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diff --git a/4476-h/4476-h.htm b/4476-h/4476-h.htm new file mode 100644 index 0000000..ae91a90 --- /dev/null +++ b/4476-h/4476-h.htm @@ -0,0 +1,20584 @@ +<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?> + +<!DOCTYPE html + PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Strict//EN" + "http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-strict.dtd" > + +<html xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml" lang="en"> + <head> + <title> + One of Our Conquerors, Complete, by George Meredith + </title> + <style type="text/css" xml:space="preserve"> + + body { margin:5%; background:#faebd7; text-align:justify} + P { text-indent: 1em; margin-top: .25em; margin-bottom: .25em; } + H1,H2,H3,H4,H5,H6 { text-align: center; margin-left: 15%; margin-right: 15%; } + hr { width: 50%; text-align: center;} + .foot { margin-left: 20%; margin-right: 20%; text-align: justify; text-indent: -3em; font-size: 90%; } + blockquote {font-size: 97%; font-style: italic; margin-left: 10%; margin-right: 10%;} + .mynote {background-color: #DDE; color: #000; padding: .5em; margin-left: 10%; margin-right: 10%; font-family: sans-serif; font-size: 95%;} + .toc { margin-left: 10%; margin-bottom: .75em;} + .toc2 { margin-left: 20%;} + div.fig { display:block; margin:0 auto; text-align:center; } + .figleft {float: left; margin-left: 0%; margin-right: 1%;} + .figright {float: right; margin-right: 0%; margin-left: 1%;} + pre { font-style: italic; font-size: 90%; margin-left: 10%;} + +</style> + </head> + <body> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> +Project Gutenberg's One of Our Conquerors, Complete, by George Meredith + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: One of Our Conquerors, Complete + +Author: George Meredith + +Release Date: October 13, 2006 [EBook #4476] +Last Updated: August 25, 2016 + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: UTF-8 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK ONE OF OUR CONQUERORS, COMPLETE *** + + + +Produced by David Widger + + + + + +</pre> + + <h1> + ONE OF OUR CONQUERORS, Complete + </h1> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <h2> + By George Meredith + </h2> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <h3> + 1897 + </h3> + <p> + <br /> <br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <br /> <br /> + </p> + <blockquote> + <p> + <big><b>CONTENTS</b></big><br /><br /> <a href="#link2HCH0001"> CHAPTER I. + </a> ACROSS LONDON BRIDGE <br /><br /> <a href="#link2HCH0002"> + CHAPTER II. </a> THROUGH THE VAGUE TO THE INFINITELY LITTLE + <br /><br /> <a href="#link2HCH0003"> CHAPTER III. </a> OLD + VEUVE <br /><br /> <a href="#link2HCH0004"> CHAPTER IV. </a> THE + SECOND BOTTLE <br /><br /> <a href="#link2HCH0005"> CHAPTER V. </a> THE + LONDON WALK WESTWARD <br /><br /> <a href="#link2HCH0006"> CHAPTER VI. + </a> NATALY <br /><br /> <a href="#link2HCH0007"> CHAPTER VII. + </a> BETWEEN A GENERAL MAN OF THIN WORLD AND A PROFESSIONAL + <br /><br /> <a href="#link2HCH0008"> CHAPTER VIII. </a> SOME + FAMILIAR GUESTS <br /><br /> <a href="#link2HCH0009"> CHAPTER IX. </a> AN + INSPECTION OF LAKELANDS <br /><br /> <a href="#link2HCH0010"> CHAPTER X. + </a> SKEPSEY IN MOTION <br /><br /> <a href="#link2HCH0011"> + CHAPTER XI. </a> WHEREIN WE BEHOLD THE COUPLE JUSTIFIED OF + LOVE HAVING SIGHT OF THEIR SCOURGE <br /><br /> <a href="#link2HCH0012"> + CHAPTER XII. </a> TREATS OF THE DUMBNESS POSSIBLE WITH + MEMBERS OF A HOUSEHOLD HAVING ONE HEART <br /><br /> <a + href="#link2HCH0013"> CHAPTER XIII. </a> THE LATEST OF MRS. + BURMAN <br /><br /> <a href="#link2HCH0014"> CHAPTER XIV. </a> DISCLOSES + A STAGE ON THE DRIVE TO PARIS <br /><br /> <a href="#link2HCH0015"> + CHAPTER XV. </a> A PATRIOT ABROAD <br /><br /> <a + href="#link2HCH0016"> CHAPTER XVI. </a> ACCOUNTS FOR + SKEPSEY’S MISCONDUCT, SHOWING HOW IT AFFECTED NATALY <br /><br /> <a + href="#link2HCH0017"> CHAPTER XVII. </a> CHIEFLY UPON THE + THEME OF A YOUNG MAID’S IMAGININGS <br /><br /> <a href="#link2HCH0018"> + CHAPTER XVIII. </a> SUITORS FOR THE HAND OF NESTA VICTORIA + <br /><br /> <a href="#link2HCH0019"> CHAPTER XIX. </a> TREATS + OF NATURE AND CIRCUMSTANCE AND THE DISSENSION BETWEEN THEM <br /><br /> <a + href="#link2HCH0020"> CHAPTER XX. </a> THE GREAT ASSEMBLY AT + LAKELANDS <br /><br /> <a href="#link2HCH0021"> CHAPTER XXI. </a> DARTREY + FENELLAN <br /><br /> <a href="#link2HCH0022"> CHAPTER XXII. </a> CONCERNS + THE INTRUSION OF JARNIMAN <br /><br /> <a href="#link2HCH0023"> CHAPTER + XXIII. </a> TREATS OF THE LADIES’ LAPDOG TASSO FOR AN + INSTANCE OF MOMENTOUS EFFECTS PRODUCED BY VERY MINOR CAUSES <br /><br /> + <a href="#link2HCH0024"> CHAPTER XXIV. </a> NESTA’S + ENGAGEMENT <br /><br /> <a href="#link2HCH0025"> CHAPTER XXV. </a> NATALY + IN ACTION <br /><br /> <a href="#link2HCH0026"> CHAPTER XXVI. </a> IN + WHICH WE SEE A CONVENTIONAL GENTLEMAN ENDEAVOURING TO EXAMINE A SPECTRE + OF HIMSELF <br /><br /> <a href="#link2HCH0027"> CHAPTER XXVII. </a> CONTAINS + WHAT IS A SMALL THING OR A GREAT, AS THE SOUL OF THE CHIEF ACTOR MAY + DECIDE <br /><br /> <a href="#link2HCH0028"> CHAPTER XXVIII. </a> MRS. + MARSETT <br /><br /> <a href="#link2HCH0029"> CHAPTER XXIX. </a> SHOWS + ONE OF THE SHADOWS OF THE WORLD CROSSING A VIRGIN’S MIND <br /><br /> <a + href="#link2HCH0030"> CHAPTER XXX. </a> THE BURDEN UPON NESTA + <br /><br /> <a href="#link2HCH0031"> CHAPTER XXXI. </a> SHOWS + HOW THE SQUIRES IN A CONQUEROR’S SERVICE HAVE AT TIMES TO DO KNIGHTLY + CONQUEST OF THEMSELVES <br /><br /> <a href="#link2HCH0032"> CHAPTER + XXXII. </a> SHOWS HOW TEMPER MAY KINDLE TEMPER AND AN + INDIGNANT WOMAN GET HER WEAPON <br /><br /> <a href="#link2HCH0033"> + CHAPTER XXXIII. </a> A PAIR OF WOOERS <br /><br /> <a + href="#link2HCH0034"> CHAPTER XXXIV. </a> CONTAINS DEEDS + UNRELATED AND EXPOSITIONS OF FEELINGS <br /><br /> <a href="#link2HCH0035"> + CHAPTER XXXV. </a> IN WHICH AGAIN WE MAKE USE OF THE OLD + LAMPS FOR LIGHTING AN ABYSMAL DARKNESS <br /><br /> <a href="#link2HCH0036"> + CHAPTER XXXVI. </a> NESTA AND HER FATHER <br /><br /> <a + href="#link2HCH0037"> CHAPTER XXXVII. </a> THE MOTHER-THE + DAUGHTER <br /><br /> <a href="#link2HCH0038"> CHAPTER XXXVIII. </a> NATALY, + NESTA, AND DARTREY FENELLAN <br /><br /> <a href="#link2HCH0039"> CHAPTER + XXXIX. </a> A CHAPTER IN THE SHADOW OF MRS. MARSETT <br /><br /> + <a href="#link2HCH0040"> CHAPTER XL. </a> AN EXPIATION <br /><br /> + <a href="#link2HCH0041"> CHAPTER XLI. </a> THE NIGHT OF THE + GREAT UNDELIVERED SPEECH <br /><br /> <a href="#link2HCH0042"> CHAPTER + XLII. </a> THE LAST <br /><br /> + </p> + </blockquote> + <p> + <br /> <br /> <br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <br /> <br /> <a name="link2HCH0001" id="link2HCH0001"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <h2> + CHAPTER I. ACROSS LONDON BRIDGE + </h2> + <p> + A gentleman, noteworthy for a lively countenance and a waistcoat to match + it, crossing London Bridge at noon on a gusty April day, was almost + magically detached from his conflict with the gale by some sly strip of + slipperiness, abounding in that conduit of the markets, which had more or + less adroitly performed the trick upon preceding passengers, and now laid + this one flat amid the shuffle of feet, peaceful for the moment as the + uncomplaining who have gone to Sabrina beneath the tides. He was unhurt, + quite sound, merely astonished, he remarked, in reply to the inquiries of + the first kind helper at his elbow; and it appeared an acceptable + statement of his condition. He laughed, shook his coat-tails, smoothed the + back of his head rather thoughtfully, thankfully received his runaway hat, + nodded bright beams to right and left, and making light of the muddy + stigmas imprinted by the pavement, he scattered another shower of his nods + and smiles around, to signify, that as his good friends would wish, he + thoroughly felt his legs and could walk unaided. And he was in the act of + doing it, questioning his familiar behind the waistcoat amazedly, to tell + him how such a misadventure could have occurred to him of all men, when a + glance below his chin discomposed his outward face. ‘Oh, confound the + fellow!’ he said, with simple frankness, and was humorously ruffled, + having seen absurd blots of smutty knuckles distributed over the maiden + waistcoat. + </p> + <p> + His outcry was no more than the confidential communication of a genial + spirit with that distinctive article of his attire. At the same time, for + these friendly people about him to share the fun of the annoyance, he + looked hastily brightly back, seeming with the contraction of his brows to + frown, on the little band of observant Samaritans; in the centre of whom a + man who knew himself honourably unclean, perhaps consequently a bit of a + political jewel, hearing one of their number confounded for his pains, and + by the wearer of a superfine dashing-white waistcoat, was moved to take + notice of the total deficiency of gratitude in this kind of gentleman’s + look and pocket. If we ask for nothing for helping gentlemen to stand + upright on their legs, and get it, we expect civility into the bargain. + Moreover, there are reasons in nature why we choose to give sign of a + particular surliness when our wealthy superiors would have us think their + condescending grins are cordials. + </p> + <p> + The gentleman’s eyes were followed on a second hurried downward grimace, + the necessitated wrinkles of which could be stretched by malevolence to a + semblance of haughty disgust; reminding us, through our readings in + journals, of the wicked overblown Prince Regent and his Court, together + with the view taken of honest labour in the mind of supercilious luxury, + even if indebted to it freshly for a trifle; and the hoar-headed + nineteenth-century billow of democratic ire craved the word to be set + swelling. + </p> + <p> + ‘Am I the fellow you mean, sir?’ the man said. + </p> + <p> + He was answered, not ungraciously: ‘All right, my man.’ + </p> + <p> + But the balance of our public equanimity is prone to violent antic + bobbings on occasions when, for example, an ostentatious garment shall + appear disdainful our class and ourself, and coin of the realm has not + usurped command of one of the scales: thus a fairly pleasant answer, cast + in persuasive features, provoked the retort: + </p> + <p> + ‘There you’re wrong; nor wouldn’t be.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘What’s that?’ was the gentleman’s musical inquiry. + </p> + <p> + ‘That’s flat, as you was half a minute ago,’ the man rejoined. + </p> + <p> + ‘Ah, well, don’t be impudent,’ the gentleman said, by way of amiable + remonstrance before a parting. + </p> + <p> + ‘And none of your dam punctilio,’ said the man. + </p> + <p> + Their exchange rattled smartly, without a direct hostility, and the + gentleman stepped forward. + </p> + <p> + It was observed in the crowd, that after a few paces he put two fingers on + the back of his head. + </p> + <p> + They might suppose him to be condoling with his recent mishap. But, in + fact, a thing had occurred to vex him more than a descent upon the + pavement or damage to his waistcoat’s whiteness: he abominated the thought + of an altercation with a member of the mob; he found that enormous beat + comprehensible only when it applauded him; and besides he wished it warmly + well; all that was good for it; plentiful dinners, country excursions, + stout menagerie bars, music, a dance, and to bed: he was for patting, + stroking, petting the mob, for tossing it sops, never for irritating it to + show an eye-tooth, much less for causing it to exhibit the grinders: and + in endeavouring to get at the grounds of his dissension with that + dirty-fisted fellow, the recollection of the word punctilio shot a throb + of pain to the spot where his mishap had rendered him susceptible. + Headache threatened—and to him of all men! But was there ever such a + word for drumming on a cranium? Puzzles are presented to us now and then + in the course of our days; and the smaller they are the better for the + purpose, it would seem; and they come in rattle-boxes, they are actually + children’s toys, for what they contain, but not the less do they buzz at + our understandings and insist that they break or we, and, in either case, + to show a mere foolish idle rattle in hollowness. Or does this happen to + us only after a fall? + </p> + <p> + He tried a suspension of his mental efforts, and the word was like the + clapper of a disorderly bell, striking through him, with reverberations, + in the form of interrogations, as to how he, of all men living, could by + any chance have got into a wrangle, in a thoroughfare, on London Bridge, + of all places in the world!—he, so popular, renowned for his + affability, his amiability; having no dislike to common dirty dogs, + entirely the reverse, liking them and doing his best for them; and + accustomed to receive their applause. And in what way had he offered a + hint to bring on him the charge of punctilio? + </p> + <p> + ‘But I am treating it seriously!’ he said, and jerked a dead laugh while + fixing a button of his coat. + </p> + <p> + That he should have treated it seriously, furnished next the subject of + cogitation; and here it was plainly suggested, that a degradation of his + physical system, owing to the shock of the fall, must be seen and + acknowledged; for it had become a perverted engine, to pull him down among + the puerilities, and very soon he was worrying at punctilio anew, + attempting to read the riddle of the application of it to himself, angry + that he had allowed it to be the final word, and admitting it a famous + word for the closing of a controversy:—it banged the door and rolled + drum-notes; it deafened reason. And was it a London cockney crow-word of + the day, or a word that had stuck in the fellow’s head from the perusal of + his pothouse newspaper columns? + </p> + <p> + Furthermore, the plea of a fall, and the plea of a shock from a fall, + required to account for the triviality of the mind, were humiliating to + him who had never hitherto missed a step, or owned to the shortest of + collapses. This confession of deficiency in explosive repartee—using + a friend’s term for the ready gift—was an old and a rueful one with + Victor Radnor. His godmother Fortune denied him that. She bestowed it on + his friend Fenellan, and little else. Simeon Fenellan could clap the + halter on a coltish mob; he had positively caught the roar of cries and + stilled it, by capping the cries in turn, until the people cheered him; + and the effect of the scene upon Victor Radnor disposed him to rank the + gift of repartee higher than a certain rosily oratorical that he was + permitted to tell himself he possessed, in bottle if not on draught. Let + it only be explosive repartee: the well-fused bomb, the bubble to the + stone, echo round the horn. Fenellan, would have discharged an + extinguisher on punctilio in emission. Victor Radnor was unable to cope + with it reflectively. + </p> + <p> + No, but one doesn’t like being beaten by anything! he replied to an + admonishment of his better mind, as he touched his two fingers, more + significantly dubious than the whole hand, at the back of his head, and + checked or stemmed the current of a fear. For he was utterly unlike + himself; he was dwelling on a trifle, on a matter discernibly the + smallest, an incident of the streets; and although he refused to feel a + bump or any responsive notification of a bruise, he made a sacrifice of + his native pride to his intellectual, in granting that he must have been + shaken, so childishly did he continue thinking. + </p> + <p> + Yes, well, and if a tumble distorts our ideas of life, and an odd word + engrosses our speculations, we are poor creatures, he addressed another + friend, from whom he stood constitutionally in dissent naming him Colney; + and under pressure of the name, reviving old wrangles between them upon + man’s present achievements and his probable destinies: especially upon + England’s grandeur, vitality, stability, her intelligent appreciation of + her place in the universe; not to speak of the historic dignity of London + City. Colney had to be overcome afresh, and he fled, but managed, with two + or three of his bitter phrases, to make a cuttle-fish fight of it, that + oppressively shadowed his vanquisher: + </p> + <p> + The Daniel Lambert of Cities: the Female Annuitant of Nations:—and + such like, wretched stuff, proper to Colney Durance, easily dispersed and + out-laughed when we have our vigour. We have as much as we need of it in + summoning a contemptuous Pooh to our lips, with a shrug at venomous + dyspepsia. + </p> + <p> + Nevertheless, a malignant sketch of Colney’s, in the which Hengist and + Horsa, our fishy Saxon originals, in modern garb of liveryman and gaitered + squire, flat-headed, paunchy, assiduously servile, are shown blacking + Ben-Israel’s boots and grooming the princely stud of the Jew, had come so + near to Victor Radnor’s apprehensions of a possible, if not an impending, + consummation, that the ghastly vision of the Jew Dominant in London City, + over England, over Europe, America, the world (a picture drawn in literary + sepia by Colney: with our poor hang neck population uncertain about making + a bell-rope of the forelock to the Satyr-snouty master; and the Norman + Lord de Warenne handing him for a lump sum son and daughter, both to be + Hebraized in their different ways), fastened on the most mercurial of + patriotic men, and gave him a whole-length plunge into despondency. + </p> + <p> + It lasted nearly a minute. His recovery was not in this instance due to + the calling on himself for the rescue of an ancient and glorious country; + nor altogether to the spectacle of the shipping, over the parapet, to his + right: the hundreds of masts rising out of the merchant river; London’s + unrivalled mezzotint and the City’ rhetorician’s inexhaustible argument: + he gained it rather from the imperious demand of an animated and thirsty + frame for novel impressions. Commonly he was too hot with his business, + and airy fancies above it when crossing the bridge, to reflect in + freshness on its wonders; though a phrase could spring him alive to them; + a suggestion of the Foreigner, jealous, condemned to admire in despair of + outstripping, like Satan worsted; or when a Premier’s fine inflation + magnified the scene at City banquets—exciting while audible, if a + waggery in memory; or when England’s cherished Bard, the Leading Article, + blew bellows, and wind primed the lieges. + </p> + <p> + That a phrase on any other subject was of much the same effect, in + relation to it, may be owned; he was lightly kindled. The scene, however, + had a sharp sparkle of attractiveness at the instant. Down went the + twirling horizontal pillars of a strong tide from the arches of the + bridge, breaking to wild water at a remove; and a reddish Northern cheek + of curdling pipeing East, at shrilly puffs between the Tower and the + Custom House, encountered it to whip and ridge the flood against + descending tug and long tail of stern-ajerk empty barges; with a steamer + slowly noseing round off the wharf-cranes, preparing to swirl the screw; + and half-bottom-upward boats dancing harpooner beside their whale; along + an avenue, not fabulously golden, of the deputy masts of all nations, a + wintry woodland, every rag aloft curling to volume; and here the spouts + and the mounds of steam, and rolls of brown smoke there, variously + undulated, curved to vanish; cold blue sky ashift with the whirl and dash + of a very Tartar cavalry of cloud overhead. + </p> + <p> + Surely a scene pretending to sublimity? + </p> + <p> + Gazeing along that grand highway of the voyageing forest, your London + citizen of good estate has reproached his country’s poets for not pouring + out, succinctly and melodiously, his multitudinous larvae of notions + begotten by the scene. For there are times when he would, pay to have them + sung; and he feels them big; he thinks them human in their bulk; they are + Londinensian; they want but form and fire to get them scored on the + tablets of the quotable at festive boards. This he can promise to his + poets. As for otherwhere than at the festive, Commerce invoked is a + Goddess that will have the reek of those boards to fill her nostrils, and + poet and alderman alike may be dedicate to the sublime, she leads them, + after two sniffs of an idea concerning her, for the dive into the + turtle-tureen. Heels up they go, poet first—a plummet he! + </p> + <p> + And besides it is barely possible for our rounded citizen, in the mood of + meditation, to direct his gaze off the bridge along the waterway + North-eastward without beholding as an eye the glow of whitebait’s + bow-window by the riverside, to the front of the summer sunset, a league + or so down stream; where he sees, in memory savours, the Elysian end of + Commerce: frontispiece of a tale to fetch us up the out-wearied spectre of + old Apicius; yea, and urge Crispinus to wheel his purse into the market + for the purchase of a costlier mullet! + </p> + <p> + But is the Jew of the usury gold becoming our despot-king of Commerce? + </p> + <p> + In that case, we do not ask our country’s poets to compose a single stanza + of eulogy’s rhymes—far from it. Far to the contrary, we bid + ourselves remember the sons of whom we are; instead of revelling in the + fruits of Commerce, we shoot scornfully past those blazing bellied windows + of the aromatic dinners, and beyond Thames, away to the fishermen’s deeps, + Old England’s native element, where the strenuous ancestry of a race yet + and ever manful at the stress of trial are heard around and aloft + whistling us back to the splendid strain of muscle, and spray fringes + cloud, and strong heart rides the briny scoops and hillocks, and Death and + Man are at grip for the haul. + </p> + <p> + There we find our nationality, our poetry, no Hebrew competing. + </p> + <p> + We do: or there at least we left it. Whether to recover it when wanted, is + not so certain. Humpy Hengist and dumpy Horsa, quitting ledger and + coronet, might recur to their sea bowlegs and red-stubble chins, might + take to their tarpaulins again; they might renew their manhood on the + capture of cod; headed by Harald and Hardiknut, they might roll surges to + whelm a Dominant Jew clean gone to the fleshpots and effeminacy. Aldermen + of our ancient conception, they may teach him that he has been backsliding + once more, and must repent in ashes, as those who are for jewels, titles, + essences, banquets, for wallowing in slimy spawn of lucre, have ever to + do. They dispossess him of his greedy gettings. + </p> + <p> + And how of the Law? + </p> + <p> + But the Law is always, and must ever be, the Law of the stronger. —Ay, + but brain beats muscle, and what if the Jew should prove to have superior + power of brain? A dreaded hypothesis! Why, then you see the insurgent + Saxon seamen (of the names in two syllables with accent on the first), and + their Danish captains, and it may be but a remnant of high-nosed old + Norman Lord de Warenne beside them, in the criminal box: and presently the + Jew smoking a giant regalia cigar on a balcony giving view of a + gallows-tree. But we will try that: on our side, to back a native + pugnacity, is morality, humanity, fraternity—nature’s rights, aha! + and who withstands them? on his, a troop of mercenaries! + </p> + <p> + And that lands me in Red Republicanism, a hop and a skip from Socialism! + said Mr. Radnor, and chuckled ironically at the natural declivity he had + come to. Still, there was an idea in it.... + </p> + <p> + A short run or attempt at running after the idea, ended in pain to his + head near the spot where the haunting word punctilio caught at any excuse + for clamouring. + </p> + <p> + Yet we cannot relinquish an idea that was ours; we are vowed to the + pursuit of it. Mr. Radnor lighted on the tracks, by dint of a thought + flung at his partner Mr. Inchling’s dread of the Jews. Inchling dreaded + Scotchmen as well, and Americans, and Armenians, and Greeks: latterly + Germans hardly less; but his dread of absorption in Jewry, signifying + subjection, had often precipitated a deplorable shrug, in which Victor + Radnor now perceived the skirts of his idea, even to a fancy that + something of the idea must have struck Inchling when he shrugged: the idea + being... he had lost it again. Definition seemed to be an extirpation + enemy of this idea, or she was by nature shy. She was very feminine; + coming when she willed and flying when wanted. Not until nigh upon the + close of his history did she return, full-statured and embraceable, to + Victor Radnor. + </p> + <p> + <a name="link2HCH0002" id="link2HCH0002"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + CHAPTER II. THROUGH THE VAGUE TO THE INFINITELY LITTLE + </h2> + <p> + The fair dealing with readers demands of us, that a narrative shall not + proceed at slower pace than legs of a man in motion; and we are still but + little more than midway across London Bridge. But if a man’s mind is to be + taken as a part of him, the likening of it, at an introduction, to an army + on the opening march of a great campaign, should plead excuses for tardy + forward movements, in consideration of the large amount of matter you have + to review before you can at all imagine yourselves to have made his + acquaintance. This it is not necessary to do when you are set astride the + enchanted horse of the Tale, which leaves the man’s mind at home while he + performs the deeds befitting him: he can indeed be rapid. Whether more + active, is a question asking for your notions of the governing element in + the composition of man, and of hid present business here. The Tale + inspirits one’s earlier ardours, when we sped without baggage, when the + Impossible was wings to imagination, and heroic sculpture the simplest act + of the chisel. It does not advance, ‘tis true; it drives the whirligig + circle round and round the single existing central point; but it is + enriched with applause of the boys and girls of both ages in this land; + and all the English critics heap their honours on its brave old + Simplicity: our national literary flag, which signalizes us while we + float, subsequently to flap above the shallows. One may sigh for it. An + ill-fortuned minstrel who has by fateful direction been brought to see + with distinctness, that man is not as much comprised in external features + as the monkey, will be devoted to the task of the fuller portraiture. + </p> + <p> + After his ineffectual catching at the volatile idea, Mr. Radnor found + repose in thoughts of his daughter and her dear mother. They had begged + him to put on an overcoat this day of bitter wind, or a silken kerchief + for the throat. Faithful to the Spring, it had been his habit since + boyhood to show upon his person something of the hue of the vernal month, + the white of the daisied meadow, and although he owned a light overcoat to + dangle from shoulders at the Opera crush, he declined to wear it for + protection. His gesture of shaking and expanding whenever the tender + request was urged on him, signified a physical opposition to the control + of garments. Mechanically now, while doating in fancy over the couple + beseeching him, he loosened the button across his defaced waistcoat, + exposed a large measure of chest to flaws of a wind barbed on Norwegian + peaks by the brewers of cough and catarrh—horrid women of the + whistling clouts, in the pay of our doctors. He braved them; he starved + the profession. He was that man in fifty thousand who despises hostile + elements and goes unpunished, calmly erect among a sneezing and tumbled + host, as a lighthouse overhead of breezy fleets. The coursing of his blood + was by comparison electrical; he had not the sensation of cold, other than + that of an effort of the elements to arouse him; and so quick was he, + through this fine animation, to feel, think, act, that the three + successive tributaries of conduct appeared as an irreflective flash and a + gamester’s daring in the vein to men who had no deep knowledge of him and + his lightning arithmetic for measuring, sounding, and deciding. + </p> + <p> + Naturally he was among the happiest of human creatures; he willed it so, + with consent of circumstances; a boisterous consent, as when votes are + reckoned for a favourite candidate: excepting on the part of a small band + of black dissentients in a corner, a minute opaque body, devilish in their + irreconcilability, who maintain their struggle to provoke discord, with a + cry disclosing the one error of his youth, the sole bad step chargeable + upon his antecedents. But do we listen to them? Shall we not have them + turned out? He gives the sign for it; and he leaves his buoying + constituents to outroar them: and he tells a friend that it was not, as + one may say, an error, although an erratic step: but let us explain to our + bosom friend; it was a step quite unregretted, gloried in; a step + deliberately marked, to be done again, were the time renewed: it was a + step necessitated (emphatically) by a false preceding step; and having + youth to plead for it, in the first instance, youth and ignorance; and + secondly, and O how deeply truly! Love. Deep true love, proved by years, + is the advocate. + </p> + <p> + He tells himself at the same time, after lending ear to the advocate’s + exordium and a favourite sentence, that, judged by the Powers (to them + only can he expose the whole skeleton-cupboard of the case), judged by + those clear-sighted Powers, he is exonerated. + </p> + <p> + To be exonerated by those awful Powers, is to be approved. + </p> + <p> + As to that, there is no doubt: whom they, all-seeing, discerning as they + do, acquit they justify. + </p> + <p> + Whom they justify, they compliment. + </p> + <p> + They, seeing all the facts, are not unintelligent of distinctions, as the + world is. + </p> + <p> + What, to them, is the spot of the error?