Anne sprang to her feet with the natural impetuosity which she tried so hard to keep under, and seized the letter out of her sister’s hands.
‘You must never speak nor think of anything of the kind,’ she cried; ‘my father’s wish, his last charge to us——’
‘I am sure,’ said Rose, beginning to cry, ‘you need not speak—it is you that refused to do what he told you, not I? This is quite innocent; what could it matter? It can’t vex him now, whatever we do, for he will never know. I would not have disobeyed him when he was living—that is, not in anything serious, not for the world—but now, what can it matter, when he will never, never know?’
The utter scepticism and cynicism of the little childish creature, crying by the fire, did not strike Anne. It was only a naughtiness, a foolishness upon the child’s part, nothing more. She restored the packet to the private drawer and locked it with energy, closing down and locking the desk, too. It was herself she blamed for having shown the packet, not Rose, who knew no better. But now it was clear that she must do, what indeed she generally had to do, when Rose claimed her attention—give up her own occupation, and devote herself to her sister. She came and sat down by her, leaving the letter in which her heart was. And Rose, taking advantage of the opportunity, tormented her with questions. When at last she consented to retire to her room, Anne could do nothing but sit by the fire, making a vain attempt to stifle the more serious questions, which were arising, whether she would or no, in her own heart. ‘Rose = prose,’ she had tried hard to say to herself, as so often before; but her lips quivered, so that a smile was impossible. She sat there for a long time after, trying to recover herself. She had arrived at a crisis of which she felt the pain without understanding the gravity of it. And indeed the sudden chaos of confusion and wonder into which she had wandered, she could not tell how, had no doubt so deadened the blow of the strange will to her, as to give her a heroism which was half stupidity, as so many heroisms are. She, too, had expected, like all the world, that Cosmo would have come to her at once—if not to Mount, yet to the rectory, where his friends would have received him. She had taken it for granted—though she had not said a word on the subject to anyone, nor even to herself, feeling that to see him and feel him near her would be all the greater consolation if she had never said she looked for it, even in her own heart. She had not given his name to Charley Ashley as one of those to be informed by telegraph, nor had she mentioned his name at all, though she seemed to herself to read it in a continual question in the Curate’s eyes. A chill had stolen over her when she heard nothing of him all the first long day. She had not permitted herself to ask or to think, but she had started at every opening door, and listened to every step outside, and even, with a pang which she would not acknowledge, had looked out through a crevice of the closed shutters, with an ache of wondering anguish in her heart, to see the Curate coming up the avenue alone on the second morning. But when Cosmo’s letter came to her, by the ordinary return of post, Anne tried to say to herself that of course he was right and she was wrong—nay more than that—that she had known exactly all through which was the more delicate and noble way, and that it was this. How could he come to Mount, he who had been turned away from it (though this was not quite true), who had been the cause of her disinheritance? How could he present himself the moment the father, who had objected to him so strenuously, was dead? Cosmo laid the whole case before her with what seemed the noblest frankness, in that letter. ‘I am in your hands,’ he said. ‘The faintest expression of a wish from you will change everything. Say to me, “Come,” and I will come, how gladly I need not say—but without that word, how can I intrude into the midst of a grief which, believe me, my dearest, I shall share, for it will be yours, but which by all the rest of the world will seem nothing but a deliverance and relief to me.’ Anne, who had not allowed herself to say a word, even to her own soul, of the sickening of disappointment and wonder in her, who had stood bravely dumb and refused to be conscious that she had expected him, felt her heart leap up with a visionary triumph of approval, when this letter came. Oh, how completely and nobly right he was! How superior in his instinctive sense of what it was most delicately honourable and fit to do, in such an emergency, to any other, or to herself even, who ought to have known better!
She wrote instantly to say, ‘You are right, dear Cosmo. You are more than right; how could anyone be so blind as not to see that this is what you ought to, what you must have done, and that nothing else was possible?’ And since then she had said these words over to herself again and again—and had gone about all her occupations more proudly, more erect and self-sustaining, because of this evident impossibility that he should have been there, which the heavier people about, without his fine perceptions and understanding, did not seem to see. As a matter of fact, she said to herself, she wanted no help. She was not delicate or very young, like Rose, but a full-grown woman, able for anything, worthy of the confidence that had been placed in her. Nevertheless, there had been a moment, when Heathcote had put out his arm to support her at the side of the grave, when the sense of Cosmo’s absence had been almost more than she could bear, and his excuse had not seemed so sufficient as before. She had rejected the proffered support. She had walked firmly away, proving to all beholders that she was able to do all that she had to do, and to bear all that she had to bear; but, nevertheless the pang and chill of this moment had shaken Anne’s moral being. She had read in Heathcote’s eyes some reflection of the indignant question, ‘Where is that fellow?’ She had discerned it in Charley Ashley’s every look and gesture—and there had been a dull anticipation and echo of their sentiments in her heart. She had, as it were, struck against it, and her strength and her nerves were shaken by the encounter. The after thrill of this, still going through and through her, had made her almost indifferent to the shock given by the reading of the will. She had not cared the least about that. She had been dulled to it, and was past feeling it—though it was not in the least what she had expected, and had so much novelty and individuality of vengeance in it as to have given a special blow had she been able to receive it. Even now when her intelligence had fully taken it in, her heart was still untouched by it—Un chiodo caccia un’ altro. But she had slowly got the better of the former shock. She had re-read Cosmo’s letters, of which she received one every day, and had again come to see that his conduct was actuated by the very noblest motives. Then had come Rose’s visit and all those questionings, and once more Anne had felt as if she had run against some one in the dark, and had been shaken by the shock. She sat trying to recover herself, trembling and incapable for a long time, before she could go and finish her letter. And yet there was much in that letter that she was anxious Cosmo should know.
While all this was going on upstairs, the two gentlemen were sitting over their dinner, with still a little excitement, a little gloom hovering over them, but on the whole comfortable, returning to their usual ways of thinking and usual calm of mind. Even to those most intimately concerned, death is one of the things to which the human mind most easily accustoms itself. Mr. Loseby was more new than Heathcote was to the aspect of the house, from which for the time all its usual inhabitants and appearances had gone. He said ‘Poor Mountford!’ two or three times in the course of dinner, and stopped to give an account of the claret on which the late master of the house had much prided himself. ‘And very good it is,’ Mr. Loseby said. ‘I suppose, unless the widow reserves it for her own use—and I don’t believe she knows it from Gladstone claret at 12s. a dozen—there will be a sale.’ This intruded a subject which was even more interesting than the will and all that must flow from it. ‘What do you intend to do?’
