life at home;--was not braver, or more virtuous, or more
self-denying than they; but there was a softness and an ease in
his manner which was palatable to her, and an absence of that too
visible effort of the intellect which is so apt to mark and mar
the conversation of Americans. She almost wished that she had been
English, in order that the man's home and friends might have suited
her. She was thinking of all this as she stood pretending to talk to
an American lady, who was very eloquent on the delights of Florence.
In the meantime Olivia and Mr. Glascock had moved away together, and
Miss Petrie was left alone. This was no injury to Miss Petrie, as her
mind at once set itself to work on a sonnet touching the frivolity
of modern social gatherings; and when she complained afterwards to
Caroline that it was the curse of their mode of life that no moment
could be allowed for thought,--in which she referred specially to a
few words that Mr. Gore had addressed to her at this moment of her
meditations,--she was not wilfully a hypocrite. She was painfully
turning her second set of rhymes, and really believed that she had
been subjected to a hardship. In the meantime Olivia and Mr. Glascock
were discussing her at a distance.
"You were being put through your facings, Mr. Glascock," Olivia had
said.
"Well; yes; and your dear friend, Miss Petrie, is rather a stern
examiner."
"She is Carry's ally, not mine," said Olivia. Then she remembered
that by saying this she might be doing her sister an injury. Mr.
Glascock might object to such a bosom friend for his wife. "That is
to say, of course we are all intimate with her, but just at this
moment Carry is most in favour."
"She is very clever, I am quite sure," said he.
"Oh yes;--she's a genius. You must not doubt that on the peril of
making every American in Italy your enemy."
"She is a poet,--is she not?"
"Mr. Glascock!"
"Have I said anything wrong?" he asked.
"Do you mean to look me in the face and tell me that you are not
acquainted with her works,--that you don't know pages of them by
heart, that you don't sleep with them under your pillow, don't travel
about with them in your dressing-bag? I'm afraid we have mistaken
you, Mr. Glascock."
"Is it so great a sin?"
"If you'll own up honestly, I'll tell you something,--in a whisper.
You have not read a word of her poems?"
"Not a word."
"Neither have I. Isn't it horrible? But, perhaps, if I heard Tennyson
talking every day, I shouldn't read Tennyson. Familiarity does breed
contempt;--doesn't it? And then poor dear Wallachia is such a bore. I
sometimes wonder, when English people are listening to her, whether
they think that American girls generally talk like that."
"Not all, perhaps, with that perfected eloquence."
"I dare say you do," continued Olivia, craftily. "That is just the
way in which people form their opinions about foreigners. Some
specially self-asserting American speaks his mind louder than other
people, and then you say that all Americans are self-asserting."
"But you are a little that way given, Miss Spalding."
"Because we are always called upon to answer accusations against
us, expressed or unexpressed. We don't think ourselves a bit better
than you; or, if the truth were known, half as good. We are always
struggling to be as polished and easy as the French, or as sensible
and dignified as the English; but when our defects are thrown in our
teeth--"
"Who throws them in your teeth, Miss Spalding?"
"You look it,--all of you,--if you do not speak it out. You do assume
a superiority, Mr. Glascock; and that we cannot endure."
"I do not feel that I assume anything," said Mr. Glascock, meekly.
"If three gentlemen be together, an Englishman, a Frenchman, and an
American, is not the American obliged to be on his mettle to prove
that he is somebody among the three? I admit that he is always
claiming to be the first; but he does so only that he may not be too
evidently the last. If you knew us, Mr. Glascock, you would find us
to be very mild, and humble and nice, and good, and clever, and kind,
and charitable, and beautiful,--in short, the finest people that have
as yet been created on the broad face of God's smiling earth." These
last words she pronounced with a nasal twang, and in a tone of voice
which almost seemed to him to be a direct mimicry of the American
Minister. The upshot of the conversation, however, was that the
disgust against Americans which, to a certain degree, had been
excited in Mr. Glascock's mind by the united efforts of Mr. Spalding
and the poetess, had been almost entirely dispelled. From all of
which the reader ought to understand that Miss Olivia Spalding was a
very clever young woman.
But nevertheless Mr. Glascock had not quite made up his mind to ask
the elder sister to be his wife. He was one of those men to whom
love-making does not come very easy, although he was never so much at
his ease as when he was in company with ladies. He was sorely in want
of a wife, but he was aware that at different periods during the last
fifteen years he had been angled for as a fish. Mothers in England
had tried to catch him, and of such mothers he had come to have the
strongest possible detestation. He had seen the hooks,--or perhaps
had fancied that he saw them when they were not there. Lady Janes and
Lady Sarahs had been hard upon him, till he learned to buckle himself
into triple armour when he went amongst them, and yet he wanted
a wife;--no man more sorely wanted one. The reader will perhaps
remember how he went down to Nuncombe Putney in quest of a wife, but
all in vain. The lady in that case had been so explicit with him that
he could not hope for a more favourable answer; and, indeed, he would
not have cared to marry a girl who had told him that she preferred
another man to himself, even if it had been possible for him to do
so. Now he had met a lady very different from those with whom he had
hitherto associated,--but not the less manifestly a lady. Caroline
Spalding was bright, pleasant, attractive, very easy to talk to, and
yet quite able to hold her own. But the American Minister was--a
bore; and Miss Petrie was--unbearable. He had often told himself that
in this matter of marrying a wife he would please himself altogether,
that he would allow himself to be tied down by no consideration of
family pride,--that he would consult nothing but his own heart and
feelings. As for rank, he could give that to his wife. As for money,
he had plenty of that also. He wanted a woman that was not blasée
with the world, that was not a fool, and who would respect him. The
more he thought of it, the more sure he was that he had seen none who
pleased him so well as Caroline Spalding; and yet he was a little
afraid of taking a step that would be irrevocable. Perhaps the
American Minister might express a wish to end his days at Monkhams,
and might think it desirable to have Miss Petrie always with him as a
private secretary in poetry!
"Between you and us, Mr. Glascock, the spark of sympathy does not
pass with a strong flash," said a voice in his ear. As he turned
round rapidly to face his foe, he was quite sure, for the moment,
that under no possible circumstances would he ever take an American
woman to his bosom as his wife.
"No," said he; "no, no. I rather think that I agree with you."
"The antipathy is one," continued Miss Petrie, "which has been
common on the face of the earth since the clown first trod upon the
courtier's heels. It is the instinct of fallen man to hate equality,
to desire ascendancy, to crush, to oppress, to tyrannise, to
enslave. Then, when the slave is at last free, and in his freedom
demands--equality, man is not great enough to take his enfranchised
brother to his bosom."
"You mean negroes," said Mr. Glascock, looking round and planning for
himself a mode of escape.
"Not negroes only,--not the enslaved blacks, who are now enslaved no
more,--but the rising nations of white men wherever they are to be
seen. You English have no sympathy with a people who claim to be at
least your equals. The clown has trod upon the courtier's heels till
the clown is clown no longer, and the courtier has hardly a court in
which he may dangle his sword-knot."
"If so the clown might as well spare the courtier," not meaning the
rebuke which his words implied.
"Ah--h,--but the clown will not spare the courtier, Mr. Glascock. I
understand the gibe, and I tell you that the courtier shall be spared
no longer;--because he is useless. He shall be cut down together with
the withered grasses and thrown into the oven, and there shall be an
end of him." Then she turned round to appeal to an American gentleman
who had joined them, and Mr. Glascock made his escape. "I hold it to
be the holiest duty which I owe to my country never to spare one of
them when I meet him."
"They are all very well in their way," said the American gentleman.
"Down with them, down with them!" exclaimed the poetess, with a
beautiful enthusiasm. In the meantime Mr. Glascock had made up his
mind that he could not dare to ask Caroline Spalding to be his wife.
There were certain forms of the American female so dreadful that no
wise man would wilfully come in contact with them. Miss Petrie's
ferocity was distressing to him, but her eloquence and enthusiasm
were worse even than her ferocity. The personal incivility of which
she had been guilty in calling him a withered grass was distasteful
to him, as being opposed to his ideas of the customs of society; but
what would be his fate if his wife's chosen friend should be for ever
dinning her denunciation of withered grasses into his ear?
He was still thinking of all this when he was accosted by Mrs.
Spalding. "Are you going to dear Lady Banbury's to-morrow?" she
asked. Lady Banbury was the wife of the English Minister.
"I suppose I shall be there in the course of the evening."
"How very nice she is; is she not? I do like Lady Banbury;--so soft,
and gentle, and kind."
"One of the pleasantest old ladies I know," said Mr. Glascock.
"It does not strike you so much as it does me," said Mrs. Spalding,
with one of her sweetest smiles. "The truth is, we all value what
we have not got. There are no Lady Banburys in our country, and
therefore we think the more of them when we meet them here. She is
talking of going to Rome for the Carnival, and has asked Caroline
to go with her. I am so pleased to find that my dear girl is such a
favourite."
Mr. Glascock immediately told himself that he saw the hook. If he
were to be fished for by this American aunt as he had been fished
for by English mothers, all his pleasure in the society of Caroline
Spalding would be at once over. It would be too much, indeed, if
in this American household he were to find the old vices of an
aristocracy superadded to young republican sins! Nevertheless Lady
Banbury was, as he knew well, a person whose opinion about young
people was supposed to be very good. She noticed those only who were
worthy of notice; and to have been taken by the hand by Lady Banbury
was acknowledged to be a passport into good society. If Caroline
Spalding was in truth going to Rome with Lady Banbury, that fact
was in itself a great confirmation of Mr. Glascock's good opinion
of her. Mrs. Spalding had perhaps understood this; but had not
understood that having just hinted that it was so, she should have
abstained from saying a word more about her dear girl. Clever and
well-practised must, indeed, be the hand of the fisherwoman in
matrimonial waters who is able to throw her fly without showing
any glimpse of the hook to the fish for whom she angles. Poor Mrs.
Spalding, though with kindly instincts towards her niece she did on
this occasion make some slight attempt at angling, was innocent of
any concerted plan. It seemed to her to be so natural to say a good
word in praise of her niece to the man whom she believed to be in
love with her niece.
Caroline and Mr. Glascock did not meet each other again till late in
the evening, and just as he was about to take his leave. As they came
together each of them involuntarily looked round to see whether Miss
Petrie was near. Had she been there nothing would have been said
beyond the shortest farewell greeting. But Miss Petrie was afar
off, electrifying some Italian by the vehemence of her sentiments,
and the audacious volubility of a language in which all arbitrary
restrictions were ignored. "Are you going?" she asked.
"Well;--I believe I am. Since I saw you last I've encountered Miss
Petrie again, and I'm rather depressed."
"Ah;--you don't know her. If you did you wouldn't laugh at her."
"Laugh at her! Indeed I do not do that; but when I'm told that I'm to
be thrown into the oven and burned because I'm such a worn-out old
institution--"
"You don't mean to say that you mind that!"
"Not much, when it comes up in the ordinary course of conversation;
but it palls upon one when it is asserted for the fourth or fifth
time in an evening."
"Alas, alas!" exclaimed Miss Spalding, with mock energy.
"And why, alas?"
"Because it is so impossible to make the oil and vinegar of the old
world and of the new mix together and suit each other."
"You think it is impossible, Miss Spalding?"
"I fear so. We are so terribly tender, and you are always pinching us
on our most tender spot. And we never meet you without treading on
your gouty toes."
"I don't think my toes are gouty," said he.
"I apologise to your own, individually, Mr. Glascock; but I must
assert that nationally you are subject to the gout."
"That is, when I'm told over and over again that I'm to be cut down
and thrown into the oven--"
"Never mind the oven now, Mr. Glascock. If my friend has been
over-zealous I will beg pardon for her. But it does seem to me,
indeed it does, with all the reverence and partiality I have
for everything European,"--the word European was an offence to
him, and he shewed that it was so by his countenance,--"that the
idiosyncrasies of you and of us are so radically different, that
we cannot be made to amalgamate and sympathise with each other
thoroughly."
He paused for some seconds before he answered her, but it was so
evident by his manner that he was going to speak, that she could
neither leave him nor interrupt him. "I had thought that it might
have been otherwise," he said at last, and the tone of his voice was
so changed as to make her know that he was in earnest.
But she did not change her voice by a single note. "I'm afraid it
cannot be so," she said, speaking after her old fashion--half in
earnest, half in banter. "We may make up our minds to be very civil
to each other when we meet. The threats of the oven may no doubt be
dropped on our side, and you may abstain from expressing in words
your sense of our inferiority."
"I never expressed anything of the kind," he said, quite in anger.
"I am taking you simply as the sample Englishman, not as Mr.
Glascock, who helped me and my sister over the mountains. Such of
us as have to meet in society may agree to be very courteous; but
courtesy and cordiality are not only not the same, but they are
incompatible."
"Why so?"
"Courtesy is an effort, and cordiality is free. I must be allowed
to contradict the friend that I love; but I assent,--too often
falsely,--to what is said to me by a passing acquaintance. In spite
of what the Scripture says, I think it is one of the greatest
privileges of a brother that he may call his brother a fool."
"Shall you desire to call your husband a fool?"
"My husband!"
"He will, I suppose, be at least as dear to you as a brother?"
"I never had a brother."
"Your sister, then! It is the same, I suppose?"
"If I were to have a husband, I hope he would be the dearest to me
of all. Unless he were so, he certainly would not be my husband. But
between a man and his wife there does not spring up that playful,
violent intimacy admitting of all liberties, which comes from early
nursery associations; and then, there is the difference of sex."
"I should not like my wife to call me a fool," he said.
"I hope she may never have occasion to do so, Mr. Glascock. Marry an
English wife in your own class,--as, of course, you will,--and then
you will be safe."
"But I have set my heart fast on marrying an American wife," he said.
"Then I can't tell what may befall you. It's like enough, if you do
that, that you may be called by some name you will think hard to
bear. But you'll think better of it. Like should pair with like, Mr.
Glascock. If you were to marry one of our young women, you would lose
in dignity as much as she would lose in comfort." Then they parted,
and she went off to say farewell to other guests. The manner in which
she had answered what he had said to her had certainly been of a
nature to stop any further speech of the same kind. Had she been
gentle with him, then he would certainly have told her that she was
the American woman whom he desired to take with him to his home in
England.
CHAPTER LVII.
DOROTHY'S FATE.
Towards the end of February Sir Peter Mancrudy declared Miss Stanbury
to be out of danger, and Mr. Martin began to be sprightly on the
subject, taking to himself no inconsiderable share of the praise
accruing to the medical faculty in Exeter generally for the saving of
a life so valuable to the city. "Yes, Mr. Burgess," Sir Peter said
to old Barty of the bank, "our friend will get over it this time,
and without any serious damage to her constitution, if she will only
take care of herself." Barty made some inaudible grunt, intended
to indicate his own indifference on the subject, and expressed his
opinion to the chief clerk that old Jemima Wideawake,--as he was
pleased to call her,--was one of those tough customers who would
never die. "It would be nothing to us, Mr. Barty, one way or the
other," said the clerk; to which Barty Burgess assented with another
grunt.
Camilla French declared that she was delighted to hear the news. At
this time there had been some sort of a reconciliation between her
and her lover. Mrs. French had extracted from him a promise that he
would not go to Natal; and Camilla had commenced the preparations for
her wedding. His visits to Heavitree were as few and far between as
he could make them with any regard to decency; but the 31st of March
was coming on quickly, and as he was to be made a possession of them
for ever, it was considered to be safe and well to allow him some
liberty in his present condition. "My dear, if they are driven, there
is no knowing what they won't do," Mrs. French said to her daughter.
Camilla had submitted with compressed lips and a slight nod of her
head. She had worked very hard, but her day of reward was coming. It
was impossible not to perceive,--both for her and her mother,--that
the scantiness of Mr. Gibson's attention to his future bride was
cause of some weak triumph to Arabella. She said that it was very odd
that he did not come,--and once added with a little sigh that he used
to come in former days, alluding to those happy days in which another
love was paramount. Camilla could not endure this with an equal mind.
"Bella, dear," she said, "we know what all that means. He has made
his choice, and if I am satisfied with what he does now, surely you
need not grumble." Miss Stanbury's illness had undoubtedly been a
great source of contentment to the family at Heavitree, as they had
all been able to argue that her impending demise was the natural
consequence of her great sin in the matter of Dorothy's proposed
marriage. When, however, they heard from Mr. Martin that she would
certainly recover, that Sir Peter's edict to that effect had gone
forth, they were willing to acknowledge that Providence, having so
far punished the sinner, was right in staying its hand and abstaining
from the final blow. "I'm sure we are delighted," said Mrs. French,
"for though she has said cruel things of us,--and so untrue too,--yet
of course it is our duty to forgive her. And we do forgive her."
Dorothy had written three or four notes to Brooke since his
departure, which contained simple bulletins of her aunt's health.
She always began her letters with "My dear Mr. Burgess," and ended
them with "yours truly." She never made any allusion to Brooke's
declaration of love, or gave the slightest sign in her letters to
shew that she even remembered it. At last she wrote to say that her
aunt was convalescent; and, in making this announcement, she allowed
herself some enthusiasm of expression. She was so happy, and was so
sure that Mr. Burgess would be equally so! And her aunt had asked
after her "dear Brooke," expressing her great satisfaction with
him, in that he had come down to see her when she had been almost
too ill to see any one. In answer to this there came to her a real
love-letter from Brooke Burgess. It was the first occasion on
which he had written to her. The little bulletins had demanded no
replies, and had received none. Perhaps there had been a shade of
disappointment on Dorothy's side, in that she had written thrice, and
had been made rich with no word in return. But, although her heart
had palpitated on hearing the postman's knock, and had palpitated in
vain, she had told herself that it was all as it should be. She wrote
to him, because she possessed information which it was necessary that
she should communicate. He did not write to her, because there was
nothing for him to tell. Then had come the love-letter, and in the
love-letter there was an imperative demand for a reply.
What was she to do? To have recourse to Priscilla for advice was
her first idea; but she herself believed that she owed a debt
of gratitude to her aunt, which Priscilla would not take into
account,--the existence of which Priscilla would by no means
admit. She knew Priscilla's mind in this matter, and was sure that
Priscilla's advice, whatever it might be, would be given without any
regard to her aunt's views. And then Dorothy was altogether ignorant
of her aunt's views. Her aunt had been very anxious that she should
marry Mr. Gibson, but had clearly never admitted into her mind the
idea that she might possibly marry Brooke Burgess; and it seemed to
her that she herself would be dishonest, both to her aunt and to her
lover, if she were to bind this man to herself without her aunt's
knowledge. He was to be her aunt's heir, and she was maintained by
her aunt's liberality! Thinking of all this, she at last resolved
that she would take the bull by the horns, and tell her aunt. She
felt that the task would be one almost beyond her strength. Thrice
she went into her aunt's room, intending to make a clean breast.
Thrice her courage failed her, and she left the room with her tale
untold, excusing herself on various pretexts. Her aunt had seemed to
be not quite so well, or had declared herself to be tired, or had
been a little cross;--or else Martha had come in at the nick of time.
But there was Brooke Burgess's letter unanswered,--a letter that was
read night and morning, and which was never for an instant out of her
mind. He had demanded a reply, and he had a right at least to that.
The letter had been with her for four entire days before she had
ventured to speak to her aunt on the subject.
On the first of March Miss Stanbury came out of her bed-room for the
first time. Dorothy, on the previous day, had decided on postponing
her communication for this occasion; but, when she found herself
sitting in the little sitting-room up-stairs close at her aunt's
elbow, and perceived the signs of weakness which the new move had
made conspicuous, and heard the invalid declare that the little
journey had been almost too much for her, her heart misgave her. She
ought to have told her tale while her aunt was still in bed. But
presently there came a question, which put her into such a flutter
that she was for the time devoid of all resolution. "Has Brooke
written?" said Miss Stanbury.
"Yes,--aunt; he has written."
"And what did he say?" Dorothy was struck quite dumb. "Is there
anything wrong?" And now, as Miss Stanbury asked the question, she
seemed herself to have forgotten that she had two minutes before
declared herself to be almost too feeble to speak. "I'm sure there is
something wrong. What is it? I will know."
"There is nothing wrong, Aunt Stanbury."
"Where is the letter? Let me see it."
"I mean there is nothing wrong about him."
"What is it, then?"
"He is quite well, Aunt Stanbury."
"Shew me the letter. I will see the letter. I know that there is
something the matter. Do you mean to say you won't shew me Brooke's
letter?"
There was a moment's pause before Dorothy answered. "I will shew you
his letter;--though I am sure he didn't mean that I should shew it to
anyone."
"He hasn't written evil of me?"
"No; no; no. He would sooner cut his hand off than say a word bad
of you. He never says or writes anything bad of anybody. But--. Oh,
aunt; I'll tell you everything. I should have told you before, only
that you were ill."
Then Miss Stanbury was frightened. "What is it?" she said hoarsely,
clasping the arms of the great chair, each with a thin, shrivelled
hand.
"Aunt Stanbury, Brooke,--Brooke,--wants me to be his--wife!"
[Illustration: "Brooke wants me to be his wife."]
"What!"
"You cannot be more surprised than I have been, Aunt Stanbury; and
there has been no fault of mine."
"I don't believe it," said the old woman.
"Now you may read the letter," said Dorothy, standing up. She was
quite prepared to be obedient, but she felt that her aunt's manner of
receiving the information was almost an insult.
"He must be a fool," said Miss Stanbury.
This was hard to bear, and the colour went and came rapidly across
Dorothy's cheeks as she gave herself a few moments to prepare an
answer. She already perceived that her aunt would be altogether
adverse to the marriage, and that therefore the marriage could never
take place. She had never for a moment allowed herself to think
otherwise, but, nevertheless, the blow was heavy on her. We all know
how constantly hope and expectation will rise high within our own
bosoms in opposition to our own judgment,--how we become sanguine
in regard to events which we almost know can never come to pass. So
it had been with Dorothy. Her heart had been almost in a flutter of
happiness since she had had Brooke's letter in her possession, and
yet she never ceased to declare to herself her own conviction that
that letter could lead to no good result. In regard to her own wishes
on the subject she had never asked herself a single question. As it
had been quite beyond her power to bring herself to endure the idea
of marrying Mr. Gibson, so it had been quite impossible to her not
to long to be Brooke's wife from the moment in which a suggestion to
that effect had fallen from his lips. This was a state of things so
certain, so much a matter of course, that, though she had not spoken
a word to him in which she owned her love, she had never for a moment
doubted that he knew the truth,--and that everybody else concerned
would know it too. But she did not suppose that her wishes would go
for anything with her aunt. Brooke Burgess was to become a rich man
as her aunt's heir, and her aunt would of course have her own ideas
about Brooke's advancement in life. She was quite prepared to submit
without quarrelling when her aunt should tell her that the idea must
not be entertained. But the order might be given, the prohibition
might be pronounced, without an insult to her own feelings as a
woman. "He must be a fool," Miss Stanbury had said, and Dorothy took
time to collect her thoughts before she would reply. In the meantime
her aunt finished the reading of the letter.
"He may be foolish in this," Dorothy said; "but I don't think you
should call him a fool."
"I shall call him what I please. I suppose this was going on at the
time when you refused Mr. Gibson."
"Nothing was going on. Nothing has gone on at all," said Dorothy,
with as much indignation as she was able to assume.
"How can you tell me that? That is an untruth."
"It is not--an untruth," said Dorothy, almost sobbing, but driven at
the same time to much anger.
"Do you mean to say that this is the first you ever heard of it?" And
she held out the letter, shaking it in her thin hand.
"I have never said so, Aunt Stanbury."
"Yes, you did."
"I said that nothing--was--going on, when Mr. Gibson--was--. If you
choose to suspect me, Aunt Stanbury, I'll go away. I won't stay here
if you suspect me. When Brooke spoke to me, I told him you wouldn't
like it."
"Of course I don't like it." But she gave no reason why she did not
like it.
"And there was nothing more till this letter came. I couldn't help
his writing to me. It wasn't my fault."
"Psha!"
"If you are angry, I am very sorry. But you haven't a right to be
angry."
"Go on, Dorothy; go on. I'm so weak that I can hardly stir myself;
it's the first moment that I've been out of my bed for weeks;--and of
course you can say what you please. I know what it will be. I shall
have to take to my bed again, and then,--in a very little time,--you
can both--make fools of yourselves,--just as you like."
This was an argument against which Dorothy of course found it to be
quite impossible to make continued combat. She could only shuffle her
letter back into her pocket, and be, if possible, more assiduous than
ever in her attentions to the invalid. She knew that she had been
treated most unjustly, and there would be a question to be answered
as soon as her aunt should be well as to the possibility of her
remaining in the Close subject to such injustice; but let her aunt
say what she might, or do what she might, Dorothy could not leave
her for the present. Miss Stanbury sat for a considerable time quite
motionless, with her eyes closed, and did not stir or make signs of
life till Dorothy touched her arm, asking her whether she would not
take some broth which had been prepared for her. "Where's Martha? Why
does not Martha come?" said Miss Stanbury. This was a hard blow, and
from that moment Dorothy believed that it would be expedient that
she should return to Nuncombe Putney. The broth, however, was taken,
while Dorothy sat by in silence. Only one word further was said that
evening by Miss Stanbury about Brooke and his love affair. "There
must be nothing more about this, Dorothy; remember that; nothing at
all. I won't have it." Dorothy made no reply. Brooke's letter was in
her pocket, and it should be answered that night. On the following
day she would let her aunt know what she had said to Brooke. Her aunt
should not see the letter, but should be made acquainted with its
purport in reference to Brooke's proposal of marriage.
"I won't have it!" That had been her aunt's command. What right had
her aunt to give any command upon the matter? Then crossed Dorothy's
mind, as she thought of this, a glimmering of an idea that no one can
be entitled to issue commands who cannot enforce obedience. If Brooke
and she chose to become man and wife by mutual consent, how could her
aunt prohibit the marriage? Then there followed another idea, that
commands are enforced by the threatening and, if necessary, by the
enforcement of penalties. Her aunt had within her hand no penalty of
which Dorothy was afraid on her own behalf; but she had the power
of inflicting a terrible punishment on Brooke Burgess. Now Dorothy
conceived that she herself would be the meanest creature alive if she
were actuated by fears as to money in her acceptance or rejection of
a man whom she loved as she did Brooke Burgess. Brooke had an income
of his own which seemed to her to be ample for all purposes. But that
which would have been sordid in her, did not seem to her to have any
stain of sordidness for him. He was a man, and was bound to be rich
if he could. And, moreover, what had she to offer in herself,--such a
poor thing as was she,--to make compensation to him for the loss of
fortune? Her aunt could inflict this penalty, and therefore the power
was hers, and the power must be obeyed. She would write to Brooke in
a manner that should convey to him her firm decision. But not the
less on that account would she let her aunt know that she thought
herself to have been ill-used. It was an insult to her, a most
ill-natured insult,--that telling her that Brooke had been a fool
for loving her. And then that accusation against her of having been
false, of having given one reason for refusing Mr. Gibson, while
there was another reason in her heart,--of having been cunning and
then untrue, was not to be endured. What would her aunt think of her
if she were to bear such allegations without indignant protest? She
would write her letter, and speak her mind to her aunt as soon as her
aunt should be well enough to hear it.
As she had resolved, she wrote her letter that night before she went
to bed. She wrote it with floods of tears, and a bitterness of heart
which almost conquered her. She too had heard of love, and had been
taught to feel that the success or failure of a woman's life depended
upon that,--whether she did, or whether she did not, by such gifts
as God might have given to her, attract to herself some man strong
enough, and good enough, and loving enough to make straight for her
her paths, to bear for her her burdens, to be the father of her
children, the staff on which she might lean, and the wall against
which she might grow, feeling the sunshine, and sheltered from the
wind. She had ever estimated her own value so lowly as to have told
herself often that such success could never come in her way. From her
earliest years she had regarded herself as outside the pale within
which such joys are to be found. She had so strictly taught herself
to look forward to a blank existence, that she had learned to do so
without active misery. But not the less did she know where happiness
lay; and when the good thing came almost within her reach, when it
seemed that God had given her gifts which might have sufficed, when
a man had sought her hand whose nature was such that she could have
leaned on him with a true worship, could have grown against him as
against a wall with perfect confidence, could have lain with her head
upon his bosom, and have felt that of all spots that in the world was
the most fitting for her,--when this was all but grasped, and must
yet be abandoned, there came upon her spirit an agony so bitter
that she had not before known how great might be the depth of human
disappointment. But the letter was at last written, and when finished
was as follows:--
The Close, Exeter, March 1, 186--.
DEAR BROOKE,
There had been many doubts about this; but at last they were
conquered, and the name was written.
I have shown your letter to my aunt, as I am sure you will
think was best. I should have answered it before, only
that I thought that she was not quite well enough to talk
about it. She says, as I was sure she would, that what you
propose is quite out of the question. I am aware that I
am bound to obey her; and as I think that you also ought
to do so, I shall think no more of what you have said to
me and have written. It is quite impossible now, even if
it might have been possible under other circumstances. I
shall always remember your great kindness to me. Perhaps
I ought to say that I am very grateful for the compliment
you have paid me. I shall think of you always;--till I
die.
Believe me to be,
Your very sincere friend,
DOROTHY STANBURY.
The next day Miss Stanbury again came out of her room, and on the
third day she was manifestly becoming stronger. Dorothy had as yet
not spoken of her letter, but was prepared to do so as soon as she
thought that a fitting opportunity had come. She had a word or two to
say for herself; but she must not again subject herself to being told
that she was taking her will of her aunt because her aunt was too ill
to defend herself. But on the third day Miss Stanbury herself asked
the question. "Have you written anything to Brooke?" she asked.
"I have answered his letter, Aunt Stanbury."
"And what have you said to him?"
"I have told him that you disapproved of it, and that nothing more
must be said about it."
"Yes;--of course you made me out to be an ogre."
"I don't know what you mean by that, aunt. I am sure that I told him
the truth."
"May I see the letter?"
"It has gone."
"But you have kept a copy," said Miss Stanbury.
"Yes; I have got a copy," replied Dorothy; "but I would rather not
shew it. I told him just what I tell you."
"Dorothy, it is not at all becoming that you should have a
correspondence with any young man of such a nature that you should be
ashamed to shew it to your aunt."
"I am not ashamed of anything," said Dorothy sturdily.
"I don't know what young women in these days have come to," continued
Miss Stanbury. "There is no respect, no subjection, no obedience, and
too often--no modesty."
"Does that mean me, Aunt Stanbury?" asked Dorothy.
"To tell you the truth, Dorothy, I don't think you ought to have
been receiving love-letters from Brooke Burgess when I was lying ill
in bed. I didn't expect it of you. I tell you fairly that I didn't
expect it of you."
Then Dorothy spoke out her mind. "As you think that, Aunt Stanbury,
I had better go away. And if you please I will,--when you are well
enough to spare me."
"Pray don't think of me at all," said her aunt.
"And as for love-letters,--Mr. Burgess has written to me once. I
don't think that there can be anything immodest in opening a letter
when it comes by the post. And as soon as I had it I determined to
shew it to you. As for what happened before, when Mr. Burgess spoke
to me, which was long, long after all that about Mr. Gibson was over,
I told him that it couldn't be so; and I thought there would be no
more about it. You were so ill that I could not tell you. Now you
know it all."
"I have not seen your letter to him."
"I shall never shew it to anybody. But you have said things, Aunt
Stanbury, that are very cruel."
"Of course! Everything I say is wrong."
"You have told me that I was telling untruths, and you have called
me--immodest. That is a terrible word."
"You shouldn't deserve it then."
"I never have deserved it, and I won't bear it. No; I won't. If Hugh
heard me called that word, I believe he'd tear the house down."
"Hugh, indeed! He's to be brought in between us;--is he?"
"He's my brother, and of course I'm obliged to think of him. And if
you please, I'll go home as soon as you are well enough to spare me."
Quickly after this there were very many letters coming and going
between the house in the Close and the ladies at Nuncombe Putney, and
Hugh Stanbury and Brooke Burgess. The correspondent of Brooke Burgess
was of course Miss Stanbury herself. The letters to Hugh and to
Nuncombe Putney were written by Dorothy. Of the former we need be
told nothing at the present moment; but the upshot of all poor
Dolly's letters was, that on the tenth of March she was to return
home to Nuncombe Putney, share once more her sister's bed and
mother's poverty, and abandon the comforts of the Close. Before
this became a definite arrangement Miss Stanbury had given way in a
certain small degree. She had acknowledged that Dorothy had intended
no harm. But this was not enough for Dorothy, who was conscious of
no harm either done or intended. She did not specify her terms, or
require specifically that her aunt should make apology for that word
immodest, or at least withdraw it; but she resolved that she would go
unless it was most absolutely declared to have been applied to her
without the slightest reason. She felt, moreover, that her aunt's
house ought to be open to Brooke Burgess, and that it could not be
open to them both. And so she went;--having resided under her aunt's
roof between nine and ten months.
"Good-bye, Aunt Stanbury," said Dorothy, kissing her aunt, with a
tear in her eye and a sob in her throat.
"Good-bye, my dear, good-bye." And Miss Stanbury, as she pressed her
niece's hand, left in it a bank-note.
"I'm much obliged, aunt; I am indeed; but I'd rather not." And the
bank-note was left on the parlour table.
CHAPTER LVIII.
DOROTHY AT HOME.
Dorothy was received at home with so much affection and such
expressions of esteem as to afford her much consolation in her
misery. Both her mother and her sister approved of her conduct.
Mrs. Stanbury's approval was indeed accompanied by many expressions
of regret as to the good things lost. She was fully alive to the
fact that life in the Close at Exeter was better for her daughter
than life in their little cottage at Nuncombe Putney. The outward
appearance which Dorothy bore on her return home was proof of this.
Her clothes, the set of her hair, her very gestures and motions had
framed themselves on town ideas. The faded, wildered, washed-out
look, the uncertain, purposeless bearing which had come from her
secluded life and subjection to her sister had vanished from her.
She had lived among people, and had learned something of their gait
and carriage. Money we know will do almost everything, and no doubt
money had had much to do with this. It is very pretty to talk of the
alluring simplicity of a clean calico gown; but poverty will shew
itself to be meagre, dowdy, and draggled in a woman's dress, let
the woman be ever so simple, ever so neat, ever so independent, and
ever so high-hearted. Mrs. Stanbury was quite alive to all that her
younger daughter was losing. Had she not received two offers of
marriage while she was at Exeter? There was no possibility that
offers of marriage should be made in the cottage at Nuncombe Putney.
A man within the walls of the cottage would have been considered as
much out of place as a wild bull. It had been matter of deep regret
to Mrs. Stanbury that her daughter should not have found herself able
to marry Mr. Gibson. She knew that there was no matter for reproach
in this, but it was a misfortune,--a great misfortune. And in the
mother's breast there had been a sad, unrepressed feeling of regret
that young people should so often lose their chances in the world
through over-fancifulness, and ignorance as to their own good. Now
when she heard the story of Brooke Burgess, she could not but think
that had Dorothy remained at Exeter, enduring patiently such hard
words as her aunt might speak, the love affair might have been
brought at some future time to a happy conclusion. She did not say
all this; but there came on her a silent melancholy, made expressive
by constant little shakings of the head and a continued reproachful
sadness of demeanour, which was quite as intelligible to Priscilla
as would have been any spoken words. But Priscilla's approval of her
sister's conduct was clear, outspoken, and satisfactory. She had been
quite sure that her sister had been right about Mr. Gibson; and was
equally sure that she was now right about Brooke Burgess. Priscilla
had in her mind an idea that if B. B., as they called him, was half
as good as her sister represented him to be,--for indeed Dorothy
endowed him with every virtue consistent with humanity,--he would
not be deterred from his pursuit either by Dolly's letter or by Aunt
Stanbury's commands. But of this she thought it wise to say nothing.
She paid Dolly the warm and hitherto unaccustomed compliment of
equality, assuming to regard her sister's judgment and persistent
independence to be equally strong with her own; and, as she knew
well, she could not have gone further than this. "I never shall agree
with you about Aunt Stanbury," she said. "To me she seems to be so
imperious, so exacting, and also so unjust, as to be unbearable."
"But she is affectionate," said Dolly.
"So is the dog that bites you, and, for aught I know, the horse that
kicks you. But it is ill living with biting dogs and kicking horses.
But all that matters little as you are still your own mistress. How
strange these nine months have been, with you in Exeter, while we
have been at the Clock House. And here we are, together again in the
old way, just as though nothing had happened." But Dorothy knew well
that a great deal had happened, and that her life could never be as
it had been heretofore. The very tone in which her sister spoke to
her was proof of this. She had an infinitely greater possession in
herself than had belonged to her before her residence at Exeter; but
that possession was so heavily mortgaged and so burthened as to make
her believe that the change was to be regretted.
At the end of the first week there came a letter from Aunt Stanbury
to Dorothy. It began by saying that Dolly had left behind her certain
small properties which had now been made up in a parcel and sent by
the railway, carriage paid. "But they weren't mine at all," said
Dolly, alluding to certain books in which she had taken delight. "She
means to give them to you," said Priscilla, "and I think you must
take them." "And the shawl is no more mine than it is yours, though
I wore it two or three times in the winter." Priscilla was of opinion
that the shawl must be taken also. Then the letter spoke of the
writer's health, and at last fell into such a strain of confidential
gossip that Mrs. Stanbury, when she read it, could not understand
that there had been a quarrel. "Martha says that she saw Camilla
French in the street to-day, such a guy in her new finery as never
was seen before except on May-day." Then in the postscript Dorothy
was enjoined to answer this letter quickly. "None of your short
scraps, my dear," said Aunt Stanbury.
"She must mean you to go back to her," said Mrs. Stanbury.
"No doubt she does," said Priscilla; "but Dolly need not go because
my aunt means it. We are not her creatures."
But Dorothy answered her aunt's letter in the spirit in which it had
been written. She asked after her aunt's health, thanked her aunt for
the gift of the books,--in each of which her name had been clearly
written,--protested about the shawl, sent her love to Martha and her
kind regards to Jane, and expressed a hope that C. F. enjoyed her new
clothes. She described the cottage, and was funny about the cabbage
stumps in the garden, and at last succeeded in concocting a long
epistle. "I suppose there will be a regular correspondence," said
Priscilla.
Two days afterwards, however, the correspondence took altogether
another form. The cottage in which they now lived was supposed to be
beyond the beat of the wooden-legged postman, and therefore it was
necessary that they should call at the post-office for their letters.
On the morning in question Priscilla obtained a thick letter from
Exeter for her mother, and knew that it had come from her aunt.
Her aunt could hardly have found it necessary to correspond with
Dorothy's mother so soon after that letter to Dorothy had been
written had there not arisen some very peculiar cause. Priscilla,
after much meditation, thought it better that the letter should be
opened in Dorothy's absence, and in Dorothy's absence the following
letter was read both by Priscilla and her mother:--
The Close, March 19, 186--.
DEAR SISTER STANBURY,
After much consideration, I think it best to send under
cover to you the enclosed letter from Mr. Brooke Burgess,
intended for your daughter Dorothy. You will see that I
have opened it and read it,--as I was clearly entitled to
do, the letter having been addressed to my niece while she
was supposed to be under my care. I do not like to destroy
the letter, though, perhaps, that would be best; but I
would advise you to do so, if it be possible, without
shewing it to Dorothy. I have told Mr. Brooke Burgess what
I have done.
I have also told him that I cannot sanction a marriage
between him and your daughter. There are many reasons of
old date,--not to speak of present reasons also,--which
would make such a marriage highly inexpedient. Mr. Brooke
Burgess is, of course, his own master, but your daughter
understands completely how the matter stands.
Yours truly,
JEMIMA STANBURY.
"What a wicked old woman!" said Priscilla. Then there arose a
question whether they should read Brooke's letter, or whether they
should give it unread to Dorothy. Priscilla denounced her aunt in
the strongest language she could use for having broken the seal.
"'Clearly entitled,'--because Dorothy had been living with her!"
exclaimed Priscilla. "She can have no proper conception of honour
or of honesty. She had no more right to open Dorothy's letter than
she had to take her money." Mrs. Stanbury was very anxious to read
Brooke's letter, alleging that they would then be able to judge
whether it should be handed over to Dorothy. But Priscilla's sense of
right would not admit of this. Dorothy must receive the letter from
her lover with no further stain from unauthorised eyes than that to
which it had been already subjected. She was called in, therefore,
from the kitchen, and the whole packet was given to her. "Your aunt
has read the enclosure, Dolly; but we have not opened it."
Dorothy took the packet without a word and sat herself down. She
first read her aunt's letter very slowly. "I understand perfectly,"
she said, folding it up, almost listlessly, while Brooke's letter lay
still unopened on her lap. Then she took it up, and held it awhile in
both hands, while her mother and Priscilla watched her. "Priscilla,"
she said, "do you read it first."
Priscilla was immediately at her side, kissing her. "No, my darling;
no," she said; "it is for you to read it." Then Dorothy took the
precious contents from the envelope, and opened the folds of the
paper. When she had read a dozen words, her eyes were so suffused
with tears, that she could hardly make herself mistress of the
contents of the letter; but she knew that it contained renewed
assurances of her lover's love, and assurance on his part that he
would take no refusal from her based on any other ground than that of
her own indifference to him. He had written to Miss Stanbury to the
same effect; but he had not thought it necessary to explain this to
Dorothy; nor did Miss Stanbury in her letter tell them that she had
received any communication from him. "Shall I read it now?" said
Priscilla, as soon as Dorothy again allowed the letter to fall into
her lap.
Both Priscilla and Mrs. Stanbury read it, and for awhile they sat
with the two letters among them without much speech about them.
Mrs. Stanbury was endeavouring to make herself believe that her
sister-in-law's opposition might be overcome, and that then Dorothy
might be married. Priscilla was inquiring of herself whether it would
be well that Dorothy should defy her aunt,--so much, at any rate,
would be well,--and marry the man, even to his deprivation of the
old woman's fortune. Priscilla had her doubts about this, being very
strong in her ideas of self-denial. That her sister should put up
with the bitterest disappointment rather than injure the man she
loved was right;--but then it would also be so extremely right to
defy Aunt Stanbury to her teeth! But Dorothy, in whose character was
mixed with her mother's softness much of the old Stanbury strength,
had no doubt in her mind. It was very sweet to be so loved. What
gratitude did she not owe to a man who was so true to her! What was
she that she should stand in his way? To lay herself down that she
might be crushed in his path was no more than she owed to him. Mrs.
Stanbury was the first to speak.
"I suppose he is a very good young man," she said.
"I am sure he is;--a noble, true-hearted man," said Priscilla.
"And why shouldn't he marry whom he pleases, as long as she is
respectable?" said Mrs. Stanbury.
"In some people's eyes poverty is more disreputable than vice," said
Priscilla.
"Your aunt has been so fond of Dorothy," pleaded Mrs. Stanbury.
"Just as she is of her servants," said Priscilla.
But Dorothy said nothing. Her heart was too full to enable her to
defend her aunt; nor at the present moment was she strong enough to
make her mother understand that no hope was to be entertained. In the
course of the day she walked out with her sister on the road towards
Ridleigh, and there, standing among the rocks and ferns, looking down
upon the river, with the buzz of the little mill within her ears,
she explained the feelings of her heart and her many thoughts with a
flow of words stronger, as Priscilla thought, than she had ever used
before.
"It is not what he would suffer now, Pris, or what he would feel, but
what he would feel ten, twenty years hence, when he would know that
his children would have been all provided for, had he not lost his
fortune by marrying me."
"He must be the only judge whether he prefers you to the old woman's
money," said Priscilla.
"No, dear; not the only judge. And it isn't that, Pris,--not which
he likes best now, but which it is best for him that he should have.
What could I do for him?"
"You can love him."
"Yes;--I can do that." And Dorothy paused a moment, to think how
exceedingly well she could do that one thing. "But what is that? As
you said the other day, a dog can do that. I am not clever. I can't
play, or talk French, or do things that men like their wives to do.
And I have lived here all my life; and what am I, that for me he
should lose a great fortune?"
"That is his look out."
"No, dearest;--it is mine, and I will look out. I shall be able, at
any rate, to remember always that I have loved him, and have not
injured him. He may be angry with me now,"--and there was a feeling
of pride at her heart, as she thought that he would be angry with
her, because she did not go to him,--"but he will know at last that I
have been as good to him as I knew how to be."
Then Priscilla wound her arms round Dorothy, and kissed her.
"My sister," she said; "my own sister!" They walked on further,
discussing the matter in all its bearings, talking of the act of
self-denial which Dorothy was called on to perform, as though it were
some abstract thing, the performance of which was, or perhaps was
not, imperatively demanded by the laws which should govern humanity;
but with no idea on the mind of either of them that there was any
longer a doubt as to this special matter in hand. They were away
from home over three hours; and, when they returned, Dorothy at once
wrote her two letters. They were very simple, and very short. She
told Brooke, whom she now addressed as "Dear Mr. Burgess," that
it could not be as he would have it; and she told her aunt,--with
some terse independence of expression, which Miss Stanbury quite
understood,--that she had considered the matter, and had thought it
right to refuse Mr. Burgess's offer.
"Don't you think she is very much changed?" said Mrs. Stanbury to her
eldest daughter.
"Not changed in the least, mother; but the sun has opened the bud,
and now we see the fruit."
CHAPTER LIX.
MR. BOZZLE AT HOME.
[Illustration]
It had now come to pass that Trevelyan had not a friend in the world
to whom he could apply in the matter of his wife and family. In the
last communication which he had received from Lady Milborough she
had scolded him, in terms that were for her severe, because he had
not returned to his wife and taken her off with him to Naples. Mr.
Bideawhile had found himself obliged to decline to move in the matter
at all. With Hugh Stanbury, Trevelyan had had a direct quarrel. Mr.
and Mrs. Outhouse he regarded as bitter enemies, who had taken the
part of his wife without any regard to the decencies of life. And now
it had come to pass that his sole remaining ally, Mr. Samuel Bozzle,
the ex-policeman, was becoming weary of his service. Trevelyan
remained in the north of Italy up to the middle of March, spending a
fortune in sending telegrams to Bozzle, instigating Bozzle by all the
means in his power to obtain possession of the child, desiring him at
one time to pounce down upon the parsonage of St. Diddulph's with a
battalion of policemen armed to the teeth with the law's authority,
and at another time suggesting to him to find his way by stratagem
into Mr. Outhouse's castle and carry off the child in his arms. At
last he sent word to say that he himself would be in England before
the end of March, and would see that the majesty of the law should be
vindicated in his favour.
Bozzle had in truth made but one personal application for the child
at St. Diddulph's. In making this he had expected no success, though,
from the energetic nature of his disposition, he had made the attempt
with some zeal. But he had never applied again at the parsonage,
disregarding the letters, the telegrams, and even the promises which
had come to him from his employer with such frequency. The truth was
that Mrs. Bozzle was opposed to the proposed separation of the mother
and the child, and that Bozzle was a man who listened to the words of
his wife. Mrs. Bozzle was quite prepared to admit that Madame T.,--as
Mrs. Trevelyan had come to be called at No. 55, Stony Walk,--was
no better than she should be. Mrs. Bozzle was disposed to think
that ladies of quality, among whom Madame T. was entitled in her
estimation to take rank, were seldom better than they ought to be,
and she was quite willing that her husband should earn his bread
by watching the lady or the lady's lover. She had participated in
Bozzle's triumph when he had discovered that the Colonel had gone to
Devonshire, and again when he had learned that the Lothario had been
at St. Diddulph's. And had the case been brought before the judge
ordinary by means of her husband's exertions, she would have taken
pleasure in reading every word of the evidence, even though her
husband should have been ever so roughly handled by the lawyers. But
now, when a demand was made upon Bozzle to violate the sanctity of
the clergyman's house, and withdraw the child by force or stratagem,
she began to perceive that the palmy days of the Trevelyan affair
were over for them, and that it would be wise on her husband's part
gradually to back out of the gentleman's employment. "Just put it on
the fire-back, Bozzle," she said one morning, as her husband stood
before her reading for the second time a somewhat lengthy epistle
which had reached him from Italy, while he held the baby over his
shoulder with his left arm. He had just washed himself at the sink,
and though his face was clean, his hair was rough, and his shirt
sleeves were tucked up.
[Illustration: "Put it on the fire-back, Bozzle."]
"That's all very well, Maryanne; but when a party has took a gent's
money, a party is bound to go through with the job."
"Gammon, Bozzle."
"It's all very well to say gammon; but his money has been took,--and
there's more to come."
"And ain't you worked for the money,--down to Hexeter one time,
across the water pretty well day and night watching that ere
clergyman's 'ouse like a cat? What more'd he have? As to the child,
I won't hear of it, B. The child shan't come here. We'd all be
shewed up in the papers as that black, that they'd hoot us along the
streets. It ain't the regular line of business, Bozzle; and there
ain't no good to be got, never, by going off the regular line."
Whereupon Bozzle scratched his head and again read the letter. A
distinct promise of a hundred pounds was made to him, if he would
have the child ready to hand over to Trevelyan on Trevelyan's arrival
in England.
"It ain't to be done, you know," said Bozzle.
"Of course it ain't," said Mrs. Bozzle.
"It ain't to be done anyways;--not in my way of business. Why didn't
he go to Skint, as I told him, when his own lawyer was too dainty for
the job? The paternal parent has a right to his infants, no doubt."
That was Bozzle's law.
"I don't believe it, B."
"But he have, I tell you."
"He can't suckle 'em;--can he? I don't believe a bit of his rights."
"When a married woman has followers, and the husband don't go the
wrong side of the post too, or it ain't proved again him that he do,
they'll never let her have nothing to do with the children. It's been
before the court a hundred times. He'll get the child fast enough if
he'll go before the court."
"Anyways it ain't your business, Bozzle, and don't you meddle nor
make. The money's good money as long as it's honest earned; but when
you come to rampaging and breaking into a gent's house, then I say
money may be had a deal too hard." In this special letter, which had
now come to hand, Bozzle was not instructed to "rampage." He was
simply desired to make a further official requisition for the boy at
the parsonage, and to explain to Mr. Outhouse, Mrs. Outhouse, and
Mrs. Trevelyan, or to as many of them as he could contrive to see,
that Mr. Trevelyan was immediately about to return to London, and
that he would put the law into execution if his son were not given
up to him at once. "I'll tell you what it is, B.," exclaimed Mrs.
Bozzle, "it's my belief as he ain't quite right up here;" and Mrs.
Bozzle touched her forehead.
"It's love for her as has done it then," said Bozzle, shaking his
head.
"I'm not a taking of her part, B. A woman as has a husband as finds
her with her wittels regular, and with what's decent and comfortable
beside, ought to be contented. I've never said no other than that.
I ain't no patience with your saucy madames as can't remember as
they're eating an honest man's bread. Drat 'em all; what is it they
wants? They don't know what they wants. It's just hidleness,--cause
there ain't a ha'porth for 'em to do. It's that as makes 'em--, I
won't say what. But as for this here child, B.--." At that moment
there came a knock at the door. Mrs. Bozzle going into the passage,
opened it herself, and saw a strange gentleman. Bozzle, who had stood
at the inner door, saw that the gentleman was Mr. Trevelyan.
The letter, which was still in the ex-policeman's hand, had reached
Stony Walk on the previous day; but the master of the house had been
absent, finding out facts, following up his profession, and earning
an honest penny. Trevelyan had followed his letter quicker than
he had intended when it was written, and was now with his prime
minister, before his prime minister had been able to take any action
on the last instruction received. "Does one Mr. Samuel Bozzle live
here?" asked Trevelyan. Then Bozzle came forward and introduced his
wife. There was no one else present except the baby, and Bozzle
intimated that let matters be as delicate as they might, they could
be discussed with perfect security in his wife's presence. But
Trevelyan was of a different opinion, and he was disgusted and
revolted,--most unreasonably,--by the appearance of his minister's
domestic arrangements. Bozzle had always waited upon him with a
decent coat, and a well-brushed hat, and clean shoes. It is very much
easier for such men as Mr. Bozzle to carry decency of appearance
about with them than to keep it at home. Trevelyan had never believed
his ally to be more than an ordinary ex-policeman, but he had not
considered how unattractive might be the interior of a private
detective's private residence. Mrs. Bozzle had set a chair for
him, but he had declined to sit down. The room was dirty, and very
close,--as though no breath of air was ever allowed to find entrance
there. "Perhaps you could put on your coat, and walk out with me for
a few minutes," said Trevelyan. Mrs. Bozzle, who well understood that
business was business, and that wives were not business, felt no
anger at this, and handed her husband his best coat. The well-brushed
hat was fetched from a cupboard, and it was astonishing to see
how easily and how quickly the outer respectability of Bozzle was
restored.
"Well?" said Trevelyan, as soon as they were together in the middle
of Stony Walk.
"There hasn't been nothing to be done, sir," said Bozzle.
"Why not?" Trevelyan could perceive at once that the authority which
he had once respected had gone from the man. Bozzle away from his own
home, out on business, with his coat buttoned over his breast, and
his best hat in his hand, was aware that he commanded respect,--and
he could carry himself accordingly. He knew himself to be
somebody, and could be easy, self-confident, confidential, severe,
authoritative, or even arrogant, as the circumstances of the moment
might demand. But he had been found with his coat off, and a baby in
his arms, and he could not recover himself. "I do not suppose that
anybody will question my right to have the care of my own child,"
said Trevelyan.
"If you would have gone to Mr. Skint, sir--," suggested Bozzle.
"There ain't no smarter gent in all the profession, sir, than Mr.
Skint."
Mr. Trevelyan made no reply to this, but walked on in silence, with
his minister at his elbow. He was very wretched, understanding well
the degradation to which he was subjecting himself in discussing his
wife's conduct with this man;--but with whom else could he discuss
it? The man seemed to be meaner now than he had been before he had
been seen in his own home. And Trevelyan was conscious too that he
himself was not in outward appearance as he used to be; that he was
ill-dressed, and haggard, and worn, and visibly a wretched being. How
can any man care to dress himself with attention who is always alone,
and always miserable when alone? During the months which had passed
over him since he had sent his wife away from him, his very nature
had been altered, and he himself was aware of the change. As he went
about, his eyes were ever cast downwards, and he walked with a quick
shuffling gait, and he suspected others, feeling that he himself was
suspected. And all work had ceased with him. Since she had left him
he had not read a single book that was worth the reading. And he knew
it all. He was conscious that he was becoming disgraced and degraded.
He would sooner have shot himself than have walked into his club,
or even have allowed himself to be seen by daylight in Pall Mall,
or Piccadilly. He had taken in his misery to drinking little drops
of brandy in the morning, although he knew well that there was no
shorter road to the devil than that opened by such a habit. He looked
up for a moment at Bozzle, and then asked him a question. "Where is
he now?"
"You mean the Colonel, sir. He's up in town, sir, a minding of his
parliamentary duties. He have been up all this month, sir."
"They haven't met?"
Bozzle paused a moment before he replied, and then smiled as he
spoke. "It is so hard to say, sir. Ladies is so cute and cunning.
I've watched as sharp as watching can go, pretty near. I've put a
youngster on at each hend, and both of 'em 'd hear a mouse stirring
in his sleep. I ain't got no evidence, Mr. Trevelyan. But if you ask
me my opinion, why in course they've been together somewhere. It
stands to reason, Mr. Trevelyan; don't it?" And Bozzle as he said
this smiled almost aloud.
"D----n and b----t it all for ever!" said Trevelyan, gnashing his
teeth, and moving away into Union Street as fast as he could walk.
And he did go away, leaving Bozzle standing in the middle of Stony
Walk.
"He's disturbed in his mind,--quite 'orrid," Bozzle said when he got
back to his wife. "He cursed and swore as made even me feel bad."
"B.," said his wife, "do you listen to me. Get in what's a howing,
and don't you have nothing more to do with it."
CHAPTER LX.
ANOTHER STRUGGLE.
Sir Marmaduke and Lady Rowley were to reach England about the end of
March or the beginning of April, and both Mrs. Trevelyan and Nora
Rowley were almost sick for their arrival. Both their uncle and aunt
had done very much for them, had been true to them in their need, and
had submitted to endless discomforts in order that their nieces might
have respectable shelter in their great need; but nevertheless their
conduct had not been of a kind to produce either love or friendship.
Each of the sisters felt that she had been much better off at
Nuncombe Putney, and that either the weakness of Mrs. Stanbury,
or the hardness of Priscilla, was preferable to the repulsive
forbearance of their clerical host. He did not scold them. He never
threw it in Mrs. Trevelyan's teeth that she had been separated
from her husband by her own fault; he did not tell them of his own
discomfort. But he showed it in every gesture, and spoke of it in
every tone of his voice;--so that Mrs. Trevelyan could not refrain
from apologising for the misfortune of her presence.
"My dear," he said, "things can't be pleasant and unpleasant at the
same time. You were quite right to come here. I am glad for all our
sakes that Sir Marmaduke will be with us so soon."
She had almost given up in her mind the hope that she had long
cherished, that she might some day be able to live again with her
husband. Every step which he now took in reference to her seemed to
be prompted by so bitter an hostility, that she could not but believe
that she was hateful to him. How was it possible that a husband and
his wife should again come together, when there had been between
them such an emissary as a detective policeman? Mrs. Trevelyan
had gradually come to learn that Bozzle had been at Nuncombe
Putney, watching her, and to be aware that she was still under the
surveillance of his eye. For some months past now she had neither
seen Colonel Osborne, nor heard from him. He had certainly by his
folly done much to produce the ruin which had fallen upon her; but it
never occurred to her to blame him. Indeed she did not know that he
was liable to blame. Mr. Outhouse always spoke of him with indignant
scorn, and Nora had learned to think that much of their misery was
due to his imprudence. But Mrs. Trevelyan would not see this, and,
not seeing it, was more widely separated from her husband than
she would have been had she acknowledged that any excuse for his
misconduct had been afforded by the vanity and folly of the other
man.
Lady Rowley had written to have a furnished house taken for them
from the first of April, and a house had been secured in Manchester
Street. The situation in question is not one which is of itself very
charming, nor is it supposed to be in a high degree fashionable; but
Nora looked forward to her escape from St. Diddulph's to Manchester
Street as though Paradise were to be re-opened to her as soon as she
should be there with her father and mother. She was quite clear now
as to her course about Hugh Stanbury. She did not doubt but that she
could so argue the matter as to get the consent of her father and
mother. She felt herself to be altogether altered in her views of
life, since experience had come upon her, first at Nuncombe Putney,
and after that, much more heavily and seriously, at St. Diddulph's.
She looked back as though to a childish dream to the ideas which had
prevailed with her when she had told herself, as she used to do so
frequently, that she was unfit to be a poor man's wife. Why should
she be more unfit for such a position than another? Of course there
were many thoughts in her mind, much of memory if nothing of regret,
in regard to Mr. Glascock and the splendour that had been offered
to her. She had had her chance of being a rich man's wife, and had
rejected it,--had rejected it twice, with her eyes open. Readers
will say that if she loved Hugh Stanbury with all her heart, there
could be nothing of regret in her reflections. But we are perhaps
accustomed in judging for ourselves and of others to draw the
lines too sharply, and to say that on this side lie vice, folly,
heartlessness, and greed,--and on the other honour, love, truth, and
wisdom,--the good and the bad each in its own domain. But the good
and the bad mix themselves so thoroughly in our thoughts, even in our
aspirations, that we must look for excellence rather in overcoming
evil than in freeing ourselves from its influence. There had been
many moments of regret with Nora;--but none of remorse. At the very
moment in which she had sent Mr. Glascock away from her, and had
felt that he had now been sent away for always, she had been full of
regret. Since that there had been many hours in which she had thought
of her own self-lesson, of that teaching by which she had striven to
convince herself that she could never fitly become a poor man's wife.
But the upshot of it all was a healthy pride in what she had done,
and a strong resolution that she would make shirts and hem towels for
her husband if he required it. It had been given her to choose, and
she had chosen. She had found herself unable to tell a man that she
loved him when she did not love him,--and equally unable to conceal
the love which she did feel. "If he wheeled a barrow of turnips about
the street, I'd marry him to-morrow," she said to her sister one
afternoon as they were sitting together in the room which ought to
have been their uncle's study.
"If he wheeled a big barrow, you'd have to wheel a little one," said
her sister.
"Then I'd do it. I shouldn't mind. There has been this advantage in
St. Diddulph's, that nothing can be triste, nothing dull, nothing
ugly after it."
"It may be so with you, Nora;--that is in imagination."
"What I mean is that living here has taught me much that I never
could have learned in Curzon Street. I used to think myself such a
fine young woman,--but, upon my word, I think myself a finer one
now."
"I don't quite know what you mean."
"I don't quite know myself; but I nearly know. I do know this, that
I've made up my own mind about what I mean to do."
"You'll change it, dear, when mamma is here, and things are
comfortable again. It's my belief that Mr. Glascock would come to you
again to-morrow if you would let him." Mrs. Trevelyan was, naturally,
in complete ignorance of the experience of transatlantic excellence
which Mr. Glascock had encountered in Italy.
"But I certainly should not let him. How would it be possible after
what I wrote to Hugh?"
"All that might pass away," said Mrs. Trevelyan,--slowly, after a
long pause.
"All what might pass away? Have I not given him a distinct promise?
Have I not told him that I loved him, and sworn that I would be true
to him? Can that be made to pass away,--even if one wished it?"
"Of course it can. Nothing need be fixed for you till you have stood
at the altar with a man and been made his wife. You may choose still.
I can never choose again."
"I never will, at any rate," said Nora.
Then there was another pause. "It seems strange to me, Nora," said
the elder sister, "that after what you have seen you should be so
keen to be married to any one."
"What is a girl to do?"
"Better drown herself than do as I have done. Only think what there
is before me. What I have gone through is nothing to it. Of course I
must go back to the Islands. Where else am I to live? Who else will
take me?"
"Come to us," said Nora.
"Us, Nora! Who are the us? But in no way would that be possible.
Papa will be here, perhaps, for six months." Nora thought it quite
possible that she might have a home of her own before six months were
passed,--even though she might be wheeling the smaller barrow,--but
she would not say so. "And by that time everything must be decided."
"I suppose it must."
"Of course papa and mamma must go back," said Mrs. Trevelyan.
"Papa might take a pension. He's entitled to a pension now."
"He'll never do that as long as he can have employment. They'll go
back, and I must go with them. Who else would take me in?"
"I know who would take you in, Emily."
"My darling, that is romance. As for myself, I should not care where
I went. If it were even to remain here, I could bear it."
"I could not," said Nora, decisively.
"It is so different with you, dear. I don't suppose it is possible
I should take my boy with me to the Islands; and how--am I--to
go--anywhere--without him?" Then she broke down, and fell into a
paroxysm of sobs, and was in very truth a broken-hearted woman.
Nora was silent for some minutes, but at last she spoke. "Why do you
not go back to him, Emily?"
"How am I to go back to him? What am I to do to make him take me
back?" At this very moment Trevelyan was in the house, but they did
not know it.
"Write to him," said Nora.
"What am I to say? In very truth I do believe that he is mad. If I
write to him, should I defend myself or accuse myself? A dozen times
I have striven to write such a letter,--not that I might send it, but
that I might find what I could say should I ever wish to send it. And
it is impossible. I can only tell him how unjust he has been, how
cruel, how mad, how wicked!"
"Could you not say to him simply this?--'Let us be together, wherever
it may be; and let bygones be bygones.'"
"While he is watching me with a policeman? While he is still thinking
that I entertain a--lover? While he believes that I am the base thing
that he has dared to think me?"
"He has never believed it."
"Then how can he be such a villain as to treat me like this? I could
not go to him, Nora;--not unless I went to him as one who was known
to be mad, over whom in his wretched condition it would be my duty
to keep watch. In no other way could I overcome my abhorrence of the
outrages to which he has subjected me."
"But for the child's sake, Emily."
"Ah, yes! If it were simply to grovel in the dust before him it
should be done. If humiliation would suffice,--or any self-abasement
that were possible to me! But I should be false if I said that I look
forward to any such possibility. How can he wish to have me back
again after what he has said and done? I am his wife, and he has
disgraced me before all men by his own words. And what have I done,
that I should not have done;--what left undone on his behalf that
I should have done? It is hard that the foolish workings of a weak
man's mind should be able so completely to ruin the prospects of a
woman's life!"
Nora was beginning to answer this by attempting to shew that the
husband's madness was, perhaps, only temporary, when there came a
knock at the door, and Mrs. Outhouse was at once in the room. It
will be well that the reader should know what had taken place at the
parsonage while the two sisters had been together up-stairs, so that
the nature of Mrs. Outhouse's mission to them may explain itself. Mr.
Outhouse had been in his closet down-stairs, when the maid-servant
brought word to him that Mr. Trevelyan was in the parlour, and was
desirous of seeing him.
"Mr. Trevelyan!" said the unfortunate clergyman, holding up both his
hands. The servant understood the tragic importance of the occasion
quite as well as did her master, and simply shook her head. "Has your
mistress seen him?" said the master. The girl again shook her head.
"Ask your mistress to come to me," said the clergyman. Then the girl
disappeared; and in a few minutes Mrs. Outhouse, equally imbued with
the tragic elements of the day, was with her husband.
Mr. Outhouse began by declaring that no consideration should induce
him to see Trevelyan, and commissioned his wife to go to the man and
tell him that he must leave the house. When the unfortunate woman
expressed an opinion that Trevelyan had some legal rights upon which
he might probably insist, Mr. Outhouse asserted roundly that he could
have no legal right to remain in that parsonage against the will
of the rector. "If he wants to claim his wife and child, he must
do it by law,--not by force; and thank God, Sir Marmaduke will be
here before he can do that." "But I can't make him go," said Mrs.
Outhouse. "Tell him that you'll send for a policeman," said the
clergyman.
It had come to pass that there had been messages backwards and
forwards between the visitor and the master of the house, all carried
by that unfortunate lady. Trevelyan did not demand that his wife and
child should be given up to him;--did not even, on this occasion,
demand that his boy should be surrendered to him,--now, at once.
He did say, very repeatedly, that of course he must have his boy,
but seemed to imply that, under certain circumstances, he would
be willing to take his wife to live with him again. This appeared
to Mrs. Outhouse to be so manifestly the one thing that was
desirable,--to be the only solution of the difficulty that could be
admitted as a solution at all,--that she went to work on that hint,
and ventured to entertain a hope that a reconciliation might be
effected. She implored her husband to lend a hand to the work;--by
which she intended to imply that he should not only see Trevelyan,
but consent to meet the sinner on friendly terms. But Mr. Outhouse
was on the occasion even more than customarily obstinate. His wife
might do what she liked. He would neither meddle nor make. He would
not willingly see Mr. Trevelyan in his own house;--unless, indeed,
Mr. Trevelyan should attempt to force his way up into the nursery.
Then he said that which left no doubt on his wife's mind that, should
any violence be attempted, her husband would manfully join the mêlée.
But it soon became evident that no such attempt was to be made on
that day. Trevelyan was lachrymose, heartbroken, and a sight pitiable
to behold. When Mrs. Outhouse loudly asserted that his wife had not
sinned against him in the least,--"not in a tittle, Mr. Trevelyan,"
she repeated over and over again,--he began to assert himself,
declaring that she had seen the man in Devonshire, and corresponded
with him since she had been at St. Diddulph's; and when the lady had
declared that the latter assertion was untrue, he had shaken his
head, and had told her that perhaps she did not know all. But the
misery of the man had its effect upon her, and at last she proposed
to be the bearer of a message to his wife. He had demanded to see his
child, offering to promise that he would not attempt to take the boy
by force on this occasion,--saying, also, that his claim by law was
so good, that no force could be necessary. It was proposed by Mrs.
Outhouse that he should first see the mother,--and to this he at last
assented. How blessed a thing would it be if these two persons could
be induced to forget the troubles of the last twelve months, and once
more to love and trust each other! "But, sir," said Mrs. Outhouse,
putting her hand upon his arm;--"you must not upbraid her, for
she will not bear it." "She knows nothing of what is due to a
husband," said Trevelyan, gloomily. The task was not hopeful; but,
nevertheless, the poor woman resolved to do her best.
And now Mrs. Outhouse was in her niece's room, asking her to go down
and see her husband. Little Louis had at the time been with the
nurse, and the very moment that the mother heard that the child's
father was in the house, she jumped up and rushed away to get
possession of her treasure. "Has he come for baby?" Nora asked in
dismay. Then Mrs. Outhouse, anxious to obtain a convert to her
present views, boldly declared that Mr. Trevelyan had no such
intention. Mrs. Trevelyan came back at once with the boy, and then
listened to all her aunt's arguments. "But I will not take baby with
me," she said. At last it was decided that she should go down alone,
and that the child should afterwards be taken to his father in the
drawing-room; Mrs. Outhouse pledging herself that the whole household
should combine in her defence if Mr. Trevelyan should attempt to take
the child out of that room. "But what am I to say to him?" she asked.
"Say as little as possible," said Mrs. Outhouse,--"except to make him
understand that he has been in error in imputing fault to you."
"He will never understand that," said Mrs. Trevelyan.
A considerable time elapsed after that before she could bring herself
to descend the stairs. Now that her husband was so near her, and that
her aunt had assured her that she might reinstate herself in her
position, if she could only abstain from saying hard words to him,
she wished that he was away from her again, in Italy. She knew that
she could not refrain from hard words. How was it possible that she
should vindicate her own honour, without asserting with all her
strength that she had been ill-used; and, to speak truth on the
matter, her love for the man, which had once been true and eager, had
been quelled by the treatment she had received. She had clung to her
love in some shape, in spite of the accusations made against her,
till she had heard that the policeman had been set upon her heels.
Could it be possible that any woman should love a man, or at least
that any wife should love a husband, after such usage as that? At
last she crept gently down the stairs, and stood at the parlour-door.
She listened, and could hear his steps, as he paced backwards and
forwards through the room. She looked back, and could see the face
of the servant peering round from the kitchen-stairs. She could not
endure to be watched in her misery, and, thus driven, she opened the
parlour-door. "Louis," she said, walking into the room, "Aunt Mary
has desired me to come to you."
"Emily!" he exclaimed, and ran to her and embraced her. She did not
seek to stop him, but she did not return the kiss which he gave her.
Then he held her by her hands, and looked into her face, and she
could see how strangely he was altered. She thought that she would
hardly have known him, had she not been sure that it was he. She
herself was also changed. Who can bear sorrow without such change,
till age has fixed the lines of the face, or till care has made them
hard and unmalleable? But the effect on her was as nothing to that
which grief, remorse, and desolation had made on him. He had had
no child with him, no sister, no friend. Bozzle had been his only
refuge,--a refuge not adapted to make life easier to such a man as
Trevelyan; and he,--in spite of the accusations made by himself
against his wife, within his own breast hourly since he had
left her,--had found it to be very difficult to satisfy his own
conscience. He told himself from hour to hour that he knew that he
was right; but in very truth he was ever doubting his own conduct.
"You have been ill, Louis," she said, looking at him.
"Ill at ease, Emily;--very ill at ease! A sore heart will make the
face thin, as well as fever or ague. Since we parted I have not had
much to comfort me."
"Nor have I,--nor any of us," said she. "How was comfort to come from
such a parting?"
Then they both stood silent together. He was still holding her by
the hand, but she was careful not to return his pressure. She would
not take her hand away from him; but she would show him no sign
of softness till he should have absolutely acquitted her of the
accusation he had made against her. "We are man and wife," he said
after awhile. "In spite of all that has come and gone I am yours, and
you are mine."
"You should have remembered that always, Louis."
"I have never forgotten it,--never. In no thought have I been untrue
to you. My heart has never changed since first I gave it you." There
came a bitter frown upon her face, of which she was so conscious
herself, that she turned her face away from him. She still remembered
her lesson, that she was not to anger him, and, therefore, she
refrained from answering him at all. But the answer was there, hot
within her bosom. Had he loved her,--and yet suspected that she was
false to him and to her vows, simply because she had been on terms
of intimacy with an old friend? Had he loved her, and yet turned her
from his house? Had he loved her,--and set a policeman to watch her?
Had he loved her, and yet spoken evil of her to all their friends?
Had he loved her, and yet striven to rob her of her child? "Will you
come to me?" he said.
"I suppose it will be better so," she answered slowly.
"Then you will promise me--" He paused, and attempted to turn her
towards him, so that he might look her in the face.
"Promise what?" she said, quickly glancing round at him, and drawing
her hand away from him as she did so.
"That all intercourse with Colonel Osborne shall be at an end."
"I will make no promise. You come to me to add one insult to another.
Had you been a man, you would not have named him to me after what you
have done to me."
"That is absurd. I have a right to demand from you such a pledge. I
am willing to believe that you have not--"
"Have not what?"
"That you have not utterly disgraced me."
"God in heaven, that I should hear this!" she exclaimed. "Louis
Trevelyan, I have not disgraced you at all,--in thought, in word, in
deed, in look, or in gesture. It is you that have disgraced yourself,
and ruined me, and degraded even your own child."
"Is this the way in which you welcome me?"
"Certainly it is,--in this way and in no other if you speak to me
of what is past, without acknowledging your error." Her brow became
blacker and blacker as she continued to speak to him. "It would be
best that nothing should be said,--not a word. That it all should be
regarded as an ugly dream. But, when you come to me and at once go
back to it all, and ask me for a promise--"
"Am I to understand then that all idea of submission to your husband
is to be at an end?"
"I will submit to no imputation on my honour,--even from you. One
would have thought that it would have been for you to preserve it
untarnished."
"And you will give me no assurance as to your future life?"
"None;--certainly none. If you want promises from me, there can be no
hope for the future. What am I to promise? That I will not have--a
lover? What respect can I enjoy as your wife if such a promise be
needed? If you should choose to fancy that it had been broken you
would set your policeman to watch me again! Louis, we can never live
together again ever with comfort, unless you acknowledge in your own
heart that you have used me shamefully."
"Were you right to see him in Devonshire?"
"Of course I was right. Why should I not see him,--or any one?"
"And you will see him again?"
"When papa comes, of course I shall see him."
"Then it is hopeless," said he, turning away from her.
"If that man is to be a source of disquiet to you, it is hopeless,"
she answered. "If you cannot so school yourself that he shall be the
same to you as other men, it is quite hopeless. You must still be
mad,--as you have been mad hitherto."
He walked about the room restlessly for a time, while she stood with
assumed composure near the window. "Send me my child," he said at
last.
"He shall come to you, Louis,--for a little; but he is not to be
taken out from hence. Is that a promise?"
"You are to exact promises from me, where my own rights are
concerned, while you refuse to give me any, though I am entitled to
demand them! I order you to send the boy to me. Is he not my own?"
"Is he not mine too? And is he not all that you have left to me?"
He paused again, and then gave the promise. "Let him be brought to
me. He shall not be removed now. I intend to have him. I tell you
so fairly. He shall be taken from you unless you come back to me
with such assurances as to your future conduct as I have a right to
demand. There is much that the law cannot give me. It cannot procure
wife-like submission, love, gratitude, or even decent matronly
conduct. But that which it can give me, I will have."
She walked off to the door, and then as she was quitting the room she
spoke to him once again. "Alas, Louis," she said, "neither can the
law, nor medicine, nor religion, restore to you that fine intellect
which foolish suspicions have destroyed." Then she left him and
returned to the room in which her aunt, and Nora, and the child
were all clustered together, waiting to learn the effects of the
interview. The two women asked their questions with their eyes,
rather than with spoken words. "It is all over," said Mrs. Trevelyan.
"There is nothing left for me but to go back to papa. I only hear the
same accusations, repeated again and again, and make myself subject
to the old insults." Then Mrs. Outhouse knew that she could interfere
no further, and that in truth nothing could be done till the return
of Sir Marmaduke should relieve her and her husband from all further
active concern in the matter.
But Trevelyan was still down-stairs waiting for the child. At last it
was arranged that Nora should take the boy into the drawing-room, and
that Mrs. Outhouse should fetch the father up from the parlour to the
room above it. Angry as was Mrs. Trevelyan with her husband, not the
less was she anxious to make the boy good-looking and seemly in his
father's eyes. She washed the child's face, put on him a clean frill
and a pretty ribbon; and, as she did so, she bade him kiss his papa,
and speak nicely to him, and love him. "Poor papa is unhappy," she
said, "and Louey must be very good to him." The boy, child though he
was, understood much more of what was passing around him than his
mother knew. How was he to love papa when mamma did not do so? In
some shape that idea had framed itself in his mind; and, as he was
taken down, he knew it was impossible that he should speak nicely
to his papa. Nora did as she was bidden, and went down to the
first-floor. Mrs. Outhouse, promising that even if she were put out
of the room by Mr. Trevelyan she would not stir from the landing
outside the door, descended to the parlour and quickly returned with
the unfortunate father. Mr. Outhouse, in the meantime, was still
sitting in his closet, tormented with curiosity, but yet determined
not to be seen till the intruder should have left his house.
"I hope you are well, Nora," he said, as he entered the room with
Mrs. Outhouse.
"Quite well, thank you, Louis."
"I am sorry that our troubles should have deprived you of the home
you had been taught to expect." To this Nora made no reply, but
escaped, and went up to her sister. "My poor little boy," said
Trevelyan, taking the child and placing it on his knee. "I suppose
you have forgotten your unfortunate father." The child, of course,
said nothing, but just allowed himself to be kissed.
"He is looking very well," said Mrs. Outhouse.
"Is he? I dare say he is well. Louey, my boy, are you happy?" The
question was asked in a voice that was dismal beyond compare, and it
also remained unanswered. He had been desired to speak nicely to his
papa, but how was it possible that a child should speak nicely under
such a load of melancholy? "He will not speak to me," said Trevelyan.
"I suppose it is what I might have expected." Then the child was put
off his knee on to the floor, and began to whimper. "A few months
since he would sit there for hours, with his head upon my breast,"
said Trevelyan.
"A few months is a long time in the life of such an infant," said
Mrs. Outhouse.
"He may go away," said Trevelyan. Then the child was led out of the
room, and sent up to his mother.
"Emily has done all she can to make the child love your memory," said
Mrs. Outhouse.
"To love my memory! What;--as though I were dead. I will teach him to
love me as I am, Mrs. Outhouse. I do not think that it is too late.
Will you tell your husband from me, with my compliments, that I shall
cause him to be served with a legal demand for the restitution of my
child?"
"But Sir Marmaduke will be here in a few days."
"I know nothing of that. Sir Marmaduke is nothing to me now. My child
is my own,--and so is my wife. Sir Marmaduke has no authority over
either one or the other. I find my child here, and it is here that
I must look for him. I am sorry that you should be troubled, but the
fault does not rest with me. Mr. Outhouse has refused to give me up
my own child, and I am driven to take such steps for his recovery as
the law has put within my reach."
"Why did you turn your wife out of doors, Mr. Trevelyan?" asked Mrs.
Outhouse boldly.
"I did not turn her out of doors. I provided a fitting shelter
for her. I gave her everything that she could want. You know what
happened. That man went down and was received there. I defy you, Mrs.
Outhouse, to say that it was my fault."
Mrs. Outhouse did attempt to show him that it was his fault; but
while she was doing so he left the house. "I don't think she could go
back to him," said Mrs. Outhouse to her husband. "He is quite insane
upon this matter."
"I shall be insane, I know," said Mr. Outhouse, "if Sir Marmaduke
does not come home very quickly." Nevertheless he quite ignored any
legal power that might be brought to bear against him as to the
restitution of the child to its father.
CHAPTER LXI.
PARKER'S HOTEL, MOWBRAY STREET.
Within a week of the occurrence which is related in the last chapter,
there came a telegram from Southampton to the parsonage at St.
Diddulph's, saying that Sir Marmaduke and Lady Rowley had reached
England. On the evening of that day they were to lodge at a small
family hotel in Baker Street, and both Mrs. Trevelyan and Nora were
to be with them. The leave-taking at the parsonage was painful, as
on both sides there existed a feeling that affection and sympathy
were wanting. The uncle and aunt had done their duty, and both Mrs.
Trevelyan and Nora felt that they ought to have been demonstrative
and cordial in their gratitude;--but they found it impossible to
become so. And the rector could not pretend but that he was glad to
be rid of his guests. There were, too, some last words about money to
be spoken, which were grievous thorns in the poor man's flesh. Two
bank notes, however, were put upon his table, and he knew that unless
he took them he could not pay for the provisions which his unwelcome
visitors had consumed. Surely there never was a man so cruelly
ill-used as had been Mr. Outhouse in all this matter. "Another such
winter as that would put me in my grave," he said, when his wife
tried to comfort him after they were gone. "I know that they have
both been very good to us," said Mrs. Trevelyan, as she and her
sister, together with the child and the nurse, hurried away towards
Baker Street in a cab, "but I have never for a moment felt that
they were glad to have us." "But how could they have been glad to
have us," she added afterwards, "when we brought such trouble with
us?" But they to whom they were going now would receive her with
joy;--would make her welcome with all her load of sorrows, would give
to her a sympathy which it was impossible that she should receive
from others. Though she might not be happy now,--for in truth how
could she be ever really happy again,--there would be a joy to her in
placing her child in her mother's arms, and in receiving her father's
warm caresses. That her father would be very vehement in his anger
against her husband she knew well,--for Sir Marmaduke was a vehement
man. But there would be some support for her in the very violence
of his wrath, and at this moment it was such support that she most
needed. As they journeyed together in the cab, the married sister
seemed to be in the higher spirits of the two. She was sure, at any
rate, that those to whom she was going would place themselves on her
side. Nora had her own story to tell about Hugh Stanbury, and was
by no means so sure that her tale would be received with cordial
agreement. "Let me tell them myself," she whispered to her sister.
"Not to-night, because they will have so much to say to you; but I
shall tell mamma to-morrow."
The train by which the Rowleys were to reach London was due at the
station at 7.30 p.m., and the two sisters timed their despatch from
St. Diddulph's so as to enable them to reach the hotel at eight. "We
shall be there now before mamma," said Nora, "because they will have
so much luggage, and so many things, and the trains are always late."
When they started from the door of the parsonage, Mr. Outhouse gave
the direction to the cabman, "Gregg's Hotel, Baker Street." Then at
once he began to console himself in that they were gone.