—admitting it as an error. + They know it for a thing of convention, not of Nature. We stand forth to + plead it in proof of an adherence to Nature’s laws: we affirm, that far + from a defilement, it is an illumination and stamp of nobility. On the + beloved who shares it with us, it is a stamp of the highest nobility. Our + world has many ways for signifying its displeasure, but it cannot brand an + angel. + </p> + <p> + This was another favourite sentence of Love’s grand oration for the + defence. So seductive was it to the Powers who sat in judgement on the + case, that they all, when the sentence came, turned eyes upon the angel, + and they smiled. + </p> + <p> + They do not smile on the condemnable. + </p> + <p> + She, then, were he rebuked, would have strength to uplift him. And who, + calling her his own, could be placed in second rank among the blissful! + </p> + <p> + Mr. Radnor could rationally say that he was made for happiness; he flew to + it, he breathed, dispensed it. How conceive the clear-sighted celestial + Powers as opposing his claim to that estate? Not they. He knew, for he had + them safe in the locked chamber of his breast, to yield him subservient + responses. The world, or Puritanic members of it, had pushed him to the + trial once or twice—or had put on an air of doing so; creating a + temporary disturbance, ending in a merry duet with his daughter Nesta + Victoria: a glorious trio when her mother Natalia, sweet lily that she + was, shook the rainwater from her cup and followed the good example to + shine in the sun. + </p> + <p> + He had a secret for them. + </p> + <p> + Nesta’s promising soprano, and her mother’s contralto, and his baritone—a + true baritone, not so well trained as their accurate notes—should be + rising in spirited union with the curtain of that secret: there was matter + for song and concert, triumph and gratulation in it. And during the whole + passage of the bridge, he had not once cast thought on a secret so + palpitating, the cause of the morning’s expedition and a long year’s + prospect of the present day! It seemed to have been knocked clean out of + it—punctilioed out, Fenellan might say. Nor had any combinations + upon the theme of business displaced it. Just before the fall, the whole + drama of the unfolding of that secret was brilliant to his eyes as a scene + on a stage. + </p> + <p> + He refused to feel any sensible bruise on his head, with the admission + that he perhaps might think he felt one which was virtually no more than + the feeling of a thought;—what his friend Dr. Peter Yatt would + define as feeling a rotifer astir in the curative compartment of a + homoeopathic globule: and a playful fancy may do that or anything. Only, + Sanity does not allow the infinitely little to disturb us. + </p> + <p> + Mr. Radnor had a quaint experience of the effects of the infinitely little + while threading his way to a haberdasher’s shop for new white waistcoats. + Under the shadow of the representative statue of City Corporations and + London’s majesty, the figure of Royalty, worshipful in its marbled + redundancy, fronting the bridge, on the slope where the seas of fish and + fruit below throw up a thin line of their drift, he stood contemplating + the not unamiable, reposefully-jolly, Guelphic countenance, from the loose + jowl to the bent knee, as if it were a novelty to him; unwilling to trust + himself to the roadway he had often traversed, equally careful that his + hesitation should not be seen. A trifle more impressible, he might have + imagined the smoky figure and magnum of pursiness barring the City against + him. He could have laughed aloud at the hypocrisy behind his quiet look of + provincial wonderment at London’s sculptor’s art; and he was partly + tickled as well by the singular fit of timidity enchaining him. Cart, + omnibus, cab, van, barrow, donkey-tray, went by in strings, broken here + and there, and he could not induce his legs to take advantage of the gaps; + he listened to a warning that he would be down again if he tried it, among + those wheels; and his nerves clutched him, like a troop of household + women, to keep him from the hazard of an exposure to the horrid crunch, + pitiless as tiger’s teeth; and we may say truly, that once down, or once + out of the rutted line, you are food for lion and jackal—the forces + of the world will have you in their mandibles. + </p> + <p> + An idea was there too; but it would not accept pursuit. + </p> + <p> + ‘A pretty scud overheard?’ said a voice at his ear. + </p> + <p> + ‘For fine!—to-day at least,’ Mr. Radnor affably replied to a + stranger; and gazing on the face of his friend Fenellan, knew the voice, + and laughed: ‘You?’ He straightened his back immediately to cross the + road, dismissing nervousness as a vapour, asking, between a cab and a van: + ‘Anything doing in the City?’ For Mr. Fenellan’s proper station faced + Westward. + </p> + <p> + The reply was deferred until they had reached the pavement, when Mr. + Fenellan said: ‘I’ll tell you,’ and looked a dubious preface, to his + friend’s thinking. + </p> + <p> + But it was merely the mental inquiry following a glance at mud-spots on + the coat. + </p> + <p> + ‘We’ll lunch; lunch with me, I must eat, tell me then,’ said Mr. Radnor, + adding within himself: ‘Emptiness! want of food!’ to account for recent + ejaculations and qualms. He had not eaten for a good four hours. + </p> + <p> + Fenellan’s tone signified to his feverish sensibility of the moment, that + the matter was personal; and the intimation of a touch on domestic affairs + caused sinkings in his vacuity, much as though his heart were having a + fall. + </p> + <p> + He mentioned the slip on the bridge, to explain his: need to visit a + haberdasher’s shop, and pointed at the waistcoat. + </p> + <p> + Mr. Fenellan was compassionate over the ‘Poor virgin of the smoky city!’ + </p> + <p> + ‘They have their ready-made at these shops—last year’s: perhaps, + never mind, do for the day,’ said Mr. Radnor, impatient for eating, now + that he had spoken of it. ‘A basin of turtle; I can’t wait. A brush of the + coat; mud must be dry by this time. Clear turtle, I think, with a bottle + of the Old Veuve. Not bad news to tell? You like that Old Veuve?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Too well to tell bad news of her,’ said Mr. Fenellan in a manner to + reassure his friend, as he intended. ‘You wouldn’t credit it for the + Spring of the year, without the spotless waistcoat?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Something of that, I suppose.’ And so saying, Mr. Radnor entered the shop + of his quest, to be complimented by the shopkeeper, while the attendants + climbed the ladder to upper stages for white-waistcoat boxes, on his + being; the first bird of the season; which it pleased him to hear; for the + smallest of our gratifications in life could give a happy tone to this + brightly-constituted gentleman. + </p> + <p> + <a name="link2HCH0003" id="link2HCH0003"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + CHAPTER III. OLD VEUVE + </h2> + <p> + They were known at the house of the turtle and the attractive Old Veuve: a + champagne of a sobered sweetness, of a great year, a great age, counting + up to the extremer maturity attained by wines of stilly depths; and their + worthy comrade, despite the wanton sparkles, for the promoting of the + state of reverential wonderment in rapture, which an ancient wine will + lead to, well you wot. The silly girly sugary crudity his given way to + womanly suavity, matronly composure, with yet the sparkles; they ascend; + but hue and flavour tell of a soul that has come to a lodgement there. It + conducts the youthful man to temples of dusky thought: philosophers + partaking of it are drawn by the arms of garlanded nymphs about their + necks into the fathomless of inquiries. It presents us with a sphere, for + the pursuit of the thing we covet most. It bubbles over mellowness; it + has, in the marriage with Time, extracted a spice of individuality from + the saccharine: by miracle, one would say, were it not for our knowledge + of the right noble issue of Time when he and good things unite. There + should be somewhere legends of him and the wine-flask. There must be + meanings to that effect in the Mythology, awaiting unravelment. For the + subject opens to deeper than cellars, and is a tree with vast + ramifications of the roots and the spreading growth, whereon half if not + all the mythic Gods, Inferior and Superior, Infernal and Celestial, might + be shown sitting in concord, performing in concert, harmoniously receiving + sacrificial offerings of the black or the white; and the black not + extinguishing the fairer fellow. Tell us of a certainty that Time has + embraced the wine-flask, then may it be asserted (assuming the great year + for the wine, i.e. combinations above) that a speck of the white within us + who drink will conquer, to rise in main ascension over volumes of the + black. It may, at a greater venture, but confidently, be said in plain + speech, that the Bacchus of auspicious birth induces ever to the worship + of the loftier Deities. + </p> + <p> + Think as you will; forbear to come hauling up examples of malarious men, + in whom these pourings of the golden rays of life breed fogs; and be + moved, since you are scarcely under an obligation to hunt the meaning, in + tolerance of some dithyrambic inebriety of narration (quiverings of the + reverent pen) when we find ourselves entering the circle of a most + magnetic polarity. Take it for not worse than accompanying choric + flourishes, in accord with Mr. Victor Radnor and Mr. Simeon Fenellan at + their sipping of the venerable wine. + </p> + <p> + Seated in a cosy corner, near the grey City window edged with a sooty + maze, they praised the wine, in the neuter and in the feminine; that for + the glass, this for the widow-branded bottle: not as poets hymning; it was + done in the City manner, briefly, part pensively, like men travelling to + the utmost bourne of flying flavour (a dell in infinite nether), and still + masters of themselves and at home. + </p> + <p> + Such a wine, in its capturing permeation of us, insists on being for a + time a theme. + </p> + <p> + ‘I wonder!’ said Mr. Radnor, completely restored, eyeing his half-emptied + second glass and his boon-fellow. + </p> + <p> + ‘Low!’ Mr. Fenellan shook his head. + </p> + <p> + ‘Half a dozen dozen left?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Nearer the half of that. And who’s the culprit?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Old days! They won’t let me have another dozen out of the house now.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘They’ll never hit on such another discovery in their cellar, unless they + unearth a fifth corner.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘I don’t blame them for making the price prohibitive. And sound as ever!’ + </p> + <p> + Mr. Radnor watched the deliberate constant ascent of bubbles through their + rose-topaz transparency. He drank. That notion of the dish of turtle was + an inspiration of the right: he ought always to know it for the want of + replenishment when such a man as he went quaking. His latest experiences + of himself were incredible; but they passed, as the dimples of the stream. + He finished his third glass. The bottle, like the cellar-wine, was at ebb: + unlike the cellar-wine, it could be set flowing again: He prattled, in the + happy ignorance of compulsion: + </p> + <p> + ‘Fenellan, remember, I had a sort of right to the wine—to the best I + could get; and this Old Veuve, more than any other, is a bridal wine! We + heard of Giulia Sanfredini’s marriage to come off with the Spanish Duke, + and drank it to the toast of our little Nesta’s godmother. I ‘ve told you. + We took the girl to the Opera, when quite a little one—that high:—and + I declare to you, it was marvellous! Next morning after breakfast, she + plants herself in the middle of the room, and strikes her attitude for + song, and positively, almost with the Sanfredini’s voice—illusion of + it, you know,—trills us out more than I could have believed credible + to be recollected by a child. But I’ve told you the story. We called her + Fredi from that day. I sent the diva, with excuses and compliments, a + nuptial present-necklace, Roman goldwork, locket-pendant, containing sunny + curl, and below a fine pearl; really pretty; telling her our grounds for + the liberty. She replied, accepting the responsible office; touching + letter—we found it so; framed in Fredi’s room, under her godmother’s + photograph. Fredi has another heroine now, though she worships her old one + still; she never abandons her old ones. You’ve heard the story over and + over!’ + </p> + <p> + Mr. Fenellan nodded; he had a tenderness for the garrulity of Old Veuve, + and for the damsel. Chatter on that subject ran pleasantly with their + entertainment. + </p> + <p> + Mr. Radnor meanwhile scribbled, and despatched a strip of his Note-book, + bearing a scrawl of orders, to his office. He was now fully himself, + benevolent, combative, gay, alert for amusement or the probeing of schemes + to the quick, weighing the good and the bad in them with his fine touch on + proportion. + </p> + <p> + ‘City dead flat? A monotonous key; but it’s about the same as fetching a + breath after a run; only, true, it lasts too long—not healthy! + Skepsey will bring me my letters. I was down in the country early this + morning, looking over the house, with Taplow, my architect; and he speaks + fairly well of the contractors. Yes, down at Lakelands; and saw my first + lemon butterfly in a dell of sunshine, out of the wind, and had half a + mind to catch it for Fredi,—and should have caught it myself, if I + had! The truth is, we three are country born and bred; we pine in London. + Good for a season; you know my old feeling. They are to learn the secret + of Lakelands to-morrow. It ‘s great fun; they think I don’t see they’ve + had their suspicion for some time. You said—somebody said—“the + eye of a needle for what they let slip of their secrets, and the point of + it for penetrating yours”:—women. But no; my dear souls didn’t prick + and bother. And they dealt with a man in armour. I carry them down to + Lakelands to-morrow, if the City’s flat.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Keeping a secret’s the lid on a boiling pot with you,’ Mr. Fenellan said; + and he mused on the profoundness of the flavour at his lips. + </p> + <p> + ‘I do it.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘You do: up to bursting at the breast.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘I keep it from Colney!’ + </p> + <p> + ‘As Vesuvius keeps it from Palmieri when shaking him.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Has old Colney an idea of it?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘He has been foretelling an eruption of an edifice.’ + </p> + <p> + The laugh between them subsided to pensiveness. + </p> + <p> + Mr. Fenellan’s delay in the delivery of his news was eloquent to reveal + the one hateful topic; and this being seen, it waxed to such increase of + size with the passing seconds, that prudence called for it. + </p> + <p> + ‘Come!’ said Mr. Radnor. + </p> + <p> + The appeal was understood. + </p> + <p> + ‘Nothing very particular. I came into the City to look at a warehouse they + want to mount double guard on. Your idea of the fireman’s night-patrol and + wires has done wonders for the office.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘I guarantee the City if all my directions are followed.’ + </p> + <p> + Mr. Fenellan’s remark, that he had nothing very particular to tell, + reduced it to the mere touch upon a vexatious matter, which one has to + endure in the ears at times; but it may be postponed. So Mr. Radnor + encouraged him to talk of an Insurance Office Investment. Where it is all + bog and mist, as in the City to-day, the maxim is, not to take a step, + they agreed. Whether it was attributable to an unconsumed glut of the + markets, or apprehension of a panic, had to be considered. Both gentlemen + were angry with the Birds on the flags of foreign nations, which would not + imitate a sawdust Lion to couch reposefully. Incessantly they scream and + sharpen talons. + </p> + <p> + ‘They crack the City bubbles and bladders, at all events,’ Mr. Fenellan + said. ‘But if we let our journals go on making use of them, in the shape + of sham hawks overhead, we shall pay for their one good day of the game + with our loss of the covey. An unstable London’s no world’s market-place.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘No, no; it’s a niggardly national purse, not the journals,’ Mr. Radnor + said. ‘The journals are trading engines. Panics are grist to them; so are + wars; but they do their duty in warning the taxpayer and rousing + Parliament. Dr. Schlesien’s right: we go on believing that our God Neptune + will do everything for us, and won’t see that Steam has paralyzed his + Trident: good! You and Colney are hard on Schlesien—or at him, I + should say. He’s right: if we won’t learn that we have become + Continentals, we shall be marched over. Laziness, cowardice, he says.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Oh, be hanged!’ interrupted Fenellan. ‘As much of the former as you like. + He ‘s right about our “individualismus” being another name for + selfishness, and showing the usual deficiency in external features; it’s + an individualism of all of a pattern, as when a mob cuts its lucky, each + fellow his own way. Well, then, conscript them, and they’ll be all of a + better pattern. The only thing to do, and the cheapest. By heaven! it’s + the only honourable thing to do.’ + </p> + <p> + Mr. Radnor disapproved. ‘No conscription here.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Not till you’ve got the drop of poison in your blood, in the form of an + army landed. That will teach you to catch at the drug.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘No, Fenellan! Besides they’ve got to land. I guarantee a trusty army and + navy under a contract, at two-thirds of the present cost. We’ll start a + National Defence Insurance Company after the next panic.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘During,’ said Mr. Fenellan, and there was a flutter of laughter at the + unobtrusive hint for seizing Dame England in the mood. + </p> + <p> + Both dropped a sigh. + </p> + <p> + ‘But you must try and run down with us to Lakelands to-morrow,’ Mr. Radnor + resumed on a cheerfuller theme. ‘You have not yet seen all I ‘ve done + there. And it ‘s a castle with a drawbridge: no exchangeing of visits, as + we did at Craye Farm and at Creckholt; we are there for country air; we + don’t court neighbours at all—perhaps the elect; it will depend on + Nataly’s wishes. We can accommodate our Concert-set, and about thirty or + forty more, for as long as they like. You see, that was my intention—to + be independent of neighbouring society. Madame Callet guarantees dinners + or hot suppers for eighty—and Armandine is the last person to be + recklessly boasting.—When was it I was thinking last of Armandine?’ + He asked himself that, as he rubbed at the back of his head. + </p> + <p> + Mr. Fenellan was reading his friend’s character by the light of his + remarks and in opposition to them, after the critical fashion of intimates + who know as well as hear: but it was amiably and trippingly, on the dance + of the wine in his veins. + </p> + <p> + His look, however, was one that reminded; and Mr. Radnor cried: ‘Now! + whatever it is!’ + </p> + <p> + ‘I had an interview: I assure you,’ Mr. Fenellan interposed to pacify: + ‘the smallest of trifles, and to be expected: I thought you ought to know + it:—an interview with her lawyer; office business, increase of + Insurance on one of her City warehouses.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Speak her name, speak the woman’s name; we’re talking like a pair of + conspirators,’ exclaimed Mr. Radnor. + </p> + <p> + ‘He informed me that Mrs. Burman has heard of the new mansion.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘My place at Lakelands?’ + </p> + <p> + Mr. Radnor’s clear-water eyes hardened to stony as their vision ran along + the consequences of her having heard it. + </p> + <p> + ‘Earlier this time!’ he added, thrummed on the table, and thumped with + knuckles. ‘I make my stand at Lakelands for good! Nothing mortal moves + me!’ + </p> + <p> + ‘That butler of hers—’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Jarniman, you mean: he’s her butler, yes, the scoundrel—h’m-pah! + Heaven forgive me! she’s an honest woman at least; I wouldn’t rob her of + her little: fifty-nine or sixty next September, fifteenth of the month! + with the constitution of a broken drug-bottle, poor soul! She hears + everything from Jarniman: he catches wind of everything. All foreseen, + Fenellan, foreseen. I have made my stand at Lakelands, and there’s my flag + till it’s hauled down over Victor Radnor. London kills Nataly as well as + Fredi—and me: that is—I can use the words to you—I get + back to primal innocence in the country. We all three have the feeling. + You’re a man to understand. My beasts, and the wild flowers, hedge-banks, + and stars. Fredi’s poetess will tell you. Quiet waters reflecting. I + should feel it in Paris as well, though they have nightingales in their + Bois. It’s the rustic I want to bathe me; and I had the feeling at school, + biting at Horace. Well, this is my Sabine Farm, rather on a larger scale, + for the sake of friends. Come, and pure air, water from the springs, walks + and rides in lanes, high sand-lanes; Nataly loves them; Fredi worships the + old roots of trees: she calls them the faces of those weedy sandy lanes. + And the two dear souls on their own estate, Fenellan! And their poultry, + cows, cream. And a certain influence one has in the country socially. I + make my stand on a home—not empty punctilio.’ + </p> + <p> + Mr. Fenellan repeated, in a pause, ‘Punctilio,’ and not emphatically. + </p> + <p> + ‘Don’t bawl the word,’ said Mr. Radnor, at the drum of whose ears it rang + and sang. ‘Here in the City the woman’s harmless; and here,’ he struck his + breast. ‘But she can shoot and hit another through me. Ah, the witch!—poor + wretch! poor soul! Only, she’s malignant. I could swear! But Colney ‘s + right for once in something he says about oaths—“dropping empty + buckets,” or something.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘“Empty buckets to haul up impotent demons, whom we have to pay as heavily + as the ready devil himself,”’ Mr. Fenellan supplied the phrase. ‘Only, the + moment old Colney moralizes, he’s what the critics call sententious. We’ve + all a parlous lot too much pulpit in us.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Come, Fenellan, I don’t think...’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Oh, yes, but it’s true of me too.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘You reserve it for your enemies.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘I ‘d like to distract it a bit from the biggest of ‘em.’ He pointed + finger at the region of the heart. + </p> + <p> + ‘Here we have Skepsey,’ said Mr. Radnor, observing the rapid approach of a + lean small figure, that in about the time of a straight-aimed javelin’s + cast, shot from the doorway to the table. + </p> + <p> + <a name="link2HCH0004" id="link2HCH0004"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + CHAPTER IV. THE SECOND BOTTLE + </h2> + <p> + This little dart of a man came to a stop at a respectful distance from his + master, having the look of an arrested needle in mechanism. His lean slip + of face was an illumination of vivacious grey from the quickest of + prominent large eyes. He placed his master’s letters legibly on the table, + and fell to his posture of attention, alert on stiff legs, the hands like + sucking-cubs at play with one another. + </p> + <p> + Skepsey waited for Mr. Fenellan to notice him. + </p> + <p> + ‘How about the Schools for Boxing?’ that gentleman said. + </p> + <p> + Deploring in motion the announcement he had to make, Skepsey replied: ‘I + have a difficulty in getting the plan treated seriously: a person of no + station:—it does not appear of national importance. Ladies are + against. They decline their signatures; and ladies have great influence; + because of the blood; which we know is very slight, rather healthy than + not; and it could be proved for the advantage of the frailer sex. They + seem to be unaware of their own interests—ladies. The contention all + around us is with ignorance. My plan is written; I have shown it, and + signatures of gentlemen, to many of our City notables favourable in most + cases: gentlemen of the Stock Exchange highly. The clergy and the medical + profession are quite with me.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘The surgical, perhaps you mean?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Also, sir. The clergy strongly.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘On the grounds of—what, Skepsey?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Morality. I have fully explained to them:—after his work at the + desk all day, the young City clerk wants refreshment. He needs it, must + have it. I propose to catch him on his way to his music-halls and other + places, and take him to one of our establishments. A short term of + instruction, and he would find a pleasure in the gloves; it would delight + him more than excesses-beer and tobacco. The female in her right place, + certainly.’ Skepsey supplicated honest interpretation of his hearer, and + pursued, + </p> + <p> + ‘It would improve his physical strength, at the same time add to his sense + of personal dignity.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Would you teach females as well—to divert them from their + frivolities?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘That would have to be thought over, sir. It would be better for them than + using their nails.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘I don’t know, Skepsey: I’m rather a Conservative there.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Yes; with regard to the female, sir: I confess, my scheme does not + include them. They dance; that is a healthy exercise. One has only to say, + that it does not add to the national force, in case of emergency. I look + to that. And I am particular in proposing an exercise independent of—I + have to say—sex. Not that there is harm in sex. But we are for + training. I hope my meaning is clear?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Quite. You would have boxing with the gloves to be a kind of monastic + recreation.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Recreation is the word, sir; I have often admired it,’ said Skepsey, + blinking, unsure of the signification of monastic. + </p> + <p> + ‘I was a bit of a boxer once,’ Mr. Fenellan said, conscious of height and + breadth in measuring the wisp of a figure before him. + </p> + <p> + ‘Something might be done with you still, sir.’ + </p> + <p> + Skepsey paid him the encomium after a respectful summary of his gifts in a + glimpse. Mr. Fenellan bowed to him. + </p> + <p> + Mr. Radnor raised head from the notes he was pencilling upon letters + perused. + </p> + <p> + ‘Skepsey’s craze: regeneration of the English race by boxing—nucleus + of a national army?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘To face an enemy at close quarters—it teaches that, sir. I have + always been of opinion, that courage may be taught. I do not say heroism. + And setting aside for a moment thoughts of an army, we create more + valuable citizens. Protection to the weak in streets and by-places—shocking + examples of ruffians maltreating women, in view of a crowd.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘One strong man is an overmatch for your mob,’ said Mr. Fenellan. + </p> + <p> + Skepsey toned his assent to the diminishing thinness where a suspicion of + the negative begins to wind upon a distant horn. + </p> + <p> + ‘Knowing his own intentions; and before an ignorant mob:—strong, you + say, sir? I venture my word that a decent lad, with science, would beat + him. It is a question of the study and practice of first principles.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘If you were to see a rascal giant mishandling a woman?’ Skepsey conjured + the scene by bending his head and peering abstractedly, as if over + spectacles. + </p> + <p> + ‘I would beg him to abstain, for his own sake.’ + </p> + <p> + Mr. Fenellan knew that the little fellow was not boasting. + </p> + <p> + ‘My brother Dartrey had a lesson or two from you in the first principles, + I think?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Captain Dartrey is an athlete, sir: exceedingly quick and clever; a hard + boxer to beat.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘You will not call him captain when you see him; he has dismissed the + army.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘I much regret it, sir, much, that we have lost him. Captain Dartrey + Fenellan was a beautiful fencer. He gave me some instruction; unhappily, I + have to acknowledge, too late. It is a beautiful art. Captain Dartrey + says, the French excel at it. But it asks for a weapon, which nature has + not given: whereas the fists...’ + </p> + <p> + ‘So,’ Mr. Radnor handed notes and papers to Skepsey: ‘No sign of life?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘It is not yet seen in the City, sir.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘The first principles of commercial activity have retreated to earth’s + maziest penetralia, where no tides are! is it not so, Skepsey?’ said Mr. + Fenellan, whose initiative and exuberance in loquency had been restrained + by a slight oppression, known to guests; especially to the guest in the + earlier process of his magnification and illumination by virtue of a grand + old wine; and also when the news he has to communicate may be a stir to + unpleasant heaps. The shining lips and eyes of his florid face now + proclaimed speech, with his Puckish fancy jack-o’-lanterning over it. + ‘Business hangs to swing at every City door, like a ragshop Doll, on the + gallows of overproduction. Stocks and Shares are hollow nuts not a + squirrel of the lot would stop to crack for sight of the milky kernel + mouldered to beard. + </p> + <p> + Percentage, like a cabman without a fare, has gone to sleep inside his + vehicle. Dividend may just be seen by tiptoe: stockholders, twinkling + heels over the far horizon. Too true!—and our merchants, brokers, + bankers, projectors of Companies, parade our City to remind us of the poor + steamed fellows trooping out of the burst-boiler-room of the big ship + Leviathan, in old years; a shade or two paler than the crowd o’ the + passengers, apparently alive and conversible, but corpses, all of them to + lie their length in fifteen minutes.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘And you, Fenellan?’ cried his host, inspired for a second bottle by the + lovely nonsense of a voluble friend wound up to the mark. + </p> + <p> + ‘Doctor of the ship! with this prescription!’ Mr. Fenellan held up his + glass. + </p> + <p> + ‘Empty?’ + </p> + <p> + Mr. Fenellan made it completely so. ‘Confident!’ he affirmed. + </p> + <p> + An order was tossed to the waiter, and both gentlemen screwed their lips + in relish of his heavy consent to score off another bottle from the narrow + list. + </p> + <p> + ‘At the office in forty minutes,’ Skepsey’s master nodded to him and shot + him forth, calling him back: ‘By the way, in case a man named Jarniman + should ask to see me, you turn him to the rightabout.’ + </p> + <p> + Skepsey repeated: ‘Jarniman!’ and flew. + </p> + <p> + ‘A good servant,’ Mr. Radnor said. ‘Few of us think of our country so + much, whatever may be said of the specific he offers. Colney has impressed + him somehow immensely: he studies to write too; pushes to improve himself; + altogether a worthy creature.’ + </p> + <p> + The second bottle appeared. The waiter, in sincerity a reluctant + executioner, heightened his part for the edification of the admiring + couple. + </p> + <p> + ‘Take heart, Benjamin,’ said Mr. Fenellan; ‘it’s only the bottle dies; and + we are the angels above to receive the spirit.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘I’m thinking of the house,’ Benjamin replied. He told them that again. + </p> + <p> + ‘It ‘s the loss of the fame of having the wine, that he mourns. But, + Benjamin,’ said Mr. Fenellan, ‘the fame enters into the partakers of it, + and we spread it, and perpetuate it for you.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘That don’t keep a house upright,’ returned Benjamin. + </p> + <p> + Mr. Fenellan murmured to himself: ‘True enough, it ‘s elegy—though + we perform it through a trumpet; and there’s not a doubt of our being down + or having knocked the world down, if we’re loudly praised.’ + </p> + <p> + Benjamin waited to hear approval sounded on the lips uncertain as a woman + is a wine of ticklish age. The gentlemen nodded, and he retired. + </p> + <p> + A second bottle, just as good as the first, should, one thoughtlessly + supposes, procure us a similar reposeful and excursive enjoyment, as of + men lying on their backs and flying imagination like a kite. The effect + was quite other. Mr. Radnor drank hastily and spoke with heat: ‘You told + me All? tell me that!’ + </p> + <p> + Mr. Fenellan gathered himself together; he sipped, and relaxed his + bracing. But there really was a bit more to tell: not much, was it? Not + likely to puff a gale on the voluptuous indolence of a man drawn along by + Nereids over sunny sea-waves to behold the birth of the Foam-Goddess? + ‘According to Carling, her lawyer; that is, he hints she meditates a + blow.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Mrs. Burman means to strike a blow?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘The lady.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Does he think I fear any—does he mean a blow with a weapon? Is it a + legal...? At last? Fenellan!’ + </p> + <p> + ‘So I fancied I understood.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘But can the good woman dream of that as a blow to strike and hurt, for a + punishment?—that’s her one aim.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘She may have her hallucinations.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘But a blow—what a word for it! But it’s life to us life! It’s the + blow we’ve prayed for. Why, you know it! Let her strike, we bless her. + We’ve never had an ill feeling to the woman; utterly the contrary—pity, + pity, pity! Let her do that, we’re at her feet, my Nataly and I. If you + knew what my poor girl suffers! She ‘s a saint at the stake. Chiefly on + behalf of her family. Fenellan, you may have a sort of guess at my + fortune: I’ll own to luck; I put in a claim to courage and calculation.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘You’ve been a bulwark to your friends.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘All, Fenellan, all-stocks, shares, mines, companies, industries at home + and—abroad—all, at a sweep, to have the woman strike that + blow! Cheerfully would I begin to build a fortune over again—singing! + Ha! the woman has threatened it before. It’s probably feline play with + us.’ + </p> + <p> + His chin took support, he frowned. + </p> + <p> + ‘You may have touched her.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘She won’t be touched, and she won’t be driven. What ‘s the secret of her? + I can’t guess, I never could. She’s a riddle.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Riddles with wigs and false teeth have to be taken and shaken for the + ardently sought secret to reveal itself,’ said Mr. Fenellan. + </p> + <p> + His picture, with the skeleton issue of any shaking, smote Mr. Radnor’s + eyes, they turned over. ‘Oh!—her charms! She had a desperate belief + in her beauty. The woman ‘s undoubtedly charitable; she’s not without a + mind—sort of mind: well, it shows no crack till it’s put to use. + Heart! yes, against me she has plenty of it. They say she used to be + courted; she talked of it: “my courtiers, Mr. Victor!” There, heaven + forgive me, I wouldn’t mock at her to another.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘It looks as if she were only inexorably human,’ said Mr. Fenellan, + crushing a delicious gulp of the wine, that foamed along the channel to + flavour. ‘We read of the tester of a bandit-bed; and it flattened unwary + recumbents to pancakes. An escape from the like of that seems pleadable, + should be: none but the drowsy would fail to jump out and run, or the + insane.’ + </p> + <p> + Mr. Radnor was taken with the illustration of his case. ‘For the sake of + my sanity, it was! to preserve my.... but any word makes nonsense of it. + Could—I must ask you—could any sane man—you were abroad + in those days, horrible days! and never met her: I say, could you consent + to be tied—I admit the vow, ceremony, so forth-tied to—I was + barely twenty-one: I put it to you, Fenellan, was it in reason an + engagement—which is, I take it, a mutual plight of faith, in good + faith; that is, with capacity on both sides to keep the engagement: + between the man you know I was in youth and a more than middle-aged woman + crazy up to the edge of the cliff—as Colney says half the world is, + and she positively is when her spite is roused. No, Fenellan, I have + nothing on my conscience with regard to the woman. She had wealth: I left + her not one penny the worse for—but she was not one to reckon it, I + own. She could be generous, was, with her money. If she had struck this + blow—I know she thought of it: or if she would strike it now, I + could not only forgive her, I could beg forgiveness.’ + </p> + <p> + A sight of that extremity fetched prickles to his forehead. + </p> + <p> + ‘You’ve borne your part bravely, my friend.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘I!’ Mr. Radnor shrugged at mention of his personal burdens. ‘Praise my + Nataly if you like! Made for one another, if ever two in this world! You + know us both, and do you doubt it? The sin would have been for us two to + meet and—but enough when I say, that I am she, she me, till death + and beyond it: that’s my firm faith. Nataly teaches me the religion of + life, and you may learn what that is when you fall in love with a woman. + Eighteen-nineteen-twenty years!’ + </p> + <p> + Tears fell from him, two drops. He blinked, bugled in his throat, eyed his + watch, and smiled: ‘The finishing glass! We should have had to put Colney + to bed. Few men stand their wine. You and I are not lamed by it; we can + drink and do business: my first experience in the City was, that the power + to drink—keeping a sound head—conduces to the doing of + business.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘It’s a pleasant way of instructing men to submit to their conqueror.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘If it doubles the energies, mind.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Not if it fiddles inside. I confess to that effect upon me. I’ve a waltz + going on, like the snake with the tail in his mouth, eternal; and it won’t + allow of a thought upon Investments.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Consult me to-morrow,’ said Mr. Radnor, somewhat pained for having + inconsiderately misled the man he had hitherto helpfully guided. ‘You’ve + looked at the warehouse?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘That’s performed.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Make a practice of getting over as much of your business in the early + morning as you well can.’ + </p> + <p> + Mr. Radnor added hints of advice to a frail humanity he was indulgent, the + giant spoke in good fellowship. It would have been to have strained his + meaning, for purposes of sarcasm upon him, if one had taken him to boast + of a personal exemption from our common weakness. + </p> + <p> + He stopped, and laughed: ‘Now I ‘m pumping my pulpit-eh? You come with us + to Lakelands. I drive the ladies down to my office, ten A.M.: if it’s + fine; train half-past. We take a basket. By the way, I had no letter from + Dartrey last mail.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘He has buried his wife. It happens to some men.’ + </p> + <p> + Mr. Radnor stood gazing. He asked for the name of the place of the burial. + He heard without seizing it. A simulacrum spectre-spark of hopefulness + shot up in his imagination, glowed and quivered, darkening at the + utterance of the Dutch syllables, leaving a tinge of witless envy. Dartrey—Fenellan + had buried the wife whose behaviour vexed and dishonoured him: and it was + in Africa! One would have to go to Africa to be free of the galling. But + Dartrey had gone, and he was free!—The strange faint freaks of our + sensations when struck to leap and throw off their load after a long + affliction, play these disorderly pranks on the brain; and they are faint, + but they come in numbers, they are recurring, always in ambush. We do not + speak of them: we have not words to stamp the indefinite things; generally + we should leave them unspoken if we had the words; we know them as out of + reason: they haunt us, pluck at us, fret us, nevertheless. + </p> + <p> + Dartrey free, he was relieved of the murderous drama incessantly in the + mind of shackled men. + </p> + <p> + It seemed like one of the miracles of a divine intervention, that Dartrey + should be free, suddenly free; and free while still a youngish man. He was + in himself a wonderful fellow, the pick of his country for vigour, + gallantry, trustiness, high-mindedness; his heavenly good fortune decked + him as a prodigy. + </p> + <p> + ‘No harm to the head from that fall of yours?’ Mr. Fenellan said. + </p> + <p> + ‘None.’ Mr. Radnor withdrew his hand from head to hat, clapped it on and + cried cheerily: ‘Now to business’; as men may, who have confidence in + their ability to concentrate an instant attention upon the substantial. + ‘You dine with us. The usual Quartet: Peridon, Pempton, Colney, Yatt, or + Catkin: Priscilla Graves and Nataly—the Rev. Septimus; Cormyn and + his wife: Young Dudley Sowerby and I—flutes: he has precision, as + naughty Fredi said, when some one spoke of expression. In the course of + the evening, Lady Grace, perhaps: you like her.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Human nature in the upper circle is particularly likeable.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Fenellan,’ said Mr. Radnor, emboldened to judge hopefully of his fortunes + by mere pressure of the thought of Dartrey’s, ‘I put it to you: would you + say, that there is anything this time behind your friend Carling’s + report?’ + </p> + <p> + Although it had not been phrased as a report, Mr. Fenellan’s answering + look and gesture, and a run of indiscriminate words, enrolled it in that + form, greatly to the inspiriting of Mr. Radnor. + </p> + <p> + Old Veuve in one, to the soul of Old Veuve in the other, they recalled a + past day or two, touched the skies; and merriment or happiness in the + times behind them held a mirror to the present: or the hour of the reverse + of happiness worked the same effect by contrast: so that notions of the + singular election of us by Dame Fortune, sprang like vinous bubbles. For + it is written, that however powerful you be, you shall not take the + Winegod on board to entertain him as a simple passenger; and you may + captain your vessel, you may pilot it, and keep to your reckonings, and + steer for all the ports you have a mind to, even to doing profitable + exchange with Armenian and Jew, and still you shall do the something more, + which proves that the Winegod is on board: he is the pilot of your blood + if not the captain of your thoughts. + </p> + <p> + Mr. Fenellan was unused to the copious outpouring of Victor Radnor’s + confidences upon his domestic affairs; and the unwonted excitement of + Victor’s manner of speech would have perplexed him, had there not been + such a fiddling of the waltz inside him. + </p> + <p> + Payment for the turtle and the bottles of Old Veuve was performed apart + with Benjamin, while Simeon Fenellan strolled out of the house, + questioning a tumbled mind as to what description of suitable + entertainment, which would be dancing and flirting and fal-lallery in the + season of youth, London City could provide near meridian hours for a man + of middle age carrying his bottle of champagne, like a guest of an + old-fashioned wedding-breakfast. For although he could stand his wine as + well as his friend, his friend’s potent capacity martially after the feast + to buckle to business at a sign of the clock, was beyond him. It pointed + to one of the embodied elements, hot from Nature’s workshop. It told of + the endurance of powers, that partly explained the successful, astonishing + career of his friend among a people making urgent, if unequal, demands + perpetually upon stomach and head. + </p> + <p> + <a name="link2HCH0005" id="link2HCH0005"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + CHAPTER V. THE LONDON WALK WESTWARD + </h2> + <p> + In that nationally interesting Poem, or Dramatic Satire, once famous, THE + RAJAH IN LONDON (London, Limbo and Sons, 1889), now obliterated under the + long wash of Press-matter, the reflection—not unknown to + philosophical observers, and natural perhaps in the mind of an Oriental + Prince—produced by his observation of the march of London citizens + Eastward at morn, Westward at eve, attributes their practice to a survival + of the Zoroastrian form of worship. His Minister, favourable to the people + or for the sake of fostering an idea in his Master’s head, remarks, that + they show more than the fidelity of the sunflower to her God. The Rajah, + it would appear, frowns interrogatively, in the princely fashion, accusing + him of obscureness of speech:—princes and the louder members of the + grey public are fraternally instant to spurn at the whip of that which + they do not immediately comprehend. It is explained by the Minister: not + even the flower, he says, would hold constant, as they, to the constantly + unseen—a trebly cataphractic Invisible. The Rajah professes + curiosity to know how it is that the singular people nourish their + loyalty, since they cannot attest to the continued being of the object in + which they put their faith. He is informed by his prostrate servant of a + settled habit they have of diligently seeking their Divinity, hidden + above, below; and of copiously taking inside them doses of what is denied + to their external vision: thus they fortify credence chemically on an + abundance of meats and liquors; fire they eat, and they drink fire; they + become consequently instinct with fire. Necessarily therefore they believe + in fire. Believing, they worship. Worshipping, they march Eastward at + morn, Westward at eve. For that way lies the key, this way the cupboard, + of the supplies, their fuel. + </p> + <p> + According to Stage directions, THE RAJAH AND HIS MINISTER Enter a + Gin-Palace.