Now Heathcote Mountford was not very happy, any more than the other members of the household. He had gone through a disappointment too. Heathcote had but one person in the world who had been of any importance in his past life, and that was his young brother Edward, now at Sandhurst. It had been settled that Edward and a number of his comrades should come to Mount for the dance, but when Heathcote had signified his wish, after all this was over, that Edward should come for the funeral, the young man had refused. “Why should I? You will all be as dull as ditch-water; and I never knew our kinsman as you call him. You are dismal by nature, Heathcote, old boy,’ the young man had said, ‘but not I—why should I come to be another mute? Can’t you find enough without me?’ Edward, who was very easily moved when his own concerns were in question, was as obstinate as the rest of the Mountfords as to affairs which did not concern himself. He paid no attention to his brother’s plea for a little personal consolation. And Heathcote, who regarded the young fellow as a father regards his spoiled child, was disappointed. To be sure, he represented to himself, Edward too had been disappointed; he had lost his ball, which was a thing of importance to him, and the settlement of his affairs, for which he had been looking with such confidence, was now indefinitely postponed. Edward had not been an easy boy to manage; he had not been a very good boy. He had been delicate and wayward and spoiled—spoiled as much by the elder brother who was thoroughly aware how wrong it was, as by the mother who had been foolish about Edward, and had died when he was still so young that spoiling did not matter much. Heathcote had carried the process on, he had vowed to himself that, so far as was possible, the delicate boy should not miss his mother’s tenderness; and he had kept his word, and ruined the boy. Edward had got everything he wanted from his brother, so long as he wanted only innocent things; and afterwards he had got for himself, and insisted on getting, things that were not so innocent; and the result was that, though still only twenty, he was deeply in debt. It was for this that Heathcote had made up his mind to sacrifice the succession to Mount. Sacrifice—it was not a sacrifice; he cared nothing for Mount, and Edward cared less than nothing. Even afterwards, when he had begun to look upon Mount with other eyes, he had persevered in his intention to sacrifice it; but now all that had come to an end. Whether he would or not, Heathcote Mountford had become the possessor of Mount, and Edward’s debts were very far from being paid. In these circumstances Heathcote felt it specially hard upon him that his brother did not come to him, to be with him during this crisis. It was natural; he did not blame Edward; and yet he felt it almost as a woman might have felt it. This threw a gloom over him almost more than the legitimate gloom, which, to be sure, Heathcote by this time had recovered from. It was not in nature that he could have felt it very deeply after the first shock. His own vexations poured back upon his mind, when Mr. Loseby said, ‘What do you intend to do?’
‘You will say what have I to do with that?’ the old lawyer said. ‘And yet, if you will think, I have to do with it more or less. We have to get the family out on our side. It’s early days—but if you should wish an early settlement——’
‘I don’t mind if it is never settled,’ said Heathcote; ‘what should I do with this great place? It would take all my income to keep it up. If they like to stay, they are very welcome. I care nothing about it. Poor St. John had a handsome income from other sources. He was able to keep it up.’
‘Good Lord, Mr. Heathcote!’ said the lawyer, ‘why didn’t you come a year ago? A young man should not neglect his relations; it always turns out badly. If you had come here a year ago, in the natural course of events, I could have laid a thousand pounds upon it that you and Anne would have taken a fancy to each other. You seem to me exactly cut out for each other—the same ways, a little resemblance even in looks——’
‘You pay me too great a compliment,’ said Heathcote, with an uneasy laugh, colouring in spite of himself; ‘and you must let me say that my cousin’s name is sacred, and that, old friend as you are, you ought not to discuss her so.’
‘I—oughtn’t to talk of Anne? Why, she has sat upon my knee,’ said Mr. Loseby. ‘Ah! why didn’t you come a year ago? I don’t say now that if it was to your mind to make yourself comfortable as poor Mountford did, in the same way, there’s still the occasion handy. No, I can’t say that,’ said the old lawyer, ‘I am too sick of the whole concern. Anne treated like that, and Rose, little Rose, that bit of a girl!—-- However,’ he said, recovering himself, ‘I ought to remember that after all you can’t take the same interest in them as I do, and that we were talking of your own concerns.’
‘I take a great interest in my cousins,’ said Heathcote gravely. ‘Do you know I believe poor St. John meant to buy my interest, to accept my proposal, and leave Mount to his eldest daughter.’
‘No; you don’t think so? Well, that might have been a way out of it—that might have been a way out of it—now that you recall it to me the same thought struck myself; at least I thought he would take advantage of that to make a new settlement, after he had taken his fling and relieved his mind with this one. Ah, poor man, he never calculated on the uncertainty of life—he never thought of that rabbit-hole. God help us, what a thing life is! at the mercy of any rolling stone, and any falling branch, of a poor little rabbit’s burrowing, or even a glass of water. And what a thing is man! as Hamlet says; it’s enough to make anyone moralise: but we never take a bit of warning by it—never a bit. And so you really think he meant to take Mount off your hands and settle it on Anne? I don’t think he had gone so far as that—but I’ll tell you what we’ll do, we’ll tell her so, and that will make her happy. She’s not like other people, she is all wrong here,’ said Mr. Loseby, laughing, with the tears in his eyes, and tapping his forehead. ‘She has a bee in her bonnet, as the Scotch say. She is a fool, that is what Anne is—she will be as pleased as if he had left her a kingdom. The worst thing of it all to that girl is, that her father has made himself look like a tyrant and a knave—which he wasn’t, you know—he wasn’t, poor Mountford! though he has done his best to make himself appear so. Once give her something to build up his character again upon, some ground, it doesn’t matter how fanciful it is, and she’ll be happy. She won’t mind her own loss, bless you,’ said the old lawyer, half crying, ‘she is such a fool!’
‘Mr. Loseby,’ said Heathcote with an emotion which surprised him, ‘I think you are giving my cousin Anne the most beautiful character that ever was.’
‘Sir,’ cried Mr. Loseby, not ashamed to dry his eyes, ‘whoever said anything different? Did you ever hear anything different? As long as I have known the world I have never known but one Anne Mountford. Oh, Mr. Heathcote, Mr. Heathcote,’ he added, his voice turning into tremulous laughter, ‘what a thousand pities that you did not make your appearance a year before!’
Heathcote got up from his chair with a start, and walked about the room in a nervous impatience, for which he could give no reason to himself. Was it that he, too, wished he had come to Mount a year sooner? He left the old man to finish his wine, and roamed about, now pausing a moment with his back to the fire, now extending his walk into the dark corners. He had lit his cigarette, which furnished him with an excuse—but he was not thinking of his cigarette. What he was thinking was—What the devil did that fellow mean by staying away now? Why didn’t he come and stand by her like a man? What sort of a pitiful cur was he that he didn’t come, now he was free to do it, and stand by her like a man? He disposed of Charley Ashley’s mild plea with still greater impatience. Perhaps she had forbidden him to come. ‘Would I have been kept away by any forbidding?’ Heathcote said to himself without knowing it. Then he came back from the corners in which such suggestions lay, feeling uneasy, feeling wroth and uncomfortable, and took his stand again before the fire. ‘Perhaps you will give me a little advice about the money I wanted,’ he said to Mr. Loseby. This was safer on the whole than suffering himself to stray into foolish fancies as to what he would have done, or would not have done, supposing an impossible case—supposing he had made his appearance a year sooner; before there was any complication of any unsatisfactory ‘fellow’ with the image of his cousin Anne.
CHAPTER XXII.
SOPHISTRY.
