CHAPTER XXIV
CONTAINS AN INSTANCE OF THE GENEROSITY OF WILLOUGHBY
Observers of a gathering complication and a character in actioncommonly resemble gleaners who are intent only on picking up the carsof grain and huddling their store. Disinterestedly or interestedly theywax over-eager for the little trifles, and make too much of them.Observers should begin upon the precept, that not all we see is worthhoarding, and that the things we see are to be weighed in the scalewith what we know of the situation, before we commit ourselves to ameasurement. And they may be accurate observers without being goodjudges. They do not think so, and their bent is to glean hurriedly andform conclusions as hasty, when their business should be sift at eachstep, and question.
Miss Dale seconded Vernon Whitford in the occupation of counting looksand tones, and noting scraps of dialogue. She was quite disinterested;he quite believed that he was; to this degree they were competent fortheir post; and neither of them imagined they could be personallyinvolved in the dubious result of the scenes they witnessed. They werebut anxious observers, diligently collecting. She fancied Clarasusceptible to his advice: he had fancied it, and was considering itone of his vanities. Each mentally compared Clara's abruptness intaking them into her confidence with her abstention from any secretword since the arrival of Colonel De Craye. Sir Willoughby requestedLaetitia to give Miss Middleton as much of her company as she could;showing that he was on the alert. Another Constantia Durham seemedbeating her wings for flight. The suddenness of the evident intimacybetween Clara and Colonel De Craye shocked Laetitia; their acquaintancecould be computed by hours. Yet at their first interview she hadsuspected the possibility of worse than she now supposed to be; and shehad begged Vernon not immediately to quit the Hall, in consequence ofthat faint suspicion. She had been led to it by meeting Clara and DeCraye at her cottage-gate, and finding them as fluent andlaughter-breathing in conversation as friends. Unable to realize therapid advance to a familiarity, more ostensible than actual, of twolively natures, after such an introduction as they had undergone: andone of the two pining in a drought of liveliness: Laetitia listened totheir wager of nothing at all--a no against a yes--in the case of poorFlitch; and Clara's, "Willoughby will not forgive"; and De Craye's "Oh,he's human": and the silence of Clara and De Craye's hearty cry,"Flitch shall be a gentleman's coachman in his old seat or I haven't atongue!" to which there was a negative of Clara's head: and it thenstruck Laetitia that this young betrothed lady, whose alienated heartacknowledged no lord an hour earlier, had met her match, and, as theobserver would have said, her destiny. She judged of the alarmingpossibility by the recent revelation to herself of Miss Middleton'scharacter, and by Clara's having spoken to a man as well (to Vernon),and previously. That a young lady should speak on the subject of theinner holies to a man, though he were Vernon Whitford, was incredibleto Laetitia; but it had to be accepted as one of the dread facts of ourinexplicable life, which drag our bodies at their wheels and leave ourminds exclaiming. Then, if Clara could speak to Vernon, which Laetitiawould not have done for a mighty bribe, she could speak to De Craye,Laetitia thought deductively: this being the logic of untrained headsopposed to the proceeding whereby their condemnatory deductionhangs.--Clara must have spoken to De Craye!
Laetitia remembered how winning and prevailing Miss Middleton could bein her confidences. A gentleman hearing her might forget his duty tohis friend, she thought, for she had been strangely swayed by Clara:ideas of Sir Willoughby that she had never before imagined herself toentertain had been sown in her, she thought; not asking herself whetherthe searchingness of the young lady had struck them and bidden themrise from where they lay imbedded. Very gentle women take in thatmanner impressions of persons, especially of the worshipped person,wounding them; like the new fortifications with embankments of softearth, where explosive missiles bury themselves harmlessly until theyare plucked out; and it may be a reason why those injured ladiesoutlive a Clara Middleton similarly battered.
Vernon less than Laetitia took into account that Clara was in a stateof fever, scarcely reasonable. Her confidences to him he had excused,as a piece of conduct, in sympathy with her position. He had not beengreatly astonished by the circumstances confided; and, on the whole, asshe was excited and unhappy, he excused her thoroughly; he could haveextolled her: it was natural that she should come to him, brave in herto speak so frankly, a compliment that she should condescend to treathim as a friend. Her position excused her widely. But she was notexcused for making a confidential friend of De Craye. There was adifference.