It was a long drive from St. Diddulph's in the east, to Marylebone in
the west, of London. None of the party in the cab knew anything of
the region through which they passed. The cabman took the line by the
back of the Bank, and Finsbury Square and the City Road, thinking it
best, probably, to avoid the crush at Holborn Hill, though at the
expense of something of a circuit. But of this Mrs. Trevelyan and
Nora knew nothing. Had their way taken them along Piccadilly, or
through Mayfair, or across Grosvenor Square, they would have known
where they were; but at present they were not thinking of those once
much-loved localities. The cab passed the Angel, and up and down the
hill at Pentonville, and by the King's Cross stations, and through
Euston Square,--and then it turned up Gower Street. Surely the man
should have gone on along the New Road, now that he had come so far
out of his way. But of this the two ladies knew nothing,--nor did the
nurse. It was a dark, windy night, but the lamps in the streets had
given them light, so that they had not noticed the night. Nor did
they notice it now as the streets became narrower and darker. They
were hardly thinking that their journey was yet at an end, and the
mother was in the act of covering her boy's face as he lay asleep on
the nurse's lap, when the cab was stopped. Nora looking out through
the window, saw the word "Hotel" over a doorway, and was satisfied.
"Shall I take the child, ma'am?" said a man in black, and the child
was handed out. Nora was the first to follow, and she then perceived
that the door of the hotel was not open. Mrs. Trevelyan followed;
and then they looked round them,--and the child was gone. They heard
the rattle of another cab as it was carried away at a gallop round a
distant corner;--and then some inkling of what had happened came upon
them. The father had succeeded in getting possession of his child.
It was a narrow, dark street, very quiet, having about it a certain
air of poor respectability,--an obscure, noiseless street, without
even a sign of life. Some unfortunate one had endeavoured here to
keep an hotel;--but there was no hotel kept there now. There had
been much craft in selecting the place in which the child had been
taken from them. As they looked around them, perceiving the terrible
misfortune which had befallen them, there was not a human being near
them save the cabman, who was occupied in unchaining, or pretending
to unchain the heavy mass of luggage on the roof. The windows of
the house before which they were stopping, were closed, and Nora
perceived at once that the hotel was not inhabited. The cabman must
have perceived it also. As for the man who had taken the child, the
nurse could only say that he was dressed in black, like a waiter,
that he had a napkin under his arm, and no hat on his head. He had
taken the boy tenderly in his arms,--and then she had seen nothing
further. The first thing that Nora had seen, as she stood on the
pavement, was the other cab moving off rapidly.
Mrs. Trevelyan had staggered against the railings, and was soon
screaming in her wretchedness. Before long there was a small crowd
around them, comprising three or four women, a few boys, an old man
or two,--and a policeman. To the policeman Nora had soon told the
whole story, and the cabman was of course attacked. But the cabman
played his part very well. He declared that he had done just what
he had been told to do. Nora was indeed sure that she had heard her
uncle desire him to drive to Gregg's Hotel in Baker Street. The
cabman in answer to this, declared that he had not clearly heard the
old gentleman's directions; but that a man whom he had conceived to
be a servant, had very plainly told him to drive to Parker's Hotel,
Mowbray Street, Gower Street. "I comed ever so far out of my way,"
said the cabman, "to avoid the rumpus with the homnibuses at the
hill,--cause the ladies' things is so heavy we'd never got up if the
'orse had once jibbed." All which, though it had nothing to do with
the matter, seemed to impress the policeman with the idea that the
cabman, if not a true man, was going to be too clever for them on
this occasion. And the crafty cabman went on to declare that his
horse was so tired with the load that he could not go on to Baker
Street. They must get another cab. Take his number! Of course they
could take his number. There was his number. His fare was four and
six,--that is if the ladies wouldn't pay him anything extra for the
terrible load; and he meant to have it. It would be sixpence more if
they kept him there many minutes longer. The number was taken, and
another cab was got, and the luggage was transferred, and the money
was paid, while the unhappy mother was still screaming in hysterics
against the railings. What had been done was soon clear enough to all
those around her. Nora had told the policeman, and had told one of
the women, thinking to obtain their sympathy and assistance. "It's
the kid's dada as has taken it," said one man, "and there ain't
nothing to be done." There was nothing to be done;--nothing at any
rate then and there.
Nora had been very eager that the cabman should be arrested; but the
policeman assured her that such an arrest was out of the question,
and would have been useless had it been possible. The man would be
forthcoming if his presence should be again desired, but he had
probably,--so said the policeman,--really been desired to drive to
Mowbray Street. "They knows where to find me if they wants me,--only
I must be paid my time," said the cabman confidently. And the
policeman was of opinion that as the boy had been kidnapped on behalf
of the father, no legal steps could be taken either for the recovery
of the child or for the punishment of the perpetrators of the act. He
got up, however, on the box of the cab, and accompanied the party to
the hotel in Baker Street. They reached it almost exactly at the same
time with Sir Marmaduke and Lady Rowley, and the reader must imagine
the confusion, the anguish, and the disappointment of that meeting.
Mrs. Trevelyan was hardly in possession of her senses when she
reached her mother, and could not be induced to be tranquil even when
she was assured by her father that her son would suffer no immediate
evil by being transferred to his father's hands. She in her frenzy
declared that she would never see her little one again, and seemed to
think that the father might not improbably destroy the child. "He is
mad, papa, and does not know what he does. Do you mean to say that a
madman may do as he pleases?--that he may rob my child from me in the
streets?--that he may take him out of my very arms in that way?" And
she was almost angry with her father because no attempt was made that
night to recover the boy.
Sir Marmaduke, who was not himself a good lawyer, had been closeted
with the policeman for a quarter of an hour, and had learned the
policeman's views. Of course, the father of the child was the person
who had done the deed. Whether the cabman had been in the plot or
not, was not matter of much consequence. There could be no doubt that
some one had told the man to go to Parker's Hotel, as the cab was
starting; and it would probably be impossible to punish him in the
teeth of such instructions. Sir Marmaduke, however, could doubtless
have the cabman summoned. And as for the absolute abduction of the
child, the policeman was of opinion that a father could not be
punished for obtaining possession of his son by such a stratagem,
unless the custody of the child had been made over to the mother
by some court of law. The policeman, indeed, seemed to think that
nothing could be done, and Sir Marmaduke was inclined to agree with
him. When this was explained to Mrs. Trevelyan by her mother, she
again became hysterical in her agony, and could hardly be restrained
from going forth herself to look for her lost treasure.
It need hardly be further explained that Trevelyan had planned the
stratagem in concert with Mr. Bozzle. Bozzle, though strongly
cautioned by his wife to keep himself out of danger in the matter,
was sorely tempted by his employer's offer of a hundred pounds.
He positively refused to be a party to any attempt at violence at
St. Diddulph's; but when he learned, as he did learn, that Mrs.
Trevelyan, with her sister and baby, were to be transferred from St.
Diddulph's in a cab to Baker Street, and that the journey was luckily
to be made during the shades of evening, his active mind went to
work, and he arranged the plan. There were many difficulties, and
even some pecuniary difficulty. He bargained that he should have his
hundred pounds clear of all deduction for expenses, and then the
attendant expenses were not insignificant. It was necessary that
there should be four men in the service, all good and true; and men
require to be well paid for such goodness and truth. There was the
man, himself an ex-policeman, who gave the instructions to the first
cabman, as he was starting. The cabman would not undertake the job at
all unless he were so instructed on the spot, asserting that in this
way he would be able to prove that the orders he obeyed came from
the lady's husband. And there was the crafty pseudo-waiter, with the
napkin and no hat, who had carried the boy to the cab in which his
father was sitting. And there were the two cabmen. Bozzle planned
it all, and with some difficulty arranged the preliminaries. How
successful was the scheme, we have seen; and Bozzle, for a month, was
able to assume a superiority over his wife, which that honest woman
found to be very disagreeable. "There ain't no fraudulent abduction
in it at all," Bozzle exclaimed, "because a wife ain't got no rights
again her husband,--not in such a matter as that." Mrs. Bozzle
implied that if her husband were to take her child away from her
without her leave, she'd let him know something about it. But as
the husband had in his possession the note for a hundred pounds,
realized, Mrs. Bozzle had not much to say in support of her view of
the case.
On the morning after the occurrence, while Sir Marmaduke was waiting
with his solicitor upon a magistrate to find whether anything could
be done, the following letter was brought to Mrs. Trevelyan at
Gregg's Hotel:--
Our child is safe with me, and will remain so. If you care
to obtain legal advice you will find that I as his father
have a right to keep him under my protection. I shall
do so; but will allow you to see him as soon as I shall
have received a full guarantee that you have no idea of
withdrawing him from my charge.
A home for yourself with me is still open to you,--on
condition that you will give me the promise that I have
demanded from you; and as long as I shall not hear that
you again see or communicate with the person to whose
acquaintance I object. While you remain away from me I
will cause you to be paid £50 a month, as I do not wish
that you should be a burden on others. But this payment
will depend also on your not seeing or holding any
communication with the person to whom I have alluded.
Your affectionate and offended husband,
LOUIS TREVELYAN.
A letter addressed to the Acrobats' Club will reach me.
Sir Rowley came home dispirited and unhappy, and could not give much
comfort to his daughter. The magistrate had told him that though the
cabman might probably be punished for taking the ladies otherwise
than as directed,--if the direction to Baker Street could be
proved,--nothing could be done to punish the father. The magistrate
explained that under a certain Act of Parliament the mother might
apply to the Court of Chancery for the custody of any children under
seven years of age, and that the court would probably grant such
custody,--unless it were shewn that the wife had left her husband
without sufficient cause. The magistrate could not undertake to say
whether or no sufficient cause had here been given;--or whether the
husband was in fault or the wife. It was, however, clear that nothing
could be done without application to the Court of Chancery. It
appeared,--so said the magistrate,--that the husband had offered a
home to his wife, and that in offering it he had attempted to impose
no conditions which could be shown to be cruel before a judge. The
magistrate thought that Mr. Trevelyan had done nothing illegal in
taking the child from the cab. Sir Marmaduke, on hearing this, was
of opinion that nothing could be gained by legal interference. His
private desire was to get hold of Trevelyan and pull him limb from
limb. Lady Rowley thought that her daughter had better go back to her
husband, let the future consequences be what they might. And the poor
desolate mother herself had almost brought herself to offer to do so,
having in her brain some idea that she would after a while be able to
escape with her boy. As for love for her husband, certainly there was
none now left in her bosom. Nor could she teach herself to think it
possible that she should ever live with him again on friendly terms.
But she would submit to anything with the object of getting back her
boy. Three or four letters were written to Mr. Trevelyan in as many
days from his wife, from Lady Rowley, and from Nora; in which various
overtures were made. Trevelyan wrote once again to his wife. She
knew, he said, already the terms on which she might come back. These
terms were still open to her. As for the boy, he certainly should not
leave his father. A meeting might be planned on condition that he,
Trevelyan, were provided with a written assurance from his wife that
she would not endeavour to remove the boy, and that he himself should
be present at the meeting.
Thus the first week was passed after Sir Marmaduke's return,--and a
most wretched time it was for all the party at Gregg's Hotel.
CHAPTER LXII.
LADY ROWLEY MAKES AN ATTEMPT.
[Illustration]
Nothing could be more uncomfortable than the state of Sir Marmaduke
Rowley's family for the first ten days after the arrival in London of
the Governor of the Mandarin Islands. Lady Rowley had brought with
her two of her girls,--the third and fourth,--and, as we know, had
been joined by the two eldest, so that there was a large family
of ladies gathered together. A house had been taken in Manchester
Street, to which they had intended to transfer themselves after a
single night passed at Gregg's Hotel. But the trouble and sorrow
inflicted upon them by the abduction of Mrs. Trevelyan's child, and
the consequent labours thrust upon Sir Marmaduke's shoulders had been
so heavy, that they had slept six nights at the hotel, before they
were able to move themselves into the house prepared for them. By
that time all idea had been abandoned of recovering the child by any
legal means to be taken as a consequence of the illegality of the
abduction. The boy was with his father, and the lawyers seemed to
think that the father's rights were paramount,--as he had offered a
home to his wife without any conditions which a court of law would
adjudge to be cruel. If she could shew that he had driven her to live
apart from him by his own bad conduct, then probably the custody of
her boy might be awarded to her, until the child should be seven
years old. But when the circumstances of the case were explained to
Sir Marmaduke's lawyer by Lady Rowley, that gentleman shook his head.
Mrs. Trevelyan had, he said, no case with which she could go into
court. Then by degrees there were words whispered as to the husband's
madness. The lawyer said that that was a matter for the doctors. If
a certain amount of medical evidence could be obtained to shew that
the husband was in truth mad, the wife could, no doubt, obtain the
custody of the child. When this was reported to Mrs. Trevelyan, she
declared that conduct such as her husband's must suffice to prove any
man to be mad; but at this Sir Marmaduke shook his head, and Lady
Rowley sat, sadly silent, with her daughter's hand within her own.
They would not dare to tell her that she could regain her child by
that plea.
During those ten days they did not learn whither the boy had been
carried, nor did they know even where the father might be found. Sir
Marmaduke followed up the address as given in the letter, and learned
from the porter at "The Acrobats" that the gentleman's letters
were sent to No. 55, Stony Walk, Union Street, Borough. To this
uncomfortable locality Sir Marmaduke travelled more than once. Thrice
he went thither, intent on finding his son-in-law's residence. On the
two first occasions he saw no one but Mrs. Bozzle; and the discretion
of that lady in declining to give any information was most admirable.
"Trewillian!" Yes, she had heard the name certainly. It might be that
her husband had business engagements with a gent of that name. She
would not say even that for certain, as it was not her custom ever
to make any inquiries as to her husband's business engagements. Her
husband's business engagements were, she said, much too important
for the "likes of she" to know anything about them. When was
Bozzle likely to be at home? Bozzle was never likely to be at home.
According to her showing, Bozzle was of all husbands the most
erratic. He might perhaps come in for an hour or two in the middle of
the day on a Wednesday, or perhaps would take a cup of tea at home on
Friday evening. But anything so fitful and uncertain as were Bozzle's
appearances in the bosom of his family was not to be conceived in the
mind of woman. Sir Marmaduke then called in the middle of the day on
Wednesday, but Bozzle was reported to be away in the provinces. His
wife had no idea in which of the provinces he was at that moment
engaged. The persevering governor from the islands called again on
the Friday evening, and then, by chance, Bozzle was found at home.
But Sir Marmaduke succeeded in gaining very little information
even from Bozzle. The man acknowledged that he was employed by Mr.
Trevelyan. Any letter or parcel left with him for Mr. Trevelyan
should be duly sent to that gentleman. If Sir Marmaduke wanted Mr.
Trevelyan's address, he could write to Mr. Trevelyan and ask for it.
If Mr. Trevelyan declined to give it, was it likely that he, Bozzle,
should betray it? Sir Marmaduke explained who he was at some length.
Bozzle with a smile assured the governor that he knew very well
who he was. He let drop a few words to show that he was intimately
acquainted with the whole course of Sir Marmaduke's family affairs.
He knew all about the Mandarins, and Colonel Osborne, and Gregg's
Hotel,--not that he said anything about Parker's Hotel,--and the
Colonial Office. He spoke of Miss Nora, and even knew the names of
the other two young ladies, Miss Sophia and Miss Lucy. It was a
weakness with Bozzle,--that of displaying his information. He would
have much liked to be able to startle Sir Marmaduke by describing
the Government House in the island, or by telling him something of
his old carriage-horses. But of such information as Sir Marmaduke
desired, Sir Marmaduke got none.
And there were other troubles which fell very heavily upon the poor
governor, who had come home as it were for a holiday, and who was a
man hating work naturally, and who, from the circumstances of his
life, had never been called on to do much work. A man may govern the
Mandarins and yet live in comparative idleness. To do such governing
work well a man should have a good presence, a flow of words which
should mean nothing, an excellent temper, and a love of hospitality.
With these attributes Sir Rowley was endowed; for, though his
disposition was by nature hot, for governing purposes it had been
brought by practice under good control. He had now been summoned
home through the machinations of his dangerous old friend Colonel
Osborne, in order that he might give the results of his experience in
governing before a committee of the House of Commons. In coming to
England on this business he had thought much more of his holiday, of
his wife and children, of his daughters at home, of his allowance per
day while he was to be away from his government, and of his salary to
be paid to him entire during his absence, instead of being halved as
it would be if he were away on leave,--he had thought much more in
coming home on these easy and pleasant matters, than he did on the
work that was to be required from him when he arrived. And then it
came to pass that he felt himself almost injured when the Colonial
Office demanded his presence from day to day, and when clerks
bothered him with questions as to which they expected ready replies,
but in replying to which Sir Marmaduke was by no means ready. The
working men at the Colonial Office had not quite thought that Sir
Marmaduke was the most fitting man for the job in hand. There was a
certain Mr. Thomas Smith at another set of islands in quite another
part of the world, who was supposed by these working men at home to
be a very paragon of a governor. If he had been had home,--so said
the working men,--no Committee of the House would have been able to
make anything of him. They might have asked him questions week after
week, and he would have answered them all fluently and would have
committed nobody. He knew all the ins and outs of governing,--did
Mr. Thomas Smith,--and was a match for the sharpest Committee that
ever sat at Westminster. Poor Sir Marmaduke was a man of a very
different sort; all of which was known by the working men; but
the Parliamentary interest had been too strong, and here was Sir
Marmaduke at home. But the working men were not disposed to make
matters so pleasant for Sir Marmaduke, as Sir Marmaduke had expected.
The Committee would not examine Sir Marmaduke till after Easter, in
the middle of April; but it was expected of him that he should read
blue-books without number, and he was so catechised by the working
men that he almost began to wish himself back at the Mandarins. In
this way the new establishment in Manchester Street was not at first
in a happy or even in a contented condition.
At last, after about ten days, Lady Rowley did succeed in obtaining
an interview with Trevelyan. A meeting was arranged through Bozzle,
and took place in a very dark and gloomy room at an inn in the City.
Why Bozzle should have selected the Bremen Coffee House, in Poulter's
Alley, for this meeting no fit reason can surely be given, unless
it was that he conceived himself bound to select the most dreary
locality within his knowledge on so melancholy an occasion. Poulter's
Alley is a narrow dark passage somewhere behind the Mansion House;
and the Bremen Coffee House,--why so called no one can now tell,--is
one of those strange houses of public resort in the City at which
the guests seem never to eat, never to drink, never to sleep, but to
come in and out after a mysterious and almost ghostly fashion, seeing
their friends,--or perhaps their enemies, in nooks and corners, and
carrying on their conferences in low, melancholy whispers. There is
an aged waiter at the Bremen Coffee House; and there is certainly
one private sitting-room up-stairs. It was a dingy, ill-furnished
room, with an old large mahogany table, an old horse-hair sofa, six
horse-hair chairs, two old round mirrors, and an old mahogany press
in a corner. It was a chamber so sad in its appearance that no
wholesome useful work could have been done within it; nor could men
have eaten there with any appetite, or have drained the flowing bowl
with any touch of joviality. It was generally used for such purposes
as that to which it was now appropriated, and no doubt had been
taken by Bozzle on more than one previous occasion. Here Lady Rowley
arrived precisely at the hour fixed, and was told that the gentleman
was waiting up-stairs for her.
There had, of course, been many family consultations as to the manner
in which this meeting should be arranged. Should Sir Marmaduke
accompany his wife;--or, perhaps, should Sir Marmaduke go alone? Lady
Rowley had been very much in favour of meeting Mr. Trevelyan without
any one to assist her in the conference. As for Sir Marmaduke, no
meeting could be concluded between him and his son-in-law without a
personal, and probably a violent quarrel. Of that Lady Rowley had
been quite sure. Sir Marmaduke, since he had been home, had, in the
midst of his various troubles, been driven into so vehement a state
of indignation against his son-in-law as to be unable to speak of
the wretched man without strongest terms of opprobrium. Nothing was
too bad to be said by him of one who had ill-treated his dearest
daughter. It must be admitted that Sir Marmaduke had heard only
one side of the question. He had questioned his daughter, and had
constantly seen his old friend Osborne. The Colonel's journey down
to Devonshire had been made to appear the most natural proceeding
in the world. The correspondence of which Trevelyan thought so much
had been shown to consist of such notes as might pass between any
old gentleman and any young woman. The promise which Trevelyan had
endeavoured to exact, and which Mrs. Trevelyan had declined to give,
appeared to the angry father to be a monstrous insult. He knew that
the Colonel was an older man than himself, and his Emily was still to
him only a young girl. It was incredible to him that anybody should
have regarded his old comrade as his daughter's lover. He did not
believe that anybody had, in truth, so regarded the man. The tale had
been a monstrous invention on the part of the husband, got up because
he had become tired of his young wife. According to Sir Marmaduke's
way of thinking, Trevelyan should either be thrashed within an inch
of his life, or else locked up in a mad-house. Colonel Osborne shook
his head, and expressed a conviction that the poor man was mad.
But Lady Rowley was more hopeful. Though she was as confident about
her daughter as was the father, she was less confident about the old
friend. She, probably, was alive to the fact that a man of fifty
might put on the airs and assume the character of a young lover;
and acting on that suspicion, entertaining also some hope that bad
as matters now were they might be mended, she had taken care that
Colonel Osborne and Mrs. Trevelyan should not be brought together.
Sir Marmaduke had fumed, but Lady Rowley had been firm. "If you think
so, mamma," Mrs. Trevelyan had said, with something of scorn in her
tone,--"of course let it be so." Lady Rowley had said that it would
be better so; and the two had not seen each other since the memorable
visit to Nuncombe Putney. And now Lady Rowley was about to meet her
son-in-law with some slight hope that she might arrange affairs.
She was quite aware that present indignation, though certainly a
gratification, might be indulged in at much too great a cost. It
would be better for all reasons that Emily should go back to her
husband and her home, and that Trevelyan should be forgiven for his
iniquities.
Bozzle was at the tavern during the interview, but he was not seen
by Lady Rowley. He remained seated down-stairs, in one of the dingy
corners, ready to give assistance to his patron should assistance be
needed. When Lady Rowley was shown into the gloomy sitting-room by
the old waiter, she found Trevelyan alone, standing in the middle of
the room, and waiting for her. "This is a sad occasion," he said, as
he advanced to give her his hand.
"A very sad occasion, Louis."
"I do not know what you may have heard of what has occurred, Lady
Rowley. It is natural, however, to suppose that you must have heard
me spoken of with censure."
"I think my child has been ill used, Louis," she replied.
"Of course you do. I could not expect that it should be otherwise.
When it was arranged that I should meet you here, I was quite aware
that you would have taken the side against me before you had heard
my story. It is I that have been ill used,--cruelly misused; but I
do not expect that you should believe me. I do not wish you to do.
I would not for worlds separate the mother from her daughter."
"But why have you separated your own wife from her child?"
"Because it was my duty. What! Is a father not to have the charge
of his own son? I have done nothing, Lady Rowley, to justify a
separation which is contrary to the laws of nature."
"Where is the boy, Louis?"
"Ah;--that is just what I am not prepared to tell any one who has
taken my wife's side till I know that my wife has consented to pay to
me that obedience which I, as her husband, have a right to demand. If
Emily will do as I request of her, as I command her,"--as Trevelyan
said this, he spoke in a tone which was intended to give the highest
possible idea of his own authority and dignity,--"then she may see
her child without delay."
"What is it you request of my daughter?"
"Obedience;--simply that. Submission to my will, which is surely a
wife's duty. Let her beg my pardon for what has occurred,--"
"She cannot do that, Louis."
"And solemnly promise me," continued Trevelyan, not deigning to
notice Lady Rowley's interruption, "that she will hold no further
intercourse with that snake in the grass who wormed his way into my
house,--let her be humble, and penitent, and affectionate, and then
she shall be restored to her husband and to her child." He said this
walking up and down the room, and waving his hand, as though he were
making a speech that was intended to be eloquent,--as though he had
conceived that he was to overcome his mother-in-law by the weight
of his words and the magnificence of his demeanour. And yet his
demeanour was ridiculous, and his words would have had no weight had
they not tended to show Lady Rowley how little prospect there was
that she should be able to heal this breach. He himself, too, was so
altered in appearance since she had last seen him, bright with the
hopes of his young married happiness, that she would hardly have
recognised him had she met him in the street. He was thin, and pale,
and haggard, and mean. And as he stalked up and down the room, it
seemed to her that the very character of the man was changed. She
had not previously known him to be pompous, unreasonable, and absurd.
She did not answer him at once, as she perceived that he had not
finished his address;--and, after a moment's pause, he continued.
"Lady Rowley, there is nothing I would not have done for your
daughter,--for my wife. All that I had was hers. I did not dictate to
her any mode of life; I required from her no sacrifices; I subjected
her to no caprices; but I was determined to be master in my own
house."
"I do not think, Louis, that she has ever denied your right to be
master."
"To be master in my own house, and to be paramount in my influence
over her. So much I had a right to demand."
"Who has denied your right?"
"She has submitted herself to the counsels and to the influences of a
man who has endeavoured to undermine me in her affection. In saying
that I make my accusation as light against her as is possible. I
might make it much heavier, and yet not sin against the truth."
"This is an illusion, Louis."
"Ah;--well. No doubt it becomes you to defend your child. Was it
an illusion when he went to Devonshire? Was it an illusion when he
corresponded with her,--contrary to my express orders,--both before
and after that unhallowed journey? Lady Rowley, there must be no more
such illusions. If my wife means to come back to me, and to have her
child in her own hands, she must be penitent as regards the past, and
obedient as regards the future."
There was a wicked bitterness in that word penitent which almost
maddened Lady Rowley. She had come to this meeting believing that
Trevelyan would be rejoiced to take back his wife, if details could
be arranged for his doing so which should not subject him to the
necessity of crying, peccavi; but she found him speaking of his wife
as though he would be doing her the greatest possible favour in
allowing her to come back to him dressed in sackcloth, and with ashes
on her head. She could understand from what she had heard that his
tone and manner were much changed since he obtained possession of
the child, and that he now conceived that he had his wife within his
power. That he should become a tyrant because he had the power to
tyrannise was not in accordance with her former conception of the
man's character;--but then he was so changed, that she felt that
she knew nothing of the man who now stood before her. "I cannot
acknowledge that my daughter has done anything that requires
penitence," said Lady Rowley.
"I dare say not; but my view is different."
"She cannot admit herself to be wrong when she knows herself to be
right. You would not have her confess to a fault, the very idea of
which has always been abhorrent to her?"
"She must be crushed in spirit, Lady Rowley, before she can again
become a pure and happy woman."
"This is more than I can bear," said Lady Rowley, now, at last,
worked up to a fever of indignation. "My daughter, sir, is as pure a
woman as you have ever known, or are likely to know. You, who should
have protected her against the world, will some day take blame to
yourself as you remember that you have so cruelly maligned her." Then
she walked away to the door, and would not listen to the words which
he was hurling after her. She went down the stairs, and out of the
house, and at the end of Poulter's Alley found the cab which was
waiting for her.
Trevelyan, as soon as he was alone, rang the bell, and sent for
Bozzle. And while the waiter was coming to him, and until his
myrmidon had appeared, he continued to stalk up and down the room,
waving his hand in the air as though he were continuing his speech.
"Bozzle," said he, as soon as the man had closed the door, "I have
changed my mind."
"As how, Mr. Trewillian?"
"I shall make no further attempt. I have done all that man can do,
and have done it in vain. Her father and mother uphold her in her
conduct, and she is lost to me,--for ever."
"But the boy, Mr. T.?"
"I have my child. Yes,--I have my child. Poor infant. Bozzle, I look
to you to see that none of them learn our retreat."
"As for that, Mr. Trewillian,--why facts is to be come at by one
party pretty well as much as by another. Now, suppose the things
was changed, wicey warsey,--and as I was hacting for the Colonel's
party."
"D---- the Colonel!" exclaimed Trevelyan.
"Just so, Mr. Trewillian; but if I was hacting for the other party,
and they said to me, 'Bozzle,--where's the boy?' why, in three days
I'd be down on the facts. Facts is open, Mr. Trewillian, if you knows
where to look for them."
"I shall take him abroad,--at once."
"Think twice of it, Mr. T. The boy is so young, you see, and a
mother's 'art is softer and lovinger than anything. I'd think twice
of it, Mr. T., before I kept 'em apart." This was a line of thought
which Mr. Bozzle's conscience had not forced him to entertain to the
prejudice of his professional arrangements; but now, as he conversed
with his employer, and became by degrees aware of the failure of
Trevelyan's mind, some shade of remorse came upon him, and made him
say a word on behalf of the "other party."
"Am I not always thinking of it? What else have they left me to think
of? That will do for to-day. You had better come down to me to-morrow
afternoon." Bozzle promised obedience to these instructions, and as
soon as his patron had started he paid the bill, and took himself
home.
Lady Rowley, as she travelled back to her house in Manchester Street,
almost made up her mind that the separation between her daughter and
her son-in-law had better be continued. It was a very sad conclusion
to which to come, but she could not believe that any high-spirited
woman could long continue to submit herself to the caprices of a
man so unreasonable and dictatorial as he to whom she had just been
listening. Were it not for the boy, there would, she felt, be no
doubt upon the matter. And now, as matters stood, she thought that
it should be their great object to regain possession of the child.
Then she endeavoured to calculate what would be the result to her
daughter, if in very truth it should be found that the wretched
man was mad. To hope for such a result seemed to her to be very
wicked;--and yet she hardly knew how not to hope for it.
"Well, mamma," said Emily Trevelyan, with a faint attempt at a smile,
"you saw him?"
"Yes, dearest, I saw him. I can only say that he is a most
unreasonable man."
"And he would tell you nothing of Louey?"
"No dear,--not a word."
CHAPTER LXIII.
SIR MARMADUKE AT HOME.
Nora Rowley had told her lover that there was to be no further
communication between them till her father and mother should be
in England; but in telling him so, had so frankly confessed her
own affection for him and had so sturdily promised to be true to
him, that no lover could have been reasonably aggrieved by such an
interdiction. Nora was quite conscious of this, and was aware that
Hugh Stanbury had received such encouragement as ought at any rate to
bring him to the new Rowley establishment, as soon as he should learn
where it had fixed itself. But when at the end of ten days he had
not shown himself, she began to feel doubts. Could it be that he had
changed his mind, that he was unwilling to encounter refusal from her
father, or that he had found, on looking into his own affairs more
closely, that it would be absurd for him to propose to take a wife to
himself while his means were so poor and so precarious? Sir Marmaduke
during this time had been so unhappy, so fretful, so indignant,
and so much worried, that Nora herself had become almost afraid of
him; and, without much reasoning on the matter, had taught herself
to believe that Hugh might be actuated by similar fears. She had
intended to tell her mother of what had occurred between her and
Stanbury the first moment that she and Lady Rowley were together; but
then there had fallen upon them that terrible incident of the loss
of the child, and the whole family had become at once so wrapped up
in the agony of the bereaved mother, and so full of rage against the
unreasonable father, that there seemed to Nora to be no possible
opportunity for the telling of her own love-story. Emily herself
appeared to have forgotten it in the midst of her own misery, and had
not mentioned Hugh Stanbury's name since they had been in Manchester
Street. We have all felt how on occasions our own hopes and fears,
nay, almost our own individuality, become absorbed in and obliterated
by the more pressing cares and louder voices of those around us. Nora
hardly dared to allude to herself while her sister's grief was still
so prominent, and while her father was daily complaining of his own
personal annoyances at the Colonial Office. It seemed to her that at
such a moment she could not introduce a new matter for dispute, and
perhaps a new subject of dismay.
Nevertheless, as the days passed by, and as she saw nothing of Hugh
Stanbury, her heart became sore and her spirit vexed. It seemed to
her that if she were now deserted by him, all the world would be
over for her. The Glascock episode in her life had passed by,--that
episode which might have been her history, which might have been a
history so prosperous, so magnificent, and probably so happy. As she
thought of herself and of circumstances as they had happened to her,
of the resolutions which she had made as to her own career when she
first came to London, and of the way in which she had thrown all
those resolutions away in spite of the wonderful success which had
come in her path, she could not refrain from thinking that she had
brought herself to shipwreck by her own indecision. It must not be
imagined that she regretted what she had done. She knew very well
that to have acted otherwise than she did when Mr. Glascock came
to her at Nuncombe Putney would have proved her to be heartless,
selfish, and unwomanly. Long before that time she had determined that
it was her duty to marry a rich man,--and, if possible, a man in
high position. Such a one had come to her,--one endowed with all the
good things of the world beyond her most sanguine expectation,--and
she had rejected him! She knew that she had been right because she
had allowed herself to love the other man. She did not repent what
she had done, the circumstances being as they were, but she almost
regretted that she had been so soft in heart, so susceptible of the
weakness of love, so little able to do as she pleased with herself.
Of what use to her was it that she loved this man with all her
strength of affection when he never came to her, although the time at
which he had been told that he might come was now ten days past?
She was sitting one afternoon in the drawing-room listlessly
reading, or pretending to read, a novel, when, on a sudden, Hugh
Stanbury was announced. The circumstances of the moment were most
unfortunate for such a visit. Sir Marmaduke, who had been down at
Whitehall in the morning, and from thence had made a journey to St.
Diddulph's-in-the-East and back, was exceedingly cross and out of
temper. They had told him at his office that they feared he would not
suffice to carry through the purpose for which he had been brought
home. And his brother-in-law, the parson, had expressed to him an
opinion that he was in great part responsible for the misfortune of
his daughter, by the encouragement which he had given to such a man
as Colonel Osborne. Sir Marmaduke had in consequence quarrelled both
with the chief clerk and with Mr. Outhouse, and had come home surly
and discontented. Lady Rowley and her eldest daughter were away,
closeted at the moment with Lady Milborough, with whom they were
endeavouring to arrange some plan by which the boy might at any
rate be given back. Poor Emily Trevelyan was humble enough now to
Lady Milborough,--was prepared to be humble to any one, and in any
circumstances, so that she should not be required to acknowledge that
she had entertained Colonel Osborne as her lover. The two younger
girls, Sophy and Lucy, were in the room when Stanbury was announced,
as was also Sir Marmaduke, who at that very moment was uttering angry
growls at the obstinacy and want of reason with which he had been
treated by Mr. Outhouse. Now Sir Marmaduke had not so much as heard
the name of Hugh Stanbury as yet; and Nora, though her listlessness
was all at an end, at once felt how impossible it would be to explain
any of the circumstances of her case in such an interview as this.
While, however, Hugh's dear steps were heard upon the stairs,
her feminine mind at once went to work to ascertain in what best
mode, with what most attractive reason for his presence, she might
introduce the young man to her father. Had not the girls been then
present, she thought that it might have been expedient to leave Hugh
to tell his own story to Sir Marmaduke. But she had no opportunity of
sending her sisters away; and, unless chance should remove them, this
could not be done.
"He is son of the lady we were with at Nuncombe Putney," she
whispered to her father as she got up to move across the room to
welcome her lover. Now Sir Marmaduke had expressed great disapproval
of that retreat to Dartmoor, and had only understood respecting it
that it had been arranged between Trevelyan and the family in whose
custody his two daughters had been sent away into banishment. He
was not therefore specially disposed to welcome Hugh Stanbury in
consequence of this mode of introduction.
Hugh, who had asked for Lady Rowley and Mrs. Trevelyan and had
learned that they were out before he had mentioned Miss Rowley's
name, was almost prepared to take his sweetheart into his arms. In
that half-minute he had taught himself to expect that he would meet
her alone, and had altogether forgotten Sir Marmaduke. Young men
when they call at four o'clock in the day never expect to find papas
at home. And of Sophia and Lucy he had either heard nothing or had
forgotten what he had heard. He repressed himself however in time,
and did not commit either Nora or himself by any very vehement
demonstration of affection. But he did hold her hand longer than he
should have done, and Sir Marmaduke saw that he did so.
"This is papa," said Nora. "Papa, this is our friend, Mr. Hugh
Stanbury." The introduction was made in a manner almost absurdly
formal, but poor Nora's difficulties lay heavy upon her. Sir
Marmaduke muttered something;--but it was little more than a grunt.
"Mamma and Emily are out," continued Nora. "I dare say they will be
in soon." Sir Marmaduke looked round sharply at the man. Why was he
to be encouraged to stay till Lady Rowley should return? Lady Rowley
did not want to see him. It seemed to Sir Marmaduke, in the midst of
his troubles, that this was no time to be making new acquaintances.
"These are my sisters, Mr. Stanbury," continued Nora. "This is
Sophia, and this is Lucy." Sophia and Lucy would have been thoroughly
willing to receive their sister's lover with genial kindness if they
had been properly instructed, and if the time had been opportune;
but, as it was, they had nothing to say. They, also, could only
mutter some little sound intended to be more courteous than their
father's grunt. Poor Nora!
"I hope you are comfortable here," said Hugh.
"The house is all very well," said Nora, "but we don't like the
neighbourhood."
Hugh also felt that conversation was difficult. He had soon come to
perceive,--before he had been in the room half a minute,--that the
atmosphere was not favourable to his mission. There was to be no
embracing or permission for embracing on the present occasion. Had he
been left alone with Sir Marmaduke he would probably have told his
business plainly, let Sir Marmaduke's manner to him have been what
it might; but it was impossible for him to do this with three young
ladies in the room with him. Seeing that Nora was embarrassed by
her difficulties, and that Nora's father was cross and silent, he
endeavoured to talk to the other girls, and asked them concerning
their journey and the ship in which they had come. But it was very
up-hill work. Lucy and Sophy could talk as glibly as any young
ladies home from any colony,--and no higher degree of fluency can
be expressed;--but now they were cowed. Their elder sister was
shamefully and most undeservedly disgraced, and this man had had
something,--they knew not what,--to do with it. "Is Priscilla quite
well?" Nora asked at last.
"Quite well. I heard from her yesterday. You know they have left the
Clock House."
"I had not heard it."
"Oh yes;--and they are living in a small cottage just outside the
village. And what else do you think has happened?"
"Nothing bad, I hope, Mr. Stanbury."
"My sister Dorothy has left her aunt, and is living with them again
at Nuncombe."
"Has there been a quarrel, Mr. Stanbury?"
"Well, yes;--after a fashion there has, I suppose. But it is a long
story and would not interest Sir Marmaduke. The wonder is that
Dorothy should have been able to stay so long with my aunt. I will
tell it you all some day." Sir Marmaduke could not understand why
a long story about this man's aunt and sister should be told to
his daughter. He forgot,--as men always do in such circumstances
forget,--that, while he was living in the Mandarins, his daughter,
living in England, would of course pick up new interest and become
intimate with new histories. But he did not forget that pressure
of the hand which he had seen, and he determined that his daughter
Nora could not have any worse lover than the friend of his elder
daughter's husband.
Stanbury had just determined that he must go, that there was no
possibility for him either to say or do anything to promote his cause
at the present moment, when the circumstances were all changed by the
return home of Lady Rowley and Mrs. Trevelyan. Lady Rowley knew, and
had for some days known, much more of Stanbury than had come to the
ears of Sir Marmaduke. She understood in the first place that the
Stanburys had been very good to her daughter, and she was aware that
Hugh Stanbury had thoroughly taken her daughter's part against his
old friend Trevelyan. She would therefore have been prepared to
receive him kindly had he not on this very morning been the subject
of special conversation between her and Emily. But, as it had
happened, Mrs. Trevelyan had this very day told Lady Rowley the
whole story of Nora's love. The elder sister had not intended to be
treacherous to the younger; but in the thorough confidence which
mutual grief and close conference had created between the mother
and daughter, everything had at last come out, and Lady Rowley had
learned the story, not only of Hugh Stanbury's courtship, but of
those rich offers which had been made by the heir to the barony of
Peterborough.
It must be acknowledged that Lady Rowley was greatly grieved and
thoroughly dismayed. It was not only that Mr. Glascock was the eldest
son of a peer, but that he was represented by the poor suffering wife
of the ill-tempered man to be a man blessed with a disposition sweet
as an angel's. "And she would have liked him," Emily had said, "if
it had not been for this unfortunate young man." Lady Rowley was not
worse than are other mothers, not more ambitious, or more heartless,
or more worldly. She was a good mother, loving her children, and
thoroughly anxious for their welfare. But she would have liked to
be the mother-in-law of Lord Peterborough, and she would have liked,
dearly, to see her second daughter removed from the danger of those
rocks against which her eldest child had been shipwrecked. And when
she asked after Hugh Stanbury, and his means of maintaining a wife,
the statement which Mrs. Trevelyan made was not comforting. "He
writes for a penny newspaper,--and, I believe, writes very well,"
Mrs. Trevelyan had said.
"For a penny newspaper! Is that respectable?"
"His aunt, Miss Stanbury, seemed to think not. But I suppose men of
education do write for such things now. He says himself that it is
very precarious as an employment."
"It must be precarious, Emily. And has he got nothing?"
"Not a penny of his own," said Mrs. Trevelyan.
Then Lady Rowley had thought again of Mr. Glascock, and of the family
title, and of Monkhams. And she thought of her present troubles, and
of the Mandarins, and the state of Sir Marmaduke's balance at the
bankers;--and of the other girls, and of all there was before her to
do. Here had been a very Apollo among suitors kneeling at her child's
feet, and the foolish girl had sent him away for the sake of a young
man who wrote for a penny newspaper! Was it worth the while of
any woman to bring up daughters with such results? Lady Rowley,
therefore, when she was first introduced to Hugh Stanbury, was not
prepared to receive him with open arms.
On this occasion the task of introducing him fell to Mrs. Trevelyan,
and was done with much graciousness. Emily knew that Hugh Stanbury
was her friend, and would sympathise with her respecting her child.
"You have heard what has happened to me?" she said. Stanbury,
however, had heard nothing of that kidnapping of the child. Though
to the Rowleys it seemed that such a deed of iniquity, done in the
middle of London, must have been known to all the world, he had not
as yet been told of it;--and now the story was given to him. Mrs.
Trevelyan herself told it, with many tears and an agony of fresh
grief; but still she told it as to one whom she regarded as a sure
friend, and from whom she knew that she would receive sympathy. Sir
Marmaduke sat by the while, still gloomy and out of humour. Why was
their family sorrow to be laid bare to this stranger?
"It is the cruellest thing I ever heard," said Hugh.
"A dastardly deed," said Lady Rowley.
"But we all feel that for the time he can hardly know what he does,"
said Nora.
"And where is the child?" Stanbury asked.
"We have not the slightest idea," said Lady Rowley. "I have seen him,
and he refuses to tell us. He did say that my daughter should see her
boy; but he now accompanies his offer with such conditions that it is
impossible to listen to him."
"And where is he?"
"We do not know where he lives. We can reach him only through a
certain man--"
"Ah, I know the man," said Stanbury; "one who was a policeman once.
His name is Bozzle."
"That is the man," said Sir Marmaduke. "I have seen him."
"And of course he will tell us nothing but what he is told to tell
us," continued Lady Rowley. "Can there be anything so horrible as
this,--that a wife should be bound to communicate with her own
husband respecting her own child through such a man as that?"
"One might possibly find out where he keeps the child," said Hugh.
"If you could manage that, Mr. Stanbury!" said Lady Rowley.
"I hardly see that it would do much good," said Hugh. "Indeed I do
not know why he should keep the place a secret. I suppose he has a
right to the boy until the mother shall have made good her claim
before the court." He promised, however, that he would do his best to
ascertain where the child was kept, and where Trevelyan resided, and
then,--having been nearly an hour at the house,--he was forced to
get up and take his leave. He had said not a word to any one of the
business that had brought him there. He had not even whispered an
assurance of his affection to Nora. Till the two elder ladies had
come in, and the subject of the taking of the boy had been mooted, he
had sat there as a perfect stranger. He thought that it was manifest
enough that Nora had told her secret to no one. It seemed to him
that Mrs. Trevelyan must have forgotten it;--that Nora herself must
have forgotten it, if such forgetting could be possible! He got up,
however, and took his leave, and was comforted in some slight degree
by seeing that there was a tear in Nora's eye.
"Who is he?" demanded Sir Marmaduke, as soon as the door was closed.
"He is a young man who was an intimate friend of Louis's," answered
Mrs. Trevelyan; "but he is so no longer, because he sees how
infatuated Louis has been."
"And why does he come here?"
[Illustration: "And why does he come here?"]
"We know him very well," continued Mrs. Trevelyan. "It was he
that arranged our journey down to Devonshire. He was very kind
about it, and so were his mother and sister. We have every reason
to be grateful to Mr. Stanbury." This was all very well, but
Nora nevertheless felt that the interview had been anything but
successful.
"Has he any profession?" asked Sir Marmaduke.
"He writes for the press," said Mrs. Trevelyan.
"What do you mean;--books?"
"No;--for a newspaper."
"For a penny newspaper," said Nora boldly--"for the Daily Record."
"Then I hope he won't come here any more," said Sir Marmaduke. Nora
paused a moment, striving to find words for some speech which might
be true to her love and yet not unseemly,--but finding no such words
ready, she got up from her seat and walked out of the room. "What is
the meaning of it all?" asked Sir Marmaduke. There was a silence for
a while, and then he repeated his question in another form. "Is there
any reason for his coming here,--about Nora?"
"I think he is attached to Nora," said Mrs. Trevelyan.
"My dear," said Lady Rowley, "perhaps we had better not speak about
it just now."
"I suppose he has not a penny in the world," said Sir Marmaduke.
"He has what he earns," said Mrs. Trevelyan.
"If Nora understands her duty she will never let me hear his name
again," said Sir Marmaduke. Then there was nothing more said, and as
soon as they could escape, both Lady Rowley and Mrs. Trevelyan left
the room.
"I should have told you everything," said Nora to her mother that
night. "I had no intention to keep anything a secret from you. But we
have all been so unhappy about Louey, that we have had no heart to
talk of anything else."
"I understand all that, my darling."
"And I had meant that you should tell papa, for I supposed that
he would come. And I meant that he should go to papa himself. He
intended that himself,--only, to-day,--as things turned out--"
"Just so, dearest;--but it does not seem that he has got any income.
It would be very rash,--wouldn't it?"
"People must be rash sometimes. Everybody can't have an income
without earning it. I suppose people in professions do marry without
having fortunes."
"When they have settled professions, Nora."
"And why is not his a settled profession? I believe he receives quite
as much at seven and twenty as Uncle Oliphant does at sixty."
"But your Uncle Oliphant's income is permanent."
"Lawyers don't have permanent incomes, or doctors,--or merchants."
"But those professions are regular and sure. They don't marry,
without fortunes, till they have made their incomes sure."
"Mr. Stanbury's income is sure. I don't know why it shouldn't be
sure. He goes on writing and writing every day, and it seems to me
that of all professions in the world it is the finest. I'd much
sooner write for a newspaper than be one of those old musty, fusty
lawyers, who'll say anything that they're paid to say."
"My dearest Nora, all that is nonsense. You know as well as I do that
you should not marry a man when there is a doubt whether he can keep
a house over your head;--that is his position."
"It is good enough for me, mamma."
"And what is his income from writing?"
"It is quite enough for me, mamma. The truth is I have promised, and
I cannot go back from it. Dear, dear mamma, you won't quarrel with
us, and oppose us, and make papa hard against us. You can do what you
like with papa. I know that. Look at poor Emily. Plenty of money has
not made her happy."
"If Mr. Glascock had only asked you a week sooner," said Lady Rowley,
with a handkerchief to her eyes.
"But you see he didn't, mamma."
"When I think of it I cannot but weep"--and the poor mother burst out
into a full flood of tears--"such a man, so good, so gentle, and so
truly devoted to you."
"Mamma, what's the good of that now?"
"Going down all the way to Devonshire after you!"
"So did Hugh, mamma."
"A position that any girl in England would have envied you. I cannot
but feel it. And Emily says she is sure he would come back if he got
the very slightest encouragement."
"That is quite impossible, mamma."
"Why should it be impossible? Emily declares that she never saw a man
so much in love in her life;--and she says also that she believes he
is abroad now simply because he is broken-hearted about it."
"Mr. Glascock, mamma, was very nice and good and all that; but indeed
he is not the man to suffer from a broken heart. And Emily is quite
mistaken. I told him the whole truth."
"What truth?"
"That there was somebody else that I did love. Then he said that of
course that put an end to it all, and he wished me good-bye ever so
calmly."
"How could you be so infatuated? Why should you have cut the ground
away from your feet in that way?"
"Because I chose that there should be an end to it. Now there has
been an end to it; and it is much better, mamma, that we should
not think about Mr. Glascock any more. He will never come again to
me,--and if he did, I could only say the same thing."
"You mustn't be surprised, Nora, if I'm unhappy; that is all. Of
course I must feel it. Such a connection as it would have been for
your sisters! Such a home for poor Emily in her trouble! And as for
this other man--"
"Mamma, don't speak ill of him."
"If I say anything of him, I must say the truth," said Lady Rowley.
"Don't say anything against him, mamma, because he is to be my
husband. Dear, dear mamma, you can't change me by anything you say.
Perhaps I have been foolish; but it is settled now. Don't make me
wretched by speaking against the man whom I mean to love all my life
better than all the world."
"Think of Louis Trevelyan."
"I will think of no one but Hugh Stanbury. I tried not to love him,
mamma. I tried to think that it was better to make believe that I
loved Mr. Glascock. But he got the better of me, and conquered me,
and I will never rebel against him. You may help me, mamma;--but you
can't change me."
CHAPTER LXIV.
SIR MARMADUKE AT HIS CLUB.
Sir Marmaduke had come away from his brother-in-law the parson in
much anger, for Mr. Outhouse, with that mixture of obstinacy and
honesty which formed his character, had spoken hard words of Colonel
Osborne, and words which by implication had been hard also against
Emily Trevelyan. He had been very staunch to his niece when attacked
by his niece's husband; but when his sympathies and assistance were
invoked by Sir Marmaduke it seemed as though he had transferred his
allegiance to the other side. He pointed out to the unhappy father
that Colonel Osborne had behaved with great cruelty in going to
Devonshire, that the Stanburys had been untrue to their trust in
allowing him to enter the house, and that Emily had been "indiscreet"
in receiving him. When a young woman is called indiscreet by her
friends it may be assumed that her character is very seriously
assailed. Sir Marmaduke had understood this, and on hearing the word
had become wroth with his brother-in-law. There had been hot words
between them, and Mr. Outhouse would not yield an inch or retract
a syllable. He conceived it to be his duty to advise the father
to caution his daughter with severity, to quarrel absolutely with
Colonel Osborne, and to let Trevelyan know that this had been done.
As to the child, Mr. Outhouse expressed a strong opinion that the
father was legally entitled to the custody of his boy, and that
nothing could be done to recover the child, except what might be
done with the father's consent. In fact, Mr. Outhouse made himself
exceedingly disagreeable, and sent away Sir Marmaduke with a very
heavy heart. Could it really be possible that his old friend Fred
Osborne, who seven or eight-and-twenty years ago had been potent
among young ladies, had really been making love to his old friend's
married daughter? Sir Marmaduke looked into himself, and conceived it
to be quite out of the question that he should make love to any one.
A good dinner, good wine, a good cigar, an easy chair, and a rubber
of whist,--all these things, with no work to do, and men of his own
standing around him were the pleasures of life which Sir Marmaduke
desired. Now Fred Osborne was an older man than he, and though Fred
Osborne did keep up a foolish system of padded clothes and dyed
whiskers, still,--at fifty-two or fifty-three,--surely a man might be
reckoned safe. And then, too, that ancient friendship! Sir Marmaduke,
who had lived all his life in the comparative seclusion of a colony,
thought perhaps more of that ancient friendship than did the Colonel,
who had lived amidst the blaze of London life, and who had had many
opportunities of changing his friends. Some inkling of all this
made its way into Sir Marmaduke's bosom, as he thought of it with
bitterness; and he determined that he would have it out with his
friend.
Hitherto he had enjoyed very few of those pleasant hours which he had
anticipated on his journey homewards. He had had no heart to go to
his club, and he had fancied that Colonel Osborne had been a little
backward in looking him up, and providing him with amusement. He had
suggested this to his wife, and she had told him that the Colonel had
been right not to come to Manchester Street. "I have told Emily,"
said Lady Rowley, "that she must not meet him, and she is quite of
the same opinion." Nevertheless, there had been remissness. Sir
Marmaduke felt that it was so, in spite of his wife's excuses. In
this way he was becoming sore with everybody, and very unhappy. It
did not at all improve his temper when he was told that his second
daughter had refused an offer from Lord Peterborough's eldest son.
"Then she may go into the workhouse for me," the angry father had
said, declaring at the same time that he would never give his consent
to her marriage with the man who "did dirty work" for the Daily
Record,--as he, with his paternal wisdom, chose to express it. But
this cruel phrase was not spoken in Nora's hearing, nor was it
repeated to her. Lady Rowley knew her husband, and was aware that he
would on occasions change his opinion.
It was not till two or three days after his visit to St. Diddulph's
that he met Colonel Osborne. The Easter recess was then over,
and Colonel Osborne had just returned to London. They met on the
door-steps of "The Acrobats," and the Colonel immediately began
with an apology. "I have been so sorry to be away just when you are
here;--upon my word I have. But I was obliged to go down to the
duchess's. I had promised early in the winter; and those people
are so angry if you put them off. By George, it's almost as bad as
putting off royalty."
"D----n the duchess," said Sir Marmaduke.
"With all my heart," said the Colonel;--"only I thought it as well
that I should tell you the truth."
"What I mean is, that the duchess and her people make no difference
to me. I hope you had a pleasant time; that's all."
"Well;--yes, we had. One must get away somewhere at Easter. There is
no one left at the club, and there's no House, and no one asks one to
dinner in town. In fact, if one didn't go away one wouldn't know what
to do. There were ever so many people there that I liked to meet.
Lady Glencora was there, and uncommon pleasant she made it. That
woman has more to say for herself than any half-dozen men that I
know. And Lord Cantrip, your chief, was there. He said a word or two
to me about you."
"What sort of a word?"
"He says he wishes you would read up some blue-books, or papers, or
reports, or something of that kind, which he says that some of his
fellows have sent you. It seems that there are some new rules, or
orders, or fashions, which he wants you to have at your fingers'
ends. Nothing could be more civil than he was,--but he just wished
me to mention this, knowing that you and I are likely to see each
other."
"I wish I had never come over," said Sir Marmaduke.
"Why so?"
"They didn't bother me with their new rules and fashions over there.
When the papers came somebody read them, and that was enough. I could
do what they wanted me to do there."
"And so you will here,--after a bit."
"I'm not so sure of that. Those young fellows seem to forget that
an old dog can't learn new tricks. They've got a young brisk fellow
there who seems to think that a man should be an encyclopedia of
knowledge because he has lived in a colony over twenty years."
"That's the new under-secretary."
"Never mind who it is. Osborne, just come up to the library, will
you? I want to speak to you." Then Sir Marmaduke, with considerable
solemnity, led the way up to the most deserted room in the club, and
Colonel Osborne followed him, well knowing that something was to be
said about Emily Trevelyan.
Sir Marmaduke seated himself on a sofa, and his friend sat close
beside him. The room was quite deserted. It was four o'clock in
the afternoon, and the club was full of men. There were men in the
morning-room, and men in the drawing-room, and men in the card-room,
and men in the billiard-room; but no better choice of a chamber for
a conference intended to be silent and secret could have been made
in all London than that which had induced Sir Marmaduke to take his
friend into the library of "The Acrobats." And yet a great deal of
money had been spent in providing this library for "The Acrobats."
Sir Marmaduke sat for awhile silent, and had he sat silent for an
hour, Colonel Osborne would not have interrupted him. Then, at last,
he began, with a voice that was intended to be serious, but which
struck upon the ear of his companion as being affected and unlike the
owner of it. "This is a very sad thing about my poor girl," said Sir
Marmaduke.
"Indeed it is. There is only one thing to be said about it, Rowley."
"And what's that?"
"The man must be mad."
"He is not so mad as to give us any relief by his madness,--poor as
such comfort would be. He has got Emily's child away from her, and
I think it will about kill her. And what is to become of her? As to
taking her back to the islands without her child, it is out of the
question. I never knew anything so cruel in my life."
"And so absurd, you know."
"Ah,--that's just the question. If anybody had asked me, I should
have said that you were the man of all men whom I could have best
trusted."
"Do you doubt it now?"
"I don't know what to think."
"Do you mean to say that you suspect me,--and your daughter too?"
"No;--by heavens! Poor dear. If I suspected her, there would be an
end of all things with me. I could never get over that. No; I don't
suspect her!" Sir Marmaduke had now dropped his affected tone, and
was speaking with natural energy.
"But you do me?"
"No;--if I did, I don't suppose I should be sitting with you here;
but they tell me--"
"They tell you what?"
"They tell me that,--that you did not behave wisely about it. Why
could you not let her alone when you found out how matters were
going?"
"Who has been telling you this, Rowley?"
Sir Marmaduke considered for awhile, and then remembering that
Colonel Osborne could hardly quarrel with a clergyman, told him the
truth. "Outhouse says that you have done her an irretrievable injury
by going down to Devonshire to her, and by writing to her."
"Outhouse is an ass."
"That is easily said;--but why did you go?"
"And why should I not go? What the deuce! Because a man like that
chooses to take vagaries into his head I am not to see my own
godchild!" Sir Marmaduke tried to remember whether the Colonel was in
fact the godfather of his eldest daughter, but he found that his mind
was quite a blank about his children's godfathers and godmothers.
"And as for the letters;--I wish you could see them. The only letters
which had in them a word of importance were those about your coming
home. I was anxious to get that arranged, not only for your sake, but
because she was so eager about it."
"God bless her, poor child," said Sir Marmaduke, rubbing the tears
away from his eyes with his red silk pocket-handkerchief.
"I will acknowledge that those letters,--there may have been one or
two,--were the beginning of the trouble. It was these that made this
man show himself to be a lunatic. I do admit that. I was bound not to
talk about your coming, and I told her to keep the secret. He went
spying about, and found her letters, I suppose,--and then he took
fire because there was to be a secret from him. Dirty, mean dog! And
now I'm to be told by such a fellow as Outhouse that it's my fault,
that I have caused all the trouble, because, when I happened to be in
Devonshire, I went to see your daughter!" We must do the Colonel the
justice of supposing that he had by this time quite taught himself to
believe that the church porch at Cockchaffington had been the motive
cause of his journey into Devonshire. "Upon my word it is too hard,"
continued he indignantly. "As for Outhouse,--only for the gown upon
his back, I'd pull his nose. And I wish that you would tell him that
I say so."
"There is trouble enough without that," said Sir Marmaduke.
"But it is hard. By G----, it is hard. There is this comfort;--if
it hadn't been me, it would have been some one else. Such a man as
that couldn't have gone two or three years, without being jealous of
some one. And as for poor Emily, she is better off perhaps with an
accusation so absurd as this, than she might have been had her name
been joined with a younger man, or with one whom you would have less
reason for trusting."
There was so much that seemed to be sensible in this, and it was
spoken with so well assumed a tone of injured innocence, that Sir
Marmaduke felt that he had nothing more to say. He muttered something
further about the cruelty of the case, and then slunk away out of the
club, and made his way home to the dull gloomy house in Manchester
Street. There was no comfort for him there;--but neither was there
any comfort for him at the club. And why did that vexatious Secretary
of State send him messages about blue books? As he went, he expressed
sundry wishes that he was back at the Mandarins, and told himself
that it would be well that he should remain there till he died.
CHAPTER LXV.
MYSTERIOUS AGENCIES.
[Illustration]
When the thirty-first of March arrived, Exeter had not as yet been
made gay with the marriage festivities of Mr. Gibson and Camilla
French. And this delay had not been the fault of Camilla. Camilla had
been ready, and when, about the middle of the month, it was hinted
to her that some postponement was necessary, she spoke her mind out
plainly, and declared that she was not going to stand that kind of
thing. The communication had not been made to her by Mr. Gibson in
person. For some days previously he had not been seen at Heavitree,
and Camilla had from day to day become more black, gloomy, and harsh
in her manners both to her mother and her sister. Little notes had
come and little notes had gone, but no one in the house, except
Camilla herself, knew what those notes contained. She would not
condescend to complain to Arabella; nor did she say much in
condemnation of her lover to Mrs. French, till the blow came. With
unremitting attention she pursued the great business of her wedding
garments, and exacted from the unfortunate Arabella an amount of work
equal to her own,--of thankless work, as is the custom of embryo
brides with their unmarried sisters. And she drew with great audacity
on the somewhat slender means of the family for the amount of
feminine gear necessary to enable her to go into Mr. Gibson's house
with something of the éclat of a well-provided bride. When Mrs.
French hesitated, and then expostulated, Camilla replied that she did
not expect to be married above once, and that in no cheaper or more
productive way than this could her mother allow her to consume her
share of the family resources. "What matter, mamma, if you do have to
borrow a little money? Mr. Burgess will let you have it when he knows
why. And as I shan't be eating and drinking at home any more, nor yet
getting my things here, I have a right to expect it." And she ended
by expressing an opinion, in Arabella's hearing, that any daughter
of a house who proves herself to be capable of getting a husband for
herself, is entitled to expect that those left at home shall pinch
themselves for a time, in order that she may go forth to the world in
a respectable way, and be a credit to the family.
Then came the blow. Mr. Gibson had not been at the house for some
days, but the notes had been going and coming. At last Mr. Gibson
came himself; but, as it happened, when he came, Camilla was out
shopping. In these days she often did go out shopping between eleven
and one, carrying her sister with her. It must have been but a poor
pleasure for Arabella, this witnessing the purchases made, seeing
the pleasant draperies, and handling the real linens and admiring
the fine cambrics spread out before them on the shop counters by
obsequious attendants. And the questions asked of her by her sister,
whether this was good enough for so august an occasion, or that
sufficiently handsome, must have been harassing. She could not have
failed to remember that it ought all to have been done for her,--that
had she not been treated with monstrous injustice, with most
unsisterly cruelty, all these good things would have been spread on
her behoof. But she went on and endured it, and worked diligently
with her needle, and folded and unfolded as she was desired, and
became as it were quite a younger sister in the house,--creeping out
by herself now and again into the purlieus of the city, to find such
consolation as she might receive from her solitary thoughts.
But Arabella and Camilla were both away when Mr. Gibson called to
tell Mrs. French of his altered plans. And as he asked, not for
his lady-love, but for Mrs. French herself, it is probable that he
watched his opportunity and that he knew to what cares his Camilla
was then devoting herself. "Perhaps it is quite as well that I should
find you alone," he said, after sundry preludes, to his future
mother-in-law, "because you can make Camilla understand this better
than I can. I must put off the day for about three weeks."
"Three weeks, Mr. Gibson?"
"Or a month. Perhaps we had better say the 29th of April." Mr. Gibson
had by this time thrown off every fear that he might have entertained
of the mother, and could speak to her of such an unwarrantable change
of plans with tolerable equanimity.
"But I don't know that that will suit Camilla at all."
"She can name any other day she pleases, of course;--that is, in
May."
"But why is this to be?"
"There are things about money, Mrs. French, which I cannot arrange
sooner. And I find that unfortunately I must go up to London." Though
many other questions were asked, nothing further was got out of
Mr. Gibson on that occasion; and he left the house with a perfect
understanding on his own part,--and on that of Mrs. French,--that the
marriage was postponed till some day still to be fixed, but which
could not and should not be before the 29th of April. Mrs. French
asked him why he did not come up and see Camilla. He replied,--false
man that he was,--that he had hoped to have seen her this morning,
and that he would come again before the week was over.
Then it was that Camilla spoke her mind out plainly. "I shall go to
his house at once," she said, "and find out all about it. I don't
understand it. I don't understand it at all; and I won't put up with
it. He shall know who he has to deal with, if he plays tricks upon
me. Mamma, I wonder you let him out of the house, till you had made
him come back to his old day."
"What could I do, my dear?"
"What could you do? Shake him out of it,--as I would have done. But
he didn't dare to tell me,--because he is a coward."
Camilla in all this showed her spirit; but she allowed her anger
to hurry her away into an indiscretion. Arabella was present, and
Camilla should have repressed her rage.
"I don't think he's at all a coward," said Arabella.
"That's my business. I suppose I'm entitled to know what he is better
than you."
"All the same I don't think Mr. Gibson is at all a coward," said
Arabella, again pleading the cause of the man who had misused her.
"Now, Arabella, I won't take any interference from you; mind that.
I say it was cowardly, and he should have come to me. It's my
concern, and I shall go to him. I'm not going to be stopped by any
shilly-shally nonsense, when my future respectability, perhaps, is
at stake. All Exeter knows that the marriage is to take place on the
31st of this month."
On the next day Camilla absolutely did go to Mr. Gibson's house at
an early hour, at nine, when, as she thought, he would surely be at
breakfast. But he had flown. He had left Exeter that morning by an
early train, and his servant thought that he had gone to London. On
the next morning Camilla got a note from him, written in London.
It affected to be very cheery and affectionate, beginning "Dearest
Cammy," and alluding to the postponement of his wedding as though
it were a thing so fixed as to require no further question. Camilla
answered this letter, still in much wrath, complaining, protesting,
expostulating;--throwing in his teeth the fact that the day had been
fixed by him, and not by her. And she added a postscript in the
following momentous words:--"If you have any respect for the name of
your future wife, you will fall back upon your first arrangement." To
this she got simply a line of an answer, declaring that this falling
back was impossible, and then nothing was heard of him for ten days.
He had gone from Tuesday to Saturday week;--and the first that
Camilla saw of him was his presence in the reading desk when he
chaunted the cathedral service as priest-vicar on the Sunday.
At this time Arabella was very ill, and was confined to her bed.
Mr. Martin declared that her system had become low from over
anxiety,--that she was nervous, weak, and liable to hysterics,--that
her feelings were in fact too many for her,--and that her efforts to
overcome them, and to face the realities of the world, had exhausted
her. This was, of course, not said openly, at the town-cross of
Exeter; but such was the opinion which Mr. Martin gave in confidence
to the mother. "Fiddle-de-dee!" said Camilla, when she was told of
feelings, susceptibilities, and hysterics. At the present moment she
had a claim to the undivided interest of the family, and she believed
that her sister's illness was feigned in order to defraud her of her
rights. "My dear, she is ill," said Mrs. French. "Then let her have
a dose of salts," said the stern Camilla. This was on the Sunday
afternoon. Camilla had endeavoured to see Mr. Gibson as he came out
of the cathedral, but had failed. Mr. Gibson had been detained within
the building,--no doubt by duties connected with the choral services.
On that evening he got a note from Camilla, and quite early on the
Monday morning he came up to Heavitree.
"You will find her in the drawing-room," said Mrs. French, as she
opened the hall-door for him. There was a smile on her face as she
spoke, but it was a forced smile. Mr. Gibson did not smile at all.
"Is it all right with her?" he asked.
"Well;--you had better go to her. You see, Mr. Gibson, young ladies,
when they are going to be married, think that they ought to have
their own way a little, just for the last time, you know." He took no
notice of the joke, but went with slow steps up to the drawing-room.
It would be inquiring too curiously to ask whether Camilla, when
she embraced him, discerned that he had fortified his courage that
morning with a glass of curacoa.
"What does all this mean, Thomas?" was the first question that
Camilla asked when the embrace was over.
"All what mean, dear?"
"This untoward delay. Thomas, you have almost broken my heart. You
have been away, and I have not heard from you."
"I wrote twice, Camilla."
"And what sort of letters? If there is anything the matter, Thomas,
you had better tell me at once." She paused, but Thomas held his
tongue. "I don't suppose you want to kill me."
"God forbid," said Thomas.
"But you will. What must everybody think of me in the city when
they find that it is put off? Poor mamma has been dreadful;--quite
dreadful! And here is Arabella now laid up on a bed of sickness."
This, too, was indiscreet. Camilla should have said nothing about her
sister's sickness.
"I have been so sorry to hear about dear Bella," said Mr. Gibson.
"I don't suppose she's very bad," said Camilla, "but of course we all
feel it. Of course we're upset. As for me, I bear up; because I've
that spirit that I won't give way if it's ever so; but, upon my word,
it tries me hard. What is the meaning of it, Thomas?"
But Thomas had nothing to say beyond what he had said before to Mrs.
French. He was very particular, he said, about money; and certain
money matters made it incumbent on him not to marry before the 29th
of April. When Camilla suggested to him that as she was to be his
wife, she ought to know all about his money matters, he told her that
she should,--some day. When they were married, he would tell her all.
Camilla talked a great deal, and said some things that were very
severe. Mr. Gibson did not enjoy his morning, but he endured the
upbraidings of his fair one with more firmness than might perhaps
have been expected from him. He left all the talking to Camilla; but
when he got up to leave her, the 29th of April had been fixed, with
some sort of assent from her, as the day on which she was really to
become Mrs. Gibson.
When he left the room, he again met Mrs. French on the landing-place.
She hesitated a moment, waiting to see whether the door would be
shut; but the door could not be shut, as Camilla was standing in
the entrance. "Mr. Gibson," said Mrs. French, in a voice that was
scarcely a whisper, "would you mind stepping in and seeing poor Bella
for a moment?"
"Why;--she is in bed," said Camilla.
"Yes;--she is in bed; but she thinks it would be a comfort to her.
She has seen nobody these four days except Mr. Martin, and she thinks
it would comfort her to have a word or two with Mr. Gibson." Now
Mr. Gibson was not only going to be Bella's brother-in-law, but
he was also a clergyman. Camilla in her heart believed that the
half-clerical aspect which her mother had given to the request was
false and hypocritical. There were special reasons why Bella should
not have wished to see Mr. Gibson in her bedroom, at any rate till
Mr. Gibson had become her brother-in-law. The expression of such a
wish at the present moment was almost indecent.
"You'll be there with them?" said Camilla. Mr. Gibson blushed up to
his ears as he heard the suggestion. "Of course you'll be there with
them, mamma."
"No, my dear, I think not. I fancy she wishes him to read to her,--or
something of that sort." Then Mr. Gibson, without speaking a word,
but still blushing up to his ears, was taken to Arabella's room; and
Camilla, flouncing into the drawing-room, banged the door behind her.
She had hitherto fought her battle with considerable skill and with
great courage;--but her very success had made her imprudent. She
had become so imperious in the great position which she had reached,
that she could not control her temper or wait till her power was
confirmed. The banging of that door was heard through the whole
house, and every one knew why it was banged. She threw herself on to
a sofa, and then, instantly rising again, paced the room with quick
step. Could it be possible that there was treachery? Was it on the
cards that that weak, poor creature, Bella, was intriguing once again
to defraud her of her husband? There were different things that she
now remembered. Arabella, in that moment of bliss in which she had
conceived herself to be engaged to Mr. Gibson, had discarded her
chignon. Then she had resumed it,--in all its monstrous proportions.
Since that it had been lessened by degrees, and brought down, through
various interesting but abnormal shapes, to a size which would hardly
have drawn forth any anathema from Miss Stanbury. And now, on this
very morning, Arabella had put on a clean nightcap, with muslin
frills. It is perhaps not unnatural that a sick lady, preparing
to receive a clergyman in her bedroom, should put on a clean
nightcap,--but to suspicious eyes small causes suffice to create
alarm. And if there were any such hideous wickedness in the wind, had
Arabella any colleague in her villainy? Could it be that the mother
was plotting against her daughter's happiness and respectability?
Camilla was well aware that her mamma would at first have preferred
to give Arabella to Mr. Gibson, had the choice in the matter been
left to her. But now, when the thing had been settled before all
the world, would not such treatment on a mother's part be equal to
infanticide? And then as to Mr. Gibson himself! Camilla was not
prone to think little of her own charms, but she had been unable
not to perceive that her lover had become negligent in his personal
attentions to her. An accepted lover, who deserves to have been
accepted, should devote every hour at his command to his mistress.
But Mr. Gibson had of late been so chary of his presence at
Heavitree, that Camilla could not but have known that he took no
delight in coming thither. She had acknowledged this to herself; but
she had consoled herself with the reflection that marriage would make
this all right. Mr. Gibson was not the man to stray from his wife,
and she could trust herself to obtain a sufficient hold upon her
husband hereafter, partly by the strength of her tongue, partly by
the ascendency of her spirit, and partly, also, by the comforts which
she would provide for him. She had not doubted but that it would be
all well when they should be married;--but how if, even now, there
should be no marriage for her? Camilla French had never heard of
Creusa and of Jason, but as she paced her mother's drawing-room that
morning she was a Medea in spirit. If any plot of that kind should be
in the wind, she would do such things that all Devonshire should hear
of her wrongs and of her revenge!
In the meantime Mr. Gibson was sitting by Arabella's bedside, while
Mrs. French was trying to make herself busy in her own chamber, next
door. There had been a reading of some chapter of the Bible,--or of
some portion of a chapter. And Mr. Gibson, as he read, and Arabella,
as she listened, had endeavoured to take to their hearts and to make
use of the word which they heard. The poor young woman, when she
begged her mother to send to her the man who was so dear to her, did
so with some half-formed condition that it would be good for her to
hear a clergyman read to her. But now the chapter had been read, and
the book was back in Mr. Gibson's pocket, and he was sitting with
his hand on the bed. "She is so very arrogant," said Bella,--"and
so domineering." To this Mr. Gibson made no reply. "I'm sure I have
endeavoured to bear it well, though you must have known what I have
suffered, Thomas. Nobody can understand it so well as you do."
"I wish I had never been born," said Mr. Gibson, tragically.
"Don't say that, Thomas,--because it's wicked."
"But I do. See all the harm I have done;--and yet I did not mean it."
"You must try and do the best you can now. I am not saying what that
should be. I am not dictating to you. You are a man, and, of course,
you must judge for yourself. But I will say this. You shouldn't do
anything just because it is the easiest. I don't suppose I should
live after it. I don't indeed. But that should not signify to you."
"I don't suppose that any man was ever before in such a terrible
position since the world began."
"It is difficult;--I am sure of that, Thomas."
"And I have meant to be so true. I fancy sometimes that some
mysterious agency interferes with the affairs of a man, and drives
him on,--and on,--and on,--almost,--till he doesn't know where it
drives him." As he said this in a voice that was quite sepulchral
in its tone, he felt some consolation in the conviction that this
mysterious agency could not affect a man without embuing him with
a certain amount of grandeur,--very uncomfortable, indeed, in its
nature, but still having considerable value as a counterpoise. Pride
must bear pain;--but pain is recompensed by pride.
"She is so strong, Thomas, that she can put up with anything," said
Arabella, in a whisper.
"Strong;--yes," said he, with a shudder;--"she is strong enough."
"And as for love--"
"Don't talk about it," said he, getting up from his chair. "Don't
talk about it. You will drive me frantic."
"You know what my feelings are, Thomas; you have always known them.
There has been no change since I was the young thing you first knew
me." As she spoke, she just touched his hand with hers; but he did
not seem to notice this, sitting with his elbow on the arm of his
chair and his forehead on his hand. In reply to what she said to him,
he merely shook his head,--not intending to imply thereby any doubt
of the truth of her assertion. "You have now to make up your mind and
to be bold, Thomas," continued Arabella. "She says that you are a
coward; but I know that you are no coward. I told her so, and she
said that I was interfering. Oh,--that she should be able to tell me
that I interfere when I defend you!"
"I must go," said Mr. Gibson, jumping up from his chair. "I must go.
Bella, I cannot stand this any longer. It is too much for me. I will
pray that I may decide aright. God bless you!" Then he kissed her
brow as she lay in bed, and hurried out of the room.
He had hoped to go from the house without further converse with any
of its inmates; for his mind was disturbed, and he longed to be at
rest. But he was not allowed to escape so easily. Camilla met him at
the dining-room door, and accosted him with a smile. There had been
time for much meditation during the last half hour, and Camilla had
meditated. "How do you find her, Thomas?" she asked.
"She seems weak, but I believe she is better. I have been reading to
her."
"Come in, Thomas;--will you not? It is bad for us to stand talking on
the stairs. Dear Thomas, don't let us be so cold to each other." He
had no alternative but to put his arm round her waist and kiss her,
thinking, as he did so, of the mysterious agency which afflicted him.
"Tell me that you love me, Thomas," she said.
"Of course I love you." The question is not a pleasant one when put
by a lady to a gentleman whose affections towards her are not strong,
and it requires a very good actor to produce an efficient answer.
"I hope you do, Thomas. It would be sad, indeed, if you did not. You
are not weary of your Camilla,--are you?"
For a moment there came upon him an idea that he would confess that
he was weary of her, but he found at once that such an effort was
beyond his powers. "How can you ask such a question?" he said.
"Because you do not--come to me." Camilla, as she spoke, laid her
head upon his shoulder, and wept. "And now you have been five minutes
with me and nearly an hour with Bella."
"She wanted me to read to her," said Mr. Gibson;--and he hated
himself thoroughly as he said it.
"And now you want to get away as fast as you can," continued Camilla.
"Because of the morning service," said Mr. Gibson. This was quite
true, and yet he hated himself again for saying it. As Camilla knew
the truth of the last plea, she was obliged to let him go; but she
made him swear before he went that he loved her dearly. "I think it's
all right," she said to herself as he went down the stairs. "I don't
think he'd dare make it wrong. If he does;--o-oh!"
Mr. Gibson, as he walked into Exeter, endeavoured to justify his
own conduct to himself. There was no moment, he declared to himself,
in which he had not endeavoured to do right. Seeing the manner in
which he had been placed among these two young women, both of whom
had fallen in love with him, how could he have saved himself from
vacillation? And by what untoward chance had it come to pass that he
had now learned to dislike so vigorously, almost to hate, the one
with whom he had been for a moment sufficiently infatuated to think
that he loved?
But with all his arguments he did not succeed in justifying to
himself his own conduct, and he hated himself.
CHAPTER LXVI.
OF A QUARTER OF LAMB.
Miss Stanbury, looking out of her parlour window, saw Mr. Gibson
hurrying towards the cathedral, down the passage which leads from
Southernhay into the Close. "He's just come from Heavitree, I'll be
bound," said Miss Stanbury to Martha, who was behind her.
"Like enough, ma'am."
"Though they do say that the poor fool of a man has become quite sick
of his bargain already."
"He'll have to be sicker yet, ma'am," said Martha.
"They were to have been married last week, and nobody ever knew why
it was put off. It's my belief he'll never marry her. And she'll be
served right;--quite right."
"He must marry her now, ma'am. She's been buying things all over
Exeter, as though there was no end of their money."
"They haven't more than enough to keep body and soul together," said
Miss Stanbury. "I don't see why I mightn't have gone to service this
morning, Martha. It's quite warm now out in the Close."
"You'd better wait, ma'am, till the east winds is over. She was at
Puddock's only the day before yesterday, buying bed-linen,--the
finest they had, and that wasn't good enough."
"Psha!" said Miss Stanbury.
"As though Mr. Gibson hadn't things of that kind good enough for
her," said Martha.
Then there was silence in the room for awhile. Miss Stanbury was
standing at one window, and Martha at the other, watching the people
as they passed backwards and forwards, in and out of the Close.
Dorothy had now been away at Nuncombe Putney for some weeks, and her
aunt felt her loneliness with a heavy sense of weakness. Never had
she entertained a companion in the house who had suited her as well
as her niece, Dorothy. Dorothy would always listen to her, would
always talk to her, would always bear with her. Since Dorothy had
gone, various letters had been interchanged between them. Though
there had been anger about Brooke Burgess, there had been no absolute
rupture; but Miss Stanbury had felt that she could not write and beg
her niece to come back to her. She had not sent Dorothy away. Dorothy
had chosen to go, because her aunt had had an opinion of her own as
to what was fitting for her heir; and as Miss Stanbury would not give
up her opinion, she could not ask her niece to return to her. Such
had been her resolution, sternly expressed to herself a dozen times
during these solitary weeks; but time and solitude had acted upon
her, and she longed for the girl's presence in the house. "Martha,"
she said at last, "I think I shall get you to go over to Nuncombe
Putney."
"Again, ma'am?"
"Why not again? It's not so far, I suppose, that the journey will
hurt you."
"I don't think it'd hurt me, ma'am;--only what good will I do?"
"If you'll go rightly to work, you may do good. Miss Dorothy was a
fool to go the way she did;--a great fool."
"She stayed longer than I thought she would, ma'am."
"I'm not asking you what you thought. I'll tell you what. Do you send
Giles to Winslow's, and tell them to send in early to-morrow a nice
fore-quarter of lamb. Or it wouldn't hurt you if you went and chose
it yourself."
"It wouldn't hurt me at all, ma'am."
"You get it nice;--not too small, because meat is meat at the price
things are now; and how they ever see butcher's meat at all is more
than I can understand."
"People as has to be careful, ma'am, makes a little go a long way."
"You get it a good size, and take it over in a basket. It won't hurt
you, done up clean in a napkin."
"It won't hurt me at all, ma'am."
"And you give it to Miss Dorothy with my love. Don't you let 'em
think I sent it to my sister-in-law."
"And is that to be all, ma'am?"
"How do you mean all?"
"Because, ma'am, the railway and the carrier would take it quite
ready, and there would be a matter of ten or twelve shillings saved
in the journey."
"Whose affair is that?"
"Not mine, ma'am, of course."
"I believe you are afraid of the trouble, Martha. Or else you don't
like going because they're poor."
"It ain't fair, ma'am, of you to say so;--that it ain't. All I ask
is,--is that to be all? When I've giv'em the lamb, am I just to come
away straight, or am I to say anything? It will look so odd if I'm
just to put down the basket and come away without e'er a word."
"Martha!"
"Yes, ma'am."
"You're a fool."
"That's true, too, ma'am."
"It would be like you to go about in that dummy way,--wouldn't
it;--and you that was so fond of Miss Dorothy."
"I was fond of her, ma'am."
"Of course you'll be talking to her;--and why not? And if she should
say anything about returning--"
"Yes, ma'am."
"You can say that you know her old aunt wouldn't,--wouldn't refuse
to have her back again. You can put it your own way, you know. You
needn't make me find words for you."
"But she won't, ma'am."
"Won't what?"
"Won't say anything about returning."
"Yes, she will, Martha, if you talk to her rightly." The servant
didn't reply for awhile, but stood looking out of the window. "You
might as well go about the lamb at once, Martha."
"So I will, ma'am, when I've got it out, all clear."
"What do you mean by that?"
"Why,--just this, ma'am. May I tell Miss Dolly straight out that you
want her to come back, and that I've been sent to say so?"
