“It is astonishing,” said Lady Mary, mournfully, “how entirely one is misunderstood in all one’s deeper meanings—even by those one has, so to speak, trained one’s self.”
“Yes,” said Edgar, hesitating, with the modesty that became his humble pretensions; “but, after all, to desire a piece of knowledge because it is useful, is not an unworthy sentiment.”
“Oh, no, not at all an unworthy sentiment; indeed, very right in its way; but totally subversive,” said Lady Mary, sadly, “of the highest principle of education, which aims at thorough cultivation of the mind rather than at conferring certain commonplace matter-of-fact acquirements. Considered in that point of view, professional education would be the highest, which I don’t think it is. Unless education is prized for itself, as a discipline of the mind, and not merely as teaching us some things we don’t know, we can never reach the highest level; and that truth, alas!” Lady Mary sighed, still more sadly, with all the disappointment of a baffled reformer, “women have not even begun to perceive. You laugh, Mr. Earnshaw, but, for my part, I cannot laugh.”
Edgar made the best apology he could for his untimely merriment. He was very much inclined to adopt the primitive Adamic argument, and declare that it was Myra’s fault; but either high principle, or terror of Lady Mary (I think the latter) intervened, and he refrained from thus committing himself. They walked along the sunny side of the Green together, the ponies having been sent home on account of the cold. It was a pretty place, like a village of romance, a succession of irregular houses surrounding a large triangular green, which was very green, and very well kept, and almost entirely appropriated to the gentry, though now and then a ragged donkey of the lower classes would graze peaceably in a corner, to the great advantage, pictorially, of the scene. Some of the houses were, like Mrs. Witherington’s, of Queen Anne’s time, not antique, but pleasantly old-fashioned and characteristic; others were white cottages, half hid in shrubberies. In one, which was very red, and very close upon the road, and had its rows of windows still more crowded than the others—a thin house, only one room in depth, with a very brightly polished brass knocker, and very white steps—there were signs of confusion which caught Lady Mary’s eye. She explained to Edgar that it was the doctor’s house, that he was going away, which was not much loss, as he was an old-fashioned man of the old school, and did not keep pace with the times; and that she trusted the new man, who was coming from Scotland, would be better. Edgar listened politely, without paying much attention, for, in his ignorance, he did not feel much interest in the new doctor.
“I must ask Miss Annetta about him,” said Lady Mary, as she led the way into a house which turned only its gable to the Green, and possessed a carriage drive and a wilderness of lofty shrubs. The cottage itself was damp and weedy, and rather dark, with blinds and curtains half drawn over the little windows, and a sort of dim religious light, green in tone, and very limited in degree, pervading the place. When Edgar’s eyes became accustomed to it, he saw that the little drawing-room was plastered over with corner cupboards, and velvet-covered shelves, and brackets, laden with old china and other curious things. The room was so crowded with these ornaments, and with old furniture, that it was scarcely possible to move without displacing something—a drawback which was all the more apparent, as both the Miss Bakers were large persons, many sizes too big for their house. They were not a well-matched pair. The eldest was a harsh-featured woman, looking fully forty-five, and calling herself so, with a total disregard to the feelings of Miss Annetta, who, all the world knew, was but two years younger. Miss Baker was clever, and the other was silly; but yet Miss Annetta was the most calculated to attract the attention of the sympathetic spectator, who could either laugh at her, or weep over her, as his nature prompted. She had no remnant of youth in the foolish face that had once been pretty enough; but her entire development, mental and moral, seemed to have been arrested when she was about seventeen, at the age when croquet (if croquet existed—I am afraid it did not exist at so early a period) and new patterns for worsted work, and crochet, were the furthest limits of her desires. Poor soul! to look at her, she was forty-three, bien sonnés, but to listen to her soft little voice and its prattle, she was seventeen, not a day more. This curious fossilised girl was left to Edgar’s share in the heat of the conversation, which immediately ensued between Lady Mary and Miss Baker—who sympathised deeply on the educational question, and had a great deal to say to each other.
After Edgar had been introduced as being “so good as to be disposed to help” in the great work, he was for the moment forgotten, while the two ladies talked of committees and schemes of lectures, and a great many things which he felt to be quite above his humble intelligence. Miss Annetta was exactly in the same position. The talk was a great deal too old and too serious for her. She sat silent for a minute or two, feeling somewhat coy of addressing that wonder and mystery, “a gentleman,” giving him little looks, half-saucy, half-timid, and betraying an inclination to go off into giggles of laughter, which filled Edgar with the gravest surprise. Finally, she made a bold step, and addressed him, giving the curls which she wore on each side of her face a little shake and toss of conscious attractiveness before she began.