Well, the difference was, that De Craye had not the smarting sense ofhonour with women which our meditator had: an impartial judiciary, itwill be seen: and he discriminated between himself and the otherjustly: but sensation surging to his brain at the same instant, hereproached Miss Middleton for not perceiving that difference asclearly, before she betrayed her position to De Craye, which Vernonassumed that she had done. Of course he did. She had been guilty of itonce: why, then, in the mind of an offended friend, she would be guiltyof it twice. There was evidence. Ladies, fatally predestined to appealto that from which they have to be guarded, must expect severity whenthey run off their railed highroad: justice is out of the question:man's brains might, his blood cannot administer it to them. By chillinghim to the bone they may get what they cry for. But that is a methoddeadening to their point of appeal.
I the evening, Miss Middleton and the colonel sang a duet. She had oflate declined to sing. Her voice was noticeably firm. Sir Willoughbysaid to her, "You have recovered your richness of tone, Clara." Shesmiled and appeared happy in pleasing him. He named a French ballad.She went to the music-rack and gave the song unasked. He should havebeen satisfied, for she said to him at the finish, "Is that as you likeit?" He broke from a murmur to Miss Dale, "Admirable." Some onementioned a Tuscan popular canzone. She waited for Willoughby'sapproval, and took his nod for a mandate.
Traitress! he could have bellowed.
He had read of this characteristic of caressing obedience of the womenabout to deceive. He had in his time profited by it.
"Is it intuitively or by their experience that our neighbours acrossChannel surpass us in the knowledge of your sex?" he said to Miss Dale,and talked through Clara's apostrophe to the 'Santissinia VirgineMaria,' still treating temper as a part of policy, without any effecton Clara; and that was matter for sickly green reflections. The loverwho cannot wound has indeed lost anchorage; he is woefully adrift: hestabs air, which is to stab himself. Her complacent proof-armour bidshim know himself supplanted.
During the short conversational period before the ladies retired forthe night, Miss Eleanor alluded to the wedding by chance. Miss Isabelreplied to her, and addressed an interrogation to Clara. De Crayefoiled it adroitly. Clara did not utter a syllable. Her bosom lifted toa wavering height and sank. Subsequently she looked at De Crayevacantly, like a person awakened, but she looked. She was astonished byhis readiness, and thankful for the succour. Her look was cold, wide,unfixed, with nothing of gratitude or of personal in it. The look,however, stood too long for Willoughby's endurance.
Ejaculating "Porcelain!" he uncrossed his legs; a signal for the ladiesEleanor and Isabel to retire. Vernon bowed to Clara as she was rising.He had not been once in her eyes, and he expected a partial recognitionat the good-night. She said it, turning her head to Miss Isabel, whowas condoling once more with Colonel De Craye over the ruins of hiswedding-present, the porcelain vase, which she supposed to have been inWilloughby's mind when he displayed the signal. Vernon walked off tohis room, dark as one smitten blind: bile tumet jecur: her stroke ofneglect hit him there where a blow sends thick obscuration uponeyeballs and brain alike.
Clara saw that she was paining him and regretted it when they wereseparated. That was her real friend! But he prescribed too hard a task.Besides, she had done everything he demanded of her, except theconsenting to stay where she was and wear out Willoughby, whosedexterity wearied her small stock of patience. She had vainly tr
iedremonstrance and supplication with her father hoodwinked by his host,she refused to consider how; through wine?--the thought wasrepulsive.
Nevertheless, she was drawn to the edge of it by the contemplation ofher scheme of release. If Lucy Darleton was at home; if Lucy invitedher to come: if she flew to Lucy: oh! then her father would have causefor anger. He would not remember that but for hateful wine! . . .
What was there in this wine of great age which expelled reasonableness,fatherliness? He was her dear father: she was his beloved child: yetsomething divided them; something closed her father's ears to her: andcould it be that incomprehensible seduction of the wine? Herdutifulness cried violently no. She bowed, stupefied, to his argumentsfor remaining awhile, and rose clear-headed and rebellious with thereminiscence of the many strong reasons she had urged against them.
The strangeness of men, young and old, the little things (she regardeda grand wine as a little thing) twisting and changing them, amazed her.And these are they by whom women are abused for variability! Only themost imperious reasons, never mean trifles, move women, thought she.Would women do an injury to one they loved for oceans of that--ah, pah!