It is not to be supposed that the events which had moved so deeply the household at Mount, and all its connections, should have passed lightly over the one other person who, of all to whom the Mountfords were familiar, could alone feel himself a principal in the important matters involved. Douglas had looked on from a distance, keeping himself out of all the immediate complications, but not the less had he looked on with a beating heart, more anxious than it is possible to say, and, though still quiescent, never less than on the verge of personal action, and never clear that it would not have been wisest for him to plunge into the midst of it from the first. His position had not been easy, nor his mind composed, from the beginning. When he had heard of Mr. Mountford’s death his agitation was great. He had not become indifferent to Anne. The thought that she was in trouble, and he not near her, was no pleasant thought. All the first evening, after he had received Charley Ashley’s telegram, he had spent in a prolonged argument with himself. He knew from Anne that something had been done, though he did not know what; that, according to her father’s own words, the property had been taken from her and given to her sister. She had told him what her father said, that it was understood between them that this transfer was to be made, and that she had no longer any interest in the fortune which had once been so certainly considered hers. Cosmo had not admired the ease with which she spoke on this question. He had gnashed his teeth at Anne’s unworldliness, at her calm consent to her father’s arrangements, and ready making up of the quarrel with him. She was his love, his dearest, in all truth the one woman in the world who had captivated his affections, and made him feel that he had no longer any choice, any preference, that did not point to her; but he had acted like a fool all the same, he thought. In some minds, perhaps in most minds, this conviction can exist without in the least affecting the reality of the love which lies behind. He loved Anne, but his love did not make him think that everything she did was well done. She had behaved like a fool. Old Mr. Loseby said the same thing, but he said it with glistening eyes, and with an appreciation of the folly and its character such as Cosmo was altogether incapable of.
Nevertheless, Anne’s lover did not feel his love materially lessened by this conviction. He gnashed his teeth at it, thinking, ‘Had I but been there!’ though he knew very well that, had he been there, he could have done nothing to change it. But one thing he could do: when she was his wife he could put a stop to such follies. There should be none of this ridiculous magnanimity, this still more ridiculous indifference, then. In writing to her he had felt that it was difficult to keep all vestige of his disapproval out of his letters, but he had managed pretty nearly to do so: feeling wisely that it was useless to preach to her on such a subject, that only his own constant guidance and example, or, better still, his personal conduct of her affairs, could bring real good sense into them. He had been anxious enough while this was going on, not seeing what was to come, feeling only certain that, love as he might, he could no more marry his love without a penny than he could make himself Lord Chief Justice. It was out of the question: in his position marriage was difficult in the best of circumstances; but to marry a wife without a fortune of her own, without enough to keep her comfortable, was simply folly not to be thought of. Anne’s dreams of romantic toil, of the enthusiasm of hard work into which a man might rush for the sake of a woman he loved, and of the heroic life the two could lead, helping each other on to fame and fortune at the end, were to him as silly as a nursery tale. Men who made their own way like that, overcoming every obstacle and forcing their way to the heights of ambition, were men who did it by temperament, not by love, or for any sentimental motive. Cosmo knew that he was not the sort of man to venture on such a madness. His wife must have enough to provide for her own comfort, to keep her as she had been accustomed to be kept, or else he could have no wife at all.
This had given him enough to think of from the very beginning of the engagement, as has been already shown. His part was harder than Anne’s, for she had fanciful ups and downs as was natural to her, and if she sometimes was depressed would be next moment up in the clouds, exulting in some visionary blessedness, dreaming out some love in a cottage or still more ludicrous love in chambers, which his sterner reason never allowed to be possible, not for an hour; therefore his was the hardest burden of the two. For he was not content to part with her, nor so much as to think of parting with her; and yet, with all his ingenuity, he could not see how, if her father did not relent, it could be done. And the worst thing now was that the father was beyond all power of relenting—that he was dead, absolutely dead, allowed to depart out of this world having done his worst. Not one of the family, not one of Mr. Mountford’s dependents, was more stunned by the news than Cosmo. Dead! he read over the telegram again and again—he could not believe his eyes—it seemed impossible that such a piece of wickedness could have been accomplished; he felt indignant and furious at everybody concerned, at Mr. Mountford for dying, at God for permitting it. A man who had made such a mistake, and to whom it was absolutely indispensable that he should be allowed time to repent of his mistake and amend it—and instead of this he had died—he had been permitted to die.
The news threw Cosmo into a commotion of mind which it is impossible to describe. At one period of the evening he had thrown some things into a bag, ready to start, as Ashley expected him to do; then he took another thought. If he identified himself with everything that was being done now, how could he ever withdraw after, how postpone ulterior proceedings? This, however, is a brutal way of stating even the very first objection that occurred to Cosmo. Sophistry would be a poor art if it only gave an over-favourable view of a man’s actions and motives to the outside world, and left himself unconvinced and undeceived. His was of a much superior kind. It did a great deal more for him. When its underground industry was once in full action it bewildered himself. It was when he was actually closing his bag, actually counting out the contents of his purse to see if he had enough for the journey, that this other line of reasoning struck him. If he thus rushed to Mount to take his place by Anne’s side, and yet was not prepared (and he knew he was not prepared) to urge, nay, almost force himself upon Anne’s immediate acceptance as her husband, would he not be doing a wrong to Anne? He would compromise her; he would be holding her up to the world as the betrothed of a poor man, a man not so well off as to be able to claim her, yet holding her bound. He paused, really feeling this to throw a new light upon the subject. Would it be acting honourably by Anne? Would it, in her interest, be the right thing to do?
This, however, was not all or half the mental process he had to go through. He paused for her sake; yet not in this way could the reason of his hesitation be made clear to her. She would not mind being ‘compromised.’ She would not insist upon the fulfilment of their engagement. He had to think of some other reason to prove to her that it was better he should stay away. He made out his case for her, gradually, at more cost of thought than the plea which had convinced himself; but at the end it satisfied him as full of very cogent and effective reasoning. The whole matter opened up before him as he pondered it. He began to ask himself, to ask her, how he could, as a man of honour, hurry to Mount as soon as the breath was out of the body of the master of the house who had rejected and sent him away? How could he thrust himself into Mr. Mountford’s presence as soon as he was dead and incapable of resenting it—he, who when living would have refused to admit him, would have had nothing to say to him? He put back his money into his purse, and slowly undid his bag and threw out his linen as these thoughts arose and shaped themselves in his mind. In either point of view it would be impossible to do it; in either point of view manly self-denial, honour, and consideration for all parties required that in this emergency he should not think of what was pleasant either to her or himself. It was a crisis too important for the mere action of instinctive feelings. Of course he would like to be with her—of course she would like to have him by her. But here was something more than what they would like—a world of things to be considered. To say that Cosmo, deep down at the bottom of his heart, was not aware that there might be another larger, simpler mode of considering the question which would sweep all these intellectual cobwebs away and carry him off in a moment to Anne’s side, to stand by her in defiance of all prudential motives, would be untrue. It is the curse of sophistry that this sense of something better, this consciousness of a fundamental flaw in its arguments, is seldom quite obliterated; but at the same time it was far more in accordance with his nature to act according to the more elaborate, and not according to the simpler system. He satisfied himself, if not completely, yet sufficiently to reconcile himself to what he was doing; and he satisfied Anne so far at least as her first response, her first apprehension was concerned. ‘Dear Cosmo, you are right, you are right, you are more than right, as you always are,’ she had said with a kind of enthusiasm, in her first letter. ‘They say that women have more delicate perceptions, but that only shows how little people know. I see in a moment the truth and the wisdom and the fine honour of what you say. I am capable of understanding it at least, but I feel how far you go beyond me in delicacy of feeling as well as in other things. No, no! you must not come; respect for my dear father forbids it, although I cannot but hope and feel certain that my father himself knows better now.’ This had been her first reply to his explanation; and he had been satisfied then that what he had done, and the reasons he had given, were in all senses the best.