—It is to witness a service that they have learnt to + appreciate as Anglicanly religious. + </p> + <p> + On the step of the return to their Indian clime, they speak of the hatted + sect, which is most, or most commercially, succoured and fattened by our + rule there: they wave adieu to the conquering Islanders, as to ‘Parsees + beneath a cloud.’ + </p> + <p> + The two are seen last on the deck of the vessel, in perusal of a medical + pamphlet composed of statistics and sketches, traceries, horrid blots, + diagrams with numbers referring to notes, of the various maladies caused + by the prolonged prosecution of that form of worship. + </p> + <p> + ‘But can they suffer so and live?’ exclaims the Rajah, vexed by the + physical sympathetic twinges which set him wincing. + </p> + <p> + ‘Science,’ his Minister answers, ‘took them up where Nature, in pity of + their martyrdom, dropped them. They do not live; they are engines, + insensible things of repairs and patches; insteamed to pursue their + infuriate course, to the one end of exhausting supplies for the renewing + of them, on peril of an instant suspension if they deviate a step or stop: + nor do they.’ + </p> + <p> + The Rajah is of opinion, that he sails home with the key of the riddle of + their power to vanquish. In some apparent allusion to an Indian story of a + married couple who successfully made their way, he accounts for their + solid and resistless advance, resembling that of— + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + The doubly-wedded man and wife, + Pledged to each other and against the world + With mutual union. +</pre> + <p> + One would like to think of the lengthened tide-flux of pedestrian citizens + facing South-westward, as being drawn by devout attraction to our + nourishing luminary: at the hour, mark, when the Norland cloud-king, after + a day of wild invasion, sits him on his restful bank of bluefish + smack-o’-cheek red above Whitechapel, to spy where his last puff of icy + javelins pierces and dismembers the vapoury masses in cluster about the + circle of flame descending upon the greatest and most elevated of Admirals + at the head of the Strand, with illumination of smoke-plumed chimneys, + house-roofs, window-panes, weather-vanes, monument and pedimental + monsters, and omnibus umbrella. One would fair believe that they advance + admireing; they are assuredly made handsome by the beams. No longer mere + concurrent atoms of the furnace of business (from coal-dust to sparks, + rushing, as it were, on respiratory blasts of an enormous engine’s + centripetal and centrifugal energy), their step is leisurely to meet the + rosy Dinner, which is ever a see-saw with the God of Light in his fall; + the mask of the noble human visage upon them is not roughened, as at + midday, by those knotted hard ridges of the scrambler’s hand seen from + forehead down to jaw; when indeed they have all the appearance of sour + scientific productions. And unhappily for the national portrait, in the + Poem quoted, the Rajah’s Minister chose an hour between morning and + meridian, or at least before an astonished luncheon had come to composure + inside their persons, for drawing his Master’s attention to the quaint + similarity of feature in the units of the busy antish congregates they had + travelled so far to visit and to study: + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + These Britons wear + The driven and perplexed look of men + Begotten hastily ‘twixt business hours +</pre> + <p> + It could not have been late afternoon. + </p> + <p> + These Orientals should have seen them, with Victor Radnor among them, + fronting the smoky splendours of the sunset. In April, the month of piled + and hurried cloud, it is a Rape of the Sabines overhead from all quarters, + either one of the winds brawnily larcenous; and London, smoking royally to + the open skies, builds images of a dusty epic fray for possession of the + portly dames. There is immensity, swinging motion, collision, dusky + richness of colouring, to the sight; and to the mind idea. London presents + it. If we can allow ourselves a moment for not inquireing scrupulously + (you will do it by inhaling the aroma of the ripe kitchen hour), here is a + noble harmony of heaven and the earth of the works of man, speaking a + grander tongue than barren sea or wood or wilderness. Just a moment; it + goes; as, when a well-attuned barrel-organ in a street has drawn us to + recollections of the Opera or Italy, another harshly crashes, and the + postman knocks at doors, and perchance a costermonger cries his mash of + fruit, a beggar woman wails her hymn. For the pinched are here, the + dinnerless, the weedy, the gutter-growths, the forces repressing them. + That grand tongue of the giant City inspires none human to Bardic eulogy + while we let those discords be. An embittered Muse of Reason prompts her + victims to the composition of the adulatory Essay and of the Leading + Article, that she may satiate an angry irony ‘upon those who pay fee for + their filling with the stuff. Song of praise she does not permit. A moment + of satisfaction in a striking picture is accorded, and no more. For this + London, this England, Europe, world, but especially this London, is rather + a thing for hospital operations than for poetic rhapsody; in aspect, too, + streaked scarlet and pock-pitted under the most cumbrous of jewelled + tiaras; a Titanic work of long-tolerated pygmies; of whom the leaders, + until sorely discomforted in body and doubtful in soul, will give gold and + labour, will impose restrictions upon activity, to maintain a conservatism + of diseases. Mind is absent, or somewhere so low down beneath material + accumulations that it is inexpressive, powerless to drive the ponderous + bulk to such excisings, purgeings, purifyings as might—as may, we + will suppose, render it acceptable, for a theme of panegyric, to the Muse + of Reason; ultimately, with her consent, to the Spirit of Song. + </p> + <p> + But first there must be the cleansing. When Night has fallen upon London, + the Rajah remarks: + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + Monogamic Societies present + A decent visage and a hideous rear. +</pre> + <p> + His Minister (satirically, or in sympathetic Conservatism) would have them + not to move on, that they may preserve among beholders the impression of + their handsome frontage. Night, however, will come; and they, adoreing the + decent face, are moved on, made to expose what the Rajah sees. Behind his + courteousness, he is an antagonistic observer of his conquerors; he pushes + his questions farther than the need for them; his Minister the same; + apparently to retain the discountenanced people in their state of + exposure. Up to the time of the explanation of the puzzle on board the + departing vessel (on the road to Windsor, at the Premier’s reception, in + the cell of the Police, in the presence of the Magistrate-whose crack of a + totally inverse decision upon their case, when he becomes acquainted with + the titles and station of these imputedly peccant, refreshes them), they + hold debates over the mysterious contrarieties of a people professing in + one street what they confound in the next, and practising by day a + demureness that yells with the cat of the tiles at night. + </p> + <p> + Granting all that, it being a transient novelist’s business to please the + light-winged hosts which live for the hour, and give him his only chance + of half of it, let him identify himself with them, in keeping to the + quadrille on the surface and shirking the disagreeable. + </p> + <p> + Clouds of high colour above London City are as the light of the Goddess to + lift the angry heroic head over human. They gloriously transfigure. A + Murillo beggar is not more precious than sight of London in any of the + streets admitting coloured cloud-scenes; the cunning of the sun’s hand so + speaks to us. And if haply down an alley some olive mechanic of + street-organs has quickened little children’s legs to rhythmic footing, + they strike on thoughts braver than pastoral. Victor Radnor, lover of the + country though he was, would have been the first to say it. He would + indeed have said it too emphatically. Open London as a theme, to a citizen + of London ardent for the clear air out of it, you have roused an orator; + you have certainly fired a magazine, and must listen to his reminiscences + of one of its paragraphs or pages. + </p> + <p> + The figures of the hurtled fair ones in sky were wreathing Nelson’s cocked + hat when Victor, distinguishably bright-faced amid a crowd of the + irradiated, emerged from the tideway to cross the square, having thoughts + upon Art, which were due rather to the suggestive proximity of the + National Gallery than to the Flemish mouldings of cloud-forms under + Venetian brushes. His purchases of pictures had been his unhappiest + ventures. He had relied and reposed on the dicta of newspaper critics; who + are sometimes unanimous, and are then taken for guides, and are fatal. He + was led to the conclusion that our modern-lauded pictures do not ripen. + They have a chance of it, if abused. But who thinks of buying the abused? + Exalted by the critics, they have, during the days of Exhibition, a glow, + a significance or a fun, abandoning them where examination is close and + constant, and the critic’s trumpet-note dispersed to the thinness of the + fee for his blowing. As to foreign pictures, classic pictures, Victor had + known his purse to leap for a Raphael with a history in stages of descent + from the Master, and critics to swarm: a Raphael of the dealers, exposed + to be condemned by the critics, universally derided. A real Raphael in + your house is aristocracy to the roof-tree. But the wealthy trader will + reach to title before he may hope to get the real Raphael or a Titian. Yet + he is the one who would, it may be, after enjoyment of his prize, bequeath + it to the nation—PRESENTED TO THE NATION BY VICTOR MONTGOMERY + RADNOR. There stood the letters in gilt; and he had a thrill of his + generosity; for few were the generous acts he could not perform; and if an + object haunted the deed, it came of his trader’s habit of mind. + </p> + <p> + He revelled in benevolent projects of gifts to the nation, which would + coat a sensitive name. Say, an ornamental City Square, flowers, fountains, + afternoon bands of music—comfortable seats in it, and a shelter, and + a ready supply of good cheap coffee or tea. Tobacco? why not rolls of + honest tobacco! nothing so much soothes the labourer. A volume of plans + for the benefit of London smoked out of each ascending pile in his brain. + London is at night a moaning outcast round the policeman’s’ legs. What of + an all-night-long, cosy, brightly lighted, odoriferous coffee-saloon for + rich or poor, on the model of the hospitable Paduan? Owner of a penny, no + soul among us shall be rightly an outcast.... + </p> + <p> + Dreams of this kind are taken at times by wealthy people as a cordial at + the bar of benevolent intentions. But Victor was not the man to steal his + refreshments in that known style. He meant to make deeds of them, as far + as he could, considering their immense extension; and except for the + sensitive social name, he was of single-minded purpose. + </p> + <p> + Turning to the steps of a chemist’s shop to get a prescription made up for + his Nataly’s doctoring of her domestics, he was arrested by a rap on his + elbow; and no one was near; and there could not be a doubt of the blow—a + sharp hard stroke, sparing the funny-bone, but ringing. His head, at the + punctilio bump, throbbed responsively—owing to which or indifference + to the prescription, as of no instant requirement, he pursued his course, + resembling mentally the wanderer along a misty beach, who hears cannon + across the waters. + </p> + <p> + He certainly had felt it. He remembered the shock: he could not remember + much of pain. How about intimations? His asking caused a smile. + </p> + <p> + Very soon the riddle answered itself. He had come into view of the + diminutive marble cavalier of the infantile cerebellum; recollecting a + couplet from the pen of the disrespectful Satirist Peter, he thought of a + fall: his head and his elbow responded simultaneously to the thought. + </p> + <p> + All was explained save his consequent rightabout from the chemist’s shop: + and that belongs to the minor involutions of circumstances and the will. + It passed like a giver’s wrinkle. He read the placards of the Opera; + reminding himself of the day when it was the single Opera-house; and now + we have two-or three. We have also a distracting couple of Clowns and + Pantaloons in our Pantomimes: though Colney says that the multiplication + of the pantaloon is a distinct advance to representative truth—and + bother Colney! Two Columbines also. We forbear to speak of men, but where + is the boy who can set his young heart upon two Columbines at once! Victor + felt the boy within him cold to both: and in his youth he had doated on + the solitary twirling spangled lovely Fairy. The tale of a delicate lady + dancer leaping as the kernel out of a nut from the arms of Harlequin to + the legalized embrace of a wealthy brewer, and thenceforth living, by + repute, with unagitated legs, as holy a matron, despite her starry past, + as any to be shown in a country breeding the like abundantly, had always + delighted him. It seemed a reconcilement of opposing stations, a defeat of + Puritanism. Ay, and poor women!