“You have not been long in the neighbourhood, Mr. Earnshaw? Do say you like it. Dear Lady Mary makes Tottenham so charming, so charming! It is such an acquisition having her. Have you had nice skating lately? I hear some of the young ladies from the Green have been at the pond. I have not gone yet myself, for I don’t skate, though everybody does now-a-days. They tell me I should learn directly if I only had the courage to try; but I am such a little coward, I really daren’t venture. Of course you will laugh at me; but I dare not. I really haven’t the courage.”
“I am not at all surprised that you have not the courage,” said Edgar, looking at her smiling face, and much disturbed in his mind as to what to say. “One must make up one’s mind to a good many tumbles; which are all very well for boys and girls—”
“Oh, I shouldn’t like that,” cried Miss Annetta; “children, as you say, don’t mind. What a pity you did not come in the summer, Mr. Earnshaw. It is such a sociable neighbourhood. We had a garden party somewhere, at least twice a week, and they are such nice things for bringing young people together—don’t you think so? Better than evening parties; you can see so much more of people, going at four or five o’clock—and if you’re intimate, staying for high tea and a little music after. It is a delightful way of spending the day. There is nothing can take the same place in winter. To be sure if a girl is bold and knows how to skate—but I really daren’t try, I haven’t the courage;—and you don’t give me much encouragement, Mr. Earnshaw, it must be allowed.”
Edgar looked on in dismay while Miss Annetta shook her curls at him, and giggled as she had done when she was pretty and seventeen, just twenty-six years ago. What could he say? He was trying to find something polite and pleasant with which to carry on the conversation, when Lady Mary suddenly turned from her grave interview with the elder sister, and interfered for his salvation.
“Miss Annetta,” said Lady Mary, suddenly, “I am sure I can get information from you about the doctor. Has he gone? and has the new one come? and who is he? I hope he is not a mere stupid country practitioner. I saw a great commotion at the house.”
“Oh, poor Mrs. Franks,” said Miss Annetta, “they were just preparing to go; but she, poor thing, though I don’t like to speak of such things before gentlemen, went and had a baby this morning. It has put them all out so dreadfully! and she had nothing ready, not so much as a little cap. Just like her, you will say; and of course they can’t go away now for ever so long.”
“Poor soul,” said Lady Mary, “I must send and ask if we can do anything.”
“Indeed, I think it wicked to encourage such people,” said Miss Baker. “How dare she go on having babies, knowing she can’t afford it? I have no pity for such a woman. Of course she brings it all on herself; and if she were the only one to suffer, I shouldn’t mind. But just fancy a woman of my age, subject to bronchitis, left to the tender mercies of her ninny of a husband, probably for six weeks longer, just the worst time of the year—not to speak of Annetta, who is a perfect martyr to rheumatism.”
“Oh, Jane!” exclaimed Miss Annetta, feebly.
“Though I think it’s gout,” said Miss Baker. “When gout is in a family, I believe it never lets you go much beyond forty without entering an appearance; which is my great reason for hoping I shall escape scot-free, seeing I’m forty-five.”
“You must not believe all my sister says; she is so fond of her fun,” said Miss Annetta, in an aside to Edgar. “Oh, I have heard a great deal about the new doctor, Lady Mary. He is quite young, and very handsome and nice, people say. He is coming straight from Scotland, so I suppose he must be very clever, for so many new medical things are found out there. I hear he has dark hair and eyes, and tall, and a very nice manner.”
“Well I suppose these are interesting details,” said Lady Mary; “but I should have liked to know a little more of his qualifications, I confess.”
“And he has a charming sister, a widow, who keeps his house; so that he will be able to ask people, which a bachelor never is, except men, and they don’t count as society;” cried Miss Annetta, continuing with breathless haste her report; for if Lady Mary had a fault, it was that she was too ready to interrupt uninteresting speeches. “The Franks are so poor, and they have so many children, they never were any good, not even for a garden party; but you must not think from what I say that I don’t love children, Mr. Earnshaw. I adore them! When are Phil and little Mary coming for a romp, and to see all our curiosities? I do feel so much at home with them, Lady Mary, you can’t think. Jane there says we are three romps all together, and she doesn’t know which is the worst.”
“They will be delighted to come,” said Lady Mary, rising.