And women must respect men. They necessarily respect a father. "Mydear, dear father!" Clara said in the solitude of her chamber, musingon all his goodness, and she endeavoured to reconcile the desperatesentiments of the position he forced her to sustain, with those of avenerating daughter. The blow which was to fall on him beat on herheavily in advance. "I have not one excuse!" she said, glancing atnumbers and a mighty one. But the idea of her father suffering at herhands cast her down lower than self-justification. She sought toimagine herself sparing him. It was too fictitious.
The sanctuary of her chamber, the pure white room so homely to hermaidenly feelings, whispered peace, only to follow the whisper withanother that went through her swelling to a roar, and leaving her as asuing of music unkindly smitten. If she stayed in this house herchamber would no longer be a sanctuary. Dolorous bondage! Insolentdeath is not worse. Death's worm we cannot keep away, but when he hasus we are numb to dishonour, happily senseless.
Youth weighed her eyelids to sleep, though she was quivering, andquivering she awoke to the sound of her name beneath her window. "Ican love still, for I love him," she said, as she luxuriated in youngCrossjay's boy's voice, again envying him his bath in the lake waters,which seemed to her to have the power to wash away grief and chains.Then it was that she resolved to let Crossjay see the last of her inthis place. He should be made gleeful by doing her a piece of service;he should escort her on her walk to the railway station next morning,thence be sent flying for a long day's truancy, with a little note ofapology on his behalf that she would write for him to deliver to Vernonat night.
Crossjay came running to her after his breakfast with Mrs Montague, thehousekeeper, to tell her he had called her up.
"You won't to-morrow: I shall be up far ahead of you," said she; andmusing on her father, while Crossjay vowed to be up the first, shethought it her duty to plunge into another expostulation.
Willoughby had need of Vernon on private affairs. Dr. Middleton betookhimself as usual to the library, after answering "I will ruin you yet,"to Willoughby's liberal offer to despatch an order to London for anybooks he might want.
His fine unruffled air, as of a mountain in still morning beams, madeClara not indisposed to a preliminary scene with Willoughby that mightsave her from distressing him, but she could not stop Willoughby; aslittle could she look an invitation. He stood in the Hall, holdingVernon by the arm. She passed him; he did not speak, and she enteredthe library.
"What now, my dear? what is it?" said Dr. Middleton, seeing that thedoor was shut on them.
"Nothing, papa," she replied, calmly.
"You've not locked the door, my child? You turned something there: trythe handle."
"I assure you, papa, the door is not locked."
"Mr. Whitford will be here instantly. We are engaged on tough matter.Women have not, and opinion is universal that they never will have, aconception of the value of time."
"We are vain and shallow, my dear papa."
"No, no, not you, Clara. But I suspect you to require to learn byhaving work in progress how important is . . . is a quiet commencementof the day's task. There is not a scholar who will not tell you so. Wemust have a retreat. These invasions!--So you intend to have anotherride to-day? They do you good. To-morrow we dine with Mrs. MountstuartJenkinson, an estimable person indeed, though I do not perfectlyunderstand our accepting.--You have not to accuse me of sitting overwine last night, my Clara! I never do it, unless I am appealed to formy judgement upon a wine."
"I have come to entreat you to take me away, papa."
In the midst of the storm aroused by this renewal of perplexity, DrMiddleton replaced a book his elbow had knocked over in his haste todash the hair off his forehead, crying: "Whither? To what spot? Thatreading of guide-books, and idle people's notes of Travel, andpicturesque correspondence in the newspapers, unsettles man and maid.My objection to the living in hotels is known. I do not hesitate to saythat I do cordially abhor it. I have had penitentially to submit to itin your dear mother's time, [Greek], up to the full ten thousand times.But will you not comprehend that to the older man his miseries aremultiplied by his years? But is it utterly useless to solicit yoursympathy with an old man, Clara?"
"General Darleton will take us in, papa."
"His table is detestable. I say nothing of that; but his wine ispoison. Let that pass--I should rather say, let it not pass!--but ourpolitical views are not in accord. True, we are not under theobligation to propound them in presence, but we are destitute of anopinion in common. We have no discourse. Military men have produced, ordiverged in, noteworthy epicures; they are often devout; they haveblossomed in lettered men: they are gentlemen; the country rightlyholds them in honour; but, in fine, I reject the proposal to go toGeneral Darleton.--Tears?"