It was now, however, the day after Mr. Mountford’s funeral, and everything had progressed beyond that event. Till it is over, the dead is still the first person to be considered, and all things refer to him as to one who is the centre of every thought. But when the earth has closed over his head then an inevitable change occurs. He is left there where he lies—be he the most important, the most cherished and beloved—and other interests push in and take the first place. Cosmo sat in his chambers on the evening of that day, and read his letters with a distinct consciousness of this difference, though he himself had taken no immediate share in the excitements of the dying and the burial. There was a long, very long letter from Anne, and a shorter one from Charley Ashley, which he read first with a slight sensation of alarm, notwithstanding his anxiety to hear about the will; for Cosmo could not but feel, although he was satisfied himself with the reasons for his conduct, and though Anne was satisfied, that such a rude simpleton as the Curate might possibly take a different view. He held Anne’s letter in his hand while he read the other. Charley was very brief. He was not much of a correspondent in any case.
‘We got over the funeral well on the whole,’ Charley wrote. ‘The others only went to the church, but she followed her father to the grave as you would expect. At one moment I thought she would break down; and then I confess that I felt, in your place, scarcely her own express command could have made up to me for being absent at such a time. The reading of the will was still more trying, if possible—at least I should have thought so. But she behaved like—herself—I can’t say anything more. I thought you would like to have a separate account, as, no doubt, she will make as light of all she has to go through as possible. Only on this point you ought not altogether to take her own word. She has acknowledged that she will have a great deal to bear. She wants support, whatever she may say.’
A slight smile went over Cosmo’s face as he put down this note. It was not a very comfortable smile. A man does not like even an imaginary tone of contempt in another man’s voice. And Charley Ashley was his own retainer, his dog, so to speak. To be judged by him was a novel and not a pleasant sensation. A year ago Cosmo could have felt certain that Charley would find everything he did right; he would have believed in his friend’s inscrutable motives, even if he could not understand them. But now there was a change. It was not only the hopeless rivalry which Charley himself felt to be hopeless, and which had never stood for a moment in Cosmo’s way, but it was the instinct of true affection in the good fellow’s heart which made a severe critic, a judge incorruptible, of Charley. Douglas did not think very much of Charley’s opinion or approval; but to feel it withdrawn from him, to detect a doubt, and even suspicion in his faithful adherent’s words, gave him a sting. Then he read the long letter in which Anne had poured forth all her heart; there were revelations in it also. It had been interrupted by Rose’s matter-of-fact questions. Darts of vulgar misapprehension, of commonplace incapacity to understand those fine motives of Cosmo’s which to herself were so eloquent, had come across the current of her words. Anne had not been aware of the risings and fallings of sentiment with which she wrote. She had known that by turns her heart in her bosom felt, as she had herself described it, ‘like lead.’ She had been aware that now and then there had seemed no sort of comfort nor lightening of the sky wherever she looked, even when she looked to him, and endeavoured to think of that ‘falling back upon’ him to support her, which had seemed the happiest image of their mutual relations a few days ago. But she had not been aware of the breaks in her letter, following these fluctuations of sentiment, of how she had flagged and shown her discouragement, and sometimes permitted to be audible a breathing, not of complaint, not of reproach, but of something which was neither, yet included both—a sort of sigh of loneliness.
‘My heart almost failed me when all was over, she wrote; ‘I think I must have shown it in my looks, for our cousin, Heathcote Mountford, held out his arm to me. It was not his arm I wanted, Cosmo, you know. Oh, how strange and how sad it is that just when we want support most, hard life has so altered everything that we cannot have it!’ And then, again, after giving him the fullest details of the will: ‘I told you before that the thought of being set aside—of being second where I had always been first—was more hard to me than I could have believed possible; and you, who are always ready to think the best of me, said that it was natural, that I could not have been expected to feel otherwise. I must tell you now, however, in my own defence, that I did not feel at all like this to-day; I never imagined, though I have thought so often on the subject, that it would have been possible to set me aside so completely as has been done. You understand that I have nothing (except what came to me from old Uncle Ben), nothing—except indeed a sort of allowance like a schoolmistress for taking care of Rose, which will only last three years. But, Cosmo, if you will believe me, I never thought of it; my heart did not sink in the least. I did not seem to care that it had all gone away from me, or that Rose had been set in my place, or that my father—(poor papa—how he must have felt it at the last!) should have been so unjust. They were all made of no account, as if they were the most trifling things in the world by—something else. I owe that to you too: and you must understand, dear Cosmo, you must understand that I feel you must have thought of this, and more or less done it on purpose, for my sake. I cared nothing, nothing, for all the loss and downfall, because there just gleamed upon me a possibility—no, not a possibility—a fancy, an imagination, of how different it would be if I had to face not the loss of fortune, but the loss of love, and companionship, and support. I cried out to myself, What would it all matter in comparison with that? Thank God that it is money that has been taken from me, not that. Feeling myself just for that moment, and for good reason, alone, made me realise to the very bottom of my heart what it would be to be really alone—to have no one to fall back upon, no Cosmo, no world of my own where I can enter in and be above all the world. So you see this little bitter has been sweet, it has been medicine for all my other weaknesses. Through this I rose altogether superior to everything that was sordid. I was astonished at myself. Making believe not to care and not caring are two different things, and this time I attained real indifference, thanks to you.’
This was the passage that affected him most; there were others in which there were slighter references of the same kind, showing that Anne had already tasted the forlorn consciousness of what it was to be alone. It was not a complaint, as will be seen; it was indeed quite the opposite of a complaint; but it gave Cosmo a chill of alarm, a sensation which it would be very difficult to describe. Nor was it a threat on Anne’s part—yet he was alarmed; he grew pale and chilly in spite of himself. When he read Anne’s letter he took up Charley’s again, and ran over that. If he did not want to marry on nothing, and have a family to provide for before he had enough for himself, still less did he wish anyone to regard him us the hero of a broken engagement, a domestic traitor. He was not bad nor treacherous, nor had he any pleasure in the possibility of breaking a heart. What he wanted was, first, to find in the woman he loved ‘a lady richly left’ like Portia, bringing with her all the natural provisions for a beautiful home which she would grace and give charm to; second, if the first should not prove possible, patience to wait, and make no fuss, and see what would turn up. But to be supposed to have behaved badly to a lady, to be set down as drawing back, or holding off, or any of the mild phrases which imply desertion, was terrible to him. This Cosmo could not bear. He did not want to lose or even to risk Anne. And to have her think badly of him, lose the respect, not to say the love, which she felt for him, was a danger that made the hair stand upright on his head. He did not wish even to lose Charley Ashley’s regard, and become a mean and discredited person in the Curate’s eyes: how much more in Anne’s, whom he loved! A panic took possession of Cosmo. A dishonourable lover, a betrayer, was as much an anachronism as a cruel father; it was a thing out of date. Men of his stamp broke no vows. They might be disinclined to heroic measures generally, and above all to the uncomfortable heroism of dragging down a woman into poverty, taking advantage of her inexperience, and marrying in the face of every suggestion of prudence. But to desert her because she had lost her fortune, to cry off as soon as it became evident that she was no longer a good match—this, whatever the vulgar imagination may think, is what a young man on his promotion, like Cosmo Douglas, could not venture to do. He was horrified by the very notion. In all questions of marriage there is of course a possibility that it may all come to nothing, that ‘circumstances may arise’—that incompatibilities may be discovered—even that a mutual sense of what is prudent may cause an absolute breach. Such things are to be heard of every day in society. But for a man, especially one who is a nobody, to ‘behave badly’ to a lady—that is what cannot be. If the mere suggestion of such a thing got out, it would be unendurable. And Cosmo knew that everybody was ready to report every rumour, to put on record every incident of such a story. At the same time, the great crisis being over, there need be no longer, he said to himself, any idea of compromising Anne. Perhaps the ground on which he framed his new resolution was less solid than that on which he had framed the last. But, according to his new light, the emergency was pressing, and there was no time to lose.
