XXII
WOMEN'S HEARTS
Lady Lansdowne walked slowly away in a state of perplexity, from whichthe monotonous lilt of the band which was now playing quadrille musicdid nothing to free her. Whether Sybil Vermuyden were dying or not, itwas certain that she was ill. Disease had laid its hand beyondmistaking on that once beautiful face; the levity and wit which hadformerly dazzled beholders now gleamed but fitfully and with such aghastly light as the corpse candle gives forth. The change was greatsince Lady Lansdowne had seen her in the coach at Chippenham; and itmight well be that if words of forgiveness were to be spoken, no timewas to be lost. Old associations, a mother's feelings for a mother,pity, all urged Lady Lansdowne to compliance with her request; nor didthe knowledge that the woman, who had once queened it so brilliantlyin this place, was now lurking on the fringe of the gay crowd, athirstfor a sight of her child, fail to move a heart which all thejealousies of a Whig coterie had not hardened or embittered.
Unluckily the owner of that heart felt that she was the last personwho ought to interfere. It behoved her, more than it behoved anyone,to avoid fresh ground of quarrel with Sir Robert. Courteously as hehad borne himself on her arrival, civilly as he had veiled thesurprise which her presence caused him, she knew that he was sore hurtby his defeat in the borough. And if those who had thwarted himpublicly were to intervene in his private concerns, if those who hadsuborned his kinsman were now to tamper with his daughter, ay, or wereto incur a suspicion of tampering, she knew that his anger would knowno bounds. She felt, indeed, that it would be justified.
She had to think, too, of her husband, who had sent her with theolive-branch. He was a politic, long-sighted man; who, content withthe solid advantage he had gained, had no mind to push to extremity astruggle which must needs take place at his own door. He would bedispleased, seriously displeased, if her mission, in place of closing,widened the breach.
And yet--and yet her heart ached for the woman, who had never whollylost a place in her affections. And there was this. If Lady Sybil werethwarted no one was more capable of carrying out her threat and oftaking some violent step, which would make matters a hundred timesworse, alike for Sir Robert and his daughter.
While she weighed the matter, Lady Lansdowne found herself back at therustic bridge. She was in the act of stepping upon it--still deep inthought--when her eyes encountered those of a young couple who werewaiting at the farther end to give her passage. She looked a secondtime; and she stood. Then, smiling, she beckoned to the girl to cometo her. Meanwhile, a side-thought, born of the conjunction of the twoyoung people, took form in her mind. "I hope that may come tonothing," she reflected.
Possibly it was for this reason, that when the man would have comealso, she made it clear that the smile was not for him. "No, Mr.Flixton," she said, the faintest possible distance in her tone. "I donot want you. I will relieve you of your charge."
And when Mary, timid and blushing, had advanced to her, "My dear," shesaid, holding out both her hands, and looking charmingly at her, "Ishould have known you anywhere." And she drew her to her and kissedher. "I am Lady Lansdowne. I knew your mother, and I hope that you andmy daughter will be friends."
The mention of her mother increased Mary's shyness. "Your ladyship isvery kind," she murmured. She did not know that her embarrassment wasso far from hurting her, that the appeal in her eyes went straight tothe elder woman's heart.
"I mean to be kind at any rate," Lady Lansdowne answered, smiling onthe lovely face before her. And then, "My dear," she said, "have theytold you that you are very beautiful? More beautiful, I think, thanyour mother was: I hope"--and she did not try to hide the depth of herfeelings--"that you may be more happy."
The girl's colour faded at this second reference to her mother; made,she could not doubt, with intention. Her father, even while he hadoverwhelmed her with benefits, even while he had opened this new lifeto her with a hand full of gifts, had taught her--tacitly or by a wordat most--that that name was the key to a Bluebeard's chamber; that itmust not be used. She knew that her mother lived; she guessed that shehad sinned against her husband; she understood that she had wrongedher child. But she knew no more: and with this, since this at theleast she must know, Sir Robert would have had her content.