"No, papa."
"I do hope not. Here we have everything man can desire; withoutcontest, an excellent host. You have your transitory tea-cup tempests,which you magnify to hurricanes, in the approved historic manner of thebook of Cupid. And all the better; I repeat, it is the better that youshould have them over in the infancy of the alliance. Come in!" Dr.Middleton shouted cheerily in response to a knock at the door.
He feared the door was locked: he had a fear that his daughter intendedto keep it locked.
"Clara!" he cried.
She reluctantly turned the handle, and the ladies Eleanor and Isabelcame in, apologizing with as much coherence as Dr. Middleton everexpected from their sex. They wished to speak to Clara, but theydeclined to take her away. In vain the Rev. Doctor assured them shewas at their service; they protested that they had very few words tosay, and would not intrude one moment further than to speak them.
Like a shy deputation of young scholars before the master, these verywords to come were preceded by none at all; a dismal and trying cause;refreshing however to Dr. Middleton, who joyfully anticipated that theladies could be induced to take away Clara when they had finished.
"We may appear to you a little formal," Miss Isabel began, and turnedto her sister.
"We have no intention to lay undue weight on our mission, if mission itcan be called," said Miss Eleanor.
"Is it entrusted to you by Willoughby?" said Clara.
"Dear child, that you may know it all the more earnest with us, and ourpersonal desire to contribute to your happiness: therefore doesWilloughby entrust the speaking of it to us."
Hereupon the sisters alternated in addressing Clara, and she gazed fromone to the other, piecing fragments of empty signification to get thefull meaning when she might.
"--And in saying your happiness, dear Clara, we have our Willoughby'sin view, which is dependent on yours."
"--And we never could sanction that our own inclinations should standin the way."
"--No. We love the old place; and if it were only our punishment forloving it too id
olatrously, we should deem it ground enough for ourdeparture."
"--Without, really, an idea of unkindness; none, not any."
"--Young wives naturally prefer to be undisputed queens of their ownestablishment."
"--Youth and age!"
"But I," said Clara, "have never mentioned, never had a thought . . ."
"--You have, dear child, a lover who in his solicitude for yourhappiness both sees what you desire and what is due to you."
"--And for us, Clara, to recognize what is due to you is to act on it."
"--Besides, dear, a sea-side cottage has always been one of ourdreams."
"--We have not to learn that we are a couple of old maids, incongruousassociates for a young wife in the government of a great house."
"--With our antiquated notions, questions of domestic management mightarise, and with the best will in the world to be harmonious!"
"--So, dear Clara, consider it settled."
"--From time to time gladly shall we be your guests."
"--Your guests, dear, not censorious critics."
"And you think me such an Egoist!--dear ladies! The suggestion of socruel a piece of selfishness wounds me. I would not have had you leavethe Hall. I like your society; I respect you. My complaint, if I hadone, would be, that you do not sufficiently assert yourselves. I couldhave wished you to be here for an example to me. I would not haveallowed you to go. What can he think of me! Did Willoughby speak of itthis morning?"
It was hard to distinguish which was the completer dupe of these twoechoes of one another in worship of a family idol.
"Willoughby," Miss Eleanor presented herself to be stamped with thetitle hanging ready for the first that should open her lips, "ourWilloughby is observant--he is ever generous--and he is not lessforethoughtful. His arrangement is for our good on all sides."
"An index is enough," said Miss Isabel, appearing in her turn themonster dupe.
"You will not have to leave, dear ladies. Were I mistress here I shouldoppose it."
"Willoughby blames himself for not reassuring you before."
"Indeed we blame ourselves for not undertaking to go."
"Did he speak of it first this morning?" said Clara; but she could drawno reply to that from them. They resumed the duet, and she resignedherself to have her cars boxed with nonsense.
"So, it is understood?" said Miss Eleanor.
"I see your kindness, ladies."
"And I am to be Aunt Eleanor again?"
"And I Aunt Isabel?"
Clara could have wrung her hands at the impediment which prohibited herdelicacy from telling them why she could not name them so as she haddone in the earlier days of Willoughby's courtship. She kissed themwarmly, ashamed of kissing, though the warmth was real.
They retired with a flow of excuses to Dr. Middleton for disturbinghim. He stood at the door to bow them out, and holding the door forClara, to wind up the procession, discovered her at a far corner of theroom.