That evening accordingly, the linen which had been put back into his drawers was replaced in the bag, and the contents of his purse reinvestigated. He sent a telegram to Charley Ashley, which filled that good fellow with excitement, compunction, and perhaps a touch of disappointment, and left London by the night train. It brought him to the rectory uncomfortably early; but still there was no other so convenient which entailed so little loss of time, and Cosmo felt the advantage of making it apparent that he had come hurriedly and had little time to spare. He arrived while it was still dark on the wintry, foggy, chill morning. Could any man do more to show the fervent reality of his passion? He had stayed away as long as Anne was filling a kind of official position, so long as she was the object of general observation. Now, when she had no longer any sort of artificial claim upon her, or necessity for exerting herself, here he was at her command.
CHAPTER XXIII.
HEATHCOTE’S PROPOSAL.
It was a new world upon which Anne rose that day. The excitement was over, the gloomy details of business drawing to completion, and the new circumstances of the family life remained to be settled by the family themselves. It was still early when Anne came downstairs, and took her way to the library in which Mr. Loseby was sitting. He was at her father’s table, almost in the same spot where Mr. Mountford, for as long as she could remember, had done his business, or made believe to do it. This startled her a little; but it was time to resist these overwhelming associations, and address herself, she felt, to the business in hand. She came up to him quickly, giving herself no time to think. ‘Mr. Loseby, you must instruct me what are my duties,’ she said.
Heathcote Mountford was at the other end of the room, idly looking through the books, and she had not seen him, but he was unconscious of this. By degrees he had come to know all about Anne, to feel a difference in the atmosphere when she came in, to see her whenever she appeared as if with eyes in the back of his head.
‘Your duties, my dear child?’ Mr. Loseby said, pushing up his spectacles on his forehead. ‘Sit down there in front of me and let us talk. It does one good to look at you, Anne.’
‘You were always very kind,’ she said gratefully. ‘But you must not spoil me now, for if you do I shall cry, and all my morning’s work will come to an end. Mamma is coming downstairs to-day, and all is to be as—it can never be again,’ said Anne, with an abrupt interruption of herself. ‘But in the meantime it is very needful for me to know what I am to do. I want you to tell me while we are safe—while we are alone.’
‘My dear Anne,’ said the old lawyer, ‘my dear Anne!’ and the tears came to his eyes. ‘I wish I were everything that I can’t be—a fairy prince or a romantic hero—for your sake.’
‘I like you a great deal better as Mr. Loseby than if you were a fairy prince.’
‘I dare say that is true; but in the one case I might have delivered you, and in the other I can’t. Do! I don’t know what you have got to do.’
‘Somebody must,’ said Anne. ‘Tell me, please. Am I the guardian, or what does it mean? In Trust! It might be a great deal, or it might not be much. I want to do my duty, Mr. Loseby.’
‘That I am sure you will do, whatever happens. You will have to administer the whole, and watch over the money, and look out for the investments. It is the most extraordinary office for you: but we will not say anything about that.’
‘No: but I do not think it is such an extraordinary office. If the money had been mine, I should have had it to do naturally, and of course I shall do it with all the more care when it is for Rose. The pity is that I don’t know anything about it,’ said Anne, gravely. ‘But I suppose there are books on the subject, books about money and how to manage it. You must tell me how to learn my new profession,’ she added with a smile. ‘It is a curious thing all at once to wake up and find that one has a trade.’
‘I don’t see how you can call it a trade.’
‘Oh, yes, Mr. Loseby, and I am to have 500l. a-year of pay—I shall not be worth half so much. When I was young,’ said Anne, with the serene consciousness of maturity, ‘it was one of my fancies to learn something that I could live by. I am afraid I thought of quite little pettifogging businesses—little bits of art-work or such like. I shall be a kind of land-steward with a little of a stockbroker in me, now.’
‘Yes, something of that sort,’ he said, humouring her, looking at her with a smile.
‘Curious,’ said Anne, with a gleam of laughter getting into her eyes, ‘I think I shall like it too; it ought to be amusing—it ought to have an interest—and you know everybody says that what we girls want is an interest in our lives.’
‘You have never wanted an interest in your life.’
‘No, I do not think I have; but you must not look so sorry—I am not sorry for myself. What does it matter after all?’ said Anne, raising her head with that lofty visionary defiance of all evil. ‘There are things which one could not consent to lose—which it really breaks one’s heart to lose—which would need to be torn and wrenched out of one: you know, Mr. Loseby?—but not money; how different when it is only money! The mere idea that you might lose the one makes you feel what loss would be, makes you contemptuous of the other.’
‘I know?—do you think I know?—Indeed, my dear, I cannot tell,’ said Mr. Loseby, shaking his head. ‘If I lost what I have, I should not find it at all easy to console myself. I don’t think I should be contemptuous or indifferent if all my living were to go.’
‘Ah!’ she cried, with a sudden light of compunction and pity in her eyes, ‘but that is because you—— Oh, forgive me!’ with a sudden perception of what she was saying.
‘That is because I have not much else to lose?’ said the old lawyer. ‘Don’t be sorry for saying it, it is true. I lost all I had in that way, my dear, as you know, many many years ago. Life, to be sure, has changed very much since then, but I am not unhappy. I have learnt to be content; and it would make a great difference to me if I lost what I have to live upon. Anne, I have got something to tell you which I think will make you happier.’
She looked at him eagerly with her lips apart, her eyes full of beseeching earnestness. ‘It is about your father, Anne.’
Her countenance changed a little, but kept its eagerness. She had not expected anything to make her happier from that quarter; but she was almost more anxious than before to hear what it was.
‘Your cousin has been telling me—you heard his proposal about the entail, which, alas! no time was left us to discuss?—he thinks from what your father said to him,’ said the lawyer, leaning across the table and putting his hand upon hers, ‘that he meant to have arranged this according to Heathcote Mountford’s wishes, and to have settled Mount on you.’