“Oh, but I suppose I must ask permission of Mr. Earnshaw now?” said Miss Annetta. “If you will come too, you will see that your charge does not get into mischief, Mr. Earnshaw, and I am sure you will be quite an addition. You are not one of the stern tutors that frighten poor little things like me.”
“Indeed I must carry Mr. Earnshaw off. We have no time to spare,” said Lady Mary. “Little fool!” she cried, severely, as soon as they had left the cottage. “I hope you don’t mind her impertinent chatter? I am sure nothing could be further from my intention than to subject you to any such disagreeable comment.”
“Disagreeable! to call me what I am, Phil’s tutor?” said Edgar. “Why, what a mean-spirited wretch you must think me. To accept a post, and be ashamed of the name of it—”
“But, Mr. Earnshaw, you know that is not how we think. We consider you only as a friend—and take it as the greatest kindness you can do us.” Then Lady Mary, with a flush of generous sentiment, took a warm little hand out of her muff, and gave it to Edgar, who was a great deal more touched by the amende than he had been hurt by Miss Annetta’s innocent assault.
“Thanks,” he said, with moisture in his eyes, “so much the better for me, and so much the less reason for being ashamed of my post. If you snubbed me, I might have some excuse perhaps for making a fool of myself.”
“Mr. Earnshaw!” said Lady Mary again, but this time with hesitation, and almost timidity. “I wonder if you will think I mean to snub you—if I say something which I am almost bound to say?”
“Say it!” said Edgar, smiling. He felt in a moment that he knew what was coming, and looked into her tremulous countenance with all the superior calm of a man prepared for pain, and prescient of what was to come.
“You will not be angry? Oh, Mr. Earnshaw! if you only knew how I fret at such restrictions—how I wish we could put aside mercenary considerations, and acknowledge ourselves all to be equal, as I am sure we are by nature!”
“I don’t think we are equal by nature,” said Edgar; “but never mind the abstract question. I promise not even to be wounded. And I think I know what you are going to say.”
“It is just this,” said Lady Mary, hurriedly, “Forgive me! The young Thornleighs, Mr. Earnshaw, have always been very much with us. I am fond of them, and so is Mr. Tottenham, and they are always coming and going. It would be ungenerous to you as well as unkind to them, if we were to send them away because you are here.”
Edgar did no more than bow in assent. A certain sense of personal dignity, quite new to him, kept him from doing more.
“It would be thoroughly ungenerous to you,” said Lady Mary, warmly, “and contrary to the perfect trust we feel—both my husband and I—in you, our friend.”
“Just one word, Lady Mary,” said Edgar, “and pardon me if it seems harsh. Why did you not think of this before? I came here in a mist, not knowing very well what was to happen to me; but you knew the whole, both my side and the other. I need not say send me away, which is the most natural thing to do, for you were aware of all the circumstances the other day when you brought me here. Of course, at any moment, I am ready to go.”
“That is not quite generous,” said Lady Mary, with an appealing look, “of course we knew, and trusted you as we trust you now—fully. But, Mr. Earnshaw, forgive me! I promised to Augusta to say just one word.”
“I have already said to Lady Augusta all that can be said,” said Edgar; “that she need not fear me—that I will not put myself in her way.”
They had, by this time, reached the avenue, and were walking unconsciously fast in the roused state of feeling which this interview had called forth, between the long level lines of leafless trees, on the edge of the sodden, bright green wintry grass, which tempted the feet with its mossy softness. It was afternoon, and the long slanting lines of sunshine lighted up, but scarcely had the better of, the creeping shadows which bided their time in every corner. Lady Mary put out her hand again suddenly, with an excitement which she did not seem able to control, and laid it on Edgar’s arm.
“Mr. Earnshaw!” she said, the tears coming to her eyes. “It is not for you. Augusta, like myself, trusts you entirely; it is not you.”
“What then?” said Edgar, suddenly stopping short, and facing her.
“Mr. Earnshaw! Oh! how can I put into words the strange service—the thing beyond words, which Augusta thinks she can trust you enough to ask for. Oh! Mr. Earnshaw, see how absolute is our faith in you! It is not you she fears. It is the impetuosity—it is the——it is her own child.”
Edgar stood still, and did not speak—how could he? In his life he had had enough to chill him one way or another; now, all at once, there seemed to burst forth a fountain of warmth and life within him—in his very heart. The water came to his eyes. If he had been alone I believe it would have overflowed, so poignant was the touch of this sudden, scarcely comprehensible happiness. “Ah!” he cried, summing up in that little syllable, as is done so often, worlds of sudden understanding, of emotion inexpressible in words; and so stood gazing at the unlucky emissary, who had put things inconceivable, things unbelievable, all at once into his throbbing brain.