—women in the worser plight under the + Puritan’s eye. They may be erring and good: yes, finding the man to lift + them the one step up! Read the history of the error. But presently we + shall teach the Puritan to act by the standards of his religion. All is + coming right—must come right. Colney shall be confounded. + </p> + <p> + Hereupon Victor hopped on to Fenellan’s hint regarding the designs of Mrs. + Burman. + </p> + <p> + His Nataly might have to go through a short sharp term of scorching—Godiva + to the gossips. + </p> + <p> + She would come out of it glorified. She would be reconciled with her + family. With her story of her devotion to the man loving her, the world + would know her for the heroine she was: a born lady, in appearance and + manner an empress among women. It was a story to be pleaded in any court, + before the sternest public. Mrs. Burman had thrown her into temptation’s + way. It was a story to touch the heart, as none other ever written of over + all the earth was there a woman equalling his Nataly! + </p> + <p> + And their Nesta would have a dowry to make princesses envious:—she + would inherit... he ran up an arithmetical column, down to a line of + figures in addition, during three paces of his feet. Dartrey Fenellan had + said of little Nesta once, that she had a nature pure and sparkling as + mid-sea foam. Happy he who wins her! But she was one of the young women + who are easily pleased and hardly enthralled. Her father strained his mind + for the shape of the man to accomplish the feat. Whether she had an ideal + of a youth in her feminine head, was beyond his guessing. She was not the + damsel to weave a fairy waistcoat for the identical prince, and try it + upon all comers to discover him: as is done by some; excuseably, if we + would be just. Nesta was of the elect, for whom excuses have not to be + made. She would probably like a flute-player best; because her father + played the flute, and she loved him—laughably a little maiden’s + reason! Her father laughed at her. + </p> + <p> + Along the street of Clubs, where a bruised fancy may see black balls + raining, the narrow way between ducal mansions offers prospect of the + sweep of greensward, all but touching up to the sunset to draw it to the + dance. + </p> + <p> + Formerly, in his very early youth, he clasped a dream of gaining way to an + alliance with one of these great surrounding houses; and he had a passion + for the acquisition of money as a means. And it has to be confessed, he + had sacrificed in youth a slice of his youth, to gain it without labour—usually + a costly purchase. It had ended disastrously: or say, a running of the + engine off the rails, and a speedy re-establishment of traffic. Could it + be a loss, that had led to the winning of his Nataly? Can we really loathe + the first of the steps when the one in due sequence, cousin to it, is a + blessedness? If we have been righted to health by a medical draught, we + are bound to be respectful to our drug. And so we are, in spite of + Nature’s wry face and shiver at a mention of what we went through during + those days, those horrible days:—hide them! + </p> + <p> + The smothering of them from sight set them sounding he had to listen. + Colney Durance accused him of entering into bonds with somebody’s + grandmother for the simple sake of browsing on her thousands: a picture of + himself too abhorrent to Victor to permit of any sort of acceptance. + Consequently he struck away to the other extreme of those who have a + choice in mixed motives: he protested that compassion had been the cause + of it. Looking at the circumstance now, he could see, allowing for human + frailty-perhaps a wish to join the ranks of the wealthy compassion for the + woman as the principal motive. How often had she not in those old days + praised his generosity for allying his golden youth to her withered age—Mrs. + Burman’s very words! And she was a generous woman or had been: she was + generous in saying that. Well, and she was generous in having a well-born, + well-bred beautiful young creature like Nataly for her companion, when it + was a case of need for the dear girl; and compassionately insisting, + against remonstrances: they were spoken by him, though they were but + partial. How, then, had she become—at least, how was it that she + could continue to behave as the vindictive Fury who persecuted + remorselessly, would give no peace, poisoned the wells round every place + where he and his dear one pitched their tent! + </p> + <p> + But at last she had come to charity, as he could well believe. Not too + late! Victor’s feeling of gratitude to Mrs. Burman assured him it was + genuine because of his genuine conviction, that she had determined to end + her incomprehensibly lengthened days in reconcilement with him: and he had + always been ready to ‘forget and forgive.’ A truly beautiful old phrase! + It thrilled off the most susceptible of men. + </p> + <p> + His well-kept secret of the spacious country-house danced him behind a + sober demeanour from one park to another; and along beside the drive to + view of his townhouse—unbeloved of the inhabitants, although by + acknowledgement it had, as Fredi funnily drawled, to express her sense of + justice in depreciation, ‘good accommodation.’ Nataly was at home, he was + sure. Time to be dressing: sun sets at six-forty, he said, and glanced at + the stained West, with an accompanying vision of outspread primroses + flooding banks of shadowy fields near Lakelands. + </p> + <p> + He crossed the road and rang. + </p> + <p> + Upon the opening of the door, there was a cascade of muslin downstairs. + His darling Fredi stood out of it, a dramatic Undine. + </p> + <p> + <a name="link2HCH0006" id="link2HCH0006"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + CHAPTER VI. NATALY + </h2> + <h3> + ‘Il segreto!’ the girl cried commandingly, with a forefinger at his + breast. + </h3> + <p> + He crossed arms, toning in similar recitative, with anguish, ‘Dove + volare!’ + </p> + <p> + They joined in half a dozen bars of operatic duet. + </p> + <p> + She flew to him, embraced and kissed. + </p> + <p> + ‘I must have it, my papa! unlock. I’ve been spying the bird on its + hedgerow nest so long! And this morning, my own dear cunning papa, weren’t + you as bare as winter twigs? “Tomorrow perhaps we will have a day in the + country.” To go and see the nest? Only, please, not a big one. A real + nest; where mama and I can wear dairymaid’s hat and apron all day—the + style you like; and strike roots. We’ve been torn away two or three times: + twice, I know.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Fixed, this time; nothing shall tear us up,’ said her father, moving on + to the stairs, with an arm about her. + </p> + <p> + ‘So, it is...?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘She’s amazed at her cleverness!’ + </p> + <p> + ‘A nest for three?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘We must have a friend or two.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘And pretty country?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Trust her papa for that.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Nice for walking and running over fields? No rich people?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘How escape that rabble in England! as Colney says. It’s a place for being + quite independent of neighbours, free as air.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Oh! bravo!’ + </p> + <p> + ‘And Fredi will have her horse, and mama her pony-carriage; and Fredi can + have a swim every Summer morning.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘A swim?’ Her note was dubious. ‘A river?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘A good long stretch—fairish, fairish. Bit of a lake; bathing-shed; + the Naiad’s bower: pretty water to see.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Ah. And has the house a name?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Lakelands. I like the name.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Papa gave it the name!’ + </p> + <p> + ‘There’s nothing he can conceal from his girl. Only now and then a little + surprise.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘And his girl is off her head with astonishment. But tell me, who has been + sharing the secret with you?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Fredi strikes home! And it is true, you dear; I must have a confidant: + Simeon Fenellan.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Not Mr. Durance?’ + </p> + <p> + He shook out a positive negative. ‘I leave Col to his guesses. He’d have + been prophesying fire the works before the completion.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Then it is not a dear old house, like Craye and Creckholt?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Wait and see to-morrow.’ + </p> + <p> + He spoke of the customary guests for concert practice; the music, + instrumental and vocal; quartet, duet, solo; and advising the girl to be + quick, as she had but twenty-five minutes, he went humming and trilling + into his dressing-room. + </p> + <p> + Nesta signalled at her mother’s door for permission to enter. She slipped + in, saw that the maid was absent, and said: ‘Yes, mama; and prepare, I + feared it; I was sure.’ + </p> + <p> + Her mother breathed a little moan: ‘Not a cottage?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘He has not mentioned it to Mr. Durance.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Why not?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Mr. Fenellan has been his confidant.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘My darling, we did wrong to let it go on, without speaking. You don’t + know for certain yet?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘It’s a large estate, mama, and a big new house.’ + </p> + <p> + Nataly’s bosom sank. ‘Ah me! here’s misery! I ought to have known. And too + late now it has gone so far! But I never imagined he would be building.’ + </p> + <p> + She caught herself languishing at her toilette-glass, as, if her beauty + were at stake; and shut her eyelids angrily. To be looking in that manner, + for a mere suspicion, was too foolish. But Nesta’s divinations were + target-arrows; they flew to the mark. Could it have been expected that + Victor would ever do anything on a small scale? O the dear little lost + lost cottage! She thought of it with a strain of the arms of womanhood’s + longing in the unblessed wife for a babe. For the secluded modest cottage + would not rack her with the old anxieties, beset her with suspicions.... + </p> + <p> + ‘My child, you won’t possibly have time before the dinner-hour,’ she said + to Nesta, dismissing her and taking her kiss of comfort with a short and + straining look out of the depths. + </p> + <p> + Those bitter doubts of the sentiments of neighbours are an incipient + dislike, when one’s own feelings to the neighbours are kind, could be + affectionate. We are distracted, perverted, made strangers to ourselves by + a false position. + </p> + <p> + She heard his voice on a carol. Men do not feel this doubtful position as + women must. They have not the same to endure; the world gives them land to + tread, where women are on breaking seas. Her Nesta knew no more than the + pain of being torn from a home she loved. But now the girl was older, and + if once she had her imagination awakened, her fearful directness would + touch the spot, question, bring on the scene to-come, necessarily to come, + dreaded much more than death by her mother. But if it might be postponed + till the girl was nearer to an age of grave understanding, with some knowledge + of our world, some comprehension of a case that could be pleaded! + </p> + <p> + He sang: he never acknowledged a trouble, he dispersed it; and in her + present wrestle with the scheme of a large country estate involving new + intimacies, anxieties, the courtship of rival magnates, followed by the + wretched old cloud, and the imposition upon them to bear it in silence + though they knew they could plead a case, at least before charitable and + discerning creatures or before heaven, the despondent lady could have + asked whether he was perfectly sane. + </p> + <p> + Who half so brilliantly!—Depreciation of him, fetched up at a stroke + the glittering armies of her enthusiasm. He had proved it; he proved it + daily in conflicts and in victories that dwarfed emotional troubles like + hers: yet they were something to bear, hard to bear, at times unbearable. + </p> + <p> + But those were times of weakness. Let anything be doubted rather than the + good guidance of the man who was her breath of life! Whither he led, let + her go, not only submissively, exultingly. + </p> + <p> + Thus she thought, under pressure of the knowledge, that unless rushing + into conflicts bigger than conceivable, she had to do it, and should + therefore think it. + </p> + <p> + This was the prudent woman’s clear deduction from the state wherein she + found herself, created by the one first great step of the mad woman. Her + surrender then might be likened to the detachment of a flower on the + river’s bank by swell of flood: she had no longer root of her own; away + she sailed, through beautiful scenery, with occasionally a crashing fall, + a turmoil, emergence from a vortex, and once more the sunny whirling + surface. Strange to think, she had not since then power to grasp in her + abstract mind a notion of stedfastness without or within. + </p> + <p> + But, say not the mad, say the enamoured woman. Love is a madness, having + heaven’s wisdom in it—a spark. But even when it is driving us on the + breakers, call it love: and be not unworthy of it, hold to it. She and + Victor had drunk of a cup. The philtre was in her veins, whatever the + directions of the rational mind. + </p> + <p> + Exulting or regretting, she had to do it, as one in the car with a racing + charioteer. Or up beside a more than Titanically audacious balloonist. For + the charioteer is bent on a goal; and Victor’s course was an ascension + from heights to heights. He had ideas, he mastered Fortune. He conquered + Nataly and held her subject, in being above his ambition; which was now + but an occupation for his powers, while the aim of his life was at the + giving and taking of simple enjoyment. In spite of his fits of + unreasonableness in the means—and the woman loving him could trace + them to a breath of nature—his gentle good friendly innocent aim in + life was of this very simplest; so wonderful, by contrast with his powers, + that she, assured of it as she was by experience of him, was touched, in a + transfusion of her feelings through lucent globes of admiration and of + tenderness, to reverence. There had been occasions when her wish for the + whole world to have proof and exhibition of his greatness, goodness, and + simplicity amid his gifts, prompted her incitement of him to stand forth + eminently: (‘lead a kingdom,’ was the phrase behind the curtain within her + shy bosom;) and it revealed her to herself, upon reflection, as being + still the Nataly who drank the cup with him, to join her fate with his. + </p> + <p> + And why not? Was that regretted? Far from it. In her maturity, the woman + was unable to send forth any dwelling thought or more than a flight of + twilight fancy, that cancelled the deed of her youth, and therewith seemed + to expunge near upon the half—of her term of years. If it came to + consideration of her family and the family’s opinion of her conduct, her + judgement did not side with them or with herself, it whirled, swam to a + giddiness and subsided. + </p> + <p> + Of course, if she and Victor were to inhabit a large country-house, they + might as well have remained at Craye Farm or at Creckholt; both places + dear to them in turn. Such was the plain sense of the surface question. + And how strange it was to her, that he, of the most quivering + sensitiveness on her behalf; could not see, that he threw her into + situations where hard words of men and women threatened about her head; + where one or two might on a day, some day, be heard; and where, in the + recollection of two years back, the word ‘Impostor’ had smacked her on + both cheeks from her own mouth. + </p> + <p> + Now once more they were to run the same round of alarms, undergo the love + of the place, with perpetual apprehensions of having to leave it: alarms, + throbbing suspicions, like those of old travellers through the haunted + forest, where whispers have intensity of meaning, and unseeing we are + seen, and unaware awaited. + </p> + <p> + Nataly shook the rolls of her thick brown hair from her forehead; she took + strength from a handsome look of resolution in the glass. She could always + honestly say, that her courage would not fail him. + </p> + <p> + Victor tapped at the door; he stepped into the room, wearing his evening + white flower over a more open white waistcoat; and she was composed and + uninquiring. Their Nesta was heard on the descent of the stairs, with a + rattle of Donizetti’s Il segreto to the skylights. + </p> + <p> + He performed his never-omitted lover’s homage. + </p> + <p> + Nataly enfolded him in a homely smile. ‘A country-house? We go and see it + to-morrow?