Anne could not speak at first. The tears that had been gathering in her eyes overflowed and fell in a warm shower upon Mr. Loseby’s hand. ‘My cousin Heathcote told you this?’ she said, half sobbing, after a pause.
‘Yes, Anne. I thought it would please you to know.’
‘Please me!’ she made a little pause again, sobbing and smiling. Then she clasped his old hand in both hers with sudden enthusiasm. ‘It makes me perfectly happy!’ she cried: ‘nothing, nothing troubles me any more.’
Then, with natural feminine instinct, she wanted to hear every detail from him of the distinct conversation which she immediately concluded to have taken place between her father and her cousin. Though no one was more ready to jump to conclusions, Anne became as matter-of-fact as Rose herself in her eagerness to know everything that had taken place. The old lawyer did not feel himself able to cope with her questions. ‘I was not present,’ he said; ‘but your cousin himself is here, and he will tell you. Yes, there he is, looking at the books. I am going to fetch some papers I left in my bedroom. Mr. Heathcote, will you come and explain it all while I am away?’
He chuckled to himself with satisfaction as he left them together: but after all what was the use? ‘Good Lord,’ he cried to himself, ‘why couldn’t the fellow have come a year ago?’ To see how Providence seems to take a pleasure in making the best of plans impracticable! It was inconceivable that nobody had sense enough ever to have thought of that plan before.
But when Anne found herself face to face with Heathcote Mountford, and suddenly discovered that he had been present all the time, she did not feel the same disposition to pursue her inquiries. She had even a feeling that she had committed herself, though she could scarcely tell how. She rose up from her seat with a faint smile, mastering her tears and excitement. ‘Thank you for telling Mr. Loseby what has made me so happy,’ she said. Then added, ‘Indeed, it was more for others than myself. I knew all the time my father had not meant to wrong anyone; no, no, he never was unjust in his life; but others, strangers, like yourself, how were you to know?’
‘I am sure this was what he meant,’ Heathcote said, putting much more fervour into the asseveration than it would have required had it been as certain as he said. Anne was chilled a little by his very warmth, but she would not admit this.
‘I was very certain of it always,’ she said, ‘though I did not know how he meant it to be. But now, Mr. Heathcote, thank you, thank you with all my heart! you have set that matter to rest.’
Was it really good for her to think that the matter was set at rest, that there never had been any doubt about it, that nothing but honour, and justice, and love towards her had ever been in her father’s thoughts? No doubt she would set up some theory of the same kind to explain, with the same certainty, the sluggishness of the other, of the fellow who, having a right to support her, had left her to stand alone in her trouble. This brought a warm glow of anger into Heathcote’s veins; but he could only show it by a little impatience expressed with a laugh over a small grievance of his own.
‘You said Cousin Heathcote just now. I think, after all we have seen and felt together, that a title at least as familiar as that might be mine.’
‘Surely,’ she said, with so friendly a smile, that Heathcote felt himself ridiculously touched. Why this girl should with a smile make him feel disposed to weep, if that were possible to a man of his age, he could not tell. It was too absurd, but perhaps it was because of the strange position in which she herself stood, and the way in which she occupied it, declaring herself happy in her loss, yet speaking with such bated breath of the other loss which she had discovered to be possible, and which, in being possible, had taken all feeling about her fortune away from her. A woman, standing thus alone among all the storms, so young, so brave, so magnanimous, touches a man’s heart in spite of himself. This was how he explained it. As he looked at her, he found it difficult to keep the moisture out of his eyes.
‘I want to speak to you about business,’ he said. ‘Mr. Loseby is not the only instructor in that art. Will you tell me—don’t think I am impertinent: where you intend—where you wish—to live?’
A flush came upon Anne’s face. She thought he wanted possession of his own house, which was so natural. ‘We will not stay to trouble you!’ she cried. Then, overcoming the little impulse of pride, ‘Forgive me, Cousin Heathcote, that was not what you meant, I know. We have not talked of it, we have had no consultation as yet. Except Mount, where I have always lived, one place is the same as another to me.’
But while she said this there was something in Anne’s eyes that contradicted her, and he thought that he could read what it meant. He felt that he knew better than she knew herself, and this gave him zeal in his proposal; though what he wanted was not to further but to hinder the wish which he divined in her heart.
‘If this is the case, why not stay at Mount?’ Heathcote said. ‘Listen to me; it is of no use to me; I am not rich enough to keep it up. This is why I wanted to get rid of it. You love the place and everything about it—whereas it is nothing to me.’
‘Is it so?’ said Anne, with a voice of regret. ‘Mount!—nothing to you?’
‘It was nothing to me, at least till the other day; and to you it is so much. All your associations are connected with it; you were born here, and have all your friends here,’ said Heathcote, unconsciously enlarging upon the claims of the place, as if to press them upon an unwilling hearer. Why should he think she was unwilling to acknowledge her love for her home? And yet Anne felt in her heart that there was divination in what he said.
‘But, Cousin Heathcote, it is yours, not ours. It was our home, but it is no longer so. Don’t you think it would be more hard to have no right to it, and yet stay, than to give it up and go? The happiness of Mount is over,’ she said softly. ‘It is no longer to us the one place in the world.’
‘That is a hard thing to say to me, Anne.’
‘Is it? why so? When you are settled in it, years after this, if you will ask me, I will come to see you, and be quite happy,’ said Anne with a smile; ‘indeed I shall; it is not a mean dislike to see you here. That is the course of nature. We always knew it was to be yours. There is no feeling of wrong, no pain at all in it; but it is no longer ours. Don’t you see the difference? I am sure you see it,’ she said.
‘But if your father had carried out his intention——’
‘Do you know,’ said Anne, looking at him with a half wistful, half smiling look, ‘on second thoughts it would perhaps be better not to say anything to mamma or Rose about my father’s intention? They might think it strange. They might say that was no punishment at all. I am very glad to know it for my own comfort, and that you should understand how really just he was; but they might not see it in the same light.’
‘And it has nothing to do with the question,’ said Heathcote, almost roughly; ‘the opportunity for such an arrangement is over. Whether he intended or whether he did not intend it—I cannot give you Mount.’
‘No, no; certainly you cannot give it to me——’
‘At least,’ he cried, carried beyond himself by the excitement of the moment. ‘There was only one way in which I could have given it to you: and that, without ever leaving me the chance, without thinking of any claim I had, you have put out of my power—you have made impossible, Anne!’
She looked at him, her eyes opened wider, her lips dropping apart, with a sort of consternation, then a tinge of warmer colour gradually rose over her face. The almost fierceness of his tone, the aggrieved voice and expression had something half ludicrous in it; but in her surprise this was not visible to Anne. And he saw that he had startled her, which is always satisfactory. She owed him reparation for this, though it was an unintentional wrong. He ended with a severity of indignation which overwhelmed her.