“Oh, God forgive me!” cried Lady Mary, with a devoutness quite unusual to her. “What have I done—what have I done?”
“Look here,” said Edgar, feeling a strange difficulty of articulation, and with a consciousness that, instead of being eloquent, as he ought to have been in the circumstances, his words were homely, almost rude; “So far as I am myself concerned, nothing will make me swerve from my word. Lady Augusta need have no fear for me; but if—” and here he paused, “if the happiness of another were any way involved. It is not my supposition, pardon me, it is yours. If——then I will be bound by no word, no promise, nothing but—her will whatever it is. I am ready to balk myself, to give up the desire of my heart, to say never a word, so far as I am concerned. But her I will not balk; it is not my place. Her will she shall have if I can get it for her—at any risk, with any pains! Lady Mary, bid me go, or take the consequences; this is all I will say.”
“Oh, Mr. Earnshaw!” cried Lady Mary, in a burst of injudicious sympathy. “Oh, Edgar! now I understand them;” and with that, this very foolish, very clever, little woman sat down upon the stump of a tree, and cried with all her heart. She was totally taken by surprise. She had believed him to be so good, so ready to obliterate himself, that she half despised him through all her generous compassion and liking. I think it is Mr. Charles Reade who describes, somewhat coarsely perhaps, but very powerfully, the woman’s surprise at discovering herself to be, for the first time, face to face with a male of her own species. The surprise, I believe, is common to both sexes, and as much when love is out of the question as when it is deeply involved. It is one of the most penetrating of mental sensations—a sudden revelation. Lady Mary felt this as she sat down on the stump of the tree, and called Edgar Earnshaw by his Christian name, and cried, suddenly abandoning her colours, giving up her cause, owning herself utterly conquered. It was a great deal to be accomplished by so few words, and Edgar himself was so entirely moved and shaken by what had occurred, that he was not half sensible of his own success. All he knew was that Lady Mary felt for him, understood him; and this gave him comfort, when he suddenly dropped down after the exaltation of his sudden transport into a sadness which was its natural consequence. Lady Mary fell too, out of her sudden enthusiasm into a sense of absolute foolishness and the indiscreetest of sympathetic ebullitions, and picked herself up and went meekly along the avenue by Edgar’s side, trying to talk about the children, and raking up nursery stories of Phil’s cleverness to tell him, in what she would herself have thought the very imbecility of motherhood. Poor Lady Mary! she had the additional misery of thinking that Edgar perceived her utter downfall and change of sides—which he, poor fellow, with his heart jumping in his throat, was far too much agitated to do.
But when they came to the great door, and were about to separate, she “thought it her duty” to leave him with a final word of counsel, “Mr. Earnshaw,” she said, almost timidly, “you saw that I was carried away by my feelings—for I feel for you, however I may be obliged to side with my sister in what she thinks to be best. You will forget all I have been so foolish as to say—and keep to what you said to her, won’t you? Don’t let me have done harm instead of good.”
“I will keep to what I said to her, religiously; she has my word,” said Edgar, “but don’t think I can ever forget what you have said to me.”
“Mr. Earnshaw, it was in confidence.”
“In closest, dearest confidence,” he said, “but not to be forgotten—never to be forgotten; that is not possible. It will be wiser to tell Lady Augusta what I have said; and remember, dear Lady Mary, you, who have been so good to me, that, at a moment’s notice, at a word, at a look, I am ready to go away.”
“Not if I can help it,” she said, half crying again, holding out her hand; and in sight of the biggest of the powdered footmen, and of the porter, and of one of the under-gardeners, all looking on in consternation, he kissed it, absolutely indifferent to what any one might say. To be sure it was only a little glove he kissed, warm out of her muff.
The Thornleigh family, or at least the feminine portion of it, was, as has been indicated to the reader, in town—though it was still very early in the year—for the purpose of looking after little Mary’s trousseau, as her wedding was to take place at Easter. Lady Augusta’s family numbered eight altogether—five girls and three boys; and if I could tell you half the trouble she had gone through with them, you would no longer wonder at the wrinkles on her forehead. Her girls had been as troublesome as her boys, which seldom happens, and that was saying a great deal. Harry, the eldest son, was a prodigal, constantly in debt and in trouble; John, the second, who, it was hoped, would have distinguished himself by his brains, had been plucked for his degree; and the regiment of which Reginald, the youngest son, was an ornament, had been sent off to India, contrary to all prognostications. As for the daughters, though the youngest was nineteen, only one was married—a terrible thought for an anxious mother, as anxious to do her duty by her children as Lady Augusta was—and that one!