"No, Martha."
"Then how am I to do it, ma'am?"
"Do it out of your own head, just as it comes up at the moment."
"Out of my own head, ma'am?"
"Yes;--just as you feel, you know."
"Just as I feel, ma'am?"
"You understand what I mean, Martha."
"I'll do my best, ma'am, and I can't say no more. And if you scolds
me afterwards, ma'am,--why, of course, I must put up with it."
"But I won't scold you, Martha."
"Then I'll go out to Winslow's about the lamb at once, ma'am."
"Very nice, and not too small, Martha."
Martha went out and ordered the lamb, and packed it as desired quite
clean in a napkin, and fitted it into the basket, and arranged with
Giles Hickbody to carry it down for her early in the morning to the
station, so that she might take the first train to Lessborough. It
was understood that she was to hire a fly at Lessborough to take her
to Nuncombe Putney. Now that she understood the importance of her
mission and was aware that the present she took with her was only
the customary accompaniment of an ambassadress entrusted with a
great mission, Martha said nothing even about the expense. The train
started for Lessborough at seven, and as she was descending from her
room at six, Miss Stanbury, in her flannel dressing-gown, stepped
out of the door of her own room. "Just put this in the basket," said
she, handing a note to her servant. "I thought last night I'd write a
word. Just put it in the basket and say nothing about it." The note
which she sent was as follows:--
The Close, 8th April, 186--.
MY DEAR DOROTHY,--
As Martha talks of going over to pay you a visit, I've
thought that I'd just get her to take you a quarter of
lamb, which is coming in now very nice. I do envy her
going to see you, my dear, for I had gotten somehow to
love to see your pretty face. I'm getting almost strong
again; but Sir Peter, who was here this afternoon, just
calling as a friend, was uncivil enough to say that I'm
too much of an old woman to go out in the east wind. I
told him it didn't much matter;--for the sooner old women
made way for young ones, the better.
I am very desolate and solitary here. But I rather think
that women who don't get married are intended to be
desolate; and perhaps it is better for them, if they
bestow their time and thoughts properly,--as I hope you
do, my dear. A woman with a family of children has almost
too many of the cares of this world, to give her mind as
she ought to the other. What shall we say then of those
who have no such cares, and yet do not walk uprightly?
Dear Dorothy, be not such a one. For myself, I acknowledge
bitterly the extent of my shortcomings. Much has been
given to me; but if much be expected, how shall I answer
the demand?
I hope I need not tell you that whenever it may suit you
to pay a visit to Exeter, your room will be ready for you,
and there will be a warm welcome. Mrs. MacHugh always asks
after you; and so has Mrs. Clifford. I won't tell you
what Mrs. Clifford said about your colour, because it
would make you vain. The Heavitree affair has all been put
off;--of course you have heard that. Dear, dear, dear! You
know what I think, so I need not repeat it.
Give my respects to your mamma and Priscilla,--and for
yourself, accept the affectionate love of
Your loving old aunt,
JEMIMA STANBURY.
P.S.--If Martha should say anything to you, you may feel
sure that she knows my mind.
Poor old soul. She felt an almost uncontrollable longing to have her
niece back again, and yet she told herself that she was bound not
to send a regular invitation, or to suggest an unconditional return.
Dorothy had herself decided to take her departure, and if she chose
to remain away,--so it must be. She, Miss Stanbury, could not demean
herself by renewing her invitation. She read her letter before she
added to it the postscript, and felt that it was too solemn in its
tone to suggest to Dorothy that which she wished to suggest. She had
been thinking much of her own past life when she wrote those words
about the state of an unmarried woman, and was vacillating between
two minds,--whether it were better for a young woman to look forward
to the cares and affections, and perhaps hard usage, of a married
life; or to devote herself to the easier and safer course of an
old maid's career. But an old maid is nothing if she be not kind
and good. She acknowledged that, and, acknowledging it, added the
postscript to her letter. What though there was a certain blow
to her pride in the writing of it! She did tell herself that in
thus referring her niece to Martha for an expression of her own
mind,--after that conversation which she and Martha had had in the
parlour,--she was in truth eating her own words. But the postscript
was written, and though she took the letter up with her to her own
room in order that she might alter the words if she repented of them
in the night, the letter was sent as it was written,--postscript and
all.
She spent the next day with very sober thoughts. When Mrs. MacHugh
called upon her and told her that there were rumours afloat in
Exeter that the marriage between Camilla French and Mr. Gibson would
certainly be broken off, in spite of all purchases that had been
made, she merely remarked that they were two poor, feckless things,
who didn't know their own minds. "Camilla knows hers plain enough,"
said Mrs. MacHugh sharply; but even this did not give Miss Stanbury
any spirit. She waited, and waited patiently, till Martha should
return, thinking of the sweet pink colour which used to come and
go in Dorothy's cheeks,--which she had been wont to observe so
frequently, not knowing that she had observed it and loved it.
CHAPTER LXVII.
RIVER'S COTTAGE.
Three days after Hugh Stanbury's visit to Manchester Street, he wrote
a note to Lady Rowley, telling her of the address at which might be
found both Trevelyan and his son. As Bozzle had acknowledged, facts
are things which may be found out. Hugh had gone to work somewhat
after the Bozzlian fashion, and had found out this fact. "He lives at
a place called River's Cottage, at Willesden," wrote Stanbury. "If
you turn off the Harrow Road to the right, about a mile beyond the
cemetery, you will find the cottage on the left hand side of the lane
about a quarter of a mile from the Harrow Road. I believe you can go
to Willesden by railway, but you had better take a cab from London."
There was much consultation respecting this letter between Lady
Rowley and Mrs. Trevelyan, and it was decided that it should not
be shown to Sir Marmaduke. To see her child was at the present
moment the most urgent necessity of the poor mother, and both the
ladies felt that Sir Marmaduke in his wrath might probably impede
rather than assist her in this desire. If told where he might find
Trevelyan, he would probably insist on starting in quest of his
son-in-law himself, and the distance between the mother and her child
might become greater in consequence, instead of less. There were many
consultations; and the upshot of these was, that Lady Rowley and her
daughter determined to start for Willesden without saying anything to
Sir Marmaduke of the purpose they had in hand. When Emily expressed
her conviction that if Trevelyan should be away from home they would
probably be able to make their way into the house,--so as to see the
child, Lady Rowley with some hesitation acknowledged that such might
be the case. But the child's mother said nothing to her own mother of
a scheme which she had half formed of so clinging to her boy that no
human power should separate them.
They started in a cab, as advised by Stanbury, and were driven to a
point on the road from which a lane led down to Willesden, passing by
River's Cottage. They asked as they came along, and met no difficulty
in finding their way. At the point on the road indicated, there was
a country inn for hay-waggoners, and here Lady Rowley proposed that
they should leave their cab, urging that it might be best to call at
the cottage in the quietest manner possible; but Mrs. Trevelyan, with
her scheme in her head for the recapture of their child, begged that
the cab might go on;--and thus they were driven up to the door.
River's Cottage was not a prepossessing abode. It was a new building,
of light-coloured bricks, with a door in the middle and one window
on each side. Over the door was a stone tablet, bearing the
name,--River's Cottage. There was a little garden between the
road and the house, across which there was a straight path to the
door. In front of one window was a small shrub, generally called
a puzzle-monkey, and in front of the other was a variegated laurel.
There were two small morsels of green turf, and a distant view round
the corner of the house of a row of cabbage stumps. If Trevelyan were
living there, he had certainly come down in the world since the days
in which he had occupied the house in Curzon Street. The two ladies
got out of the cab, and slowly walked across the little garden. Mrs.
Trevelyan was dressed in black, and she wore a thick veil. She had
altogether been unable to make up her mind as to what should be her
conduct to her husband should she see him. That must be governed by
circumstances as they might occur. Her visit was made not to him, but
to her boy.
The door was opened before they knocked, and Trevelyan himself was
standing in the narrow passage. Lady Rowley was the first to speak.
"Louis," she said, "I have brought your wife to see you."
"Who told you that I was here?" he asked, still standing in the
passage.
"Of course a mother would find out where was her child," said Lady
Rowley.
"You should not have come here without notice," he said. "I was
careful to let you know the conditions on which you should come."
"You do not mean that I shall not see my child," said the mother.
"Oh, Louis, you will let me see him."
Trevelyan hesitated a moment, still keeping his position firmly in
the doorway. By this time an old woman, decently dressed and of
comfortable appearance, had taken her place behind him, and behind
her was a slip of a girl about fifteen years of age. This was the
owner of River's Cottage and her daughter, and all the inhabitants
of the cottage were now there, standing in the passage. "I ought not
to let you see him," said Trevelyan; "you have intruded upon me in
coming here! I had not wished to see you here,--till you had complied
with the order I had given you." What a meeting between a husband and
a wife who had not seen each other now for many months,--between a
husband and a wife who were still young enough not to have outlived
the first impulses of their early love! He still stood there guarding
the way, and had not even put out his hand to greet her. He was
guarding the way lest she should, without his permission, obtain
access to her own child! She had not removed her veil, and now she
hardly dared to step over the threshold of her husband's house. At
this moment, she perceived that the woman behind was pointing to
the room on the left, as the cottage was entered, and Emily at once
understood that her boy was there. Then at that moment she heard her
son's voice, as, in his solitude, the child began to cry. "I must go
in," she said; "I will go in;" and rushing on she tried to push aside
her husband. Her mother aided her, nor did Trevelyan attempt to stop
her with violence, and in a moment she was kneeling at the foot of a
small sofa, with her child in her arms. "I had not intended to hinder
you," said Trevelyan, "but I require from you a promise that you will
not attempt to remove him."
"Why should she not take him home with her?" said Lady Rowley.
"Because I will not have it so," replied Trevelyan. "Because I choose
that it should be understood that I am to be the master of my own
affairs."
Mrs. Trevelyan had now thrown aside her bonnet and her veil, and was
covering her child with caresses. The poor little fellow, whose mind
had been utterly dismayed by the events which had occurred to him
since his capture, though he returned her kisses, did so in fear
and trembling. And he was still sobbing, rubbing his eyes with his
knuckles, and by no means yielding himself with his whole heart to
his mother's tenderness,--as she would have had him do. "Louey,"
she said, whispering to him, "you know mamma; you haven't forgotten
mamma?" He half murmured some little infantine word through his sobs,
and then put his cheek up to be pressed against his mother's face.
"Louey will never, never forget his own mamma; will he, Louey?" The
poor boy had no assurances to give, and could only raise his cheek
again to be kissed. In the meantime Lady Rowley and Trevelyan were
standing by, not speaking to each other, regarding the scene in
silence.
[Illustration: "You haven't forgotten Mamma?"]
She,--Lady Rowley,--could see that he was frightfully altered in
appearance, even since the day on which she had so lately met him
in the City. His cheeks were thin and haggard, and his eyes were
deep and very bright,--and he moved them quickly from side to side,
as though ever suspecting something. He seemed to be smaller in
stature,--withered, as it were, as though he had melted away. And
though he stood looking upon his wife and child, he was not for a
moment still. He would change the posture of his hands and arms,
moving them quickly with little surreptitious jerks, and would
shuffle his feet upon the floor, almost without altering his
position. His clothes hung about him, and his linen was soiled and
worn. Lady Rowley noticed this especially, as he had been a man
peculiarly given to neatness of apparel. He was the first to speak.
"You have come down here in a cab?" said he.
"Yes,--in a cab, from London," said Lady Rowley.
"Of course you will go back in it? You cannot stay here. There is no
accommodation. It is a wretched place, but it suits the boy. As for
me, all places are now alike."
"Louis," said his wife, springing up from her knees, coming to him,
and taking his right hand between both her own, "you will let me take
him with me. I know you will let me take him with me."
"I cannot do that, Emily; it would be wrong."
"Wrong to restore a child to his mother? Oh, Louis, think of it. What
must my life be without him,--or you?"
"Don't talk of me. It is too late for that."
"Not if you will be reasonable, Louis, and listen to me. Oh, heavens,
how ill you are!" As she said this she drew nearer to him, so that
her face was almost close to his. "Louis, come back; come back, and
let it all be forgotten. It shall be a dream, a horrid dream, and
nobody shall speak of it." He left his hand within hers and stood
looking into her face. He was well aware that his life since he had
left her had been one long hour of misery. There had been to him no
alleviation, no comfort, no consolation. He had not a friend left to
him. Even his satellite, the policeman, was becoming weary of him and
manifestly suspicious. The woman with whom he was now lodging, and
whose resources were infinitely benefited by his payments to her, had
already thrown out hints that she was afraid of him. And as he looked
at his wife, he knew that he loved her. Everything for him now was
hot and dry and poor and bitter. How sweet would it be again to sit
with her soft hand in his, to feel her cool brow against his own, to
have the comfort of her care, and to hear the music of loving words!
The companionship of his wife had once been to him everything in the
world; but now, for many months past, he had known no companion. She
bade him come to her, and look upon all this trouble as a dream not
to be mentioned. Could it be possible that it should be so, and that
they might yet be happy together,--perhaps in some distant country,
where the story of all their misery might not be known? He felt all
this truly and with a keen accuracy. If he were mad, he was not all
mad. "I will tell you of nothing that is past," said she, hanging to
him, and coming still nearer to him, and embracing his arm.
Could she have condescended to ask him not to tell her of the
past;--had it occurred to her so to word her request,--she might
perhaps have prevailed. But who can say how long the tenderness of
his heart would have saved him from further outbreak;--and whether
such prevailing on her part would have been of permanent service? As
it was, her words wounded him in that spot of his inner self which
was most sensitive,--on that spot from whence had come all his fury.
A black cloud came upon his brow, and he made an effort to withdraw
himself from her grasp. It was necessary to him that she should in
some fashion own that he had been right, and now she was promising
him that she would not tell him of his fault! He could not thus
swallow down all the convictions by which he had fortified himself to
bear the misfortunes which he had endured. Had he not quarrelled with
every friend he possessed on this score; and should he now stultify
himself in all those quarrels by admitting that he had been cruel,
unjust, and needlessly jealous? And did not truth demand of him that
he should cling to his old assurances? Had she not been disobedient,
ill-conditioned, and rebellious? Had she not received the man, both
him personally and his letters, after he had explained to her that
his honour demanded that it should not be so? How could he come into
such terms as those now proposed to him, simply because he longed
to enjoy the rich sweetness of her soft hand, to feel the fragrance
of her breath, and to quench the heat of his forehead in the cool
atmosphere of her beauty? "Why have you driven me to this by your
intercourse with that man?" he said. "Why, why, why did you do it?"
She was still clinging to him. "Louis," she said, "I am your wife."
"Yes; you are my wife."
"And will you still believe such evil of me without any cause?"
"There has been cause,--horrible cause. You must
repent,--repent,--repent."
"Heaven help me," said the woman, falling back from him, and
returning to the boy who was now seated in Lady Rowley's lap. "Mamma,
do you speak to him. What can I say? Would he think better of me were
I to own myself to have been guilty, when there has been no guilt, no
slightest fault? Does he wish me to purchase my child by saying that
I am not fit to be his mother?"
"Louis," said Lady Rowley, "if any man was ever wrong, mad, madly
mistaken, you are so now."
"Have you come out here to accuse me again, as you did before in
London?" he asked. "Is that the way in which you and she intend to
let the past be, as she says, like a dream? She tells me that I am
ill. It is true. I am ill,--and she is killing me, killing me, by her
obstinacy."
"What would you have me do?" said the wife, again rising from her
child.
"Acknowledge your transgressions, and say that you will amend your
conduct for the future."
"Mamma, mamma,--what shall I say to him?"
"Who can speak to a man that is beside himself?" replied Lady Rowley.
"I am not so beside myself as yet, Lady Rowley, but that I know how
to guard my own honour and to protect my own child. I have told you,
Emily, the terms on which you can come back to me. You had better now
return to your mother's house; and if you wish again to have a house
of your own, and your husband, and your boy, you know by what means
you may acquire them. For another week I shall remain here;--after
that I shall remove far from hence."
"And where will you go, Louis?"
"As yet I know not. To Italy I think,--or perhaps to America. It
matters little where for me."
"And will Louey be taken with you?"
"Certainly he will go with me. To strive to bring him up so that he
may be a happier man than his father is all that there is now left
for me in life." Mrs. Trevelyan had now got the boy in her arms, and
her mother was seated by her on the sofa. Trevelyan was standing away
from them, but so near the door that no sudden motion on their part
would enable them to escape with the boy without his interposition.
It now again occurred to the mother to carry off her prize in
opposition to her husband;--but she had no scheme to that effect laid
with her mother, and she could not reconcile herself to the idea of
a contest with him in which personal violence would be necessary.
The woman of the house had, indeed, seemed to sympathise with her,
but she could not dare in such a matter to trust to assistance from a
stranger. "I do not wish to be uncourteous," said Trevelyan, "but if
you have no assurance to give me, you had better--leave me."
Then there came to be a bargaining about time, and the poor woman
begged almost on her knees that she might be allowed to take her
child up-stairs and be with him alone for a few minutes. It seemed
to her that she had not seen her boy till she had had him to herself,
in absolute privacy, till she had kissed his limbs, and had her hand
upon his smooth back, and seen that he was white and clean and bright
as he had ever been. And the bargain was made. She was asked to
pledge her word that she would not take him out of the house,--and
she pledged her word, feeling that there was no strength in her for
that action which she had meditated. He, knowing that he might still
guard the passage at the bottom of the stairs, allowed her to go with
the boy to his bedroom, while he remained below with Lady Rowley. A
quarter of an hour was allowed to her, and she humbly promised that
she would return when that time was expired.
Trevelyan held the door open for her as she went, and kept it open
during her absence. There was hardly a word said between him and Lady
Rowley, but he paced from the passage into the room and from the room
into the passage with his hands behind his back. "It is cruel," he
said once. "It is very cruel."
"It is you that are cruel," said Lady Rowley.
"Of course;--of course. That is natural from you. I expect that from
you." To this she made no answer, and he did not open his lips again.
After a while Mrs. Trevelyan called to her mother, and Lady Rowley
was allowed to go up-stairs. The quarter of an hour was of course
greatly stretched, and all the time Trevelyan continued to pace in
and out of the room. He was patient, for he did not summon them; but
went on pacing backwards and forwards, looking now and again to see
that the cab was at its place,--that no deceit was being attempted,
no second act of kidnapping being perpetrated. At last the two ladies
came down the stairs, and the boy was with them,--and the woman of
the house.
"Louis," said the wife, going quickly up to her husband, "I will do
anything, if you will give me my child."
"What will you do?"
"Anything;--say what you want. He is all the world to me, and I
cannot live if he be taken from me."
"Acknowledge that you have been wrong."
"But how;--in what words;--how am I to speak it?"
"Say that you have sinned;--and that you will sin no more."
"Sinned, Louis;--as the woman did,--in the Scripture? Would you have
me say that?"
"He cannot think that it is so," said Lady Rowley.
But Trevelyan had not understood her. "Lady Rowley, I should have
fancied that my thoughts at any rate were my own. But this is useless
now. The child cannot go with you to-day, nor can you remain here. Go
home and think of what I have said. If then you will do as I would
have you, you shall return."
With many embraces, with promises of motherly love, and with prayers
for love in return, the poor woman did at last leave the house, and
return to the cab. As she went there was a doubt on her own mind
whether she should ask to kiss her husband; but he made no sign, and
she at last passed out without any mark of tenderness. He stood by
the cab as they entered it, and closed the door upon them, and then
went slowly back to his room. "My poor bairn," he said to the boy;
"my poor bairn."
"Why for mamma go?" sobbed the child.
"Mamma goes--; oh, heaven and earth, why should she go? She goes
because her spirit is obstinate, and she will not bend. She is
stiff-necked, and will not submit herself. But Louey must love mamma
always;--and mamma some day will come back to him, and be good to
him."
"Mamma is good,--always," said the child. Trevelyan had intended on
this very afternoon to have gone up to town,--to transact business
with Bozzle; for he still believed, though the aspect of the man was
bitter to him as wormwood, that Bozzle was necessary to him in all
his business. And he still made appointments with the man, sometimes
at Stony Walk, in the Borough, and sometimes at the tavern in
Poulter's Court, even though Bozzle not unfrequently neglected to
attend the summons of his employer. And he would go to his banker's
and draw out money, and then walk about the crowded lanes of the
City, and afterwards return to his desolate lodgings at Willesden,
thinking that he had been transacting business,--and that this
business was exacted from him by the unfortunate position of his
affairs. But now he gave up his journey. His retreat had been
discovered; and there came upon him at once a fear that if he left
the house his child would be taken. His landlady told him on this
very day that the boy ought to be sent to his mother, and had made
him understand that it would not suit her to find a home any longer
for one who was so singular in his proceedings. He believed that his
child would be given up at once, if he were not there to guard it.
He stayed at home, therefore, turning in his mind many schemes. He
had told his wife that he should go either to Italy or to America at
once; but in doing so he had had no formed plan in his head. He had
simply imagined at the moment that such a threat would bring her to
submission. But now it became a question whether he would do better
than go to America. He suggested to himself that he should go to
Canada, and fix himself with his boy on some remote farm,--far away
from any city; and would then invite his wife to join him if she
would. She was too obstinate, as he told himself, ever to yield,
unless she should be absolutely softened and brought down to the
ground by the loss of her child. What would do this so effectually
as the interposition of the broad ocean between him and her? He sat
thinking of this for the rest of the day, and Louey was left to the
charge of the mistress of River's Cottage.
"Do you think he believes it, mamma?" Mrs. Trevelyan said to her
mother when they had already made nearly half their journey home in
the cab. There had been nothing spoken hitherto between them, except
some half-formed words of affection intended for consolation to the
young mother in her great affliction.
"He does not know what he believes, dearest."
"You heard what he said. I was to own that I had--sinned."
"Sinned;--yes; because you will not obey him like a slave. That is
sin--to him."
"But I asked him, mamma. Did you not hear me? I could not say
the word plainer,--but I asked him whether he meant that sin.
He must have known, and he would not answer me. And he spoke of
my--transgression. Mamma, if he believed that, he would not let me
come back at all."
"He did not believe it, Emily."
"Could he possibly then so accuse me,--the mother of his child! If
his heart be utterly hard and false towards me, if it is possible
that he should be cruel to me with such cruelty as that,--still he
must love his boy. Why did he not answer me, and say that he did not
think it?"
"Simply because his reason has left him."
"But if he be mad, mamma, ought we to leave him like that? And, then,
did you see his eyes, and his face, and his hands? Did you observe
how thin he is,--and his back, how bent? And his clothes,--how they
were torn and soiled. It cannot be right that he should be left like
that."
"We will tell papa when we get home," said Lady Rowley, who was
herself beginning to be somewhat frightened by what she had seen.
It is all very well to declare that a friend is mad when one simply
desires to justify one's self in opposition to that friend;--but
the matter becomes much more serious when evidence of the friend's
insanity becomes true and circumstantial. "I certainly think that a
physician should see him," continued Lady Rowley. On their return
home Sir Marmaduke was told of what had occurred, and there was a
long family discussion in which it was decided that Lady Milborough
should be consulted, as being the oldest friend of Louis Trevelyan
himself with whom they were acquainted. Trevelyan had relatives of
his own name living in Cornwall; but Mrs. Trevelyan herself had never
even met one of that branch of the family.
Sir Marmaduke, however, resolved that he himself would go out and
see his son-in-law. He too had called Trevelyan mad, but he did not
believe that the madness was of such a nature as to interfere with
his own duties in punishing the man who had ill used his daughter. He
would at any rate see Trevelyan himself;--but of this he said nothing
either to his wife or to his child.
CHAPTER LXVIII.
MAJOR MAGRUDER'S COMMITTEE.
[Illustration]
Sir Marmaduke could not go out to Willesden on the morning after Lady
Rowley's return from River's Cottage, because on that day he was
summoned to attend at twelve o'clock before a Committee of the House
of Commons, to give his evidence and the fruit of his experience as
to the government of British colonies generally; and as he went down
to the House in a cab from Manchester Street he thoroughly wished
that his friend Colonel Osborne had not been so efficacious in
bringing him home. The task before him was one which he thoroughly
disliked, and of which he was afraid. He dreaded the inquisitors
before whom he was to appear, and felt that though he was called
there to speak as a master of his art of governing, he would in truth
be examined as a servant,--and probably as a servant who did not
know his business. Had his sojourn at home been in other respects
happy, he might have been able to balance the advantage against the
inquiry;--but there was no such balancing for him now. And, moreover,
the expense of his own house in Manchester Street was so large that
this journey, in a pecuniary point of view, would be of but little
service to him. So he went down to the House in an unhappy mood; and
when he shook hands in one of the passages with his friend Osborne
who was on the Committee, there was very little cordiality in his
manner. "This is the most ungrateful thing I ever knew," said the
Colonel to himself; "I have almost disgraced myself by having this
fellow brought home; and now he quarrels with me because that idiot,
his son-in-law, has quarrelled with his wife." And Colonel Osborne
really did feel that he was a martyr to the ingratitude of his
friend.
The Committee had been convoked by the House in compliance with the
eager desires of a certain ancient pundit of the constitution, who
had been for many years a member, and who had been known as a stern
critic of our colonial modes of government. To him it certainly
seemed that everything that was, was bad,--as regarded our national
dependencies. But this is so usually the state of mind of all
parliamentary critics, it is so much a matter of course that the
members who take up the army or the navy, guns, India, our relations
with Spain, or workhouse management, should find everything to
be bad, rotten, and dishonest, that the wrath of the member for
Killicrankie against colonial peculation and idleness, was not
thought much of in the open House. He had been at the work for years,
and the Colonial Office were so used to it that they rather liked
him. He had made himself free of the office, and the clerks were
always glad to see him. It was understood that he said bitter things
in the House,--that was Major Magruder's line of business; but he
could be quite pleasant when he was asking questions of a private
secretary, or telling the news of the day to a senior clerk. As he
was now between seventy and eighty, and had been at the work for at
least twenty years, most of those concerned had allowed themselves
to think that he would ride his hobby harmlessly to the day of his
parliamentary death. But the drop from a house corner will hollow
a stone by its constancy, and Major Magruder at last persuaded the
House to grant him a Committee of Inquiry. Then there came to be
serious faces at the Colonial Office, and all the little pleasantries
of a friendly opposition were at an end. It was felt that the battle
must now become a real fight, and Secretary and Under-Secretary
girded up their loins.
Major Magruder was chairman of his own committee, and being a man
of a laborious turn of mind, much given to blue-books, very patient,
thoroughly conversant with the House, and imbued with a strong belief
in the efficacy of parliamentary questionings to carry a point, if
not to elicit a fact, had a happy time of it during this session.
He was a man who always attended the House from 4 p.m. to the time
of its breaking up, and who never missed a division. The slight
additional task of sitting four hours in a committee-room three days
a week, was only a delight the more,--especially as during those four
hours he could occupy the post of chairman. Those who knew Major
Magruder well did not doubt but that the Committee would sit for many
weeks, and that the whole theory of colonial government, or rather of
imperial control supervising such government, would be tested to the
very utmost. Men who had heard the old Major maunder on for years
past on his pet subject, hardly knew how much vitality would be found
in him when his maundering had succeeded in giving him a committee.
A Governor from one of the greater colonies had already been under
question for nearly a week, and was generally thought to have come
out of the fire unscathed by the flames of the Major's criticism.
This Governor had been a picked man, and he had made it appear that
the control of Downing Street was never more harsh and seldom less
refreshing and beautifying than a spring shower in April. No other
lands under the sun were so blest, in the way of government, as were
the colonies with which he had been acquainted; and, as a natural
consequence, their devotion and loyalty to the mother country were
quite a passion with them. Now the Major had been long of a mind that
one or two colonies had better simply be given up to other nations,
which were more fully able to look after them than was England, and
that three or four more should be allowed to go clear,--costing
England nothing, and owing England nothing. But the well-chosen
Governor who had now been before the Committee, had rather staggered
the Major,--and things altogether were supposed to be looking up for
the Colonial Office.
And now had come the day of Sir Marmaduke's martyrdom. He was first
requested, with most urbane politeness, to explain the exact nature
of the government which he exercised in the Mandarins. Now it
certainly was the case that the manner in which the legislative and
executive authorities were intermingled in the affairs of these
islands, did create a complication which it was difficult for any man
to understand, and very difficult indeed for any man to explain to
others. There was a Court of Chancery, so called, which Sir Marmaduke
described as a little parliament. When he was asked whether the court
exercised legislative or executive functions, he said at first that
it exercised both, and then that it exercised neither. He knew that
it consisted of nine men, of whom five were appointed by the colony
and four by the Crown. Yet he declared that the Crown had the control
of the court;--which, in fact, was true enough no doubt, as the five
open members were not perhaps, all of them, immaculate patriots; but
on this matter poor Sir Marmaduke was very obscure. When asked who
exercised the patronage of the Crown in nominating the four members,
he declared that the four members exercised it themselves. Did he
appoint them? No; he never appointed anybody himself. He consulted
the Court of Chancery for everything. At last it came out that the
chief justice of the islands, and three other officers, always sat in
the court;--but whether it was required by the constitution of the
islands that this should be so, Sir Marmaduke did not know. It had
worked well; that was to say, everybody had complained of it, but
he, Sir Marmaduke, would not recommend any change. What he thought
best was that the Colonial Secretary should send out his orders, and
that the people in the colonies should mind their business and grow
coffee. When asked what would be the effect upon the islands, under
his scheme of government, if an incoming Colonial Secretary should
change the policy of his predecessor, he said that he didn't think it
would much matter if the people did not know anything about it.
In this way the Major had a field day, and poor Sir Marmaduke
was much discomfited. There was present on the Committee a young
Parliamentary Under-Secretary, who with much attention had studied
the subject of the Court of Chancery in the Mandarins, and who had
acknowledged to his superiors in the office that it certainly was of
all legislative assemblies the most awkward and complicated. He did
what he could, by questions judiciously put, to pull Sir Marmaduke
through his difficulties; but the unfortunate Governor had more than
once lost his temper in answering the chairman; and in his heavy
confusion was past the power of any Under-Secretary, let him be ever
so clever, to pull him through. Colonel Osborne sat by the while and
asked no questions. He had been put on the Committee as a respectable
dummy; but there was not a member sitting there who did not know that
Sir Marmaduke had been brought home as his friend;--and some of them,
no doubt, had whispered that this bringing home of Sir Marmaduke
was part of the payment made by the Colonel for the smiles of the
Governor's daughter. But no one alluded openly to the inefficiency of
the evidence given. No one asked why a Governor so incompetent had
been sent to them. No one suggested that a job had been done. There
are certain things of which opposition members of Parliament complain
loudly;--and there are certain other things as to which they are
silent. The line between these things is well known; and should an
ill-conditioned, a pig-headed, an underbred, or an ignorant member
not understand this line and transgress it, by asking questions which
should not be asked, he is soon put down from the Treasury bench, to
the great delight of the whole House.
Sir Marmaduke, after having been questioned for an entire afternoon,
left the House with extreme disgust. He was so convinced of his own
failure, that he felt that his career as a Colonial Governor must be
over. Surely they would never let him go back to his islands after
such an exposition as he had made of his own ignorance. He hurried
off into a cab, and was ashamed to be seen of men. But the members
of the Committee thought little or nothing about it. The Major, and
those who sided with him, had been anxious to entrap their witness
into contradictions and absurdities, for the furtherance of their own
object; and for the furtherance of theirs, the Under-Secretary from
the Office and the supporters of Government had endeavoured to defend
their man. But, when the affair was over, if no special admiration
had been elicited for Sir Marmaduke, neither was there expressed
any special reprobation. The Major carried on his Committee over
six weeks, and succeeded in having his blue-book printed; but, as
a matter of course, nothing further came of it; and the Court of
Chancery in the Mandarin Islands still continues to hold its own,
and to do its work, in spite of the absurdities displayed in its
construction. Major Magruder has had his day of success, and now
feels that Othello's occupation is gone. He goes no more to the
Colonial Office, lives among his friends on the memories of his
Committee,--not always to their gratification,--and is beginning to
think that as his work is done he may as well resign Killicrankie to
some younger politician. Poor Sir Marmaduke remembered his defeat
with soreness long after it had been forgotten by all others who had
been present, and was astonished when he found that the journals of
the day, though they did in some curt fashion report the proceedings
of the Committee, never uttered a word of censure against him, as
they had not before uttered a word of praise for that pearl of a
Governor who had been examined before him.
On the following morning he went to the Colonial Office by
appointment, and then he saw the young Irish Under-Secretary whom he
had so much dreaded. Nothing could be more civil than was the young
Irish Under-Secretary, who told him that he had better of course stay
in town till the Committee was over, though it was not probable that
he would be wanted again. When the Committee had done its work he
would be allowed to remain six weeks on service to prepare for his
journey back. If he wanted more time after that he could ask for
leave of absence. So Sir Marmaduke left the Colonial Office with a
great weight off his mind, and blessed that young Irish Secretary as
he went.
CHAPTER LXIX.
SIR MARMADUKE AT WILLESDEN.
On the next day Sir Marmaduke purposed going to Willesden. He was in
great doubt whether or no he would first consult that very eminent
man Dr. Trite Turbury, as to the possibility, and,--if possible,--as
to the expediency, of placing Mr. Trevelyan under some control. But
Sir Marmaduke, though he would repeatedly declare that his son-in-law
was mad, did not really believe in this madness. He did not, that
is, believe that Trevelyan was so mad as to be fairly exempt from
the penalties of responsibility; and he was therefore desirous of
speaking his own mind out fully to the man, and, as it were, of
having his own personal revenge, before he might be deterred by the
interposition of medical advice. He resolved therefore that he would
not see Sir Trite Turbury, at any rate till he had come back from
Willesden. He also went down in a cab, but he left the cab at the
public-house at the corner of the road, and walked to the cottage.
When he asked whether Mr. Trevelyan was at home, the woman of
the house hesitated and then said that her lodger was out. "I
particularly wish to see him," said Sir Marmaduke, feeling that the
woman was lying to him. "But he ain't to be seen, sir," said the
woman. "I know he is at home," said Sir Marmaduke. But the argument
was soon cut short by the appearance of Trevelyan behind the woman's
shoulder.
"I am here, Sir Marmaduke Rowley," said Trevelyan. "If you wish to
see me you may come in. I will not say that you are welcome, but you
can come in." Then the woman retired, and Sir Marmaduke followed
Trevelyan into the room in which Lady Rowley and Emily had been
received; but the child was not now in the chamber.
"What are these charges that I hear against my daughter?" said Sir
Marmaduke, rushing at once into the midst of his indignation.
"I do not know what charges you have heard."
"You have put her away."
"In strict accuracy that is not correct, Sir Marmaduke."
"But she is put away. She is in my house now because you have no
house of your own for her. Is not that so? And when I came home she
was staying with her uncle, because you had put her away. And what
was the meaning of her being sent down into Devonshire? What has she
done? I am her father, and I expect to have an answer."
"You shall have an answer, certainly."
"And a true one. I will have no hocus-pocus, no humbug, no Jesuitry."
"Have you come here to insult me, Sir Marmaduke? Because, if so,
there shall be an end to this interview at once."
"There shall not be an end;--by G----, no, not till I have heard what
is the meaning of all this. Do you know what people are saying of
you;--that you are mad, and that you must be locked up, and your
child taken away from you, and your property?"
"Who are the people that say so? Yourself;--and, perhaps, Lady
Rowley? Does my wife say so? Does she think that I am mad? She did
not think so on Thursday, when she prayed that she might be allowed
to come back and live with me."
"And you would not let her come?"
"Pardon me," said Trevelyan. "I would wish that she should come,--but
it must be on certain conditions."
"What I want to know is why she was turned out of your house?"
"She was not turned out."
"What has she done that she should be punished?" urged Sir Marmaduke,
who was unable to arrange his questions with the happiness which had
distinguished Major Magruder. "I insist upon knowing what it is that
you lay to her charge. I am her father, and I have a right to know.
She has been barbarously, shamefully ill-used, and by G---- I will
know."
"You have come here to bully me, Sir Marmaduke Rowley."
"I have come here, sir, to do the duty of a parent to his child;
to protect my poor girl against the cruelty of a husband who in
an unfortunate hour was allowed to take her from her home. I will
know the reason why my daughter has been treated as though,--as
though,--as though--"
"Listen to me for a minute," said Trevelyan.
"I am listening."
"I will tell you nothing; I will answer you not a word."
"You will not answer me?"
"Not when you come to me in this fashion. My wife is my wife, and
my claim to her is nearer and closer than is yours, who are her
father. She is the mother of my child, and the only being in the
world,--except that child,--whom I love. Do you think that with
such motives on my part for tenderness towards her, for loving care,
for the most anxious solicitude, that I can be made more anxious,
more tender, more loving by coarse epithets from you? I am the
most miserable being under the sun because our happiness has been
interrupted, and is it likely that such misery should be cured by
violent words and gestures? If your heart is wrung for her, so is
mine. If she be much to you, she is more to me. She came here the
other day, almost as a stranger, and I thought that my heart would
have burst beneath its weight of woe. What can you do that can add
an ounce to the burden that I bear? You may as well leave me,--or at
least be quiet."
Sir Marmaduke had stood and listened to him, and he, too, was so
struck by the altered appearance of the man that the violence of his
indignation was lessened by the pity which he could not suppress.
When Trevelyan spoke of his wretchedness, it was impossible not to
believe him. He was as wretched a being to look at as it might have
been possible to find. His contracted cheeks, and lips always open,
and eyes glowing in their sunken caverns, told a tale which even
Sir Marmaduke, who was not of nature quick in deciphering such
stories, could not fail to read. And then the twitching motion of
the man's hands, and the restless shuffling of his feet, produced a
nervous feeling that if some remedy were not applied quickly, some
alleviation given to the misery of the suffering wretch, human power
would be strained too far, and the man would break to pieces,--or
else the mind of the man. Sir Marmaduke, during his journey in the
cab, had resolved that, old as he was, he would take this sinner
by the throat, this brute who had striven to stain his daughter's
name,--and would make him there and then acknowledge his own
brutality. But it was now very manifest to Sir Marmaduke that there
could be no taking by the throat in this case. He could not have
brought himself to touch the poor, weak, passionate creature before
him. Indeed, even the fury of his words was stayed, and after that
last appeal he stormed no more. "But what is to be the end of it?" he
said.
"Who can tell? Who can say? She can tell. She can put an end to it
all. She has but to say a word, and I will devote my life to her. But
that word must be spoken." As he said this, he dashed his hand upon
the table, and looked up with an air that would have been comic with
its assumed magnificence had it not been for the true tragedy of the
occasion.
"You had better, at any rate, let her have her child for the
present."
"No;--my boy shall go with me. She may go, too, if she pleases, but
my boy shall certainly go with me. If I had put her from me, as you
said just now, it might have been otherwise. But she shall be as
welcome to me as flowers in May,--as flowers in May! She shall be as
welcome to me as the music of heaven."
Sir Marmaduke felt that he had nothing more to urge. He had
altogether abandoned that idea of having his revenge at the cost of
the man's throat, and was quite convinced that reason could have
no power with him. He was already thinking that he would go away,
straight to his lawyer, so that some step might be taken at once to
stop, if possible, the taking away of the boy to America, when the
lock of the door was gently turned, and the landlady entered the
room.
"You will excuse me, sir," said the woman, "but if you be anything to
this gentleman--"
"Mrs. Fuller, leave the room," said Trevelyan. "I and the gentleman
are engaged."
"I see you be engaged, and I do beg pardon. I ain't one as would
intrude wilful, and, as for listening, or the likes of that, I scorn
it. But if this gentleman be anything to you, Mr. Trevelyan--"
"I am his wife's father," said Sir Marmaduke.
"Like enough. I was thinking perhaps so. His lady was down here on
Thursday,--as sweet a lady as any gentleman need wish to stretch by
his side."
"Mrs. Fuller," said Trevelyan, marching up towards her, "I will not
have this, and I desire that you will retire from my room."
But Mrs. Fuller escaped round the table, and would not be banished.
She got round the table, and came closely opposite to Sir Marmaduke.
"I don't want to say nothing out of my place, sir," said she, "but
something ought to be done. He ain't fit to be left to hisself,--not
alone,--not as he is at present. He ain't, indeed, and I wouldn't be
doing my duty if I didn't say so. He has them sweats at night as'd be
enough to kill any man; and he eats nothing, and he don't do nothing;
and as for that poor little boy as is now in my own bed upstairs, if
it wasn't that I and my Bessy is fond of children, I don't know what
would become of that boy."
Trevelyan, finding it impossible to get rid of her, had stood
quietly, while he listened to her. "She has been good to my child,"
he said. "I acknowledge it. As for myself, I have not been well. It
is true. But I am told that travel will set me on my feet again.
Change of air will do it." Not long since he had been urging the
wretchedness of his own bodily health as a reason why his wife
should yield to him; but now, when his sickness was brought as a
charge against him,--was adduced as a reason why his friends should
interfere, and look after him, and concern themselves in his affairs,
he saw at once that it was necessary that he should make little of
his ailments.
"Would it not be best, Trevelyan, that you should come with me to a
doctor?" said Sir Marmaduke.
"No;--no. I have my own doctor. That is, I know the course which
I should follow. This place, though it is good for the boy, has
disagreed with me, and my life has not been altogether pleasant;--I
may say, by no means pleasant. Troubles have told upon me, but change
of air will mend it all."
"I wish you would come with me, at once, to London. You shall come
back, you know. I will not detain you."
"Thank you,--no. I will not trouble you. That will do, Mrs. Fuller.
You have intended to do your duty, no doubt, and now you can go."
Whereupon Mrs. Fuller did go. "I am obliged for your care, Sir
Marmaduke, but I can really do very well without troubling you."
"You cannot suppose, Trevelyan, that we can allow things to go on
like this."
"And what do you mean to do?"
"Well;--I shall take advice. I shall go to a lawyer,--and to a
doctor, and perhaps to the Lord Chancellor, and all that kind of
thing. We can't let things go on like this."
"You can do as you please," said Trevelyan, "but as you have
threatened me, I must ask you to leave me."
Sir Marmaduke could do no more, and could say no more, and he took
his leave, shaking hands with the man, and speaking to him with a
courtesy which astonished himself. It was impossible to maintain
the strength of his indignation against a poor creature who was so
manifestly unable to guide himself. But when he was in London he
drove at once to the house of Dr. Trite Turbury, and remained there
till the doctor returned from his round of visits. According to
the great authority, there was much still to be done before even
the child could be rescued out of the father's hands. "I can't act
without the lawyers," said Dr. Turbury. But he explained to Sir
Marmaduke what steps should be taken in such a matter.
Trevelyan, in the mean time, clearly understanding that hostile
measures would now be taken against him, set his mind to work to
think how best he might escape at once to America with his boy.
CHAPTER LXX.
SHEWING WHAT NORA ROWLEY THOUGHT ABOUT CARRIAGES.
Sir Marmaduke, on his return home from Dr. Turbury's house, found
that he had other domestic troubles on hand over and above those
arising from his elder daughter's position. Mr. Hugh Stanbury had
been in Manchester Street during his absence, and had asked for him,
and, finding that he was away from home, had told his story to Lady
Rowley. When he had been shown up-stairs all the four daughters had
been with their mother; but he had said a word or two signifying his
desire to speak to Lady Rowley, and the three girls had left the
room. In this way it came to pass that he had to plead his cause
before Nora's mother and her elder sister. He had pleaded it well,
and Lady Rowley's heart had been well disposed towards him; but when
she asked of his house and his home, his answer had been hardly more
satisfactory than that of Alan-a-Dale. There was little that he
could call his own beyond "The blue vault of heaven." Had he saved
any money? No,--not a shilling;--that was to say,--as he himself
expressed it,--nothing that could be called money. He had a few
pounds by him, just to go on with. What was his income? Well--last
year he had made four hundred pounds, and this year he hoped to make
something more. He thought he could see his way plainly to five
hundred a year. Was it permanent; and if not, on what did it depend?
He believed it to be as permanent as most other professional incomes,
but was obliged to confess that, as regarded the source from whence
it was drawn at the present moment, it might be brought to an abrupt
end any day by a disagreement between himself and the editor of the
D. R. Did he think that this was a fixed income? He did think that if
he and the editor of the D. R. were to fall out, he could come across
other editors who would gladly employ him. Would he himself feel safe
in giving his own sister to a man with such an income? In answer to
this question, he started some rather bold doctrines on the subject
of matrimony in general, asserting that safety was not desirable,
that energy, patience, and mutual confidence would be increased by
the excitement of risk, and that in his opinion it behoved young men
and young women to come together and get themselves married, even
though there might be some not remote danger of distress before them.
He admitted that starvation would be disagreeable,--especially for
children, in the eyes of their parents,--but alleged that children
as a rule were not starved, and quoted the Scripture to prove that
honest laborious men were not to be seen begging their bread in
the streets. He was very eloquent, but his eloquence itself was
against him. Both Lady Rowley and Mrs. Trevelyan were afraid of such
advanced opinions; and, although everything was of course to be left,
nominally, to the decision of Sir Marmaduke, they both declared that
they could not recommend Sir Marmaduke to consent. Lady Rowley said
a word as to the expediency of taking Nora back with her to the
Mandarins, pointing out what appeared to her then to be the necessity
of taking Mrs. Trevelyan with them also; and in saying this she
hinted that if Nora were disposed to stand by her engagement, and
Mr. Stanbury equally so disposed, there might be some possibility
of a marriage at a future period. Only in such case, there must be
no correspondence. In answer to this Hugh declared that he regarded
such a scheme as being altogether bad. The Mandarins were so very far
distant that he might as well be engaged to an angel in heaven. Nora,
if she were to go away now, would perhaps never come back again; and
if she did come back, would be an old woman, with hollow cheeks. In
replying to this proposition, he let fall an opinion that Nora was
old enough to judge for herself. He said nothing about her actual
age, and did not venture to plead that the young lady had a legal
right to do as she liked with herself; but he made it manifest that
such an idea was in his mind. In answer to this, Lady Rowley asserted
that Nora was a good girl, and would do as her father told her; but
she did not venture to assert that Nora would give up her engagement.
Lady Rowley at last undertook to speak to Sir Rowley, and to speak
also to her daughter. Hugh was asked for his address, and gave that
of the office of the D. R. He was always to be found there between
three and five; and after that, four times a week, in the reporters'
gallery of the House of Commons. Then he was at some pains to explain
to Lady Rowley that though he attended the reporters' gallery, he
did not report himself. It was his duty to write leading political
articles, and, to enable him to do so, he attended the debates.
Before he went Mrs. Trevelyan thanked him most cordially for the
trouble he had taken in procuring for her the address at Willesden,
and gave him some account of the journey which she and her mother
had made to River's Cottage. He argued with both of them that the
unfortunate man must now be regarded as being altogether out of his
mind, and something was said as to the great wisdom and experience of
Dr. Trite Turbury. Then Hugh Stanbury took his leave; and even Lady
Rowley bade him adieu with kind cordiality. "I don't wonder, mamma,
that Nora should like him," said Mrs. Trevelyan.
"That is all very well, my dear, and no doubt he is pleasant, and
manly, and all that;--but really it would be almost like marrying a
beggar."
"For myself," said Mrs. Trevelyan, "if I could begin life again, I do
not think that any temptation would induce me to place myself in a
man's power."
Sir Marmaduke was told of all this on his return home, and he asked
many questions as to the nature of Stanbury's work. When it was
explained to him,--Lady Rowley repeating as nearly as she could all
that Hugh had himself said about it, he expressed his opinion that
writing for a penny newspaper was hardly more safe as a source of
income than betting on horse races. "I don't see that it is wrong,"
said Mrs. Trevelyan.
"I say nothing about wrong. I simply assert that it is uncertain. The
very existence of such a periodical must in itself be most insecure."
Sir Marmaduke, amidst the cares of his government at the Mandarins,
had, perhaps, had no better opportunity of watching what was going on
in the world of letters than had fallen to the lot of Miss Stanbury
at Exeter.
"I think your papa is right," said Lady Rowley.
"Of course I am right. It is out of the question; and so Nora must
be told." He had as yet heard nothing about Mr. Glascock. Had that
misfortune been communicated to him his cup would indeed have been
filled with sorrow to overflowing.
In the evening Nora was closeted with her father. "Nora, my dear,
you must understand, once and for all, that this cannot be," said
Sir Marmaduke. The Governor, when he was not disturbed by outward
circumstances, could assume a good deal of personal dignity, and
could speak, especially to his children, with an air of indisputable
authority.
"What can't be, papa?" said Nora.
Sir Marmaduke perceived at once that there was no indication of
obedience in his daughter's voice, and he prepared himself for
battle. He conceived himself to be very strong, and thought that his
objections were so well founded that no one would deny their truth
and that his daughter had not a leg to stand on. "This, that your
mamma tells me of about Mr. Stanbury. Do you know, my dear, that he
has not a shilling in the world?"
"I know that he has no fortune, papa,--if you mean that."
"And no profession either;--nothing that can be called a profession.
I do not wish to argue it, my dear, because there is no room for
argument. The whole thing is preposterous. I cannot but think ill
of him for having proposed it to you; for he must have known,--must
have known, that a young man without an income cannot be accepted as
a fitting suitor for a gentleman's daughter. As for yourself, I can
only hope that you will get the little idea out of your head very
quickly;--but mamma will speak to you about that. What I want you to
understand from me is this,--that there must be an end to it."
Nora listened to this speech in perfect silence, standing before her
father, and waiting patiently till the last word of it should be
pronounced. Even when he had finished she still paused before she
answered him. "Papa," she said at last, and hesitated again before
she went on.
"Well, my dear."
"I can not give it up."
"But you must give it up."
[Illustration: "But you must give it up," said Sir Marmaduke.]
"No, papa. I would do anything I could for you and mamma, but that is
impossible."
"Why is it impossible?"
"Because I love him so dearly."
"That is nonsense. That is what all girls say when they choose to
run against their parents. I tell you that it shall be given up. I
will not have him here. I forbid you to see him. It is quite out of
the question that you should marry such a man. I do hope, Nora, that
you are not going to add to mamma's difficulties and mine by being
obstinate and disobedient." He paused a moment, and then added, "I do
not think that there is anything more to be said."
"Papa."
"My dear, I think you had better say nothing further about it. If you
cannot bring yourself at the present moment to promise that there
shall be an end of it, you had better hold your tongue. You have
heard what I say, and you have heard what mamma says. I do not for
a moment suppose that you dream of carrying on a communication with
this gentleman in opposition to our wishes."
"But I do."
"Do what?"
"Papa, you had better listen to me." Sir Marmaduke, when he heard
this, assumed an air of increased authority, in which he intended
that paternal anger should be visible; but he seated himself, and
prepared to receive, at any rate, some of the arguments with which
Nora intended to bolster up her bad cause. "I have promised Mr.
Stanbury that I will be his wife."
"That is all nonsense."
"Do listen to me, papa. I have listened to you and you ought to
listen to me. I have promised him, and I must keep my promise. I
shall keep my promise if he wishes it. There is a time when a girl
must be supposed to know what is best for herself,--just as there is
for a man."
"I never heard such stuff in all my life. Do you mean that you'll go
out and marry him like a beggar, with nothing but what you stand up
in, with no friend to be with you, an outcast, thrown off by your
mother,--with your father's--curse?"
"Oh, papa, do not say that. You would not curse me. You could not."
"If you do it at all, that will be the way."
"That will not be the way, papa. You could not treat me like that."
"And how are you proposing to treat me?"
"But, papa, in whatever way I do it, I must do it. I do not say
to-day or to-morrow; but it must be the intention and purpose of
my life, and I must declare that it is, everywhere. I have made
up my mind about it. I am engaged to him, and I shall always say
so,--unless he breaks it. I don't care a bit about fortune. I thought
I did once, but I have changed all that."
"Because this scoundrel has talked sedition to you."
"He is not a scoundrel, papa, and he has not talked sedition. I don't
know what sedition is. I thought it meant treason, and I'm sure he is
not a traitor. He has made me love him, and I shall be true to him."
Hereupon Sir Marmaduke began almost to weep. There came first a
half-smothered oath and then a sob, and he walked about the room, and
struck the table with his fist, and rubbed his bald head impatiently
with his hand. "Nora," he said, "I thought you were so different from
this! If I had believed this of you, you never should have come to
England with Emily."
"It is too late for that now, papa."
"Your mamma always told me that you had such excellent ideas about
marriage."
"So I have,--I think," said she, smiling.
"She always believed that you would make a match that would be a
credit to the family."
"I tried it, papa;--the sort of match that you mean. Indeed I was
mercenary enough in what I believed to be my views of life. I meant
to marry a rich man,--if I could, and did not think much whether I
should love him or not. But when the rich man came--"
"What rich man?"
"I suppose mamma has told you about Mr. Glascock."
"Who is Mr. Glascock? I have not heard a word about Mr. Glascock."
Then Nora was forced to tell her story,--was called upon to tell it
with all its aggravating details. By degrees Sir Marmaduke learned
that this Mr. Glascock, who had desired to be his son-in-law, was in
very truth the heir to the Peterborough title and estates,--would
have been such a son-in-law as almost to compensate, by the
brilliance of the connection, for that other unfortunate alliance. He
could hardly control his agony when he was made to understand that
this embryo peer had in truth been in earnest. "Do you mean that he
went down after you into Devonshire?"
"Yes, papa."
"And you refused him then,--a second time?"
"Yes, papa."
"Why;--why;--why? You say yourself that you liked him;--that you
thought that you would accept him."
"When it came to speaking the word, papa, I found that I could not
pretend to love him when I did not love him. I did not care for
him,--and I liked somebody else so much better! I just told him the
plain truth,--and so he went away."
The thought of all that he had lost, of all that might so easily have
been his, for a time overwhelmed Sir Marmaduke, and drove the very
memory of Hugh Stanbury almost out of his head. He could understand
that a girl should not marry a man whom she did not like; but he
could not understand how any girl should not love such a suitor
as was Mr. Glascock. And had she accepted this pearl of men, with
her position, with her manners and beauty and appearance, such a
connection would have been as good as an assured marriage for every
one of Sir Marmaduke's numerous daughters. Nora was just the woman to
look like a great lady, a lady of high rank,--such a lady as could
almost command men to come and throw themselves at her unmarried
sisters' feet. Sir Marmaduke had believed in his daughter Nora, had
looked forward to see her do much for the family; and, when the crash
had come upon the Trevelyan household, had thought almost as much
of her injured prospects as he had of the misfortune of her sister.
But now it seemed that more than all the good things of what he had
dreamed had been proposed to this unruly girl, in spite of that great
crash,--and had been rejected! And he saw more than this,--as he
thought. These good things would have been accepted had it not been
for this rascal of a penny-a-liner, this friend of that other rascal
Trevelyan, who had come in the way of their family to destroy the
happiness of them all! Sir Marmaduke, in speaking of Stanbury after
this, would constantly call him a penny-a-liner, thinking that the
contamination of the penny communicated itself to all transactions of
the Daily Record.
"You have made your bed for yourself, Nora, and you must lie upon
it."
"Just so, papa."
"I mean that, as you have refused Mr. Glascock's offer, you can never
again hope for such an opening in life."
"Of course I cannot. I am not such a child as to suppose that there
are many Mr. Glascocks to come and run after me. And if there were
ever so many, papa, it would be no good. As you say, I have chosen
for myself, and I must put up with it. When I see the carriages going
about in the streets, and remember how often I shall have to go home
in an omnibus, I do think about it a good deal."
"I'm afraid you will think when it is too late."
"It isn't that I don't like carriages, papa. I do like them; and
pretty dresses, and brooches, and men and women who have nothing to
do, and balls, and the opera; but--I love this man, and that is more
to me than all the rest. I cannot help myself, if it were ever so.
Papa, you mustn't be angry with me. Pray, pray, pray do not say that
horrid word again."
This was the end of the interview. Sir Marmaduke found that he had
nothing further to say. Nora, when she reached her last prayer to her
father, referring to that curse with which he had threatened her, was
herself in tears, and was leaning on him with her head against his
shoulder. Of course he did not say a word which could be understood
as sanctioning her engagement with Stanbury. He was as strongly
determined as ever that it was his duty to save her from the perils
of such a marriage as that. But, nevertheless, he was so far overcome
by her as to be softened in his manners towards her. He kissed her as
he left her, and told her to go to her mother. Then he went out and
thought of it all, and felt as though Paradise had been opened to his
child and she had refused to enter the gate.
CHAPTER LXXI.
SHEWING WHAT HUGH STANBURY THOUGHT ABOUT THE DUTY OF MAN.
In the conference which took place between Sir Marmaduke and his
wife after the interview between him and Nora, it was his idea that
nothing further should be done at all. "I don't suppose the man will
come here if he be told not," said Sir Marmaduke, "and if he does,
Nora of course will not see him." He then suggested that Nora would
of course go back with them to the Mandarins, and that when once
there she would not be able to see Stanbury any more. "There must be
no correspondence or anything of that sort, and so the thing will die
away." But Lady Rowley declared that this would not quite suffice.
Mr. Stanbury had made his offer in due form, and must be held to be
entitled to an answer. Sir Marmaduke, therefore, wrote the following
letter to the "penny-a-liner," mitigating the asperity of his
language in compliance with his wife's counsels.
Manchester Street, April 20th, 186--.
MY DEAR SIR,--
Lady Rowley has told me of your proposal to my daughter
Nora; and she has told me also what she learned from you
as to your circumstances in life. I need hardly point out
to you that no father would be justified in giving his
daughter to a gentleman upon so small an income, and upon
an income so very insecure.
I am obliged to refuse my consent, and I must therefore
ask you to abstain from visiting and from communicating
with my daughter.
Yours faithfully,
MARMADUKE ROWLEY.
Hugh Stanbury, Esq.
This letter was directed to Stanbury at the office of the D. R.,
and Sir Marmaduke, as he wrote the pernicious address, felt himself
injured in that he was compelled to write about his daughter to a man
so circumstanced. Stanbury, when he got the letter, read it hastily
and then threw it aside. He knew what it would contain before he
opened it. He had heard enough from Lady Rowley to be aware that Sir
Marmaduke would not welcome him as a son-in-law. Indeed, he had never
expected such welcome. He was half-ashamed of his own suit because of
the lowliness of his position,--half-regretful that he should have
induced such a girl as Nora Rowley to give up for his sake her hopes
of magnificence and splendour. But Sir Marmaduke's letter did not add
anything to this feeling. He read it again, and smiled as he told
himself that the father would certainly be very weak in the hands
of his daughter. Then he went to work again at his article with a
persistent resolve that so small a trifle as such a note should have
no effect upon his daily work. Of course Sir Marmaduke would refuse
his consent. Of course it would be for him, Stanbury, to marry the
girl he loved in opposition to her father. Her father indeed! If Nora
chose to take him,--and as to that he was very doubtful as to Nora's
wisdom,--but if Nora would take him, what was any father's opposition
to him? He wanted nothing from Nora's father. He was not looking
for money with his wife;--nor for fashion, nor countenance. Such a
Bohemian was he that he would be quite satisfied if his girl would
walk out to him, and become his wife, with any morning-gown on and
with any old hat that might come readiest to hand. He wanted neither
cards, nor breakfast, nor carriages, nor fine clothes. If his Nora
should choose to come to him as she was, he having had all previous
necessary arrangements duly made,--such as calling of banns or
procuring of licence if possible,--he thought that a father's
opposition would almost add something to the pleasure of the
occasion. So he pitched the letter on one side, and went on with his
article. And he finished his article; but it may be doubted whether
it was completed with the full strength and pith needed for moving
the pulses of the national mind,--as they should be moved by leading
articles in the D. R. As he was writing he was thinking of Nora,--and
thinking of the letter which Nora's father had sent to him. Trivial
as was the letter, he could not keep himself from repeating the words
of it to himself. "'Need hardly point out,'--oh; needn't he. Then
why does he? Refusing his consent! I wonder what the old buffers
think is the meaning of their consent, when they are speaking of
daughters old enough to manage for themselves? Abstain from visiting
or communicating with her! But if she visits and communicates with
me;--what then? I can't force my way into the house, but she can
force her way out. Does he imagine that she can be locked up in the
nursery or put into the corner?" So he argued with himself, and by
such arguments he brought himself to the conviction that it would
be well for him to answer Sir Marmaduke's letter. This he did at
once,--before leaving the office of the D. R.
250, Fleet Street, 20th April.
MY DEAR SIR MARMADUKE ROWLEY,--
I have just received your letter, and am indeed sorry that
its contents should be so little favourable to my hopes.
I understand that your objection to me is simply in regard
to the smallness and insecurity of my income. On the first
point I may say that I have fair hopes that it may be
at once increased. As to the second, I believe I may
assert that it is as sure at least as the income of other
professional men, such as barristers, merchants, and
doctors. I cannot promise to say that I will not see your
daughter. If she desires me to do so, of course I shall
be guided by her views. I wish that I might be allowed an
opportunity of seeing you, as I think I could reverse or
at least mitigate some of the objections which you feel to
our marriage.
Yours most faithfully,
HUGH STANBURY.
On the next day but one Sir Marmaduke came to him. He was sitting
at the office of the D. R., in a very small and dirty room at the
back of the house, and Sir Marmaduke found his way thither through
a confused crowd of compositors, pressmen, and printers' boys. He
thought that he had never before been in a place so foul, so dark,
so crowded, and so comfortless. He himself was accustomed to do his
work, out in the Islands, with many of the appanages of vice-royalty
around him. He had his secretary, and his private secretary, and his
inner-room, and his waiting-room; and not unfrequently he had the
honour of a dusky sentinel walking before the door through which he
was to be approached. He had an idea that all gentlemen at their
work had comfortable appurtenances around them,--such as carpets,
dispatch-boxes, unlimited stationery, easy chairs for temporary
leisure, big table-space, and a small world of books around them
to give at least a look of erudition to their pursuits. There was
nothing of the kind in the miserably dark room occupied by Stanbury.
He was sitting at a wretched little table on which there was nothing
but a morsel of blotting paper, a small ink-bottle, and the paper
on which he was scribbling. There was no carpet there, and no
dispatch-box, and the only book in the room was a little dog's-eared
dictionary. "Sir Marmaduke, I am so much obliged to you for coming,"
said Hugh. "I fear you will find this place a little rough, but we
shall be all alone."
"The place, Mr. Stanbury, will not signify, I think."
"Not in the least,--if you don't mind it. I got your letter, you
know, Sir Marmaduke."
"And I have had your reply. I have come to you because you have
expressed a wish for an interview;--but I do not see that it will do
any good."
"You are very kind for coming, indeed, Sir Marmaduke;--very kind. I
thought I might explain something to you about my income."
"Can you tell me that you have any permanent income?"
"It goes on regularly from month to month;"--Sir Marmaduke did not
feel the slightest respect for an income that was paid monthly.
According to his ideas, a gentleman's income should be paid
quarterly, or perhaps half-yearly. According to his view, a monthly
salary was only one degree better than weekly wages;--"and I suppose
that is permanence," said Hugh Stanbury.
"I cannot say that I so regard it."
"A barrister gets his, you know, very irregularly. There is no saying
when he may have it."
"But a barrister's profession is recognised as a profession among
gentlemen, Mr. Stanbury."
"And is not ours recognised? Which of us, barristers or men of
literature, have the most effect on the world at large? Who is most
thought of in London, Sir Marmaduke,--the Lord Chancellor or the
Editor of the 'Jupiter?'"
"The Lord Chancellor a great deal," said Sir Marmaduke, quite
dismayed by the audacity of the question.
"By no means, Sir Marmaduke," said Stanbury, throwing out his hand
before him so as to give the energy of action to his words. "He has
the higher rank. I will admit that."
"I should think so," said Sir Marmaduke.
"And the larger income."
"Very much larger, I should say," said Sir Marmaduke, with a smile.
"And he wears a wig."
"Yes;--he wears a wig," said Sir Marmaduke, hardly knowing in what
spirit to accept this assertion.
"And nobody cares one brass button for him or his opinions," said
Stanbury, bringing down his hand heavily on the little table for the
sake of emphasis.
"What, sir?"
"If you'll think of it, it is so."
"Nobody cares for the Lord Chancellor!" It certainly is the fact that
gentlemen living in the Mandarin Islands do think more of the Lord
Chancellor, and the Lord Mayor, and the Lord-Lieutenant, and the Lord
Chamberlain, than they whose spheres of life bring them into closer
contact with those august functionaries. "I presume, Mr. Stanbury,
that a connection with a penny newspaper makes such opinions as these
almost a necessity."
"Quite a necessity, Sir Marmaduke. No man can hold his own in print,
now-a-days, unless he can see the difference between tinsel and
gold."
"And the Lord Chancellor, of course, is tinsel."
"I do not say so. He may be a great lawyer,--and very useful. But his
lordship, and his wig, and his woolsack, are tinsel in comparison
with the real power possessed by the editor of a leading newspaper.
If the Lord Chancellor were to go to bed for a month, would he be
much missed?"
"I don't know, sir. I'm not in the secrets of the Cabinet. I should
think he would."
"About as much as my grandmother;--but if the Editor of the 'Jupiter'
were to be taken ill, it would work quite a commotion. For myself I
should be glad,--on public grounds,--because I don't like his mode of
business. But it would have an effect,--because he is a leading man."
"I don't see what all this leads to, Mr. Stanbury."
"Only to this,--that we who write for the press think that our
calling is recognised, and must be recognised as a profession. Talk
of permanence, Sir Marmaduke, are not the newspapers permanent? Do
not they come out regularly every day,--and more of them, and still
more of them, are always coming out? You do not expect a collapse
among them."
"There will be plenty of newspapers, I do not doubt;--more than
plenty, perhaps."
"Somebody must write them,--and the writers will be paid."
"Anybody could write the most of them, I should say."
"I wish you would try, Sir Marmaduke. Just try your hand at a leading
article to-night, and read it yourself to-morrow morning."
"I've a great deal too much to do, Mr. Stanbury."
"Just so. You have, no doubt, the affairs of your Government to look
to. We are all so apt to ignore the work of our neighbours! It seems
to me that I could go over and govern the Mandarins without the
slightest trouble in the world. But no doubt I am mistaken;--just as
you are about writing for the newspapers."
"I do not know," said Sir Marmaduke, rising from his chair with
dignity, "that I called here to discuss such matters as these. As it
happens, you, Mr. Stanbury, are not the Governor of the Mandarins,
and I have not the honour to write for the columns of the penny
newspaper with which you are associated. It is therefore useless
to discuss what either of us might do in the position held by the
other."
"Altogether useless, Sir Marmaduke,--except just for the fun of the
thing."
"I do not see the fun, Mr. Stanbury. I came here, at your request,
to hear what you might have to urge against the decision which I
expressed to you in reference to my daughter. As it seems that you
have nothing to urge, I will not take up your time further."
"But I have a great deal to urge, and have urged a great deal."
"Have you, indeed?"
"You have complained that my work is not permanent. I have shewn that
it is so permanent that there is no possibility of its coming to an
end. There must be newspapers, and the people trained to write them
must be employed. I have been at it now about two years. You know
what I earn. Could I have got so far in so short a time as a lawyer,
a doctor, a clergyman, a soldier, a sailor, a Government clerk, or
in any of those employments which you choose to call professions? I
think that is urging a great deal. I think it is urging everything."
"Very well, Mr. Stanbury. I have listened to you, and in a certain
degree I admire your,--your,--your zeal and ingenuity, shall I say."
"I didn't mean to call for admiration, Sir Marmaduke; but suppose you
say,--good sense and discrimination."
"Let that pass. You must permit me to remark that your position is
not such as to justify me in trusting my daughter to your care. As my
mind on that matter is quite made up, as is that also of Lady Rowley,
I must ask you to give me your promise that your suit to my daughter
shall be discontinued."
"What does she say about it, Sir Marmaduke?"
"What she has said to me has been for my ears, and not for yours."
"What I say is for her ears and for yours, and for her mother's ears,
and for the ears of any who may choose to hear it. I will never give
up my suit to your daughter till I am forced to do so by a full
conviction that she has given me up. It is best to be plain, Sir
Marmaduke, of course."
"I do not understand this, Mr. Stanbury."
"I mean to be quite clear."
"I have always thought that when a gentleman was told by the head of
a family that he could not be made welcome in that family, it was
considered to be the duty of that gentleman,--as a gentleman,--to
abandon his vain pursuit. I have been brought up with that idea."
"And I, Sir Marmaduke, have been brought up in the idea that when
a man has won the affections of a woman, it is the duty of that
man,--as a man,--to stick to her through thick and thin; and I mean
to do my duty, according to my idea."
"Then, sir, I have nothing further to say, but to take my leave. I
must only caution you not to enter my doors." As the passages were
dark and intricate, it was necessary that Stanbury should shew Sir
Marmaduke out, and this he did in silence. When they parted each of
them lifted his hat, and not a word more was said.
That same night there was a note put into Nora's hands, as she was
following her mother out of one of the theatres. In the confusion she
did not even see the messenger who had handed it to her. Her sister
Lucy saw that she had taken the note, and questioned her about it
afterwards,--with discretion, however, and in privacy. This was the
note:--
DEAREST LOVE,
I have seen your father, who is stern,--after the manner
of fathers. What granite equals a parent's flinty bosom!
For myself, I do not prefer clandestine arrangements
and rope ladders; and you, dear, have nothing of the
Lydia about you. But I do like my own way, and like it
especially when you are at the end of the path. It is
quite out of the question that you should go back to those
islands. I think I am justified in already assuming enough
of the husband to declare that such going back must not be
held for a moment in question. My proposition is that you
should authorise me to make such arrangements as may be
needed, in regard to licence, banns, or whatever else, and
that you should then simply walk from the house to the
church and marry me. You are of age, and can do as you
please. Neither your father nor mother can have any right
to stop you. I do not doubt but that your mother would
accompany you, if she were fully satisfied of your
purpose. Write to me to the D. R.
Your own, ever and ever, and always,
H. S.
I shall try and get this given to you as you leave the
theatre. If it should fall into other hands, I don't much
care. I'm not in the least ashamed of what I am doing; and
I hope that you are not.
CHAPTER LXXII.
THE DELIVERY OF THE LAMB.
[Illustration]
It is hoped that a certain quarter of lamb will not have been
forgotten,--a quarter of lamb that was sent as a peace-offering from
Exeter to Nuncombe Putney by the hands of Miss Stanbury's Martha, not
with purposes of corruption, not intended to buy back the allegiance
of Dorothy,--folded delicately and temptingly in one of the best
table napkins, with no idea of bribery, but sent as presents used
to be sent of old in the trains of great ambassadors as signs of
friendship and marks of true respect. Miss Stanbury was, no doubt,
most anxious that her niece should return to her, but was not,
herself, low spirited enough to conceive that a quarter of lamb
could be efficacious in procuring such return. If it might be that
Dorothy's heart could be touched by mention of the weariness of her
aunt's solitary life; and if, therefore, she would return, it would
be very well; but it could not be well so, unless the offer should
come from Dorothy herself. All of which Martha had been made to
understand by her mistress, considerable ingenuity having been
exercised in the matter on each side.
On her arrival at Lessboro', Martha had hired a fly, and been driven
out to Nuncombe Putney; but she felt, she knew not why, a dislike
to be taken in her carriage to the door of the cottage; and was put
down in the middle of the village, from whence she walked out to Mrs.
Stanbury's abode, with the basket upon her arm. It was a good half
mile, and the lamb was heavy, for Miss Stanbury had suggested that a
bottle of sherry should be put in under the napkin,--and Martha was
becoming tired of her burden, when,--whom should she see on the road
before her but Brooke Burgess! As she said herself afterwards, it
immediately occurred to her, "that all the fat was in the fire." Here
had this young man come down, passing through Exeter without even a
visit to Miss Stanbury, and had clandestinely sought out the young
woman whom he wasn't to marry; and here was the young woman herself
flying in her aunt's face, when one scratch of a pen might ruin them
both! Martha entertained a sacred, awful, overcoming feeling about
her mistress's will. That she was to have something herself she
supposed, and her anxiety was not on that score; but she had heard
so much about it, had realised so fully the great power which Miss
Stanbury possessed, and had had her own feelings so rudely invaded by
alterations in Miss Stanbury's plans, that she had come to entertain
an idea that all persons around her should continually bear that will
in their memory. Hugh had undoubtedly been her favourite, and, could
Martha have dictated the will herself, she would still have made Hugh
the heir; but she had realised the resolution of her mistress so
far as to confess that the bulk of the property was to go back to a
Burgess. But there were very many Burgesses; and here was the one
who had been selected flying in the very face of the testatrix! What
was to be done? Were she to go back and not tell her mistress that
she had seen Brooke Burgess at Nuncombe then,--should the fact be
found out,--would the devoted anger of Miss Stanbury fall upon
her own head? It would be absolutely necessary that she should
tell the story, let the consequences be what they might;--but the
consequences, probably, would be very dreadful. "Mr. Brooke, that is
not you?" she said, as she came up to him, putting her basket down in
the middle of the dusty road.
"Then who can it be?" said Brooke, giving her his hand to shake.
"But what do bring you here, Mr. Brooke? Goodness me, what will
missus say?"
"I shall make that all straight. I'm going back to Exeter to-morrow."
Then there were many questions and many answers. He was sojourning
at Mrs. Crocket's, and had been there for the last two days. "Dear,
dear, dear," she said over and over again. "Deary me, deary me!" and
then she asked him whether it was "all along of Miss Dorothy" that he
had come. Of course, it was all along of Miss Dorothy. Brooke made no
secret about it. He had come down to see Dorothy's mother and sister,
and to say a bit of his own mind about future affairs;--and to see
the beauties of the country. When he talked about the beauties of the
country, Martha looked at him as the people of Lessboro' and Nuncombe
Putney should have looked at Colonel Osborne, when he talked of
the church porch at Cockchaffington. "Beauties of the country, Mr.
Brooke;--you ought to be ashamed of yourself!" said Martha.
"But I ain't,--the least in the world," said Brooke.
Then Martha took up her basket, and went on to the cottage, which had
been close in sight during their conversation in the road. She felt
angry with Dorothy. In such matters a woman is always angry with the
woman,--who has probably been quite passive, and rarely with the man,
who is ever the real transgressor. Having a man down after her at
Nuncombe Putney! It had never struck Martha as very horrible that
Brooke Burgess should fall in love with Dorothy in the city;--but
this meeting, in the remoteness of the country, out of sight even of
the village, was almost indecent; and all, too, with Miss Stanbury's
will just, as one might say, on the balance! Dorothy ought to have
buried herself rather than have allowed Brooke to see her at Nuncombe
Putney; and Dorothy's mother and Priscilla must be worse. She trudged
on, however, with her lamb, and soon found herself in the presence of
the three ladies.
"What,--Martha!" said Dorothy.
"Yes, miss,--here I am. I'd have been here half-an-hour ago amost, if
I hadn't been stopped on the road."
"And who stopped you?" asked Priscilla.
"Why,--Mr. Brooke, of course."
"And what did Mr. Brooke say to you?" asked Dorothy.
Martha perceived at once that Dorothy was quite radiant. She told her
mistress that she had never seen Miss Dorothy look half so comely
before. "Laws, ma'am, she brightened up and speckled about, till it
did your heart good to see her in spite of all." But this was some
time afterwards.
"He didn't say very much," replied Martha, gravely.
"But I've got very much to tell you," continued Dorothy. "I'm engaged
to be married to Mr. Brooke, and you must congratulate me. It is
settled now, and mamma and my sister know all about it."
Martha, when she was thus asked directly for congratulation, hardly
knew at once how to express herself. Being fully aware of Miss
Stanbury's objection to the marriage, she could not venture to
express her approbation of it. It was very improper, in Martha's
mind, that any young woman should have a follower, when the "missus"
didn't approve of it. She understood well enough that, in that matter
of followers, privileges are allowed to young ladies which are not
accorded to maid servants. A young lady may do things,--have young
men to walk and talk with them, to dance with them and embrace them,
and perhaps even more than this,--when for half so much a young woman
would be turned into the streets without a character. Martha knew
all this, and knew also that Miss Dorothy, though her mother lived
in a very little cottage, was not altogether debarred, in the matter
of followers, from the privileges of a lady. But yet Miss Dorothy's
position was so very peculiar! Look at that will,--or, rather, at
that embryo will, which might be made any day, which now probably
would be made, and which might affect them both so terribly! People
who have not got money should not fly in the face of those who have.
Such at least was Martha's opinion very strongly. How could she
congratulate Miss Dorothy under the existing circumstances? "I do
hope you will be happy, miss;--that you knows," said Martha, in her
difficulty. "And now, ma'am;--miss, I mean," she added, correcting
herself, in obedience to Miss Stanbury's direct orders about the
present,--"missus has just sent me over with a bit of lamb, and a
letter as is here in the basket, and to ask how you is,--and the
other ladies."
"We are very much obliged," said Mrs. Stanbury, who had not
understood the point of Martha's speech.
"My sister is, I'm sure," said Priscilla, who had understood it.
Dorothy had taken the letter, and had gone aside with it, and was
reading it very carefully. It touched her nearly, and there had come
tears into both her eyes, as she dwelt upon it. There was something
in her aunt's allusion to the condition of unmarried women which came
home to her especially. She knew her aunt's past history, and now she
knew, or hoped that she knew, something of her own future destiny.
Her aunt was desolate, whereas upon her the world smiled most
benignly. Brooke had just informed her that he intended to make
her his wife as speedily as possible,--with her aunt's consent if
possible, but if not, then without it. He had ridiculed the idea of
his being stopped by Miss Stanbury's threats, and had said all this
in such fashion that even Priscilla herself had only listened and
obeyed. He had spoken not a word of his own income, and none of them
had dreamed even of asking him a question. He had been as a god in
the little cottage, and all of them had been ready to fall down
and worship him. Mrs. Stanbury had not known how to treat him
with sufficient deference, and, at the same time, with sufficient
affection. He had kissed them all round, and Priscilla had felt an
elation which was hardly intelligible to herself. Dorothy, who was so
much honoured, had come to enjoy a status in her mother's estimation
very different from that which she had previously possessed, and had
grown to be quite beautiful in her mother's eyes.
There was once a family of three ancient maiden ladies, much
respected and loved in the town in which they lived. Their manners
of life were well known among their friends, and excited no surprise;
but a stranger to the locality once asked of the elder why Miss
Matilda, the younger, always went first out of the room? "Matilda
once had an offer of marriage," said the dear simple old lady, who
had never been so graced, and who felt that such an episode in life
was quite sufficient to bestow brevet rank. It was believed by Mrs.
Stanbury that Dorothy's honours would be carried further than those
of Miss Matilda, but there was much of the same feeling in the bosom
of the mother towards the fortunate daughter, who, in the eyes of a
man, had seemed goodly enough to be his wife.
With this swelling happiness round her heart, Dorothy read her aunt's
letter, and was infinitely softened. "I had gotten somehow to love
to see your pretty face." Dorothy had thought little enough of her
own beauty, but she liked being told by her aunt that her face had
been found to be pretty. "I am very desolate and solitary here," her
aunt said; and then had come those words about the state of maiden
women;--and then those other words, about women's duties, and her
aunt's prayer on her behalf. "Dear Dorothy, be not such an one."
She held the letter to her lips and to her bosom, and could hardly
continue its perusal because of her tears. Such prayers from the aged
addressed to the young are generally held in light esteem, but this
adjuration was valued by the girl to whom it was addressed. She put
together the invitation,--or rather the permission accorded to her,
to make a visit to Exeter,--and the intimation in the postscript
that Martha knew her mistress's mind; and then she returned to the
sitting-room, in which Martha was still seated with her mother, and
took the old servant apart. "Martha," she said, "is my aunt happy
now?"
"Well,--miss."
"She is strong again; is she not?"
"Sir Peter says she is getting well; and Mr. Martin--; but Mr. Martin
isn't much account."
"She eats and drinks again?"
"Pretty well;--not as it used to be, you know, miss. I tell her she
ought to go somewheres,--but she don't like moving nohow. She never
did. I tell her if she'd go to Dawlish,--just for a week. But she
don't think there's a bed fit to sleep on, nowhere, except just her
own."
"She would go if Sir Peter told her."
"She says that these movings are newfangled fashions, and that the
air didn't use to want changing for folk when she was young. I heard
her tell Sir Peter herself, that if she couldn't live at Exeter,
she would die there. She won't go nowheres, Miss Dorothy. She ain't
careful to live."
"Tell me something, Martha; will you?"
"What is it, Miss Dorothy?"
"Be a dear good woman now, and tell me true. Would she be better if I
were with her?"
"She don't like being alone, miss. I don't know nobody as does."
"But now, about Mr. Brooke, you know."
"Yes, Mr. Brooke! That's it."
"Of course, Martha, I love him better than anything in all the world.
I can't tell you how it was, but I think I loved him the very first
moment I saw him."
"Dear, dear, dear!"
"I couldn't help it, Martha;--but it's no good talking about it, for
of course I shan't try to help it now. Only this,--that I would do
anything in the world for my aunt,--except that."
"But she don't like it, Miss Dorothy. That is the truth, you know."
"It can't be helped now, Martha; and of course she'll be told at
once. Shall I go and tell her? I'd go to-day if you think she would
like it."
"And Mr. Brooke?"
"He is to go to-morrow."
"And will you leave him here?"
"Why not? Nobody will hurt him. I don't mind a bit about having him
with me now. But I can tell you this. When he went away from us once
it made me very unhappy. Would Aunt Stanbury be glad to see me,
Martha?"
Martha's reserve was at last broken down, and she expressed herself
in strong language. There was nothing on earth her mistress wanted so
much as to have her favourite niece back again. Martha acknowledged
that there were great difficulties about Brooke Burgess, and she did
not see her way clearly through them. Dorothy declared her purpose of
telling her aunt boldly,--at once. Martha shook her head, admiring
the honesty and courage, but doubting the result. She understood
better than did any one else the peculiarity of mind which made her
mistress specially anxious that none of the Stanbury family should
enjoy any portion of the Burgess money, beyond that which she herself
had saved out of the income. There had been moments in which Martha
had hoped that this prejudice might be overcome in favour of Hugh;
but it had become stronger as the old woman grew to be older and
more feeble,--and it was believed now to be settled as Fate. "She'd
sooner give it all to old Barty over the way," Martha had once said,
"than let it go to her own kith and kin. And if she do hate any human
creature, she do hate Barty Burgess." She assented, however, to
Dorothy's proposal; and, though Mrs. Stanbury and Priscilla were
astounded by the precipitancy of the measure they did not attempt to
oppose it.