‘It does not seem to me that I was ever thought of, that anyone took me into consideration. I was never allowed to have a chance. Before I came here, my place, the place I might have claimed, was appropriated. And now I must keep Mount though I do not want it, and you must leave it though you do want it, when our interests might have been one. But no, no, I am mistaken. You do not want it now, though it is your home. You think you will prefer London, because London is——’
‘Mr. Heathcote Mountford, I think you forget what you are saying——’
‘Don’t call me that at least,’ he cried; ‘don’t thrust me away again as a stranger. Yes, I am absurd; I have no right to claim any place or any rights. If I had not been a fool, I should have come here a year, five years ago, as old Loseby says.’
‘What is that about old Loseby?’ said the lawyer, coming into the room. He was carrying a portfolio in his hands, which, let us hope, he had honestly gone to look for when he left them. Anyhow he carried it ostentatiously as if this had been his natural object in his absence. But the others were too much excited to notice his portfolio or his severely business air. At least Heathcote was excited, who felt that he had evidently made a fool of himself, and had given vent to a bit of ridiculous emotion, quite uncalled for, without any object, and originating he could not tell how. What was the meaning of it, he would have asked himself, but that the fumes of his own words had got into his head. He turned away, quite beyond his own control, when the lawyer appeared, his heart beating, his blood coursing through his veins. How had all this tempest got up in an instant? Did it come from nothing, and mean nothing? or had it been there within him, lying quiescent all this time. He could not answer the question, nor, indeed, for that matter, did he ask it, being much too fully occupied for the moment with the commotion which had thus suddenly got up like the boiling of a volcano within him, without any will of his own.
And Anne was too much bewildered, too much astonished to say anything. She could not believe her own ears. It seemed to her that her senses must be playing her false, that she could not be seeing aright or hearing aright—or else what did it mean? Mr. Loseby glided in between them with his portfolio, feeling sure they would remark his little artifice and understand his stratagem; but he had succeeded in that stratagem so much better than he thought, that they paid no attention to him at all.
‘What are you saying about old Loseby?’ he asked. ‘It is not civil in the first place, Mr. Heathcote, to call your family man of business old. It is a contumelious expression. I am not sure that it is not actionable. That reminds me that I have never had anything to do with your branch of the family—which, no doubt, is the reason why you take this liberty. I am on the other side——’
‘Do me this service, then, at once,’ said Heathcote, coming back from that agitated little walk with which a man who has been committing himself and showing uncalled-for emotion so often relieves his feelings. ‘Persuade my cousins to gratify me by staying at Mount. I have clearly told you I should not know what to do with it. If they will stay nothing need be changed.’
‘It is a very good idea,’ said Mr. Loseby. ‘I think an excellent idea. They will pay you a rent for it which will be reasonable, which will not be exorbitant.’
‘They shall do nothing of the sort,’ cried Heathcote: ‘rent—between me and——’
‘Yes, between you and Mrs. Mountford, the most reasonable proposal in the world. It is really a thing to be taking into your full consideration, Anne. Of course you must live somewhere. And there is no place you would like so well.’
Here a guilty flush came upon Anne’s face. She stole a furtive glance at Heathcote to see if he were observing her. She did not wish to give him the opportunity of saying ‘I told you so,’ or convicting her out of her own mouth.
‘I think mamma and Rose have some idea—that is, there was some talk—Rose has always wanted masters whom we can’t get here. There was an idea of settling in London—for a time——’
He did not turn round, which was merciful. If he had divined her, if he now understood her, he gave no sign at least. This was generous, and touched Anne’s heart.
‘In London! Now, what on earth would you do in London, country birds like Rose and you? I don’t say for a little time in the season, to see the pictures, and hear some music, and that sort of thing; but settling in London, what would you do that for? You would not like it; I feel sure you would not like it. You never could like it, if you tried.’
To this Anne was dumb, making no response. She stood with her eyes cast down, her face flushed and abashed, her two hands clasped together, as much like a confused and naughty child as it was possible for Anne to be. She gave once more an instantaneous, furtive glance from under her downcast eyelids at Heathcote. Would he rejoice over her to see his guess, his impertinent guess, proved true? But Heathcote was taking another agitated turn about the room, to blow off his own excitement, and was not for the moment observant of hers.
After this Mr. Loseby began to impart to Anne real information about the duties which would be required of her, to which she gave what attention she could. But this was not so much as could have been desired. Her mind was running over with various thoughts of her own, impulses which had come to her from another mind, and new aspects of old questions. She left the library as soon as she could, in order to get back to the shelter of her own room and there think them out. Had Heathcote known how little attention she gave to his own strange, unintentional self-betrayal—if it was indeed a self-betrayal, and not a mere involuntary outbreak of the moment, some nervous impulse or other, incomprehensible to the speaker as to the hearer—he would have been sadly humbled. But, as a matter of fact, Anne scarcely thought of his words at all. He had made some mistake, she felt sure. She had not heard him right, or else she had missed the real meaning of what he said, for that surface meaning was of course impossible. But she did think about the other matter. He had divined her almost more clearly than she had understood herself. When she had decided that to go to London would be the best thing the family could do, she had carefully directed her mind to other motives; to the facilities of getting masters for Rose, and books, and everything that was interesting; to the comfort and ease of life in a place where everything could be provided so easily, where there would be no great household to keep up. She had thought of the cheerfulness of a bright little house near the parks, and all the things there would be to see—the interests on all sides, the means of occupying themselves. But she had not thought—had she thought?—that Cosmo would be at hand, that he would be within reach, that he might be the companion of many expeditions, the sharer of many occupations. Had she secretly been thinking of this all the time? had this been her motive and not the other? Heathcote Mountford had seen through her and had divined it, though she had not known it herself. She paused now to ask herself with no small emotion, if this were true; and she could not say that it was not true or half true. If it were so, was it not unmaidenly, unwomanly, wrong to go after him, since he did not come to her? She had made up her mind to it without being conscious of that motive: but now the veil was torn from her eyes, and she was aware of the weakness in her own heart. Ought she to go, being now sure that to be near Cosmo was one of her chief objects; or would it be better to remain at Mount as Heathcote’s tenant? Anne’s heart sank down, down to the lowest depth; but she was a girl who could defy her heart and all her inclinations when need was. She threw herself back as a last resource upon the others who had to be consulted. Though she knew she could turn them as she pleased, yet she proposed to herself to make an oracle of them. According to their response, who knew nothing about it, who would speak according to the chance impression of the moment, so should the decision be.
CHAPTER XXIV.
A VISITOR.