And yet, to speak correctly, she did know more. She knew that theveiled lady who had intervened at long intervals in her life must havebeen her mother. But she felt no impulse of affection towards thatwoman--whom she had not seen. Her heart went out instead to a shadowymother who walked the silent house at sunset, whose skirts trailed inthe lonely passages, of whose career of wild and reckless gaiety shehad vague hints here and there. It was to this mother, radiant andyoung, with the sheen of pearls in her hair, and the haunting smile,that she yearned. She had learned in some subtle way that the vacantplace over the mantel in the hall which her own portrait by Maclisewas to fill, had been occupied by her mother's picture. And dreamingof the past, as what young girl alone in that stately house would not,she had seen her come and go in the half lights, a beautiful, spoiltchild of fashion. She had traced her up and down the wide polishedstairway, heard the tap of her slender sandal on the shining floors,perceived in long-closed chambers the fading odours of her favouritescent. And in a timid, frightened way she had longed to know her andto love her, to feel her touch on her hair and give her pity inreturn.
It is possible that she might have dwelt more intimately on LadySybil's fate, possible that she might have ventured on some line ofher own in regard to her, if her new life had been free frompreoccupation; if there had not been with her an abiding regret, whichclouded the sunniest prospects. But love, man's love, woman's love, isthe most cruel of monopolists: it tramples on the claims of thepresent, much more of the absent. And if the novelty of Mary's newlife, the many marvels to which she must accustom herself, the newpleasures, the new duties, the strange new feeling of wealth--if, infine, the necessity of orientating herself afresh in relation to everyperson and everything--was not able to put thoughts of her lover fromher mind, the claims of an unknown mother had an infinitely smallerchance of asserting themselves.
But now at that word, twice pronounced by Lady Lansdowne, the girlstood ashamed and conscience-stricken. "You knew my mother?" shefaltered.
"Yes, my dear," the elder woman answered gravely. "I knew her verywell."
The gravity of the speaker's tone presented a new idea to Mary's mind."She is not happy?" she said slowly.
"No."
With that word Lady Lansdowne looked over her shoulder; consciencemakes cowards, and her nervousness communicated itself to Mary. Apossibility, at which the girl had never glanced, presented itself,and so abruptly that all the colour left her face. "She is not here?"she said.
"Yes, she is here. And--don't be frightened, my dear!" Lady Lansdownecontinued earnestly. "But listen to me! A moment ago I thought ofthrowing you in her way without your knowledge. But, since I have seenyou, I have your welfare at heart, as well as hers. And I must, Iought to tell you, that I do not think your father would wish you tosee her. I think that you should know this; and that you should decidefor yourself--whether you will see her. Indeed, you must decide foryourself," she repeated, her eyes fixed anxiously on the girl's face."I cannot take the responsibility."
"She is unhappy?" Mary asked, looking most unhappy herself.
"She is unhappy, and she is ill."
"I ought to go to her? You think so? Please--your ladyship, will youadvise me?"
Lady Lansdowne hesitated. "I cannot," she said.
"But--there is no reason," Mary asked faintly, "why I should not go toher?"
"There is no reason. I honestly believe," Lady Lansdowne repeatedsolemnly, "that there is no reason--except your father's wish. It isfor you to say how far that, which should weigh with you in all otherthings, shall weigh with you in this."
Suddenly a burning colour dyed Mary's face. "I will go to her," shecried impulsively. She ha
d been weak once, she had been weak! And howshe had suffered for that weakness! But she would be strong now."Where is she, if you please?" she continued bravely. "Can I see herat once?"
"She is in the path leading to the kennels. You know it? No, you neednot take leave of me, child! Go, and," Lady Lansdowne added withfeeling, "God forgive me if I have done wrong in sending you!"
"You have not done wrong!" Mary cried, an unwonted spirit in her tone.And, without taking other leave, she turned and went--though her limbstrembled under her. She was going to her mother! To her mother! Oh,strange, oh, impossible thought!