"And what am I to do?" said Brooke, when he was told.
"You'll come to-morrow, of course," said Dorothy.
"But it may be that the two of us together will be too many for the
dear old lunatic."
"You shan't call her a lunatic, Brooke. She isn't so much a lunatic
as you are, to run counter to her, and disobey her, and all that kind
of thing."
"And how about yourself?"
"How can I help it, Brooke? It is you that say it must be so."
"Of course it must. Who is to be stayed from doing what is reasonable
because an old woman has a bee on her bonnet. I don't believe in
people's wills."
"She can do what she likes about it, Brooke."
"Of course she can, and of course she will. What I mean is that it
never pays to do this or that because somebody may alter his will, or
may make a will, or may not make a will. You become a slave for life,
and then your dead tyrant leaves you a mourning-ring, and grins at
you out of his grave. All the same she'll kick up a row, I fancy, and
you'll have to bear the worst of it."
"I'll tell her the truth; and if she be very angry, I'll just come
home again. But I think I'll come home to-morrow any way, so that
I'll pass you on the road. That will be best. She won't want us both
together. Only then, Brooke, I shan't see you again."
"Not till June."
"And is it to be really in June?"
"You say you don't like May."
"You are such a goose, Brooke. It will be May almost to-morrow. I
shall be such a poor wife for you, Brooke. As for getting my things
ready, I shall not bring hardly any things at all. Have you thought
what it is to take a body so very poor?"
"I own I haven't thought as much about it, Dolly,--as I ought to have
done, perhaps."
"It is too late now, Brooke."
"I suppose it is."
"Quite too late. A week ago I could have borne it. I had almost got
myself to think that it would be better that I should bear it. But
you have come, and banished all the virtue out of my head. I am
ashamed of myself, because I am so unworthy; but I would put up with
that shame rather than lose you now. Brooke, Brooke, I will so try to
be good to you!"
In the afternoon Martha and Dorothy started together for Exeter,
Brooke and Priscilla accompanying them as far as Mrs. Crocket's,
where the Lessboro' fly was awaiting them. Dorothy said little or
nothing during the walk, nor, indeed, was she very communicative
during the journey into Exeter. She was going to her aunt, instigated
simply by the affection of her full heart; but she was going with a
tale in her mouth which she knew would be very unwelcome. She could
not save herself from feeling that, in having accepted Brooke, and in
having not only accepted him but even fixed the day for her marriage,
she had been ungrateful to her aunt. Had it not been for her aunt's
kindness and hospitality, she would never have seen Brooke Burgess.
And as she had been under her aunt's care at Exeter, she doubted
whether she had not been guilty of some great fault in falling in
love with this man, in opposition as it were to express orders.
Should her aunt still declare that she would in no way countenance
the marriage, that she would still oppose it and use her influence
with Brooke to break it off, then would Dorothy return on the morrow
to her mother's cottage at Nuncombe Putney, so that her lover might
be free to act with her aunt as he might think fit. And should he
yield, she would endeavour,--she would struggle hard, to think that
he was still acting for the best. "I must tell her myself, Martha,"
said Dorothy, as they came near to Exeter.
"Certainly, miss;--only you'll do it to-night."
"Yes;--at once. As soon after I get there as possible."
CHAPTER LXXIII.
DOROTHY RETURNS TO EXETER.
Miss Stanbury perfectly understood that Martha was to come back by
the train reaching Exeter at 7 p.m., and that she might be expected
in the Close about a quarter-of-an-hour after that time. She had been
nervous and anxious all day,--so much so that Mr. Martin had told
her that she must be very careful. "That's all very well," the old
woman had said, "but you haven't got any medicine for my complaint,
Mr. Martin." The apothecary had assured her that the worst of her
complaint was in the east wind, and had gone away begging her to be
very careful. "It is not God's breezes that are hard to any one," the
old lady had said to herself,--"but our own hearts." After her lonely
dinner she had fidgeted about the room, and had rung twice for the
girl, not knowing what order to give when the servant came to her.
She was very anxious about her tea, but would not have it brought to
her till after Martha should have arrived. She was half-minded to
order that a second cup and saucer should be placed there, but she
had not the courage to face the disappointment which would fall upon
her, should the cup and saucer stand there for no purpose. And yet,
should she come, how nice it would be to shew her girl that her old
aunt had been ready for her. Thrice she went to the window after the
cathedral clock had struck seven, to see whether her ambassador was
returning. From her window there was only one very short space of
pathway on which she could have seen her,--and, as it happened, there
came the ring at the door, and no ambassador had as yet been viewed.
Miss Stanbury was immediately off her seat, and out upon the landing.
"Here we are again, Miss Dorothy," said Martha. Then Miss Stanbury
could not restrain herself,--but descended the stairs, moving as she
had never moved since she had first been ill. "My bairn," she said;
"my dearest bairn! I thought that perhaps it might be so. Jane,
another tea-cup and saucer up-stairs." What a pity that she had not
ordered it before! "And get a hot cake, Jane. You will be ever so
hungry, my darling, after your journey."
"Are you glad to see me, Aunt Stanbury?" said Dorothy.
"Glad, my pretty one!" Then she put up her hands, and smoothed down
the girl's cheeks, and kissed her, and patted Martha on the back, and
scolded her at the same time for not bringing Miss Dorothy from the
station in a cab. "And what is the meaning of that little bag?" she
said. "You shall go back for the rest yourself, Martha, because it is
your own fault." Martha knew that all this was pleasant enough;--but
then her mistress's moods would sometimes be changed so suddenly! How
would it be when Miss Stanbury knew that Brooke Burgess had been left
behind at Nuncombe Putney?
"You see I didn't stay to eat any of the lamb," said Dorothy,
smiling.
"You shall have a calf instead, my dear," said Miss Stanbury,
"because you are a returned prodigal."
All this was very pleasant, and Miss Stanbury was so happy dispensing
her tea, and the hot cake, and the clotted cream, and was so intent
upon her little methods of caressing and petting her niece, that
Dorothy had no heart to tell her story while the plates and cups were
still upon the table. She had not, perhaps, cared much for the hot
cake, having such a weight upon her mind, but she had seemed to care,
understanding well that she might so best conduce to her aunt's
comfort. Miss Stanbury was a woman who could not bear that the good
things which she had provided for a guest should not be enjoyed. She
could taste with a friend's palate, and drink with a friend's throat.
But when debarred these vicarious pleasures by what seemed to her to
be the caprice of her guests, she would be offended. It had been one
of the original sins of Camilla and Arabella French that they would
declare at her tea-table that they had dined late and could not eat
tea-cake. Dorothy knew all this,--and did her duty;--but with a
heavy heart. There was the story to be told, and she had promised
Martha that it should be told to-night. She was quite aware, too,
independently of her promise, that it was necessary that it should
be told to-night. It was very sad,--very grievous that the dear old
lady's happiness should be disturbed so soon; but it must be done.
When the tea-things were being taken away her aunt was still purring
round her, and saying gentle, loving words. Dorothy bore it as well
as she could,--bore it well, smiling and kissing her aunt's hand, and
uttering now and then some word of affection. But the thing had to be
done; and as soon as the room was quiet for a moment, she jumped up
from her chair and began. "Aunt Stanbury, I must tell you something
at once. Who, do you think, is at Nuncombe Putney?"
"Not Brooke Burgess?"
"Yes, he is. He is there now, and is to be here with you to-morrow."
The whole colour and character of Miss Stanbury's face was changed in
a moment. She had been still purring up to the moment in which this
communication had been made to her. Her gratification had come to her
from the idea that her pet had come back to her from love of her,--as
in very truth had been the case; but now it seemed that Dorothy had
returned to ask for a great favour for herself. And she reflected at
once that Brooke had passed through Exeter without seeing her. If
he was determined to marry without reference to her, he might at
any rate have had the grace to come to her and say so. She, in the
fulness of her heart, had written words of affection to Dorothy;--and
both Dorothy and Brooke had at once taken advantage of her
expressions for their own purposes. Such was her reading of the story
of the day. "He need not trouble himself to come here now," she said.
"Dear aunt, do not say that."
"I do say it. He need not trouble himself to come now. When I said
that I should be glad to see you, I did not intend that you should
meet Mr. Burgess under my roof. I did not wish to have you both
together."
"How could I help coming, when you wrote to me like that?"
"It is very well,--but he need not come. He knows the way from
Nuncombe to London without stopping at Exeter."
"Aunt Stanbury, you must let me tell it you all."
"There is no more to tell, I should think."
"But there is more. You knew what he thought about me, and what he
wished."
"He is his own master, my dear;--and you are your own mistress."
"If you speak to me like that you will kill me, Aunt Stanbury. I did
not think of coming; only when Martha brought your dear letter I
could not help it. But he was coming. He meant to come to-morrow,
and he will. Of course he must defend himself, if you are angry with
him."
"He need not defend himself at all."
"I told them, and I told him, that I would only stay one night,--if
you did not wish that we should be here together. You must see him,
Aunt Stanbury. You would not refuse to see him."
"If you please, my dear, you must allow me to judge whom I will see."
After that the discussion ceased between them for awhile, and Miss
Stanbury left the room that she might hold a consultation with
Martha. Dorothy went up to her chamber, and saw that everything had
been prepared for her with most scrupulous care. Nothing could be
whiter, neater, cleaner, nicer than was everything that surrounded
her. She had perceived while living under her aunt's roof, how,
gradually, small, delicate feminine comforts had been increased for
her. Martha had been told that Miss Dorothy ought to have this, and
that Miss Dorothy ought to have that; till at last she, who had
hitherto known nothing of the small luxuries that come from an easy
income, had felt ashamed of the prettinesses that had been added to
her. Now she could see at once that infinite care had been used to
make her room bright and smiling,--only in the hope that she would
return. As soon as she saw it all, she sat down on her bed and burst
out into tears. Was it not hard upon her that she should be forced
into such ingratitude! Every comfort prepared for her was a coal of
hot fire upon her head. And yet what had she done that she ought not
to have done? Was it unreasonable that she should have loved this
man, when they two were brought together? And had she even dared to
think of him otherwise than as an acquaintance till he had compelled
her to confess her love? And after that had she not tried to separate
herself from him, so that they two,--her aunt and her lover,--might
be divided by no quarrel? Had not Priscilla told her that she was
right in all that she was doing? Nevertheless, in spite of all this,
she could not refrain from accusing herself of ingratitude towards
her aunt. And she began to think it would have been better for her
now to have remained at home, and have allowed Brooke to come alone
to Exeter than to have obeyed the impulse which had arisen from the
receipt of her aunt's letter. When she went down again she found
herself alone in the room, and she was beginning to think that it was
intended that she should go to bed without again seeing her aunt;
but at last Miss Stanbury came to her, with a sad countenance, but
without that look of wrath which Dorothy knew so well. "My dear,"
she said, "it will be better that Mr. Burgess should go up to London
to-morrow. I will see him, of course, if he chooses to come, and
Martha shall meet him at the station and explain it. If you do not
mind, I would prefer that you should not meet him here."
"I meant only to stay one night, aunt."
"That is nonsense. If I am to part with either of you, I will part
with him. You are dearer to me than he is. Dorothy, you do not know
how dear to me you are."
Dorothy immediately fell on her knees at her aunt's feet, and hid her
face in her aunt's lap. Miss Stanbury twined round her fingers the
soft hair which she loved so well,--because it was a grace given by
God and not bought out of a shop,--and caressed the girl's head, and
muttered something that was intended for a prayer. "If he will let
me, aunt, I will give him up," said Dorothy, looking up into her
aunt's face. "If he will say that I may, though I shall love him
always, he may go."
"He is his own master," said Miss Stanbury. "Of course he is his own
master."
"Will you let me return to-morrow,--just for a few days,--and then
you can talk to him as you please. I did not mean to come to stay. I
wished him good-bye because I knew that I should not meet him here."
"You always talk of going away, Dorothy, as soon as ever you are in
the house. You are always threatening me."
"I will come again, the moment you tell me. If he goes in the
morning, I will be here the same evening. And I will write to him,
Aunt Stanbury, and tell him,--that he is--quite free,--quite
free,--quite free."
Miss Stanbury made no reply to this, but sat, still playing with her
niece's hair. "I think I will go to bed," she said at last. "It is
past ten. You need not go to Nuncombe, Dorothy. Martha shall meet
him, and he can see me here. But I do not wish him to stay in the
house. You can go over and call on Mrs. MacHugh. Mrs. MacHugh will
take it well of you that you should call on her." Dorothy made no
further opposition to this arrangement, but kissed her aunt, and went
to her chamber.
How was it all to be for her? For the last two days she had been
radiant with new happiness. Everything had seemed to be settled. Her
lover, in his high-handed way, had declared that in no important
crisis of life would he allow himself to be driven out of his way
by the fear of what an old woman might do in her will. When Dorothy
assured him that not for worlds would she, though she loved him
dearly, injure his material prospects, he had thrown it all aside,
after a grand fashion, that had really made the girl think that
all Miss Stanbury's money was as nothing to his love for her. She
and Priscilla and her mother had been carried away so entirely by
Brooke's oratory as to feel for the time that the difficulties were
entirely conquered. But now the aspect of things was so different!
Whatever Brooke might owe to Miss Stanbury, she, Dorothy, owed her
aunt everything. She would immolate herself,--if Brooke would only
let her. She did not quite understand her aunt's stubborn opposition;
but she knew that there was some great cause for her aunt's feeling
on the matter. There had been a promise made, or an oath sworn, that
the property of the Burgess family should not go into the hands of
any Stanbury. Dorothy told herself that, were she married, she would
be a Stanbury no longer;--that her aunt would still comply with the
obligation she had fixed for herself; but, nevertheless, she was
ready to believe that her aunt might be right. Her aunt had always
declared that it should be so; and Dorothy, knowing this, confessed
to herself that she should have kept her heart under better control.
Thinking of these things, she went to the table, where paper and ink
and pens had all been prepared for her so prettily, and began her
letter to Brooke. "Dearest, dearest Brooke." But then she thought
that this was not a fair keeping of her promise, and she began again.
"My dear Brooke." The letter, however, did not get itself written
that night. It was almost impossible for her to write it. "I think it
will be better for you," she had tried to say, "to be guided by my
aunt." But how could she say this when she did not believe it? It was
her wish to make him understand that she would never think ill of
him, for a moment, if he would make up his mind to abandon her;--but
she could not find the words to express herself,--and she went, at
last, to bed, leaving the half-covered paper upon the table.
She went to bed, and cried herself to sleep. It had been so sweet
to have a lover,--a man of her own, to whom she could say what she
pleased, from whom she had a right to ask for counsel and protection,
a man who delighted to be near her, and to make much of her. In
comparison with her old mode of living, her old ideas of life, her
life with such a lover was passed in an elysium. She had entered from
barren lands into so rich a paradise! But there is no paradise, as
she now found, without apples which must be eaten, and which lead
to sorrow. She regretted in this hour that she had ever seen Brooke
Burgess. After all, with her aunt's love and care for her, with
her mother and sister near her, with the respect of those who knew
her, why should the lands have been barren, even had there been no
entrance for her into that elysium? And did it not all result in
this,--that the elysium to be desired should not be here; that the
paradise, without the apples, must be waited for till beyond the
grave? It is when things go badly with us here, and for most of us
only then, that we think that we can see through the dark clouds into
the joys of heaven. But at last she slept, and in her dreams Brooke
was sitting with her in Niddon Park with his arm tight clasped round
her waist.
She slept so soundly, that when a step crept silently into her room,
and when a light was held for awhile over her face, neither the step
nor the light awakened her. She was lying with her head back upon the
pillow, and her arm hung by the bedside, and her lips were open, and
her loose hair was spread upon the pillow. The person who stood there
with the light thought that there never had been a fairer sight.
Everything there was so pure, so sweet, so good! She was one whose
only selfish happiness could come to her from the belief that others
loved her. The step had been very soft, and even the breath of the
intruder was not allowed to pass heavily into the air, but the light
of the candle shone upon the eyelids of the sleeper, and she moved
her head restlessly on the pillow. "Dorothy, are you awake? Can you
speak to me?"
Then the disturbed girl gradually opened her eyes and gazed upwards,
and raised herself in her bed, and sat wondering. "Is anything the
matter, aunt?" she said.
"Only the vagaries of an old woman, my pet,--of an old woman who
cannot sleep in her bed."
[Illustration: "Only the vagaries of an old woman."]
"But what is it, aunt?"
"Kiss me, dearest." Then with something of slumber still about her,
Dorothy raised herself in her bed, and placed her arm on her aunt's
shoulder and embraced her. "And now for my news," said Miss Stanbury.
"What news, aunt? It isn't morning yet; is it?"
"No;--it is not morning. You shall sleep again presently. I have
thought of it, and you shall be Brooke's wife, and I will have it
here, and we will all be friends."
"What!"
"You will like that;--will you not?"
"And you will not quarrel with him? What am I to say? What am I to
do?" She was, in truth, awake now, and, not knowing what she did, she
jumped out of bed, and stood holding her aunt by the arm.
"It is not a dream," said Miss Stanbury.
"Are you sure that it is not a dream? And may he come here
to-morrow?"
"Of course he will come to-morrow."
"And may I see him, Aunt Stanbury?"
"Not if you go home, my dear."
"But I won't go home. And will you tell him? Oh dear, oh dear! Aunt
Stanbury, I do not think that I believe it yet."
"You will catch cold, my dear, if you stay there trying to believe
it. You have nothing on. Get into bed and believe it there. You will
have time to think of it before the morning." Then Miss Stanbury went
back to her own chamber, and Dorothy was left alone to realise her
bliss.
She thought of all her life for the last twelve months,--of the
first invitation to Exeter, and the doubts of the family as to
its acceptance, of her arrival and of her own doubts as to the
possibility of her remaining, of Mr. Gibson's courtship and her
aunt's disappointment, of Brooke's coming, of her love and of
his,--and then of her departure back to Nuncombe. After that had come
the triumph of Brooke's visit, and then the terrible sadness of her
aunt's displeasure. But now everything was good and glorious. She
did not care for money herself. She thought that she never could
care much for being rich. But had she made Brooke poor by marrying
him, that must always have been to her matter of regret, if not of
remorse. But now it was all to be smooth and sweet. Now a paradise
was to be opened to her, with no apples which she might not eat;--no
apples which might not, but still must, be eaten. She thought that it
would be impossible that she should sleep again that night; but she
did sleep, and dreamed that Brooke was holding her in Niddon Park,
tighter than ever.
When the morning came she trembled as she walked down into the
parlour. Might it not still be possible that it was all a dream? Or
what if her aunt should again have changed her purpose? But the first
moment of her aunt's presence told her that there was nothing to
fear. "How did you sleep, Dorothy?" said the old lady.
"Dear aunt, I do not know. Was it all sleep?"
"What shall we say to Brooke when he comes?"
"You shall tell him."
"No, dearest, you must tell him. And you must say to him that if he
is not good to my girl, and does not love her always, and cling to
her, and keep her from harm, and be in truth her loving husband, I
will hold him to be the most ungrateful of human beings." And before
Brooke came, she spoke again. "I wonder whether he thinks you as
pretty as I do, Dolly?"
"He never said that he thought me pretty at all."
"Did he not? Then he shall say so, or he shall not have you. It was
your looks won me first, Dolly,--like an old fool as I am. It is so
pleasant to have a little nature after such a deal of artifice." In
which latter remarks it was quite understood that Miss Stanbury was
alluding to her enemies at Heavitree.
CHAPTER LXXIV.
THE LIONESS AROUSED.
Brooke Burgess had been to Exeter and had gone,--for he only remained
there one night,--and everything was apparently settled. It was not
exactly told through Exeter that Miss Stanbury's heir was to be
allowed to marry Miss Stanbury's niece; but Martha knew it, and Giles
Hickbody guessed it, and Dorothy was allowed to tell her mother and
sister, and Brooke himself, in his own careless way, had mentioned
the matter to his uncle Barty. As Miss Stanbury had also told the
secret in confidence to Mrs. MacHugh, it cannot be said that it was
altogether well kept. Four days after Brooke's departure the news
reached the Frenches at Heavitree. It was whispered to Camilla by
one of the shopmen with whom she was still arranging her marriage
trousseau, and was repeated by her to her mother and sister with some
additions which were not intended to be good-natured. "He gets her
and the money together as a bargain--of course," said Camilla. "I
only hope the money won't be found too dear."
"Perhaps he won't get it after all," said Arabella.
"That would be cruel," replied Camilla. "I don't think that even Miss
Stanbury is so false as that."
Things were going very badly at Heavitree. There was war there,
almost everlastingly, though such little playful conversations as the
above shewed that there might be an occasional lull in the battle.
Mr. Gibson was not doing his duty. That was clear enough. Even Mrs.
French, when she was appealed to with almost frantic energy by her
younger daughter, could not but acknowledge that he was very remiss
as a lover. And Camilla, in her fury, was very imprudent. That very
frantic energy which induced her to appeal to her mother was, in
itself, proof of her imprudence. She knew that she was foolish, but
she could not control her passion. Twice had she detected Arabella in
receiving notes from Mr. Gibson, which she did not see, and of which
it had been intended that she should know nothing. And once, when
she spent a night away at Ottery St. Mary with a friend,--a visit
which was specially prefatory to marriage, and made in reference to
bridesmaids' dresses,--Arabella had had,--so at least Camilla was
made to believe,--a secret meeting with Mr. Gibson in some of the
lanes which lead down from Heavitree to the Topsham road.
"I happened to meet him, and spoke two words to him," said Arabella.
"Would you have me cut him?"
"I'll tell you what it is, Bella;--if there is any underhand game
going on that I don't understand, all Exeter shall be on fire before
you shall carry it out."
Bella made no answer to this, but shrugged her shoulders. Camilla
was almost at a loss to guess what might be the truth. Would not any
sister, so accused on such an occasion, rebut the accusation with
awful wrath? But Arabella simply shrugged her shoulders, and went her
way. It was now the 15th of April, and there wanted but one short
fortnight to their marriage. The man had not the courage to jilt
her! She felt sure that he had not heart enough to do a deed of such
audacity. And her sister, too, was weak and a coward, and would
lack the power to stand on her legs and declare herself to be the
perpetrator of such villany. Her mother, as she knew well, would
always have preferred that her elder daughter should be the bride;
but her mother was not the woman to have the hardihood, now, in
the eleventh hour, to favour such an intrigue. Let her wish be
what it might, she would not be strong enough to carry through the
accomplishment of it. They would all know that that threat of hers
of setting Exeter on fire would be carried out after some fashion
that would not be inadequate to the occasion. A sister, a mother, a
promised lover, all false,--all so damnably, cruelly false! It was
impossible. No history, no novel of most sensational interest, no
wonderful villany that had ever been wrought into prose or poetry,
would have been equal to this. It was impossible. She told herself so
a score of times a day. And yet the circumstances were so terribly
suspicious! Mr. Gibson's conduct as a lover was simply disgraceful
to him as a man and a clergyman. He was full of excuses, which she
knew to be false. He would never come near her if he could help it.
When he was with her, he was as cold as an archbishop both in word
and in action. Nothing would tempt him to any outward manifestation
of affection. He would talk of nothing but the poor women of St.
Peter-cum-Pumpkin in the city, and the fraudulent idleness of a
certain colleague in the cathedral services, who was always shirking
his work. He made her no presents. He never walked with her. He was
always gloomy,--and he had indeed so behaved himself in public that
people were beginning to talk of "poor Mr. Gibson." And yet he could
meet Arabella on the sly in the lanes, and send notes to her by the
green-grocer's boy! Poor Mr. Gibson indeed! Let her once get him
well over the 29th of April, and the people of Exeter might talk
about poor Mr. Gibson if they pleased. And Bella's conduct was more
wonderful almost than that of Mr. Gibson. With all her cowardice, she
still held up her head,--held it perhaps a little higher than was
usual with her. And when that grievous accusation was made against
her,--made and repeated,--an accusation the very thought and sound
of which would almost have annihilated her had there been a decent
feeling in her bosom, she would simply shrug her shoulders and walk
away. "Camilla," she had once said, "you will drive that man mad
before you have done." "What is it to you how I drive him?" Camilla
had answered in her fury. Then Arabella had again shrugged her
shoulders and walked away. Between Camilla and her mother, too, there
had come to be an almost internecine quarrel on a collateral point.
Camilla was still carrying on a vast arrangement which she called the
preparation of her trousseau, but which both Mrs. French and Bella
regarded as a spoliation of the domestic nest, for the proud purposes
of one of the younger birds. And this had grown so fearfully that
in two different places Mrs. French had found herself compelled to
request that no further articles might be supplied to Miss Camilla.
The bride elect had rebelled, alleging that as no fortune was to be
provided for her, she had a right to take with her such things as she
could carry away in her trunks and boxes. Money could be had at the
bank, she said; and, after all, what were fifty pounds more or less
on such an occasion as this? And then she went into a calculation to
prove that her mother and sister would be made so much richer by her
absence, and that she was doing so much for them by her marriage,
that nothing could be more mean in them than that they should
hesitate to supply her with such things as she desired to make her
entrance into Mr. Gibson's house respectable. But Mrs. French was
obdurate, and Mr. Gibson was desired to speak to her. Mr. Gibson, in
fear and trembling, told her that she ought to repress her spirit of
extravagance, and Camilla at once foresaw that he would avail himself
of this plea against her should he find it possible at any time to
avail himself of any plea. She became ferocious, and, turning upon
him, told him to mind his own business. Was it not all for him that
she was doing it? "She was not," she said, "disposed to submit to any
control in such matters from him till he had assumed his legal right
to it by standing with her before the altar." It came, however, to
be known all over Exeter that Miss Camilla's expenditure had been
checked, and that, in spite of the joys naturally incidental to a
wedding, things were not going well with the ladies at Heavitree.
At last the blow came. Camilla was aware that on a certain morning
her mother had been to Mr. Gibson's house, and had held a long
conference with him. She could learn nothing of what took place
there, for at that moment she had taken upon herself to place herself
on non-speaking terms with her mother in consequence of those
disgraceful orders which had been given to the tradesmen. But Bella
had not been at Mr. Gibson's house at the time, and Camilla, though
she presumed that her own conduct had been discussed in a manner very
injurious to herself, did not believe that any step was being then
arranged which would be positively antagonistic to her own views. The
day fixed was now so very near, that there could, she felt, be no
escape for the victim. But she was wrong.
Mr. Gibson had been found by Mrs. French in a very excited state on
that occasion. He had wept, and pulled his hair, and torn open his
waistcoat, had spoken of himself as a wretch,--pleading, however,
at the same time, that he was more sinned against than sinning, had
paced about the room with his hands dashing against his brows, and
at last had flung himself prostrate on the ground. The meaning of it
all was, that he had tried very hard, and had found at last that "he
couldn't do it." "I am ready to submit," said he, "to any verdict
that you may pronounce against me, but I should deceive you and
deceive her if I didn't say at once that I can't do it." He went on
to explain that since he had unfortunately entered into his present
engagement with Camilla,--of whose position he spoke in quite a
touching manner,--and since he had found what was the condition of
his own heart and feelings he had consulted a friend,--who, if any
merely human being was capable of advising, might be implicitly
trusted for advice in such a matter,--and that his friend had told
him that he was bound to give up the marriage let the consequences
to himself or to others be what they might. "Although the skies
should fall on me, I cannot stand at the hymeneal altar with a lie
in my mouth," said Mr. Gibson immediately upon his rising from his
prostrate condition on the floor. In such a position as this a
mother's fury would surely be very great! But Mrs. French was hardly
furious. She cried, and begged him to think better of it, and assured
him that Camilla, when she should be calmed down by matrimony, would
not be so bad as she seemed;--but she was not furious. "The truth
is, Mr. Gibson," she said through her tears, "that, after all, you
like Bella best." Mr. Gibson owned that he did like Bella best,
and although no bargain was made between them then and there,--and
such making of a bargain then and there would hardly have been
practicable,--it was understood that Mrs. French would not proceed to
extremities if Mr. Gibson would still make himself forthcoming as a
husband for the advantage of one of the daughters of the family.
So far Mr. Gibson had progressed towards a partial liberation from
his thraldom with a considerable amount of courage; but he was well
aware that the great act of daring still remained to be done. He
had suggested to Mrs. French that she should settle the matter with
Camilla,--but this Mrs. French had altogether declined to do. It
must, she said, come from himself. If she were to do it, she must
sympathise with her child; and such sympathy would be obstructive
of the future arrangements which were still to be made. "She always
knew that I liked Bella best," said Mr. Gibson,--still sobbing, still
tearing his hair, still pacing the room with his waistcoat torn open.
"I would not advise you to tell her that," said Mrs. French. Then
Mrs. French went home, and early on the following morning it was
thought good by Arabella that she also should pay a visit at Ottery
St. Mary's. "Good-bye, Cammy," said Arabella as she went. "Bella,"
said Camilla, "I wonder whether you are a serpent. I do not think
you can be so base a serpent as that." "I declare, Cammy, you do say
such odd things that no one can understand what you mean." And so she
went.
On that morning Mr. Gibson was walking at an early hour along the
road from Exeter to Cowley, contemplating his position and striving
to arrange his plans. What was he to do, and how was he to do it? He
was prepared to throw up his living, to abandon the cathedral, to
leave the diocese,--to make any sacrifice rather than take Camilla
to his bosom. Within the last six weeks he had learned to regard her
with almost a holy horror. He could not understand by what miracle
of self-neglect he had fallen into so perilous an abyss. He had long
known Camilla's temper. But in those days in which he had been beaten
like a shuttlecock between the Stanburys and the Frenches, he had
lost his head and had done,--he knew not what. "Those whom the God
chooses to destroy, he first maddens," said Mr. Gibson to himself
of himself, throwing himself back upon early erudition and pagan
philosophy. Then he looked across to the river Exe, and thought that
there was hardly water enough there to cover the multiplicity of his
sorrows.
But something must be done. He had proceeded so far in forming a
resolution, as he reached St. David's Church on his return homewards.
His sagacious friend had told him that as soon as he had altered
his mind, he was bound to let the lady know of it without delay.
"You must remember," said the sagacious friend, "that you will owe
her much,--very much." Mr. Gibson was perplexed in his mind when he
reflected how much he might possibly be made to owe her if she should
decide on appealing to a jury of her countrymen for justice. But
anything would be better than his home at St. Peter's-cum-Pumpkin
with Camilla sitting opposite to him as his wife. Were there not
distant lands in which a clergyman, unfortunate but still energetic,
might find work to do? Was there not all America?--and were there
not Australia, New Zealand, Natal, all open to him? Would not a
missionary career among the Chinese be better for him than St.
Peter's-cum-Pumpkin with Camilla French for his wife? By the time he
had reached home his mind was made up. He would write a letter to
Camilla at once; and he would marry Arabella at once,--on any day
that might be fixed,--on condition that Camilla would submit to her
defeat without legal redress. If legal redress should be demanded, he
would put in evidence the fact that her own mother had been compelled
to caution the tradesmen of the city in regard to her extravagance.
He did write his letter,--in an agony of spirit. "I sit down,
Camilla, with a sad heart and a reluctant hand," he said,
to communicate to you a fatal truth. But truth should be
made to prevail, and there is nothing in man so cowardly,
so detrimental, and so unmanly as its concealment. I have
looked into myself, and have inquired of myself, and have
assured myself, that were I to become your husband, I
should not make you happy. It would be of no use for me
now to dilate on the reasons which have convinced me;--but
I am convinced, and I consider it my duty to inform you so
at once. I have been closeted with your mother, and have
made her understand that it is so.
I have not a word to say in my own justification but
this,--that I am sure I am acting honestly in telling you
the truth. I would not wish to say a word animadverting
on yourself. If there must be blame in this matter, I am
willing to take it all on my own shoulders. But things
have been done of late, and words have been spoken, and
habits have displayed themselves, which would not, I am
sure, conduce to our mutual comfort in this world, or to
our assistance to each other in our struggles to reach the
happiness of the world to come.
I think that you will agree with me, Camilla, that when
a man or a woman has fallen into such a mistake as
that which I have now made, it is best that it should
be acknowledged. I know well that such a change of
arrangements as that which I now propose will be regarded
most unfavourably. But will not anything be better than
the binding of a matrimonial knot which cannot be again
unloosed, and which we should both regret?
I do not know that I need add anything further. What can
I add further? Only this;--that I am inflexible. Having
resolved to take this step,--and to bear the evil things
that may be said of me,--for your happiness and for my own
tranquility,--I shall not now relinquish my resolution. I
do not ask you to forgive me. I doubt much whether I shall
ever be quite able to forgive myself. The mistake which
I have made is one which should not have been committed.
I do not ask you to forgive me; but I do ask you to pray
that I may be forgiven.
Yours, with feelings of the truest friendship,
THOMAS GIBSON.
The letter had been very difficult, but he was rather proud of it
than otherwise when it was completed. He had felt that he was writing
a letter which not improbably might become public property. It was
necessary that he should be firm, that he should accuse himself a
little in order that he might excuse himself much, and that he should
hint at causes which might justify the rupture, though he should
so veil them as not to appear to defend his own delinquency by
ungenerous counter-accusation. When he had completed the letter,
he thought that he had done all this rather well, and he sent the
despatch off to Heavitree by the clerk of St. Peter's Church, with
something of that feeling of expressible relief which attends the
final conquest over some fatal and all but insuperable misfortune. He
thought that he was sure now that he would not have to marry Camilla
on the 29th of the month,--and there would probably be a period of
some hours before he would be called upon to hear or read Camilla's
reply.
Camilla was alone when she received the letter, but she rushed at
once to her mother. "There," said she; "there--I knew that it was
coming!" Mrs. French took the paper into her hands, and gasped, and
gazed at her daughter without speaking. "You knew of it, mother."
"Yesterday,--when he told me, I knew of it."
"And Bella knows it."
"Not a word of it."
"She does. I am sure she does. But it is all nothing. I will not
accept it. He cannot treat me so. I will drag him there;--but he
shall come."
"You can't make him, my dear."
"I will make him. And you would help me, mamma, if you had any
spirit. What,--a fortnight before the time, when the things are all
bought! Look at the presents that have been sent! Mamma, he doesn't
know me. And he never would have done it, if it had not been for
Bella,--never. She had better take care, or there shall be such a
tragedy that nobody ever heard the like. If she thinks that she is
going to be that man's wife,--she is--mistaken." Then there was a
pause for a moment. "Mamma," she said, "I shall go to him at once.
I do not care in the least what anybody may say. I shall--go to
him,--at once." Mrs. French felt that at this moment it was best that
she should be silent.
CHAPTER LXXV.
THE ROWLEYS GO OVER THE ALPS.
[Illustration]
By the thirteenth of May the Rowley family had established itself in
Florence, purposing to remain either there or at the baths of Lucca
till the end of June, at which time it was thought that Sir Marmaduke
should begin to make preparations for his journey back to the
Islands. Their future prospects were not altogether settled. It was
not decided whether Lady Rowley should at once return with him,
whether Mrs. Trevelyan should return with him,--nor was it settled
among them what should be the fate of Nora Rowley. Nora Rowley was
quite resolved herself that she would not go back to the Islands, and
had said as much to her mother. Lady Rowley had not repeated this
to Sir Marmaduke, and was herself in doubt as to what might best be
done. Girls are understood by their mothers better than they are by
their fathers. Lady Rowley was beginning to be aware that Nora's
obstinacy was too strong to be overcome by mere words, and that other
steps must be taken if she were to be weaned from her pernicious
passion for Hugh Stanbury. Mr. Glascock was still in Florence. Might
she not be cured by further overtures from Mr. Glascock? The chance
of securing such a son-in-law was so important, so valuable, that no
trouble was too great to be incurred, even though the probability of
success might not be great.
It must not, however, be supposed that Lady Rowley carried off all
the family to Italy, including Sir Marmaduke, simply in chase of
Mr. Glascock. Anxious as she was on the subject, she was too proud,
and also too well-conditioned, to have suggested to herself such a
journey with such an object. Trevelyan had escaped from Willesden
with the child, and they had heard,--again through Stanbury,--that
he had returned to Italy. They had all agreed that it would be well
that they should leave London for awhile, and see something of
the Continent; and when it was told to them that little Louis was
probably in Florence, that alone was reason enough for them to go
thither. They would go to the city till the heat was too great and
the mosquitoes too powerful, and then they would visit the baths
of Lucca for a month. This was their plan of action, and the cause
for their plan; but Lady Rowley found herself able to weave into it
another little plan of her own of which she said nothing to anybody.
She was not running after Mr. Glascock; but if Mr. Glascock should
choose to run after them,--or her, who could say that any harm had
been done?
Nora had answered that proposition of her lover's to walk out of the
house in Manchester Street, and get married at the next church, in a
most discreet manner. She had declared that she would be true and
firm, but that she did not wish to draw upon herself the displeasure
of her father and mother. She did not, she said, look upon a
clandestine marriage as a happy resource. But,--this she added at the
end of a long and very sensible letter,--she intended to abide by her
engagement, and she did not intend to go back to the Mandarins. She
did not say what alternative she would choose in the event of her
being unable to obtain her father's consent before his return. She
did not suggest what was to become of her when Sir Marmaduke's leave
of absence should be expired. But her statement that she would not go
back to the islands was certainly made with more substantial vigour,
though, perhaps, with less of reasoning, than any other of the
propositions made in her letter. Then, in her postscript, she told
him that they were all going to Italy. "Papa and mamma think that we
ought to follow poor Mr. Trevelyan. The lawyer says that nothing can
be done while he is away with the boy. We are therefore all going to
start to Florence. The journey is delightful. I will not say whose
presence will be wanting to make it perfect."
Before they started there came a letter to Nora from Dorothy, which
shall be given entire, because it will tell the reader more of
Dorothy's happiness than would be learned from any other mode of
narrative.
The Close, Thursday.
DEAREST NORA,
I have just had a letter from Hugh, and that makes me feel
that I should like to write to you. Dear Hugh has told me
all about it, and I do so hope that things may come right
and that we may be sisters. He is so good that I do not
wonder that you should love him. He has been the best son
and the best brother in the world, and everybody speaks
well of him,--except my dear aunt, who is prejudiced
because she does not like newspapers. I need not praise
him to you, for I dare say you think quite as well of him
as I do. I cannot tell you all the beautiful things he
says about you, but I dare say he has told them to you
himself.
I seem to know you so well because Priscilla has talked
about you so often. She says that she knew that you and
my brother were fond of each other because you growled at
each other when you were together at the Clock House, and
never had any civil words to say before people. I don't
know whether growling is a sign of love, but Hugh does
growl sometimes when he is most affectionate. He growls at
me, and I understand him, and I like to be growled at. I
wonder whether you like him to growl at you.
And now I must tell you something about myself,--because
if you are to be my sister you ought to know it all. I
also am going to be married to a man whom I love,--oh, so
dearly! His name is Mr. Brooke Burgess, and he is a great
friend of my aunt's. At first she did not like our being
engaged, because of some family reason;--but she has got
over that, and nothing can be kinder and nicer than she
is. We are to be married here, some day in June,--the 11th
I think it will be. How I do wish you could have been here
to be my bridesmaid. It would have been so nice to have
had Hugh's sweetheart with me. He is a friend of Hugh's,
and no doubt you will hear all about him. The worst of it
is that we must live in London, because my husband as will
be,--you see I call him mine already,--is in an office
there. And so poor Aunt Stanbury will be left all alone.
It will be very sad, and she is so wedded to Exeter that I
fear we shall not get her up to London.
I would describe Mr. Burgess to you, only I do not suppose
you would care to hear about him. He is not so tall as
Hugh, but he is a great deal better looking. With you two
the good looks are to be with the wife; but, with us, with
the husband. Perhaps you think Hugh is handsome. We used
to declare that he was the ugliest boy in the country.
I don't suppose it makes very much difference. Brooke is
handsome, but I don't think I should like him the less if
he were ever so ugly.
Do you remember hearing about the Miss Frenches when you
were in Devonshire? There has come up such a terrible
affair about them. A Mr. Gibson, a clergyman, was going to
marry the younger; but has changed his mind and wants to
take the elder. I think he was in love with her first.
Dorothy did not say a word about the little intermediate stage of
attachment to herself.
All this is making a great noise in the city, and some
people think he should be punished severely. It seems to
me that a gentleman ought not to make such a mistake; but
if he does, he ought to own it. I hope they will let him
marry the elder one. Aunt Stanbury says it all comes from
their wearing chignons. I wish you knew Aunt Stanbury,
because she is so good. Perhaps you wear a chignon. I
think Priscilla said that you did. It must not be large,
if you come to see Aunt Stanbury.
Pray write to me,--and believe that I hope to be your most
affectionate sister,
DOROTHY STANBURY.
P.S.--I am so happy, and I do so hope that you will be the
same.
This was received only a day before the departure of the Rowleys for
Italy, and was answered by a short note promising that Nora would
write to her correspondent from Florence.
There could be no doubt that Trevelyan had started with his boy,
fearing the result of the medical or legal interference with his
affairs which was about to be made at Sir Marmaduke's instance. He
had written a few words to his wife, neither commencing nor ending
his note after any usual fashion, telling her that he thought it
expedient to travel, that he had secured the services of a nurse for
the little boy, and that during his absence a certain income would,
as heretofore, be paid to her. He said nothing as to his probable
return, or as to her future life; nor was there anything to indicate
whither he was going. Stanbury, however, had learned from the
faithless and frightened Bozzle that Trevelyan's letters were to be
sent after him to Florence. Mr. Bozzle, in giving this information,
had acknowledged that his employer was "becoming no longer quite
himself under his troubles," and had expressed his opinion that he
ought to be "looked after." Bozzle had made his money; and now,
with a grain of humanity mixed with many grains of faithlessness,
reconciled it to himself to tell his master's secrets to his master's
enemies. What would a counsel be able to say about his conduct
in a court of law? That was the question which Bozzle was always
asking himself as to his own business. That he should be abused
by a barrister to a jury, and exposed as a spy and a fiend, was,
he thought, a matter of course. To be so abused was a part of his
profession. But it was expedient for him in all cases to secure some
loop-hole of apparent duty by which he might in part escape from such
censures. He was untrue to his employer now, because he thought that
his employer ought to be "looked after." He did, no doubt, take a
five-pound note from Hugh Stanbury; but then it was necessary that
he should live. He must be paid for his time. In this way Trevelyan
started for Florence, and within a week afterwards the Rowleys were
upon his track.
Nothing had been said by Sir Marmaduke to Nora as to her lover since
that stormy interview in which both father and daughter had expressed
their opinions very strongly, and very little had been said by Lady
Rowley. Lady Rowley had spoken more than once of Nora's return to
the Mandarins, and had once alluded to it as a certainty. "But I do
not know that I shall go back," Nora had said. "My dear," the mother
had replied, "unless you are married, I suppose your home must be
with your parents." Nora, having made her protest, did not think it
necessary to persevere, and so the matter was dropped. It was known,
however, that they must all come back to London before they started
for their seat of government, and therefore the subject did not at
present assume its difficult aspect. There was a tacit understanding
among them that everything should be done to make the journey
pleasant to the young mother who was in search of her son; and, in
addition to this, Lady Rowley had her own little understanding, which
was very tacit indeed, that in Mr. Glascock might be found an escape
from one of their great family difficulties.
"You had better take this, papa," Mrs. Trevelyan had said, when she
received from the office of Mr. Bideawhile a cheque payable to her
order for the money sent to her by her husband's direction.
"I do not want the man's money," said Sir Marmaduke.
"But you are going to this place for my sake, papa;--and it is right
that he should bear the expense for his own wife. And, papa, you must
remember always that though his mind is distracted on this horrible
business, he is not a bad man. No one is more liberal or more just
about money." Sir Marmaduke's feelings on the matter were very
much the same as those which had troubled Mr. Outhouse, and he,
personally, refused to touch the money; but his daughter paid her own
share of the expenses of the journey.
They travelled at their ease, stopping at Paris, and at Geneva, and
at Milan. Lady Rowley thought that she was taken very fast, because
she was allowed to sleep only two nights at each of these places,
and Sir Rowley himself thought that he had achieved something of a
Hannibalian enterprise in taking five ladies and two maids over the
Simplon and down into the plains of Lombardy, with nobody to protect
him but a single courier. He had been a little nervous about it,
being unaccustomed to European travelling, and had not at first
realised the fact that the journey is to be made with less trouble
than one from the Marble Arch to Mile End. "My dears," he said to his
younger daughters, as they were rattling round the steep downward
twists and turns of the great road, "you must sit quite still on
these descents, or you do not know where you may go. The least thing
would overset us." But Lucy and Sophy soon knew better, and became
so intimate with the mountain, under the friendly guidance of their
courier, that before the plains were reached, they were in and out,
and here and there, and up and down, as though they had been bred
among the valleys of the pass. There would come a ringing laugh from
some rock above their head, and Lady Rowley looking up would see
their dresses fluttering on a pinnacle which appeared to her to be
fit only for a bird; and there would be the courier behind them, with
two parasols, and a shawl, and a cloak, and an eye-glass, and a fine
pair of grizzled whiskers. They made an Alpine club of their own,
refusing to admit their father because he would not climb up a rock,
and Nora thought of the letters about it which she would write to
her lover,--only that she had determined that she would not write to
him at all without telling her mother,--and Mrs. Trevelyan would for
moments almost forget that she had been robbed of her child.
From Milan they went on to Florence, and though they were by that
time quite at home in Italy, and had become critical judges of
Italian inns and Italian railways, they did not find that journey
to be quite so pleasant. There is a romance to us still in the name
of Italy which a near view of many details in the country fails to
realise. Shall we say that a journey through Lombardy is about as
interesting as one through the flats of Cambridgeshire and the fens
of Norfolk? And the station of Bologna is not an interesting spot
in which to spend an hour or two, although it may be conceded that
provisions may be had there much better than any that can be procured
at our own railway stations. From thence they went, still by rail,
over the Apennines, and unfortunately slept during the whole time.
The courier had assured them that if they would only look out they
would see the castles of which they had read in novels; but the day
had been very hot, and Sir Marmaduke had been cross, and Lady Rowley
had been weary, and so not a castle was seen. "Pistoia, me lady,
this," said the courier opening the door;--"to stop half an hour."
"Oh, why was it not Florence?" Another hour and a half! So they
all went to sleep again, and were very tired when they reached the
beautiful city.
During the next day they rested at their inn, and sauntered through
the Duomo, and broke their necks looking up at the inimitable glories
of the campanile. Such a one as Sir Marmaduke had of course not come
to Florence without introductions. The Foreign Office is always very
civil to its next-door neighbour of the colonies,--civil and cordial,
though perhaps a little patronising. A minister is a bigger man than
a governor; and the smallest of the diplomatic fry are greater swells
than even secretaries in quite important dependencies. The attaché,
though he be unpaid, dwells in a capital, and flirts with a countess.
The governor's right-hand man is confined to an island, and dances
with a planter's daughter. The distinction is quite understood, but
is not incompatible with much excellent good feeling on the part of
the superior department. Sir Marmaduke had come to Florence fairly
provided with passports to Florentine society, and had been mentioned
in more than one letter as the distinguished Governor of the
Mandarins, who had been called home from his seat of government on a
special mission of great importance. On the second day he went out
to call at the embassy and to leave his cards. "Have you been able
to learn whether he is here?" asked Lady Rowley of her husband in a
whisper, as soon as they were alone.
"Who;--Trevelyan?"
"I did not suppose you could learn about him, because he would be
hiding himself. But is Mr. Glascock here?"
"I forgot to ask," said Sir Marmaduke.
Lady Rowley did not reproach him. It is impossible that any father
should altogether share a mother's anxiety in regard to the marriage
of their daughters. But what a thing it would be! Lady Rowley thought
that she could compound for all misfortunes in other respects, if she
could have a daughter married to the future Lord Peterborough. She
had been told in England that he was faultless,--not very clever, not
very active, not likely to be very famous; but, as a husband, simply
faultless. He was very rich, very good-natured, easily managed,
more likely to be proud of his wife than of himself, addicted to no
jealousies, afflicted by no vices, so respectable in every way that
he was sure to become great as an English nobleman by the very weight
of his virtues. And it had been represented also to Lady Rowley
that this paragon among men had been passionately attached to her
daughter! Perhaps she magnified a little the romance of the story;
but it seemed to her that this greatly endowed lover had rushed away
from his country in despair, because her daughter Nora would not
smile upon him. Now they were, as she hoped, in the same city with
him. But it was indispensable to her success that she should not seem
to be running after him. To Nora, not a word had been said of the
prospect of meeting Mr. Glascock at Florence. Hardly more than a
word had been said to her sister Emily, and that under injunction
of strictest secrecy. It must be made to appear to all the world
that other motives had brought them to Florence,--as, indeed, other
motives had brought them. Not for worlds would Lady Rowley have run
after a man for her daughter; but still, still,--still, seeing that
the man was himself so unutterably in love with her girl, seeing that
he was so fully justified by his position to be in love with any
girl, seeing that such a maximum of happiness would be the result of
such a marriage, she did feel that, even for his sake, she must be
doing a good thing to bring them together! Something, though not much
of all this, she had been obliged to explain to Sir Marmaduke;--and
yet he had not taken the trouble to inquire whether Mr. Glascock was
in Florence!
On the third day after their arrival, the wife of the British
minister came to call upon Lady Rowley, and the wife of the British
minister was good-natured, easy-mannered, and very much given to
conversation. She preferred talking to listening, and in the course
of a quarter of an hour had told Lady Rowley a good deal about
Florence; but she had not mentioned Mr. Glascock's name. It would
have been so pleasant if the requisite information could have been
obtained without the asking of any direct question on the subject!
But Lady Rowley, who from many years' practice of similar, though
perhaps less distinguished, courtesies on her part, knew well the
first symptom of the coming end of her guest's visit, found that the
minister's wife was about to take her departure without an allusion
to Mr. Glascock. And yet the names had been mentioned of so many
English residents in Florence, who neither in wealth, rank, or
virtue, were competent to hold a candle to that phoenix! She was
forced, therefore, to pluck up courage, and to ask the question.
"Have you had a Mr. Glascock here this spring?" said Lady Rowley.
"What;--Lord Peterborough's son? Oh, dear, yes. Such a singular
being!"
Lady Rowley thought that she could perceive that her phoenix had
not made himself agreeable at the embassy. It might perhaps be that
he had buried himself away from society because of his love. "And is
here now?" asked Lady Rowley.
"I cannot say at all. He is sometimes here and sometimes with his
father at Naples. But when here, he lives chiefly with the Americans.
They say he is going to marry an American girl,--their minister's
niece. There are three of them, I think, and he is to take the
eldest." Lady Rowley asked no more questions, and let her august
visitor go, almost without another word.
CHAPTER LXXVI.
"WE SHALL BE SO POOR."
Mr. Glascock at that moment was not only in Florence, but was
occupying rooms in the very hotel in which the Rowleys were staying.
Lady Rowley, when she heard that he was engaged to marry an American
lady, became suddenly very sick at heart,--sick with a sickness
that almost went beyond her heart. She felt ill, and was glad to be
alone. The rumour might be untrue. Such rumours generally are untrue.
But then, as Lady Rowley knew very well, they generally have some
foundation in truth. Mr. Glascock, if he were not actually engaged
to the American girl, had probably been flirting with her;--and, if
so, where was that picture which Lady Rowley had been painting for
herself of a love-lorn swain to be brought back to the pleasures and
occupations of the world only by the girl of whom he was enamoured?
But still she would not quite give up the project. Mr. Glascock,
if he was in Italy, would no doubt see by the newspapers that Sir
Marmaduke and his family were in Florence,--and would probably come
to them. Then, if Nora would only behave herself, the American girl
might still be conquered.
During two or three days after this nothing was seen or heard of
Mr. Glascock. Had Lady Rowley thought of mentioning the name to the
waiter at the hotel, she would have learned that he was living in the
next passage; but it did not occur to her to seek information in that
fashion. Nor did she ask direct questions in other quarters about
Mr. Glascock himself. She did, however, make inquiry about Americans
living in Florence,--especially about the American Minister,--and,
before a week had passed overhead, had been introduced to the
Spaldings. Mrs. Spalding was very civil, and invited Lady Rowley and
all the girls and Sir Marmaduke to come to her on her "Fridays." She
received her friends every Friday, and would continue to do so till
the middle of June. She had nieces who would, she said, be so happy
to make the acquaintance of the Miss Rowleys.
By this time the picture galleries, the churches, and the palaces in
Florence had nearly all been visited. Poor Lady Rowley had dragged
herself wearily from sight to sight, hoping always to meet with
Mr. Glascock, ignorant of the fact that residents in a town do not
pass their mornings habitually in looking after pictures. During
this time inquiries were being made through the police, respecting
Trevelyan; and Sir Marmaduke had obtained information that an English
gentleman, with a little boy, had gone on to Siena, and had located
himself there. There seemed to be but little doubt that this was
Trevelyan,--though nothing had been learned with certainty as to the
gentleman's name. It had been decided that Sir Marmaduke, with his
courier and Mrs. Trevelyan, should go on to Siena, and endeavour
to come upon the fugitive, and they had taken their departure on a
certain morning. On that same day Lady Rowley was walking with Nora
and one of the other girls through the hall of the hotel, when they
were met in full face--by Mr. Glascock! Lady Rowley and Lucy were in
front, and they, of course, did not know the man. Nora had seen him
at once, and in her confusion hardly knew how to bear herself. Mr.
Glascock was passing by her without recognising her,--had passed her
mother and sister, and had so far gone on, that Nora had determined
to make no sign, when he chanced to look up and see who it was that
was so close to him. "Miss Rowley," he said, "who thought of meeting
you in Florence!" Lady Rowley, of course, turned round, and there was
an introduction. Poor Nora, though she knew nothing of her mother's
schemes, was confused and ill at ease. Mr. Glascock was very civil,
but at the same time rather cold. Lady Rowley was all smiles and
courtesy. She had, she said, heard his name from her daughters, and
was very happy to make his acquaintance. Lucy looked on somewhat
astonished to find that the lover whom her sister had been blamed for
rejecting, and who was spoken of with so many encomiums, was so old a
man. Mr. Glascock asked after Mrs. Trevelyan; and Lady Rowley, in a
low, melancholy whisper, told him that they were now all in Florence,
in the hope of meeting Mr. Trevelyan. "You have heard the sad story,
I know, Mr. Glascock,--and therefore I do not mind telling you." Mr.
Glascock acknowledged that he did know the story, and informed her
that he had seen Mr. Trevelyan in Florence within the last ten days.
This was so interesting, that, at Lady Rowley's request, he went with
them up to their rooms, and in this way the acquaintance was made. It
turned out that Mr. Glascock had spoken to Mr. Trevelyan, and that
Trevelyan had told him that he meant for the present to take up his
residence in some small Italian town. "And how was he looking, Mr.
Glascock?"
"Very ill, Lady Rowley;--very ill, indeed."
"Do not tell her so, Mr. Glascock. She has gone now with her father
to Siena. We think that he is there, with the boy,--or, at least,
that he may be heard of there. And you;--you are living here?" Mr.
Glascock said that he was living between Naples and Florence,--going
occasionally to Naples, a place that he hated, to see his father,
and coming back at intervals to the capital. Nora sat by, and hardly
spoke a word. She was nicely dressed, with an exquisite little
bonnet, which had been bought as they came through Paris; and Lady
Rowley, with natural pride, felt that if he was ever in love with her
child, that love must come back upon him now. American girls, she had
been told, were hard, and dry, and sharp, and angular. She had seen
some at the Mandarins, with whom she thought it must be impossible
that any Englishman should be in love. There never, surely, had
been an American girl like her Nora. "Are you fond of pictures, Mr.
Glascock?" she asked. Mr. Glascock was not very fond of pictures,
and thought that he was rather tired of them. What was he fond of?
Of sitting at home and doing nothing. That was his reply, at least;
and a very unsatisfactory reply it was, as Lady Rowley could hardly
propose that they should come and sit and do nothing with him. Could
he have been lured into churches or galleries, Nora might have been
once more thrown into his company. Then Lady Rowley took courage,
and asked him whether he knew the Spaldings. They were going to Mrs.
Spalding's that very evening,--she and her daughters. Mr. Glascock
replied that he did know the Spaldings, and that he also should be at
their house. Lady Rowley thought that she discovered something like a
blush about his cheekbones and brow, as he made his answer. Then he
left them, giving his hand to Nora as he went;--but there was nothing
in his manner to justify the slightest hope.
"I don't think he is nice at all," said Lucy.
"Don't be so foolish, Lucy," said Lady Rowley angrily.
"I think he is very nice," said Nora. "He was only talking nonsense
when he said that he liked to sit still and do nothing. He is not at
all an idle man;--at least I am told so."
"But he is as old as Methuselah," said Lucy.
"He is between thirty and forty," said Lady Rowley. "Of course we
know that from the peerage." Lady Rowley, however, was wrong. Had she
consulted the peerage, she would have seen that Mr. Glascock was over
forty.
Nora, as soon as she was alone and could think about it all, felt
quite sure that Mr. Glascock would never make her another offer. This
ought not to have caused her any sorrow, as she was very well aware
that she would not accept him, should he do so. Yet, perhaps, there
was a moment of some feeling akin to disappointment. Of course she
would not have accepted him. How could she? Her faith was so plighted
to Hugh Stanbury that she would be a by-word among women for ever,
were she to be so false. And as she told herself, she had not the
slightest feeling of affection for Mr. Glascock. It was quite out of
the question, and a matter simply for speculation. Nevertheless it
would have been a very grand thing to be Lady Peterborough, and she
almost regretted that she had a heart in her bosom.
She had become fully aware during that interview that her mother
still entertained hopes, and almost suspected that Lady Rowley had
known something of Mr. Glascock's residence in Florence. She had
seen that her mother had met Mr. Glascock almost as though some such
meeting had been expected, and had spoken to him almost as though she
had expected to have to speak to him. Would it not be better that she
should at once make her mother understand that all this could be of
no avail? If she were to declare plainly that nothing could bring
about such a marriage, would not her mother desist? She almost made
up her mind to do so; but as her mother said nothing to her before
they started for Mr. Spalding's house, neither did she say anything
to her mother. She did not wish to have angry words if they could be
avoided, and she felt that there might be anger and unpleasant words
were she to insist upon her devotion to Hugh Stanbury while this rich
prize was in sight. If her mother should speak to her, then, indeed,
she would declare her own settled purpose; but she would do nothing
to accelerate the evil hour.
There were but few people in Mrs. Spalding's drawing-room when they
were announced, and Mr. Glascock was not among them. Miss Wallachia
Petrie was there, and in the confusion of the introduction was
presumed by Lady Rowley to be one of the nieces introduced. She had
been distinctly told that Mr. Glascock was to marry the eldest, and
this lady was certainly older than the other two. In this way Lady
Rowley decided that Miss Wallachia Petrie was her daughter's hated
rival, and she certainly was much surprised at the gentleman's taste.
But there is nothing,--nothing in the way of an absurd matrimonial
engagement,--into which a man will not allow himself to be entrapped
by pique. Nora would have a great deal to answer for, Lady Rowley
thought, if the unfortunate man should be driven by her cruelty to
marry such a woman as this one now before her.
It happened that Lady Rowley soon found herself seated by Miss
Petrie, and she at once commenced her questionings. She intended to
be very discreet, but the subject was too near her heart to allow her
to be altogether silent. "I believe you know Mr. Glascock?" she said.
"Yes," said Wallachia, "I do know him." Now the peculiar nasal twang
which our cousins over the water have learned to use, and which
has grown out of a certain national instinct which coerces them to
express themselves with self-assertion;--let the reader go into his
closet and talk through his nose for awhile with steady attention
to the effect which his own voice will have, and he will find that
this theory is correct;--this intonation, which is so peculiar among
intelligent Americans, had been adopted con amore, and, as it were,
taken to her bosom by Miss Petrie. Her ears had taught themselves
to feel that there could be no vitality in speech without it, and
that all utterance unsustained by such tone was effeminate, vapid,
useless, unpersuasive, unmusical,--and English. It was a complaint
frequently made by her against her friends Caroline and Olivia that
they debased their voices, and taught themselves the puling British
mode of speech. "I do know the gentleman," said Wallachia;--and Lady
Rowley shuddered. Could it be that such a woman as this was to reign
over Monkhams, and become the future Lady Peterborough?
"He told me that he is acquainted with the family," said Lady Rowley.
"He is staying at our hotel, and my daughter knew him very well when
he was living in London."
"I dare say. I believe that in London the titled aristocrats do hang
pretty much together." It had never occurred to poor Lady Rowley,
since the day in which her husband had been made a knight, at the
advice of the Colonial Minister, in order that the inhabitants of
some island might be gratified by the opportunity of using the
title, that she and her children had thereby become aristocrats.
Were her daughter Nora to marry Mr. Glascock, Nora would become an
aristocrat,--or would, rather, be ennobled,--all which Lady Rowley
understood perfectly.
"I don't know that London society is very exclusive in that respect,"
said Lady Rowley.
"I guess you are pretty particular," said Miss Petrie, "and it seems
to me you don't have much regard to intellect or erudition,--but fix
things up straight according to birth and money."
"I hope we are not quite so bad as that," said Lady Rowley. "I do not
know London well myself, as I have passed my life in very distant
places."
"The distant places are, in my estimation, the best. The further the
mind is removed from the contamination incidental to the centres of
long-established luxury, the more chance it has of developing itself
according to the intention of the Creator, when he bestowed his gifts
of intellect upon us." Lady Rowley, when she heard this eloquence,
could hardly believe that such a man as Mr. Glascock should really be
intent upon marrying such a lady as this who was sitting next to her.
In the meantime, Nora and the real rival were together, and they also
were talking of Mr. Glascock. Caroline Spalding had said that Mr.
Glascock had spoken to her of Nora Rowley, and Nora acknowledged that
there had been some acquaintance between them in London. "Almost more
than that, I should have thought," said Miss Spalding, "if one might
judge by his manner of speaking of you."
[Illustration: The rivals.]
"He is a little given to be enthusiastic," said Nora, laughing.
"The least so of all mankind, I should have said. You must know he is
very intimate in this house. It begun in this way;--Olivia and I were
travelling together, and there was--a difficulty, as we say in our
country when three or four gentlemen shoot each other. Then there
came up Mr. Glascock and another gentleman. By-the-bye, the other
gentleman was your brother-in-law."
"Poor Mr. Trevelyan!"
"He is very ill;--is he not?"
"We think so. My sister is with us, you know. That is to say, she is
at Siena to-day."
"I have heard about him, and it is so sad. Mr. Glascock knows him. As
I said, they were travelling together, when Mr. Glascock came to our
assistance. Since that, we have seen him very frequently. I don't
think he is enthusiastic,--except when he talks of you."
"I ought to be very proud," said Nora.
"I think you ought,--as Mr. Glascock is a man whose good opinion is
certainly worth having. Here he is. Mr. Glascock, I hope your ears
are tingling. They ought to do so, because we are saying all manner
of fine things about you."
"I could not be well spoken of by two on whose good word I should set
a higher value," said he.
"And whose do you value the most?" said Caroline.
"I must first know whose eulogium will run the highest."
Then Nora answered him. "Mr. Glascock, other people may praise
you louder than I can do, but no one will ever do so with more
sincerity." There was a pretty earnestness about her as she spoke,
which Lady Rowley ought to have heard. Mr. Glascock bowed, and Miss
Spalding smiled, and Nora blushed.
"If you are not overwhelmed now," said Miss Spalding, "you must be so
used to flattery, that it has no longer any effect upon you. You must
be like a drunkard, to whom wine is as water, and who thinks that
brandy is not strong enough."
"I think I had better go away," said Mr. Glascock, "for fear the
brandy should be watered by degrees." And so he left them.
Nora had become quite aware, without much process of thinking about
it, that her former lover and this American young lady were very
intimate with each other. The tone of the conversation had shewn that
it was so;--and, then, how had it come to pass that Mr. Glascock had
spoken to this American girl about her,--Nora Rowley? It was evident
that he had spoken of her with warmth, and had done so in a manner to
impress his hearer. For a minute or two they sat together in silence
after Mr. Glascock had left them, but neither of them stirred. Then
Caroline Spalding turned suddenly upon Nora, and took her by the
hand. "I must tell you something," said she, "only it must be a
secret for awhile."
"I will not repeat it."
"Thank you, dear. I am engaged to him,--as his wife. He asked me this
very afternoon, and nobody knows it but my aunt. When I had accepted
him, he told me all the story about you. He had very often spoken
of you before, and I had guessed how it must have been. He wears
his heart so open for those whom he loves, that there is nothing
concealed. He had seen you just before he came to me. But perhaps I
am wrong to tell you that now. He ought to have been thinking of you
again at such a time."
"I did not want him to think of me again."
"Of course you did not. Of course I am joking. You might have been
his wife if you wished it. He has told me all that. And he especially
wants us to be friends. Is there anything to prevent it?"
"On my part? Oh, dear, no;--except that you will be such grand folk,
and we shall be so poor."
"We!" said Caroline, laughing. "I am so glad that there is a 'we.'"
CHAPTER LXXVII.
THE FUTURE LADY PETERBOROUGH.
"If you have not sold yourself for British gold, and for British
acres, and for British rank, I have nothing to say against it,"
said Miss Wallachia Petrie that same evening to her friend Caroline
Spalding.
"You know that I have not sold myself, as you call it," said
Caroline. There had been a long friendship between these two ladies,
and the younger one knew that it behoved her to bear a good deal
from the elder. Miss Petrie was honest, clever, and in earnest. We
in England are not usually favourably disposed to women who take a
pride in a certain antagonism to men in general, and who are anxious
to shew the world that they can get on very well without male
assistance; but there are many such in America who have noble
aspirations, good intellects, much energy, and who are by no means
unworthy of friendship. The hope in regard to all such women,--the
hope entertained not by themselves, but by those who are solicitous
for them,--is that they will be cured at last by a husband and
half-a-dozen children. In regard to Wallachia Petrie there was not,
perhaps, much ground for such hope. She was so positively wedded to
women's rights in general, and to her own rights in particular, that
it was improbable that she should ever succumb to any man;--and where
would be the man brave enough to make the effort? From circumstances
Caroline Spalding had been the beloved of her heart since Caroline
Spalding was a very little girl; and she had hoped that Caroline
would through life have borne arms along with her in that contest
which she was determined to wage against man, and which she always
waged with the greatest animosity against men of the British race.
She hated rank; she hated riches; she hated monarchy;--and with
a true woman's instinct in battle, felt that she had a specially
strong point against Englishmen, in that they submitted themselves
to dominion from a woman monarch. And now the chosen friend of her
youth,--the friend who had copied out all her poetry, who had learned
by heart all her sonnets, who had, as she thought, reciprocated all
her ideas, was going to be married,--and to be married to an English
lord! She had seen that it was coming for some time, and had spoken
out very plainly, hoping that she might still save the brand from
the burning. Now the evil was done; and Caroline Spalding, when she
told her news, knew well that she would have to bear some heavy
reproaches.
"How many of us are there who never know whether we sell ourselves
or not?" said Wallachia. "The senator who longs for office, and who
votes this way instead of that in order that he may get it, thinks
that he is voting honestly. The minister who calls himself a teacher
of God's word, thinks that it is God's word that he preaches when
he strains his lungs to fill his church. The question is this,
Caroline;--would you have loved the same man had he come to you with
a woodman's axe in his hand or a clerk's quill behind his ear? I
guess not."
"As to the woodman's axe, Wally, it is very well in theory; but--"
"Things good in theory, Caroline, will be good also when practised.
You may be sure of that. We dislike theory simply because our
intelligences are higher than our wills. But we will let that pass."
"Pray let it pass, Wally. Do not preach me sermons to-night. I am so
happy, and you ought to wish me joy."
"If wishing you joy would get you joy, I would wish it you while I
lived. I cannot be happy that you should be taken from us whither I
shall never see you again."
"But you are to come to us. I have told him so, and it is settled."
"No, dear; I shall not do that. What should I be in the glittering
halls of an English baron? Could there be any visiting less fitting,
any admixture less appropriate? Could I who have held up my voice
in the Music Hall of Lacedæmon, amidst the glories of the West, in
the great and free State of Illinois, against the corruption of an
English aristocracy,--could I, who have been listened to by two
thousand of my countrywomen,--and men,--while I spurned the unmanly,
inhuman errors of primogeniture,--could I, think you, hold my tongue
beneath the roof of a feudal lord!" Caroline Spalding knew that her
friend could not hold her tongue, and hesitated to answer. There had
been that fatal triumph of a lecture on the joint rights of men and
women, and it had rendered poor Wallachia Petrie unfit for ordinary
society.
"You might come there without talking politics, Wally," said
Caroline.
"No, Caroline; no. I will go into the house of no man in which the
free expression of my opinion is debarred me. I will not sit even
at your table with a muzzled tongue. When you are gone, Caroline,
I shall devote myself to what, after all, must be the work of my
life, and I shall finish the biographical history of our great
hero in verse,--which I hope may at least be not ephemeral. From
month to month I shall send you what I do, and you will not refuse
me your friendly criticism,--and, perhaps, some slight meed of
approbation,--because you are dwelling beneath the shade of a throne.
Oh, Caroline, let it not be a upas tree!"
The Miss Petries of the world have this advantage,--an advantage
which rarely if ever falls to the lot of a man,--that they are never
convinced of error. Men, let them be ever so much devoted to their
closets, let them keep their work ever so closely veiled from public
scrutiny, still find themselves subjected to criticism, and under
the necessity of either defending themselves or of succumbing. If,
indeed, a man neither speaks, nor writes,--if he be dumb as regards
opinion,--he passes simply as one of the crowd, and is in the way
neither of convincing nor of being convinced; but a woman may speak,
and almost write, as she likes, without danger of being wounded by
sustained conflict. Who would have the courage to begin with such a
one as Miss Petrie, and endeavour to prove to her that she is wrong
from the beginning? A little word of half-dissent, a smile, a shrug,
and an ambiguous compliment which is misunderstood, are all the forms
of argument which can be used against her. Wallachia Petrie, in
her heart of hearts, conceived that she had fairly discussed her
great projects from year to year with indomitable eloquence and
unanswerable truth,--and that none of her opponents had had a leg
to stand upon. And this she believed because the chivalry of men
had given to her sex that protection against which her life was one
continued protest.
"Here he is," said Caroline, as Mr. Glascock came up to them. "Try
and say a civil word to him, if he speaks about it. Though he is to
be a lord, still he is a man and a brother."
"Caroline," said the stern monitress, "you are already learning to
laugh at principles which have been dear to you since you left your
mother's breast. Alas, how true it is, 'You cannot touch pitch and
not be defiled.'"
The further progress of these friendly and feminine amenities was
stopped by the presence of the gentleman who had occasioned them.
"Miss Petrie," said the hero of the hour, "Caroline was to tell you
of my good fortune, and no doubt she has done so."
"I cannot wait to hear the pretty things he has to say," said
Caroline, "and I must look after my aunt's guests. There is poor
Signor Buonarosci without a soul to say a syllable to him, and I must
go and use my ten Italian words."
"You are about to take with you to your old country, Mr. Glascock,"
said Miss Petrie, "one of the brightest stars in our young American
firmament." There could be no doubt, from the tone of Miss Petrie's
voice, that she now regarded this star, however bright, as one of a
sort which is subjected to falling.
"I am going to take a very nice young woman," said Mr. Glascock.
"I hate that word woman, sir, uttered with the half-hidden sneer
which always accompanies its expression from the mouth of a man."
"Sneer, Miss Petrie!"
"I quite allow that it is involuntary, and not analysed or understood
by yourselves. If you speak of a dog, you intend to do so with
affection, but there is always contempt mixed with it. The so-called
chivalry of man to woman is all begotten in the same spirit. I want
no favour, but I claim to be your equal."
"I thought that American ladies were generally somewhat exacting as
to those privileges which chivalry gives them."
"It is true, sir, that the only rank we know in our country is in
that precedence which man gives to woman. Whether we maintain that,
or whether we abandon it, we do not intend to purchase it at the
price of an acknowledgment of intellectual inferiority. For myself, I
hate chivalry;--what you call chivalry. I can carry my own chair, and
I claim the right to carry it whithersoever I may please."
Mr. Glascock remained with her for some time, but made no opportunity
for giving that invitation to Monkhams of which Caroline had spoken.
As he said afterwards, he found it impossible to expect her to attend
to any subject so trivial; and when, afterwards, Caroline told him,
with some slight mirth,--the capability of which on such a subject
was coming to her with her new ideas of life,--that, though he was
partly saved as a man and a brother, still he was partly the reverse
as a feudal lord, he began to reflect that Wallachia Petrie would be
a guest with whom he would find it very difficult to make things go
pleasant at Monkhams. "Does she not bully you horribly?" he asked.
"Of course she bullies me," Caroline answered; "and I cannot expect
you to understand as yet how it is that I love her and like her; but
I do. If I were in distress to-morrow, she would give everything she
has in the world to put me right."
"So would I," said he.
"Ah, you;--that is a matter of course. That is your business now.
And she would give everything she has in the world to set the world
right. Would you do that?"
"It would depend on the amount of my faith. If I could believe in the
result, I suppose I should do it."
"She would do it on the slightest hope that such giving would have
any tendency that way. Her philanthropy is all real. Of course she is
a bore to you."
"I am very patient."
"I hope I shall find you so,--always. And, of course, she is
ridiculous--in your eyes. I have learned to see it, and to regret it;
but I shall never cease to love her."
"I have not the slightest objection. Her lessons will come from over
the water, and mine will come from--where shall I say?--over the
table. If I can't talk her down with so much advantage on my side, I
ought to be made a woman's-right man myself."
Poor Lady Rowley had watched Miss Petrie and Mr. Glascock during
those moments that they had been together, and had half believed the
rumour, and had half doubted, thinking in the moments of her belief
that Mr. Glascock must be mad, and in the moments of unbelief that
the rumours had been set afloat by the English Minister's wife with
the express intention of turning Mr. Glascock into ridicule. It had
never occurred to her to doubt that Wallachia was the eldest of that
family of nieces. Could it be possible that a man who had known
her Nora, who had undoubtedly loved her Nora,--who had travelled
all the way from London to Nuncombe Putney to ask Nora to be his
wife,--should within twelve months of that time have resolved to
marry a woman whom he must have selected simply as being the most
opposite to Nora of any female human being that he could find? It was
not credible to her; and if it were not true, there might still be a
hope. Nora had met him, and had spoken to him, and it had seemed that
for a moment or two they had spoken as friends. Lady Rowley, when
talking to Mrs. Spalding, had watched them closely; and she had seen
that Nora's eyes had been bright, and that there had been something
between them which was pleasant. Suddenly she found herself close to
Wallachia, and thought that she would trust herself to a word.
"Have you been long in Florence?" asked Lady Rowley in her softest
voice.
"A pretty considerable time, ma'am;--that is, since the fall began."
What a voice;--what an accent;--and what words! Was there a man
living with sufficient courage to take this woman to England, and
shew her to the world as Lady Peterborough?
"Are you going to remain in Italy for the summer?" continued Lady
Rowley.
"I guess I shall;--or, perhaps, locate myself in the purer atmosphere
of the Swiss mountains."
"Switzerland in summer must certainly be much pleasanter."
"I was thinking at the moment of the political atmosphere," said Miss
Petrie; "for although, certainly, much has been done in this country
in the way of striking off shackles and treading sceptres under foot,
still, Lady Rowley, there remains here that pernicious thing,--a
king. The feeling of the dominion of a single man,--and that of a
single woman is, for aught I know, worse,--with me so clouds the air,
that the breath I breathe fails to fill my lungs." Wallachia, as she
said this, put forth her hand, and raised her chin, and extended
her arm. She paused, feeling that justice demanded that Lady Rowley
should have a right of reply. But Lady Rowley had not a word to say,
and Wallachia Petrie went on. "I cannot adapt my body to the sweet
savours and the soft luxuries of the outer world with any comfort to
my inner self, while the circumstances of the society around me are
oppressive to my spirit. When our war was raging all around me I was
light-spirited as the lark that mounts through the morning sky."
"I should have thought it was very dreadful," said Lady Rowley.
"Full of dread, of awe, and of horror, were those fiery days of
indiscriminate slaughter; but they were not days of desolation,
because hope was always there by our side. There was a hope in
which the soul could trust, and the trusting soul is ever light and
buoyant."
"I dare say it is," said Lady Rowley.
"But apathy, and serfdom, and kinghood, and dominion, drain the
fountain of its living springs, and the soul becomes like the plummet
of lead, whose only tendency is to hide itself in subaqueous mud and
unsavoury slush."
Subaqueous mud and unsavoury slush! Lady Rowley repeated the words to
herself as she made good her escape, and again expressed to herself
her conviction that it could not possibly be so. The "subaqueous mud
and unsavoury slush," with all that had gone before it about the
soul was altogether unintelligible to her; but she knew that it was
American buncom of a high order of eloquence, and she told herself
again and again that it could not be so. She continued to keep her
eyes upon Mr. Glascock, and soon saw him again talking to Nora. It
was hardly possible, she thought, that Nora should speak to him
with so much animation, or he to her, unless there was some feeling
between them which, if properly handled, might lead to a renewal of
the old tenderness. She went up to Nora, having collected the other
girls, and said that the carriage was then waiting for them. Mr.
Glascock immediately offered Lady Rowley his arm, and took her
down to the hall. Could it be that she was leaning upon a future
son-in-law? There was something in the thought which made her lay
her weight upon him with a freedom which she would not otherwise
have used. Oh!--that her Nora should live to be Lady Peterborough!
We are apt to abuse mothers for wanting high husbands for their
daughters;--but can there be any point in which the true maternal
instinct can shew itself with more affectionate enthusiasm? This poor
mother wanted nothing for herself from Mr. Glascock. She knew very
well that it was her fate to go back to the Mandarins, and probably
to die there. She knew also that such men as Mr. Glascock, when they
marry beneath themselves in rank and fortune, will not ordinarily
trouble themselves much with their mothers-in-law. There was nothing
desired for herself. Were such a match accomplished, she might,
perhaps, indulge herself in talking among the planters' wives of her
daughter's coronet; but at the present moment there was no idea even
of this in her mind. It was of Nora herself, and of Nora's sisters,
that she was thinking,--for them that she was plotting,--that the
one might be rich and splendid, and the others have some path opened
for them to riches and splendour. Husband-hunting mothers may be
injudicious; but surely they are maternal and unselfish. Mr. Glascock
put her into the carriage, and squeezed her hand;--and then he
squeezed Nora's hand. She saw it, and was sure of it. "I am so glad
you are going to be happy," Nora had said to him before this. "As
far as I have seen her, I like her so much." "If you do not come
and visit her in her own house, I shall think you have no spirit of
friendship," he said. "I will," Nora had replied;--"I will." This had
been said up-stairs, just as Lady Rowley was coming to them, and on
this understanding, on this footing, Mr. Glascock had pressed her
hand.
As she went home, Lady Rowley's mind was full of doubt as to the
course which it was best that she should follow with her daughter.
She was not unaware how great was the difficulty before her. Hugh
Stanbury's name had not been mentioned since they left London, but at
that time Nora was obstinately bent on throwing herself away upon the
"penny-a-liner." She had never been brought to acknowledge that such
a marriage would be even inappropriate, and had withstood gallantly
the expression of her father's displeasure. But with such a spirit as
Nora's, it might be easier to prevail by silence than by many words.
Lady Rowley was quite sure of this,--that it would be far better to
say nothing further of Hugh Stanbury. Let the cure come, if it might
be possible, from absence and from her daughter's good sense. The
only question was whether it would be wise to say any word about Mr.
Glascock. In the carriage she was not only forbearing but flattering
in her manner to Nora. She caressed her girl's hand and spoke to
her,--as mothers know how to speak when they want to make much of
their girls, and to have it understood that those girls are behaving
as girls should behave. There was to be nobody to meet them to-night,
as it had been arranged that Sir Marmaduke and Mrs. Trevelyan should
sleep at Siena. Hardly a word had been spoken in the carriage; but
up-stairs, in their drawing-room, there came a moment in which Lucy
and Sophie had left them, and Nora was alone with her mother. Lady
Rowley almost knew that it would be most prudent to be silent;--but a
word spoken in season;--how good it is! And the thing was so near to
her that she could not hold her peace. "I must say, Nora," she began,
"that I do like your Mr. Glascock."
"He is not my Mr. Glascock, mamma," said Nora, smiling.
"You know what I mean, dear." Lady Rowley had not intended to utter a
word that should appear like pressure on her daughter at this moment.
She had felt how imprudent it would be to do so. But now Nora seemed
to be leading the way herself to such discourse. "Of course, he is
not your Mr. Glascock. You cannot eat your cake and have it, nor can
you throw it away and have it."
"I have thrown my cake away altogether, and certainly I cannot have
it." She was still smiling as she spoke, and seemed to be quite merry
at the idea of regarding Mr. Glascock as the cake which she had
declined to eat.
"I can see one thing quite plainly, dear."
"What is that, mamma?"
"That in spite of what you have done, you can still have your cake
whenever you choose to take it."
"Why, mamma, he is engaged to be married!"
"Mr. Glascock?"
"Yes, Mr. Glascock. It's quite settled. Is it not sad?"
"To whom is he engaged?" Lady Rowley's solemnity as she asked this
question was piteous to behold.
"To Miss Spalding,--Caroline Spalding."
"The eldest of those nieces?"
"Yes;--the eldest."
"I cannot believe it."
"Mamma, they both told me so. I have sworn an eternal friendship with
her already."
"I did not see you speaking to her."
"But I did talk to her a great deal."
"And he is really going to marry that dreadful woman?"
"Dreadful, mamma!"
"Perfectly awful! She talked to me in a way that I have read about
in books, but which I did not before believe to be possible. Do you
mean that he is going to be married to that hideous old maid,--that
bell-clapper?"
"Oh, mamma, what slander! I think her so pretty."
"Pretty!"