The eldest was Ada, who, when her lover, only a poor clergyman at the best, died of typhus fever, caught in his work, never would look at another man, but retired meekly into old maidenhood. The second, Helena, was the clever one of the family. She had more brains than all the rest put together, everybody said, and so indeed she herself thought—more than she knew what to do with. If that head could only have been put on her brother John’s shoulders, what a blessing to everyone concerned! for, alas! all the good her brains did her, was to betray her into a marriage with a very clever and very learned professor, painfully superior to everybody else, but altogether out of “her own class.” The third was Gussy, who had been always Lady Augusta’s most dearly beloved, and who, three years ago, had been all but betrothed to the best match in the county—young Edgar Arden; but when Edgar was ruined, and disappeared, as it were, off the face of the earth, Gussy, instead of abandoning him as a sensible girl should have done, clung with the obstinacy which distinguished the Thornleighs, to the very recollection of him—which, as he was still living and marriageable, though no match at all, was a fanaticism much less manageable than Ada’s. For Ada, if she insisted upon considering herself a widow, was at all events quite submissive in other matters, and content to be her mother’s right hand at home; but Gussy, who had by no means given up her personal possibilities of happiness, and whose hopes were still alive, had been very restless, and worried her family with many vagaries. Schemes and crotchets ran, I suppose, in the noble blood which Lady Augusta had transmitted to her daughters. It showed itself in different ways in the sisters: Helena’s ways had been all intellectual, but Gussy, who was benevolent and religious, was more difficult to deal with. The melancholy seclusion, which to an English mind is the first characteristic of a convent, has little to do with the busy beehive of a modern sisterhood; and a young woman connected with such an institution has claims made upon her which are wonderfully embarrassing to a fashionable mother. Helena, in her wildest days, when she had all sorts of committees going on, could be taken to her meetings and lectures in the carriage, like a Christian, and could be sent for when these séances were over; but Gussy had to trudge off on foot to all sorts of places in her long black cloak, and to visit houses in which fever, and every kind of evil, physical and moral, abounded; and was not to be shaken by any remonstrances. Indeed, the parents had been glad to compromise and consent to any amount of Associateship, so as to keep off the dreaded possibility of a determination on Gussy’s part to enter the Sisterhood for good and all. I do not think that Gussy herself ever threatened this, though she thought of it sometimes as her best alternative, if—; but there was still an if, a living and strong peradventure in her mind. Other good-natured friends, however, strongly pressed the possibility on Lady Augusta’s mind; they did all they could to persuade the anxious mother to take forcible steps in the matter, and constrain Gussy, on her obedience, to give up her objectionable charities and devotions. Fortunately Lady Augusta did not belong to that class of women who take pleasure in worrying their children for their good. She shook her head when her pretty daughter, still as pretty as in her first season, went out in her black cloak, and the hideous bonnet, which the mother would not allow to herself was “becoming,” notwithstanding its intrinsic hideousness. She moaned over the dirt, the disease, the evil smells and sights which her child was about to encounter, and about the risk of infection to which she would expose herself.
“Who can tell what you may bring back with you, Gussy?—fever, or one does not know what,” Lady Augusta said, piteously. “It is so different with our poor people at home, whom we all know.”
“I will shut myself up in my room, mamma; or I will go to the House, when there is anything infectious about; but I cannot give up my work,” said Gussy, filial, but determined.
“Oh, work, child! what do you mean by work?” cried Lady Augusta, driven to her wits’ end. “Home is surely better than the ‘House,’ as you call it, and I am sure Ada and I find plenty to do at home. Why cannot you do as we do?”
“Perhaps because Ada and you do it all,” said Gussy, unmoved by that despairing appeal which the old is always making to the new. Why cannot you do as we do?