Yet, engrossing as was that thought, it could not quite oust fear ofher father and of his anger. And the blush soon died; so that thewhiteness of her cheeks when she reached the Kennel Path was a poorset off for the ribbons that decked her muslin robe. What sheexpected, what she wished or feared or hoped she could never remember.What she saw, that which awaited her, was a woman, ill, and plainlyclad, with only the remains of beauty in her wasted features; butwithal cynical and hard-eyed, and very, very far from the mother ofher day-dreams.
Such as she was the unknown scanned Mary with a kind of scornfulamusement. "Oh," she said, "so this is what they have made of MissVermuyden? Let me look at you, girl?" And laying her hands on Mary'sshoulders she looked long into the tearful, agitated face. "Why, youare like a sheet of paper!" she continued, raising the girl's chinwith her finger. "I wonder you dared to come with Sir Robert sayingno! And, you little fool," she continued in a swift spirit ofirritation, "as soon not come at all, as look at me like that! You'vegot my chin and my nose, and more of me than I thought. But God knowswhere you got your hare's eyes! Are you always frightened?"
"No, Ma'am, no!" she stammered.
"No, Ma'am? No, goose!" Lady Sybil retorted, mimicking her. "Why, tenkings on ten thrones had never made me shake as you are shaking! Nortwenty Sir Roberts in twenty passions! What is it you are afraid of?Being found with me?"
"No! "Mary cried. And, to do her justice, the emotion with which LadySybil found fault was as much a natural agitation, on seeing hermother, as fear on her own account.
"Then you are afraid of me?" Lady Sybil rejoined. And again shetwitched the girl's face to the light.
Mary was amazed rather than afraid: but she could not say that. Andshe kept silence.
"Or is it dislike of me?" the mother continued--a slight grimace, asof pain, distorting her face. "You hate me, I suppose? You hate me?"
"Oh, no, no!" the girl cried in distress.
"You do, Miss!" And with no little violence she pushed Mary from her."You set down all to me, I suppose! I've kept you from your own,that's it! I am the wicked mother, worse than a step-mother, whorobbed you of your rights! And made a beggar of you and would havekept you a beggar! I am she who wronged you and robbed you--theunnatural mother! And you never ask," she went on with fierce,impulsive energy, "what I suffered? How I was wronged! What I bore!No, nor what I meant to do--with you!"
"Indeed, indeed----"
"What I meant to do, I say!" Lady Sybil repeated violently. "At mydeath--and I am dying, but what is that to you?--all would have beentold, girl! And you would have got your own. Do you believe me?" sheadded passionately, advancing a step in a manner almost menacing. "Doyou believe me, girl?"
"I do, I do!" Mary cried, inexpressibly pained by the other'svehemence.
"I'll swear it, if you like! But I hoped that he--your father--woulddie first and never know! He deserved no better! He deserved nothingof me! And then you'd have stepped into all! Or better still--do youremember the day you travelled to Bristol? It's not so long ago thatyou need forget it, Miss Vermuyden! I was in the coach, and I saw you,and I saw the young man who was with you. I knew him, and I toldmyself that there was a God after all, though I'd often doubted it, oryou two would not have been brought together! I saw another way then,but you'd have parted and known nothing, if," she continued, laughingrecklessly, "I had not helped Providence, and sent him with a presentto your school! But--why, you're red enough now, girl! What is it?"
"He knew?" Mary murmured, with an effort. "You told him who I was,Ma'am?"
"He knew no more than a doll!" Lady Sybil answered. "I told himnothing, or he'd have told again! I know his kind. No, I thought toget all for you and thwart Vermuyden, too! I thought to marry his heirto the little schoolmistress--it was an opera touch, my dear, andbeyond all the Tremaynes and Vivian Greys in the world! But there,when all promised well, that slut of a maid went to my husband, andtrumped my trick!"