He was debating upon the advisability of leaving her there, when VernonWhitford crossed the hall from the laboratory door, a mirror of himselfin his companion air of discomposure.
That was not important, so long as Vernon was a check on Clara; but themoment Clara, thus baffled, moved to quit the library, Dr. Middletonfelt the horror of having an uncomfortable face opposite.
"No botheration, I hope? It's the worst thing possible to work on.Where have you been? I suspect your weak point is not to arm yourselfin triple brass against bother and worry, and no good work can you dounless you do. You have come out of that laboratory."
"I have, sir.--Can I get you any book?" Vernon said to Clara.
She thanked him, promising to depart immediately.
"Now you are at the section of Italian literature, my love," said DrMiddleton. "Well, Mr. Whitford, the laboratory--ah!--where the amountof labour done within the space of a year would not stretch an electriccurrent between this Hall and the railway station: say, four miles,which I presume the distance to be. Well, sir, and a dilettantismcostly in time and machinery is as ornamental as foxes' tails anddeers' horns to an independent gentleman whose fellows are contentedwith the latter decorations for their civic wreath. Willoughby, let meremark, has recently shown himself most considerate for my girl. As faras I could gather--I have been listening to a dialogue of ladies--he isas generous as he is discreet. There are certain combats in which to bethe one to succumb is to claim the honours;--and that is what womenwill not learn. I doubt their seeing the glory of it."
"I have heard of it; I have been with Willoughby," Vernon said,hastily, to shield Clara from her father's allusive attacks. He wishedto convey to her that his interview with Willoughby had not beenprofitable in her interests, and that she had better at once, havinghim present to support her, pour out her whole heart to her father. Buthow was it to be conveyed? She would not meet his eyes, and he was toopoor an intriguer to be ready on the instant to deal out the verbalobscurities which are transparencies to one.
"I shall regret it, if Willoughby has annoyed you, for he stands highin my favour," said Dr. Middleton.
Clara dropped a book. Her father started higher than the nervousimpulse warranted in his chair. Vernon tried to win a glance, and shewas conscious of his effort, but her angry and guilty feelings,prompting her resolution to follow her own counsel, kept her eyelids onthe defensive.
"I don't say he annoys me, sir. I am here to give him my advice, and ifhe does not accept it I have no right to be annoyed. Willoughby seemsannoyed that Colonel De Craye should talk of going to-morrow or nextday."
"He likes his friends about him. Upon my word, a man of a more genialheart you might march a day without finding. But you have it on theforehead, Mr. Whitford."
"Oh! no, sir."
"There," Dr. Middleton drew his finger along his brows.
Vernon felt along his own, and coined an excuse for their blackness;not aware that the direction of his mind toward Clara pushed him to akind of clumsy double meaning, while he satisfied an inward and cravingwrath, as he said: "By the way, I have been racking my head; I mustapply to you, sir. I have a line, and I am uncertain of the run of theline. Will this pass, do you think?
'In Asination's tongue he asinates';
signifying that he excels any man of us at donkey-dialect."
After a decent interval for the genius of criticism to seem to havebeen sitting under his frown, Dr. Middleton rejoined with soberjocularity: "No, sir, it will not pass; and your uncertainty in regardto the run of the line would only be extended were the line centipedal.Our recommendation is, that you erase it before the arrival of theferule. This might do:
'In Assignation's name he assignats';
signifying that he pre-eminently flourishes hypothetical promises, topay by appointment. That might pass. But you will forbear to cite mefor your authority."
"The line would be acceptable if I could get it to apply," said Vernon.
"Or this . . ." Dr. Middleton was offering a second suggestion, butClara fled, astonished at men as she never yet had been. Why, in aburning world they would be exercising their minds in absurdities! Andthose two were scholars, learned men! And both knew they were in thepresence of a soul in a tragic fever!
A minute after she had closed the door they were deep in their work.Dr. Middleton forgot his alternative line.
"Nothing serious?" he said in reproof of the want of honourableclearness on Vernon's brows.
"I trust not, sir; it's a case for common sense."
"And you call that not serious?"
"I take Hermann's praise of the versus dochmiachus to be not onlyserious but unexaggerated," said Vernon.
Dr. Middleton assented and entered on the voiceful ground of Greekmetres, shoving your dry dusty world from his elbow.