"Very pretty. And, mamma, ought I not to be happy that he should
have been able to make himself so happy? It was quite, quite, quite
impossible that I should have been his wife. I have thought about it
ever so much, and I am so glad of it! I think she is just the girl
that is fit for him."
Lady Rowley took her candle and went to bed, professing to herself
that she could not understand it. But what did it signify? It was,
at any rate, certain now that the man had put himself out of Nora's
reach, and if he chose to marry a republican virago, with a red nose,
it could now make no difference to Nora. Lady Rowley almost felt
a touch of satisfaction in reflecting on the future misery of his
married life.
CHAPTER LXXVIII.
CASALUNGA.
Sir Marmaduke had been told at the Florence post-office that he would
no doubt be able to hear tidings of Trevelyan, and to learn his
address, from the officials in the post-office at Siena. At Florence
he had been introduced to some gentleman who was certainly of
importance,--a superintendent who had clerks under him and who was a
big man. This person had been very courteous to him, and he had gone
to Siena thinking that he would find it easy to obtain Trevelyan's
address,--or to learn that there was no such person there. But at
Siena he and his courier together could obtain no information. They
rambled about the huge cathedral and the picturesque market-place
of that quaint old city for the whole day, and on the next morning
after breakfast they returned to Florence. They had learned nothing.
The young man at the post-office had simply protested that he knew
nothing of the name of Trevelyan. If letters should come addressed to
such a name, he would keep them till they were called for; but, to
the best of his knowledge, he had never seen or heard the name. At
the guard-house of the gendarmerie they could not, or would not, give
him any information, and Sir Marmaduke came back with an impression
that everybody at Siena was ignorant, idiotic, and brutal. Mrs.
Trevelyan was so dispirited as to be ill, and both Sir Marmaduke and
Lady Rowley were disposed to think that the world was all against
them. "You have no conception of the sort of woman that man is going
to marry," said Lady Rowley.
"What man?"
"Mr. Glascock! A horrid American female, as old almost as I am, who
talks through her nose, and preaches sermons about the rights of
women. It is incredible! And Nora might have had him just for lifting
up her hand." But Sir Marmaduke could not interest himself much about
Mr. Glascock. When he had been told that his daughter had refused the
heir to a great estate and a peerage, it had been matter of regret;
but he had looked upon the affair as done, and cared nothing now
though Mr. Glascock should marry a transatlantic Xantippe. He was
angry with Nora because by her obstinacy she was adding to the
general perplexities of the family, but he could not make comparisons
on Mr. Glascock's behalf between her and Miss Spalding,--as his wife
was doing, either mentally or aloud, from hour to hour. "I suppose it
is too late now," said Lady Rowley, shaking her head.
"Of course it is too late. The man must marry whom he pleases. I am
beginning to wonder that anybody should ever want to get married. I
am indeed."
"But what are the girls to do?"
"I don't know what anybody is to do. Here is a man as mad as a March
hare, and yet nobody can touch him. If it was not for the child, I
should advise Emily to put him out of her head altogether."
But though Sir Marmaduke could not bring himself to take any interest
in Mr. Glascock's affairs, and would not ask a single question
respecting the fearful American female whom this unfortunate man
was about to translate to the position of an English peeress, yet
circumstances so fell out that before three days were over he and
Mr. Glascock were thrown together in very intimate relations. Sir
Marmaduke had learned that Mr. Glascock was the only Englishman in
Florence to whom Trevelyan had been known, and that he was the only
person with whom Trevelyan had been seen to speak while passing
through the city. In his despair, therefore, Sir Marmaduke had gone
to Mr. Glascock, and it was soon arranged that the two gentlemen
should renew the search at Siena together, without having with them
either Mrs. Trevelyan or the courier. Mr. Glascock knew the ways
of the people better than did Sir Marmaduke, and could speak the
language. He obtained a passport to the good offices of the police of
Siena, and went prepared to demand rather than to ask for assistance.
They started very early, before breakfast, and on arriving at Siena
at about noon, first employed themselves in recruiting exhausted
nature. By the time that they had both declared that the hotel at
Siena was the very worst in all Italy, and that a breakfast without
eatable butter was not to be considered a breakfast at all, they
had become so intimate that Mr. Glascock spoke of his own intended
marriage. He must have done this with the conviction on his mind that
Nora Rowley would have told her mother of his former intention, and
that Lady Rowley would have told Sir Marmaduke; but he did not feel
it to be incumbent on himself to say anything on that subject. He had
nothing to excuse. He had behaved fairly and honourably. It was not
to be expected that he should remain unmarried for ever for the sake
of a girl who had twice refused him. "Of course there are very many
in England," he said, "who will think me foolish to marry a girl from
another country."
"It is done every day," said Sir Marmaduke.
"No doubt it is. I admit, however, that I ought to be more careful
than some other persons. There is a title and an estate to be
perpetuated, and I cannot, perhaps, be justified in taking quite so
much liberty as some other men may do; but I think I have chosen a
woman born to have a high position, and who will make her own way in
any society in which she may be placed."
"I have no doubt she will," said Sir Marmaduke, who had still
sounding in his ears the alarming description which his wife had
given him of this infatuated man's proposed bride. But he would have
been bound to say as much had Mr. Glascock intended to marry as lowly
as did King Cophetua.
"She is highly educated, gentle-mannered, as sweetly soft as any
English girl I ever met, and very pretty. You have met her, I think."
"I do not remember that I have observed her."
"She is too young for me, perhaps," said Mr. Glascock; "but that is a
fault on the right side." Sir Marmaduke, as he wiped his beard after
his breakfast, remembered what his wife had told him about the lady's
age. But it was nothing to him. "She is four-and-twenty, I think,"
said Mr. Glascock. If Mr. Glascock chose to believe that his intended
wife was four-and-twenty instead of something over forty, that was
nothing to Sir Marmaduke.
"The very best age in the world," said he.
They had sent for an officer of the police, and before they had been
three hours in Siena they had been told that Trevelyan lived about
seven miles from the town, in a small and very remote country house,
which he had hired for twelve months from one of the city hospitals.
He had hired it furnished, and had purchased a horse and small
carriage from a man in the town. To this man they went, and it soon
became evident to them that he of whom they were in search was living
at this house, which was called Casalunga, and was not, as the police
officer told them, on the way to any place. They must leave Siena by
the road for Rome, take a turn to the left about a mile beyond the
city gate, and continue on along the country lane till they saw a
certain round hill to the right. On the top of that round hill was
Casalunga. As the country about Siena all lies in round hills, this
was no adequate description;--but it was suggested that the country
people would know all about it. They got a small open carriage in
the market-place, and were driven out. Their driver knew nothing of
Casalunga, and simply went whither he was told. But by the aid of the
country people they got along over the unmade lanes, and in little
more than an hour were told, at the bottom of the hill, that they
must now walk up to Casalunga. Though the hill was round-topped, and
no more than a hill, still the ascent at last was very steep, and
was paved with stones set edgeway in a manner that could hardly have
been intended to accommodate wheels. When Mr. Glascock asserted that
the signor who lived there had a carriage of his own, the driver
suggested that he must keep it at the bottom of the hill. It was
clearly not his intention to attempt to drive up the ascent, and Sir
Marmaduke and Mr. Glascock were therefore obliged to walk. It was
now in the latter half of May, and there was a blazing Italian sky
over their heads. Mr. Glascock was acclimated to Italian skies, and
did not much mind the work; but Sir Marmaduke, who never did much
in walking, declared that Italy was infinitely hotter than the
Mandarins, and could hardly make his way as far as the house door.
It seemed to both of them to be a most singular abode for such a
man as Trevelyan. At the top of the hill there was a huge entrance
through a wooden gateway, which seemed to have been constructed with
the intention of defying any intruders not provided with warlike
ammunition. The gates were, indeed, open at the period of their
visit, but it must be supposed that they were intended to be closed
at any rate at night. Immediately on the right, as they entered
through the gates, there was a large barn, in which two men were
coopering wine vats. From thence a path led slanting to the house,
of which the door was shut, and all the front windows blocked with
shutters. The house was very long, and only of one story for a
portion of its length. Over that end at which the door was placed
there were upper rooms, and there must have been space enough for a
large family with many domestics. There was nothing round or near
the residence which could be called a garden, so that its look of
desolation was extreme. There were various large barns and outhouses,
as though it had been intended by the builder that corn and hay and
cattle should be kept there; but it seemed now that there was nothing
there except the empty vats at which the two men were coopering. Had
the Englishmen gone farther into the granary, they would have seen
that there were wine-presses stored away in the dark corners.
They stopped and looked at the men, and the men halted for a moment
from their work and looked at them; but the men spoke never a word.
Mr. Glascock then asked after Mr. Trevelyan, and one of the coopers
pointed to the house. Then they crossed over to the door, and Mr.
Glascock finding there neither knocker nor bell, first tapped with
his knuckles, and then struck with his stick. But no one came. There
was not a sound in the house, and no shutter was removed. "I don't
believe that there is a soul here," said Sir Marmaduke.
"We'll not give it up till we've seen it all at any rate," said Mr.
Glascock. And so they went round to the other front.
On this side of the house the tilled ground, either ploughed or dug
with the spade, came up to the very windows. There was hardly even
a particle of grass to be seen. A short way down the hill there
were rows of olive trees, standing in prim order and at regular
distances, from which hung the vines that made the coopering of
the vats necessary. Olives and vines have pretty names, and call
up associations of landscape beauty. But here they were in no way
beautiful. The ground beneath them was turned up, and brown, and
arid, so that there was not a blade of grass to be seen. On some
furrows the maize or Indian corn was sprouting, and there were
patches of growth of other kinds,--each patch closely marked by its
own straight lines; and there were narrow paths, so constructed as to
take as little room as possible. But all that had been done had been
done for economy, and nothing for beauty. The occupiers of Casalunga
had thought more of the produce of their land than of picturesque or
attractive appearance.
The sun was blazing fiercely hot, hotter on this side, Sir Marmaduke
thought, even than on the other; and there was not a wavelet of a
cloud in the sky. A balcony ran the whole length of the house, and
under this Sir Marmaduke took shelter at once, leaning with his back
against the wall. "There is not a soul here at all," said he.
"The men in the barn told us that there was," said Mr. Glascock;
"and, at any rate, we will try the windows." So saying, he walked
along the front of the house, Sir Marmaduke following him slowly,
till they came to a door, the upper half of which was glazed, and
through which they looked into one of the rooms. Two or three of the
other windows in this frontage of the house came down to the ground,
and were made for egress and ingress; but they had all been closed
with shutters, as though the house was deserted. But they now looked
into a room which contained some signs of habitation. There was a
small table with a marble top, on which lay two or three books, and
there were two arm-chairs in the room, with gilded arms and legs,
and a morsel of carpet, and a clock on a shelf over a stove, and--a
rocking-horse. "The boy is here, you may be sure," said Mr. Glascock.
"The rocking-horse makes that certain. But how are we to get at any
one!"
"I never saw such a place for an Englishman to come and live in
before," said Sir Marmaduke. "What on earth can he do here all day!"
As he spoke the door of the room was opened, and there was Trevelyan
standing before them, looking at them through the window. He wore an
old red English dressing-gown, which came down to his feet, and a
small braided Italian cap on his head. His beard had been allowed
to grow, and he had neither collar nor cravat. His trousers were
unbraced, and he shuffled in with a pair of slippers, which would
hardly cling to his feet. He was paler and still thinner than when he
had been visited at Willesden, and his eyes seemed to be larger, and
shone almost with a brighter brilliancy.
Mr. Glascock tried to open the door, but found that it was closed.
"Sir Marmaduke and I have come to visit you," said Mr. Glascock,
aloud. "Is there any means by which we can get into the house?"
Trevelyan stood still and stared at them. "We knocked at the front
door, but nobody came," continued Mr. Glascock. "I suppose this is
the way you usually go in and out."
"He does not mean to let us in," whispered Sir Marmaduke.
"Can you open this door," said Mr. Glascock, "or shall we go round
again?" Trevelyan had stood still contemplating them, but at last
came forward and put back the bolt. "That is all right," said
Mr. Glascock, entering. "I am sure you will be glad to see Sir
Marmaduke."
"I should be glad to see him,--or you, if I could entertain you,"
said Trevelyan. His voice was harsh and hard, and his words were
uttered with a certain amount of intended grandeur. "Any of the
family would be welcome were it not--"
"Were it not what?" asked Mr. Glascock.
"It can be nothing to you, sir, what troubles I have here. This is my
own abode, in which I had flattered myself that I could be free from
intruders. I do not want visitors. I am sorry that you should have
had trouble in coming here, but I do not want visitors. I am very
sorry that I have nothing that I can offer you, Mr. Glascock."
"Emily is in Florence," said Sir Marmaduke.
"Who brought her? Did I tell her to come? Let her go back to her
home. I have come here to be free from her, and I mean to be free. If
she wants my money, let her take it."
"She wants her child," said Mr. Glascock.
"He is my child," said Trevelyan, "and my right to him is better than
hers. Let her try it in a court of law, and she shall see. Why did
she deceive me with that man? Why has she driven me to this? Look
here, Mr. Glascock;--my whole life is spent in this seclusion, and it
is her fault."
"Your wife is innocent of all fault, Trevelyan," said Mr. Glascock.
"Any woman can say as much as that;--and all women do say it.
Yet,--what are they worth?"
"Do you mean, sir, to take away your wife's character?" said Sir
Marmaduke, coming up in wrath. "Remember that she is my daughter, and
that there are things which flesh and blood cannot stand."
"She is my wife, sir, and that is ten times more. Do you think that
you would do more for her than I would do,--drink more of Esill? You
had better go away, Sir Marmaduke. You can do no good by coming here
and talking of your daughter. I would have given the world to save
her;--but she would not be saved."
"You are a slanderer!" said Sir Marmaduke, in his wrath.
Mr. Glascock turned round to the father, and tried to quiet him. It
was so manifest to him that the balance of the poor man's mind was
gone, that it seemed to him to be ridiculous to upbraid the sufferer.
He was such a piteous sight to behold, that it was almost impossible
to feel indignation against him. "You cannot wonder," said Mr.
Glascock, advancing close to the master of the house, "that the
mother should want to see her only child. You do not wish that your
wife should be the most wretched woman in the world."
"Am not I the most wretched of men? Can anything be more wretched
than this? Is her life worse than mine? And whose fault was it? Had
I any friend to whom she objected? Was I untrue to her in a single
thought?"
"If you say that she was untrue, it is a falsehood," said Sir
Marmaduke.
"You allow yourself a liberty of expression, sir, because you are my
wife's father," said Trevelyan, "which you would not dare to take in
other circumstances."
"I say that it is a false calumny,--a lie! and I would say so to any
man on earth who should dare to slander my child's name."
"Your child, sir! She is my wife;--my wife;--my wife!" Trevelyan, as
he spoke, advanced close up to his father-in-law; and at last hissed
out his words, with his lips close to Sir Marmaduke's face. "Your
right in her is gone, sir. She is mine,--mine,--mine! And you see the
way in which she has treated me, Mr. Glascock. Everything I had was
hers; but the words of a grey-haired sinner were sweeter to her than
all my love. I wonder whether you think that it is a pleasant thing
for such a one as I to come out here and live in such a place as
this? I have not a friend,--a companion,--hardly a book. There is
nothing that I can eat or drink. I do not stir out of the house,--and
I am ill;--very ill! Look at me. See what she has brought me to! Mr.
Glascock, on my honour as a man, I never wronged her in a thought or
a word."
Mr. Glascock had come to think that his best chance of doing any good
was to get Trevelyan into conversation with himself, free from the
interruption of Sir Marmaduke. The father of the injured woman could
not bring himself to endure the hard words that were spoken of his
daughter. During this last speech he had broken out once or twice;
but Trevelyan, not heeding him, had clung to Mr. Glascock's arm. "Sir
Marmaduke," said he, "would you not like to see the boy?"
"He shall not see the boy," said Trevelyan. "You may see him. He
shall not. What is he that he should have control over me?"
"This is the most fearful thing I ever heard of," said Sir Marmaduke.
"What are we to do with him?"
Mr. Glascock whispered a few words to Sir Marmaduke, and then
declared that he was ready to be taken to the child. "And he will
remain here?" asked Trevelyan. A pledge was then given by Sir
Marmaduke that he would not force his way farther into the house,
and the two other men left the chamber together. Sir Marmaduke,
as he paced up and down the room alone, perspiring at every pore,
thoroughly uncomfortable and ill at ease, thought of all the hard
positions of which he had ever read, and that his was harder than
them all. Here was a man married to his daughter, in possession of
his daughter's child, manifestly mad,--and yet he could do nothing
to him! He was about to return to the seat of his government, and
he must leave his own child in this madman's power! Of course, his
daughter could not go with him, leaving her child in this madman's
hands. He had been told that even were he to attempt to prove the man
to be mad in Italy, the process would be slow; and, before it could
be well commenced, Trevelyan would be off with the child elsewhere.
There never was an embarrassment, thought Sir Marmaduke, out of which
it was so impossible to find a clear way.
In the meantime, Mr. Glascock and Trevelyan were visiting the child.
It was evident that the father, let him be ever so mad, had discerned
the expediency of allowing some one to see that his son was alive
and in health. Mr. Glascock did not know much of children, and could
only say afterwards that the boy was silent and very melancholy, but
clean, and apparently well. It appeared that he was taken out daily
by his father in the cool hours of the morning, and that his father
hardly left him from the time that he was taken up till he was put to
bed. But Mr. Glascock's desire was to see Trevelyan alone, and this
he did after they had left the boy. "And now, Trevelyan," he said,
"what do you mean to do?"
"To do?"
"In what way do you propose to live? I want you to be reasonable with
me."
"They do not treat me reasonably."
"Are you going to measure your own conduct by that of other people?
In the first place, you should go back to England. What good can you
do here?" Trevelyan shook his head, but remained silent. "You cannot
like this life."
"No, indeed. But whither can I go now that I shall like to live?"
"Why not home?"
"I have no home."
"Why not go back to England? Ask your wife to join you, and return
with her. She would go at a word." The poor wretch again shook
his head. "I hope you think that I speak as your friend," said Mr.
Glascock.
"I believe you do."
"I will say nothing of any imprudence; but you cannot believe that
she has been untrue to you?" Trevelyan would say nothing to this, but
stood silent waiting for Mr. Glascock to continue. "Let her come back
to you--here; and then, as soon as you can arrange it, go to your own
home."
"Shall I tell you something?" said Trevelyan.
"What is it?"
He came up close to Mr. Glascock, and put his hand upon his visitor's
shoulder. "I will tell you what she would do at once. I dare say that
she would come to me. I dare say that she would go with me. I am
sure she would. And directly she got me there, she would--say that I
was--mad! She,--my wife, would do it! He,--that furious, ignorant old
man below, tried to do it before. His wife said that I was mad." He
paused a moment, as though waiting for a reply; but Mr. Glascock had
none to make. It had not been his object, in the advice which he had
given, to entrap the poor fellow by a snare, and to induce him so to
act that he should deliver himself up to keepers; but he was well
aware that wherever Trevelyan might be, it would be desirable that he
should be placed for awhile in the charge of some physician. He could
not bring himself at the spur of the moment to repudiate the idea by
which Trevelyan was actuated. "Perhaps you think that she would be
right?" said Trevelyan.
"I am quite sure that she would do nothing that is not for the best,"
said Mr. Glascock.
"I can see it all. I will not go back to England, Mr. Glascock. I
intend to travel. I shall probably leave this and go to--to--to
Greece, perhaps. It is a healthy place, this, and I like it for that
reason; but I shall not stay here. If my wife likes to travel with
me, she can come. But,--to England I will not go."
"You will let the child go to his mother?"
"Certainly not. If she wants to see the child, he is here. If she
will come,--without her father,--she shall see him. She shall not
take him from hence. Nor shall she return to live with me, without
full acknowledgment of her fault, and promises of an amended life. I
know what I am saying, Mr. Glascock, and have thought of these things
perhaps more than you have done. I am obliged to you for coming to
me; but now, if you please, I would prefer to be alone."
Mr. Glascock, seeing that nothing further could be done, joined Sir
Marmaduke, and the two walked down to their carriage at the bottom of
the hill. Mr. Glascock, as he went, declared his conviction that the
unfortunate man was altogether mad, and that it would be necessary
to obtain some interference on the part of the authorities for the
protection of the child. How this could be done, or whether it
could be done in time to intercept a further flight on the part of
Trevelyan, Mr. Glascock could not say. It was his idea that Mrs.
Trevelyan should herself go out to Casalunga, and try the force of
her own persuasion.
"I believe that he would murder her," said Sir Marmaduke.
"He would not do that. There is a glimmer of sense in all his
madness, which will keep him from any actual violence."
CHAPTER LXXIX.
"I CAN SLEEP ON THE BOARDS."
Three days after this there came another carriage to the bottom of
the hill on which Casalunga stood, and a lady got out of it all
alone. It was Emily Trevelyan, and she had come thither from Siena
in quest of her husband and her child. On the previous day Sir
Marmaduke's courier had been at the house with a note from the
wife to the husband, and had returned with an answer, in which
Mrs. Trevelyan was told that, if she would come quite alone, she
should see her child. Sir Marmaduke had been averse to any further
intercourse with the man, other than what might be made in accordance
with medical advice, and, if possible, with government authority.
Lady Rowley had assented to her daughter's wish, but had suggested
that she should at least be allowed to go also,--at any rate, as
far as the bottom of the hill. But Emily had been very firm, and Mr.
Glascock had supported her. He was confident that the man would do no
harm to her, and he was indisposed to believe that any interference
on the part of the Italian Government could be procured in such a
case with sufficient celerity to be of use. He still thought it might
be possible that the wife might prevail over the husband, or the
mother over the father. Sir Marmaduke was at last obliged to yield,
and Mrs. Trevelyan went to Siena with no other companion but the
courier. From Siena she made the journey quite alone; and having
learned the circumstances of the house from Mr. Glascock, she got out
of the carriage, and walked up the hill. There were still the two men
coopering at the vats, but she did not stay to speak to them. She
went through the big gates, and along the slanting path to the door,
not doubting of her way;--for Mr. Glascock had described it all to
her, making a small plan of the premises, and even explaining to her
the position of the room in which her boy and her husband slept. She
found the door open, and an Italian maid-servant at once welcomed
her to the house, and assured her that the signor would be with her
immediately. She was sure that the girl knew that she was the boy's
mother, and was almost tempted to ask questions at once as to the
state of the household; but her knowledge of Italian was slight, and
she felt that she was so utterly a stranger in the land that she
could dare to trust no one. Though the heat was great, her face was
covered with a thick veil. Her dress was black, from head to foot,
and she was as a woman who mourned for her husband. She was led into
the room which her father had been allowed to enter through the
window; and here she sat, in her husband's house, feeling that in no
position in the world could she be more utterly separated from the
interests of all around her. In a few minutes the door was opened,
and her husband was with her, bringing the boy in his hand. He had
dressed himself with some care; but it may be doubted whether the
garments which he wore did not make him appear thinner even and more
haggard than he had looked to be in his old dressing-gown. He had not
shaved himself, but his long hair was brushed back from his forehead,
after a fashion quaint and very foreign to his former ideas of
dress. His wife had not expected that her child would come to her
at once,--had thought that some entreaties would be necessary, some
obedience perhaps exacted from her, before she would be allowed to
see him; and now her heart was softened, and she was grateful to her
husband. But she could not speak to him till she had had the boy in
her arms. She tore off her bonnet, and then clinging to the child,
covered him with kisses. "Louey, my darling! Louey; you remember
mamma?" The child pressed himself close to the mother's bosom, but
spoke never a word. He was cowed and overcome, not only by the
incidents of the moment, but by the terrible melancholy of his
whole life. He had been taught to understand, without actual spoken
lessons, that he was to live with his father, and that the former
woman-given happinesses of his life were at an end. In this second
visit from his mother he did not forget her. He recognised the luxury
of her love; but it did not occur to him even to hope that she might
have come to rescue him from the evil of his days. Trevelyan was
standing by, the while, looking on; but he did not speak till she
addressed him.
"I am so thankful to you for bringing him to me," she said.
"I told you that you should see him," he said. "Perhaps it might have
been better that I should have sent him by a servant; but there are
circumstances which make me fear to let him out of my sight."
"Do you think that I did not wish to see you also? Louis, why do
you do me so much wrong? Why do you treat me with such cruelty?"
Then she threw her arms round his neck, and before he could repulse
her,--before he could reflect whether it would be well that he should
repulse her or not,--she had covered his brow and cheeks and lips
with kisses. "Louis," she said; "Louis, speak to me!"
"It is hard to speak sometimes," he said.
[Illustration: "It is hard to speak sometimes."]
"You love me, Louis?"
"Yes;--I love you. But I am afraid of you!"
"What is it that you fear? I would give my life for you, if you would
only come back to me and let me feel that you believed me to be
true." He shook his head, and began to think,--while she still clung
to him. He was quite sure that her father and mother had intended to
bring a mad doctor down upon him, and he knew that his wife was in
her mother's hands. Should he yield to her now,--should he make her
any promise,--might not the result be that he would be shut up in
dark rooms, robbed of his liberty, robbed of what he loved better
than his liberty,--his power as a man. She would thus get the better
of him and take the child, and the world would say that in this
contest between him and her he had been the sinning one, and she the
one against whom the sin had been done. It was the chief object of
his mind, the one thing for which he was eager, that this should
never come to pass. Let it once be conceded to him from all sides
that he had been right, and then she might do with him almost as she
willed. He knew well that he was ill. When he thought of his child,
he would tell himself that he was dying. He was at some moments of
his miserable existence fearfully anxious to come to terms with his
wife, in order that at his death his boy might not be without a
protector. Were he to die, then it would be better that his child
should be with its mother. In his happy days, immediately after
his marriage, he had made a will, in which he had left his entire
property to his wife for her life, providing for its subsequent
descent to his child,--or children. It had never even occurred to his
poor shattered brain that it would be well for him to alter his will.
Had he really believed that his wife had betrayed him, doubtless he
would have done so. He would have hated her, have distrusted her
altogether, and have believed her to be an evil thing. He had no such
belief. But in his desire to achieve empire, and in the sorrows which
had come upon him in his unsuccessful struggle, his mind had wavered
so frequently, that his spoken words were no true indicators of his
thoughts; and in all his arguments he failed to express either his
convictions or his desires. When he would say something stronger than
he intended, and it would be put to him by his wife, by her father or
mother, or by some friend of hers, whether he did believe that she
had been untrue to him, he would recoil from the answer which his
heart would dictate, lest he should seem to make an acknowledgment
that might weaken the ground upon which he stood. Then he would
satisfy his own conscience by assuring himself that he had never
accused her of such sin. She was still clinging to him now as his
mind was working after this fashion. "Louis," she said, "let it all
be as though there had been nothing."
"How can that be, my dear?"
"Not to others;--but to us it can be so. There shall be no word
spoken of the past." Again he shook his head. "Will it not be best
that there should be no word spoken?"
"'Forgiveness may be spoken with the tongue,'" he said, beginning to
quote from a poem which had formerly been frequent in his hands.
"Cannot there be real forgiveness between you and me,--between
husband and wife who, in truth, love each other? Do you think that I
would tell you of it again?" He felt that in all that she said there
was an assumption that she had been right, and that he had been
wrong. She was promising to forgive. She was undertaking to forget.
She was willing to take him back to the warmth of her love, and the
comfort of her kindness,--but was not asking to be taken back. This
was what he could not and would not endure. He had determined that
if she behaved well to him, he would not be harsh to her, and he
was struggling to keep up to his resolve. He would accuse her of
nothing,--if he could help it. But he could not say a word that would
even imply that she need forget,--that she should forgive. It was for
him to forgive;--and he was willing to do it, if she would accept
forgiveness. "I will never speak a word, Louis," she said, laying her
head upon his shoulder.
"Your heart is still hardened," he replied slowly.
"Hard to you?"
"And your mind is dark. You do not see what you have done. In our
religion, Emily, forgiveness is sure, not after penitence, but with
repentance."
"What does that mean?"
"It means this, that though I would welcome you back to my arms with
joy, I cannot do so, till you have--confessed your fault."
"What fault, Louis? If I have made you unhappy, I do, indeed, grieve
that it has been so."
"It is of no use," said he. "I cannot talk about it. Do you suppose
that it does not tear me to the very soul to think of it?"
"What is it that you think, Louis?" As she had been travelling
thither, she had determined that she would say anything that he
wished her to say,--make any admission that might satisfy him. That
she could be happy again as other women are happy, she did not
expect; but if it could be conceded between them that bygones should
be bygones, she might live with him and do her duty, and, at least,
have her child with her. Her father had told her that her husband was
mad; but she was willing to put up with his madness on such terms as
these. What could her husband do to her in his madness that he could
not do also to the child? "Tell me what you want me to say, and I
will say it," she said.
"You have sinned against me," he said, raising her head gently from
his shoulder.
"Never!" she exclaimed. "As God is my judge, I never have!" As she
said this, she retreated and took the sobbing boy again into her
arms.
He was at once placed upon his guard, telling himself that he saw the
necessity of holding by his child. How could he tell? Might there not
be a policeman down from Florence, ready round the house, to seize
the boy and carry him away? Though all his remaining life should be
a torment to him, though infinite plagues should be poured upon his
head, though he should die like a dog, alone, unfriended, and in
despair, while he was fighting this battle of his, he would not give
way. "That is sufficient," he said. "Louey must return now to his own
chamber."
"I may go with him?"
"No, Emily. You cannot go with him now. I will thank you to release
him, that I may take him." She still held the little fellow closely
pressed in her arms. "Do not reward me for my courtesy by further
disobedience," he said.
"You will let me come again?" To this he made no reply. "Tell me that
I may come again."
"I do not think that I shall remain here long."
"And I may not stay now?"
"That would be impossible. There is no accommodation for you."
"I could sleep on the boards beside his cot," said Mrs. Trevelyan.
"That is my place," he replied. "You may know that he is not
disregarded. With my own hands I tend him every morning. I take him
out myself. I feed him myself. He says his prayers to me. He learns
from me, and can say his letters nicely. You need not fear for him.
No mother was ever more tender with her child than I am with him."
Then he gently withdrew the boy from her arms, and she let her child
go, lest he should learn to know that there was a quarrel between
his father and his mother. "If you will excuse me," he said, "I will
not come down to you again to-day. My servant will see you to your
carriage."
So he left her; and she, with an Italian girl at her heels, got into
her vehicle, and was taken back to Siena. There she passed the night
alone at the inn, and on the next morning returned to Florence by the
railway.
CHAPTER LXXX.
"WILL THEY DESPISE HIM?"
Gradually the news of the intended marriage between Mr. Glascock and
Miss Spalding spread itself over Florence, and people talked about
it with that energy which subjects of such moment certainly deserve.
That Caroline Spalding had achieved a very great triumph, was, of
course, the verdict of all men and of all women; and I fear that
there was a corresponding feeling that poor Mr. Glascock had been
triumphed over, and as it were, subjugated. In some respects he had
been remiss in his duties as a bachelor visitor to Florence,--as a
visitor to Florence who had manifestly been much in want of a wife.
He had not given other girls a fair chance, but had thrown himself
down at the feet of this American female in the weakest possible
manner. And then it got about the town that he had been refused over
and over again by Nora Rowley. It is too probable that Lady Rowley
in her despair and dismay had been indiscreet, and had told secrets
which should never have been mentioned by her. And the wife of
the English minister, who had some grudges of her own, lifted her
eyebrows and shook her head and declared that all the Glascocks at
home would be outraged to the last degree. "My dear Lady Rowley,"
she said, "I don't know whether it won't become a question with them
whether they should issue a commission de lunatico." Lady Rowley did
not know what a commission de lunatico meant, but was quite willing
to regard poor Mr. Glascock as a lunatic. "And there is poor Lord
Peterborough at Naples just at death's door," continued the British
Minister's wife. In this she was perhaps nearly correct; but as Lord
Peterborough had now been in the same condition for many months, as
his mind had altogether gone, and as the doctor declared that he
might live in his present condition for a year, or for years, it
could not fairly be said that Mr. Glascock was acting without due
filial feeling in engaging himself to marry a young lady. "And she
such a creature!" said Lady Rowley, with emphasis. This the British
Minister's wife noticed simply by shaking her head. Caroline Spalding
was undoubtedly a pretty girl; but, as the British Minister's wife
said afterwards, it was not surprising that poor Lady Rowley should
be nearly out of her mind.
This had occurred a full week after the evening spent at Mr.
Spalding's house; and even yet Lady Rowley had never been put right
as to that mistake of hers about Wallachia Petrie. That other trouble
of hers, and her eldest daughter's journey to Siena, had prevented
them from going out; and though the matter had often been discussed
between Lady Rowley and Nora, there had not as yet come between them
any proper explanation. Nora would declare that the future bride
was very pretty and very delightful; and Lady Rowley would throw up
her hands in despair and protest that her daughter was insane. "Why
should he not marry whom he likes, mamma?" Nora once said, almost
with indignation.
"Because he will disgrace his family."
"I cannot understand what you mean, mamma. They are, at any rate, as
good as we are. Mr. Spalding stands quite as high as papa does."
"She is an American," said Lady Rowley.
"And her family might say that he is an Englishman," said Nora.
"My dear, if you do not understand the incongruity between an English
peer and a Yankee--female, I cannot help you. I suppose it is because
you have been brought up within the limited society of a small
colony. If so, it is not your fault. But I had hoped you had been in
Europe long enough to have learned what was what. Do you think, my
dear, that she will look well when she is presented to her Majesty as
Lord Peterborough's wife?"
"Splendid," said Nora. "She has just the brow for a coronet."
"Heavens and earth!" said Lady Rowley, throwing up her hands. "And
you believe that he will be proud of her in England?"
"I am sure he will."
"My belief is that he will leave her behind him, or that they
will settle somewhere in the wilds of America,--out in Mexico, or
Massachusetts, or the Rocky Mountains. I do not think that he will
have the courage to shew her in London."
The marriage was to take place in the Protestant church at Florence
early in June, and then the bride and bridegroom were to go over the
Alps, and to remain there subject to tidings as to the health of the
old man at Naples. Mr. Glascock had thrown up his seat in Parliament,
some month or two ago, knowing that he could not get back to his
duties during the present session, and feeling that he would shortly
be called upon to sit in the other House. He was thus free to use his
time and to fix his days as he pleased; and it was certainly clear to
those who knew him, that he was not ashamed of his American bride.
He spent much of his time at the Spaldings' house, and was always
to be seen with them in the Cascine and at the Opera. Mrs. Spalding,
the aunt, was, of course, in great glory. A triumphant, happy, or
even simply a splendid marriage, for the rising girl of a family is
a great glory to the maternal mind. Mrs. Spalding could not but be
aware that the very air around her seemed to breathe congratulations
into her ears. Her friends spoke to her, even on indifferent
subjects, as though everything was going well with her,--better with
her than with anybody else; and there came upon her in these days
a dangerous feeling, that in spite of all the preachings of the
preachers, the next world might perhaps be not so very much better
than this. She was, in fact, the reverse of the medal of which
poor Lady Rowley filled the obverse. And the American Minister was
certainly an inch taller than before, and made longer speeches, being
much more regardless of interruption. Olivia was delighted at her
sister's success, and heard with rapture the description of Monkhams,
which came to her second-hand through her sister. It was already
settled that she was to spend her next Christmas at Monkhams, and
perhaps there might be an idea in her mind that there were other
eldest sons of old lords who would like American brides. Everything
around Caroline Spalding was pleasant,--except the words of Wallachia
Petrie.
Everything around her was pleasant till there came to her a touch of
a suspicion that the marriage which Mr. Glascock was going to make
would be detrimental to her intended husband in his own country.
There were many in Florence who were saying this besides the wife of
the English Minister and Lady Rowley. Of course Caroline Spalding
herself was the last to hear it, and to her the idea was brought
by Wallachia Petrie. "I wish I could think you would make yourself
happy,--or him," Wallachia had said, croaking.
"Why should I fail to make him happy?"
"Because you are not of the same blood, or race, or manners as
himself. They say that he is very wealthy in his own country, and
that those who live around him will look coldly on you."
"So that he does not look coldly, I do not care how others may look,"
said Caroline proudly.
"But when he finds that he has injured himself by such a marriage in
the estimation of all his friends,--how will it be then?"
This set Caroline Spalding thinking of what she was doing. She began
to realise the feeling that perhaps she might not be a fit bride for
an English lord's son, and in her agony she came to Nora Rowley for
counsel. After all, how little was it that she knew of the home and
the country to which she was to be carried! She might not, perhaps,
get adequate advice from Nora, but she would probably learn something
on which she could act. There was no one else among the English at
Florence to whom she could speak with freedom. When she mentioned her
fears to her aunt, her aunt of course laughed at her. Mrs. Spalding
told her that Mr. Glascock might be presumed to know his own business
best, and that she, as an American lady of high standing,--the niece
of a minister!--was a fitting match for any Englishman, let him be
ever so much a lord. But Caroline was not comforted by this, and in
her suspense she went to Nora Rowley. She wrote a line to Nora, and
when she called at the hotel, was taken up to her friend's bed-room.
She found great difficulty in telling her story, but she did tell it.
"Miss Rowley," she said, "if this is a silly thing that he is going
to do, I am bound to save him from his own folly. You know your own
country better than I do. Will they think that he has disgraced
himself?"
"Certainly not that," said Nora.
"Shall I be a load round his neck? Miss Rowley, for my own sake I
would not endure such a position as that, not even though I love him.
But for his sake! Think of that. If I find that people think ill of
him,--because of me--!"
"No one will think ill of him."
"Is it esteemed needful that such a one as he should marry a woman of
his own rank? I can bear to end it all now; but I shall not be able
to bear his humiliation, and my own despair, if I find that I have
injured him. Tell me plainly,--is it a marriage that he should not
make?" Nora paused for a while before she answered, and as she sat
silent the other girl watched her face carefully. Nora on being thus
consulted, was very careful that her tongue should utter nothing that
was not her true opinion as best she knew how to express it. Her
sympathy would have prompted her to give such an answer as would
at once have made Caroline happy in her mind. She would have been
delighted to have been able to declare that these doubts were utterly
groundless, and this hesitation needless. But she conceived that she
owed it as a duty from one woman to another to speak the truth as she
conceived it on so momentous an occasion, and she was not sure but
that Mr. Glascock would be considered by his friends in England to be
doing badly in marrying an American girl. What she did not remember
was this,--that her very hesitation was in fact an answer, and such
an answer as she was most unwilling to give. "I see that it would be
so," said Caroline Spalding.
"No;--not that."
"What then? Will they despise him,--and me?"
"No one who knows you can despise you. No one who sees you can fail
to admire you." Nora, as she said this, thought of her mother, but
told herself at once that in this matter her mother's judgment had
been altogether destroyed by her disappointment. "What I think will
take place will be this. His family, when first they hear of it, will
be sorry."
"Then," said Caroline, "I will put an end to it."
"You can't do that, dear. You are engaged, and you haven't a right.
I am engaged to a man, and all my friends object to it. But I shan't
put an end to it. I don't think I have a right. I shall not do it any
way, however."
"But if it were for his good?"
"It couldn't be for his good. He and I have got to go along together
somehow."
"You wouldn't hurt him," said Caroline.
"I won't if I can help it, but he has got to take me along with him
any how; and Mr. Glascock has got to take you. If I were you, I
shouldn't ask any more questions."
"It isn't the same. You said that you were to be poor, but he is very
rich. And I am beginning to understand that these titles of yours are
something like kings' crowns. The man who has to wear them can't do
just as he pleases with them. Noblesse oblige. I can see the meaning
of that, even when the obligation itself is trumpery in its nature.
If it is a man's duty to marry a Talbot because he's a Howard, I
suppose he ought to do his duty." After a pause she went on again. "I
do believe that I have made a mistake. It seemed to be absurd at the
first to think of it, but I do believe it now. Even what you say to
me makes me think it."
"At any rate you can't go back," said Nora enthusiastically.
"I will try."
"Go to himself and ask him. You must leave him to decide it at last.
I don't see how a girl when she is engaged, is to throw a man over
unless he consents. Of course you can throw yourself into the Arno."
"And get the water into my shoes,--for it wouldn't do much more at
present."
"And you can--jilt him," said Nora.
"It would not be jilting him."
"He must decide that. If he so regards it, it will be so. I advise
you to think no more about it; but if you speak to anybody it should
be to him." This was at last the result of Nora's wisdom, and then
the two girls descended together to the room in which Lady Rowley was
sitting with her other daughters. Lady Rowley was very careful in
asking after Miss Spalding's sister, and Miss Spalding assured her
that Olivia was quite well. Then Lady Rowley made some inquiry about
Olivia and Mr. Glascock, and Miss Spalding assured her that no two
persons were ever such allies, and that she believed that they were
together at this moment investigating some old church. Lady Rowley
simpered, and declared that nothing could be more proper, and
expressed a hope that Olivia would like England. Caroline Spalding,
having still in her mind the trouble that had brought her to Nora,
had not much to say about this. "If she goes again to England I am
sure she will like it," replied Miss Spalding.
"But of course she is going," said Lady Rowley.
"Of course she will some day, and of course she'll like it," said
Miss Spalding. "We both of us have been there already."
"But I mean Monkhams," said Lady Rowley, still simpering.
"I declare I believe mamma thinks that your sister is to be married
to Mr. Glascock!" said Lucy.
"And so she is;--isn't she?" said Lady Rowley.
"Oh, mamma!" said Nora, jumping up. "It is Caroline;--this one,
this one, this one,"--and Nora took her friend by the arm as she
spoke,--"it is this one that is to be Mrs. Glascock."
"It is a most natural mistake to make," said Caroline.
Lady Rowley became very red in the face, and was unhappy. "I
declare," she said, "that they told me it was your elder sister."
"But I have no elder sister," said Caroline, laughing.
"Of course she is oldest," said Nora,--"and looks to be so, ever so
much. Don't you, Miss Spalding?"
"I have always supposed so."
"I don't understand it at all," said Lady Rowley, who had no image
before her mind's eye but that of Wallachia Petrie, and who was
beginning to feel that she had disgraced her own judgment by the
criticisms she had expressed everywhere as to Mr. Glascock's bride.
"I don't understand it at all. Do you mean that both your sisters are
younger than you, Miss Spalding?"
"I have only got one, Lady Rowley."
"Mamma, you are thinking of Miss Petrie," said Nora, clapping both
her hands together.
"I mean the lady that wears the black bugles."
"Of course you do;--Miss Petrie. Mamma has all along thought that Mr.
Glascock was going to carry away with him the republican Browning!"
"Oh, mamma, how can you have made such a blunder!" said Sophie
Rowley. "Mamma does make such delicious blunders."
"Sophie, my dear, that is not a proper way of speaking."
"But, dear mamma, don't you?"
"If somebody has told me wrong, that has not been my fault," said
Lady Rowley.
The poor woman was so evidently disconcerted that Caroline Spalding
was quite unhappy. "My dear Lady Rowley, there has been no fault. And
why shouldn't it have been so? Wallachia is so clever, that it is the
most natural thing in the world to have thought."
"I cannot say that I agree with you there," said Lady Rowley,
somewhat recovering herself.
"You must know the whole truth now," said Nora, turning to her
friend, "and you must not be angry with us if we laugh a little at
your poetess. Mamma has been frantic with Mr. Glascock because he has
been going to marry,--whom shall I say,--her edition of you. She has
sworn that he must be insane. When we have sworn how beautiful you
were, and how nice, and how jolly, and all the rest of it,--she has
sworn that you were at least a hundred, and that you had a red nose.
You must admit that Miss Petrie has a red nose."
"Is that a sin?"
"Not at all in the woman who has it; but in the man who is going to
marry it,--yes. Can't you see how we have all been at cross-purposes,
and what mamma has been thinking and saying of poor Mr. Glascock?
You mustn't repeat it, of course; but we have had such a battle here
about it. We thought that mamma had lost her eyes and her ears and
her knowledge of things in general. And now it has all come out! You
won't be angry?"
"Why should I be angry?"
"Miss Spalding," said Lady Rowley, "I am really unhappy at what has
occurred, and I hope that there may be nothing more said about it.
I am quite sure that somebody told me wrong, or I should not have
fallen into such an error. I beg your pardon,--and Mr. Glascock's!"
"Beg Mr. Glascock's pardon, certainly," said Lucy.
Miss Spalding looked very pretty, smiled very gracefully, and coming
up to Lady Rowley to say good-bye, kissed her on her cheeks. This
overcame the spirit of the disappointed mother, and Lady Rowley never
said another word against Caroline Spalding or her marriage. "Now,
mamma, what do you think of her?" said Nora, as soon as Caroline was
gone.
"Was it odd, my dear, that I should be astonished at his wanting to
marry that other woman?"
"But, mamma, when we told you that she was young and pretty and
bright!"
"I thought that you were all demented. I did indeed. I still think it
a pity that he should take an American. I think that Miss Spalding is
very nice, but there are English girls quite as nice-looking as her."
After that there was not another word said by Lady Rowley against
Caroline Spalding.
Nora, when she thought of it all that night, felt that she had hardly
spoken to Miss Spalding as she should have spoken as to the treatment
in England which would be accorded to Mr. Glascock's wife. She became
aware of the effect which her own hesitation must have had, and
thought that it was her duty to endeavour to remove it. Perhaps, too,
the conversion of her mother had some effect in making her feel that
she had been wrong in supposing that there would be any difficulty
in Caroline's position in England. She had heard so much adverse
criticism from her mother that she had doubted in spite of
her own convictions;--but now it had come to light that Lady
Rowley's criticisms had all come from a most absurd blunder. "Only
fancy;"--she said to herself;--"Miss Petrie coming out as Lady
Peterborough! Poor mamma!" And then she thought of the reception
which would be given to Caroline, and of the place the future Lady
Peterborough would fill in the world, and of the glories of Monkhams!
Resolving that she would do her best to counteract any evil which
she might have done, she seated herself at her desk, and wrote the
following letter to Miss Spalding:--
MY DEAR CAROLINE,
I am sure you will let me call you so, as had you not felt
towards me like a friend, you would not have come to me
to-day and told me of your doubts. I think that I did not
answer you as I ought to have done when you spoke to me.
I did not like to say anything off-hand, and in that way
I misled you. I feel quite sure that you will encounter
nothing in England as Mr. Glascock's wife to make you
uncomfortable, and that he will have nothing to repent.
Of course Englishmen generally marry Englishwomen; and,
perhaps, there may be some people who will think that such
a prize should not be lost to their countrywomen. But that
will be all. Mr. Glascock commands such universal respect
that his wife will certainly be respected, and I do not
suppose that anything will ever come in your way that can
possibly make you feel that he is looked down upon. I hope
you will understand what I mean.
As for your changing now, that is quite impossible. If I
were you, I would not say a word about it to any living
being; but just go on,--straight forward,--in your own
way, and take the good the gods provide you,--as the poet
says to the king in the ode. And I think the gods have
provided for you very well,--and for him.
I do hope that I may see you sometimes. I cannot explain
to you how very much out of your line "we" shall be;--for
of course there is a "we." People are more separated with
us than they are, I suppose, with you. And my "we" is
a very poor man, who works hard at writing in a dingy
newspaper office, and we shall live in a garret and have
brown sugar in our tea, and eat hashed mutton. And I shall
have nothing a year to buy my clothes with. Still I mean
to do it; and I don't mean to be long before I do do it.
When a girl has made up her mind to be married, she had
better go on with it at once, and take it all afterwards
as it may come. Nevertheless, perhaps, we may see each
other somewhere, and I may be able to introduce you to the
dearest, honestest, very best, and most affectionate man
in the world. And he is very, very clever.
Yours very affectionately,
NORA ROWLEY.
Thursday morning.
CHAPTER LXXXI.
MR. GLASCOCK IS MASTER.
[Illustration]
Caroline Spalding, when she received Nora's letter, was not disposed
to give much weight to it. She declared to herself that the girl's
unpremeditated expression of opinion was worth more than her studied
words. But she was not the less grateful or the less loving towards
her new friend. She thought how nice it would be to have Nora at that
splendid abode in England of which she had heard so much,--but she
thought also that in that splendid abode she herself ought never to
have part or share. If it were the case that this were an unfitting
match, it was clearly her duty to decide that there should be no
marriage. Nora had been quite right in bidding her speak to Mr.
Glascock himself, and to Mr. Glascock she would go. But it was very
difficult for her to determine on the manner in which she would
discuss the subject with him. She thought that she could be firm if
her mind were once made up. She believed that perhaps she was by
nature more firm than he. In all their intercourse together he had
ever yielded to her; and though she had been always pleased and
grateful, there had grown upon her an idea that he was perhaps too
easy,--that he was a man as to whom it was necessary that they who
loved him should see that he was not led away by weakness into folly.
But she would want to learn something from him before her decision
was finally reached, and in this she foresaw a great difficulty.
In her trouble she went to her usual counsellor,--the Republican
Browning. In such an emergency she could hardly have done worse.
"Wally," she said, "we talk about England, and Italy, and France,
as though we knew all about them; but how hard it is to realise the
difference between one's own country and others."
"We can at least learn a great deal that is satisfactory," said
Wallachia. "About one out of every five Italians can read a book,
about two out of every five Englishmen can read a book. Out of every
five New Englanders four and four-fifths can read a book. I guess
that is knowing a good deal."
"I don't mean in statistics."
"I cannot conceive how you are to learn anything about any country
except by statistics. I have just discovered that the number of
illegitimate children--"
"Oh, Wally, I can't talk about that,--not now at least. What I cannot
realise is this,--what sort of a life it is that they will lead at
Monkhams."
"Plenty to eat and drink, I guess; and you'll always have to go round
in fine clothes."
"And that will be all?"
"No;--not all. There will be carriages and horses, and all manner
of people there who won't care much about you. If he is firm,--very
firm;--if he have that firmness which one does not often meet, even
in an American man, he will be able, after a while, to give you
a position as an English woman of rank." It is to be feared that
Wallachia Petrie had been made aware of Caroline's idea as to Mr.
Glascock's want of purpose.
"And that will be all?"
"If you have a baby, they'll let you go and see it two or three times
a day. I don't suppose you will be allowed to nurse it, because they
never do in England. You have read what the Saturday Review says. In
every other respect the Saturday Review has been the falsest of all
false periodicals, but I guess it has been pretty true in what it has
said about English women."
"I wish I knew more about it really."
"When a man has to leap through a window in the dark, Caroline, of
course he doubts whether the feather bed said to be below will be
soft enough for him."
"I shouldn't fear the leap for myself, if it wouldn't hurt him. Do
you think it possible that society can be so formed that a man should
lose caste because he doesn't marry just one of his own set?"
"It has been so all over the world, my dear. If like to like is to be
true anywhere, it should be true in marriage."
"Yes;--but with a difference. He and I are like to like. We come of
the same race, we speak the same language, we worship the same God,
we have the same ideas of culture and of pleasures. The difference is
one that is not patent to the eye or to the ear. It is a difference
of accidental incident, not of nature or of acquirement."
"I guess you would find, Caroline, that a jury of English matrons
sworn to try you fairly, would not find you to be entitled to come
among them as one of themselves."
"And how will that affect him?"
"Less powerfully than many others, because he is not impassioned. He
is, perhaps--lethargic."
"No, Wally, he is not lethargic."
"If you ask me I must speak. It would harass some men almost to
death; it will not do so with him. He would probably find his
happiness best in leaving his old country and coming among your
people."
The idea of Mr. Glascock,--the future Lord Peterborough,--leaving
England, abandoning Monkhams, deserting his duty in the House of
Lords, and going away to live in an American town, in order that he
might escape the miseries which his wife had brought upon him in his
own country, was more than Caroline could bear. She knew that, at
any rate, it would not come to that. The lord of Monkhams would live
at Monkhams, though the heavens should fall--in regard to domestic
comforts. It was clear to Caroline that Wallachia Petrie had in truth
never brought home to her own imagination the position of an English
peer. "I don't think you understand the people at all," she said
angrily.
"You think that you can understand them better because you are
engaged to this man!" said Miss Petrie, with well-pronounced irony.
"You have found generally that when the sun shines in your eyes your
sight is improved by it! You think that the love-talk of a few weeks
gives clearer instruction than the laborious reading of many volumes
and thoughtful converse with thinking persons! I hope that you may
find it so, Caroline." So saying Wallachia Petrie walked off in great
dudgeon.
Miss Petrie, not having learned from her many volumes and her much
converse with thoughtful persons to read human nature aright, was
convinced by this conversation that her friend Caroline was blind
to all results, and was determined to go on with this dangerous
marriage, having the rays of that sun of Monkhams so full upon her
eyes that she could not see at all. She was specially indignant at
finding that her own words had no effect. But, unfortunately, her
words had had much effect; and Caroline, though she had contested her
points, had done so only with the intention of producing her Mentor's
admonitions. Of course it was out of the question that Mr. Glascock
should go and live in Providence, Rhode Island, from which thriving
town Caroline Spalding had come; but, because that was impossible,
it was not the less probable that he might be degraded and made
miserable in his own home. That suggested jury of British matrons
was a frightful conclave to contemplate, and Caroline was disposed
to believe that the verdict given in reference to herself would
be adverse to her. So she sat and meditated, and spoke not a word
further to any one on the subject till she was alone with the man
that she loved.
Mr. Spalding at this time inhabited the ground floor of a large
palace in the city, from which there was access to a garden which at
this period of the year was green, bright, and shady, and which as
being in the centre of a city was large and luxurious. From one end
of the house there projected a covered terrace, or loggia, in which
there were chairs and tables, sculptured ornaments, busts, and old
monumental relics let into the wall in profusion. It was half chamber
and half garden,--such an adjunct to a house as in our climate would
give only an idea of cold, rheumatism, and a false romance, but under
an Italian sky, is a luxury daily to be enjoyed during most months of
the year. Here Mr. Glascock and Caroline had passed many hours,--and
here they were now seated, late in the evening, while all others of
the family were away. As far as regarded the rooms occupied by the
American Minister, they had the house and garden to themselves, and
there never could come a time more appropriate for the saying of a
thing difficult to be said. Mr. Glascock had heard from his father's
physician, and had said that it was nearly certain now that he
need not go down to Naples again before his marriage. Caroline was
trembling, not knowing how to speak, not knowing how to begin;--but
resolved that the thing should be done. "He will never know you,
Carry," said Mr. Glascock. "It is, perhaps, hardly a sorrow to me,
but it is a regret."
"It would have been a sorrow perhaps to him had he been able to know
me," said she, taking the opportunity of rushing at her subject.
"Why so? Of all human beings he was the softest-hearted."
"Not softer-hearted than you, Charles. But soft hearts have to be
hardened."
"What do you mean? Am I becoming obdurate?"
"I am, Charles," she said. "I have got something to say to you. What
will your uncles and aunts and your mother's relations say of me when
they see me at Monkhams?"
"They will swear to me that you are charming; and then,--when my back
is turned,--they'll pick you to pieces a little among themselves. I
believe that is the way of the world, and I don't suppose that we are
to do better than others."
"And if you had married an English girl, a Lady Augusta
Somebody,--would they pick her to pieces?"
"I guess they would, as you say."
"Just the same?"
"I don't think anybody escapes, as far as I can see. But that won't
prevent their becoming your bosom friends in a few weeks time."
"No one will say that you have been wrong to marry an American girl?"
"Now, Carry, what is the meaning of all this?"
"Do you know any man in your position who ever did marry an American
girl;--any man of your rank in England?" Mr. Glascock began to think
of the case, and could not at the moment remember any instance.
"Charles, I do not think you ought to be the first."
"And yet somebody must be first, if the thing is ever to be
done;--and I am too old to wait on the chance of being the second."
She felt that at the rate she was now progressing she would only run
from one little suggestion to another, and that he, either wilfully
or in sheer simplicity, would take such suggestions simply as jokes;
and she was aware that she lacked the skill to bring the conversation
round gradually to the point which she was bound to reach. She must
make another dash, let it be ever so sudden. Her mode of doing so
would be crude, ugly,--almost vulgar she feared; but she would attain
her object and say what she had to say. When once she had warmed
herself with the heat which argument would produce, then, she was
pretty sure, she would find herself at least as strong as he. "I
don't know that the thing ought to be done at all," she said. During
the last moment or two he had put his arm round her waist; and she,
not choosing to bid him desist from embracing her, but unwilling in
her present mood to be embraced, got up and stood before him. "I have
thought, and thought, and thought, and feel that it should not be
done. In marriage, like should go to like." She despised herself for
using Wallachia's words, but they fitted in so usefully, that she
could not refrain from them. "I was wrong not to know it before, but
it is better to know it now, than not to have known it till too late.
Everything that I hear and see tells me that it would be so. If you
were simply an Englishman, I would go anywhere with you; but I am not
fit to be the wife of an English lord. The time would come when I
should be a disgrace to you, and then I should die."
"I think I should go near dying myself," said he, "if you were a
disgrace to me." He had not risen from his chair, and sat calmly
looking up into her face.
"We have made a mistake, and let us unmake it," she continued. "I
will always be your friend. I will correspond with you. I will come
and see your wife."
"That will be very kind!"
"Charles, if you laugh at me, I shall be angry with you. It is right
that you should look to your future life, as it is right that I
should do so also. Do you think that I am joking? Do you suppose that
I do not mean it?"
"You have taken an extra dose this morning of Wallachia Petrie, and
of course you mean it."
"If you think that I am speaking her mind and not my own, you do not
know me."
"And what is it you propose?" he said, still keeping his seat and
looking calmly up into her face.
"Simply that our engagement should be over."
"And why?"
"Because it is not a fitting one for you to have made. I did not
understand it before, but now I do. It will not be good for you to
marry an American girl. It will not add to your happiness, and may
destroy it. I have learned, at last, to know how much higher is your
position than mine."
"And I am to be supposed to know nothing about it?"
"Your fault is only this,--that you have been too generous. I can be
generous also."
"Now, look here, Caroline, you must not be angry with me if on such
a subject I speak plainly. You must not even be angry if I laugh a
little."
"Pray do not laugh at me!--not now."
"I must a little, Carry. Why am I to be supposed to be so ignorant of
what concerns my own happiness and my own duties? If you will not sit
down, I will get up, and we will take a turn together." He rose from
his seat, but they did not leave the covered terrace. They moved on
to the extremity, and then he stood hemming her in against a marble
table in the corner. "In making this rather wild proposition, have
you considered me at all?"
"I have endeavoured to consider you, and you only."
"And how have you done it? By the aid of some misty, far-fetched
ideas respecting English society, for which you have no basis except
your own dreams,--and by the fantasies of a rabid enthusiast."
"She is not rabid," said Caroline earnestly; "other people think just
the same."
"My dear, there is only one person whose thinking on this subject
is of any avail, and I am that person. Of course, I can't drag you
into church to be married, but practically you can not help yourself
from being taken there now. As there need be no question about our
marriage,--which is a thing as good as done--"
"It is not done at all," said Caroline.
"I feel quite satisfied you will not jilt me, and as I shall insist
on having the ceremony performed, I choose to regard it as a
certainty. Passing that by, then, I will go on to the results. My
uncles, and aunts, and cousins, and the people you talk of, were very
reasonable folk when I last saw them, and quite sufficiently alive to
the fact that they had to regard me as the head of their family. I
do not doubt that we shall find them equally reasonable when we get
home; but should they be changed, should there be any sign shewn that
my choice of a wife had occasioned displeasure,--such displeasure
would not affect you."
"But it would affect you."
"Not at all. In my own house I am master,--and I mean to continue to
be so. You will be mistress there, and the only fear touching such
a position is that it may be recognised by others too strongly. You
have nothing to fear, Carry."
"It is of you I am thinking."
"Nor have I. What if some old women, or even some young women, should
turn up their noses at the wife I have chosen, because she has not
been chosen from among their own countrywomen, is that to be a cause
of suffering to us? Can not we rise above that,--lasting as it would
do for a few weeks, a month or two perhaps,--say a year,--till my
Caroline shall have made herself known? I think that we are strong
enough to live down a trouble so light." He had come close to her
as he was speaking, and had again put his arm round her waist. She
tried to escape from his embrace,--not with persistency, not with the
strength which always suffices for a woman when the embrace is in
truth a thing to be avoided, but clutching at his fingers with hers,
pressing them rather than loosening their grasp. "No, Carry," he
continued; "we have got to go through with it now, and we will try
and make the best of it. You may trust me that we shall not find it
difficult,--not, at least, on the ground of your present fears. I can
bear a heavier burden than you will bring upon me."
"I know that I ought to prove to you that I am right," she said,
still struggling with his hand.
"And I know that you can prove nothing of the kind. Dearest, it is
fixed between us now, and do not let us be so silly as to raise
imaginary difficulties. Of course you would have to marry me, even if
there were cause for such fears. If there were any great cause, still
the game would be worth the candle. There could be no going back, let
the fear be what it might. But there need be no fear if you will only
love me." She felt that he was altogether too strong for her,--that
she had mistaken his character in supposing that she could be more
firm than he. He was so strong that he treated her almost as a
child;--and yet she loved him infinitely the better for so treating
her. Of course, she knew now that her objection, whether true or
unsubstantial, could not avail. As he stood with his arm round her,
she was powerless to contradict him in anything. She had so far
acknowledged this that she no longer struggled with him, but allowed
her hand to remain quietly within his. If there was no going back
from this bargain that had been made,--why, then, there was no need
for combating. And when he stooped over and kissed her lips, she had
not a word to say. "Be good to me," he said, "and tell me that I am
right."
"You must be master, I suppose, whether you are right or wrong. A man
always thinks himself entitled to his own way."
"Why, yes. When he has won the battle, he claims his captive. Now,
the truth is this, I have won the battle, and your friend, Miss
Petrie, has lost it. I hope she will understand that she has been
beaten at last out of the field." As he said this, he heard a step
behind them, and turning round saw Wallachia there almost before he
could drop his arm.
"I am sorry that I have intruded on you," she said very grimly.
"Not in the least," said Mr. Glascock. "Caroline and I have had a
little dispute, but we have settled it without coming to blows."
"I do not suppose that an English gentleman ever absolutely strikes a
lady," said Wallachia Petrie.
"Not except on strong provocation," said Mr. Glascock. "In reference
to wives, a stick is allowed as big as your thumb."
"I have heard that it is so by the laws of England," said Wallachia.
"How can you be so ridiculous, Wally!" said Caroline. "There is
nothing that you would not believe."
"I hope that it may never be true in your case," said Wallachia.
A couple of days after this Miss Spalding found that it was
absolutely necessary that she should explain the circumstances of her
position to Nora. She had left Nora with the purpose of performing
a very high-minded action, of sacrificing herself for the sake of
her lover, of giving up all her golden prospects, and of becoming
once again the bosom friend of Wallachia Petrie, with this simple
consolation for her future life,--that she had refused to marry
an English nobleman because the English nobleman's condition was
unsuited to her. It would have been an episode in female life in
which pride might be taken;--but all that was now changed. She had
made her little attempt,--had made it, as she felt, in a very languid
manner, and had found herself treated as a child for doing so. Of
course she was happy in her ill success; of course she would have
been broken-hearted had she succeeded. But, nevertheless, she was
somewhat lowered in her own esteem, and it was necessary that she
should acknowledge the truth to the friend whom she had consulted. A
day or two had passed before she found herself alone with Nora, but
when she did so she confessed her failure at once.
"You told him all, then?" said Nora.
"Oh yes, I told him all. That is, I could not really tell him. When
the moment came I had no words."
"And what did he say?"
"He had words enough. I never knew him to be eloquent before."
"He can speak out if he likes," said Nora.
"So I have found,--with a vengeance. Nobody was ever so put down as I
was. Don't you know that there are times when it does not seem to be
worth your while to put out your strength against an adversary? So it
was with him. He just told me that he was my master, and that I was
to do as he bade me."
"And what did you say?"
"I promised to be a good girl," said Caroline, "and not to pretend
to have any opinion of my own ever again. And so we kissed, and were
friends."
"I dare say there was a kiss, my dear."
"Of course there was;--and he held me in his arms, and comforted me,
and told me how to behave;--just as you would do a little girl. It's
all over now, of course; and if there be a mistake, it is his fault.
I feel that all responsibility is gone from myself, and that for all
the rest of my life I have to do just what he tells me."
"And what says the divine Wallachia?"
"Poor Wally! She says nothing, but she thinks that I am a castaway
and a recreant. I am a recreant, I know;--but yet I think that I was
right. I know I could not help myself."
"Of course you were right, my dear," said the sage Nora. "If you had
the notion in your head, it was wise to get rid of it; but I knew how
it would be when you spoke to him."
"You were not so weak when he came to you."
"That was altogether another thing. It was not arranged in heaven
that I was to become his captive."
After that Wallachia Petrie never again tried her influence on her
former friend, but admitted to herself that the evil was done, and
that it could not be remedied. According to her theory of life,
Caroline Spalding had been wrong, and weak,--had shewn herself to
be comfort-loving and luxuriously-minded, had looked to get her
happiness from soft effeminate pleasures rather than from rational
work and the useful, independent exercise of her own intelligence.
In the privacy of her little chamber Wallachia Petrie shed,--not
absolute tears,--but many tearful thoughts over her friend. It was
to her a thing very terrible that the chosen one of her heart should
prefer the career of an English lord's wife to that of an American
citizeness, with all manner of capability for female voting, female
speech-making, female poetising, and, perhaps, female political
action before her. It was a thousand pities! "You may take a horse
to water,"--said Wallachia to herself, thinking of the ever-freshly
springing fountain of her own mind, at which Caroline Spalding would
always have been made welcome freely to quench her thirst,--"but you
cannot make him drink if he be not athirst." In the future she would
have no friend. Never again would she subject herself to the disgrace
of such a failure. But the sacrifice was to be made, and she knew
that it was bootless to waste her words further on Caroline Spalding.
She left Florence before the wedding, and returned alone to the land
of liberty. She wrote a letter to Caroline explaining her conduct,
and Caroline Spalding shewed the letter to her husband,--as one that
was both loving and eloquent.
"Very loving and very eloquent," he said. "But, nevertheless, one
does think of sour grapes."
"There I am sure you wrong her," said Caroline.
CHAPTER LXXXII.
MRS. FRENCH'S CARVING KNIFE.
During these days there were terrible doings at Exeter. Camilla had
sworn that if Mr. Gibson did not come to, there should be a tragedy,
and it appeared that she was inclined to keep her word. Immediately
after the receipt of her letter from Mr. Gibson she had had an
interview with that gentleman in his lodgings, and had asked him his
intentions. He had taken measures to fortify himself against such an
attack; but, whatever those measures were, Camilla had broken through
them. She had stood before him as he sat in his arm-chair, and he had
been dumb in her presence. It had perhaps been well for him that the
eloquence of her indignation had been so great that she had hardly
been able to pause a moment for a reply. "Will you take your letter
back again?" she had said. "I should be wrong to do that," he had
lisped out in reply, "because it is true. As a Christian minister
I could not stand with you at the altar with a lie in my mouth."
In no other way did he attempt to excuse himself,--but that, twice
repeated, filled up all the pause which she made for him.
[Illustration: Camilla's wrath.]
There never had been such a case before,--so impudent, so cruel, so
gross, so uncalled for, so unmanly, so unnecessary, so unjustifiable,
so damnable,--so sure of eternal condemnation! All this she
said to him with loud voice, and clenched fist, and starting
eyes,--regardless utterly of any listeners on the stairs, or of
outside passers in the street. In very truth she was moved to a
sublimity of indignation. Her low nature became nearly poetic under
the wrong inflicted upon her. She was almost tempted to tear him with
her hands, and inflict upon him at the moment some terrible vengeance
which should be told of for ever in the annals of Exeter. A man so
mean as he, so weak, so cowardly, one so little of a hero;--that he
should dare to do it, and dare to sit there before her, and to say
that he would do it! "Your gown shall be torn off your back, sir, and
the very boys of Exeter shall drag you through the gutters!" To this
threat he said nothing, but sat mute, hiding his face in his hands.
"And now tell me this, sir;--is there anything between you and
Bella?" But there was no voice in reply. "Answer my question, sir.
I have a right to ask it." Still he said not a word. "Listen to me.
Sooner than that you and she should be man and wife, I would stab
her! Yes, I would;--you poor, paltry, lying, cowardly creature!" She
remained with him for more than half an hour, and then banged out of
the room flashing back a look of scorn at him as she went. Martha,
before that day was over, had learned the whole story from Mr.
Gibson's cook, and had told her mistress.
"I did not think he had so much spirit in him," was Miss Stanbury's
answer. Throughout Exeter the great wonder arising from the crisis
was the amount of spirit which had been displayed by Mr. Gibson.
When he was left alone he shook himself, and began to think that if
there were danger that such interviews might occur frequently he had
better leave Exeter for good. As he put his hand over his forehead,
he declared to himself that a very little more of that kind of thing
would kill him. When a couple of hours had passed over his head he
shook himself again, and sat down and wrote a letter to his intended
mother-in-law.
I do not mean to complain [he said], God knows I have
no right; but I cannot stand a repetition of what has
occurred just now. If your younger daughter comes to see
me again I must refuse to see her, and shall leave the
town. I am ready to make what reparation may be possible
for the mistake into which I have fallen.
T. G.
Mrs. French was no doubt much afraid of her younger daughter, but
she was less afraid of her than were other people. Familiarity, they
say, breeds contempt; and who can be so familiar with a child as its
parent? She did not in her heart believe that Camilla would murder
anybody, and she fully realised the conviction that, even after all
that was come and gone, it would be better that one of her daughters
should have a husband than that neither should be so blessed. If only
Camilla could be got out of Exeter for a few months,--how good a
thing it would be for them all! She had a brother in Gloucester,--if
only he could be got to take Camilla for a few months! And then, too,
she knew that if the true rights of her two daughters were strictly
and impartially examined, Arabella's claim was much stronger than any
that Camilla could put forward to the hand of Mr. Gibson.
"You must not go there again, Camilla," the mother said.
"I shall go whenever I please," replied the fury.
"Now, Camilla, we may as well understand each other. I will not have
it done. If I am provoked, I will send to your uncle at Gloucester."
Now the uncle at Gloucester was a timber merchant, a man with
protuberant eyes and a great square chin,--known to be a very stern
man indeed, and not at all afraid of young women.
"What do I care for my uncle? My uncle would take my part."
"No, he would not. The truth is, Camilla, you interfered with Bella
first."
"Mamma, how dare you say so!"
"You did, my dear. And these are the consequences."
"And you mean to say that she is to be Mrs. Gibson?"
"I say nothing about that. But I do not see why they shouldn't be
married if their hearts are inclined to each other."
"I will die first!"
"Your dying has nothing to do with it, Camilla."
"And I will kill her!"
"If you speak to me again in that way I will write to your uncle at
Gloucester. I have done the best I could for you both, and I will not
bear such treatment."
"And how am I treated?"
"You should not have interfered with your sister."
"You are all in a conspiracy together," shouted Camilla, "you are!
There never was anybody so badly treated,--never,--never,--never!
What will everybody say of me?"
"They will pity you, if you will be quiet."
"I don't want to be pitied;--I won't be pitied. I wish I could
die,--and I will die! Anybody else would, at any rate, have had their
mother and sister with them!" Then she burst into a flood of real,
true, womanly tears.
After this there was a lull at Heavitree for a few days. Camilla
did not speak to her sister, but she condescended to hold some
intercourse with her mother, and to take her meals at the family
table. She did not go out of the house, but she employed herself in
her own room, doing no one knew what, with all that new clothing and
household gear which was to have been transferred in her train to
Mr. Gibson's house. Mrs. French was somewhat uneasy about the new
clothing and household gear, feeling that, in the event of Bella's
marriage, at least a considerable portion of it must be transferred
to the new bride. But it was impossible at the present moment to open
such a subject to Camilla;--it would have been as a proposition to a
lioness respecting the taking away of her whelps. Nevertheless, the
day must soon come in which something must be said about the clothing
and household gear. All the property that had been sent into the
house at Camilla's orders could not be allowed to remain as Camilla's
perquisites, now that Camilla was not to be married. "Do you know
what she is doing, my dear?" said Mrs. French to her elder daughter.
"Perhaps she is picking out the marks," said Bella.
"I don't think she would do that as yet," said Mrs. French.
"She might just as well leave it alone," said Bella, feeling that one
of the two letters would do for her. But neither of them dared to
speak to her of her occupation in these first days of her despair.
Mr. Gibson in the meantime remained at home, or only left his house
to go to the Cathedral or to visit the narrow confines of his little
parish. When he was out he felt that everybody looked at him, and it
seemed to him that people whispered about him when they saw him at
his usual desk in the choir. His friends passed him merely bowing to
him, and he was aware that he had done that which would be regarded
by every one around him as unpardonable. And yet,--what ought he to
have done? He acknowledged to himself that he had been very foolish,
mad,--quite demented at the moment,--when he allowed himself to think
it possible that he should marry Camilla French. But having found out
how mad he had been at that moment, having satisfied himself that to
live with her as his wife would be impossible, was he not right to
break the engagement? Could anything be so wicked as marrying a woman
whom he--hated? Thus he tried to excuse himself; but yet he knew that
all the world would condemn him. Life in Exeter would be impossible,
if no way to social pardon could be opened for him. He was willing to
do anything within bounds in mitigation of his offence. He would give
up fifty pounds a year to Camilla for his life,--or he would marry
Bella. Yes; he would marry Bella at once,--if Camilla would only
consent, and give up that idea of stabbing some one. Bella French
was not very nice in his eyes; but she was quiet, he thought, and it
might be possible to live with her. Nevertheless, he told himself
over and over again that the manner in which unmarried men with
incomes were set upon by ladies in want of husbands was very
disgraceful to the country at large. That mission to Natal which had
once been offered to him would have had charms for him now, of which
he had not recognised the force when he rejected it.
"Do you think that he ever was really engaged to her?" Dorothy said
to her aunt. Dorothy was now living in a seventh heaven of happiness,
writing love-letters to Brooke Burgess every other day, and devoting
to this occupation a number of hours of which she ought to have
been ashamed; making her purchases for her wedding,--with nothing,
however, of the magnificence of a Camilla,--but discussing everything
with her aunt, who urged her on to extravagances which seemed beyond
the scope of her own economical ideas; settling, or trying to settle,
little difficulties which perplexed her somewhat, and wondering
at her own career. She could not of course be married without the
presence of her mother and sister, and her aunt,--with something of
a grim courtesy,--had intimated that they should be made welcome to
the house in the Close for the special occasion. But nothing had been
said about Hugh. The wedding was to be in the Cathedral, and Dorothy
had a little scheme in her head for meeting her brother among the
aisles. He would no doubt come down with Brooke, and nothing perhaps
need be said about it to Aunt Stanbury. But still it was a trouble.
Her aunt had been so good that Dorothy felt that no step should be
taken which would vex the old woman. It was evident enough that
when permission had been given for the visit of Mrs. Stanbury and
Priscilla, Hugh's name had been purposely kept back. There had been
no accidental omission. Dorothy, therefore, did not dare to mention
it,--and yet it was essential for her happiness that he should be
there. At the present moment Miss Stanbury's intense interest in the
Stanbury wedding was somewhat mitigated by the excitement occasioned
by Mr. Gibson's refusal to be married. Dorothy was so shocked that
she could not bring herself to believe the statement that had reached
them through Martha.
"Of course he was engaged to her. We all knew that," said Miss
Stanbury.
"I think there must have been some mistake," said Dorothy. "I don't
see how he could do it."
"There is no knowing what people can do, my dear, when they're hard
driven. I suppose we shall have a lawsuit now, and he'll have to pay
ever so much money. Well, well, well! see what a deal of trouble you
might have saved!"
"But he'd have done the same to me, aunt;--only, you know, I never
could have taken him. Isn't it better as it is, aunt? Tell me."
"I suppose young women always think it best when they can get their
own ways. An old woman like me has only got to do what she is bid."
"But this was best, aunt;--was it not?"
"My dear, you've had your way, and let that be enough. Poor Camilla
French is not allowed to have hers at all. Dear, dear, dear! I didn't
think the man would ever have been such a fool to begin with;--or
that he would ever have had the heart to get out of it afterwards."
It astonished Dorothy to find that her aunt was not loud in
reprobation of Mr. Gibson's very dreadful conduct.
In the meantime Mrs. French had written to her brother at Gloucester.
The maid-servant, in making Miss Camilla's bed, and in "putting the
room to rights," as she called it,--which description probably was
intended to cover the circumstances of an accurate search,--had
discovered, hidden among some linen,--a carving knife! such a
knife as is used for the cutting up of fowls; and, after two days'
interval, had imparted the discovery to Mrs. French. Instant visit
was made to the pantry, and it was found that a very aged but
unbroken and sharply-pointed weapon was missing. Mrs. French at once
accused Camilla, and Camilla, after some hesitation, admitted that
it might be there. Molly, she said, was a nasty, sly, wicked thing,
to go looking in her drawers, and she would never leave anything
unlocked again. The knife, she declared, had been taken up-stairs,
because she had wanted something very sharp to cut,--the bones of
her stays. The knife was given up, but Mrs. French thought it best
to write to her brother, Mr. Crump. She was in great doubt about
sundry matters. Had the carving knife really pointed to a domestic
tragedy;--and if so, what steps ought a poor widow to take with
such a daughter? And what ought to be done about Mr. Gibson? It ran
through Mrs. French's mind that unless something were done at once,
Mr. Gibson would escape scot free. It was her wish that he should yet
become her son-in-law. Poor Bella was entitled to her chance. But
if Bella was to be disappointed,--from fear of carving knives, or
for other reasons,--then there came the question whether Mr. Gibson
should not be made to pay in purse for the mischief he had done. With
all these thoughts and doubts running through her head, Mrs. French
wrote to her brother at Gloucester.
There came back an answer from Mr. Crump, in which that gentleman
expressed a very strong idea that Mr. Gibson should be prosecuted for
damages with the utmost virulence, and with the least possible delay.
No compromise should be accepted. Mr. Crump would himself come to
Exeter and see the lawyer as soon as he should be told that there
was a lawyer to be seen. As to the carving knife, Mr. Crump was of
opinion that it did not mean anything. Mr. Crump was a gentleman who
did not believe in strong romance, but who had great trust in all
pecuniary claims. The Frenches had always been genteel. The late
Captain French had been an officer in the army, and at ordinary times
and seasons the Frenches were rather ashamed of the Crump connection.
But now the timber merchant might prove himself to be a useful
friend.
Mrs. French shewed her brother's letter to Bella,--and poor Bella was
again sore-hearted, seeing that nothing was said in it of her claims.
"It will be dreadful scandal to have it all in the papers!" said
Bella.
"But what can we do?"
"Anything would be better than that," said Bella. "And you don't want
to punish Mr. Gibson, mamma."
"But, my dear, you see what your uncle says. What can I do, except go
to him for advice?"
"Why don't you go to Mr. Gibson yourself, mamma?"
But nothing was said to Camilla about Mr. Crump;--nothing as yet.
Camilla did not love Mr. Crump, but there was no other house except
that of Mr. Crump's at Gloucester to which she might be sent, if
it could be arranged that Mr. Gibson and Bella should be made one.
Mrs. French took her eldest daughter's advice, and went to Mr.
Gibson;--taking Mr. Crump's letter in her pocket. For herself she
wanted nothing,--but was it not the duty of her whole life to fight
for her daughters? Poor woman! If somebody would only have taught her
how that duty might best be done, she would have endeavoured to obey
the teaching. "You know I do not want to threaten you," she said to
Mr. Gibson; "but you see what my brother says. Of course I wrote to
my brother. What could a poor woman do in such circumstances except
write to her brother?"
"If you choose to set the bloodhounds of the law at me, of course you
can," said Mr. Gibson.
"I do not want to go to law at all;--God knows I do not!" said Mrs.
French. Then there was a pause. "Poor dear Bella!" ejaculated Mrs.
French.
"Dear Bella!" echoed Mr. Gibson.
"What do you mean to do about Bella?" asked Mrs. French.
"I sometimes think that I had better take poison and have done with
it!" said Mr. Gibson, feeling himself to be very hard pressed.
CHAPTER LXXXIII.
BELLA VICTRIX.
Mr. Crump arrived at Exeter. Camilla was not told of his coming till
the morning of the day on which he arrived; and then the tidings were
communicated, because it was necessary that a change should be made
in the bed-rooms. She and her sister had separate rooms when there
was no visitor with them, but now Mr. Crump must be accommodated.
There was a long consultation between Bella and Mrs. French, but at
last it was decided that Bella should sleep with her mother. There
would still be too much of the lioness about Camilla to allow of her
being regarded as a safe companion through the watches of the night.
"Why is Uncle Jonas coming now?" she asked.
"I thought it better to ask him," said Mrs. French.
After a long pause, Camilla asked another question. "Does Uncle Jonas
mean to see Mr. Gibson?"
"I suppose he will," said Mrs. French.
"Then he will see a low, mean fellow;--the lowest, meanest fellow
that ever was heard of! But that won't make much difference to Uncle
Jonas. I wouldn't have him now, if he was to ask me ever so;--that I
wouldn't!"
Mr. Crump came, and kissed his sister and two nieces. The embrace
with Camilla was not very affectionate. "So your Joe has been and
jilted you?" said Uncle Jonas;--"it's like one of them clergymen.
They say so many prayers, they think they may do almost anything
afterwards. Another man would have had his head punched."
"The less talk there is about it the better," said Camilla.
On the following day Mr. Crump called by appointment on Mr. Gibson,
and remained closeted with that gentleman for the greater portion of
the morning. Camilla knew well that he was going, and went about the
house like a perturbed spirit during his absence. There was a look
about her that made them all doubt whether she was not, in truth,
losing her mind. Her mother more than once went to the pantry to
see that the knives were right; and, as regarded that sharp-pointed
weapon, was careful to lock it up carefully out of her daughter's
way. Mr. Crump had declared himself willing to take Camilla back to
Gloucester, and had laughed at the obstacles which his niece might,
perhaps, throw in the way of such an arrangement. "She mustn't have
much luggage;--that is all," said Mr. Crump. For Mr. Crump had been
made aware of the circumstances of the trousseau. About three o'clock
Mr. Crump came back from Mr. Gibson's, and expressed a desire to be
left alone with Camilla. Mrs. French was prepared for everything; and
Mr. Crump soon found himself with his younger niece.