"And Mr.--Mr. Vaughan," Mary stammered, "had no knowledge--who I was?"
"Mr.--Mr. Vaughan!" Lady Sybil repeated, mocking her, "had noknowledge? No! Not a jot, not a tittle! But what?" she went on, in atone of derision, "Sits the wind there, Miss Meek? You're not all milkand water, bread and butter and backboard, then, but have a spice ofyour mother, after all? Mr.--Mr. Vaughan!" again she mimicked her."Why, if you were fond of the man, didn't you say so?"
Mary, under the fire of those sharp, hard eyes, could not restrain hertears. But, overcome as she was, she managed in broken words toexplain that her father had forbidden it.
"Oh, your father, was it?" Lady Sybil rejoined. "He said 'No,' and noit was! And the lord of my heart and the Man of Feeling is dismissedin disgrace! And now we weep in secret and the worm feeds on ourdamask cheek!" she ran on in a tone of raillery, assumed perhaps tohide a deeper feeling. "I suppose," she added shrewdly, "Sir Robertwould have you think that Vaughan knew who you were, and waspractising on you?"
"Yes."
"And you dismissed him at papa's command, eh? That was it, was it?"
Mary could only confess the fact with tears, her distress in asstrange contrast with the gaiety of her dress as with the strains ofthe neighbouring band, which told of festivity and pleasure. Perhapssome thought of this nature forced itself upon Lady Sybil's light andevasive mind: for as she looked, the cynical expression of her eyesgave place to one of feeling and emotion, better fitted to thosewasted features as well as to the relation in which the two stood toone another. She looked down the path, as if for the first time shefeared an intrusive eye. Then her glance reverted to her daughter'sslender form and drooping head: and again it changed, it grew soft, itgrew pitiful. The laurels shut all in, the path was empty. Thematernal feeling, long repressed, long denied, long buried under amountain of pique and resentment, of fancied wrongs and real neglect,broke forth irresistibly. In a step she was at the girl's side, andsnatching her to her bosom in a fierce embrace, was covering her face,her neck, her hair with hungry kisses.
The action was so sudden, so unexpected, that crushed and even hurt bythe other's grasp, and frightened by her vehemence, Mary would haveresisted, would have tried to free herself. Then she understood. And arush of pent-up affection, of love and pity, carried away the barriersof constraint and timidity. She clung to Lady Sybil with tears of joy,murmuring low broken words, calling her "Mother, Mother," burying herface on her shoulder, pressing herself against her. In a moment herbeing was stirred to its depths. In all her life no one had caressedher after this fashion, no one had embraced her with passion, no onehad kissed her with more than the placid affection which gentlenessand goodness earn, and which kind offices kindly performed warrant.Even Sir Robert, even her father, proud as he was of her, much as heloved her, had awakened in her respect and gratitude--mingled withfear--rather than love.
After a time, warned by approaching voices, Lady Sybil put her fromher; but with a low and exultant laugh. "You are mine, now!" she said,"Mine! Mine! You will come to me when I want you. And I shall want yousoon! Very soon!"
Mary laid hold of her again. "Let me come now!" she cried withpassion, forgetting all but the mother she had gained, the clingingarms which had cherished her, the kisses that had rained on her. "Letme come to you! You are ill!"
"No, not now! Not now! I will send for you when I want you," LadySybil answered. "I will promise to send for you. And you will come,"she added with the same ring of triumph i
n her voice. "You will come!"For it was joy to her, even amid the satisfaction of her mother-love,to know that she had tricked her husband; it was joy to her to knowthat though she had taken all from the child and he had given all, thechild was hers--hers, and could never be taken from her! "You willcome! For you will not have me long. But," she whispered, as thevoices came nearer, "go now! Go now! And not a word! Not a word,child, as you love me. I will send for you when--when my time comes."
And with a last look, strangely made up of love and pain and triumph,Lady Sybil moved out of sight among the laurels. And Mary, drying hertears and composing her countenance as well as she could, turned tomeet the intruders' eyes.