That evening all things had recommenced to be at Mount as——‘they could never be again,’ as Anne said: that is, the habits of the first week of mourning had been laid aside, the ladies had come downstairs, and appeared at table, and everything returned to its use and wont. Mr. Mountford’s place was left vacant at the table. Heathcote would not take it, though he had been assured, with tears, that the family would wish it so to be, and that no one would feel wounded by his assumption of his rights. ‘I will sit where I have always sat if you will let me,’ he said, putting himself at Mrs. Mountford’s right hand. Thus he sat between her and Rose, who was pleased by what she thought the preference he showed her. Rose dearly liked to be preferred—and, besides, Heathcote was not to be despised in any way. Grave thoughts of uniting the property had already entered her little head. He was not young, indeed he was distinctly old in Rose’s juvenile eyes, but she said to herself that when a man has so much in his favour a trifling matter like age does not count. She was very serious, what her mother called practical, in her ways of thinking: and the importance of uniting the property affected Rose. Therefore she was glad that he seemed to like her best, to choose her side of the table. Anne sat opposite, contemplating them all serenely, meeting Heathcote’s eyes without any shyness, which was more than he could boast in respect to her. He scarcely addressed her at all during the time of dinner, and he never, she perceived, broached to her stepmother or sister the question which he had discussed with her with so much vehemence. At dinner Anne felt herself at leisure—she was able to look at him and observe him, as she had never done before. He had a very handsome face, more like the ideal hero of a book than anything that is usually met with in the world. His eyes were large and dark; his nose straight; his hair dark, too, and framing his face as in a picture. ‘I do not like handsome men,’ Anne said to herself. She smiled when the thought had formed in her mind, smiled at herself. Cosmo was not handsome; he was of no particular colour, and had no very striking features. People said of him that he was gentlemanlike. It was the only thing to say. But here was a face which really was beautiful. Beauty! in a man she said to herself! and felt that she disliked it. But she could not but look at him across the table. She could not lift her eyes without seeing him. His face was the kind of face that it was natural to suppose should express fine sentiments, high-flown, Anne said to herself, she whom everybody else called high-flown. But he listened with a smile to Rose who was not of that constitution of mind.
After dinner, when the ladies were alone in the drawing-room, Anne made their cousin’s proposal known to them: that they should continue to live at Mount, paying him rent according to Mr. Loseby’s suggestion. She did not herself wish to accept this proposal—but a kind of opposition was roused in her by the blank manner in which it was listened to. She had been struggling against a guilty sense of her own private inclination to go to London, to be in the same place with her lover—but she did not see why they should wish the same thing. There seemed to Anne to be a certain impertinence in any inclination of theirs which should turn the same way. What inducement had they to care for London, or any change of residence? Though they were virtually backing her up, yet she was angry with them for it. ‘I thought you would be sure to wish to stay,’ she said.
‘You see, Anne,’ said Mrs. Mountford, with some hesitation, ‘it is not now as it was before; when we were all happy together, home was home. But now, after all we have gone through—and things would not be the same as before—your sister wants a change—and so do you——’
‘Do not think of me,’ said Anne, hastily.
‘But it is my duty to think of you, too. Rose has always been delicate, and the winters at Mount are trying, and this year, of course, you would have no variety, no society. I am sure it is very kind of Heathcote: but if we could get a comfortable little house in town—a change,’ said Mrs. Mountford, growing bolder, ‘would do us all good.’
‘Oh, don’t let us stay at Mount!’ cried Rose. ‘In the wet, cold winter days it is terrible. I have never liked Mount in winter. Do let us get away now that we can get away. I have never seen anything. Let us go to town till the spring, and then let us go abroad.’
‘That is what I should like,’ said Mrs. Mountford, meekly. ‘Change of air and scene is always recommended. You are very strong, Anne, you don’t feel it so much—you could go on for ever; but people that are more delicately organised, people who feel things more, can’t just settle down after trouble like ours. We ought to move about a little and have thorough change of scene.’
Anne was amazed at herself for the annoyance, the resentment, the resistance to which she felt herself moved. It was simple perversity, she felt, for in her heart she wanted to move, perhaps more than they did—and she had a reason for her wish—but they had none. It was mere wanton desire for change on their part. She was angry, though she saw how foolish it was to be angry. ‘It was extremely kind of Heathcote to make such a proposal,’ she said.
‘I don’t say it was not kind, Anne—but he feels that he cannot keep it up. He does not like the idea of leaving the place all dismantled and uninhabited. You may tell him I will leave the furniture; I should not think of taking it away, just at present. I think we should look about us,’ said Mrs. Mountford, ‘before we settle anywhere; and select a really good place—which Mount would never be,’ she added, with a little shaking out of her crape, ‘for us, in our changed circumstances. It may be very kind of Heathcote—but I don’t see that we can do it. It would be too much to expect.’
And Anne was silenced, not knowing what pleas to bring forward for the defeat of the cause which was her own cause; but she was angry that they should presume to think so too. What was town to them? They had no one in it to make that great wilderness feel like home. They had no inducement that she knew of. She felt reluctant to be happy by such unreasonable means.
Keziah, the little maid to whom Anne had, during the interval since she was last mentioned, imparted a great deal of very energetic advice as to the duty of holding fast to her lover, and taking no thought of interest, had red eyes that night when she came to put her mistress’s things away. Anne was very independent. She did not require much actual service. It was Rose who benefited by Keziah’s services in this respect. But when she was dismissed by Rose she came into the room where Anne sat writing, and instead of doing her work as usual with noiseless speed, and taking herself away, she hovered about for a long time, poking the fire, arranging things that had no particular need of arranging, and crossing and re-crossing Anne’s point of view. She had red eyes, but there was in her little person an air of decision that was but seldom apparent there. This Anne perceived, when, attracted at length by these manœuvres, she put away her writing and looked up. ‘Keziah,’ she said, ‘how are things going? I can’t help thinking you have something to say to me to-night.’
‘Yes, Miss Anne,’ said the girl, very composedly: ‘I have got something to say—I wanted you to know, as you’ve always been so kind and taken an interest—people has the same sort of feelings, I suppose, whether they’re quality or whether they’re common folks——’
‘That is very true, Keziah. I suspect we are all of the same flesh and blood.’
‘Don’t you laugh at me, Miss Anne. Miss Anne, I would like to tell you as I’ve made up my mind to-night.’
‘I hope you have made a right decision, Keziah,’ said Anne, with some anxiety, feeling suspicious of the red eyes.
‘Oh, I’m not afraid of its being right, Miss Anne. If it wasn’t right,’ said the little girl, with a wan smile, ‘I don’t think as it would be as hard. I’d have settled sooner if it hadn’t been for thinking what Jim would say,’ she added, a tear or two coming to dilate her eyes; ‘it wasn’t for myself. If you do your duty, Miss Anne, you can’t do no more.’
‘Then, Keziah, you have been talked over,’ said Anne, with some indignation, rising up from her desk. ‘Worth has been worrying you, and you have not been able to resist her. Why did you not tell her, as I told you, to come and have it out with me?’
‘I don’t know what good that would have done, Miss Anne. It was me that had to settle after all.’
‘Of course it was you that had to settle. Had it been anyone else I should not have lost all this time, I should have interfered at once. Keziah, do you know what you are doing? A young girl like you, just my age—(but I am not so young, I have had so much to think of, and to go through), to sell herself to an old man.’
‘Miss Anne, I’m not selling myself,’ said Keziah, with a little flush of resentment. ‘He hasn’t given me anything, not so much as a ring—I wouldn’t have it of him—I wouldn’t take not a silver thimble, though he’s always teasing—for fear you should say—— Whatever anyone may think, they can’t say as I’ve sold myself,’ said Keziah proudly. ‘I wouldn’t take a thing from him, not if it was to save his life.’
‘This is mere playing upon words, Keziah,’ said Anne, towering over the victim in virtuous indignation. ‘Old Saymore is well off and poor Jim has nothing. What do you call that but selling yourself? But it is not your doing! it is Worth’s doing. Why doesn’t he marry her? It would be a great deal more suitable than marrying you.’