"Camilla, my dear," said he, "this has been a bad business."
"I don't know what business you mean, Uncle Jonas."
"Yes, you do, my dear;--you know. And I hope it won't come too late
to prove to you that young women shouldn't be too keen in setting
their caps at the gentlemen. It's better for them to be hunted, than
to hunt."
"Uncle Jonas, I will not be insulted."
"Stick to that, my dear, and you won't get into a scrape again. Now,
look here. This man can never be made to marry you, anyhow."
"I wouldn't touch him with a pair of tongs, if he were kneeling at my
feet!"
"That's right; stick to that. Of course, you wouldn't now, after all
that has come and gone. No girl with any spirit would."
"He's a coward and a thief, and he'll be--damned for what he has
done, some of these days!"
"T-ch, t-ch, t-ch! That isn't a proper way for a young lady to talk.
That's cursing and swearing."
"It isn't cursing and swearing;--it's what the Bible says."
"Then we'll leave him to the Bible. In the meantime, Mr. Gibson wants
to marry some one else, and that can't hurt you."
"He may marry whom he likes;--but he shan't marry Bella--that's all!"
"It is Bella that he means to marry."
"Then he won't. I'll forbid the banns. I'll write to the bishop. I'll
go to the church and prevent its being done. I'll make such a noise
in the town that it can't be done. It's no use your looking at me
like that, Uncle Jonas. I've got my own feelings, and he shall never
marry Bella. It's what they have been intending all through, and it
shan't be done!"
"It will be done."
"Uncle Jonas, I'll stab her to the heart, and him too, before I'll
see it done! Though I were to be killed the next day, I would. Could
you bear it?"
"I'm not a young woman. Now, I'll tell you what I want you to do."
"I'll not do anything."
"Just pack up your things, and start with me to Gloucester
to-morrow."
"I--won't!"
"Then you'll be carried, my dear. I'll write to your aunt, to say
that you're coming; and we'll be as jolly as possible when we get you
home."
"I won't go to Gloucester, Uncle Jonas. I won't go away from Exeter.
I won't let it be done. She shall never, never, never be that man's
wife!"
Nevertheless, on the day but one after this, Camilla French did go to
Gloucester. Before she went, however, things had to be done in that
house which almost made Mrs. French repent that she had sent for so
stern an assistant. Camilla was at last told, in so many words, that
the things which she had prepared for her own wedding must be given
up for the wedding of her sister; and it seemed that this item in
the list of her sorrows troubled her almost more than any other. She
swore that whither she went there should go the dresses, and the
handkerchiefs, and the hats, the bonnets, and the boots. "Let her
have them," Bella had pleaded. But Mr. Crump was inexorable. He had
looked into his sister's affairs, and found that she was already in
debt. To his practical mind, it was an absurdity that the unmarried
sister should keep things that were wholly unnecessary, and that the
sister that was to be married should be without things that were
needed. There was a big trunk, of which Camilla had the key, but
which, unfortunately for her, had been deposited in her mother's
room. Upon this she sat, and swore that nothing should move her but a
promise that her plunder should remain untouched. But there came this
advantage from the terrible question of the wedding raiments,--that
in her energy to keep possession of them, she gradually abandoned her
opposition to her sister's marriage. She had been driven from one
point to another till she was compelled at last to stand solely upon
her possessions. "Perhaps we had better let her keep them," said Mrs.
French. "Trash and nonsense!" said Mr. Crump. "If she wants a new
frock, let her have it; as for the sheets and tablecloths, you'd
better keep them yourself. But Bella must have the rest."
It was found on the eve of the day on which she was told that she was
to depart that she had in truth armed herself with a dagger or clasp
knife. She actually displayed it when her uncle told her to come away
from the chest on which she was sitting. She declared that she would
defend herself there to the last gasp of her life; but of course the
knife fell from her hand the first moment that she was touched. "I
did think once that she was going to make a poke at me," Mr. Crump
said afterwards; "but she had screamed herself so weak that she
couldn't do it."
When the morning came, she was taken to the fly and driven to
the station without any further serious outbreak. She had even
condescended to select certain articles, leaving the rest of
the hymeneal wealth behind her. Bella, early on that morning of
departure, with great humility, implored her sister to forgive her;
but no entreaties could induce Camilla to address one gracious word
to the proposed bride. "You've been cheating me all along!" she said;
and that was the last word she spoke to poor Bella.
She went, and the field was once more open to the amorous Vicar
of St. Peter's-cum-Pumpkin. It is astonishing how the greatest
difficulties will sink away, and become as it were nothing, when
they are encountered face to face. It is certain that Mr. Gibson's
position had been one most trying to the nerves. He had speculated on
various modes of escape;--a curacy in the north of England would be
welcome, or the duties of a missionary in New Zealand,--or death. To
tell the truth, he had, during the last week or two, contemplated
even a return to the dominion of Camilla. That there should ever
again be things pleasant for him in Exeter seemed to be quite
impossible. And yet, on the evening of the day but one after the
departure of Camilla, he was seated almost comfortably with his own
Arabella! There is nothing that a man may not do, nothing that he may
not achieve, if he have only pluck enough to go through with it.
"You do love me?" Bella said to him. It was natural that she should
ask him; but it would have been better perhaps if she had held her
tongue. Had she spoken to him about his house, or his income, or the
servants, or the duties of his parish church, it would have been
easier for him to make a comfortable reply.
"Yes;--I love you," he replied; "of course I love you. We have always
been friends, and I hope things will go straight now. I have had
a great deal to go through, Bella, and so have you;--but God will
temper the wind to the shorn lambs." How was the wind to be tempered
for the poor lamb who had gone forth shorn down to the very skin!
Soon after this Mrs. French returned to the room, and then there was
no more romance. Mrs. French had by no means forgiven Mr. Gibson
all the trouble he had brought into the family, and mixed a certain
amount of acrimony with her entertainment of him. She dictated to
him, treated him with but scant respect, and did not hesitate to let
him understand that he was to be watched very closely till he was
actually and absolutely married. The poor man had in truth no further
idea of escape. He was aware that he had done that which made it
necessary that he should bear a great deal, and that he had no right
to resent suspicion. When a day was fixed in June on which he should
be married at the church of Heavitree, and it was proposed that he
should be married by banns, he had nothing to urge to the contrary.
And when it was also suggested to him by one of the prebendaries of
the Cathedral that it might be well for him to change his clerical
duties for a period with the vicar of a remote parish in the north
of Cornwall,--so as to be out of the way of remark from those whom
he had scandalised by his conduct,--he had no objection to make to
that arrangement. When Mrs. MacHugh met him in the Close, and told
him that he was a gay Lothario, he shook his head with a melancholy
self-abasement, and passed on without even a feeling of anger. "When
they smite me on the right cheek, I turn unto them my left," he said
to himself, when one of the cathedral vergers remarked to him that
after all he was going to be married, at last. Even Bella became
dominant over him, and assumed with him occasionally the air of one
who had been injured.
Bella wrote a touching letter to her sister;--a letter that ought to
have touched Camilla, begging for forgiveness, and for one word of
sisterly love. Camilla answered the letter, but did not send a word
of sisterly love. "According to my way of thinking, you have been a
nasty sly thing, and I don't believe you'll ever be happy. As for
him, I'll never speak to him again." That was nearly the whole of her
letter. "You must leave it to time," said Mrs. French wisely; "she'll
come round some day." And then Mrs. French thought how bad it would
be for her if the daughter who was to be her future companion did not
"come round" some day.
And so it was settled that they should be married in Heavitree
Church,--Mr. Gibson and his first love,--and things went on
pretty much as though nothing had been done amiss. The gentleman
from Cornwall came down to take Mr. Gibson's place at St.
Peter's-cum-Pumpkin, while his duties in the Cathedral were
temporarily divided among the other priest-vicars,--with some amount
of grumbling on their part. Bella commenced her modest preparations
without any of the éclat which had attended Camilla's operations, but
she felt more certainty of ultimate success than had ever fallen to
Camilla's lot. In spite of all that had come and gone, Bella never
feared again that Mr. Gibson would be untrue to her. In regard to
him, it must be doubted whether Nemesis ever fell upon him with a
hand sufficiently heavy to punish him for the great sins which he
had manifestly committed. He had encountered a bad week or two, and
there had been days in which, as has been said, he thought of Natal,
of ecclesiastical censures, and even of annihilation; but no real
punishment seemed to fall upon him. It may be doubted whether, when
the whole arrangement was settled for him, and when he heard that
Camilla had yielded to the decrees of Fate, he did not rather flatter
himself on being a successful man of intrigue,--whether he did not
take some glory to himself for his good fortune with women, and pride
himself amidst his self-reproaches for the devotion which had been
displayed for him by the fair sex in general. It is quite possible
that he taught himself to believe that at one time Dorothy Stanbury
was devotedly in love with him, and that when he reckoned up his
sins she was one of those in regard to whom he accounted himself
to have been a sinner. The spirit of intrigue with women, as to
which men will flatter themselves, is customarily so vile, so mean,
so vapid a reflection of a feeling, so aimless, resultless, and
utterly unworthy! Passion exists and has its sway. Vice has its
votaries,--and there is, too, that worn-out longing for vice,
"prurient, yet passionless, cold-studied lewdness," which drags on
a feeble continuance with the aid of money. But the commonest folly
of man in regard to women is a weak taste for intrigue, with little
or nothing on which to feed it;--a worse than feminine aptitude for
male coquetry, which never ascends beyond a desire that somebody
shall hint that there is something peculiar; and which is shocked and
retreats backwards into its boots when anything like a consequence
forces itself on the apprehension. Such men have their glory in their
own estimation. We remember how Falstaff flouted the pride of his
companion whose victory in the fields of love had been but little
glorious. But there are victories going now-a-days so infinitely less
glorious, that Falstaff's page was a Lothario, a very Don Juan, in
comparison with the heroes whose praises are too often sung by their
own lips. There is this recompense,--that their defeats are always
sung by lips louder than their own. Mr. Gibson, when he found that he
was to escape apparently unscathed,--that people standing respectably
before the world absolutely dared to whisper words to him of
congratulation on this third attempt at marriage within little more
than a year, took pride to himself, and bethought himself that he
was a gay deceiver. He believed that he had selected his wife,--and
that he had done so in circumstances of peculiar difficulty! Poor Mr.
Gibson,--we hardly know whether most to pity him, or the unfortunate,
poor woman who ultimately became Mrs. Gibson.
"And so Bella French is to be the fortunate woman after all," said
Miss Stanbury to her niece.
"It does seem to me to be so odd," said Dorothy. "I wonder how he
looked when he proposed it."
"Like a fool,--as he always does."
Dorothy refrained from remarking that Miss Stanbury had not always
thought that Mr. Gibson looked like a fool, but the idea occurred to
her mind. "I hope they will be happy at last," she said.
"Pshaw! Such people can't be happy, and can't be unhappy. I don't
suppose it much matters which he marries, or whether he marries them
both, or neither. They are to be married by banns, they say,--at
Heavitree."
"I don't see anything bad in that."
"Only Camilla might step out and forbid them," said Aunt Stanbury. "I
almost wish she would."
"She has gone away, aunt,--to an uncle who lives at Gloucester."
"It was well to get her out of the way, no doubt. They'll be married
before you now, Dolly."
"That won't break my heart, aunt."
"I don't suppose there'll be much of a wedding. They haven't anybody
belonging to them, except that uncle at Gloucester." Then there was a
pause. "I think it is a nice thing for friends to collect together at
a wedding," continued Aunt Stanbury.
"I think it is," said Dorothy, in the mildest, softest voice.
"I suppose we must make room for that black sheep of a brother of
yours, Dolly,--or else you won't be contented."
"Dear, dear, dearest aunt!" said Dorothy, falling down on her knees
at her aunt's feet.
CHAPTER LXXXIV.
SELF-SACRIFICE.
[Illustration]
Trevelyan, when his wife had left him, sat for hours in silence
pondering over his own position and hers. He had taken his child to
an upper room, in which was his own bed and the boy's cot, and before
he seated himself, he spread out various toys which he had been at
pains to purchase for the unhappy little fellow,--a regiment of
Garibaldian soldiers, all with red shirts, and a drum to give the
regiment martial spirit, and a soft fluffy Italian ball, and a
battledore and a shuttlecock,--instruments enough for juvenile joy,
if only there had been a companion with whom the child could use
them. But the toys remained where the father had placed them, almost
unheeded, and the child sat looking out of the window, melancholy,
silent, and repressed. Even the drum did not tempt him to be noisy.
Doubtless he did not know why he was wretched, but he was fully
conscious of his wretchedness. In the meantime the father sat
motionless, in an old worn-out but once handsome leathern arm-chair,
with his eyes fixed against the opposite wall, thinking of the wreck
of his life.
Thought deep, correct, continued, and energetic is quite compatible
with madness. At this time Trevelyan's mind was so far unhinged, his
ordinary faculties were so greatly impaired, that they who declared
him to be mad were justified in their declaration. His condition was
such that the happiness and welfare of no human being,--not even his
own,--could safely be entrusted to his keeping. He considered himself
to have been so injured by the world, to have been the victim of so
cruel a conspiracy among those who ought to have been his friends,
that there remained nothing for him but to flee away from them and
remain in solitude. But yet, through it all, there was something
approaching to a conviction that he had brought his misery upon
himself by being unlike to other men; and he declared to himself
over and over again that it was better that he should suffer than
that others should be punished. When he was alone his reflections
respecting his wife were much juster than were his words when he
spoke either with her, or to others, of her conduct. He would declare
to himself not only that he did not believe her to have been false to
him, but that he had never accused her of such crime. He had demanded
from her obedience, and she had been disobedient. It had been
incumbent upon him,--so ran his own ideas, as expressed to himself
in these long unspoken soliloquies,--to exact obedience, or at least
compliance, let the consequences be what they might. She had refused
to obey or even to comply, and the consequences were very grievous.
But, though he pitied himself with a pity that was feminine, yet he
acknowledged to himself that her conduct had been the result of his
own moody temperament. Every friend had parted from him. All those to
whose counsels he had listened, had counselled him that he was wrong.
The whole world was against him. Had he remained in England, the
doctors and lawyers among them would doubtless have declared him to
be mad. He knew all this, and yet he could not yield. He could not
say that he had been wrong. He could not even think that he had been
wrong as to the cause of the great quarrel. He was one so miserable
and so unfortunate,--so he thought,--that even in doing right he had
fallen into perdition!
He had had two enemies, and between them they had worked his ruin.
These were Colonel Osborne and Bozzle. It may be doubted whether he
did not hate the latter the more strongly of the two. He knew now
that Bozzle had been untrue to him, but his disgust did not spring
from that so much as from the feeling that he had defiled himself by
dealing with the man. Though he was quite assured that he had been
right in his first cause of offence, he knew that he had fallen from
bad to worse in every step that he had taken since. Colonel Osborne
had marred his happiness by vanity, by wicked intrigue, by a devilish
delight in doing mischief; but he, he himself, had consummated the
evil by his own folly. Why had he not taken Colonel Osborne by the
throat, instead of going to a low-born, vile, mercenary spy for
assistance? He hated himself for what he had done;--and yet it was
impossible that he should yield.
It was impossible that he should yield;--but it was yet open to him
to sacrifice himself. He could not go back to his wife and say that
he was wrong; but he could determine that the destruction should
fall upon him and not upon her. If he gave up his child and then
died,--died, alone, without any friend near him, with no word of love
in his ears, in that solitary and miserable abode which he had found
for himself,--then it would at least be acknowledged that he had
expiated the injury that he had done. She would have his wealth, his
name, his child to comfort her,--and would be troubled no longer by
demands for that obedience which she had sworn at the altar to give
him, and which she had since declined to render to him. Perhaps there
was some feeling that the coals of fire would be hot upon her head
when she should think how much she had received from him and how
little she had done for him. And yet he loved her, with all his
heart, and would even yet dream of bliss that might be possible with
her,--had not the terrible hand of irresistible Fate come between
them and marred it all. It was only a dream now. It could be no more
than a dream. He put out his thin wasted hands and looked at them,
and touched the hollowness of his own cheeks, and coughed that he
might hear the hacking sound of his own infirmity, and almost took
glory in his weakness. It could not be long before the coals of fire
would be heaped upon her head.
"Louey," he said at last, addressing the child who had sat for an
hour gazing through the window without stirring a limb or uttering a
sound; "Louey, my boy, would you like to go back to mamma?" The child
turned round on the floor, and fixed his eyes on his father's face,
but made no immediate reply. "Louey, dear, come to papa and tell him.
Would it be nice to go back to mamma?" And he stretched out his hand
to the boy. Louey got up, and approached slowly and stood between his
father's knees. "Tell me, darling;--you understand what papa says?"
"Altro!" said the boy, who had been long enough among Italian
servants to pick up the common words of the language. Of course he
would like to go back. How indeed could it be otherwise?
"Then you shall go to her, Louey."
"To-day, papa?"
"Not to-day, nor to-morrow."
"But the day after?"
"That is sufficient. You shall go. It is not so bad with you that one
day more need be a sorrow to you. You shall go,--and then you will
never see your father again!" Trevelyan as he said this drew his
hands away so as not to touch the child. The little fellow had put
out his arm, but seeing his father's angry gesture had made no
further attempt at a caress. He feared his father from the bottom of
his little heart, and yet was aware that it was his duty to try to
love papa. He did not understand the meaning of that last threat,
but slunk back, passing his untouched toys, to the window, and there
seated himself again, filling his mind with the thought that when two
more long long days should have crept by, he should once more go to
his mother.
Trevelyan had tried his best to be soft and gentle to his child.
All that he had said to his wife of his treatment of the boy had
been true to the letter. He had spared no personal trouble, he had
done all that he had known how to do, he had exercised all his
intelligence to procure amusement for the boy;--but Louey had hardly
smiled since he had been taken from his mother. And now that he was
told that he was to go and never see his father again, the tidings
were to him simply tidings of joy. "There is a curse upon me," said
Trevelyan; "it is written down in the book of my destiny that nothing
shall ever love me!"
He went out from the house, and made his way down by the narrow path
through the olives and vines to the bottom of the hill in front of
the villa. It was evening now, but the evening was very hot, and
though the olive trees stood in long rows, there was no shade. Quite
at the bottom of the hill there was a little sluggish muddy brook,
along the sides of which the reeds grew thickly and the dragon-flies
were playing on the water. There was nothing attractive in the spot,
but he was weary, and sat himself down on the dry hard bank which had
been made by repeated clearing of mud from the bottom of the little
rivulet. He sat watching the dragon-flies as they made their short
flights in the warm air, and told himself that of all God's creatures
there was not one to whom less power of disporting itself in God's
sun was given than to him. Surely it would be better for him that he
should die, than live as he was now living without any of the joys of
life. The solitude of Casalunga was intolerable to him, and yet there
was no whither that he could go and find society. He could travel if
he pleased. He had money at command, and, at any rate as yet, there
was no embargo on his personal liberty. But how could he travel
alone,--even if his strength might suffice for the work? There had
been moments in which he had thought that he would be happy in the
love of his child,--that the companionship of an infant would suffice
for him if only the infant would love him. But all such dreams as
that were over. To repay him for his tenderness his boy was always
dumb before him. Louey would not prattle as he had used to do. He
would not even smile, or give back the kisses with which his father
had attempted to win him. In mercy to the boy he would send him back
to his mother;--in mercy to the boy if not to the mother also. It was
in vain that he should look for any joy in any quarter. Were he to
return to England, they would say that he was mad!
[Illustration: Trevelyan at Casalunga.]
He lay there by the brook-side till the evening was far advanced,
and then he arose and slowly returned to the house. The labour of
ascending the hill was so great to him that he was forced to pause
and hold by the olive trees as he slowly performed his task. The
perspiration came in profusion from his pores, and he found himself
to be so weak that he must in future regard the brook as being beyond
the tether of his daily exercise. Eighteen months ago he had been a
strong walker, and the snow-bound paths of Swiss mountains had been
a joy to him. He paused as he was slowly dragging himself on, and
looked up at the wretched, desolate, comfortless abode which he
called his home. Its dreariness was so odious to him that he was
half-minded to lay himself down where he was, and let the night air
come upon him and do its worst. In such case, however, some Italian
doctor would be sent down who would say that he was mad. Above
all the things, and to the last, he must save himself from that
degradation.
When he had crawled up to the house, he went to his child, and found
that the woman had put the boy to bed. Then he was angry with himself
in that he himself had not seen to this, and kept up his practice
of attending the child to the last. He would, at least, be true to
his resolution, and prepare for the boy's return to his mother. Not
knowing how otherwise to manage it, he wrote that night the following
note to Mr. Glascock;--
Casalunga, Thursday night.
MY DEAR SIR,
Since you last were considerate enough to call upon me I
have resolved to take a step in my affairs which, though
it will rob me of my only remaining gratification, will
tend to lessen the troubles under which Mrs. Trevelyan is
labouring. If she desires it, as no doubt she does, I will
consent to place our boy again in her custody,--trusting
to her sense of honour to restore him to me should I
demand it. In my present unfortunate position I cannot
suggest that she should come for the boy. I am unable to
support the excitement occasioned by her presence. I will,
however, deliver up my darling either to you, or to any
messenger sent by you whom I can trust. I beg heartily
to apologise for the trouble I am giving you, and to
subscribe myself yours very faithfully,
LOUIS TREVELYAN.
The Hon. C. Glascock.
P.S.--It is as well, perhaps, that I should explain that
I must decline to receive any visit from Sir Marmaduke
Rowley. Sir Marmaduke has insulted me grossly on each
occasion on which I have seen him since his return home.
CHAPTER LXXXV.
THE BATHS OF LUCCA.
June was now far advanced, and the Rowleys and the Spaldings had
removed from Florence to the Baths of Lucca. Mr. Glascock had
followed in their wake, and the whole party were living at the Baths
in one of those hotels in which so many English and Americans are
wont to congregate in the early weeks of the Italian summer. The
marriage was to take place in the last week of the month; and all
the party were to return to Florence for the occasion,--with the
exception of Sir Marmaduke and Mrs. Trevelyan. She was altogether
unfitted for wedding joys, and her father had promised to bear her
company when the others left her. Mr. Glascock and Caroline Spalding
were to be married in Florence, and were to depart immediately from
thence for some of the cooler parts of Switzerland. After that
Sir Marmaduke and Lady Rowley were to return to London with their
daughters, preparatory to that dreary journey back to the Mandarins;
and they had not even yet resolved what they had better do respecting
that unfortunate man who was living in seclusion on the hill-top near
Siena. They had consulted lawyers and doctors in Florence, but it had
seemed that everybody there was afraid of putting the law in force
against an Englishman. Doubtless there was a law in respect to the
custody of the insane; and it was admitted that if Trevelyan were
dangerously mad something could be done; but it seemed that nobody
was willing to stir in such a case as that which now existed.
Something, it was said, might be done at some future time; but the
difficulties were so great that nothing could be done now.
It was very sad, because it was necessary that some decision
should be made as to the future residence of Mrs. Trevelyan and of
Nora. Emily had declared that nothing should induce her to go to
the Islands with her father and mother unless her boy went with
her. Since her journey to Casalunga she had also expressed her
unwillingness to leave her husband. Her heart had been greatly
softened towards him, and she had declared that where he remained,
there would she remain,--as near to him as circumstances would admit.
It might be that at last her care would be necessary for his comfort.
He supplied her with means of living, and she would use these means
as well as she might be able in his service.
Then there had arisen the question of Nora's future residence. And
there had come troubles and storms in the family. Nora had said that
she would not go back to the Mandarins, but had not at first been
able to say where or how she would live. She had suggested that
she might stay with her sister, but her father had insisted that
she could not live on the income supplied by Trevelyan. Then, when
pressed hard, she had declared that she intended to live on Hugh
Stanbury's income. She would marry him at once,--with her father's
leave, if she could get it, but without it if it needs must be so.
Her mother told her that Hugh Stanbury was not himself ready for her;
he had not even proposed so hasty a marriage, nor had he any home
fitted for her. Lady Rowley, in arguing this, had expressed no assent
to the marriage, even as a distant arrangement, but had thought
thus to vanquish her daughter by suggesting small but insuperable
difficulties. On a sudden, however, Lady Rowley found that all
this was turned against her, by an offer that came direct from Mr.
Glascock. His Caroline, he said, was very anxious that Nora should
come to them at Monkhams as soon as they had returned home from
Switzerland. They intended to be there by the middle of August, and
would hurry there sooner, if there was any intermediate difficulty
about finding a home for Nora. Mr. Glascock said nothing about Hugh
Stanbury; but, of course, Lady Rowley understood that Nora had told
all her troubles and hopes to Caroline, and that Caroline had told
them to her future husband. Lady Rowley, in answer to this, could
only say that she would consult her husband.
There was something very grievous in the proposition to Lady Rowley.
If Nora had not been self-willed and stiff-necked beyond the usual
self-willedness and stiff-neckedness of young women she might have
been herself the mistress of Monkhams. It was proposed now that she
should go there to wait till a poor man should have got together
shillings enough to buy a few chairs and tables, and a bed to lie
upon! The thought of this was very bitter. "I cannot think, Nora, how
you could have the heart to go there," said Lady Rowley.
"I cannot understand why not, mamma. Caroline and I are friends, and
surely he and I need not be enemies. He has never injured me; and if
he does not take offence, why should I?"
"If you don't see it, I can't help it," said Lady Rowley.
And then Mrs. Spalding's triumph was terrible to Lady Rowley. Mrs.
Spalding knew nothing of her future son-in-law's former passion, and
spoke of her Caroline as having achieved triumphs beyond the reach of
other girls. Lady Rowley bore it, never absolutely telling the tale
of her daughter's fruitless victory. She was too good at heart to
utter the boast;--but it was very hard to repress it. Upon the whole
she would have preferred that Mr. Glascock and his bride should not
have become the fast friends of herself and her family. There was
more of pain than of pleasure in the alliance. But circumstances
had been too strong for her. Mr. Glascock had been of great use in
reference to Trevelyan, and Caroline and Nora had become attached
to each other almost on their first acquaintance. Here they were
together at the Baths of Lucca, and Nora was to be one of the four
bridesmaids. When Sir Marmaduke was consulted about this visit to
Monkhams, he became fretful, and would give no answer. The marriage,
he said, was impossible, and Nora was a fool. He could give her no
allowance more than would suffice for her clothes, and it was madness
for her to think of stopping in England. But he was so full of cares
that he could come to no absolute decision on this matter. Nora,
however, had come to a very absolute decision.
"Caroline," she said, "if you will have me, I will go to Monkhams."
"Of course we will have you. Has not Charles said how delighted he
would be?"
"Oh yes,--your Charles," said Nora, laughing.
"He is mine now, dear. You must not expect him to change his mind
again. I gave him the chance, you know, and he would not take it.
But, Nora, come to Monkhams, and stay as long as it suits. I have
talked it all over with him, and we both agree that you shall have
a home there. You shall be just like a sister. Olivia is coming too
after a bit; but he says there is room for a dozen sisters. Of course
it will be all right with Mr. Stanbury after a while." And so it was
settled among them that Nora Rowley should find a home at Monkhams,
if a home in England should be wanted for her.
It wanted but four days to that fixed for the marriage at Florence,
and but six to that on which the Rowleys were to leave Italy for
England, when Mr. Glascock received Trevelyan's letter. It was
brought to him as he was sitting at a late breakfast in the garden
of the hotel; and there were present at the moment not only all the
Spalding family, but the Rowleys also. Sir Marmaduke was there and
Lady Rowley, and the three unmarried daughters; but Mrs. Trevelyan,
as was her wont, had remained alone in her own room. Mr. Glascock
read the letter, and read it again, without attracting much
attention. Caroline, who was of course sitting next to him, had her
eyes upon him, and could see that the letter moved him; but she was
not curious, and at any rate asked no question. He himself understood
fully how great was the offer made,--how all-important to the
happiness of the poor mother,--and he was also aware, or thought
that he was aware, how likely it might be that the offer would be
retracted. As regarded himself, a journey from the Baths at Lucca to
Casalunga and back before his marriage, would be a great infliction
on his patience. It was his plan to stay where he was till the day
before his marriage, and then to return to Florence with the rest
of the party. All this must be altered, and sudden changes must be
made, if he decided on going to Siena himself. The weather now was
very hot, and such a journey would be most disagreeable to him. Of
course he had little schemes in his head, little amatory schemes
for prænuptial enjoyment, which, in spite of his mature years,
were exceedingly agreeable to him. The chestnut woods round the
Baths of Lucca are very pleasant in the early summer, and there
were excursions planned in which Caroline would be close to his
side,--almost already his wife. But, if he did not go, whom could he
send? It would be necessary at least that he should consult her, the
mother of the child, before any decision was formed.
At last he took Lady Rowley aside, and read to her the letter. She
understood at once that it opened almost a heaven of bliss to her
daughter;--and she understood also how probable it might be that that
wretched man, with his shaken wits, should change his mind. "I think
I ought to go," said Mr. Glascock.
"But how can you go now?"
"I can go," said he. "There is time for it. It need not put off my
marriage,--to which of course I could not consent. I do not know whom
I could send."
"Monnier could go," said Lady Rowley, naming the courier.
"Yes;--he could go. But it might be that he would return without
the child, and then we should not forgive ourselves. I will go,
Lady Rowley. After all, what does it signify? I am a little old, I
sometimes think, for this philandering. You shall take this letter to
your daughter, and I will explain it all to Caroline."
Caroline had not a word to say. She could only kiss him, and promise
to make him what amends she could when he came back. "Of course you
are right," she said. "Do you think that I would say a word against
it, even though the marriage were to be postponed?"
"I should;--a good many words. But I will be back in time for that,
and will bring the boy with me."
Mrs. Trevelyan, when her husband's letter was read to her, was almost
overcome by the feelings which it excited. In her first paroxysm of
joy she declared that she would herself go to Siena, not for her
child's sake, but for that of her husband. She felt at once that the
boy was being given up because of the father's weakness,--because
he felt himself to be unable to be a protector to his son,--and
her woman's heart was melted with softness as she thought of the
condition of the man to whom she had once given her whole heart.
Since then, doubtless, her heart had revolted from him. Since that
time there had come hours in which she had almost hated him for his
cruelty to her. There had been moments in which she had almost cursed
his name because of the aspersion which it had seemed that he had
thrown upon her. But this was now forgotten, and she remembered only
his weakness. "Mamma," she said, "I will go. It is my duty to go to
him." But Lady Rowley withheld her, explaining that were she to go,
the mission might probably fail in its express purpose. "Let Louey be
sent to us first," said Lady Rowley, "and then we will see what can
be done afterwards."
And so Mr. Glascock started, taking with him a maid-servant who might
help him with the charge of the child. It was certainly very hard
upon him. In order to have time for his journey to Siena and back,
and time also to go out to Casalunga, it was necessary that he should
leave the Baths at five in the morning. "If ever there was a hero of
romance, you are he!" said Nora to him.
"The heroes of life are so much better than the heroes of romance,"
said Caroline.
"That is a lesson from the lips of the American Browning," said Mr.
Glascock. "Nevertheless, I think I would rather ride a charge against
a Paynim knight in Palestine than get up at half-past four in the
morning."
"We will get up too, and give the knight his coffee," said Nora.
They did get up, and saw him off; and when Mr. Glascock and Caroline
parted with a lover's embrace, Nora stood by as a sister might have
done. Let us hope that she remembered that her own time was coming.
There had been a promise given by Nora, when she left London, that
she would not correspond with Hugh Stanbury while she was in Italy,
and this promise had been kept. It may be remembered that Hugh had
made a proposition to his lady-love, that she should walk out of the
house one fine morning, and get herself married without any reference
to her father's or her mother's wishes. But she had not been willing
to take upon herself as yet independence so complete as this would
have required. She had assured her lover that she did mean to marry
him some day, even though it should be in opposition to her father,
but that she thought that the period for filial persuasion was not
yet over; and then, in explaining all this to her mother, she had
given a promise neither to write nor to receive letters during the
short period of her sojourn in Italy. She would be an obedient child
for so long;--but, after that, she must claim the right to fight her
own battle. She had told her lover that he must not write; and, of
course, she had not written a word herself. But now, when her mother
threw it in her teeth that Stanbury would not be ready to marry her,
she thought that an unfair advantage was being taken of her,--and of
him. How could he be expected to say that he was ready,--deprived as
he was of the power of saying anything at all?
"Mamma," she said, the day before they went to Florence, "has papa
fixed about your leaving England yet? I suppose you'll go now on the
last Saturday in July?"
"I suppose we shall, my dear."
"Has not papa written about the berths?"
"I believe he has, my dear."
"Because he ought to know who are going. I will not go."
"You will not, Nora. Is that a proper way of speaking?"
"Dear mamma, I mean it to be proper. I hope it is proper. But is it
not best that we should understand each other? All my life depends on
my going or my staying now. I must decide."
"After what has passed, you do not, I suppose, mean to live in Mr.
Glascock's house?"
"Certainly not. I mean to live with,--with,--with my husband. Mamma,
I promised not to write, and I have not written. And he has not
written,--because I told him not. Therefore, nothing is settled. But
it is not fair to throw it in my teeth that nothing is settled."
"I have thrown nothing in your teeth, Nora."
"Papa talks sneeringly about chairs and tables. Of course, I know
what he is thinking of. As I cannot go with him to the Mandarins, I
think I ought to be allowed to look after the chairs and tables."
"What do you mean, my dear?"
"That you should absolve me from my promise, and let me write to Mr.
Stanbury. I do not want to be left without a home."
"You cannot wish to write to a gentleman and ask him to marry you!"
"Why not? We are engaged. I shall not ask him to marry me,--that is
already settled; but I shall ask him to make arrangements."
"Your papa will be very angry if you break your word to him."
"I will write, and show you the letter. Papa may see it, and if he
will not let it go, it shall not go. He shall not say that I broke my
word. But, mamma, I will not go out to the Islands. I should never
get back again, and I should be broken-hearted." Lady Rowley had
nothing to say to this; and Nora went and wrote her letter. "Dear
Hugh," the letter ran, "Papa and mamma leave England on the last
Saturday in July. I have told mamma that I cannot return with them.
Of course, you know why I stay. Mr. Glascock is to be married the day
after to-morrow, and they have asked me to go with them to Monkhams
some time in August. I think I shall do so, unless Emily wants me to
remain with her. At any rate, I shall try to be with her till I go
there. You will understand why I tell you all this. Papa and mamma
know that I am writing. It is only a business letter, and, therefore,
I shall say no more, except that I am ever and always yours,--NORA."
"There," she said, handing her letter to her mother, "I think that
that ought to be sent. If papa chooses to prevent its going, he can."
Lady Rowley, when she handed the letter to her husband, recommended
that it should be allowed to go to its destination. She admitted
that, if they sent it, they would thereby signify their consent to
her engagement;--and she alleged that Nora was so strong in her will,
and that the circumstances of their journey out to the Antipodes were
so peculiar, that it was of no avail for them any longer to oppose
the match. They could not force their daughter to go with them.
"But I can cast her off from me, if she be disobedient," said Sir
Marmaduke. Lady Rowley, however, had no desire that her daughter
should be cast off, and was aware that Sir Marmaduke, when it came
to the point of casting off, would be as little inclined to be stern
as she was herself. Sir Marmaduke, still hoping that firmness would
carry the day, and believing that it behoved him to maintain his
parental authority, ended the discussion by keeping possession of the
letter, and saying that he would take time to consider the matter.
"What security have we that he will ever marry her, if she does
stay?" he asked the next morning. Lady Rowley had no doubt on this
score, and protested that her opposition to Hugh Stanbury arose
simply from his want of income. "I should never be justified," said
Sir Marmaduke, "if I were to go and leave my girl as it were in the
hands of a penny-a-liner." The letter, in the end, was not sent; and
Nora and her father hardly spoke to each other as they made their
journey back to Florence together.
Emily Trevelyan, before the arrival of that letter from her husband,
had determined that she would not leave Italy. It had been her
purpose to remain somewhere in the neighbourhood of her husband and
child; and to overcome her difficulties,--or be overcome by them, as
circumstances might direct. Now her plans were again changed,--or,
rather, she was now without a plan. She could form no plan till
she should again see Mr. Glascock. Should her child be restored to
her, would it not be her duty to remain near her husband? All this
made Nora's line of conduct the more difficult for her. It was
acknowledged that she could not remain in Italy. Mrs. Trevelyan's
position would be most embarrassing; but as all her efforts were to
be used towards a reconciliation with her husband, and as his state
utterly precluded the idea of a mixed household,--of any such a
family arrangement as that which had existed in Curzon Street,--Nora
could not remain with her. Mrs. Trevelyan herself had declared that
she would not wish it. And, in that case, where was Nora to bestow
herself when Sir Marmaduke and Lady Rowley had sailed? Caroline
offered to curtail those honeymoon weeks in Switzerland, but it was
impossible to listen to an offer so magnanimous and so unreasonable.
Nora had a dim romantic idea of sharing Priscilla's bed-room in that
small cottage near Nuncombe Putney, of which she had heard, and of
there learning lessons in strict economy;--but of this she said
nothing. The short journey from the Baths of Lucca to Florence was
not a pleasant one, and the Rowley family were much disturbed as they
looked into the future. Lodgings had now been taken for them, and
there was the great additional doubt whether Mrs. Trevelyan would
find her child there on her arrival.
The Spaldings went one way from the Florence station, and the Rowleys
another. The American Minister had returned to the city some days
previously,--drawn there nominally by pleas of business, but, in
truth, by the necessities of the wedding breakfast,--and he met them
at the station. "Has Mr. Glascock come back?" Nora was the first to
ask. Yes;--he had come. He had been in the city since two o'clock,
and had been up at the American Minister's house for half a minute.
"And has he brought the child?" asked Caroline, relieved of doubt
on her own account. Mr. Spalding did not know;--indeed, he had not
interested himself quite so intently about Mrs. Trevelyan's little
boy, as had all those who had just returned from the Baths. Mr.
Glascock had said nothing to him about the child, and he had not
quite understood why such a man should have made a journey to Siena,
leaving his sweetheart behind him, just on the eve of his marriage.
He hurried his women-kind into their carriage, and they were driven
away; and then Sir Marmaduke was driven away with his women-kind.
Caroline Spalding had perhaps thought that Mr. Glascock might have
been there to meet her.
CHAPTER LXXXVI.
MR. GLASCOCK AS NURSE.
A message had been sent by the wires to Trevelyan, to let him know
that Mr. Glascock was himself coming for the boy. Whether such
message would or would not be sent out to Casalunga Mr. Glascock had
been quite ignorant;--but it could, at any rate, do no harm. He did
feel it hard as in this hot weather he made the journey, first to
Florence, and then on to Siena. What was he to the Rowleys, or to
Trevelyan himself, that such a job of work should fall to his lot at
such a period of his life? He had been very much in love with Nora,
no doubt; but, luckily for him, as he thought, Nora had refused him.
As for Trevelyan,--Trevelyan had never been his friend. As for Sir
Marmaduke,--Sir Marmaduke was nothing to him. He was almost angry
even with Mrs. Trevelyan as he arrived tired, heated, and very dusty,
at Siena. It was his purpose to sleep at Siena that night, and to
go out to Casalunga early the next morning. If the telegram had not
been forwarded, he would send a message on that evening. On inquiry,
however, he found that the message had been sent, and that the paper
had been put into the Signore's own hand by the Sienese messenger.
Then he got into some discourse with the landlord about the strange
gentleman at Casalunga. Trevelyan was beginning to become the subject
of gossip in the town, and people were saying that the stranger was
very strange indeed. The landlord thought that if the Signore had
any friends at all, it would be well that such friends should come
and look after him. Mr. Glascock asked if Mr. Trevelyan was ill. It
was not only that the Signore was out of health,--so the landlord
heard,--but that he was also somewhat-- And then the landlord touched
his head. He eat nothing, and went nowhere, and spoke to no one; and
the people at the hospital to which Casalunga belonged were beginning
to be uneasy about their tenant. Perhaps Mr. Glascock had come to
take him away. Mr. Glascock explained that he had not come to take
Mr. Trevelyan away,--but only to take away a little boy that was with
him. For this reason he was travelling with a maid-servant,--a fact
for which Mr. Glascock clearly thought it necessary that he should
give an intelligible and credible explanation. The landlord seemed to
think that the people at the hospital would have been much rejoiced
had Mr. Glascock intended to take Mr. Trevelyan away also.
He started after a very early breakfast, and found himself walking
up over the stone ridges to the house between nine and ten in the
morning. He himself had sat beside the driver and had put the maid
inside the carriage. He had not deemed it wise to take an undivided
charge of the boy even from Casalunga to Siena. At the door of the
house, as though waiting for him, he found Trevelyan, not dirty as he
had been before, but dressed with much appearance of smartness. He
had a brocaded cap on his head, and a shirt with a laced front, and a
worked waistcoat, and a frock coat, and coloured bright trousers. Mr.
Glascock knew at once that all the clothes which he saw before him
had been made for Italian and not for English wear; and could almost
have said that they had been bought in Siena and not in Florence.
"I had not intended to impose this labour on you, Mr. Glascock,"
Trevelyan said, raising his cap to salute his visitor.
"For fear there might be mistakes, I thought it better to come
myself," said Mr. Glascock. "You did not wish to see Sir Marmaduke?"
"Certainly not Sir Marmaduke," said Trevelyan, with a look of anger
that was almost grotesque.
"And you thought it better that Mrs. Trevelyan should not come."
"Yes;--I thought it better;--but not from any feeling of anger
towards her. If I could welcome my wife here, Mr. Glascock, without
a risk of wrath on her part, I should be very happy to receive her.
I love my wife, Mr. Glascock. I love her dearly. But there have been
misfortunes. Never mind. There is no reason why I should trouble you
with them. Let us go in to breakfast. After your drive you will have
an appetite."
Poor Mr. Glascock was afraid to decline to sit down to the meal which
was prepared for him. He did mutter something about having already
eaten, but Trevelyan put this aside with a wave of his hand as he led
the way into a spacious room, in which had been set out a table with
almost a sumptuous banquet. The room was very bare and comfortless,
having neither curtains nor matting, and containing not above half
a dozen chairs. But an effort had been made to give it an air of
Italian luxury. The windows were thrown open, down to the ground, and
the table was decorated with fruits and three or four long-necked
bottles. Trevelyan waved with his hand towards an arm-chair, and Mr.
Glascock had no alternative but to seat himself. He felt that he was
sitting down to breakfast with a madman; but if he did not sit down,
the madman might perhaps break out into madness. Then Trevelyan went
to the door and called aloud for Catarina. "In these remote places,"
said he, "one has to do without the civilisation of a bell. Perhaps
one gains as much in quiet as one loses in comfort." Then Catarina
came with hot meats and fried potatoes, and Mr. Glascock was
compelled to help himself.
"I am but a bad trencherman myself," said Trevelyan, "but I shall
lament my misfortune doubly if that should interfere with your
appetite." Then he got up and poured out wine into Mr. Glascock's
glass. "They tell me that it comes from the Baron's vineyard," said
Trevelyan, alluding to the wine-farm of Ricasoli, "and that there is
none better in Tuscany. I never was myself a judge of the grape, but
this to me is as palatable as any of the costlier French wines. How
grand a thing would wine really be, if it could make glad the heart
of man. How truly would one worship Bacchus if he could make one's
heart to rejoice. But if a man have a real sorrow, wine will not wash
it away,--not though a man were drowned in it, as Clarence was."
Mr. Glascock hitherto had spoken hardly a word. There was an attempt
at joviality about this breakfast,--or, at any rate, of the usual
comfortable luxury of hospitable entertainment,--which, coming as it
did from Trevelyan, almost locked his lips. He had not come there to
be jovial or luxurious, but to perform a most melancholy mission; and
he had brought with him his saddest looks, and was prepared for a
few sad words. Trevelyan's speech, indeed, was sad enough, but Mr.
Glascock could not take up questions of the worship of Bacchus at
half a minute's warning. He eat a morsel, and raised his glass to his
lips, and felt himself to be very uncomfortable. It was necessary,
however, that he should utter a word. "Do you not let your little boy
come in to breakfast?" he said.
"He is better away," said Trevelyan gloomily.
"But as we are to travel together," said Mr. Glascock, "we might as
well make acquaintance."
"You have been a little hurried with me on that score," said
Trevelyan. "I wrote certainly with a determined mind, but things have
changed somewhat since then."
"You do not mean that you will not send him?"
"You have been somewhat hurried with me, I say. If I remember
rightly, I named no time, but spoke of the future. Could I have
answered the message which I received from you, I would have
postponed your visit for a week or so."
"Postponed it! Why,--I am to be married the day after to-morrow.
It was just as much as I was able to do, to come here at all." Mr.
Glascock now pushed his chair back from the table, and prepared
himself to speak up. "Your wife expects her child now, and you will
break her heart by refusing to send him."
"Nobody thinks of my heart, Mr. Glascock."
"But this is your own offer."
"Yes, it was my own offer, certainly. I am not going to deny my own
words, which have no doubt been preserved in testimony against me."
"Mr. Trevelyan, what do you mean?" Then, when he was on the point of
boiling over with passion, Mr. Glascock remembered that his companion
was not responsible for his expressions. "I do hope you will let
the child go away with me," he said. "You cannot conceive the state
of his mother's anxiety, and she will send him back at once if you
demand it."
"Is that to be in good faith?"
"Certainly, in good faith. I would lend myself to nothing, Mr.
Trevelyan, that was not said and done in good faith."
"She will not break her word, excusing herself, because I am--mad?"
"I am sure that there is nothing of the kind in her mind."
"Perhaps not now; but such things grow. There is no iniquity, no
breach of promise, no treason that a woman will not excuse to
herself,--or a man either,--by the comfortable self-assurance that
the person to be injured is--mad. A hound without a friend is not so
cruelly treated. The outlaw, the murderer, the perjurer has surer
privileges than the man who is in the way, and to whom his friends
can point as being--mad!" Mr. Glascock knew or thought that he knew
that his host in truth was mad, and he could not, therefore, answer
this tirade by an assurance that no such idea was likely to prevail.
"Have they told you, I wonder," continued Trevelyan, "how it was
that, driven to force and an ambuscade for the recovery of my own
child, I waylaid my wife and took him from her? I have done nothing
to forfeit my right as a man to the control of my own family. I
demanded that the boy should be sent to me, and she paid no attention
to my words. I was compelled to vindicate my own authority; and then,
because I claimed the right which belongs to a father, they said that
I was--mad! Ay, and they would have proved it, too, had I not fled
from my country and hidden myself in this desert. Think of that, Mr.
Glascock! Now they have followed me here,--not out of love for me;
and that man whom they call a governor comes and insults me; and my
wife promises to be good to me, and says that she will forgive and
forget! Can she ever forgive herself her own folly, and the cruelty
that has made shipwreck of my life? They can do nothing to me here;
but they would entice me home because there they have friends, and
can fee doctors,--with my own money,--and suborn lawyers, and put me
away,--somewhere in the dark, where I shall be no more heard of among
men! As you are a man of honour, Mr. Glascock,--tell me; is it not
so?"
"I know nothing of their plans,--beyond this, that you wrote me word
that you would send them the boy."
"But I know their plans. What you say is true. I did write you
word,--and I meant it. Mr. Glascock, sitting here alone from
morning to night, and lying down from night till morning, without
companionship, without love, in utter misery, I taught myself to feel
that I should think more of her than of myself."
"If you are so unhappy here, come back yourself with the child. Your
wife would desire nothing better."
"Yes;--and submit to her, and her father, and her mother. No,--Mr.
Glascock; never, never. Let her come to me."
"But you will not receive her."
"Let her come in a proper spirit, and I will receive her. She is the
wife of my bosom, and I will receive her with joy. But if she is to
come to me and tell me that she forgives me,--forgives me for the
evil that she has done,--then, sir, she had better stay away. Mr.
Glascock, you are going to be married. Believe me,--no man should
submit to be forgiven by his wife. Everything must go astray if that
be done. I would rather encounter their mad doctors, one of them
after another till they had made me mad;--I would encounter anything
rather than that. But, sir, you neither eat nor drink, and I fear
that my speech disturbs you."
It was like enough that it may have done so. Trevelyan, as he had
been speaking, had walked about the room, going from one extremity to
the other with hurried steps, gesticulating with his arms, and every
now and then pushing back with his hands the long hair from off his
forehead. Mr. Glascock was in truth very much disturbed. He had come
there with an express object; but, whenever he mentioned the child,
the father became almost rabid in his wrath. "I have done very well,
thank you," said Mr. Glascock. "I will not eat any more, and I
believe I must be thinking of going back to Siena."
"I had hoped you would spend the day with me, Mr. Glascock."
"I am to be married, you see, in two days; and I must be in Florence
early to-morrow. I am to meet my--wife, as she will be, and the
Rowleys, and your wife. Upon my word I can't stay. Won't you just say
a word to the young woman and let the boy be got ready?"
"I think not;--no, I think not."
"And am I to have had all this journey for nothing? You will have
made a fool of me in writing to me."
"I intended to be honest, Mr. Glascock."
"Stick to your honesty, and send the boy back to his mother. It will
be better for you, Trevelyan."
"Better for me! Nothing can be better for me. All must be worst. It
will be better for me, you say; and you ask me to give up the last
drop of cold water wherewith I can touch my parched lips. Even in my
hell I had so much left to me of a limpid stream, and you tell me
that it will be better for me to pour it away. You may take him, Mr.
Glascock. The woman will make him ready for you. What matters it
whether the fiery furnace be heated seven times, or only six;--in
either degree the flames are enough! You may take him;--you may take
him." So saying, Trevelyan walked out of the window, leaving Mr.
Glascock seated in his chair. He walked out of the window and went
down among the olive trees. He did not go far, however, but stood
with his arm round the stem of one of them, playing with the shoots
of a vine with his hand. Mr. Glascock followed him to the window and
stood looking at him for a few moments. But Trevelyan did not turn
or move. There he stood gazing at the pale, cloudless, heat-laden,
motionless sky, thinking of his own sorrows, and remembering too,
doubtless, with the vanity of a madman, that he was probably being
watched in his reverie.
Mr. Glascock was too practical a man not to make the most of the
offer that had been made to him, and he went back among the passages
and called for Catarina. Before long he had two or three women with
him, including her whom he had brought from Florence, and among them
Louey was soon made to appear, dressed for his journey, together with
a small trunk in which were his garments. It was quite clear that
the order for his departure had been given before that scene at the
breakfast-table, and that Trevelyan had not intended to go back from
his promise. Nevertheless Mr. Glascock thought it might be as well to
hurry his departure, and he turned back to say the shortest possible
word of farewell to Trevelyan in the garden. But when he got to the
window, Trevelyan was not to be found among the olive trees. Mr.
Glascock walked a few steps down the hill, looking for him, but
seeing nothing of him, returned to the house. The elder woman said
that her master had not been there, and Mr. Glascock started with his
charge. Trevelyan was manifestly mad, and it was impossible to treat
him as a sane man would have been treated. Nevertheless, Mr. Glascock
felt much compunction in carrying the child away without a final kiss
or word of farewell from its father. But it was not to be so. He
had got into the carriage with the child, having the servant seated
opposite to him,--for he was moved by some undefinable fear which
made him determine to keep the boy close to him, and he had not,
therefore, returned to the driver's seat,--when Trevelyan appeared
standing by the road-side at the bottom of the hill. "Would you take
him away from me without one word!" said Trevelyan bitterly.
"I went to look for you but you were gone," said Mr. Glascock.
"No, sir, I was not gone. I am here. It is the last time that I shall
ever gladden my eyes with his brightness. Louey, my love, will you
come to your father?" Louey did not seem to be particularly willing
to leave the carriage, but he made no loud objection when Mr.
Glascock held him up to the open space above the door. The child had
realised the fact that he was to go, and did not believe that his
father would stop him now; but he was probably of opinion that the
sooner the carriage began to go on the better it would be for him.
Mr. Glascock, thinking that his father intended to kiss him over the
door, held him by his frock; but the doing of this made Trevelyan
very angry. "Am I not to be trusted with my own child in my arms?"
said he. "Give him to me, sir. I begin to doubt now whether I am
right to deliver him to you." Mr. Glascock immediately let go his
hold of the boy's frock and leaned back in the carriage. "Louey will
tell papa that he loves him before he goes?" said Trevelyan. The poor
little fellow murmured something, but it did not please his father,
who had him in his arms. "You are like the rest of them, Louey," he
said; "because I cannot laugh and be gay, all my love for you is
nothing;--nothing! You may take him. He is all that I have;--all that
I have;--and I shall never see him again!" So saying he handed the
child into the carriage, and sat himself down by the side of the road
to watch till the vehicle should be out of sight. As soon as the last
speck of it had vanished from his sight, he picked himself up, and
dragged his slow footsteps back to the house.
Mr. Glascock made sundry attempts to amuse the child, with whom he
had to remain all that night at Siena; but his efforts in that line
were not very successful. The boy was brisk enough, and happy, and
social by nature; but the events, or rather the want of events of
the last few months, had so cowed him, that he could not recover his
spirits at the bidding of a stranger. "If I have any of my own," said
Mr. Glascock to himself, "I hope they will be of a more cheerful
disposition."
As we have seen, he did not meet Caroline at the station,--thereby
incurring his lady-love's displeasure for the period of
half-a-minute; but he did meet Mrs. Trevelyan almost at the door of
Sir Marmaduke's lodgings. "Yes, Mrs. Trevelyan; he is here."
"How am I ever to thank you for such goodness?" said she. "And Mr.
Trevelyan;--you saw him?"
"Yes:--I saw him."
Before he could answer her further she was up-stairs, and had her
child in her arms. It seemed to be an age since the boy had been
stolen from her in the early spring in that unknown, dingy street
near Tottenham Court Road. Twice she had seen her darling since
that,--twice during his captivity; but on each of these occasions
she had seen him as one not belonging to herself, and had seen him
under circumstances which had robbed the greeting of almost all its
pleasure. But now he was her own again, to take whither she would,
to dress and to undress, to feed, to coax, to teach, and to caress.
And the child lay close up to her as she hugged him, putting up his
little cheek to her chin, and burying himself happily in her embrace.
He had not much as yet to say, but she could feel that he was
contented.
Mr. Glascock had promised to wait for her a few minutes,--even at the
risk of Caroline's displeasure,--and Mrs. Trevelyan ran down to him
as soon as the first craving of her mother's love was satisfied. Her
boy would at any rate be safe with her now, and it was her duty to
learn something of her husband. It was more than her duty;--if only
her services might be of avail to him. "And you say he was well?"
she asked. She had taken Mr. Glascock apart, and they were alone
together, and he had determined that he would tell her the truth.
"I do not know that he is ill,--though he is pale and altered beyond
belief."
"Yes;--I saw that."
"I never knew a man so thin and haggard."
"My poor Louis!"
"But that is not the worst of it."
"What do you mean, Mr. Glascock?"
"I mean that his mind is astray, and that he should not be left
alone. There is no knowing what he might do. He is so much more alone
there than he would be in England. There is not a soul who could
interfere."
"Do you mean that you think--that he is in danger--from himself?"
"I would not say so, Mrs. Trevelyan; but who can tell? I am sure of
this,--that he should not be left alone. If it were only because of
the misery of his life, he should not be left alone."
"But what can I do? He would not even see papa."
"He would see you."
"But he would not let me guide him in anything. I have been to him
twice, and he breaks out,--as if I were--a bad woman."
"Let him break out. What does it matter?"
"Am I to own to a falsehood,--and such a falsehood?"
"Own to anything, and you will conquer him at once. That is what I
think. You will excuse what I say, Mrs. Trevelyan."
"Oh, Mr. Glascock, you have been such a friend! What should we have
done without you!"
"You cannot take to heart the words that come from a disordered
reason. In truth, he believes no ill of you."
"But he says so."
"It is hard to know what he says. Declare that you will submit to
him, and I think that he will be softened towards you. Try to bring
him back to his own country. It may be that were he to--die there,
alone, the memory of his loneliness would be heavy with you in after
days." Then, having so spoken, he rushed off, declaring, with a
forced laugh, that Caroline Spalding would never forgive him.
The next day was the day of the wedding, and Emily Trevelyan was
left all alone. It was of course out of the question that she should
join any party the purport of which was to be festive. Sir Marmaduke
went with some grumbling, declaring that wine and severe food in the
morning were sins against the plainest rules of life. And the three
Rowley girls went, Nora officiating as one of the bridesmaids. But
Mrs. Trevelyan was left with her boy, and during the day she was
forced to resolve what should be the immediate course of her life.
Two days after the wedding her family would return to England. It was
open to her to go with them, and to take her boy with her. But a few
days since how happy she would have been could she have been made to
believe that such a mode of returning would be within her power! But
now she felt that she might not return and leave that poor, suffering
wretch behind her. As she thought of him she tried to interrogate
herself in regard to her feelings. Was it love, or duty, or
compassion which stirred her? She had loved him as fondly as any
bright young woman loves the man who is to take her away from
everything else, and make her a part of his house and of himself.
She had loved him as Nora now loved the man whom she worshipped and
thought to be a god, doing godlike work in the dingy recesses of the
D. R. office. Emily Trevelyan was forced to tell herself that all
that was over with her. Her husband had shown himself to be weak,
suspicious, unmanly,--by no means like a god. She had learned to feel
that she could not trust her comfort in his hands,--that she could
never know what his thoughts of her might be. But still he was her
husband, and the father of her child; and though she could not dare
to look forward to happiness in living with him, she could understand
that no comfort would be possible to her were she to return to
England and to leave him to perish alone at Casalunga. Fate seemed
to have intended that her life should be one of misery, and she must
bear it as best she might.
The more she thought of it, however, the greater seemed to be her
difficulties. What was she to do when her father and mother should
have left her? She could not go to Casalunga if her husband would not
give her entrance; and if she did go, would it be safe for her to
take her boy with her? Were she to remain in Florence she would be
hardly nearer to him for any useful purpose than in England; and even
should she pitch her tent at Siena, occupying there some desolate
set of huge apartments in a deserted palace, of what use could she
be to him? Could she stay there if he desired her to go; and was it
probable that he would be willing that she should be at Siena while
he was living at Casalunga,--no more than two leagues distant? How
should she begin her work; and if he repulsed her, how should she
then continue it?
But during these wedding hours she did make up her mind as to what
she would do for the present. She would certainly not leave Italy
while her husband remained there. She would for a while keep her
rooms in Florence, and there should her boy abide. But from time
to time,--twice a week perhaps,--she would go down to Siena and
Casalunga, and there form her plans in accordance with her husband's
conduct. She was his wife, and nothing should entirely separate her
from him, now that he so sorely wanted her aid.
CHAPTER LXXXVII.
MR. GLASCOCK'S MARRIAGE COMPLETED.
[Illustration]
The Glascock marriage was a great affair in Florence;--so much
so, that there were not a few who regarded it as a strengthening
of peaceful relations between the United States and the United
Kingdom, and who thought that the Alabama claims and the question
of naturalisation might now be settled with comparative ease. An
English lord was about to marry the niece of an American Minister
to a foreign court. The bridegroom was not, indeed, quite a lord as
yet, but it was known to all men that he must be a lord in a very
short time, and the bride was treated with more than usual bridal
honours because she belonged to a legation. She was not, indeed, an
ambassador's daughter, but the niece of a daughterless ambassador,
and therefore almost as good as a daughter. The wives and daughters
of other ambassadors, and the other ambassadors themselves, of
course, came to the wedding; and as the palace in which Mr. Spalding
had apartments stood alone, in a garden, with a separate carriage
entrance, it seemed for all wedding purposes as though the
whole palace were his own. The English Minister came, and his
wife,--although she had never quite given over turning up her nose at
the American bride whom Mr. Glascock had chosen for himself. It was
such a pity, she said, that such a man as Mr. Glascock should marry
a young woman from Providence, Rhode Island. Who in England would
know anything of Providence, Rhode Island? And it was so expedient,
in her estimation, that a man of family should strengthen himself
by marrying a woman of family. It was so necessary, she declared,
that a man when marrying should remember that his child would have
two grandfathers, and would be called upon to account for four
great-grandfathers. Nevertheless Mr. Glascock was--Mr. Glascock;
and, let him marry whom he would, his wife would be the future Lady
Peterborough. Remembering this, the English Minister's wife gave up
the point when the thing was really settled, and benignly promised to
come to the breakfast with all the secretaries and attachés belonging
to the legation, and all the wives and daughters thereof. What may
a man not do, and do with éclat, if he be heir to a peer and have
plenty of money in his pocket?
Mr. and Mrs. Spalding were covered with glory on the occasion; and
perhaps they did not bear their glory as meekly as they should have
done. Mrs. Spalding laid herself open to some ridicule from the
British Minister's wife because of her inability to understand with
absolute clearness the condition of her niece's husband in respect to
his late and future seat in Parliament, to the fact of his being a
commoner and a nobleman at the same time, and to certain information
which was conveyed to her, surely in a most unnecessary manner, that
if Mr. Glascock were to die before his father her niece would never
become Lady Peterborough, although her niece's son, if she had
one, would be the future lord. No doubt she blundered, as was most
natural; and then the British Minister's wife made the most of the
blunders; and when once Mrs. Spalding ventured to speak of Caroline
as her ladyship, not to the British Minister's wife, but to the
sister of one of the secretaries, a story was made out of it which
was almost as false as it was ill-natured. Poor Caroline was spoken
of as her ladyship backward and forwards among the ladies of the
legation in a manner which might have vexed her had she known
anything about it; but, nevertheless, all the ladies prepared their
best flounces to go to the wedding. The time would soon come when she
would in truth be a "ladyship," and she might be of social use to any
one of the ladies in question.
But Mr. Spalding was, for the time, the most disturbed of any of
the party concerned. He was a tall, thin, clever Republican of the
North,--very fond of hearing himself talk, and somewhat apt to take
advantage of the courtesies of conversation for the purpose of making
unpardonable speeches. As long as there was any give and take going
on in the mêlée of words he would speak quickly and with energy,
seizing his chances among others; but the moment he had established
his right to the floor,--as soon as he had won for himself the
position of having his turn at the argument, he would dole out his
words with considerable slowness, raise his hand for oratorial
effect, and proceed as though Time were annihilated. And he would go
further even than this, for,--fearing by experience the escape of his
victims,--he would catch a man by the button-hole of his coat, or
back him ruthlessly into the corner of a room, and then lay on to him
without quarter. Since the affair with Mr. Glascock had been settled,
he had talked an immensity about England,--not absolutely taking
honour to himself because of his intended connection with a lord, but
making so many references to the aristocratic side of the British
constitution as to leave no doubt on the minds of his hearers as
to the source of his arguments. In old days, before all this was
happening, Mr. Spalding, though a courteous man in his personal
relations, had constantly spoken of England with the bitter
indignation of the ordinary American politician. England must be made
to disgorge. England must be made to do justice. England must be
taught her place in the world. England must give up her claims. In
hot moments he had gone further, and had declared that England must
be--whipped. He had been specially loud against that aristocracy of
England which, according to a figure of speech often used by him,
was always feeding on the vitals of the people. But now all this was
very much changed. He did not go the length of expressing an opinion
that the House of Lords was a valuable institution; but he discussed
questions of primogeniture and hereditary legislation, in reference
to their fitness for countries which were gradually emerging
from feudal systems, with an equanimity, an impartiality, and a
perseverance which soon convinced those who listened to him where he
had learned his present lessons, and why. "The conservative nature of
your institutions, sir," he said to poor Sir Marmaduke at the Baths
of Lucca a very few days before the marriage, "has to be studied
with great care before its effects can be appreciated in reference
to a people who, perhaps, I may be allowed to say, have more in
their composition of constitutional reverence than of educated
intelligence." Sir Marmaduke, having suffered before, had endeavoured
to bolt; but the American had caught him and pinned him, and the
Governor of the Mandarins was impotent in his hands. "The position
of the great peer of Parliament is doubtless very splendid, and
may be very useful," continued Mr. Spalding, who was intending to
bring round his argument to the evil doings of certain scandalously
extravagant young lords, and to offer a suggestion that in such
cases a committee of aged and respected peers should sit and decide
whether a second son, or some other heir should not be called to the
inheritance both of the title and the property. But Mrs. Spalding
had seen the sufferings of Sir Marmaduke, and had rescued him. "Mr.
Spalding," she had said, "it is too late for politics, and Sir
Marmaduke has come out here for a holiday." Then she took her husband
by the arm, and led him away helpless.
In spite of these drawbacks to the success,--if ought can be
said to be a drawback on success of which the successful one is
unconscious,--the marriage was prepared with great splendour, and
everybody who was anybody in Florence was to be present. There
were only to be four bridesmaids, Caroline herself having strongly
objected to a greater number. As Wallachia Petrie had fled at
the first note of preparation for these trivial and unpalatable
festivities, another American young lady was found; and the sister of
the English secretary of legation, who had so maliciously spread that
report about her "ladyship," gladly agreed to be the fourth.
As the reader will remember, the whole party from the Baths of Lucca
reached Florence only the day before the marriage, and Nora at
the station promised to go up to Caroline that same evening. "Mr.
Glascock will tell me about the little boy," said Caroline; "but I
shall be so anxious to hear about your sister." So Nora crossed the
bridge after dinner, and went up to the American Minister's palatial
residence. Caroline was then in the loggia, and Mr. Glascock was
with her; and for a while they talked about Emily Trevelyan and her
misfortunes. Mr. Glascock was clearly of opinion that Trevelyan would
soon be either in an asylum or in his grave. "I could not bring
myself to tell your sister so," he said; "but I think your father
should be told,--or your mother. Something should be done to put an
end to that fearful residence at Casalunga." Then by degrees the
conversation changed itself to Nora's prospects; and Caroline, with
her friend's hand in hers, asked after Hugh Stanbury.
"You will not mind speaking before him,--will you?" said Caroline,
putting her hand on her own lover's arm.
"Not unless he should mind it," said Nora, smiling. She had meant
nothing beyond a simple reply to her friend's question, but he took
her words in a different sense, and blushed as he remembered his
visit to Nuncombe Putney.
"He thinks almost more of your happiness than he does of mine," said
Caroline; "which isn't fair, as I am sure that Mr. Stanbury will not
reciprocate the attention. And now, dear, when are we to see you?"
"Who on earth can say?"
"I suppose Mr. Stanbury would say something,--only he is not here."
"And papa won't send my letter," said Nora.
"You are sure that you will not go out to the Islands with him?"
"Quite sure," said Nora. "I have made up my mind so far as that."
"And what will your sister do?"
"I think she will stay. I think she will say good-bye to papa and
mamma here in Florence."
"I am quite of opinion that she should not leave her husband alone in
Italy," said Mr. Glascock.
"She has not told us with certainty," said Nora; "but I feel sure
that she will stay. Papa thinks she ought to go with them to London."
"Your papa seems to have two very intractable daughters," said
Caroline.
"As for me," declared Nora, solemnly, "nothing shall make me go back
to the Islands,--unless Mr. Stanbury should tell me to do so."
"And they start at the end of July?"
"On the last Saturday."
"And what will you do then, Nora?"
"I believe there are casual wards that people go to."
"Casual wards!" said Caroline.
"Miss Rowley is condescending to poke her fun at you," said Mr.
Glascock.
"She is quite welcome, and shall poke as much as she likes; only we
must be serious now. If it be necessary, we will get back by the end
of July;--won't we, Charles?"
"You will do nothing of the kind," said Nora. "What!--give up your
honeymoon to provide me with board and lodgings! How can you suppose
that I am so selfish or so helpless? I would go to my aunt, Mrs.
Outhouse."
"We know that that wouldn't do," said Caroline. "You might as well be
in Italy as far as Mr. Stanbury is concerned."
"If Miss Rowley would go to Monkhams, she might wait for us,"
suggested Mr. Glascock. "Old Mrs. Richards is there; and though of
course she would be dull--"
"It is quite unnecessary," said Nora. "I shall take a two-pair back
in a respectable feminine quarter, like any other young woman who
wants such accommodation, and shall wait there till my young man can
come and give me his arm to church. That is about the way we shall do
it. I am not going to give myself any airs, Mr. Glascock, or make any
difficulties. Papa is always talking to me about chairs and tables
and frying-pans, and I shall practise to do with as few of them as
possible. As I am headstrong about having my young man,--and I own
that I am headstrong about that,--I guess I've got to fit myself for
that sort of life." And Nora, as she said this, pronounced her words
with something of a nasal twang, imitating certain countrywomen of
her friend's.
"I like to hear you joking about it, Nora; because your voice is so
cheery and you are so bright when you joke. But, nevertheless, one
has to be reasonable, and to look the facts in the face. I don't see
how you are to be left in London alone, and you know that your aunt
Mrs. Outhouse,--or at any rate your uncle,--would not receive you
except on receiving some strong anti-Stanbury pledge."
"I certainly shall not give an anti-Stanbury pledge."
"And, therefore, that is out of the question. You will have a
fortnight or three weeks in London, in all the bustle of their
departure, and I declare I think that at the last moment you will go
with them."
"Never!--unless he says so."
"I don't see how you are even to meet--'him,' and talk it over."
"I'll manage that. My promise not to write lasts only while we are in
Italy."
"I think we had better get back to England, Charles, and take pity on
this poor destitute one."
"If you talk of such a thing I will swear that I will never go to
Monkhams. You will find that I shall manage it. It may be that I
shall do something very shocking,--so that all your patronage will
hardly be able to bring me round afterwards; but I will do something
that will serve my purpose. I have not gone so far as this to be
turned back now." Nora, as she spoke of having "gone so far," was
looking at Mr. Glascock, who was seated in an easy arm-chair close
to the girl whom he was to make his wife on the morrow, and she
was thinking, no doubt, of the visit which he had made to Nuncombe
Putney, and of the first irretrievable step which she had taken when
she told him that her love was given to another. That had been her
Rubicon. And though there had been periods with her since the passing
of it, in which she had felt that she had crossed it in vain, that
she had thrown away the splendid security of the other bank without
obtaining the perilous object of her ambition,--though there had been
moments in which she had almost regretted her own courage and noble
action, still, having passed the river, there was nothing for her
but to go on to Rome. She was not going to be stopped now by the
want of a house in which to hide herself for a few weeks. She was
without money, except so much as her mother might be able, almost
surreptitiously, to give her. She was without friends to help
her,--except these who were now with her, whose friendship had come
to her in so singular a manner, and whose power to aid her at the
present moment was cruelly curtailed by their own circumstances.
Nothing was settled as to her own marriage. In consequence of
the promise that had been extorted from her that she should not
correspond with Stanbury, she knew nothing of his present wishes or
intention. Her father was so offended by her firmness that he would
hardly speak to her. And it was evident to her that her mother,
though disposed to yield, was still in hopes that her daughter, in
the press and difficulty of the moment, would allow herself to be
carried away with the rest of the family to the other side of the
world. She knew all this,--but she had made up her mind that she
would not be carried away. It was not very pleasant, the thought that
she would be obliged at last to ask her young man, as she called
him, to provide for her; but she would do that and trust herself
altogether in his hands sooner than be taken to the Antipodes. "I
can be very resolute if I please, my dear," she said, looking at
Caroline. Mr. Glascock almost thought that she must have intended to
address him.
They sat there discussing the matter for some time through the long,
cool, evening hours, but nothing could be settled further,--except
that Nora would write to her friend as soon as her affairs had begun
to shape themselves after her return to England. At last Caroline
went into the house, and for a few minutes Mr. Glascock was alone
with Nora. He had remained, determining that the moment should come,
but now that it was there he was for awhile unable to say the words
that he wished to utter. At last he spoke. "Miss Rowley, Caroline is
so eager to be your friend."
"I know she is, and I do love her so dearly. But, without joke, Mr.
Glascock, there will be as it were a great gulf between us."
"I do not know that there need be any gulf, great or little. But
I did not mean to allude to that. What I want to say is this. My
feelings are not a bit less warm or sincere than hers. You know of
old that I am not very good at expressing myself."
"I know nothing of the kind."
"There is no such gulf as what you speak of. All that is mostly
gone by, and a nobleman in England, though he has advantages as a
gentleman, is no more than a gentleman. But that has nothing to
do with what I am saying now. I shall never forget my journey to
Devonshire. I won't pretend to say now that I regret its result."
"I am quite sure you don't."
"No; I do not;--though I thought then that I should regret it always.
But remember this, Miss Rowley,--that you can never ask me to do
anything that I will not, if possible, do for you. You are in some
little difficulty now."
"It will disappear, Mr. Glascock. Difficulties always do."
"But we will do anything that we are wanted to do; and should a
certain event take place--"
"It will take place some day."
"Then I hope that we may be able to make Mr. Stanbury and his wife
quite at home at Monkhams." After that he took Nora's hand and kissed
it, and at that moment Caroline came back to them.
"To-morrow, Mr. Glascock," she said, "you will, I believe, be at
liberty to kiss everybody; but to-day you should be more discreet."
It was generally admitted among the various legations in Florence
that there had not been such a wedding in the City of Flowers since
it had become the capital of Italia. Mr. Glascock and Miss Spalding
were married in the chapel of the legation,--a legation chapel on the
ground floor having been extemporised for the occasion. This greatly
enhanced the pleasantness of the thing, and saved the necessity of
matrons and bridesmaids packing themselves and their finery into
close fusty carriages. A portion of the guests attended in the
chapel, and the remainder, when the ceremony was over, were found
strolling about the shady garden. The whole affair of the breakfast
was very splendid and lasted some hours. In the midst of this the
bride and bridegroom were whisked away with a pair of grey horses to
the railway station, and before the last toast of the day had been
proposed by the Belgian Councillor of Legation, they were half way up
the Apennines on their road to Bologna. Mr. Spalding behaved himself
like a man on the occasion. Nothing was spared in the way of expense,
and when he made that celebrated speech, in which he declared that
the republican virtue of the New World had linked itself in a happy
alliance with the aristocratic splendour of the Old, and went on with
a simile about the lion and the lamb, everybody accepted it with good
humour in spite of its being a little too long for the occasion.
"It has gone off very well, mamma; has it not?" said Nora, as she
returned home with her mother to her lodgings.
"Yes, my dear; much, I fancy, as these things generally do."
"I thought it was so nice. And she looked so very well. And he was so
pleasant, and so much like a gentleman;--not noisy, you know,--and
yet not too serious."
"I dare say, my love."
"It is easy enough, mamma, for a girl to be married, for she has
nothing to do but to wear her clothes and look as pretty as she can.
And if she cries and has a red nose it is forgiven her. But a man has
so difficult a part to play. If he tries to carry himself as though
it were not a special occasion, he looks like a fool that way; and if
he is very special, he looks like a fool the other way. I thought Mr.
Glascock did it very well."
"To tell you the truth, my dear, I did not observe him."
"I did,--narrowly. He hadn't tied his cravat at all nicely."
"How you could think of his cravat, Nora, with such memories as you
must have, and such regrets, I cannot understand."
"Mamma, my memories of Mr. Glascock are pleasant memories, and as for
regrets,--I have not one. Can I regret, mamma, that I did not marry a
man whom I did not love,--and that I rejected him when I knew that I
loved another? You cannot mean that, mamma."
"I know this;--that I was thinking all the time how proud I should
have been, and how much more fortunate he would have been, had you
been standing there instead of that American young woman." As she
said this Lady Rowley burst into tears, and Nora could only answer
her mother by embracing her. They were alone together, their party
having been too large for one carriage, and Sir Marmaduke having
taken his two younger daughters. "Of course I feel it," said Lady
Rowley, through her tears. "It would have been such a position for
my child! And that young man,--without a shilling in the world; and
writing in that way, just for bare bread!" Nora had nothing more
to say. A feeling that in herself would have been base, was simply
affectionate and maternal in her mother. It was impossible that she
should make her mother see it as she saw it.
There was but one intervening day and then the Rowleys returned to
England. There had been, as it were, a tacit agreement among them
that, in spite of all their troubles, their holiday should be a
holiday up to the time of the Glascock marriage. Then must commence
at once the stern necessity of their return home,--home, not only
to England, but to those antipodean islands from which it was
too probable that some of them might never come back. And the
difficulties in their way seemed to be almost insuperable. First
of all there was to be the parting from Emily Trevelyan. She had
determined to remain in Florence, and had written to her husband
saying that she would do so, and declaring her willingness to go out
to him, or to receive him in Florence at any time and in any manner
that he might appoint. She had taken this as a first step, intending
to go to Casalunga very shortly, even though she should receive
no answer from him. The parting between her and her mother and
father and sisters was very bitter. Sir Marmaduke, as he had become
estranged from Nora, had grown to be more and more gentle and loving
with his elder daughter, and was nearly overcome at the idea of
leaving her in a strange land, with a husband near her, mad, and yet
not within her custody. But he could do nothing,--could hardly say a
word,--toward opposing her. Though her husband was mad, he supplied
her with the means of living; and when she said that it was her duty
to be near him, her father could not deny it. The parting came. "I
will return to you the moment you send to me," were Nora's last words
to her sister. "I don't suppose I shall send," said Emily. "I shall
try to bear it without assistance."
Then the journey from Italy to England was made without much
gratification or excitement, and the Rowley family again found
themselves at Gregg's Hotel.
CHAPTER LXXXVIII.
CROPPER AND BURGESS.
We must now go back to Exeter and look after Mr. Brooke Burgess and
Miss Dorothy Stanbury. It is rather hard upon readers that they
should be thus hurried from the completion of hymeneals at Florence,
to the preparations for other hymeneals in Devonshire; but it is the
nature of a complex story to be entangled with many weddings towards
its close. In this little history there are, we fear, three or four
more to come. We will not anticipate by alluding prematurely to Hugh
Stanbury's treachery, or death,--or the possibility that he after all
may turn out to be the real descendant of the true Lord Peterborough
and the actual inheritor of the title and estate of Monkhams, nor
will we speak of Nora's certain fortitude under either of these
emergencies. But the instructed reader must be aware that Camilla
French ought to have a husband found for her; that Colonel Osborne
should be caught in some matrimonial trap,--as, how otherwise
should he be fitly punished?--and that something should be at least
attempted for Priscilla Stanbury, who from the first has been
intended to be the real heroine of these pages. That Martha should
marry Giles Hickbody, and Barty Burgess run away with Mrs. MacHugh,
is of course evident to the meanest novel-expounding capacity; but
the fate of Brooke Burgess and of Dorothy will require to be evolved
with some delicacy and much detail.
There was considerable difficulty in fixing the day. In the first
place Miss Stanbury was not very well,--and then she was very
fidgety. She must see Brooke again before the day was fixed, and
after seeing Brooke she must see her lawyer. "To have a lot of money
to look after is more plague than profit, my dear," she said to
Dorothy one day; "particularly when you don't quite know what you
ought to do with it." Dorothy had always avoided any conversation
with her aunt about money since the first moment in which she had
thought of accepting Brooke Burgess as her husband. She knew that
her aunt had some feeling which made her averse to the idea that any
portion of the property which she had inherited should be enjoyed by
a Stanbury after her death, and Dorothy, guided by this knowledge,
had almost convinced herself that her love for Brooke was treason
either against him or against her aunt. If, by engaging herself to
him, she should rob him of his inheritance, how bitter a burden to
him would her love have been! If, on the other hand, she should
reward her aunt for all that had been done for her by forcing
herself, a Stanbury, into a position not intended for her, how base
would be her ingratitude! These thoughts had troubled her much, and
had always prevented her from answering any of her aunt's chance
allusions to the property. For her, things had at last gone very
right. She did not quite know how it had come about, but she was
engaged to marry the man she loved. And her aunt was, at any rate,
reconciled to the marriage. But when Miss Stanbury declared that she
did not know what to do about the property, Dorothy could only hold
her tongue. She had had plenty to say when it had been suggested to
her that the marriage should be put off yet for a short while, and
that, in the meantime, Brooke should come again to Exeter. She swore
that she did not care for how long it was put off,--only that she
hoped it might not be put off altogether. And as for Brooke's coming,
that, for the present, would be very much nicer than being married
out of hand at once. Dorothy, in truth, was not at all in a hurry to
be married, but she would have liked to have had her lover always
coming and going. Since the courtship had become a thing permitted,
she had had the privilege of welcoming him twice at the house in the
Close; and that running down to meet him in the little front parlour,
and the getting up to make his breakfast for him as he started in
the morning, were among the happiest epochs of her life. And then,
as soon as ever the breakfast was eaten, and he was gone, she would
sit down to write him a letter. Oh, those letters, so beautifully
crossed, more than one of which was copied from beginning to end
because some word in it was not thought to be sweet enough;--what a
heaven of happiness they were to her! The writing of the first had
disturbed her greatly, and she had almost repented of the privilege
before it was ended; but with the first and second the difficulties
had disappeared; and, had she not felt somewhat ashamed of the
occupation, she could have sat at her desk and written him letters
all day. Brooke would answer them, with fair regularity, but in a
most cursory manner,--sending seven or eight lines in return for two
sheets fully crossed; but this did not discompose her in the least.
He was worked hard at his office, and had hundreds of other things
to do. He, too, could say,--so thought Dorothy,--more in eight lines
than she could put into as many pages.
She was quite happy when she was told that the marriage could not
take place till August, but that Brooke must come again in July.
Brooke did come in the first week of July, and somewhat horrified
Dorothy by declaring to her that Miss Stanbury was unreasonable.
"If I insist upon leaving London so often for a day or two," said he,
"how am I to get anything like leave of absence when the time comes?"
In answer to this Dorothy tried to make him understand that business
should not be neglected, and that, as far as she was concerned, she
could do very well without that trip abroad which he had proposed for
her. "I'm not going to be done in that way," said Brooke. "And now
that I am here she has nothing to say to me. I've told her a dozen
times that I don't want to know anything about her will, and that
I'll take it all for granted. There is something to be settled on
you, that she calls her own."
"She is so generous, Brooke."
"She is generous enough, but she is very whimsical. She is going
to make her whole will over again, and now she wants to send some
message to Uncle Barty. I don't know what it is yet, but I am to take
it. As far as I can understand, she has sent all the way to London
for me, in order that I may take a message across the Close."
"You talk as though it were very disagreeable, coming to Exeter,"
said Dorothy, with a little pout.
"So it is,--very disagreeable."