Poor Lady Augusta! It was she who had to give in, not her daughter. And you may easily understand, dear reader, how such a good mother was affected by the break-down of all her elder hopes—Ada, Helena, Gussy. Her three eldest children—all failures! What a heart-breaking thought it was to a woman of fashion, surrounded by contemporaries who had married their daughters well, and whom no man could reproach as negligent of their highest duties! She would wake sometimes in the middle of the night, and ask herself was it her fault? Had she put foolish notions into the heads of the girls? Certainly on the Thornleigh side there were no “views” nor “crotchets;” and Lady Augusta was aware that she herself had accomplished her own fate, not altogether because she preferred it, and had, perhaps, smothered personal predilections, which her children showed no inclination to smother. “Why cannot they do as I did?” she would say in her heart, with a sigh.
But now at last a moment had come, in which her natural cares were rewarded. When Lord Granton proposed for Mary, her mother had almost cried with joy. For the first time here was a satisfactory—a completely satisfactory conclusion. So unexceptionable a young man, such a title, such estates, and a family which any girl might be proud to enter! The delight was all the sweeter from being so long deferred, so sadly missed. She forgave Helena her bad match, and Gussy and Ada their no matches at all, in the exhilaration of this happy moment. All her little grievances and grudges vanished in the sudden flood of sunshine. She was reconciled to all the world, even to Helena’s husband, the Professor, over whom, too, a heavenly radiance would be flung, when he was brother-in-law to a marquis. Poor Lady Augusta! In the full height of her exhilaration she betook herself to Tottenham’s to send the good news to her sister, feeling that now at least, perhaps for the first time, there was no trouble to lessen her happiness; and there she encountered, without any warning, Edgar! Heaven help her! a man still more objectionable, because more hopelessly penniless than Helena’s professor, a man without a name, without a shilling, without a connection! but whom Gussy, her favourite daughter, was ready, she knew, to follow to the end of the world. When she drove out to the rural Tottenham’s after this, to tell her sister the story of Mary’s engagement, is it wonderful that her agitated mind should have poured forth all its mingled strain of joy, tribulation, content, and alarm? The wholly joyful part of her budget was soon swallowed up in the revelation of her fears about Gussy, and in the reproaches she could not quite restrain. Why had her sister so added to her burdens, by this injudicious, this uncalled-for interference in Edgar’s fortunes? He was not so friendless, Lady Augusta protested, half indignant, half weeping, that they, of all the world, should have rushed into the breach, and taken him up—bringing him even into their house, where he could not fail to see Gussy one time or other. And then the anxious mother cried, and told her sister that she had no confidence in Gussy. In Edgar she had every confidence; he had promised never to thrust himself into her way; but Gussy had made no such promise, and her mother did not even dare to speak to her on the subject, knowing that she would be met by unanswerable arguments. Thus the two ladies, talking over the whole matter, fell into a not unnatural snare, and resolved to confide in Edgar, and trust to him to keep Gussy, as well as himself, right—not foreseeing how that confidence would change to him the whole aspect of affairs. When Ada heard how far her mother’s revelations had gone, and of the step Lady Mary was commissioned to take, she did not give it her approval, as Lady Augusta had hoped, but looked very grave, and doubted much the wisdom of the proceeding. “He promised never to stand in my way,” Lady Augusta said, much depressed by her privy-councillor’s disapproval. “But he did not promise for Gussy—what right would he have to undertake for Gussy?” said Ada, shaking her head. It was an idea which had not entered her mother’s mind, for Lady Augusta had that kind of confidence in Edgar, as of a man born to set everything right, which women, especially when surrounded by practical difficulties, are so ready to place in an ideal man. He had never objected to her commands hitherto; why should he now? Nevertheless, when Ada disappeared, Lady Augusta began to quake lest she should have done more harm than good.
“We must try to get something for him to do,” she said, faltering, “something abroad. Notwithstanding all those absurd new arrangements, people of influence can still command situations abroad, I hope, if they choose to take the trouble. I shall speak to Lord Millboard, Ada; and I am sure Granton, dear fellow, would take any trouble, if he knew how important it was.”
“Because he is happy himself, to prevent poor Gussy from being happy?” said Ada. “Oh, I am not saying anything against it, mamma. I suppose it will have to be.”
“Of course it will have to be,” said her mother, “you are all very unkind—you girls. Not one of you has exerted herself as I had a right to expect. Do you think that I thought of nothing but pleasing myself when I married? And who has lost the most in losing Edgar? Well, Gussy, you may say, in one way; but I too. What a help he would have been to me! so kind and so understanding. Oh, Ada! if you knew how much it goes against my heart to shut him out. But it must be; what would your father—what would every one say?”
To this, Ada could return but little answer, except to murmur something about “leaving it in the hands of Providence,” which was not so consolatory to Lady Augusta as it was meant to be.