Fortunately--for she was far from being herself--the two persons whohad wandered that way, did but pause at the end of the Kennel Path,and, murmuring small talk, turn again to retrace their steps. Shegained a minute or two, in which to collect her thoughts and smoothher hair; but more than a minute or two she dared not linger lest hercontinued absence should arouse curiosity. As sedately as she could,she emerged from the shrubbery and made her way--though her breastheaved with a hundred emotions--towards the rustic bridge on which shesaw that Lady Lansdowne was standing, keeping Sir Robert in talk.
In talk, indeed, of her. For as she approached he placed thecoping-stone on the edifice of her praises which her ladyship hadcraftily led him to build. "The most docile," he said, "I assure you,the most docile child you can imagine! A beautiful disposition. She isdocility itself!"
"I hope she may always remain so," Lady Lansdowne answered slily.
"I've no doubt she will," Sir Robert replied with fond assurance, hiseye on the Honourable Bob, who was approaching the bridge from thelawns.
Lady Lansdowne followed the look with her eyes and smiled. But shesaid nothing. She turned to Mary, who was now near at hand, andreading in the girl's looks plain traces of trouble, and agitation,she contented herself with sending for Lady Louisa, and asking thather carriage might be called. In this way she cloaked under a littlebustle the girl's embarrassment as she came up to them and joinedthem. Five minutes later Lady Lansdowne was gone.
* * * * *
After that, Mary would have had only too much food for thought, hadher mother alone filled her mind; had those kisses which had sostirred her being, those clinging arms, and that face which bore thedeep imprint of illness, alone burdened her memory. Years afterwardsthe beat of the music which played in the gardens that evening, whilethe party within sat at dinner, haunted her; bringing back, as suchthings will, the scene and her aching heart, the outward glitter andthe inward care, the Honourable Bob's gallantries and her father'sstately figure as he rose and drank wine with her; ay, and the hip,hip, hurrah which shook the glasses when an old Squire, a privilegedperson, rose, before she could leave, and toasted her.
Burdened only with the sacred memories of the afternoon, and theanxiety, the pity, the love which they engendered, she had been farfrom happy, far from free. But in truth, with all her feeling for hermother, Mary bore about with her a keener and more bitter regret. Thedull pain which had troubled her of late when thoughts of ArthurVaughan would beset her was grown to a pang of shame, almostintolerable. She had told herself a hundred times before this that itwas her weakness, her fear of her father, her mean compliance that hadled her to give him up--rather than any real belief in his baseness.For she had never, she was sure now, believed in that baseness. Butnow, now when her mother, whose word it never struck her to doubt,had affirmed his innocence, now that she knew, now since a phraseof that mother's had brought to her mind every incident of thenever-to-be-forgotten coach-drive, the May morning, the sunshine andthe budding trees, the birth of love--pain gnawed at her heart. Shewas sick with misery.
For, oh, how vile, how thankless, how poor and small a thing he mustthink her! He would have given her all, and she had robbed him of all.And then when she had robbed him and he could give her little she hadturned her back on him, abandoned him, believed evil of him, heard himinsulted, and joined in the outrage! Over that thought, over thatmemory, she shed many and many a bitter tear. Romance had come to herin her lowliness, and a noble lover, stooping to her; and she hadkilled the one and denied the other. And now, now there was nothingshe could do, nothing she would dare to do.
For that she had for a moment believed in his baseness--if she hadindeed believed--was not the worst. In that she had been the sport ofcircumstances; appearances had deceived her, and the phase had beenbrief. But that she had been weak, that she had been swayed, that shehad given him up at a word, that she had shown herself wholly unworthyof him--there was the rub. Now, how happy had she been could she havegone back to Miss Sibson's, and the dull schoolroom and the old stuffdress and the children's prattle--and heard his step as he came acrossthe forecourt to the door!