"Oh, Brooke!"
"Very disagreeable if our marriage is to be put off by it. I think
it will be so much nicer making love somewhere on the Rhine than
having snatches of it here, and talking all the time about wills and
tenements and settlements." As he said this, with his arm round her
waist and his face quite close to hers,--shewing thereby that he was
not altogether averse even to his present privileges,--she forgave
him.
On that same afternoon, just before the banking hours were over,
Brooke went across to the house of Cropper and Burgess, having first
been closeted for nearly an hour with his aunt,--and, as he went,
his step was sedate and his air was serious. He found his uncle
Barty, and was not very long in delivering his message. It was to
this effect,--that Miss Stanbury particularly wished to see Mr.
Bartholomew Burgess on business, at some hour on that afternoon
or that evening. Brooke himself had been made acquainted with the
subject in regard to which this singular interview was desired;
but it was not a part of his duty to communicate any information
respecting it. It had been necessary that his consent to certain
arrangements should be asked before the invitation to Barty Burgess
could be given; but his present mission was confined to an authority
to give the invitation.
Old Mr. Burgess was much surprised, and was at first disposed to
decline the proposition made by the "old harridan," as he called her.
He had never put any restraint on his language in talking of Miss
Stanbury with his nephew, and was not disposed to do so now, because
she had taken a new vagary into her head. But there was something in
his nephew's manner which at last induced him to discuss the matter
rationally.
"And you don't know what it's all about?" said Uncle Barty.
"I can't quite say that. I suppose I do know pretty well. At any
rate, I know enough to think that you ought to come. But I must not
say what it is."
"Will it do me or anybody else any good?"
"It can't do you any harm. She won't eat you."
"But she can abuse me like a pickpocket, and I should return it, and
then there would be a scolding match. I always have kept out of her
way, and I think I had better do so still."
Nevertheless Brooke prevailed,--or rather the feeling of curiosity
which was naturally engendered prevailed. For very, very many years
Barty Burgess had never entered or left his own house of business
without seeing the door of that in which Miss Stanbury lived,--and
he had never seen that door without a feeling of detestation for the
owner of it. It would, perhaps, have been a more rational feeling on
his part had he confined his hatred to the memory of his brother, by
whose will Miss Stanbury had been enriched, and he had been, as he
thought, impoverished. But there had been a contest, and litigation,
and disputes, and contradictions, and a long course of those
incidents in life which lead to rancour and ill blood, after the
death of the former Brooke Burgess; and, as the result of all this,
Miss Stanbury held the property and Barty Burgess held his hatred.
He had never been ashamed of it, and had spoken his mind out to all
who would hear him. And, to give Miss Stanbury her due, it must be
admitted that she had hardly been behind him in the warmth of her
expression,--of which old Barty was well aware. He hated, and knew
that he was hated in return. And he knew, or thought that he knew,
that his enemy was not a woman to relent because old age and weakness
and the fear of death were coming on her. His enemy, with all her
faults, was no coward. It could not be that now at the eleventh hour
she should desire to reconcile him by any act of tardy justice,--nor
did he wish to be reconciled at this the eleventh hour. His hatred
was a pleasant excitement to him. His abuse of Miss Stanbury was a
chosen recreation. His unuttered daily curse, as he looked over to
her door, was a relief to him. Nevertheless he would go. As Brooke
had said,--no harm could come of his going. He would go, and at least
listen to her proposition.
About seven in the evening his knock was heard at the door. Miss
Stanbury was sitting in the small up-stairs parlour, dressed in her
second best gown, and was prepared with considerable stiffness and
state for the occasion. Dorothy was with her, but was desired in a
quick voice to hurry away the moment the knock was heard, as though
old Barty would have jumped from the hall door into the room at
a bound. Dorothy collected herself with a little start, and went
without a word. She had heard much of Barty Burgess, but had never
spoken to him, and was subject to a feeling of great awe when she
would remember that the grim old man of whom she had heard so much
evil would soon be her uncle. According to arrangement, Mr. Burgess
was shewn up-stairs by his nephew. Barty Burgess had been born in
this very house, but had not been inside the walls of it for more
than thirty years. He also was somewhat awed by the occasion, and
followed his nephew without a word. Brooke was to remain at hand,
so that he might be summoned should he be wanted; but it had been
decided by Miss Stanbury that he should not be present at the
interview. As soon as her visitor entered the room she rose in a
stately way, and curtseyed, propping herself with one hand upon the
table as she did so. She looked him full in the face meanwhile, and
curtseying a second time asked him to seat himself in a chair which
had been prepared for him. She did it all very well, and it may be
surmised that she had rehearsed the little scene, perhaps more than
once, when nobody was looking at her. He bowed, and walked round to
the chair and seated himself; but finding that he was so placed that
he could not see his neighbour's face, he moved his chair. He was not
going to fight such a duel as this with the disadvantage of the sun
in his eyes.
[Illustration: Barty Burgess.]
Hitherto there had hardly been a word spoken. Miss Stanbury had
muttered something as she was curtseying, and Barty Burgess had made
some return. Then she began: "Mr. Burgess," she said, "I am indebted
to you for your complaisance in coming here at my request." To this
he bowed again. "I should not have ventured thus to trouble you were
it not that years are dealing more hardly with me than they are
with you, and that I could not have ventured to discuss a matter
of deep interest otherwise than in my own room." It was her room
now, certainly, by law; but Barty Burgess remembered it when it was
his mother's room, and when she used to give them all their meals
there,--now so many, many years ago! He bowed again, and said not a
word. He knew well that she could sooner be brought to her point by
his silence than by his speech.
She was a long time coming to her point. Before she could do so she
was forced to allude to times long past, and to subjects which she
found it very difficult to touch without saying that which would
either belie herself, or seem to be severe upon him. Though she had
prepared herself, she could hardly get the words spoken, and she was
greatly impeded by the obstinacy of his silence. But at last her
proposition was made to him. She told him that his nephew, Brooke,
was about to be married to her niece, Dorothy; and that it was her
intention to make Brooke her heir in the bulk of the property which
she had received under the will of the late Mr. Brooke Burgess.
"Indeed," she said, "all that I received at your brother's hands
shall go back to your brother's family unimpaired." He only bowed,
and would not say a word. Then she went on to say that it had at
first been a matter to her of deep regret that Brooke should have set
his affections upon her niece, as there had been in her mind a strong
desire that none of her own people should enjoy the reversion of the
wealth, which she had always regarded as being hers only for the
term of her life; but that she had found that the young people had
been so much in earnest, and that her own feeling had been so near
akin to a prejudice, that she had yielded. When this was said Barty
smiled instead of bowing, and Miss Stanbury felt that there might be
something worse even than his silence. His smile told her that he
believed her to be lying. Nevertheless she went on. She was not fool
enough to suppose that the whole nature of the man was to be changed
by a few words from her. So she went on. The marriage was a thing
fixed, and she was thinking of settlements, and had been talking to
lawyers about a new will.
"I do not know that I can help you," said Barty, finding that a
longer pause than usual made some word from him absolutely necessary.
"I am going on to that, and I regret that my story should detain
you so long, Mr. Burgess." And she did go on. She had, she said,
made some saving out of her income. She was not going to trouble Mr.
Burgess with this matter,--only that she might explain to him that
what she would at once give to the young couple, and what she would
settle on Dorothy after her own death, would all come from such
savings, and that such gifts and bequests would not diminish the
family property. Barty again smiled as he heard this, and Miss
Stanbury in her heart likened him to the devil in person. But still
she went on. She was very desirous that Brooke Burgess should
come and live at Exeter. His property would be in the town and
the neighbourhood. It would be a seemly thing,--such were her
words,--that he should occupy the house that had belonged to his
grandfather and his great-grandfather; and then, moreover,--she
acknowledged that she spoke selfishly,--she dreaded the idea of being
left alone for the remainder of her own years. Her proposition at
last was uttered. It was simply this, that Barty Burgess should give
to his nephew, Brooke, his share in the bank.
"I am damned, if I do!" said Barty Burgess, rising up from his chair.
But before he had left the room he had agreed to consider the
proposition. Miss Stanbury had of course known that any such
suggestion coming from her without an adequate reason assigned, would
have been mere idle wind. She was prepared with such adequate reason.
If Mr. Burgess could see his way to make the proposed transfer of his
share of the bank business, she, Miss Stanbury, would hand over to
him, for his life, a certain proportion of the Burgess property which
lay in the city, the income of which would exceed that drawn by him
from the business. Would he, at his time of life, take that for doing
nothing which he now got for working hard? That was the meaning of
it. And then, too, as far as the portion of the property went,--and
it extended to the houses owned by Miss Stanbury on the bank side
of the Close,--it would belong altogether to Barty Burgess for his
life. "It will simply be this, Mr. Burgess;--that Brooke will be your
heir,--as would be natural."
"I don't know that it would be at all natural," said he. "I should
prefer to choose my own heir."
"No doubt, Mr. Burgess,--in respect to your own property," said Miss
Stanbury.
At last he said that he would think of it, and consult his partner;
and then he got up to take his leave. "For myself," said Miss
Stanbury, "I would wish that all animosities might be buried."
"We can say that they are buried," said the grim old man,--"but
nobody will believe us."
"What matters,--if we could believe it ourselves?"
"But suppose we didn't. I don't believe that much good can come from
talking of such things, Miss Stanbury. You and I have grown too old
to swear a friendship. I will think of this thing, and if I find
that it can be made to suit without much difficulty, I will perhaps
entertain it." Then the interview was over, and old Barty made
his way down-stairs, and out of the house. He looked over to the
tenements in the Close which were offered to him, every circumstance
of each one of which he knew, and felt that he might do worse. Were
he to leave the bank, he could not take his entire income with him,
and it had been long said of him that he ought to leave it. The
Croppers, who were his partners,--and whom he had never loved,--would
be glad to welcome in his place one of the old family who would have
money; and then the name would be perpetuated in Exeter, which, even
to Barty Burgess, was something.
On that night the scheme was divulged to Dorothy, and she was in
ecstasies. London had always sounded bleak and distant and terrible
to her; and her heart had misgiven her at the idea of leaving her
aunt. If only this thing might be arranged! When Brooke spoke the
next morning of returning at once to his office, he was rebuked by
both the ladies. What was the Ecclesiastical Commission Office to any
of them, when matters of such importance were concerned? But Brooke
would not be talked out of his prudence. He was very willing to be
made a banker at Exeter, and to go to school again and learn banking
business; but he would not throw up his occupation in London till he
knew that there was another ready for him in the country. One day
longer he spent in Exeter, and during that day he was more than once
with his uncle. He saw also the Messrs. Cropper, and was considerably
chilled by the manner in which they at first seemed to entertain the
proposition. Indeed, for a couple of hours he thought that the scheme
must be abandoned. It was pointed out to him that Mr. Barty Burgess's
life would probably be short, and that he--Barty--had but a small
part of the business at his disposal. But gradually a way to terms
was seen,--not quite so simple as that which Miss Stanbury had
suggested; and Brooke, when he left Exeter, did believe it possible
that he, after all, might become the family representative in the old
banking-house of the Burgesses.
"And how long will it take, Aunt Stanbury?" Dorothy asked.
"Don't you be impatient, my dear."
"I am not the least impatient; but of course I want to tell mamma and
Priscilla. It will be so nice to live here and not go up to London.
Are we to stay here,--in this very house?"
"Have you not found out yet that Brooke will be likely to have an
opinion of his own on such things?"
"But would you wish us to live here, aunt?"
"I hardly know, dear. I am a foolish old woman, and cannot say what I
would wish. I cannot bear to be alone."
"Of course we will stay with you."
"And yet I should be jealous if I were not mistress of my own house."
"Of course you will be mistress."
"I believe, Dolly, that it would be better that I should die. I have
come to feel that I can do more good by going out of the world than
by remaining in it." Dorothy hardly answered this in words, but sat
close by her aunt, holding the old woman's hand and caressing it, and
administering that love of which Miss Stanbury had enjoyed so little
during her life and which had become so necessary to her.
The news about the bank arrangements, though kept of course as a
great secret, soon became common in Exeter. It was known to be a good
thing for the firm in general that Barty Burgess should be removed
from his share of the management. He was old-fashioned, unpopular,
and very stubborn; and he and a certain Mr. Julius Cropper, who was
the leading man among the Croppers, had not always been comfortable
together. It was at first hinted that old Miss Stanbury had been
softened by sudden twinges of conscience, and that she had confessed
to some terrible crime in the way of forgery, perjury, or perhaps
worse, and had relieved herself at last by making full restitution.
But such a rumour as this did not last long or receive wide credence.
When it was hinted to such old friends as Sir Peter Mancrudy and Mrs.
MacHugh, they laughed it to scorn,--and it did not exist even in the
vague form of an undivulged mystery for above three days. Then it
was asserted that old Barty had been found to have no real claim
to any share in the bank, and that he was to be turned out at Miss
Stanbury's instance;--that he was to be turned out, and that Brooke
had been acknowledged to be the owner of the Burgess share of her
business. Then came the fact that old Barty had been bought out, and
that the future husband of Miss Stanbury's niece was to be the junior
partner. A general feeling prevailed at last that there had been
another great battle between Miss Stanbury and old Barty, and that
the old maid had prevailed now as she had done in former days.
Before the end of July the papers were in the lawyer's hands, and
all the terms had been fixed. Brooke came down again and again, to
Dorothy's great delight, and displayed considerable firmness in the
management of his own interest. If Fate intended to make him a banker
in Exeter instead of a clerk in the Ecclesiastical Commission Office,
he would be a banker after a respectable fashion. There was more
than one little struggle between him and Mr. Julius Cropper, which
ended in accession of respect on the part of Mr. Cropper for his new
partner. Mr. Cropper had thought that the establishment might best
be known to the commercial world of the West of England as "Croppers'
Bank;" but Brooke had been very firm in asserting that if he was to
have anything to do with it the old name should be maintained.
"It's to be 'Cropper and Burgess,'" he said to Dorothy one afternoon.
"They fought hard for 'Cropper, Cropper, and Burgess;'--but I
wouldn't stand more than one Cropper."
"Of course not," said Dorothy, with something almost of scorn in
her voice. By this time Dorothy had gone very deeply into banking
business.
CHAPTER LXXXIX.
"I WOULDN'T DO IT, IF I WAS YOU."
Miss Stanbury at this time was known all through Exeter to be very
much altered from the Miss Stanbury of old;--or even from the Miss
Stanbury of two years since. The Miss Stanbury of old was a stalwart
lady who would play her rubber of whist five nights a week, and could
hold her own in conversation against the best woman in Exeter,--not
to speak of her acknowledged superiority over every man in that city.
Now she cared little for the glories of debate; and though she still
liked her rubber, and could wake herself up to the old fire in the
detection of a revoke or the claim for a second trick, her rubbers
were few and far between, and she would leave her own house on an
evening only when all circumstances were favourable, and with many
precautions against wind and water. Some said that she was becoming
old, and that she was going out like the snuff of a candle. But Sir
Peter Mancrudy declared that she might live for the next fifteen
years, if she would only think so herself. "It was true," Sir Peter
said, "that in the winter she had been ill, and that there had been
danger as to her throat during the east winds of the spring;--but
those dangers had passed away, and, if she would only exert herself,
she might be almost as good a woman as ever she had been." Sir Peter
was not a man of many words, or given to talk frequently of his
patients; but it was clearly Sir Peter's opinion that Miss Stanbury's
mind was ill at ease. She had become discontented with life, and
therefore it was that she cared no longer for the combat of tongues,
and had become cold even towards the card-table. It was so in truth;
and yet perhaps the lives of few men or women had been more innocent,
and few had struggled harder to be just in their dealings and
generous in their thoughts.
There was ever present to her mind an idea of failure and a fear lest
she had been mistaken in her views throughout her life. No one had
ever been more devoted to peculiar opinions, or more strong in the
use of language for their expression; and she was so far true to
herself, that she would never seem to retreat from the position she
had taken. She would still scorn the new fangles of the world around
her, and speak of the changes which she saw as all tending to evil.
But, through it all, there was an idea present to herself that
it could not be God's intention that things should really change
for the worse, and that the fault must be in her, because she had
been unable to move as others had moved. She would sit thinking of
the circumstances of her own life and tell herself that with her
everything had failed. She had loved, but had quarrelled with her
lover; and her love had come to nothing--but barren wealth. She had
fought for her wealth and had conquered;--and had become hard in the
fight, and was conscious of her own hardness. In the early days of
her riches and power she had taken her nephew by the hand,--and had
thrown him away from her because he would not dress himself in her
mirror. She had believed herself to be right, and would not, even
now, tell herself that she had been wrong; but there were doubts, and
qualms of conscience, and an uneasiness,--because her life had been
a failure. Now she was seeking to appease her self-accusations by
sacrificing everything for the happiness of her niece and her chosen
hero; but as she went on with the work she felt that all would be in
vain, unless she could sweep herself altogether from off the scene.
She had told herself that if she could bring Brooke to Exeter, his
prospects would be made infinitely brighter than they would be in
London, and that she in her last days would not be left utterly
alone. But as the prospect of her future life came nearer to her, she
saw, or thought that she saw, that there was still failure before
her. Young people would not want an old woman in the house with
them;--even though the old woman would declare that she would be no
more in the house than a tame cat. And she knew herself also too well
to believe that she could make herself a tame cat in the home that
had so long been subject to her dominion. Would it not be better that
she should go away somewhere,--and die?
"If Mr. Brooke is to come here," Martha said to her one day, "we
ought to begin and make the changes, ma'am."
"What changes? You are always wanting to make changes."
"If they was never made till I wanted them they'd never be made,
ma'am. But if there is to be a married couple there should be things
proper. Anyways, ma'am, we ought to know;--oughtn't we?"
The truth of this statement was so evident that Miss Stanbury could
not contradict it. But she had not even yet made up her mind. Ideas
were running through her head which she knew to be very wild, but
of which she could not divest herself. "Martha," she said, after a
while, "I think I shall go away from this myself."
"Leave the house, ma'am?" said Martha, awestruck.
"There are other houses in the world, I suppose, in which an old
woman can live and die."
"There is houses, ma'am, of course."
"And what is the difference between one and another?"
"I wouldn't do it, ma'am, if I was you. I wouldn't do it if it was
ever so. Sure the house is big enough for Mr. Brooke and Miss Dorothy
along with you. I wouldn't go and make such change as that;--I
wouldn't indeed, ma'am." Martha spoke out almost with eloquence, so
much expression was there in her face. Miss Stanbury said nothing
more at the moment, beyond signifying her indisposition to make up
her mind to anything at the present moment. Yes;--the house was big
enough as far as rooms were concerned; but how often had she heard
that an old woman must always be in the way, if attempting to live
with a newly-married couple? If a mother-in-law be unendurable, how
much more so one whose connection would be less near? She could keep
her own house no doubt, and let them go elsewhere; but what then
would come of her old dream, that Burgess, the new banker in the
city, should live in the very house that had been inhabited by the
Burgesses, the bankers of old? There was certainly only one way out
of all these troubles, and that way would be that she should--go from
them and be at rest.
Her will had now been drawn out and completed for the third or fourth
time, and she had made no secret of its contents either with Brooke
or Dorothy. The whole estate she left to Brooke, including the houses
which were to become his after his uncle's death; and in regard to
the property she had made no further stipulation. "I might have
settled it on your children," she said to him, "but in doing so I
should have settled it on hers. I don't know why an old woman should
try to interfere with things after she has gone. I hope you won't
squander it, Brooke."
"I shall be a steady old man by that time," he said.
"I hope you'll be steady at any rate. But there it is, and God must
direct you in the use of it, if He will. It has been a burthen to
me; but then I have been a solitary old woman." Half of what she had
saved she proposed to give Dorothy on her marriage, and for doing
this arrangements had already been made. There were various other
legacies, and the last she announced was one to her nephew, Hugh. "I
have left him a thousand pounds," she said to Dorothy,--"so that he
may remember me kindly at last." As to this, however, she exacted a
pledge that no intimation of the legacy was to be made to Hugh. Then
it was that Dorothy told her aunt that Hugh intended to marry Nora
Rowley, one of the ladies who had been at the Clock House during the
days in which her mother had lived in grandeur; and then it was also
that Dorothy obtained leave to invite Hugh to her own wedding. "I
hope she will be happier than her sister," Miss Stanbury said, when
she heard of the intended marriage.
"It wasn't Mrs. Trevelyan's fault, you know, aunt."
"I say nothing about anybody's fault; but this I do say, that it was
a very great misfortune. I fought all that battle with your sister
Priscilla, and I don't mean to fight it again, my dear. If Hugh
marries the young lady, I hope she will be more happy than her
sister. There can be no harm in saying that."
Dorothy's letter to her brother shall be given, because it will
inform the reader of all the arrangements as they were made up to
that time, and will convey the Exeter news respecting various persons
with whom our story is concerned.
The Close, July 20th, 186--.
DEAR HUGH,--
The day for my marriage is now fixed, and I wish with all
my heart that it was the same with you. Pray give my love
to Nora. It seems so odd that, though she was living for a
while with mamma at Nuncombe Putney, I never should have
seen her yet. I am very glad that Brooke has seen her, and
he declares that she is quite _magnificently beautiful_.
Those are his own words.
We are to be married on the 10th of August, a Wednesday,
and now comes my great news. Aunt Stanbury says that you
are to come and stay in the house. She bids me tell you so
with her love; and that you can have a room as long as you
like. _Of course you must come._ In the first place, you
must because you are to give me away, and Brooke wouldn't
have me if I wasn't given away properly; and then it will
make me so happy that you and Aunt Stanbury should be
friends again. You can stay as long as you like, but, of
course, you must come the day before the wedding. We are
to be married in the Cathedral, and there are to be two
clergymen, but I don't yet know who they will be;--not Mr.
Gibson, certainly, as you were good enough to suggest.
Mr. Gibson is married to Arabella French, and they have
gone away somewhere into Cornwall. Camilla has come back,
and I have seen her once. She looked ever so fierce, as
though she intended to declare that she didn't mind what
anybody may think. They say that she still protests that
she never will speak to her sister again.
I was introduced to Mr. Barty Burgess the other day.
Brooke was here, and we met him in the Close. I hardly
knew what he said to me, I was so frightened; but Brooke
said that he meant to be civil, and that he is going
to send me a present. I have got a quantity of things
already, and yesterday Mrs. MacHugh sent me such a
beautiful cream-jug. If you'll come in time on the 9th,
you shall see them all before they are put away.
Mamma and Priscilla are to be here, and they will come
on the 9th also. Poor, dear mamma is, I know, terribly
flurried about it, and so is Aunt Stanbury. It is so long
since they have seen each other. I don't think Priscilla
feels it the same way, because she is so brave. Do you
remember when it was first proposed that I should come
here? I am so glad I came,--because of Brooke. He will
come on the 9th, quite early, and I do so hope you will
come with him.
Yours most affectionately,
DOROTHY STANBURY.
Give my best, best love to Nora.
CHAPTER XC.
LADY ROWLEY CONQUERED.
[Illustration]
When the Rowleys were back in London, and began to employ themselves
on the terrible work of making ready for their journey to the
Islands, Lady Rowley gradually gave way about Hugh Stanbury. She had
become aware that Nora would not go back with them,--unless under an
amount of pressure which she would find it impossible to use. And if
Nora did not go out to the Islands, what was to become of her unless
she married this man? Sir Marmaduke, when all was explained to him,
declared that a girl must do what her parents ordered her to do.
"Other girls live with their fathers and mothers, and so must she."
Lady Rowley endeavoured to explain that other girls lived with their
fathers and mothers, because they found themselves in established
homes from which they are not disposed to run away; but Nora's
position was, as she alleged, very different. Nora's home had
latterly been with her sister, and it was hardly to be expected
that the parental authority should not find itself impaired by the
interregnum which had taken place. Sir Marmaduke would not see the
thing in the same light, and was disposed to treat his daughter with
a high hand. If she would not do as she was bidden, she should no
longer be daughter of his. In answer to this Lady Rowley could only
repeat her conviction that Nora would not go out to the Mandarins;
and that as for disinheriting her, casting her off, cursing her, and
the rest,--she had no belief in such doings at all. "On the stage
they do such things as that," she said; "and, perhaps, they used to
do it once in reality. But you know that it's out of the question,
now. Fancy your standing up and cursing at the dear girl, just as we
are all starting from Southampton!" Sir Marmaduke knew as well as his
wife that it would be impossible, and only muttered something about
the "dear girl" behaving herself with great impropriety.
They were all aware that Nora was not going to leave England, because
no berth had been taken for her on board the ship, and because, while
the other girls were preparing for their long voyage, no preparations
were made for her. Of course she was not going. Sir Marmaduke would
probably have given way altogether immediately on his return to
London, had he not discussed the matter with his friend Colonel
Osborne. It became, of course, his duty to make some inquiry as
to the Stanbury family, and he knew that Osborne had visited Mrs.
Stanbury when he made his unfortunate pilgrimage to the porch of
Cockchaffington Church. He told Osborne the whole story of Nora's
engagement, telling also that other most heart-breaking tale of
her conduct in regard to Mr. Glascock, and asked the Colonel what
he thought about the Stanburys. Now the Colonel did not hold the
Stanburys in high esteem. He had met Hugh, as the reader may perhaps
remember, and had had some intercourse with the young man, which
had not been quite agreeable to him, on the platform of the railway
station at Exeter. And he had also heard something of the ladies
at Nuncombe Putney during his short sojourn at the house of Mrs.
Crocket. "My belief is, they are beggars," said Colonel Osborne.
"I suppose so," said Sir Marmaduke, shaking his head.
"When I went over to call on Emily,--that time I was at
Cockchaffington, you know, when Trevelyan made himself such a d----
fool,--I found the mother and sister living in a decentish house
enough; but it wasn't their house."
"Not their own, you mean?"
"It was a place that Trevelyan had got this young man to take for
Emily, and they had merely gone there to be with her. They had been
living in a little bit of a cottage; a sort of a place that any--any
ploughman would live in. Just that kind of cottage."
"Goodness gracious!"
"And they've gone to another just like it;--so I'm told."
"And can't he do anything better for them than that?" asked Sir
Marmaduke.
"I know nothing about him. I have met him, you know. He used to be
with Trevelyan;--that was when Nora took a fancy for him, of course.
And I saw him once down in Devonshire, when I must say he behaved
uncommonly badly,--doing all he could to foster Trevelyan's stupid
jealousy."
"He has changed his mind about that, I think."
"Perhaps he has; but he behaved very badly then. Let him shew up his
income;--that, I take it, is the question in such a case as this. His
father was a clergyman, and therefore I suppose he must be considered
to be a gentleman. But has he means to support a wife, and keep up a
house in London? If he has not, that is an end to it, I should say."
But Sir Marmaduke could not see his way to any such end, and,
although he still looked black upon Nora, and talked to his wife
of his determination to stand no contumacy, and hinted at cursing,
disinheriting, and the like, he began to perceive that Nora would
have her own way. In his unhappiness he regretted this visit to
England, and almost thought that the Mandarins were a pleasanter
residence than London. He could do pretty much as he pleased there,
and could live quietly, without the trouble which encountered him now
on every side.
Nora, immediately on her return to London, had written a note to
Hugh, simply telling him of her arrival and begging him to come and
see her. "Mamma," she said, "I must see him, and it would be nonsense
to say that he must not come here. I have done what I have said
I would do, and you ought not to make difficulties." Lady Rowley
declared that Sir Marmaduke would be very angry if Hugh were admitted
without his express permission. "I don't want to do anything in the
dark," continued Nora, "but of course I must see him. I suppose it
will be better that he should come to me than that I should go to
him?" Lady Rowley quite understood the threat that was conveyed in
this. It would be much better that Hugh should come to the hotel, and
that he should be treated then as an accepted lover. She had come to
that conclusion. But she was obliged to vacillate for awhile between
her husband and her daughter. Hugh came of course, and Sir Marmaduke,
by his wife's advice, kept out of the way. Lady Rowley, though she
was at home, kept herself also out of the way, remaining above with
her two other daughters. Nora thus achieved the glory and happiness
of receiving her lover alone.
"My own true girl!" he said, speaking with his arms still round her
waist.
"I am true enough; but whether I am your own,--that is another
question."
"You mean to be?"
"But papa doesn't mean it. Papa says that you are nobody, and that
you haven't got an income; and thinks that I had better go back and
be an old maid at the Mandarins."
"And what do you think yourself, Nora?"
"What do I think? As far as I can understand, young ladies are not
allowed to think at all. They have to do what their papas tell them.
That will do, Hugh. You can talk without taking hold of me."
"It is such a time since I have had a hold of you,--as you call it."
"It will be much longer before you can do so again, if I go back
to the Islands with papa. I shall expect you to be true, you know;
and it will be ten years at the least before I can hope to be home
again."
"I don't think you mean to go, Nora."
"But what am I to do? That idea of yours of walking out to the
next church and getting ourselves married sounds very nice and
independent, but you know that it is not practicable."
"On the other hand, I know it is."
"It is not practicable for me, Hugh. Of all things in the world I
don't want to be a Lydia. I won't do anything that anybody shall ever
say that your wife ought not to have done. Young women when they are
married ought to have their papas' and mammas' consent. I have been
thinking about it a great deal for the last month or two, and I have
made up my mind to that."
"What is it all to come to, then?"
"I mean to get papa's consent. That is what it is to come to."
"And if he is obstinate?"
"I shall coax him round at last. When the time for going comes, he'll
yield then."
"But you will not go with them?" As he asked this he came to her and
tried again to take her by the waist; but she retreated from him, and
got herself clear from his arm. "If you are afraid of me, I shall
know that you think it possible that we may be parted."
"I am not a bit afraid of you, Hugh."
"Nora, I think you ought to tell me something definitely."
"I think I have been definite enough, sir. You may be sure of this,
however;--I will not go back to the Islands."
"Give me your hand on that."
"There is my hand. But, remember;--I had told you just as much
before. I don't mean to go back. I mean to stay here. I mean;--but I
do not think I will tell you all the things I mean to do."
"You mean to be my wife?"
"Certainly;--some day, when the difficulty about the chairs and
tables can settle itself. The real question now is,--what am I to do
with myself when papa and mamma are gone?"
"Become Mrs. H. Stanbury at once. Chairs and tables! You shall have
chairs and tables as many as you want. You won't be too proud to live
in lodgings for a few months?"
"There must be preliminaries, Hugh,--even for lodgings, though they
may be very slender. Papa goes in less than three weeks now, and
mamma has got something else to think of than my marriage garments.
And then there are all manner of difficulties, money difficulties
and others, out of which I don't see my way yet." Hugh began to
asseverate that it was his business to help her through all money
difficulties as well as others; but she soon stopped his eloquence.
"It will be by-and-by, Hugh, and I hope you'll support the burden
like a man; but just at present there is a hitch. I shouldn't have
come over at all;--I should have stayed with Emily in Italy, had I
not thought that I was bound to see you."
"My own darling!"
"When papa goes, I think that I had better go back to her."
"I'll take you!" said Hugh, picturing to himself all the pleasures of
such a tour together over the Alps.
"No you won't, because that would be improper. When we travel
together we must go Darby and Joan fashion, as man and wife. I think
I had better go back to Emily, because her position there is so
terrible. There must come some end to it, I suppose soon. He will be
better, or he will become so bad that,--that medical interference
will be unavoidable. But I do not like that she should be alone. She
gave me a home when she had one;--and I must always remember that
I met you there." After this there was of course another attempt
with Hugh's right arm, which on this occasion was not altogether
unsuccessful. And then she told him of her friendship for Mr.
Glascock's wife, and of her intention at some future time to visit
them at Monkhams.
[Illustration: "I must always remember that I met you there."]
"And see all the glories that might have been your own," he said.
"And think of the young man who has robbed me of them all! And you
are to go there too, so that you may see what you have done. There
was a time, Hugh, when I was very nearly pleasing all my friends
and shewing myself to be a young lady of high taste and noble
fortune,--and an obedient, good girl."
"And why didn't you?"
"I thought I would wait just a little longer.
Because,--because,--because--. Oh, Hugh, how cross you were to me
afterwards when you came down to Nuncombe and would hardly speak to
me!"
"And why didn't I speak to you?"
"I don't know. Because you were cross, and surly, and thinking of
nothing but your tobacco, I believe. Do you remember how we walked to
Niddon, and you hadn't a word for anybody?"
"I remember I wanted you to go down to the river with me, and you
wouldn't go."
"You asked me only once, and I did so long to go with you. Do you
remember the rocks in the river? I remember the place as though I saw
it now; and how I longed to jump from one stone to another. Hugh, if
we are ever married, you must take me there, and let me jump on those
stones."
"You pretended that you could not think of wetting your feet."
"Of course I pretended,--because you were so cross, and so cold. Oh,
dear! I wonder whether you will ever know it all."
"Don't I know it all now?"
"I suppose you do, nearly. There is mighty little of a secret in it,
and it is the same thing that is going on always. Only it seems so
strange to me that I should ever have loved any one so dearly,--and
that for next to no reason at all. You never made yourself very
charming that I know of;--did you?"
"I did my best. It wasn't much, I dare say."
"You did nothing, sir,--except just let me fall in love with you. And
you were not quite sure that you would let me do that."
"Nora, I don't think you do understand."
"I do;--perfectly. Why were you cross with me, instead of saying one
nice word when you were down at Nuncombe? I do understand."
"Why was it?"
"Because you did not think well enough of me to believe that I would
give myself to a man who had no fortune of his own. I know it now,
and I knew it then; and therefore I wouldn't dabble in the river with
you. But it's all over now, and we'll go and get wet together like
dear little children, and Priscilla shall scold us when we come
back."
They were alone in the sitting-room for more than an hour, and Lady
Rowley was patient up-stairs as mothers will be patient in such
emergencies. Sophie and Lucy had gone out and left her; and there
she remained telling herself, as the weary minutes went by, that as
the thing was to be, it was well that the young people should be
together. Hugh Stanbury could never be to her what Mr. Glascock would
have been,--a son-in-law to sit and think about, and dream of, and
be proud of,--whose existence as her son-in-law would in itself have
been a happiness to her out in her banishment at the other side of
the world; but nevertheless it was natural to her, as a soft-hearted
loving mother with many daughters, that any son-in-law should be dear
to her. Now that she had gradually brought herself round to believe
in Nora's marriage, she was disposed to make the best of Hugh, to
remember that he was certainly a clever man, that he was an honest
fellow, and that she had heard of him as a good son and a kind
brother, and that he had behaved well in reference to her Emily and
Trevelyan. She was quite willing now that Hugh should be happy, and
she sat there thinking that the time was very long, but still waiting
patiently till she should be summoned. "You must let me go for mamma
for a moment," Nora said. "I want you to see her and make yourself a
good boy before her. If you are ever to be her son-in-law, you ought
to be in her good graces." Hugh declared that he would do his best,
and Nora fetched her mother.
Stanbury found some difficulty in making himself a "good boy" in
Lady Rowley's presence; and Lady Rowley herself, for some time, felt
very strongly the awkwardness of the meeting. She had never formally
recognised the young man as her daughter's accepted suitor, and was
not yet justified in doing so by any permission from Sir Marmaduke;
but, as the young people had been for the last hour or two alone
together, with her connivance and sanction, it was indispensable
that she should in some way signify her parental adherence to the
arrangement. Nora began by talking about Emily, and Trevelyan's
condition and mode of living were discussed. Then Lady Rowley said
something about their coming journey, and Hugh, with a lucky blunder,
spoke of Nora's intended return to Italy. "We don't know how that may
be," said Lady Rowley. "Her papa still wishes her to go back with
us."
"Mamma, you know that that is impossible," said Nora.
"Not impossible, my love."
"But she will not go back," said Hugh. "Lady Rowley, you would not
propose to separate us by such a distance as that?"
"It is Sir Marmaduke that you must ask."
"Mamma, mamma!" exclaimed Nora, rushing to her mother's side, "it is
not papa that we must ask,--not now. We want you to be our friend.
Don't we, Hugh? And, mamma, if you will really be our friend, of
course, papa will come round."
"My dear Nora!"
"You know he will, mamma; and you know that you mean to be good and
kind to us. Of course I can't go back to the Islands with you. How
could I go so far and leave him behind? He might have half-a-dozen
wives before I could get back to him--"
"If you have not more trust in him than that--!"
"Long engagements are awful bores," said Hugh, finding it to be
necessary that he also should press forward his argument.
"I can trust him as far as I can see him," said Nora, "and therefore
I do not want to lose sight of him altogether."
Lady Rowley of course gave way and embraced her accepted son-in-law.
After all it might have been worse. He saw his way clearly, he said,
to making six hundred a year, and did not at all doubt that before
long he would do better than that. He proposed that they should be
married some time in the autumn, but was willing to acknowledge that
much must depend on the position of Trevelyan and his wife. He would
hold himself ready at any moment, he said, to start to Italy, and
would do all that could be done by a brother. Then Lady Rowley gave
him her blessing, and kissed him again,--and Nora kissed him too, and
hung upon him, and did not push him away at all when his arm crept
round her waist. And that feeling came upon him which must surely be
acknowledged by all engaged young men when they first find themselves
encouraged by mammas in the taking of liberties which they have
hitherto regarded as mysteries to be hidden, especially from maternal
eyes,--that feeling of being a fine fat calf decked out with ribbons
for a sacrifice.
CHAPTER XCI.
FOUR O'CLOCK IN THE MORNING.
Another week went by and Sir Marmaduke had even yet not surrendered.
He quite understood that Nora was not to go back to the Islands.
And he had visited Mr. and Mrs. Outhouse at St. Diddulph's in order
to secure a home for her there, if it might be possible. Mr. Outhouse
did not refuse, but gave the permission in such a fashion as to make
it almost equal to a refusal. "He was," he said, "much attached to
his niece Nora, but he had heard that there was a love affair." Sir
Marmaduke, of course, could not deny the love affair. There was
certainly a love affair of which he did not personally approve, as
the gentleman had no fixed income and as far as he could understand
no fixed profession. "Such a love affair," thought Mr. Outhouse, "was
a sort of thing that he didn't know how to manage at all. If Nora
came to him, was the young man to visit at the house, or was he
not?" Then Mrs. Outhouse said something as to the necessity of an
anti-Stanbury pledge on Nora's part, and Sir Marmaduke found that
that scheme must be abandoned. Mrs. Trevelyan had written from
Florence more than once or twice, and in her last letter had said
that she would prefer not to have Nora with her. She was at that
time living in lodgings at Siena and had her boy there also. She saw
her husband every other day; but nevertheless,--according to her
statements,--her visits to Casalunga were made in opposition to his
wishes. He had even expressed a desire that she should leave Siena
and return to England. He had once gone so far as to say that if she
would do so, he would follow her. But she clearly did not believe
him, and in all her letters spoke of him as one whom she could not
regard as being under the guidance of reason. She had taken her
child with her once or twice to the house, and on the first occasion
Trevelyan had made much of his son, had wept over him, and professed
that in losing him he had lost his only treasure; but after that he
had not noticed the boy, and latterly she had gone alone. She thought
that perhaps her visits cheered him, breaking the intensity of his
solitude; but he never expressed himself gratified by them, never
asked her to remain at the house, never returned with her into Siena,
and continually spoke of her return to England as a step which must
be taken soon,--and the sooner the better. He intended to follow her,
he said; and she explained very fully how manifest was his wish that
she should go, by the temptation to do so which he thought that he
held out by this promise. He had spoken, on every occasion of her
presence with him, of Sir Marmaduke's attempt to prove him to be a
madman; but declared that he was afraid of no one in England, and
would face all the lawyers in Chancery Lane and all the doctors
in Savile Row. Nevertheless, so said Mrs. Trevelyan, he would
undoubtedly remain at Casalunga till after Sir Marmaduke should have
sailed. He was not so mad but that he knew that no one else would be
so keen to take steps against him as would Sir Marmaduke. As for his
health, her account of him was very sad. "He seemed," she said, "to
be withering away." His hand was mere skin and bone. His hair and
beard so covered his thin long cheeks, that there was nothing left
of his face but his bright, large, melancholy eyes. His legs had
become so frail and weak that they would hardly bear his weight as he
walked; and his clothes, though he had taken a fancy to throw aside
all that he had brought with him from England, hung so loose about
him that they seemed as though they would fall from him. Once she had
ventured to send out to him from Siena a doctor to whom she had been
recommended in Florence; but he had taken the visit in very bad part,
had told the gentleman that he had no need for any medical services,
and had been furious with her, because of her offence in having sent
such a visitor. He had told her that if ever she ventured to take
such a liberty again, he would demand the child back, and refuse her
permission inside the gates of Casalunga. "Don't come, at any rate,
till I send for you," Mrs. Trevelyan said in her last letter to her
sister. "Your being here would do no good, and would, I think, make
him feel that he was being watched. My hope is, at last, to get him
to return with me. If you were here, I think this would be less
likely. And then why should you be mixed up with such unutterable
sadness and distress more than is essentially necessary? My health
stands wonderfully well, though the heat here is very great. It is
cooler at Casalunga than in the town,--of which I am glad for his
sake. He perspires so profusely that it seems to me he cannot stand
the waste much longer. I know he will not go to England as long as
papa is there;--but I hope that he may be induced to do so by slow
stages as soon as he knows that papa has gone. Mind you send me a
newspaper, so that he may see it stated in print that papa has
sailed."
It followed as one consequence of these letters from Florence that
Nora was debarred from the Italian scheme as a mode of passing her
time till some house should be open for her reception. She had
suggested to Hugh that she might go for a few weeks to Nuncombe
Putney, but he had explained to her the nature of his mother's
cottage, and had told her that there was no hole there in which she
could lay her head. "There never was such a forlorn young woman,"
she said. "When papa goes I shall literally be without shelter."
There had come a letter from Mrs. Glascock,--at least it was signed
Caroline Glascock, though another name might have been used,--dated
from Milan, saying that they were hurrying back to Naples even at
that season of the year, because Lord Peterborough was dead. "And
she is Lady Peterborough!" said Lady Rowley, unable to repress the
expression of the old regrets. "Of course she is Lady Peterborough,
mamma; what else should she be?--though she does not so sign
herself." "We think," said the American peeress, "that we shall be
at Monkhams before the end of August, and Charles says that you are
to come just the same. There will be nobody else there, of course,
because of Lord Peterborough's death." "I saw it in the paper," said
Sir Marmaduke, "and quite forgot to mention it."
That same evening there was a long family discussion about Nora's
prospects. They were all together in the gloomy sitting-room at
Gregg's Hotel, and Sir Marmaduke had not yielded. The ladies had
begun to feel that it would be well not to press him to yield.
Practically he had yielded. There was now no question of cursing
and of so-called disinheritance. Nora was to remain in England, of
course with the intention of being married to Hugh Stanbury; and the
difficulty consisted in the need of an immediate home for her. It
wanted now but twelve days to that on which the family were to sail
from Southampton, and nothing had been settled. "If papa will allow
me something ever so small, and will trust me, I will live alone in
lodgings," said Nora.
"It is the maddest thing I ever heard," said Sir Marmaduke.
"Who would take care of you, Nora?" asked Lady Rowley.
"And who would walk about with you?" said Lucy.
"I don't see how it would be possible to live alone like that," said
Sophie.
"Nobody would take care of me, and nobody would walk about with me,
and I could live alone very well," said Nora. "I don't see why a
young woman is to be supposed to be so absolutely helpless as all
that comes to. Of course it won't be very nice,--but it need not be
for long."
"Why not for long?" asked Sir Marmaduke.
"Not for very long," said Nora.
"It does not seem to me," said Sir Marmaduke, after a considerable
pause, "that this gentleman himself is so particularly anxious for
the match. I have heard no day named, and no rational proposition
made."
"Papa, that is unfair, most unfair,--and ungenerous."
"Nora," said her mother, "do not speak in that way to your father."
"Mamma, it is unfair. Papa accuses Mr. Stanbury of being,--being
lukewarm and untrue,--of not being in earnest."
"I would rather that he were not in earnest," said Sir Marmaduke.
"Mr. Stanbury is ready at any time," continued Nora. "He would have
the banns at once read, and marry me in three weeks,--if I would let
him."
"Good gracious, Nora!" exclaimed Lady Rowley.
"But I have refused to name any day, or to make any arrangement,
because I did not wish to do so before papa had given his consent.
That is why things are in this way. If papa will but let me take a
room till I can go to Monkhams, I will have everything arranged from
there. You can trust Mr. Glascock for that, and you can trust her."
"I suppose your papa will make you some allowance," said Lady Rowley.
"She is entitled to nothing, as she has refused to go to her proper
home," said Sir Marmaduke.
The conversation, which had now become very disagreeable, was
not allowed to go any further. And it was well that it should be
interrupted. They all knew that Sir Marmaduke must be brought round
by degrees, and that both Nora and Lady Rowley had gone as far as was
prudent at present. But all trouble on this head was suddenly ended
for this evening by the entrance of the waiter with a telegram.
It was addressed to Lady Rowley, and she opened it with trembling
hands,--as ladies always do open telegrams. It was from Emily
Trevelyan. "Louis is much worse. Let somebody come to me. Hugh
Stanbury would be the best."
In a few minutes they were so much disturbed that no one quite knew
what should be done at once. Lady Rowley began by declaring that she
would go herself. Sir Marmaduke of course pointed out that this was
impossible, and suggested that he would send a lawyer. Nora professed
herself ready to start immediately on the journey, but was stopped by
a proposition from her sister Lucy that in that case Hugh Stanbury
would of course go with her. Lady Rowley asked whether Hugh would go,
and Nora asserted that he would go immediately as a matter of course.
She was sure he would go, let the people at the D. R. say what they
might. According to her there was always somebody at the call of the
editor of the D. R. to do the work of anybody else, when anybody else
wanted to go away. Sir Marmaduke shook his head, and was very uneasy.
He still thought that a lawyer would be best, feeling, no doubt, that
if Stanbury's services were used on such an occasion, there must be
an end of all opposition to the marriage. But before half-an-hour was
over Stanbury was sent for. The boots of the hotel went off in a cab
to the office of the D. R. with a note from Lady Rowley. "Dear Mr.
Stanbury,--We have had a telegram from Emily, and want to see you,
_at once_. Please come. We shall sit up and wait for you till you do
come.--E. R."
It was very distressing to them because, let the result be what it
might, it was all but impossible that Mrs. Trevelyan should be with
them before they had sailed, and it was quite out of the question
that they should now postpone their journey. Were Stanbury to start
by the morning train on the following day, he could not reach Siena
till the afternoon of the fourth day; and let the result be what
it might when he arrived there, it would be out of the question
that Emily Trevelyan should come back quite at once, or that she
should travel at the same speed. Of course they might hear again by
telegram, and also by letter; but they could not see her, or have any
hand in her plans. "If anything were to happen, she might have come
with us," said Lady Rowley.
"It is out of the question," said Sir Marmaduke gloomily. "I could
not give up the places I have taken."
"A few days more would have done it."
"I don't suppose she would wish to go," said Nora. "Of course she
would not take Louey there. Why should she? And then I don't suppose
he is so ill as that."
"There is no saying," said Sir Marmaduke. It was very evident
that, whatever might be Sir Marmaduke's opinion, he had no
strongly-developed wish for his son-in-law's recovery.
They all sat up waiting for Hugh Stanbury till eleven, twelve, one,
and two o'clock at night. The "boots" had returned, saying that Mr.
Stanbury had not been at the office of the newspaper, but that,
according to information received, he certainly would be there that
night. No other address had been given to the man, and the note had
therefore of necessity been left at the office. Sir Marmaduke became
very fretful, and was evidently desirous of being liberated from his
night watch. But he could not go himself, and shewed his impatience
by endeavouring to send the others away. Lady Rowley replied for
herself that she should certainly remain in her corner on the sofa
all night, if it were necessary; and as she slept very soundly in her
corner, her comfort was not much impaired. Nora was pertinacious in
refusing to go to bed. "I should only go to my own room, papa, and
remain there," she said. "Of course I must speak to him before he
goes." Sophie and Lucy considered that they had as much right to sit
up as Nora, and submitted to be called geese and idiots by their
father.
Sir Marmaduke had arisen with a snort from a short slumber, and
had just sworn that he and everybody else should go to bed, when
there came a ring at the front-door bell. The trusty boots had also
remained up, and in two minutes Hugh Stanbury was in the room. He
had to make his excuses before anything else could be said. When he
reached the D. R. office between ten and eleven, it was absolutely
incumbent on him to write a leading article before he left it. He
had been in the reporter's gallery of the House all the evening,
and he had come away laden with his article. "It was certainly
better that we should remain up, than that the whole town should be
disappointed," said Sir Marmaduke, with something of a sneer.
"It is so very, very good of you to come," said Nora.
"Indeed, it is," said Lady Rowley; "but we were quite sure you would
come." Having kissed and blessed him as her son-in-law, Lady Rowley
was now prepared to love him almost as well as though he had been
Lord Peterborough.
"Perhaps, Mr. Stanbury, we had better show you this telegram," said
Sir Marmaduke, who had been standing with the scrap of paper in his
hand since the ring of the bell had been heard. Hugh took the message
and read it. "I do not know what should have made my daughter mention
your name," continued Sir Marmaduke;--"but as she has done so, and as
perhaps the unfortunate invalid himself may have alluded to you, we
thought it best to send for you."
"No doubt it was best, Sir Marmaduke."
"We are so situated that I cannot go. It is absolutely necessary that
we should leave town for Southampton on Friday week. The ship sails
on Saturday."
"I will go as a matter of course," said Hugh. "I will start at
once,--at any time. To tell the truth, when I got Lady Rowley's note,
I thought that it was to be so. Trevelyan and I were very intimate at
one time, and it may be that he will receive me without displeasure."
There was much to be discussed, and considerable difficulty in
the discussion. This was enhanced, too, by the feeling in the
minds of all of them that Hugh and Sir Marmaduke would not meet
again,--probably for many years. Were they to part now on terms of
close affection, or were they to part almost as strangers? Had Lucy
and Sophie not persistently remained up, Nora would have faced the
difficulty, and taken the bull by the horns, and asked her father to
sanction her engagement in the presence of her lover. But she could
not do it before so many persons, even though the persons were her
own nearest relatives. And then there arose another embarrassment.
Sir Marmaduke, who had taught himself to believe that Stanbury
was so poor as hardly to have the price of a dinner in his
pocket,--although, in fact, our friend Hugh was probably the richer
man of the two,--said something about defraying the cost of the
journey. "It is taken altogether on our behalf," said Sir Marmaduke.
Hugh became red in the face, looked angry, and muttered a word or two
about Trevelyan being the oldest friend he had in the world,--"even
if there were nothing else." Sir Marmaduke felt ashamed of
himself,--without cause, indeed, for the offer was natural,--said
nothing further about it; but appeared to be more stiff and ungainly
than ever.
The Bradshaw was had out and consulted, and nearly half an hour
was spent in poring over that wondrous volume. It is the fashion
to abuse Bradshaw,--we speak now especially of Bradshaw the
Continental,--because all the minutest details of the autumn tour,
just as the tourist thinks that it may be made, cannot be made patent
to him at once without close research amidst crowded figures. After
much experience we make bold to say that Bradshaw knows more, and
will divulge more in a quarter of an hour, of the properest mode of
getting from any city in Europe to any other city more than fifty
miles distant, than can be learned in that first city in a single
morning with the aid of a courier, a carriage, a pair of horses, and
all the temper that any ordinary tourist possesses. The Bradshaw was
had out, and it was at last discovered that nothing could be gained
in the journey from London to Siena by starting in the morning.
Intending as he did to travel through without sleeping on the road,
Stanbury could not do better than leave London by the night mail
train, and this he determined to do. But when that was arranged, then
came the nature of his commission. What was he to do? No commission
could be given to him. A telegram should be sent to Emily the next
morning to say that he was coming; and then he would hurry on and
take his orders from her.
They were all in doubt, terribly in doubt, whether the aggravated
malady of which the telegram spoke was malady of the mind or of the
body. If of the former nature then the difficulty might be very great
indeed; and it would be highly expedient that Stanbury should have
some one in Italy to assist him. It was Nora who suggested that he
should carry a letter of introduction to Mr. Spalding, and it was she
who wrote it. Sir Marmaduke had not foregathered very closely with
the English Minister, and nothing was said of assistance that should
be peculiarly British. Then, at last, about three or four in the
morning came the moment for parting. Sir Marmaduke had suggested that
Stanbury should dine with them on the next day before he started, but
Hugh had declined, alleging that as the day was at his command it
must be devoted to the work of providing for his absence. In truth,
Sir Marmaduke had given the invitation with a surly voice, and Hugh,
though he was ready to go to the North Pole for any others of the
family, was at the moment in an aggressive mood of mind towards Sir
Marmaduke.
"I will send a message directly I get there," he said, holding Lady
Rowley by the hand, "and will write fully,--to you,--immediately."
"God bless you, my dear friend!" said Lady Rowley, crying.
"Good night, Sir Marmaduke," said Hugh.
"Good night, Mr. Stanbury."
Then he gave a hand to the two girls, each of whom, as she took it,
sobbed, and looked away from Nora. Nora was standing away from them,
by herself, and away from the door, holding on to her chair, and with
her hands clasped together. She had prepared nothing,--not a word, or
an attitude, not a thought, for his farewell. But she had felt that
it was coming, and had known that she must trust to him for a cue
for her own demeanour. If he could say adieu with a quiet voice, and
simply with a touch of the hand, then would she do the same,--and
endeavour to think no worse of him. Nor had he prepared anything; but
when the moment came he could not leave her after that fashion. He
stood a moment hesitating, not approaching her, and merely called her
by her name,--"Nora!" For a moment she was still; for a moment she
held by her chair; and then she rushed into his arms. He did not much
care for her father now, but kissed her hair and her forehead, and
held her closely to his bosom. "My own, own Nora!"
It was necessary that Sir Marmaduke should say something. There
was at first a little scene between all the women, during which he
arranged his deportment. "Mr. Stanbury," he said, "let it be so.
I could wish for my child's sake, and also for your own, that your
means of living were less precarious." Hugh accepted this simply as
an authority for another embrace, and then he allowed them all to go
to bed.
CHAPTER XCII.
TREVELYAN DISCOURSES ON LIFE.
Stanbury made his journey without pause or hindrance till he reached
Florence, and as the train for Siena made it necessary that he should
remain there for four or five hours, he went to an inn, and dressed
and washed himself, and had a meal, and was then driven to Mr.
Spalding's house. He found the American Minister at home, and was
received with cordiality; but Mr. Spalding could tell him little or
nothing about Trevelyan. They went up to Mrs. Spalding's room, and
Hugh was told by her that she had seen Mrs. Trevelyan once since her
niece's marriage, and that then she had represented her husband as
being very feeble. Hugh, in the midst of his troubles, was amused
by a second and a third, perhaps by a fourth, reference to "Lady
Peterborough." Mrs. Spalding's latest tidings as to the Trevelyans
had been received through "Lady Peterborough" from Nora Rowley. "Lady
Peterborough" was at the present moment at Naples, but was expected
to pass north through Florence in a day or two. They, the Spaldings
themselves, were kept in Florence in this very hot weather by this
circumstance. They were going up to the Tyrolese mountains for a
few weeks as soon as "Lady Peterborough" should have left them for
England. "Lady Peterborough" would have been so happy to make Mr.
Stanbury's acquaintance, and to have heard something direct from
her friend Nora. Then Mrs. Spalding smiled archly, showing thereby
that she knew all about Hugh Stanbury and his relation to Nora
Rowley. From all which, and in accordance with the teaching which
we got,--alas, now many years ago,--from a great master on the
subject, we must conclude that poor, dear Mrs. Spalding was a snob.
Nevertheless, with all deference to the memory of that great master,
we think that Mrs. Spalding's allusions to the success in life
achieved by her niece were natural and altogether pardonable; and
that reticence on the subject,--a calculated determination to
abstain from mentioning a triumph which must have been very dear to
her,--would have betrayed on the whole a condition of mind lower than
that which she exhibited. While rank, wealth, and money are held to
be good things by all around us, let them be acknowledged as such. It
is natural that a mother should be as proud when her daughter marries
an Earl's heir as when her son becomes Senior Wrangler; and when we
meet a lady in Mrs. Spalding's condition who purposely abstains from
mentioning the name of her titled daughter, we shall be disposed to
judge harshly of the secret workings of that lady's thoughts on the
subject. We prefer the exhibition, which we feel to be natural. Mr.
Spalding got our friend by the button-hole, and was making him a
speech on the perilous condition in which Mrs. Trevelyan was placed;
but Stanbury, urged by the circumstances of his position, pulled out
his watch, pleaded the hour, and escaped.
He found Mrs. Trevelyan waiting for him at the station at Siena.
He would hardly have known her,--not from any alteration that was
physically personal to herself, not that she had become older in
face, or thin, or grey, or sickly,--but that the trouble of her
life had robbed her for the time of that brightness of apparel, of
that pride of feminine gear, of that sheen of high-bred womanly
bearing with which our wives and daughters are so careful to invest
themselves. She knew herself to be a wretched woman, whose work in
life now was to watch over a poor prostrate wretch, and who had
thrown behind her all ideas of grace and beauty. It was not quickly
that this condition had come upon her. She had been unhappy at
Nuncombe Putney; but unhappiness had not then told upon the outward
woman. She had been more wretched still at St. Diddulph's, and all
the outward circumstances of life in her uncle's parsonage had been
very wearisome to her; but she had striven against it all, and the
sheen and outward brightness had still been there. After that her
child had been taken from her, and the days which she had passed in
Manchester Street had been very grievous;--but even yet she had not
given way. It was not till her child had been brought back to her,
and she had seen the life which her husband was living, and that her
anger,--hot anger,--had been changed to pity, and that with pity love
had returned, it was not till this point had come in her sad life
that her dress became always black and sombre, that a veil habitually
covered her face, that a bonnet took the place of the jaunty hat that
she had worn, and that the prettinesses of her life were lain aside.
"It is very good of you to come," she said; "very good. I hardly knew
what to do, I was so wretched. On the day that I sent he was so bad
that I was obliged to do something." Stanbury, of course, inquired
after Trevelyan's health, as they were being driven up to Mrs.
Trevelyan's lodgings. On the day on which she had sent the telegram
her husband had again been furiously angry with her. She had
interfered, or had endeavoured to interfere, in some arrangements as
to his health and comfort, and he had turned upon her with an order
that the child should be at once sent back to him, and that she
should immediately quit Siena. "When I said that Louey could not be
sent,--and who could send a child into such keeping,--he told me
that I was the basest liar that ever broke a promise, and the vilest
traitor that had ever returned evil for good. I was never to come to
him again,--never; and the gate of the house would be closed against
me if I appeared there."
On the next day she had gone again, however, and had seen him, and
had visited him on every day since. Nothing further had been said
about the child, and he had now become almost too weak for violent
anger. "I told him you were coming, and though he would not say so,
I think he is glad of it. He expects you to-morrow."
"I will go this evening, if he will let me."
"Not to-night. I think he goes to bed almost as the sun sets. I am
never there myself after four or five in the afternoon. I told him
that you should be there to-morrow,--alone. I have hired a little
carriage, and you can take it. He said specially that I was not
to come with you. Papa goes certainly on next Saturday?" It was a
Saturday now,--this day on which Stanbury had arrived at Siena.
"He leaves town on Friday."
"You must make him believe that. Do not tell him suddenly, but bring
it in by degrees. He thinks that I am deceiving him. He would go back
if he knew that papa were gone."
They spent a long evening together, and Stanbury learned all that
Mrs. Trevelyan could tell him of her husband's state. There was no
doubt, she said, that his reason was affected; but she thought the
state of his mind was diseased in a ratio the reverse of that of his
body, and that when he was weakest in health, then were his ideas the
most clear and rational. He never now mentioned Colonel Osborne's
name, but would refer to the affairs of the last two years as though
they had been governed by an inexorable Fate which had utterly
destroyed his happiness without any fault on his part. "You may be
sure," she said, "that I never accuse him. Even when he says terrible
things of me,--which he does,--I never excuse myself. I do not think
I should answer a word, if he called me the vilest thing on earth."
Before they parted for the night many questions were of course asked
about Nora, and Hugh described the condition in which he and she
stood to each other. "Papa has consented, then?"
"Yes,--at four o'clock in the morning,--just as I was leaving them."
"And when is it to be?"
"Nothing has been settled, and I do not as yet know where she will go
to when they leave London. I think she will visit Monkhams when the
Glascock people return to England."
"What an episode in life,--to go and see the place, when it might all
now have been hers!"
"I suppose I ought to feel dreadfully ashamed of myself for having
marred such promotion," said Hugh.
"Nora is such a singular girl;--so firm, so headstrong, so good, and
so self-reliant that she will do as well with a poor man as she would
have done with a rich. Shall I confess to you that I did wish that
she should accept Mr. Glascock, and that I pressed it on her very
strongly? You will not be angry with me?"
"I am only the more proud of her;--and of myself."
"When she was told of all that he had to give in the way of wealth
and rank, she took the bit between her teeth and would not be turned
an inch. Of course she was in love."
"I hope she may never regret it;--that is all."
"She must change her nature first. Everything she sees at Monkhams
will make her stronger in her choice. With all her girlish ways, she
is like a rock;--nothing can move her."
Early on the next morning Hugh started alone for Casalunga, having
first, however, seen Mrs. Trevelyan. He took out with him certain
little things for the sick man's table;--as to which, however, he
was cautioned to say not a word to the sick man himself. And it was
arranged that he should endeavour to fix a day for Trevelyan's return
to England. That was to be the one object in view. "If we could get
him to England," she said, "he and I would, at any rate, be together,
and gradually he would be taught to submit himself to advice." Before
ten in the morning, Stanbury was walking up the hill to the house,
and wondering at the dreary, hot, hopeless desolation of the spot.
It seemed to him that no one could live alone in such a place, in
such weather, without being driven to madness. The soil was parched
and dusty, as though no drop of rain had fallen there for months.
The lizards, glancing in and out of the broken walls, added to the
appearance of heat. The vegetation itself was of a faded yellowish
green, as though the glare of the sun had taken the fresh colour out
of it. There was a noise of grasshoppers and a hum of flies in the
air, hardly audible, but all giving evidence of the heat. Not a human
voice was to be heard, nor the sound of a human foot, and there was
no shelter; but the sun blazed down full upon everything. He took
off his hat, and rubbed his head with his handkerchief as he struck
the door with his stick. Oh God, to what misery had a little folly
brought two human beings who had had every blessing that the world
could give within their reach!
In a few minutes he was conducted through the house, and found
Trevelyan seated in a chair under the verandah which looked down
upon the olive trees. He did not even get up from his seat, but put
out his left hand and welcomed his old friend. "Stanbury," he said,
"I am glad to see you,--for auld lang syne's sake. When I found
out this retreat, I did not mean to have friends round me here.
I wanted to try what solitude was;--and, by heaven, I've tried
it!" He was dressed in a bright Italian dressing-gown or woollen
paletot,--Italian, as having been bought in Italy, though, doubtless,
it had come from France,--and on his feet he had green worked
slippers, and on his head a brocaded cap. He had made but little
other preparation for his friend in the way of dressing. His long
dishevelled hair came down over his neck, and his beard covered his
face. Beneath his dressing-gown he had on a night-shirt and drawers,
and was as dirty in appearance as he was gaudy in colours. "Sit
down and let us two moralise," he said. "I spend my life here doing
nothing,--nothing,--nothing; while you cudgel your brain from day
to day to mislead the British public. Which of us two is taking the
nearest road to the devil?"
Stanbury seated himself in a second arm-chair, which there was there
in the verandah, and looked as carefully as he dared to do at his
friend. There could be no mistake as to the restless gleam of that
eye. And then the affected air of ease, and the would-be cynicism,
and the pretence of false motives, all told the same story. "They
used to tell us," said Stanbury, "that idleness is the root of all
evil."
"They have been telling us since the world began so many lies, that I
for one have determined never to believe anything again. Labour leads
to greed, and greed to selfishness, and selfishness to treachery,
and treachery straight to the devil,--straight to the devil. Ha, my
friend, all your leading articles won't lead you out of that. What's
the news? Who's alive? Who dead? Who in? Who out? What think you of
a man who has not seen a newspaper for two months; and who holds no
conversation with the world further than is needed for the cooking of
his polenta and the cooling of his modest wine-flask?"
"You see your wife sometimes," said Stanbury.
"My wife! Now, my friend, let us drop that subject. Of all topics of
talk it is the most distressing to man in general, and I own that
I am no exception to the lot. Wives, Stanbury, are an evil, more
or less necessary to humanity, and I own to being one who has not
escaped. The world must be populated, though for what reason one does
not see. I have helped,--to the extent of one male bantling; and if
you are one who consider population desirable, I will express my
regret that I should have done no more."
It was very difficult to force Trevelyan out of this humour, and it
was not till Stanbury had risen apparently to take his leave that he
found it possible to say a word as to his mission there. "Don't you
think you would be happier at home?" he asked.
"Where is my home, Sir Knight of the midnight pen?"
"England is your home, Trevelyan."
"No, sir; England was my home once; but I have taken the liberty
accorded to me by my Creator of choosing a new country. Italy is now
my nation, and Casalunga is my home."
"Every tie you have in the world is in England."
"I have no tie, sir;--no tie anywhere. It has been my study to untie
all the ties; and, by Jove, I have succeeded. Look at me here. I have
got rid of the trammels pretty well,--haven't I?--have unshackled
myself, and thrown off the paddings, and the wrappings, and the
swaddling clothes. I have got rid of the conventionalities, and can
look Nature straight in the face. I don't even want the Daily Record,
Stanbury;--think of that!"
Stanbury paced the length of the terrace, and then stopped for a
moment down under the blaze of the sun, in order that he might think
how to address this philosopher. "Have you heard," he said at last,
"that I am going to marry your sister-in-law, Nora Rowley?"
"Then there will be two more full-grown fools in the world certainly,
and probably an infinity of young fools coming afterwards. Excuse me,
Stanbury, but this solitude is apt to make one plain-spoken."
"I got Sir Marmaduke's sanction the day before I left."
"Then you got the sanction of an illiterate, ignorant,
self-sufficient, and most contemptible old man; and much good may it
do you."
"Let him be what he may, I was glad to have it. Most probably I shall
never see him again. He sails from Southampton for the Mandarins on
this day week."
"He does,--does he? May the devil sail along with him!--that is all I
say. And does my much-respected and ever-to-be-beloved mother-in-law
sail with him?"
"They all return together,--except Nora."
"Who remains to comfort you? I hope you may be comforted;--that is
all. Don't be too particular. Let her choose her own friends, and go
her own gait, and have her own way, and do you be blind and deaf and
dumb and properly submissive; and it may be that she'll give you your
breakfast and dinner in your own house,--so long as your hours don't
interfere with her pleasures. If she should even urge you beside
yourself by her vanity, folly, and disobedience,--so that at last you
are driven to express your feeling,--no doubt she will come to you
after a while and tell you with the sweetest condescension that she
forgives you. When she has been out of your house for a twelvemonth
or more, she will offer to come back to you, and to forget
everything,--on condition that you will do exactly as she bids you
for the future."
This attempt at satire, so fatuous, so plain, so false, together
with the would-be jaunty manner of the speaker, who, however, failed
repeatedly in his utterances from sheer physical exhaustion, was
excessively painful to Stanbury. What can one do at any time with a
madman? "I mentioned my marriage," said he, "to prove my right to
have an additional interest in your wife's happiness."
"You are quite welcome, whether you marry the other one or
not;--welcome to take any interest you please. I have got beyond all
that, Stanbury;--yes, by Jove, a long way beyond all that."
"You have not got beyond loving your wife, and your child,
Trevelyan?"
"Upon my word, yes;--I think I have. There may be a grain of weakness
left, you know. But what have you to do with my love for my wife?"
"I was thinking more just now of her love for you. There she is at
Siena. You cannot mean that she should remain there?"
"Certainly not. What the deuce is there to keep her there?"
"Come with her then to England."
"Why should I go to England with her? Because you bid me, or because
she wishes it,--or simply because England is the most damnable,
puritanical, God-forgotten, and stupid country on the face of the
globe? I know no other reason for going to England. Will you take a
glass of wine, Stanbury?" Hugh declined the offer. "You will excuse
me," continued Trevelyan; "I always take a glass of wine at this
hour." Then he rose from his chair, and helped himself from a
cupboard that was near at hand. Stanbury, watching him as he filled
his glass, could see that his legs were hardly strong enough to carry
him. And Stanbury saw, moreover, that the unfortunate man took two
glasses out of the bottle. "Go to England indeed. I do not think much
of this country; but it is, at any rate, better than England."
Hugh perceived that he could do nothing more on the present occasion.
Having heard so much of Trevelyan's debility, he had been astonished
to hear the man speak with so much volubility and attempts at
high-flown spirit. Before he had taken the wine he had almost sunk
into his chair, but still he had continued to speak with the same
fluent would-be cynicism. "I will come and see you again," said Hugh,
getting up to take his departure.
"You might as well save your trouble, Stanbury; but you can come if
you please, you know. If you should find yourself locked out, you
won't be angry. A hermit such as I am must assume privileges."
"I won't be angry," said Hugh, good humouredly.
"I can smell what you are come about," said Trevelyan. "You and my
wife want to take me away from here among you, and I think it best to
stay here. I don't want much for myself, and why should I not live
here? My wife can remain at Siena if she pleases, or she can go to
England if she pleases. She must give me the same liberty;--the same
liberty,--the same liberty." After this he fell a-coughing violently,
and Stanbury thought it better to leave him. He had been at Casalunga
about two hours, and did not seem as yet to have done any good.
He had been astonished both by Trevelyan's weakness, and by his
strength; by his folly, and by his sharpness. Hitherto he could see
no way for his future sister-in-law out of her troubles.
When he was with her at Siena, he described what had taken place
with all the accuracy in his power. "He has intermittent days,"
said Emily. "To-morrow he will be in quite another frame of
mind,--melancholy, silent perhaps, and self-reproachful. We will
both go to-morrow, and we shall find probably that he has forgotten
altogether what has passed to-day between you and him."
So their plans for the morrow were formed.
CHAPTER XCIII.
"SAY THAT YOU FORGIVE ME."
[Illustration]
On the following day, again early in the morning, Mrs. Trevelyan and
Stanbury were driven out to Casalunga. The country people along the
road knew the carriage well, and the lady who occupied it, and would
say that the English wife was going to see her mad husband. Mrs.
Trevelyan knew that these words were common in the people's mouths,
and explained to her companion how necessary it would be to use these
rumours, to aid her in putting some restraint over her husband even
in this country, should they fail in their effort to take him to
England. She saw the doctor in Siena constantly, and had learned from
him how such steps might be taken. The measure proposed would be
slow, difficult, inefficient, and very hard to set aside, if once
taken;--but still it might be indispensable that something should be
done. "He would be so much worse off here than he would be at home,"
she said;--"if we could only make him understand that it would be
so." Then Stanbury asked about the wine. It seemed that of late
Trevelyan had taken to drink freely, but only of the wine of the
country. But the wine of the country in these parts is sufficiently
stimulating, and Mrs. Trevelyan acknowledged that hence had arisen a
further cause of fear.
They walked up the hill together, and Mrs. Trevelyan, now well
knowing the ways of the place, went round at once to the front
terrace. There he was, seated in his arm-chair, dressed in the same
way as yesterday, dirty, dishevelled, and gaudy with various colours;
but Stanbury could see at once that his mood had greatly changed. He
rose slowly, dragging himself up out of his chair, as they came up to
him, but shewing as he did so,--and perhaps somewhat assuming,--the
impotency of querulous sickness. His wife went to him, and took him
by the hand, and placed him back in his chair. He was weak, he said,
and had not slept, and suffered from the heat; and then he begged her
to give him wine. This she did, half filling for him a tumbler, of
which he swallowed the contents greedily. "You see me very poorly,
Stanbury,--very poorly," he said, seeming to ignore all that had
taken place on the previous day.
"You want change of climate, old fellow," said Stanbury.
"Change of everything;--I want change of everything," he said. "If
I could have a new body and a new mind, and a new soul!"
"The mind and soul, dear, will do well enough, if you will let us
look after the body," said his wife, seating herself on a stool near
his feet. Stanbury, who had settled beforehand how he would conduct
himself, took out a cigar and lighted it;--and then they sat together
silent, or nearly silent, for half an hour. She had said that if Hugh
would do so, Trevelyan would soon become used to the presence of his
old friend, and it seemed that he had already done so. More than
once, when he coughed, his wife fetched him some drink in a cup,
which he took from her without a word. And Stanbury the while went on
smoking in silence.
"You have heard, Louis," she said at last, "that, after all, Nora and
Mr. Stanbury are going to be married?"
"Ah;--yes; I think I was told of it. I hope you may be happy,
Stanbury;--happier than I have been." This was unfortunate, but
neither of the visitors winced, or said a word.
"It will be a pity that papa and mamma cannot be present at the
wedding," said Mrs. Trevelyan.
"If I had to do it again, I should not regret your father's absence;
I must say that. He has been my enemy. Yes, Stanbury,--my enemy. I
don't care who hears me say so. I am obliged to stay here, because
that man would swear every shilling I have away from me if I were in
England. He would strive to do so, and the struggle in my state of
health would be too much for me."
"But Sir Marmaduke sails from Southampton this very week," said
Stanbury.
"I don't know. He is always sailing, and always coming back again. I
never asked him for a shilling in my life, and yet he has treated me
as though I were his bitterest enemy."
"He will trouble you no more now, Louis," said Mrs. Trevelyan.
"He cannot trouble you again. He will have left England before you
can possibly reach it."
"He will have left other traitors behind him,--though none as bad as
himself," said Trevelyan.
Stanbury, when his cigar was finished, rose and left the husband and
wife together on the terrace. There was little enough to be seen at
Casalunga, but he strolled about looking at the place. He went into
the huge granary, and then down among the olive trees, and up into
the sheds which had been built for beasts. He stood and teased the
lizards, and listened to the hum of the insects, and wiped away the
perspiration which rose to his brow even as he was standing. And all
the while he was thinking what he would do next, or what say next,
with the view of getting Trevelyan away from the place. Hitherto he
had been very tender with him, contradicting him in nothing, taking
from him good humouredly any absurd insult which he chose to offer,
pressing upon him none of the evil which he had himself occasioned,
saying to him no word that could hurt either his pride or his
comfort. But he could not see that this would be efficacious for the
purpose desired. He had come thither to help Nora's sister in her
terrible distress, and he must take upon himself to make some plan
for giving this aid. When he had thought of all this and made his
plan, he sauntered back round the house on to the terrace. She was
still there, sitting at her husband's feet, and holding one of his
hands in hers. It was well that the wife should be tender, but he
doubted whether tenderness would suffice.
"Trevelyan," he said, "you know why I have come over here?"
"I suppose she told you to come," said Trevelyan.
"Well; yes; she did tell me. I came to try and get you back to
England. If you remain here, the climate and solitude together will
kill you."
"As for the climate, I like it;--and as for solitude, I have got used
even to that."
"And then there is another thing," said Stanbury.
"What is that?" asked Trevelyan, starting.
"You are not safe here."
"How not safe?"
"She could not tell you, but I must." His wife was still holding his
hand, and he did not at once attempt to withdraw it; but he raised
himself in his chair, and fixed his eyes fiercely on Stanbury. "They
will not let you remain here quietly," said Stanbury.
"Who will not?"
"The Italians. They are already saying that you are not fit to be
alone; and if once they get you into their hands,--under some Italian
medical board, perhaps into some Italian asylum, it might be years
before you could get out,--if ever. I have come to tell you what the
danger is. I do not know whether you will believe me."
"Is it so?" he said, turning to his wife.
"I believe it is, Louis."
"And who has told them? Who has been putting them up to it?" Now his
hand had been withdrawn. "My God, am I to be followed here too with
such persecution as this?"
"Nobody has told them,--but people have eyes."
"Liar, traitor, fiend!--it is you!" he said, turning upon his wife.
"Louis, as I hope for mercy, I have said not a word to any one that
could injure you."
"Trevelyan, do not be so unjust, and so foolish," said Stanbury. "It
is not her doing. Do you suppose that you can live here like this
and give rise to no remarks? Do you think that people's eyes are not
open, and that their tongues will not speak? I tell you, you are in
danger here."
"What am I to do? Where am I to go? Can not they let me stay till I
die? Whom am I hurting here? She may have all my money, if she wants
it. She has got my child."
"I want nothing, Louis, but to take you where you may be safe and
well."
"Why are you afraid of going to England?" Stanbury asked.
"Because they have threatened to put me--in a madhouse."
"Nobody ever thought of so treating you," said his wife.
"Your father did,--and your mother. They told me so."
"Look here, Trevelyan. Sir Marmaduke and Lady Rowley are gone. They
will have sailed, at least, before we can reach England. Whatever may
have been either their wishes or their power, they can do nothing
now. Here something would be done,--very soon; you may take my word
for that. If you will return with me and your wife, you shall choose
your own place of abode. Is not that so, Emily?"
"He shall choose everything. His boy will be with him, and I will be
with him, and he shall be contradicted in nothing. If he only knew my
heart towards him!"
"You hear what she says, Trevelyan?"
"Yes; I hear her."
"And you believe her?"
"I'm not so sure of that. Stanbury, how should you like to be locked
up in a madhouse and grin through the bars till your heart was
broken? It would not take long with me, I know."
"You shall never be locked up;--never be touched," said his wife.
"I am very harmless here," he said, almost crying; "very harmless. I
do not think anybody here will touch me," he added, afterwards. "And
there are other places. There are other places. My God, that I should
be driven about the world like this!" The conference was ended by his
saying that he would take two days to think of it, and by his then
desiring that they would both leave him. They did so, and descended
the hill together, knowing that he was watching them,--that he would
watch them till they were out of sight from the gate;--for, as Mrs.
Trevelyan said, he never came down the hill now, knowing that the
labour of ascending it was too much for him. When they were at the
carriage they were met by one of the women of the house, and strict
injunctions were given to her by Mrs. Trevelyan to send on word
to Siena if the Signore should prepare to move. "He cannot go far
without my knowing it," said she, "because he draws his money in
Siena, and lately I have taken to him what he wants. He has not
enough with him for a long journey." For Stanbury had suggested that
he might be off to seek another residence in another country, and
that they would find Casalunga vacant when they reached it on the
following Tuesday. But he told himself almost immediately,--not
caring to express such an opinion to Emily,--that Trevelyan would
hardly have strength even to prepare for such a journey by himself.
On the intervening day, the Monday, Stanbury had no occupation
whatever, and he thought that since he was born no day had ever been
so long. Siena contains many monuments of interest, and much that is
valuable in art,--having had a school of painting of its own, and
still retaining in its public gallery specimens of its school, of
which as a city it is justly proud. There are palaces there to be
beaten for gloomy majesty by none in Italy. There is a cathedral
which was to have been the largest in the world, and than which few
are more worthy of prolonged inspection. The town is old, and quaint,
and picturesque, and dirty, and attractive,--as it becomes a town in
Italy to be. But in July all such charms are thrown away. In July
Italy is not a land of charms to an Englishman. Poor Stanbury did
wander into the cathedral, and finding it the coolest place in the
town, went to sleep on a stone step. He was awoke by the voice of the
priests as they began to chant the vespers. The good-natured Italians
had let him sleep, and would have let him sleep till the doors were
closed for the night. At five he dined with Mrs. Trevelyan, and then
endeavoured to while away the evening thinking of Nora with a pipe in
his mouth. He was standing in this way at the hotel gateway, when, on
a sudden, all Siena was made alive by the clatter of an open carriage
and four on its way through the town to the railway. On looking up,
Stanbury saw Lord Peterborough in the carriage,--with a lady whom
he did not doubt to be Lord Peterborough's wife. He himself had not
been recognised, but he slowly followed the carriage to the railway
station. After the Italian fashion, the arrival was three-quarters
of an hour before the proper time, and Stanbury had full opportunity
of learning their news and telling his own. They were coming up from
Rome, and thought it preferable to take the route by Siena than to
use the railway through the Maremma; and they intended to reach
Florence that night.
"And do you think he is really mad?" asked Lady Peterborough.
"He is undoubtedly so mad as to be unfit to manage anything for
himself, but he is not in such a condition that any one would wish to
see him put into confinement. If he were raving mad there would be
less difficulty, though there might be more distress."
A great deal was said about Nora, and both Lord Peterborough and his
wife insisted that the marriage should take place at Monkhams. "We
shall be home now in less than three weeks," said Caroline, "and she
must come to us at once. But I will write to her from Florence, and
tell her how we saw you smoking your pipe under the archway. Not that
my husband knew you in the least."
"Upon my word no," said the husband,--"one didn't expect to find you
here. Good-bye. I hope you may succeed in getting him home. I went
to him once, but could do very little." Then the train started, and
Stanbury went back to Mrs. Trevelyan.
On the next day Stanbury went out to Casalunga alone. He had
calculated, on leaving England, that if any good might be done
at Siena it could be done in three days, and that he would have
been able to start on his return on the Wednesday morning,--or on
Wednesday evening at the latest. But now there did not seem to be any
chance of that;--and he hardly knew how to guess when he might get
away. He had sent a telegram to Lady Rowley after his first visit,
in which he had simply said that things were not at all changed at
Casalunga, and he had written to Nora each day since his arrival. His
stay was prolonged at great expense and inconvenience to himself;
and yet it was impossible that he should go and leave his work half
finished. As he walked up the hill to the house he felt very angry
with Trevelyan, and prepared himself to use hard words and dreadful
threats. But at the very moment of his entrance on the terrace,
Trevelyan professed himself ready to go to England. "That's right,
old fellow," said Hugh. "I am so glad." But in expressing his joy he
had hardly noticed Trevelyan's voice and appearance.
"I might as well go," he said. "It matters little where I am, or
whether they say that I am mad or sane."
"When we have you over there, nobody shall say a word that is
disagreeable."
"I only hope that you may not have the trouble of burying me on the
road. You don't know, Stanbury, how ill I am. I cannot eat. If I
were at the bottom of that hill, I could no more walk up it than I
could fly. I cannot sleep, and at night my bed is wet through with
perspiration. I can remember nothing,--nothing but what I ought to
forget."