“It is all very well to say, leave it to Providence!” cried that much tried mother, “if you had lived as long as I have, Ada, you would have found that all the most inconvenient things that happen in the world are said to be brought about by Providence—especially in the way of marriages. No, we must take precautions; Gussy must not go near Tottenham’s while he is there; and I’ll tell you what I will do. Harry is at home doing nothing particular, and probably quarrelling with your poor papa, who has so much to vex him. I have just been wondering how they could possibly get on with all of us away. I will write and tell him to offer himself to your aunt Mary for a visit.”
“Harry! what good will Harry do?” asked Ada, wondering.
“Well, my dear, at least he will be on the spot,” said Lady Augusta; and she breathed a long sigh, as if a weight had been taken off her mind. Any stop-gap, however imperfect, which takes, or seems to take, a responsibility off the mind, is enough to give a sense of relief to one so overborne by many businesses as Lady Augusta was. “And now, my dear, let us look over Mary’s patterns,” she said, drawing a chair towards Ada’s table, on which a mass of samples, of linen, silk, muslin, and every other fabric, known to human ingenuity, were lying, ticketed and arranged in packets. This was a little bit of pure enjoyment, which refreshed the anxious mother in the midst of all her cares.
I need not tell what commotion was made in the household when the news crept out and stole secretly from one girl to another, that Edgar had come back. Mary and Beatrice put their curly heads together over it, and the result was a communication to the young Granton, which effectually fortified him against making himself a tool of any of poor Lady Augusta’s schemings to get rid of the danger. These two were the children of the house, and the elder sisters paid but little attention to their innocent conspiracies. The elders were more interesting personages than little Mary and Bee, though Mary was a predestined marchioness, and there was no knowing what Bee might come to in the way of matrimonial elevation. There are people, no doubt, who will think the old maid of the family its least interesting member; but you, dear unknown friend, my gentle reader, are not of that complexion; and there may be others who will feel that Ada’s obscure life was a poor enough thing to settle down to, after all the hopes and all the disappointments of youth, both of which are more exciting and sustaining than the simple monotony of such a commonplace existence. I am not sure, however, for my own part, whether Ada’s soft self-renunciation never expressed in words, and her constant readiness in trouble, and the numberless frocks she made for her poor children—and even her mother’s meetings, though the family laughed at them—were half so bewildering an anti-climax to the high aspirations of youth as was Helena’s Professor, and the somewhat humdrum, if highly intellectual routine into which she had dropped with him. Helena, herself now and then, had a confused and giddy consciousness that ministering to a man’s comforts, who was not at all a demi-god, and attending lectures at the Royal Society was a very odd and sudden downfall from all her dreams of social amelioration and “a great work;” but fortunately she was happy, a thing which deadens the moral perception. Ada was happy, too, in her different way; but Gussy was not happy. She had not the tranquil soul of her elder sister, nor that curious mixture of sense and talent, and self-confidence and absence of humour which made Helena what she was. She had not “given up,” as in various ways both of them had done. She was dissatisfied, for life as yet had lost none of its possibilities, neither by fulfilment nor renunciation. All clouds might yet be cleared away from her sky, and what she considered perfect happiness might yet be waiting for her somewhere. This remnant of possibility that the soul may still have all it craves, ought, you might think, to have kept Gussy’s heart alive, and given her a secret support; but it was in fact a very fire of restlessness within her. The first step towards attaining the secondary happinesses of life, is to have given up and recognised as impossible the primary and greater happiness. Gussy had been compelled to occupy herself closely, in order to save herself from becoming discontented, morbid, sour, and miserable, by reason of this sense within her, that everything might yet come right.
“Why should you say it was injudicious?” she said to her sister, when they at length discussed the subject, “why should not they help him, since he wants it, because of the chance of meeting me? I heard what mamma said as I came in. If he does meet me, I dare say he has forgotten all about me by this time, or at least remembers me only as a friend. It would be hard indeed if any ghost of me, after all these years, were to come in his way.”
“And you,” said her sister, “could you meet him as a friend whom you remembered? Would that be all?”
Gussy’s lip quivered in spite of herself. “I hope I could do—whatever was necessary,” she said proudly. But in the midst of uttering these two or three words, a sudden tear fell unexpectedly out of her eye and betrayed her. “How silly!” she said, dashing it away; “you forget I did see him. Oh, Ada, fancy travelling with him all those hours, and never saying a word! It was as if we were in two different worlds—like looking into another existence, and seeing those whom one has lost, without any power to communicate with them.”