"We'll put you on to your legs again when we get you to your own
climate."
"I shall be a poor traveller,--a poor traveller; but I will do my
best."
When would he start? That was the next question. Trevelyan asked for
a week, and Stanbury brought him down at last to three days. They
would go to Florence by the evening train on Friday, and sleep there.
Emily should come out and assist him to arrange his things on the
morrow. Having finished so much of his business, Stanbury returned to
Siena.
They both feared that he might be found on the next day to have
departed from his intention; but no such idea seemed to have occurred
to him. He gave instructions as to the notice to be served on the
agent from the Hospital as to his house, and allowed Emily to go
among his things and make preparations for the journey. He did not
say much to her; and when she attempted, with a soft half-uttered
word, to assure him that the threat of Italian interference, which
had come from Stanbury, had not reached Stanbury from her, he simply
shook his head sadly. She could not understand whether he did not
believe her, or whether he simply wished that the subject should be
dropped. She could elicit no sign of affection from him, nor would he
willingly accept such from her;--but he allowed her to prepare for
the journey, and never hinted that his purpose might again be liable
to change. On the Friday, Emily with her child, and Hugh with all
their baggage, travelled out on the road to Casalunga, thinking it
better that there should be no halt in the town on their return.
At Casalunga, Hugh went up the hill with the driver, leaving Mrs.
Trevelyan in the carriage. He had been out at the house before in the
morning, and had given all necessary orders;--but still at the last
moment he thought that there might be failure. But Trevelyan was
ready, having dressed himself up with a laced shirt, and changed his
dressing-gown for a blue frock-coat, and his brocaded cap for a Paris
hat, very pointed before and behind, and closely turned up at the
sides. But Stanbury did not in the least care for his friend's dress.
"Take my arm," he said, "and we will go down, fair and easy. Emily
would not come up because of the heat." He suffered himself to be
led, or almost carried down the hill; and three women, and the
coachman, and an old countryman who worked on the farm, followed with
the luggage. It took about an hour and a half to pack the things; but
at last they were all packed, and corded, and bound together with
sticks, as though it were intended that they should travel in that
form to Moscow. Trevelyan the meanwhile sat on a chair which had been
brought out for him from one of the cottages, and his wife stood
beside him with her boy. "Now then we are ready," said Stanbury. And
in that way they bade farewell to Casalunga. Trevelyan sat speechless
in the carriage, and would not even notice the child. He seemed to be
half dreaming and to fix his eyes on vacancy. "He appears to think of
nothing now," Emily said that evening to Stanbury. But who can tell
how busy and how troubled are the thoughts of a madman!
They had now succeeded in their object of inducing their patient to
return with them to England; but what were they to do with him when
they had reached home with him? They rested only a night at Florence;
but they found their fellow-traveller so weary, that they were unable
to get beyond Bologna on the second day. Many questions were asked
of him as to where he himself would wish to take up his residence in
England; but it was found almost impossible to get an answer. Once
he suggested that he would like to go back to Mrs. Fuller's cottage
at Willesden, from whence they concluded that he would wish to live
somewhere out of London. On his first day's journey, he was moody
and silent,--wilfully assuming the airs of a much-injured person. He
spoke hardly at all, and would notice nothing that was said to him by
his wife. He declared once that he regarded Stanbury as his keeper,
and endeavoured to be disagreeable and sullenly combative; but on
the second day, he was too weak for this, and accepted, without
remonstrance, the attentions that were paid to him. At Bologna they
rested a day, and from thence both Stanbury and Mrs. Trevelyan wrote
to Nora. They did not know where she might be now staying, but the
letters, by agreement, were addressed to Gregg's Hotel. It was
suggested that lodgings, or, if possible, a small furnished house,
should be taken in the neighbourhood of Mortlake, Richmond, or
Teddington, and that a telegram as well as a letter should be sent to
them at the Paris hotel. As they could not travel quick, there might
be time enough for them in this way to know whither they should go on
their reaching London.
They stayed a day at Bologna, and then they went on again,--to Turin,
over the mountains to Chambery, thence to Dijon, and on to Paris. At
Chambery they remained a couple of days, fancying that the air there
was cool, and that the delay would be salutary to the sick man. At
Turin, finding that they wanted further assistance, they had hired
a courier, and at last Trevelyan allowed himself to be carried in
and out of the carriages and up and down the hotel stairs almost as
though he were a child. The delay was terribly grievous to Stanbury,
and Mrs. Trevelyan, perceiving this more than once, begged him to
leave them, and to allow her to finish the journey with the aid
of the courier. But this he could not do. He wrote letters to
his friends at the D. R. office, explaining his position as well
as he could, and suggesting that this and that able assistant
should enlighten the British people on this and that subject,
which would,--in the course of nature, as arranged at the D. R.
office,--have fallen into his hands. He and Mrs. Trevelyan became
as brother and sister to each other on their way home,--as, indeed,
it was natural that they should do. Were they doing right or wrong
in this journey that they were taking? They could not conceal from
themselves that the labour was almost more than the poor wretch could
endure; and that it might be, as he himself had suggested, that they
would be called on to bury him on the road. But that residence at
Casalunga had been so terrible,--the circumstances of it, including
the solitude, sickness, madness, and habits of life of the wretched
hermit, had been so dangerous,--the probability of interference on
the part of some native authority so great, and the chance of the
house being left in Trevelyan's possession so small, that it had
seemed to him that they had no other alternative; and yet, how would
it be if they were killing him by the toil of travelling? From
Chambery, they made the journey to Paris in two days, and during that
time Trevelyan hardly opened his mouth. He slept much, and ate better
than he had done in the hotter climate on the other side of the Alps.
They found a telegram at Paris, which simply contained the promise
of a letter for the next day. It had been sent by Nora, before she
had gone out on her search. But it contained one morsel of strange
information; "Lady Milborough is going with me." On the next day
they got a letter, saying that a cottage had been taken, furnished,
between Richmond and Twickenham. Lady Milborough had known of the
cottage, and everything would be ready then. Nora would herself meet
them at the station in London, if they would, as she proposed, stay
a night at Dover. They were to address to her at Lady Milborough's
house, in Eccleston Square. In that case, she would have a carriage
for them at the Victoria Station, and would go down with them at once
to the cottage.
There were to be two days more of weary travelling, and then they
were to be at home again. She and he would have a house together as
husband and wife, and the curse of their separation would, at any
rate, be over. Her mind towards him had changed altogether since
the days in which she had been so indignant, because he had set a
policeman to watch over her. All feeling of anger was over with her
now. There is nothing that a woman will not forgive a man, when he is
weaker than she is herself.
The journey was made first to Dover, and then to London. Once, as
they were making their way through the Kentish hop-fields, he put
out his hand feebly, and touched hers. They had the carriage to
themselves, and she was down on her knees before him instantly. "Oh,
Louis! Oh, Louis! say that you forgive me!" What could a woman do
more than that in her mercy to a man?
"Yes;--yes; yes," he said; "but do not talk now; I am so tired."
CHAPTER XCIV.
A REAL CHRISTIAN.
In the meantime the Rowleys were gone. On the Monday after the
departure of Stanbury for Italy, Lady Rowley had begun to look the
difficulty about Nora in the face, and to feel that she must do
something towards providing the poor girl with a temporary home.
Everybody had now agreed that she was to marry Hugh Stanbury as soon
as Hugh Stanbury could be ready, and it was not to be thought of that
she should be left out in the world as one in disgrace or under a
cloud. But what was to be done? Sir Marmaduke was quite incapable of
suggesting anything. He would make her an allowance, and leave her a
small sum of ready money;--but as to residence, he could only suggest
again and again that she should be sent to Mrs. Outhouse. Now Lady
Rowley was herself not very fond of Mrs. Outhouse, and she was aware
that Nora herself was almost as averse to St. Diddulph's as she was
to the Mandarins. Nora already knew that she had the game in her
own hands. Once when in her presence her father suggested the near
relationship and prudent character and intense respectability of Mrs.
Outhouse, Nora, who was sitting behind Sir Marmaduke, shook her head
at her mother, and Lady Rowley knew that Nora would not go to St.
Diddulph's. This was the last occasion on which that proposition was
discussed.
Throughout all the Trevelyan troubles Lady Milborough had continued
to shew a friendly anxiety on behalf of Emily Trevelyan. She had
called once or twice on Lady Rowley, and Lady Rowley had of course
returned the visits. She had been forward in expressing her belief
that in truth the wife had been but little if at all to blame,
and had won her way with Lady Rowley, though she had never been
a favourite with either of Lady Rowley's daughters. Now, in her
difficulty, Lady Rowley went to Lady Milborough, and returned with
an invitation that Nora should come to Eccleston Square, either till
such time as she might think fit to go to Monkhams, or till Mrs.
Trevelyan should have returned, and should be desirous of having her
sister with her. When Nora first heard of this she almost screamed
with surprise, and, if the truth must be told, with disappointment
also.
"She never liked me, mamma."
"Then she is so much more good-natured."
"But I don't want to go to her merely because she is good-natured
enough to receive a person she dislikes. I know she is very good. I
know she would sacrifice herself for anything she thought right. But,
mamma, she is such a bore!"
But Lady Rowley would not be talked down, even by Nora, in this
fashion. Nora was somewhat touched with an idea that it would be a
fine independent thing to live alone, if it were only for a week or
two, just because other young ladies never lived alone. Perhaps there
was some half-formed notion in her mind that permission to do so was
part of the reward due to her for having refused to marry a lord.
Stanbury was in some respects a Bohemian, and it would become her,
she thought, to have a little practice herself in the Bohemian
line. She had, indeed, declined a Bohemian marriage, feeling
strongly averse to encounter the loud displeasure of her father and
mother;--but as long as everything was quite proper, as long as there
should be no running away, or subjection of her name to scandal, she
considered that a little independence would be useful and agreeable.
She had looked forward to sitting up at night alone by a single
tallow candle, to stretching a beefsteak so as to last her for two
days' dinners, and perhaps to making her own bed. Now, there would
not be the slightest touch of romance in a visit to Lady Milborough's
house in Eccleston Square, at the end of July. Lady Rowley, however,
was of a different opinion, and spoke her mind plainly. "Nora, my
dear, don't be a fool. A young lady like you can't go and live in
lodgings by herself. All manner of things would be said. And this is
such a very kind offer! You must accept it,--for Hugh's sake. I have
already said that you would accept it."
"But she will be going out of town."
"She will stay till you can go to Monkhams,--if Emily is not back
before then. She knows all about Emily's affairs; and if she does
come back,--which I doubt, poor thing,--Lady Milborough and you will
be able to judge whether you should go to her." So it was settled,
and Nora's Bohemian Castle in the Air fell into shatters.
The few remaining days before the departure to Southampton passed
quickly, but yet sadly. Sir Marmaduke had come to England expecting
pleasure,--and with that undefined idea which men so employed always
have on their return home that something will turn up which will make
their going back to that same banishment unnecessary. What Governor
of Hong-Kong, what Minister to Bogota, what General of the Forces
at the Gold Coast, ever left the scene of his official or military
labours without a hope, which was almost an expectation, that a
grateful country would do something better for him before the period
of his return should have arrived? But a grateful country was doing
nothing better for Sir Marmaduke, and an ungrateful Secretary of
State at the Colonial Office would not extend the term during which
he could regard himself as absent on special service. How thankful he
had been when first the tidings reached him that he was to come home
at the expense of the Crown, and without diminution of his official
income! He had now been in England for five months, with a per diem
allowance, with his very cabs paid for him, and he was discontented,
sullen, and with nothing to comfort him but his official grievance,
because he could not be allowed to extend his period of special
service more than two months beyond the time at which those special
services were in truth ended! There had been a change of Ministry in
the last month, and he had thought that a Conservative Secretary of
State would have been kinder to him. "The Duke says I can stay three
months with leave of absence;--and have half my pay stopped. I wonder
whether it ever enters into his august mind that even a Colonial
Governor must eat and drink." It was thus he expressed his great
grievance to his wife. "The Duke," however, had been as inexorable
as his predecessor, and Sir Rowley, with his large family, was too
wise to remain to the detriment of his pocket. In the meantime the
clerks in the office, who had groaned in spirit over the ignorance
displayed in his evidence before the committee, were whispering
among themselves that he ought not to be sent back to his seat of
government at all.
Lady Rowley also was disappointed and unhappy. She had expected so
much pleasure from her visit to her daughter, and she had received so
little! Emily's condition was very sad, but in her heart of hearts
perhaps she groaned more bitterly over all that Nora had lost, than
she did over the real sorrows of her elder child. To have had the cup
at her lip, and then not to have tasted it! And she had the solace of
no communion in this sorrow. She had accepted Hugh Stanbury as her
son-in-law, and not for worlds would she now say a word against him
to any one. She had already taken him to her heart, and she loved
him. But to have had it almost within her grasp to have had a lord,
the owner of Monkhams, for her son-in-law! Poor Lady Rowley!
Sophie and Lucy, too, were returning to their distant and dull
banishment without any realisation of their probable but unexpressed
ambition. They made no complaint, but yet it was hard on them
that their sister's misfortune should have prevented them from
going,--almost to a single dance. Poor Sophie and poor Lucy! They
must go, and we shall hear no more about them. It was thought well
that Nora should not go down with them to Southampton. What good
would her going do? "God bless you, my darling," said the mother, as
she held her child in her arms.
"Good-bye, dear mamma."
"Give my best love to Hugh, and tell him that I pray him with my
last word to be good to you." Even then she was thinking of Lord
Peterborough, but the memory of what might have been was buried deep
in her mind.
"Nora, tell me all about it," said Lucy.
"There will be nothing to tell," said Nora.
"Tell it all the same," said Lucy. "And bring Hugh out to write a
book of travels about the Mandarins. Nobody has ever written a book
about the Mandarins." So they parted; and when Sir Marmaduke and his
party were taken off in two cabs to the Waterloo Station, Nora was
taken in one cab to Eccleston Square.
It may be doubted whether any old lady since the world began ever did
a more thoroughly Christian and friendly act than this which was now
being done by Lady Milborough. It was the end of July, and she would
already have been down in Dorsetshire, but for her devotion to this
good deed. For, in truth, what she was doing was not occasioned by
any express love for Nora Rowley. Nora Rowley was all very well, but
Nora Rowley towards her had been flippant, impatient, and, indeed,
not always so civil as a young lady should be to the elderly friends
of her married sister. But to Lady Milborough it had seemed to be
quite terrible that a young girl should be left alone in the world,
without anybody to take care of her. Young ladies, according to her
views of life, were fragile plants that wanted much nursing before
they could be allowed to be planted out in the gardens of the
world as married women. When she heard from Lady Rowley that Nora
was engaged to marry Hugh Stanbury,--"You know all about Lord
Peterborough, Lady Milborough; but it is no use going back to that
now,--is it? And Mr. Stanbury has behaved so exceedingly well
in regard to poor Louis,"--when Lady Milborough heard this, and
heard also that Nora was talking of going to live by herself--in
lodgings--she swore to herself, like a goodly Christian woman, as
she was, that such a thing must not be. Eccleston Square in July
and August is not pleasant, unless it be to an inhabitant who
is interested in the fag-end of the parliamentary session. Lady
Milborough had no interest in politics,--had not much interest even
in seeing the social season out to its dregs. She ordinarily remained
in London till the beginning or middle of July, because the people
with whom she lived were in the habit of doing so;--but as soon as
ever she had fixed the date of her departure, that day to her was
a day of release. On this occasion the day had been fixed,--and it
was unfixed, and changed, and postponed, because it was manifest
to Lady Milborough that she could do good by remaining for another
fortnight. When she made the offer she said nothing of her previous
arrangements. "Lady Rowley, let her come to me. As soon as her friend
Lady Peterborough is at Monkhams, she can go there."
Thus it was that Nora found herself established in Eccleston Square.
As she took her place in Lady Milborough's drawing-rooms, she
remembered well a certain day, now two years ago, when she had first
heard of the glories of Monkhams in that very house. Lady Milborough,
as good-natured then as she was now, had brought Mr. Glascock and
Nora together, simply because she had heard that the gentleman
admired the young lady. Nora, in her pride, had resented this as
interference,--had felt that the thing had been done, and, though she
had valued the admiration of the man, had ridiculed the action of the
woman. As she thought of it now she was softened by gratitude. She
had not on that occasion been suited with a husband, but she had
gained a friend. "My dear," said Lady Milborough, as at her request
Nora took off her hat, "I am afraid that the parties are mostly
over,--that is, those I go to; but we will drive out every day, and
the time won't be so very long."
"It won't be long for me, Lady Milborough;--but I cannot but know how
terribly I am putting you out."
"I am never put out, Miss Rowley," said the old lady, "as long as I
am made to think that what I do is taken in good part."
"Indeed, indeed it shall be taken in good part," said Nora,--"indeed
it shall." And she swore a solemn silent vow of friendship for the
dear old woman.
Then there came letters and telegrams from Chambery, Dijon, and
Paris, and the joint expedition in search of the cottage was made
to Twickenham. It was astonishing how enthusiastic and how loving
the elder and the younger lady were together before the party from
Italy had arrived in England. Nora had explained everything about
herself,--how impossible it had been for her not to love Hugh
Stanbury; how essential it had been for her happiness and self-esteem
that she should refuse Mr. Glascock; how terrible had been the
tragedy of her sister's marriage. Lady Milborough spoke of the former
subject with none of Lady Rowley's enthusiasm, but still with an
evident partiality for her own rank, which almost aroused Nora to
indignant eloquence. Lady Milborough was contented to acknowledge
that Nora might be right, seeing that her heart was so firmly fixed;
but she was clearly of opinion that Mr. Glascock, being Mr. Glascock,
had possessed a better right to the prize in question than could
have belonged to any man who had no recognised position in the world.
Seeing that her heart had been given away, Nora was no doubt right
not to separate her hand from her heart; but Lady Milborough was of
opinion that young ladies ought to have their hearts under better
control, so that the men entitled to the prizes should get them. It
was for the welfare of England at large that the eldest sons of good
families should marry the sweetest, prettiest, brightest, and most
lovable girls of their age. It is a doctrine on behalf of which very
much may be said.
On that other matter, touching Emily Trevelyan, Lady Milborough
frankly owned that she had seen early in the day that he was the one
most in fault. "I must say, my dear," she said, "that I very greatly
dislike your friend, Colonel Osborne."
"I am sure that he meant not the slightest harm,--no more than she
did."
"He was old enough, and ought to have known better. And when the
first hint of an uneasiness in the mind of Louis was suggested to
him, his feelings as a gentleman should have prompted him to remove
himself. Let the suspicion have been ever so absurd, he should
have removed himself. Instead of that, he went after her,--into
Devonshire."
"He went to see other friends, Lady Milborough."
"I hope it may have been so;--I hope it may have been so. But he
should have cut off his hand before he rang at the door of the house
in which she was living. You will understand, my dear, that I acquit
your sister altogether. I did so all through, and said the same to
poor Louis when he came to me. But Colonel Osborne should have known
better. Why did he write to her? Why did he go to St. Diddulph's? Why
did he let it be thought that,--that she was especially his friend.
Oh dear; oh dear; oh dear! I am afraid he is a very bad man."
"We had known him so long, Lady Milborough."
"I wish you had never known him at all. Poor Louis! If he had only
done what I told him at first, all might have been well. 'Go to
Naples, with your wife,' I said. 'Go to Naples.' If he had gone to
Naples, there would have been no journeys to Siena, no living at
Casalunga, no separation. But he didn't seem to see it in the same
light. Poor dear Louis. I wish he had gone to Naples when I told
him."
While they were going backwards and forwards, looking at the cottage
at Twickenham and trying to make things comfortable there for the
sick man, Lady Milborough hinted to Nora that it might be distasteful
to Trevelyan, in his present condition, to have even a sister-in-law
staying in the house with him. There was a little chamber which Nora
had appropriated to herself, and at first it seemed to be taken
for granted that she should remain there at least till the 10th of
August, on which day Lady Peterborough had signified that she and her
husband would be ready to receive their visitor. But Lady Milborough
slept on the suggestion, and on the next morning hinted her
disapprobation. "You shall take them down in the carriage, and their
luggage can follow in a cab;--but the carriage can bring you back.
You will see how things are then."
"Dear Lady Milborough, you would go out of town at once if I left
you."
"And I shall not go out of town if you don't leave me. What
difference does it make to an old woman like me? I have got no
lover coming to look for me, and all I have to do is to tell my
daughter-in-law that I shall not be there for another week or so.
Augusta is very glad to have me, but she is the wisest woman in the
world, and can get on very well without me."
"And as I am the silliest, I cannot."
"You shall put it in that way if you like it, my dear. Girls in your
position often do want assistance. I dare say you think me very
straight-laced, but I am quite sure Mr. Stanbury will be grateful to
me. As you are to be married from Monkhams, it will be quite well
that you should pass thither through my house as an intermediate
resting-place, after leaving your father and mother." By all which
Lady Milborough intended to express an opinion that the value of
the article which Hugh Stanbury would receive at the altar would be
enhanced by the distinguished purity of the hands through which it
had passed before it came into his possession;--in which opinion she
was probably right as regarded the price put upon the article by
the world at large, though it may perhaps be doubted whether the
recipient himself would be of the same opinion.
"I hope you know that I am grateful, whatever he may be," said Nora,
after a pause.
"I think that you take it as it is meant, and that makes me quite
comfortable."
"Lady Milborough, I shall love you for ever and ever. I don't think I
ever knew anybody so good as you are,--or so nice."
"Then I shall be more than comfortable," said Lady Milborough. After
that there was an embrace, and the thing was settled.
CHAPTER XCV.
TREVELYAN BACK IN ENGLAND.
Nora, with Lady Milborough's carriage, and Lady Milborough's coach
and footman, and with a cab ready for the luggage close behind the
carriage, was waiting at the railway station when the party from
Dover arrived. She soon saw Hugh upon the platform, and ran to
him with her news. They had not a word to say to each other of
themselves, so anxious were they both respecting Trevelyan. "We got a
bed-carriage for him at Dover," said Hugh; "and I think he has borne
the journey pretty well;--but he feels the heat almost as badly as
in Italy. You will hardly know him when you see him." Then, when the
rush of passengers was gone, Trevelyan was brought out by Hugh and
the courier, and placed in Lady Milborough's carriage. He just smiled
as his eye fell upon Nora, but he did not even put out his hand to
greet her.
"I am to go in the carriage with him," said his wife.
"Of course you are,--and so will I and Louey. I think there will be
room: it is so large. There is a cab for all the things. Dear Emily,
I am so glad to see you."
"Dearest Nora! I shall be able to speak to you by-and-by, but you
must not be angry with me now. How good you have been."
"Has not she been good? I don't understand about the cottage. It
belongs to some friend of hers; and I have not been able to say a
word about the rent. It is so nice;--and looks upon the river. I hope
that he will like it."
"You will be with us?"
"Not just at first. Lady Milborough thinks I had better not,--that he
will like it better. I will come down almost every day, and will stay
if you think he will like it."
These few words were said while the men were putting Trevelyan
into the carriage. And then another arrangement was made. Hugh
hired a second cab, in which he and the courier made a part of the
procession; and so they all went to Twickenham together. Hugh had not
yet learned that he would be rewarded by coming back alone with Nora
in the carriage.
The cottage by the River Thames, which, as far as the party knew, was
nameless, was certainly very much better than the house on the top of
the hill at Casalunga. And now, at last, the wife would sleep once
more under the same roof with her husband, and the separation would
be over. "I suppose that is the Thames," said Trevelyan; and they
were nearly the only words he spoke in Nora's hearing that evening.
Before she started on her return journey, the two sisters were
together for a few minutes, and each told her own budget of news in
short, broken fragments. There was not much to tell. "He is so weak,"
said Mrs. Trevelyan, "that he can do literally nothing. He can hardly
speak. When we give him wine, he will say a few words, and his mind
seems then to be less astray than it was. I have told him just simply
that it was all my doing,--that I have been in fault all through, and
every now and then he will say a word, to shew me that he remembers
that I have confessed."
"My poor Emily!"
"It was better so. What does it all matter? He had suffered so, that
I would have said worse than that to give him relief. The pride has
gone out of me so, that I do not regard what anybody may say. Of
course, it will be said that I--went astray, and that he forgave me."
"Nobody will say that, dearest; nobody. Lady Milborough is quite
aware how it all was."
"What does it signify? There are things in life worse even than a bad
name."
"But he does not think it?"
"Nora, his mind is a mystery to me. I do not know what is in it.
Sometimes I fancy that all facts have been forgotten, and that he
merely wants the childish gratification of being assured that he is
the master. Then, again, there come moments, in which I feel sure
that suspicion is lurking within him, that he is remembering the
past, and guarding against the future. When he came into this house,
a quarter of an hour ago, he was fearful lest there was a mad doctor
lurking about to pounce on him. I can see in his eye that he had some
such idea. He hardly notices Louey,--though there was a time, even at
Casalunga, when he would not let the child out of his sight."
"What will you do now?"
"I will try to do my duty;--that is all."
"But you will have a doctor?"
"Of course. He was content to see one in Paris, though he would not
let me be present. Hugh saw the gentleman afterwards, and he seemed
to think that the body was worse than the mind." Then Nora told her
the name of a doctor whom Lady Milborough had suggested, and took her
departure along with Hugh in the carriage.
In spite of all the sorrow that they had witnessed and just left,
their journey up to London was very pleasant. Perhaps there is no
period so pleasant among all the pleasant periods of love-making as
that in which the intimacy between the lovers is so assured, and the
coming event so near, as to produce and to endure conversation about
the ordinary little matters of life;--what can be done with the
limited means at their mutual disposal; how that life shall be begun
which they are to lead together; what idea each has of the other's
duties; what each can do for the other; what each will renounce for
the other. There was a true sense of the delight of intimacy in the
girl who declared that she had never loved her lover so well as when
she told him how many pairs of stockings she had got. It is very
sweet to gaze at the stars together; and it is sweet to sit out
among the haycocks. The reading of poetry together, out of the same
book, with brows all close, and arms all mingled, is very sweet. The
pouring out of the whole heart in written words, which the writer
knows would be held to be ridiculous by any eyes, and any ears, and
any sense, but the eyes and ears and sense of the dear one to whom
they are sent, is very sweet;--but for the girl who has made a shirt
for the man that she loves, there has come a moment in the last
stitch of it, sweeter than any that stars, haycocks, poetry, or
superlative epithets have produced. Nora Rowley had never as yet
been thus useful on behalf of Hugh Stanbury. Had she done so, she
might perhaps have been happier even than she was during this
journey;--but, without the shirt, it was one of the happiest moments
of her life. There was nothing now to separate them but their own
prudential scruples;--and of them it must be acknowledged that Hugh
Stanbury had very few. According to his shewing, he was as well
provided for matrimony as the gentleman in the song, who came out
to woo his bride on a rainy night. In live stock he was not so well
provided as the Irish gentleman to whom we allude; but in regard to
all other provisions for comfortable married life, he had, or at a
moment's notice could have, all that was needed. Nora could live just
where she pleased;--not exactly in Whitehall Gardens or Belgrave
Square; but the New Road, Lupus Street, Montague Place, the North
Bank, or Kennington Oval, with all their surrounding crescents,
terraces, and rows, offered, according to him, a choice so wide,
either for lodgings or small houses, that their only embarrassment
was in their riches. He had already insured his life for a thousand
pounds, and, after paying yearly for that, and providing a certain
surplus for saving, five hundred a year was the income on which they
were to commence the world. "Of course, I wish it were five thousand
for your sake," he said; "and I wish I were a Cabinet Minister, or a
duke, or a brewer; but, even in heaven, you know all the angels can't
be archangels." Nora assured him that she would be quite content with
virtues simply angelic. "I hope you like mutton-chops and potatoes; I
do," he said. Then she told him of her ambition about the beef-steak,
acknowledging that, as it must now be shared between two, the
glorious idea of putting a part of it away in a cupboard must be
abandoned. "I don't believe in beef-steaks," he said. "A beef-steak
may mean anything. At our club, a beef-steak is a sumptuous and
expensive luxury. Now, a mutton-chop means something definite, and
must be economical."
"Then we will have the mutton-chops at home," said Nora, "and you
shall go to your club for the beef-steak."
When they reached Eccleston Square, Nora insisted on taking Hugh
Stanbury up to Lady Milborough. It was in vain that he pleaded that
he had come all the way from Dover on a very dusty day,--all the way
from Dover, including a journey in a Hansom cab to Twickenham and
back, without washing his hands and face. Nora insisted that Lady
Milborough was such a dear, good, considerate creature, that she
would understand all that, and Hugh was taken into her presence. "I
am delighted to see you, Mr. Stanbury," said the old lady, "and hope
you will think that Nora is in good keeping."
"She has been telling me how very kind you have been to her. I do not
know where she could have bestowed herself if you had not received
her."
"There, Nora;--I told you he would say so. I won't tell tales, Mr.
Stanbury; but she had all manner of wild plans which I knew you
wouldn't approve. But she is very amiable, and if she will only
submit to you as well as she does to me--"
"I don't mean to submit to him at all, Lady Milborough;--of course
not. I am going to marry for liberty."
"My dear, what you say, you say in joke; but a great many young women
of the present day do, I really believe, go up to the altar and
pronounce their marriage vows, with the simple idea that as soon as
they have done so, they are to have their own way in everything. And
then people complain that young men won't marry! Who can wonder at
it?"
"I don't think the young men think much about the obedience," said
Nora. "Some marry for money, and some for love. But I don't think
they marry to get a slave."
"What do you say, Mr. Stanbury?" asked the old lady.
"I can only assure you that I shan't marry for money," said he.
Two or three days after this Nora left her friend in Eccleston
Square, and domesticated herself for awhile with her sister. Mrs.
Trevelyan declared that such an arrangement would be comfortable
for her, and that it was very desirable now, as Nora would so soon
be beyond her reach. Then Lady Milborough was enabled to go to
Dorsetshire, which she did not do, however, till she had presented
Nora with the veil which she was to wear on the occasion of her
wedding. "Of course I cannot see it, my dear, as it is to take place
at Monkhams; but you must write and tell me the day;--and I will
think of you. And you, when you put on the veil, must think of me."
So they parted, and Nora knew that she had made a friend for life.
[Illustration: Nora's veil.]
When she first took her place in the house at Twickenham as a
resident, Trevelyan did not take much notice of her;--but, after
awhile, he would say a few words to her, especially when it might
chance that she was with him in her sister's absence. He would speak
of dear Emily, and poor Emily, and shake his head slowly, and talk of
the pity of it. "The pity of it, Iago; oh, the pity of it," he said
once. The allusion to her was so terrible that she almost burst out
in anger, as she would have done formerly. She almost told him that
he had been as wrong throughout as was the jealous husband in the
play whose words he quoted, and that his jealousy, if continued, was
likely to be as tragical. But she restrained herself, and kept close
to her needle,--making, let us hope, an auspicious garment for Hugh
Stanbury. "She has seen it now," he continued; "she has seen it now."
Still she went on with her hemming in silence. It certainly could not
be her duty to upset at a word all that her sister had achieved. "You
know that she has confessed?" he asked.
"Pray, pray do not talk about it, Louis."
"I think you ought to know," he said. Then she rose from her seat and
left the room. She could not stand it, even though he were mad,--even
though he were dying!
She went to her sister and repeated what had been said. "You had
better not notice it," said Emily. "It is only a proof of what I told
you. There are times in which his mind is as active as ever it was,
but it is active in so terrible a direction!"
"I cannot sit and hear it. And what am I to say when he asks me a
question as he did just now? He said that you had confessed."
"So I have. Do none confess but the guilty? What is all that we have
read about the Inquisition and the old tortures? I have had to learn
that torturing has not gone out of the world;--that is all."
"I must go away if he says the same thing to me so again."
"That is nonsense, Nora. If I can bear it, cannot you? Would you have
me drive him into violence again by disputing with him upon such a
subject?"
"But he may recover;--and then he will remember what you have said."
"If he recovers altogether he will suspect nothing. I must take my
chance of that. You cannot suppose that I have not thought about it.
I have often sworn to myself that though the world should fall around
me, nothing should make me acknowledge that I had ever been untrue
to my duty as a married woman, either in deed, or word, or thought.
I have no doubt that the poor wretches who were tortured in their
cells used to make the same resolutions as to their confessions. But
yet, when their nails were dragged out of them, they would own to
anything. My nails have been dragged out, and I have been willing to
confess anything. When he talks of the pity of it, of course I know
what he means. There has been something, some remainder of a feeling,
which has still kept him from asking me that question. May God, in
his mercy, continue to him that feeling!"
"But you would answer truly?"
"How can I say what I might answer when the torturer is at my nails?
If you knew how great was the difficulty to get him away from that
place in Italy and bring him here; and what it was to feel that one
was bound to stay near him, and that yet one was impotent,--and to
know that even that refuge must soon cease for him, and that he might
have gone out and died on the road-side, or have done anything which
the momentary strength of madness might have dictated,--if you could
understand all this, you would not be surprised at my submitting to
any degradation which would help to bring him here."
Stanbury was often down at the cottage, and Nora could discuss the
matter better with him than with her sister. And Stanbury could learn
more thoroughly from the physician who was now attending Trevelyan
what was the state of the sick man, than Emily could do. According
to the doctor's idea there was more of ailment in the body than in
the mind. He admitted that his patient's thoughts had been forced
to dwell on one subject till they had become distorted, untrue,
jaundiced, and perhaps mono-maniacal; but he seemed to doubt whether
there had ever been a time at which it could have been decided that
Trevelyan was so mad as to make it necessary that the law should
interfere to take care of him. A man,--so argued the doctor,--need
not be mad because he is jealous, even though his jealousy be ever
so absurd. And Trevelyan, in his jealousy, had done nothing cruel,
nothing wasteful, nothing infamous. In all this Nora was very little
inclined to agree with the doctor, and thought nothing could be more
infamous than Trevelyan's conduct at the present moment,--unless,
indeed, he could be screened from infamy by that plea of madness.
But then there was more behind. Trevelyan had been so wasted by the
kind of life which he had led, and possessed by nature stamina so
insufficient to resist such debility, that it was very doubtful
whether he would not sink altogether before he could be made to
begin to rise. But one thing was clear. He should be contradicted in
nothing. If he chose to say that the moon was made of green cheese,
let it be conceded to him that the moon was made of green cheese.
Should he make any other assertion equally removed from the truth,
let it not be contradicted. Who would oppose a man with one foot in
the grave?
"Then, Hugh, the sooner I am at Monkhams the better," said Nora, who
had again been subjected to inuendoes which had been unendurable to
her. This was on the 7th of August, and it still wanted three days to
that on which the journey to Monkhams was to be made.
"He never says anything to me on the subject," said Hugh.
"Because you have made him afraid of you. I almost think that Emily
and the doctor are wrong in their treatment, and that it would be
better to stand up to him and tell him the truth." But the three days
passed away, and Nora was not driven to any such vindication of her
sister's character towards her sister's husband.
CHAPTER XCVI.
MONKHAMS.
[Illustration]
On the 10th of August Nora Rowley left the cottage by the river-side
at Twickenham, and went down to Monkhams. The reader need hardly be
told that Hugh brought her up from Twickenham and sent her off in the
railway carriage. They agreed that no day could be fixed for their
marriage till something further should be known of Trevelyan's state.
While he was in his present condition such a marriage could not have
been other than very sad. Nora, when she left the cottage, was still
very bitter against her brother-in-law, quoting the doctor's opinion
as to his sanity, and expressing her own as to his conduct under that
supposition. She also believed that he would rally in health, and was
therefore, on that account, less inclined to pity him than was his
wife. Emily Trevelyan of course saw more of him than did her sister,
and understood better how possible it was that a man might be in such
a condition as to be neither mad nor sane;--not mad, so that all
power over his own actions need be taken from him; nor sane, so
that he must be held to be accountable for his words and thoughts.
Trevelyan did nothing, and attempted to do nothing, that could injure
his wife and child. He submitted himself to medical advice. He did
not throw away his money. He had no Bozzle now waiting at his heels.
He was generally passive in his wife's hands as to all outward
things. He was not violent in rebuke, nor did he often allude to
their past unhappiness. But he still maintained, by a word spoken
every now and then, that he had been right throughout in his contest
with his wife,--and that his wife had at last acknowledged that it
was so. She never contradicted him, and he became bolder and bolder
in his assertions, endeavouring on various occasions to obtain some
expression of an assent from Nora. But Nora would not assent, and he
would scowl at her, saying words, both in her presence and behind her
back, which implied that she was his enemy. "Why not yield to him?"
her sister said the day before she went. "I have yielded, and your
doing so cannot make it worse."
"I can't do it. It would be false. It is better that I should go
away. I cannot pretend to agree with him, when I know that his mind
is working altogether under a delusion." When the hour for her
departure came, and Hugh was waiting for her, she thought that it
would be better that she should go, without seeing Trevelyan. "There
will only be more anger," she pleaded. But her sister would not be
contented that she should leave the house in this fashion, and urged
at last, with tears running down her cheeks, that this might possibly
be the last interview between them.
"Say a word to him in kindness before you leave us," said Mrs.
Trevelyan. Then Nora went up to her brother-in-law's bed-side, and
told him that she was going, and expressed a hope that he might be
stronger when she returned. And as she did so she put her hand upon
the bed-side, intending to press his in token of affection. But his
face was turned from her, and he seemed to take no notice of her.
"Louis," said his wife, "Nora is going to Monkhams. You will say
good-bye to her before she goes?"
"If she be not my enemy, I will," said he.
"I have never been your enemy, Louis," said Nora, "and certainly I am
not now."
"She had better go," he said. "It is very little more that I expect
of any one in this world;--but I will recognise no one as my friend
who will not acknowledge that I have been sinned against during the
last two years;--sinned against cruelly and utterly." Emily, who
was standing at the bed-head, shuddered as she heard this, but made
no reply. Nor did Nora speak again, but crept silently out of the
room;--and in half a minute her sister followed her.
"I feared how it would be," said Nora.
"We can only do our best. God knows that I try to do mine."
"I do not think you will ever see him again," said Hugh to her in the
train.
"Would you have had me act otherwise? It is not that it would have
been a lie. I would not have minded that to ease the shattered
feelings of one so infirm and suffering as he. In dealing with mad
people I suppose one must be false. But I should have been accusing
her; and it may be that he will get well, and it might be that he
would then remember what I had said."
At the station near Monkhams she was met by Lady Peterborough in the
carriage. A tall footman in livery came on to the platform to shew
her the way and to look after her luggage, and she could not fail to
remember that the man might have been her own servant, instead of
being the servant of her who now sat in Lord Peterborough's carriage.
And when she saw the carriage, and her ladyship's great bay horses,
and the glittering harness, and the respectably responsible coachman,
and the arms on the panel, she smiled to herself at the sight of
these first outward manifestations of the rank and wealth of the man
who had once been her lover. There are men who look as though they
were the owners of bay horses and responsible coachmen and family
blazons,--from whose outward personal appearance, demeanour, and tone
of voice, one would expect a following of liveries and a magnificence
of belongings; but Mr. Glascock had by no means been such a man. It
had suited his taste to keep these things in abeyance, and to place
his pride in the oaks and elms of his park rather than in any of
those appanages of grandeur which a man may carry about with him. He
could talk of his breed of sheep on an occasion, but he never talked
of his horses; and though he knew his position and all its glories as
well as any nobleman in England, he was ever inclined to hang back a
little in going out of a room, and to bear himself as though he were
a small personage in the world. Some perception of all this came
across Nora's mind as she saw the equipage, and tried to reflect, at
a moment's notice, whether the case might have been different with
her, had Mr. Glascock worn a little of his tinsel outside when she
first met him. Of course she told herself that had he worn it all on
the outside, and carried it ever so gracefully, it could have made no
difference.
It was very plain, however, that, though Mr. Glascock did not like
bright feathers for himself, he chose that his wife should wear them.
Nothing could be prettier than the way in which Caroline Spalding,
whom we first saw as she was about to be stuck into the interior
of the diligence, at St. Michel, now filled her carriage as Lady
Peterborough. The greeting between them was very affectionate, and
there was a kiss in the carriage, even though the two pretty hats,
perhaps, suffered something. "We are so glad to have you at last,"
said Lady Peterborough. "Of course we are very quiet; but you won't
mind that." Nora declared that no house could be too quiet for her,
and then said something of the melancholy scene which she had just
left. "And no time is fixed for your own marriage? But of course it
has not been possible. And why should you be in a hurry? We quite
understand that this is to be your home till everything has arranged
itself." There was a drive of four or five miles before they reached
the park gates, and nothing could be kinder or more friendly than was
the new peeress; but Nora told herself that there was no forgetting
that her friend was a peeress. She would not be so ill-conditioned as
to suggest to herself that her friend patronised her;--and, indeed,
had she done so, the suggestion would have been false;--but she could
not rid herself of a certain sensation of external inferiority, and
of a feeling that the superiority ought to be on her side, as all
this might have been hers,--only that she had not thought it worth
her while to accept it. As these ideas came into her mind, she hated
herself for entertaining them; and yet, come they would. While she
was talking about her emblematic beef-steak with Hugh, she had no
regret, no uneasiness, no conception that any state of life could be
better for her than that state in which an emblematic beef-steak was
of vital importance; but she could not bring her mind to the same
condition of unalloyed purity while sitting with Lady Peterborough in
Lord Peterborough's carriage. And for her default in this respect she
hated herself.
"This is the beginning of the park," said her friend.
"And where is the house?"
"You can't see the house for ever so far yet; it is two miles off.
There is about a mile before you come to the gates, and over a mile
afterwards. One has a sort of feeling when one is in that one can't
get out,--it is so big." In so speaking, it was Lady Peterborough's
special endeavour to state without a boast facts which were
indifferent, but which must be stated.
"It is very magnificent," said Nora. There was in her voice the
slightest touch of sarcasm, which she would have given the world not
to have uttered; but it had been irrepressible.
Lady Peterborough understood it instantly, and forgave it, not
attributing to it more than its true meaning, acknowledging to
herself that it was natural. "Dear Nora," she said,--not knowing what
to say, blushing as she spoke,--"the magnificence is nothing; but the
man's love is everything."
Nora shook herself, and determined that she would behave well. The
effort should be made, and the required result should be produced by
it. "The magnificence, as an adjunct, is a great deal," she said;
"and for his sake, I hope that you enjoy it."
"Of course I enjoy it."
"Wallachia's teachings and preachings have all been thrown to the
wind, I hope."
"Not quite all. Poor dear Wally! I got a letter from her the
other day, which she began by saying that she would attune her
correspondence to my changed condition in life. I understood the
reproach so thoroughly! And, when she told me little details of
individual men and women, and of things she had seen, and said not a
word about the rights of women, or even of politics generally, I felt
that I was a degraded creature in her sight. But, though you laugh at
her, she did me good,--and will do good to others. Here we are inside
Monkhams, and now you must look at the avenue."
Nora was now rather proud of herself. She had made the effort, and
it had been successful; and she felt that she could speak naturally,
and express her thoughts honestly. "I remember his telling me about
the avenue the first time I ever saw him;--and here it is. I did not
think then that I should ever live to see the glories of Monkhams.
Does it go all the way like this to the house?"
"Not quite;--where you see the light at the end the road turns to the
right, and the house is just before you. There are great iron gates,
and terraces, and wondrous paraphernalia before you get up to the
door. I can tell you Monkhams is quite a wonder. I have to shut
myself up every Wednesday morning, and hand the house over to Mrs.
Crutch, the housekeeper, who comes out in a miraculous brown silk
gown, to shew it to visitors. On other days, you'll find Mrs. Crutch
quite civil and useful;--but on Wednesdays, she is majestic. Charles
always goes off among his sheep on that day, and I shut myself up
with a pile of books in a little room. You will have to be imprisoned
with me. I do so long to peep at the visitors."
"And I dare say they want to peep at you."
"I proposed at first to shew them round myself;--but Charles wouldn't
let me."
"It would have broken Mrs. Crutch's heart."
"That's what Charles said. He thinks that Mrs. Crutch tells them
that I'm locked up somewhere, and that that gives a zest to the
search. Some people from Nottingham once did break into old Lady
Peterborough's room, and the shew was stopped for a year. There was
such a row about it! It prevented Charles coming up for the county.
But he wouldn't have got in; and therefore it was lucky, and saved
money."
By this time Nora was quite at her ease; but still there was before
her the other difficulty, of meeting Lord Peterborough. They were
driven out of the avenue, and round to the right, and through the
iron gate, and up to the huge front door. There, upon the top step,
was standing Lord Peterborough, with a billycock hat and a very old
shooting coat, and nankeen trousers, which were considerably too
short for him. It was one of the happinesses of his life to dress
just as he pleased as he went about his own place; and it certainly
was his pleasure to wear older clothes than any one else in his
establishment. "Miss Rowley," he said, coming forward to give her
a hand out of the carriage, "I am delighted that you should see
Monkhams at last."
"You see I have kept you to your promise. Caroline has been telling
me everything about it; but she is not quite a complete guide as yet.
She does not know where the seven oaks are. Do you remember telling
me of the seven oaks?"
"Of course I do. They are five miles off;--at Clatton farm, Carry.
I don't think you have been near Clatton yet. We will ride there
to-morrow." And thus Nora Rowley was made at home at Monkhams.
She was made at home, and after a week or two she was very happy. She
soon perceived that her host was a perfect gentleman, and as such,
a man to be much loved. She had probably never questioned the fact,
whether Mr. Glascock was a gentleman or not, and now she did not
analyse it. It probably never occurred to her, even at the present
time, to say to herself that he was certainly that thing, so
impossible of definition, and so capable of recognition; but she knew
that she had to do with one whose presence was always pleasant to
her, whose words and acts towards her extorted her approbation, whose
thoughts seemed to her to be always good and manly. Of course she
had not loved him, because she had previously known Hugh Stanbury.
There could be no comparison between the two men. There was a
brightness about Hugh which Lord Peterborough could not rival.
Otherwise,--except for this reason,--it seemed to her to be
impossible that any young woman should fail to love Lord Peterborough
when asked to do so.
About the middle of September there came a very happy time for her,
when Hugh was asked down to shoot partridges,--in the doing of which,
however, all his brightness did not bring him near in excellence to
his host. Lord Peterborough had been shooting partridges all his
life, and shot them with a precision which excited Hugh's envy. To
own the truth, Stanbury did not shoot well, and was treated rather
with scorn by the gamekeeper; but in other respects he spent three or
four of the happiest days of his life. He had his work to do, and
after the second day over the stubbles, declared that the exigencies
of the D. R. were too severe to enable him to go out with his gun
again; but those rambles about the park with Nora, for which, among
the exigencies of the D. R., he did find opportunity, were never to
be forgotten.
"Of course I remember that it might have been mine," she said,
sitting with him under an old, hollow, withered sloping stump of an
oak, which still, however, had sufficient of a head growing from one
edge of the trunk to give them the shade they wanted; "and if you
wish me to own to regrets,--I will."
"It would kill me, I think, if you did; and yet I cannot get it out
of my head that if it had not been for me your rank and position in
life might have been so--so suitable to you."
"No, Hugh; there you're wrong. I have thought about it a good deal,
too; and I know very well that the cold beef-steak in the cupboard is
the thing for me. Caroline will do very well here. She looks like a
peeress, and bears her honours grandly; but they will never harden
her. I, too, could have been magnificent with fine feathers. Most
birds are equal to so much as that. I fancy that I could have
looked the part of the fine English lady, and could have patronised
clergymen's wives in the country, could have held my own among my
peers in London, and could have kept Mrs. Crutch in order; but it
would have hardened me, and I should have learned to think that to be
a lady of fashion was everything."
"I do not believe a bit of it."
"It is better as it is, Hugh;--for me at least. I had always a sort
of conviction that it would be better, though I had a longing to play
the other part. Then you came, and you have saved me. Nevertheless,
it is very nice, Hugh, to have the oaks to sit under." Stanbury
declared that it was very nice.
[Illustration: Monkhams.]
But still nothing was settled about the wedding. Trevelyan's
condition was so uncertain that it was very difficult to settle
anything. Though nothing was said on the subject between Stanbury
and Mrs. Trevelyan, and nothing written between Nora and her sister,
it could not but be remembered that should Trevelyan die, his widow
would require a home with them. They were deterred from choosing a
house by this reflection, and were deterred from naming a day also by
the consideration that were they to do so, Trevelyan's state might
still probably prevent it. But this was arranged, that if Trevelyan
lived through the winter, or even if he should not live, their
marriage should not be postponed beyond the end of March. Till
that time Lord Peterborough would remain at Monkhams, and it was
understood that Nora's invitation extended to that period.
"If my wife does not get tired of you, I shall not," Lord
Peterborough said to Nora. "The thing is that when you do go we shall
miss you so terribly." In September, too, there happened another
event which took Stanbury to Exeter, and all needful particulars as
to that event shall be narrated in the next chapter.
CHAPTER XCVII.
MRS. BROOKE BURGESS.
It may be doubted whether there was a happier young woman in England
than Dorothy Stanbury when that September came which was to make
her the wife of Mr. Brooke Burgess, the new partner in the firm of
Cropper and Burgess. Her early aspirations in life had been so low,
and of late there had come upon her such a succession of soft showers
of success,--mingled now and then with slight threatenings of storms
which had passed away,--that the Close at Exeter seemed to her to
have become a very Paradise. Her aunt's temper had sometimes been to
her as the threat of a storm, and there had been the Gibson marriage
treaty, and the short-lived opposition to the other marriage treaty
which had seemed to her to be so very preferable; but everything had
gone at last as though she had been Fortune's favourite,--and now
had come this beautiful arrangement about Cropper and Burgess, which
would save her from being carried away to live among strangers in
London! When she first became known to us on her coming to Exeter,
in compliance with her aunt's suggestion, she was timid, silent,
and altogether without self-reliance. Even they who knew her best
had never guessed that she possessed a keen sense of humour, a nice
appreciation of character, and a quiet reticent wit of her own, under
that staid and frightened demeanour. Since her engagement with Brooke
Burgess it seemed to those who watched her that her character had
become changed, as does that of a flower when it opens itself in its
growth. The sweet gifts of nature within became visible, the petals
sprang to view, and the leaves spread themselves, and the sweet scent
was felt upon the air. Had she remained at Nuncombe, it is probable
that none would ever have known her but her sister. It was necessary
to this flower that it should be warmed by the sun of life, and
strengthened by the breezes of opposition, and filled by the showers
of companionship, before it could become aware of its own loveliness.
Dorothy was one who, had she remained ever unseen in the retirement
of her mother's village cottage, would have lived and died ignorant
of even her own capabilities for enjoyment. She had not dreamed that
she could win a man's love,--had hardly dreamed till she had lived at
Exeter that she had love of her own to give back in return. She had
not known that she could be firm in her own opinion, that she could
laugh herself and cause others to laugh, that she could be a lady and
know that other women were not so, that she had good looks of her own
and could be very happy when told of them by lips that she loved. The
flower that blows the quickest is never the sweetest. The fruit that
ripens tardily has ever the finest flavour. It is often the same with
men and women. The lad who talks at twenty as men should talk at
thirty, has seldom much to say worth the hearing when he is forty;
and the girl who at eighteen can shine in society with composure, has
generally given over shining before she is a full-grown woman. With
Dorothy the scent and beauty of the flower, and the flavour of the
fruit, had come late; but the fruit will keep, and the flower will
not fall to pieces with the heat of an evening.
"How marvellously your bride has changed since she has been here,"
said Mrs. MacHugh to Miss Stanbury. "We thought she couldn't say boo
to a goose at first; but she holds her own now among the best of
'em."
"Of course she does;--why shouldn't she? I never knew a Stanbury yet
that was a fool."
"They are a wonderful family, of course," said Mrs. MacHugh; "but I
think that of all of them she is the most wonderful. Old Barty said
something to her at my house yesterday that wasn't intended to be
kind."
"When did he ever intend to be kind?"
"But he got no change out of her. 'The Burgesses have been in Exeter
a long time,' she said, 'and I don't see why we should not get on at
any rate as well as those before us.' Barty grunted and growled and
slunk away. He thought she would shake in her shoes when he spoke to
her."
"He has never been able to make a Stanbury shake in her shoes yet,"
said the old lady.
Early in September, Dorothy went to Nuncombe Putney to spend a week
with her mother and sister at the cottage. She had insisted on this,
though Priscilla had hinted, somewhat unnecessarily, that Dorothy,
with her past comforts and her future prospects, would find the
accommodation at the cottage very limited. "I suppose you and I,
Pris, can sleep in the same bed, as we always did," she said, with a
tear in each eye. Then Priscilla had felt ashamed of herself, and had
bade her come.
"The truth is, Dolly," said the elder sister, "that we feel so unlike
marrying and giving in marriage at Nuncombe, that I'm afraid you'll
lose your brightness and become dowdy, and grim, and misanthropic, as
we are. When mamma and I sit down to what we call dinner, I always
feel that there is a grace hovering in the air different to that
which she says."
"And what is it, Pris?"
"Pray, God, don't quite starve us, and let everybody else have
indigestion. We don't say it out loud, but there it is; and the
spirit of it might damp the orange blossoms."
She went of course, and the orange blossoms were not damped. She had
long walks with her sister round by Niddon and Ridleigh, and even as
far distant as Cockchaffington, where much was said about that wicked
Colonel as they stood looking at the porch of the church. "I shall be
so happy," said Dorothy, "when you and mother come to us. It will be
such a joy to me that you should be my guests."
"But we shall not come."
"Why not, Priscilla?"
"I know it will be so. Mamma will not care for going, if I do not
go."
"And why should you not come?"
"For a hundred reasons, all of which you know, Dolly. I am stiff,
impracticable, ill-conditioned, and very bad at going about visiting.
I am always thinking that other people ought to have indigestion, and
perhaps I might come to have some such feeling about you and Brooke."
"I should not be at all afraid of that."
"I know that my place in the world is here, at Nuncombe Putney. I
have a pride about myself, and think that I never did wrong but
once,--when I let mamma go into that odious Clock House. It is a bad
pride, and yet I'm proud of it. I haven't got a gown fit to go and
stay with you, when you become a grand lady in Exeter. I don't doubt
you'd give me any sort of gown I wanted."
"Of course I would. Ain't we sisters, Pris?"
"I shall not be so much your sister as he will be your husband.
Besides, I hate to take things. When Hugh sends money, and for
mamma's sake it is accepted, I always feel uneasy while it lasts, and
think that that plague of an indigestion ought to come upon me also.
Do you remember the lamb that came when you went away? It made me so
sick."
"But, Priscilla;--isn't that morbid?"
"Of course it is. You don't suppose I really think it grand. I am
morbid. But I am strong enough to live on, and not get killed by the
morbidity. Heaven knows how much more there may be of it;--forty
years, perhaps, and probably the greater portion of that absolutely
alone;--"
"No;--you'll be with us then,--if it should come."
"I think not, Dolly. Not to have a hole of my own would be
intolerable to me. But, as I was saying, I shall not be unhappy. To
enjoy life, as you do, is I suppose out of the question for me. But
I have a satisfaction when I get to the end of the quarter and find
that there is not half-a-crown due to any one. Things get dearer and
dearer, but I have a comfort even in that. I have a feeling that I
should like to bring myself to the straw a day." Of course there
were offers made of aid,--offers which were rather prayers,--and
plans suggested of what might be done between Brooke and Hugh; but
Priscilla declared that all such plans were odious to her. "Why
should you be unhappy about us?" she continued. "We will come and see
you,--at least I will,--perhaps once in six months, and you shall pay
for the railway ticket; only I won't stay, because of the gown."
"Is not that nonsense, Pris?"
"Just at present it is, because mamma and I have both got new gowns
for the wedding. Hugh sent them, and ever so much money to buy
bonnets and gloves."
"He is to be married himself soon,--down at a place called Monkhams.
Nora is staying there."
"Yes;--with a lord," said Priscilla. "We sha'n't have to go there, at
any rate."
"You liked Nora when she was here?"
"Very much;--though I thought her self-willed. But she is not
worldly, and she is conscientious. She might have married that lord
herself if she would. I do like her. When she comes to you at Exeter,
if the wedding gown isn't quite worn out, I shall come and see her. I
knew she liked him when she was here, but she never said so."
"She is very pretty, is she not? He sent me her photograph."
"She is handsome rather than pretty. I wonder why it is that you two
should be married, and so grandly married, and that I shall never,
never have any one to love."
"Oh, Priscilla, do not say that. If I have a child will you not love
it?"
"It will be your child;--not mine. Do not suppose that I complain.
I know that it is right. I know that you ought to be married and I
ought not. I know that there is not a man in Devonshire who would
take me, or a man in Devonshire whom I would accept. I know that I am
quite unfit for any other kind of life than this. I should make any
man wretched, and any man would make me wretched. But why is it so? I
believe that you would make any man happy."
"I hope to make Brooke happy."
"Of course you will, and therefore you deserve it. We'll go home now,
dear, and get mamma's things ready for the great day."
On the afternoon before the great day all the visitors were to come,
and during the forenoon old Miss Stanbury was in a great fidget.
Luckily for Dorothy, her own preparations were already made, so that
she could give her time to her aunt without injury to herself. Miss
Stanbury had come to think of herself as though all the reality of
her life had passed away from her. Every resolution that she had
formed had been broken. She had had the great enemy of her life,
Barty Burgess, in the house with her upon terms that were intended
to be amicable, and had arranged with him a plan for the division of
the family property. Her sister-in-law, whom in the heyday of her
strength she had chosen to regard as her enemy, and with whom even as
yet there had been no reconciliation, was about to become her guest,
as was also Priscilla,--whom she had ever disliked almost as much as
she had respected. She had quarrelled utterly with Hugh,--in such a
manner as to leave no possible chance of a reconciliation,--and he
also was about to be her guest. And then, as to her chosen heir, she
was now assisting him in doing the only thing, as to which she had
declared that if he did do it, he should not be her heir. As she went
about the house, under an idea that such a multiplicity of persons
could not be housed and fed without superhuman exertion, she thought
of all this, and could not help confessing to herself that her life
had been very vain. It was only when her eyes rested on Dorothy, and
she saw how supremely happy was the one person whom she had taken
most closely to her heart, that she could feel that she had done
anything that should not have been left undone. "I think I'll sit
down now, Dorothy," she said, "or I sha'n't be able to be with you
to-morrow."
"Do, aunt. Everything is all ready, and nobody will be here for an
hour yet. Nothing can be nicer than the rooms, and nothing ever was
done so well before. I'm only thinking how lonely you'll be when
we're gone."
"It'll be only for six weeks."
"But six weeks is such a long time."
"What would it have been if he had taken you up to London, my pet?
Are you sure your mother wouldn't like a fire in her room, Dorothy?"
"A fire in September, aunt?"
"People live so differently. One never knows."
"They never have but one fire at Nuncombe, aunt, summer or winter."
"That's no reason they shouldn't be comfortable here." However, she
did not insist on having the fire lighted.
Mrs. Stanbury and Priscilla came first, and the meeting was certainly
very uncomfortable. Poor Mrs. Stanbury was shy, and could hardly
speak a word. Miss Stanbury thought that her visitor was haughty,
and, though she endeavoured to be gracious, did it with a struggle.
They called each other ma'am, which made Dorothy uneasy. Each of them
was so dear to her, that it was a pity that they should glower at
each other like enemies. Priscilla was not at all shy; but she was
combative, and, as her aunt said of her afterwards, would not keep
her prickles in. "I hope, Priscilla, you like weddings," said Miss
Stanbury to her, not knowing where to find a subject for
conversation.
"In the abstract I like them," said Priscilla. Miss Stanbury did not
know what her niece meant by liking weddings in the abstract, and was
angry.
"I suppose you do have weddings at Nuncombe Putney sometimes," she
said.
"I hope they do," said Priscilla, "but I never saw one. To-morrow
will be my first experience."
"Your own will come next, my dear," said Miss Stanbury.
"I think not," said Priscilla. "It is quite as likely to be yours,
aunt." This, Miss Stanbury thought, was almost an insult, and she
said nothing more on the occasion.
Then came Hugh and the bridegroom. The bridegroom, as a matter of
course, was not accommodated in the house, but he was allowed to
come there for his tea. He and Hugh had come together; and for Hugh
a bed-room had been provided. His aunt had not seen him since he
had been turned out of the house, because of his bad practices, and
Dorothy had anticipated the meeting between them with alarm. It was,
however, much more pleasant than had been that between the ladies.
"Hugh," she said stiffly, "I am glad to see you on such an occasion
as this."
"Aunt," he said, "I am glad of any occasion that can get me an
entrance once more into the dear old house. I am so pleased to see
you." She allowed her hand to remain in his a few moments, and
murmured something which was intended to signify her satisfaction.
"I must tell you that I am going to be married myself, to one of the
dearest, sweetest, and loveliest girls that ever were seen, and you
must congratulate me."
"I do, I do; and I hope you may be happy."
"We mean to try to be; and some day you must let me bring her to you,
and shew her. I shall not be satisfied, if you do not know my wife."
She told Martha afterwards that she hoped that Mr. Hugh had sown his
wild oats, and that matrimony would sober him. When, however, Martha
remarked that she believed Mr. Hugh to be as hardworking a young man
as any in London, Miss Stanbury shook her head sorrowfully. Things
were being very much changed with her; but not even yet was she to be
brought to approve of work done on behalf of a penny newspaper.
On the following morning, at ten o'clock, there was a procession from
Miss Stanbury's house into the Cathedral, which was made entirely on
foot;--indeed, no assistance could have been given by any carriage,
for there is a back entrance to the Cathedral, near to the Lady
Chapel, exactly opposite Miss Stanbury's house. There were many
of the inhabitants of the Close there, to see the procession, and
the cathedral bells rang out their peals very merrily. Brooke, the
bridegroom, gave his arm to Miss Stanbury, which was, no doubt, very
improper,--as he should have appeared in the church as coming from
quite some different part of the world. Then came the bride, hanging
on her brother, then two bridesmaids,--friends of Dorothy's, living
in the town; and, lastly, Priscilla with her mother, for nothing
would induce Priscilla to take the part of a bridesmaid. "You might
as well ask an owl to sing to you," she said. "And then all the
frippery would be thrown away upon me." But she stood close to
Dorothy, and when the ceremony had been performed, was the first,
after Brooke, to kiss her.
Everybody acknowledged that the bride was a winsome bride. Mrs.
MacHugh was at the breakfast, and declared afterwards that Dorothy
Burgess,--as she then was pleased to call her,--was a girl very hard
to be understood. "She came here," said Mrs. MacHugh, "two years ago,
a plain, silent, shy, dowdy young woman, and we all said that Miss
Stanbury would be tired of her in a week. There has never come a time
in which there was any visible difference in her, and now she is one
of our city beauties, with plenty to say to everybody, with a fortune
in one pocket and her aunt in the other, and everybody is saying what
a fortunate fellow Brooke Burgess is to get her. In a year or two
she'll be at the top of everything in the city, and will make her way
in the county too."
The compiler of this history begs to add his opinion to that of
"everybody," as quoted above by Mrs. MacHugh. He thinks that Brooke
Burgess was a very fortunate fellow to get his wife.
CHAPTER XCVIII.
ACQUITTED.
During this time, while Hugh was sitting with his love under the oak
trees at Monkhams, and Dorothy was being converted into Mrs. Brooke
Burgess in Exeter Cathedral, Mrs. Trevelyan was living with her
husband in the cottage at Twickenham. Her life was dreary enough,
and there was but very little of hope in it to make its dreariness
supportable. As often happens in periods of sickness, the single
friend who could now be of service to the one or to the other was
the doctor. He came daily to them, and with that quick growth of
confidence which medical kindness always inspires, Trevelyan told
to this gentleman all the history of his married life,--and all
that Trevelyan told to him he repeated to Trevelyan's wife. It may
therefore be understood that Trevelyan, between them, was treated
like a child.
Dr. Nevill had soon been able to tell Mrs. Trevelyan that her
husband's health had been so shattered as to make it improbable that
he should ever again be strong either in body or in mind. He would
not admit, even when treating his patient like a child, that he had
ever been mad, and spoke of Sir Marmaduke's threat as unfortunate.
"But what could papa have done?" asked the wife.
"It is often, no doubt, difficult to know what to do; but threats are
seldom of avail to bring a man back to reason. Your father was angry
with him, and yet declared that he was mad. That in itself was hardly
rational. One does not become angry with a madman."
One does not become angry with a madman; but while a man has power
in his hands over others, and when he misuses that power grossly
and cruelly, who is there that will not be angry? The misery of the
insane more thoroughly excites our pity than any other suffering
to which humanity is subject; but it is necessary that the madness
should be acknowledged to be madness before the pity can be felt. One
can forgive, or, at any rate, make excuses for any injury when it is
done; but it is almost beyond human nature to forgive an injury when
it is a-doing, let the condition of the doer be what it may. Emily
Trevelyan at this time suffered infinitely. She was still willing to
yield in all things possible, because her husband was ill,--because
perhaps he was dying; but she could no longer satisfy herself with
thinking that all that she admitted,--all that she was still ready to
admit,--had been conceded in order that her concessions might tend to
soften the afflictions of one whose reason was gone. Dr. Nevill said
that her husband was not mad;--and indeed Trevelyan seemed now to be
so clear in his mind that she could not doubt what the doctor said to
her. She could not think that he was mad,--and yet he spoke of the
last two years as though he had suffered from her almost all that a
husband could suffer from a wife's misconduct. She was in doubt about
his health. "He may recover," the doctor said; "but he is so weak
that the slightest additional ailment would take him off." At this
time Trevelyan could not raise himself from his bed, and was carried,
like a child, from one room to another. He could eat nothing solid,
and believed himself to be dying. In spite of his weakness,--and of
his savage memories in regard to the past,--he treated his wife on
all ordinary subjects with consideration. He spoke much of his money,
telling her that he had not altered, and would not alter, the will
that he had made immediately on his marriage. Under that will all his
property would be hers for her life, and would go to their child when
she was dead. To her this will was more than just,--it was generous
in the confidence which it placed in her; and he told his lawyer, in
her presence, that, to the best of his judgment, he need not change
it. But still there passed hardly a day in which he did not make some
allusion to the great wrong which he had endured, throwing in her
teeth the confessions which she had made,--and almost accusing her
of that which she certainly never had confessed, even when, in the
extremity of her misery at Casalunga, she had thought that it little
mattered what she said, so that for the moment he might be appeased.
If he died, was he to die in this belief? If he lived, was he to live
in this belief? And if he did so believe, was it possible that he
should still trust her with his money and with his child?
"Emily," he said one day, "it has been a terrible tragedy, has it
not?" She did not answer his question, sitting silent as it was her
custom to do when he addressed her after such fashion as this. At
such times she would not answer him; but she knew that he would
press her for an answer. "I blame him more than I do you," continued
Trevelyan,--"infinitely more. He was a serpent intending to sting me
from the first,--not knowing perhaps how deep the sting would go."
There was no question in this, and the assertion was one which had
been made so often that she could let it pass. "You are young, Emily,
and it may be that you will marry again."
"Never," she said, with a shudder. It seemed to her then that
marriage was so fearful a thing that certainly she could never
venture upon it again.
"All I ask of you is, that should you do so, you will be more careful
of your husband's honour."
"Louis," she said, getting up and standing close to him, "tell me
what it is that you mean." It was now his turn to remain silent,
and hers to demand an answer. "I have borne much," she continued,
"because I would not vex you in your illness."
"You have borne much?"
"Indeed and indeed, yes. What woman has ever borne more!"
"And I?" said he.
"Dear Louis, let us understand each other at last. Of what do you
accuse me? Let us, at any rate, know each other's thoughts on this
matter, of which each of us is ever thinking."
"I make no new accusation."
"I must protest then against your using words which seem to convey
accusation. Since marriages were first known upon earth, no woman has
ever been truer to her husband than I have been to you."
"Were you lying to me then at Casalunga when you acknowledged that
you had been false to your duties?"
"If I acknowledged that, I did lie. I never said that; but yet I did
lie,--believing it to be best for you that I should do so. For your
honour's sake, for the child's sake, weak as you are, Louis, I must
protest that it was so. I have never injured you by deed or thought."
"And yet you have lied to me! Is a lie no injury;--and such a lie!
Emily, why did you lie to me? You will tell me to-morrow that you
never lied, and never owned that you had lied."
Though it should kill him, she must tell him the truth now. "You were
very ill at Casalunga," she said, after a pause.
"But not so ill as I am now. I could breathe that air. I could live
there. Had I remained I should have been well now,--but what of
that?"
"Louis, you were dying there. Pray, pray listen to me. We thought
that you were dying; and we knew also that you would be taken from
that house."
"That was my affair. Do you mean that I could not keep a house over
my head?" At this moment he was half lying, half sitting, in a large
easy chair in the little drawing-room of their cottage, to which he
had been carried from the adjoining bed-room. When not excited, he
would sit for hours without moving, gazing through the open window,
sometimes with some pretext of a book lying within the reach of his
hand; but almost without strength to lift it, and certainly without
power to read it. But now he had worked himself up to so much energy
that he almost raised himself up in his chair, as he turned towards
his wife. "Had I not the world before me, to choose a house in?"
"They would have put you somewhere, and I could not have reached
you."
"In a madhouse, you mean. Yes;--if you had told them."
"Will you listen, dear Louis? We knew that it was our duty to bring
you home; and as you would not let me come to you, and serve you, and
assist you to come here where you are safe,--unless I owned that you
had been right, I said that you had been right."
"And it was a lie,--you say now?"
"All that is nothing. I cannot go through it; nor should you. There
is the only question. You do not think that I have been--? I need not
say the thing. You do not think that?" As she asked the question, she
knelt beside him, and took his hand in hers, and kissed it. "Say that
you do not think that, and I will never trouble you further about the
past."
"Yes;--that is it. You will never trouble me!" She glanced up into
his face and saw there the old look which he used to wear when he was
at Willesden and at Casalunga; and there had come again the old tone
in which he had spoken to her in the bitterness of his wrath:--the
look and the tone, which had made her sure that he was a madman. "The
craft and subtlety of women passes everything!" he said. "And so at
last I am to tell you that from the beginning it has been my doing. I
will never say so, though I should die in refusing to do it."
After that there was no possibility of further conversation, for
there came upon him a fit of coughing, and then he swooned; and in
half-an-hour he was in bed, and Dr. Nevill was by his side. "You must
not speak to him at all on this matter," said the doctor. "But if he
speaks to me?" she asked. "Let it pass," said the doctor. "Let the
subject be got rid of with as much ease as you can. He is very ill
now, and even this might have killed him." Nevertheless, though this
seemed to be stern, Dr. Nevill was very kind to her, declaring that
the hallucination in her husband's mind did not really consist of a
belief in her infidelity, but arose from an obstinate determination
to yield nothing. "He does not believe it; but he feels that were he
to say as much, his hands would be weakened and yours strengthened."
"Can he then be in his sane mind?"
"In one sense all misconduct is proof of insanity," said the doctor.
"In his case the weakness of the mind has been consequent upon the
weakness of the body."
Three days after that Nora visited Twickenham from Monkhams in
obedience to a telegram from her sister. "Louis," she said, "had
become so much weaker, that she hardly dared to be alone with him.
Would Nora come to her?" Nora came of course, and Hugh met her at the
station, and brought her with him to the cottage. He asked whether
he might see Trevelyan, but was told that it would be better that
he should not. He had been almost continually silent since the last
dispute which he had with his wife; but he had given little signs
that he was always thinking of the manner in which he had been
brought home by her from Italy, and of the story she had told him
of her mode of inducing him to come. Hugh Stanbury had been her
partner in that struggle, and would probably be received, if not with
sullen silence, then with some attempt at rebuke. But Hugh did see
Dr. Nevill, and learned from him that it was hardly possible that
Trevelyan should live many hours. "He has worn himself out," said the
doctor, "and there is nothing left in him by which he can lay hold of
life again." Of Nora her brother-in-law took but little notice, and
never again referred in her hearing to the great trouble of his life.
He said to her a word or two about Monkhams, and asked a question now
and again as to Lord Peterborough,--whom, however, he always called
Mr. Glascock; but Hugh Stanbury's name was never mentioned by him.
There was a feeling in his mind that at the very last he had been
duped in being brought to England, and that Stanbury had assisted in
the deception. To his wife he would whisper little petulant regrets
for the loss of the comforts of Casalunga, and would speak of the air
of Italy and of Italian skies and of the Italian sun, as though he
had enjoyed at his Sienese villa all the luxuries which climate can
give, and would have enjoyed them still had he been allowed to remain
there. To all this she would say nothing. She knew now that he was
failing quickly, and there was only one subject on which she either
feared or hoped to hear him speak. Before he left her for ever and
ever would he tell her that he had not doubted her faith?
She had long discussions with Nora on the matter, as though all the
future of her life depended on it. It was in vain that Nora tried to
make her understand that if hereafter the spirit of her husband could
know anything of the troubles of his mortal life, could ever look
back to the things which he had done in the flesh, then would he
certainly know the truth, and all suspicion would be at an end. And
if not, if there was to be no such retrospect, what did it matter
now, for these few last hours before the coil should be shaken off,
and all doubt and all sorrow should be at an end? But the wife, who
was soon to be a widow, yearned to be acquitted in this world by him
to whom her guilt or her innocence had been matter of such vital
importance. "He has never thought it," said Nora.
"But if he would say so! If he would only look it! It will be all in
all to me as long as I live in this world." And then, though they had
determined between themselves in spoken words never to regard him
again as one who had been mad, in all their thoughts and actions
towards him they treated him as though he were less responsible than
an infant. And he was mad;--mad though every doctor in England had
called him sane. Had he not been mad he must have been a fiend,--or
he could not have tortured, as he had done, the woman to whom he owed
the closest protection which one human being can give to another.
During these last days and nights she never left him. She had done
her duty to him well, at any rate since the time when she had been
enabled to come near him in Italy. It may be that in the first days
of their quarrel, she had not been regardful, as she should have
been, of a husband's will,--that she might have escaped this tragedy
by submitting herself to the man's wishes, as she had always been
ready to submit herself to his words. Had she been able always to
keep her neck in the dust under his foot, their married life might
have been passed without outward calamity, and it is possible that
he might still have lived. But if she erred, surely she had been
scourged for her error with scorpions. As she sat at his bedside
watching him, she thought of her wasted youth, of her faded beauty,
of her shattered happiness, of her fallen hopes. She had still her
child,--but she felt towards him that she herself was so sad a
creature, so sombre, so dark, so necessarily wretched from this time
forth till the day of her death, that it would be better for the boy
that she should never be with him. There could be nothing left for
her but garments dark with woe, eyes red with weeping, hours sad from
solitude, thoughts weary with memory. And even yet,--if he would only
now say that he did not believe her to have been guilty, how great
would be the change in her future life!
Then came an evening in which he seemed to be somewhat stronger than
he had been. He had taken some refreshment that had been prepared
for him, and, stimulated by its strength, had spoken a word or two
both to Nora and to his wife. His words had been of no especial
interest,--alluding to some small detail of his own condition, such
as are generally the chosen topics of conversation with invalids.
But he had been pronounced to be better, and Nora spoke to him
cheerfully, when he was taken into the next room by the man who
was always at hand to move him. His wife followed him, and soon
afterwards returned, and bade Nora good night. She would sit by her
husband, and Nora was to go to the room below, that she might receive
her lover there. He was expected out that evening, but Mrs. Trevelyan
said that she would not see him. Hugh came and went, and Nora took
herself to her chamber. The hours of the night went on, and Mrs.
Trevelyan was still sitting by her husband's bed. It was still
September, and the weather was very warm. But the windows had been
all closed since an hour before sunset. She was sitting there
thinking, thinking, thinking. Dr. Nevill had told her that the time
now was very near. She was not thinking now how very near it might
be, but whether there might yet be time for him to say that one word
to her.
"Emily," he said, in the lowest whisper.
"Darling!" she answered, turning round and touching him with her
hand.
"My feet are cold. There are no clothes on them."
She took a thick shawl and spread it double across the bottom of
the bed, and put her hand upon his arm. Though it was clammy with
perspiration, it was chill, and she brought the warm clothes up close
round his shoulders. "I can't sleep," he said. "If I could sleep,
I shouldn't mind." Then he was silent again, and her thoughts went
harping on, still on the same subject. She told herself that if ever
that act of justice were to be done for her, it must be done that
night. After a while she turned round over him ever so gently, and
saw that his large eyes were open and fixed upon the wall.
She was kneeling now on the chair close by the bed head, and her hand
was on the rail of the bedstead supporting her. "Louis," she said,
ever so softly.
"Well."
"Can you say one word for your wife, dear, dear, dearest husband?"
"What word?"
"I have not been a harlot to you;--have I?"
"What name is that?"
"But what a thing, Louis! Kiss my hand, Louis, if you believe me."
And very gently she laid the tips of her fingers on his lips. For a
moment or two she waited, and the kiss did not come. Would he spare
her in this the last moment left to him either for justice or for
mercy? For a moment or two the bitterness of her despair was almost
unendurable. She had time to think that were she once to withdraw
her hand, she would be condemned for ever;--and that it must be
withdrawn. But at length the lips moved, and with struggling ear she
could hear the sound of the tongue within, and the verdict of the
dying man had been given in her favour. He never spoke a word more
either to annul it or to enforce it.
Some time after that she crept into Nora's room. "Nora," she said,
waking the sleeping girl, "it is all over."
"Is he--dead?"
"It is all over. Mrs. Richards is there. It is better than an hour
since now. Let me come in." She got into her sister's bed, and there
she told the tale of her tardy triumph. "He declared to me at last
that he trusted me," she said,--almost believing that real words had
come from his lips to that effect. Then she fell into a flood of
tears, and after a while she also slept.
CHAPTER XCIX.
CONCLUSION.
At last the maniac was dead, and in his last moments he had made such
reparation as was in his power for the evil that he had done. With
that slight touch of his dry fevered lips he had made the assertion
on which was to depend the future peace and comfort of the woman whom
he had so cruelly misused. To her mind the acquittal was perfect;
but she never explained to human ears,--not even to those of her
sister,--the manner in which it had been given. Her life, as far as
we are concerned with it, has been told. For the rest, it cannot be
but that it should be better than that which was passed. If there be
any retribution for such sufferings in money, liberty, and outward
comfort, such retribution she possessed;--for all that had been his,
was now hers. He had once suggested what she should do, were she
ever to be married again; and she felt that of such a career there
could be no possibility. Anything but that! We all know that widows'
practices in this matter do not always tally with wives' vows; but,
as regards Mrs. Trevelyan, we are disposed to think that the promise
will be kept. She has her child, and he will give her sufficient
interest to make life worth having.
Early in the following spring Hugh Stanbury was married to Nora
Rowley in the parish church of Monkhams,--at which place by that time
Nora found herself to be almost as much at home as she might have
been under other circumstances. They had prayed that the marriage
might be very private;--but when the day arrived there was no
very close privacy. The parish church was quite full, there were
half-a-dozen bridesmaids, there was a great breakfast, Mrs. Crutch
had a new brown silk gown given to her, there was a long article
in the county gazette, and there were short paragraphs in various
metropolitan newspapers. It was generally thought among his compeers
that Hugh Stanbury had married into the aristocracy, and that the
fact was a triumph for the profession to which he belonged. It shewed
what a Bohemian could do, and that men of the press in England might
gradually hope to force their way almost anywhere. So great was the
name of Monkhams! He and his wife took for themselves a very small
house near the Regent's Park, at which they intend to remain until
Hugh shall have enabled himself to earn an additional two hundred
a-year. Mrs. Trevelyan did not come to live with them, but kept the
cottage near the river at Twickenham. Hugh Stanbury was very averse
to any protracted connection with comforts to be obtained from poor
Trevelyan's income, and told Nora that he must hold her to her
promise about the beef-steak in the cupboard. It is our opinion that
Mr. and Mrs. Hugh Stanbury will never want for a beef-steak and all
comfortable additions until the inhabitants of London shall cease to
require newspapers on their breakfast tables.
Brooke and Mrs. Brooke established themselves in the house in the
Close on their return from their wedding tour, and Brooke at once put
himself into intimate relations with the Messrs. Croppers, taking
his fair share of the bank work. Dorothy was absolutely installed as
mistress in her aunt's house with many wonderful ceremonies, with
the unlocking of cupboards, the outpouring of stores, the giving
up of keys, and with many speeches made to Martha. This was all
very painful to Dorothy, who could not bring herself to suppose it
possible that she should be the mistress of that house, during her
aunt's life. Miss Stanbury, however, of course persevered, speaking
of herself as a worn-out old woman, with one foot in the grave, who
would soon be carried away and put out of sight. But in a very few
days things got back into their places, and Aunt Stanbury had the
keys again. "I knew how it would be, miss," said Martha to her young
mistress, "and I didn't say nothing, 'cause you understand her so
well."
Mrs. Stanbury and Priscilla still live at the cottage, which,
however, to Priscilla's great disgust, has been considerably improved
and prettily furnished. This was done under the auspices of Hugh, but
with funds chiefly supplied from the house of Brooke, Dorothy, and
Co. Priscilla comes into Exeter to see her sister, perhaps, every
other week; but will never sleep away from home, and very rarely will
eat or drink at her sister's table. "I don't know why, I don't," she
said to Dorothy, "but somehow it puts me out. It delays me in my
efforts to come to the straw a day." Nevertheless, the sisters are
dear friends.
I fear that in some previous number a half promise was made that a
husband should be found for Camilla French. That half-promise cannot
be treated in the manner in which any whole promise certainly would
have been handled. There is no husband ready for Cammy French. The
reader, however, will be delighted to know that she made up her
quarrel with her sister and Mr. Gibson, and is now rather fond
of being a guest at Mr. Gibson's house. On her first return to
Exeter after the Gibsons had come back from their little Cornish
rustication, Camilla declared that she could not and would not bring
herself to endure a certain dress of which Bella was very fond;--and
as this dress had been bought for Camilla with special reference
to the glories of her anticipated married life, this objection was
almost natural. But Bella treated it as absurd, and Camilla at last
gave way.
It need only further be said that though Giles Hickbody and Martha
are not actually married as yet,--men and women in their class of
life always moving towards marriage with great precaution,--it is
quite understood that the young people are engaged, and are to be
made happy together at some future time.
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