“Ah! but we are not permitted to do even that,” said Ada; “do you think he did not recognise you? Not at all? That is so strange to me.”
Gussy shook her head. “I don’t think he did; but you must remember,” she said humbly, “that he never was what you might call so very much in love with me. He liked me; he was even fond of me—but not exactly in love. It is different—I always felt that, even when you all made so sure. And what he thinks of me now, I don’t know. If I saw him once, I should be able to tell you; but I shall try not to see him. It is best I should not see him,” said Gussy very low, “best in every way.”
“My poor child!” said Ada; but she did not contradict her, as her sister almost hoped; and Gussy went away immediately after, with her heart full, to put on her black cloak and close bonnet, and to go forth into some very unsavoury region indeed, where a serene Sister, so smiling and cheery that you might be certain her mind was taken up by no possible happiness, was hard at work. Gussy had some very disagreeable work allotted to her which gave her full occupation till it was time to return to “the world,” and as long as she was thus engaged she was able to forget all about herself and Edgar, and everything else in the other existence. Thus Rag Fair was good for her, and gave her a certain amount of strength with which to return to Berkeley Square.
But the reader will perceive that if Edgar’s mind was disturbed by what he had heard, a similar, if less violent commotion had been raised, by the mere intimation of his return, in the opposite camp, where every member of the family instinctively felt the danger, though the young and the romantic among them welcomed it as rather an advantage than a peril. Gussy went about her ordinary work, whether in “the world” or out of it, with a soft perpetual tremor, feeling that at any moment, round any corner, she might meet him with whom her youthful thoughts had wandered all these years. I will not say that she was not somewhat anxious and uncertain as to the effect which this long interval might have had upon Edgar’s mind; for women seldom have a very strong faith, unassisted by evidence, in the fidelity of a long absent lover; but she had no sense of having given love unsought, or shame in her own secret devotion. She knew that if Edgar had remained rich and prosperous she would have been his wife long ere now, and this gave to Gussy’s maiden love that sweet legitimacy and pride of duty which is so much to a woman, and emboldens her to give without shame, and with all her heart.
In the meantime, however, Lady Augusta took that other precautionary measure which had suddenly occurred to her, to Ada’s great surprise and consternation, and sent private orders to her son, Harry—who was at that moment under a cloud, and doing his best to act the part of a good son to a very irritable father who had just paid his debts for him, and was taking them out in abuse of every description at Thornleigh, while the mother and sisters were in town. I don’t believe she had the least notion what good Harry could do; but it relieved him from a very trying ordeal, and the young man jumped at it, though Ada shook her head. “He will be on the spot at least, my dear,” said Lady Augusta, all unconscious of slang. She explained to her husband that the Tottenhams had taken one of their fancies to Mr. Earnshaw, whom they had all once known so well as Edgar Arden, and that she thought it would be well that one of the family should be there to keep an eye upon him, lest he and Gussy should meet. “For you know, Gussy has not been the same since that affair,” wrote the careful mother. Mr. Thornleigh, who had a more than ordinary contempt at this moment for Harry’s capabilities, wrote her a rather rude letter in reply, telling her that she was a fool indeed if she trusted in anything her hopeful son could do; but nevertheless, he made no objection to the visit. Thus it will be seen how emphatically their own doing was all the confusion that followed this momentous step, which the Thornleighs all combined in their ignorance to make Harry take—and which he accepted as he would have accepted any change, at that moment; not having the least idea of what was wanted of him, any more than of what fate had in store for him. Lady Augusta went on more calmly with her preparations for little Mary’s grand wedding when she had thus, to her own satisfaction, secured a representative at Tottenham’s. And Ada studied the patterns indefatigably, and gave the mother the very best advice as to which was most suitable; and Gussy had a perfect carnival of work, and spent almost all her time in Rag Fair—with occasional expeditions to the shop, where Mr. Tottenham had established a chapel, chiefly to please her, and where one of the clergymen attached to the Charity-House kept up daily service. This was much more dangerous, had Lady Augusta been aware of the fact, than the rural Tottenham’s, where Harry was set to be sentinel without knowing it.
And thus the first cold lingering days of spring—spring only in name, with all winter’s cold, and less than winter’s comfort, dragged themselves along. Only to Lady Augusta, who was busy with the trousseau, and little Mary, who was making love, the days were not long enough for all that had to be put into them; though the others were of a different mind.
END OF VOL. I.