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘And you’ve been pining for a country home, my dear soul.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘After the summer six weeks, the house in London does not seem a home to + return to.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘And next day, Nataly draws five thousand pounds for the first sketch of + the furniture.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘There is the Creckholt...’ she had a difficulty in saying. + </p> + <p> + ‘Part of it may do. Lakelands requires—but you will see to-morrow.’ + </p> + <p> + After a close shutting of her eyes, she rejoined: ‘It is not a cottage?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Well, dear, no: when the Slave of the Lamp takes to building, he does not + run up cottages. And we did it without magic, all in a year; which is + quite as good as a magical trick in a night.’ He drew her close to him. + ‘When was it my dear girl guessed me at work?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘It was the other dear girl. Nesta is the guesser.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘You were two best of souls to keep from bothering me; and I might have + had to fib; and we neither of us like that.’ He noticed a sidling of her + look. ‘More than the circumstances oblige:—to be frank. But now we + can speak of them. Wait—and the change comes; and opportunely, I + have found. It’s true we have waited long; my darling has had her worries. + However, it ‘s here at last. Prepare yourself. I speak positively. You + have to brace up for one sharp twitch—the woman’s portion! as Natata + says—and it’s over.’ He looked into her eyes for comprehension; and + not finding inquiry, resumed: ‘Just in time for the entry into Lakelands. + With the pronouncement of the decree, we present the licence... at an + altar we’ve stood before, in spirit... one of the ladies of your family to + support you:—why not? Not even then?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘No, Victor; they have cast me off.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Count on my cousins, the Duvidney ladies. Then we can say, that those two + good old spinsters are less narrow than the Dreightons. I have to confess + I rather think I was to blame for leaving Creckholt. Only, if I see my + girl wounded, I hate the place that did the mischief. You and Fredi will + clap hands for the country about Lakelands.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Have you heard from her... of her... is it anything, Victor?’ Nataly + asked him shyly; with not much of hope, but some readiness to be inflated. + The prospect of an entry into the big new house, among a new society, + begirt by the old nightmares and fretting devils, drew her into staring + daylight or furnace-light. + </p> + <p> + He answered: ‘Mrs. Burman has definitely decided. In pity of us?—to + be free herself?—who can say! She ‘s a woman with a conscience—of + a kind: slow, but it brings her to the point at last. You know her, know + her well. Fenellan has it from her lawyer—her lawyer! a Mr. Carting; + a thoroughly trustworthy man—’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Fenellan, as a reporter?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Thoroughly to be trusted on serious matters. I understand that Mrs. + Burman:—her health is awful: yes, yes; poor woman! poor woman! we + feel for her:—she has come to perceive her duty to those she leaves + behind. Consider: she HAS used the rod. She must be tired out—if + human. And she is. One remembers traits.’ + </p> + <p> + Victor sketched one or two of the traits allusively to the hearer + acquainted with them. They received strong colouring from midday’s Old + Veuve in his blood. His voice and words had a swing of conviction: they + imparted vinousness to a heart athirst. + </p> + <p> + The histrionic self-deceiver may be a persuasive deceiver of another, who + is again, though not ignorant of his character, tempted to swallow the + nostrums which have made so gallant a man of him: his imperceptible + sensible playing of the part, on a substratum of sincereness, induces + fascinatingly to the like performance on our side, that we may be armed as + he is for enjoying the coveted reality through the partial simulation of + possessing it. And this is not a task to us when we have looked our actor + in the face, and seen him bear the look, knowing that he is not + intentionally untruthful; and when we incline to be captivated by his rare + theatrical air of confidence; when it seems as an outside thought striking + us, that he may not be altogether deceived in the present instance; when + suddenly an expectation of the thing desired is born and swims in a + credible featureless vagueness on a misty scene: and when we are being + kissed and the blood is warmed. In fine, here as everywhere along our + history, when the sensations are spirited up to drown the mind, we become + drift-matter of tides, metal to magnets. And if we are women, who commonly + allow the lead to men, getting it for themselves only by snaky cunning or + desperate adventure, credulity—the continued trust in the man—is + the alternative of despair. + </p> + <p> + ‘But, Victor, I must ask,’ Nataly said: ‘you have it through Simeon + Fenellan; you have not yourself received the letter from her lawyer?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘My knowledge of what she would do near the grave—poor soul, yes! I + shall soon be hearing.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘You do not, propose to enter this place until—until it is over?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘We enter this place, my love, without any sort of ceremony. We live there + independently, and we can we have quarters there for our friends. Our one + neighbour is London—there! And at Lakelands we are able to entertain + London and wife;—our friends, in short; with some, what we have to + call, satellites. You inspect the house and grounds to-morrow—sure + to be fair. Put aside all but the pleasant recollections of Craye and + Creckholt. We start on a different footing. Really nothing can be simpler. + Keeping your town-house, you are now and then in residence at Lakelands, + where you entertain your set, teach them to feel the charm of country + life: we have everything about us; could have had our own milk and cream + up to London the last two months. Was it very naughty?—I should have + exploded my surprise! You will see, you will see to-morrow.’ + </p> + <p> + Nataly nodded, as required. ‘Good news from the mines?’ she said. + </p> + <p> + He answered: ‘Dartrey is—yes, poor fellow! Dartrey is confident, + from the yield of stones, that the value of our claim counts in a number + of millions. The same with the gold. But gold-mines are lodgeings, not + homes.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Oh, Victor! if money...! But why did you say “poor fellow” of Dartrey + Fenellan?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘You know how he’s...’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Yes, yes,’ she said hastily. ‘But has that woman been causing fresh + anxiety?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘And Natata’s chief hero on earth is not to be named a poor fellow,’ said + he, after a negative of the head on a subject they neither of them liked + to touch. + </p> + <p> + Then he remembered that Dartrey Fenellan was actually a lucky fellow; and + he would have mentioned the circumstance confided to him by Simeon, but + for a downright dread of renewing his painful fit of envy. He had also + another, more distant, very faint idea, that it had better not be + mentioned just yet, for a reason entirely undefined. + </p> + <p> + He consulted his watch. The maid had come in for the robeing of her + mistress. Nataly’s mind had turned to the little country cottage which + would have given her such great happiness. She raised her eyes to him; she + could not check their filling; they were like a river carrying moonlight + on the smooth roll of a fall. + </p> + <p> + He loved the eyes, disliked the water in them. With an impatient, ‘There, + there!’ and a smart affectionate look, he retired, thinking in our old + satirical vein of the hopeless endeavour to satisfy a woman’s mind without + the intrusion of hard material statements, facts. Even the best of women, + even the most beautiful, and in their moments of supremest beauty, have + this gross ravenousness for facts. You must not expect to appease them + unless you administer solids. It would almost appear that man is + exclusively imaginative and poetical; and that his mate, the fair, the + graceful, the bewitching, with the sweetest and purest of natures, cannot + help being something of a groveller. + </p> + <p> + Nataly had likewise her thoughts. + </p> + <p> + <a name="link2HCH0007" id="link2HCH0007"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + CHAPTER VII. BETWEEN A GENERAL MAN OF THIN WORLD AND A PROFESSIONAL + </h2> + <p> + Rather earlier in the afternoon of that day, Simeon Fenellan, thinking of + the many things which are nothing, and so melancholy for lack of + amusements properly to follow Old Veuve, that he could ask himself whether + he had not done a deed of night, to be blinking at his fellow-men like an + owl all mad for the reveller’s hoots and flights and mice and moony + roundels behind his hypocritical judex air of moping composure, chanced on + Mr. Carling, the solicitor, where Lincoln’s Inn pumps lawyers into Fleet + Street through the drain-pipe of Chancery Lane. He was in the state of the + wine when a shake will rouse the sluggish sparkles to foam. Sight of Mrs. + Burman’s legal adviser had instantly this effect upon him: his bubbling + friendliness for Victor Radnor, and the desire of the voice in his bosom + for ears to hear, combined like the rush of two waves together, upon which + he may be figured as the boat: he caught at Mr. Carling’s hand more + heartily than their acquaintanceship quite sanctioned; but his grasp and + his look of overflowing were immediately privileged; Mr. Carling, enjoying + this anecdotal gentleman’s conversation as he did, liked the warmth, and + was flattered during the squeeze with a prospect of his wife and friends + partaking of the fun from time to time. + </p> + <h3> + ‘I was telling my wife yesterday your story of the lady contrabandist: I + don’t think she has done laughing since,’ Mr. Calling said. + </h3> + <p> + Fenellan fluted: ‘Ah?’ He had scent, in the eulogy of a story grown flat + as Election hats, of a good sort of man in the way of men, a step or two + behind the man of the world. He expressed profound regret at not having + heard the silvery ring of the lady’s laughter. + </p> + <p> + Carling genially conceived a real gratification to be conferred on his + wife. ‘Perhaps you will some day honour us?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘You spread gold-leaf over the days to come, sir.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Now, if I might name the day?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘You lump the gold and make it current coin;—says the blushing + bride, who ought not to have delivered herself so boldly, but she had + forgotten her bashful part and spoilt the scene, though, luckily for the + damsel, her swain was a lover of nature, and finding her at full charge, + named the very next day of the year, and held her to it, like the + complimentary tyrant he was.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘To-morrow, then!’ said Carling intrepidly, on a dash of enthusiasm, + through a haggard thought of his wife and the cook and the netting of + friends at short notice. He urged his eagerness to ask whether he might + indeed have the satisfaction of naming to-morrow. + </p> + <p> + ‘With happiness,’ Fenellan responded. + </p> + <p> + Mrs. Carling was therefore in for it. + </p> + <p> + ‘To-morrow, half-past seven: as for company to meet you, we will do what + we can. You go Westward?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘To bed with the sun,’ said the reveller. + </p> + <p> + ‘Perhaps by Covent Garden? I must give orders there.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Orders given in Covent Garden, paint a picture for bachelors of the + domestic Paradise an angel must help them to enter! Ah, dear me! Is there + anything on earth to compare with the pride of a virtuous life?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘I was married at four and twenty,’ said Carling, as one taking up the + expository second verse of a poem; plain facts, but weighty and necessary: + ‘my wife was in her twentieth year: we have five children; two sons, three + daughters, one married, with a baby. So we are grandfather and mother, and + have never regretted the first step, I may say for both of us.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Think of it! Good luck and sagacity joined hands overhead on the day you + proposed to the lady: and I’d say, that all the credit is with her, but + that it would seem to be at the expense of her sex.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘She would be the last to wish it, I assure you.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘True of all good women! You encourage me, touching a matter of deep + interest, not unknown to you. The lady’s warm heart will be with us. + Probably she sees Mrs. Burman?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Mrs. Burman Radnor receives no one.’ + </p> + <p> + A comic severity in the tone of the correction was deferentially accepted + by Fenellan. + </p> + <p> + ‘Pardon. She flies her flag, with her captain wanting; and she has, + queerly, the right. So, then, the worthy dame who receives no one, might + be treated, it struck us, conversationally, as a respectable harbour-hulk, + with more history than top-honours. But she has the indubitable legal + right to fly them—to proclaim it; for it means little else.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘You would have her, if I follow you, divest herself of the name?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Pin me to no significations, if you please, O shrewdest of the legal + sort! I have wit enough to escape you there. She is no doubt an estimable + person.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Well, she is; she is in her way a very good woman.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Ah. You see, Mr. Carling, I cannot bring myself to rank her beside + another lady, who has already claimed the title of me; and you will + forgive me if I say, that your word “good” has a look of being stuck upon + the features we know of her, like a coquette’s naughty patch; or it’s a + jewel of an eye in an ebony idol: though I’ve heard tell she performs her + charities.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘I believe she gives away three parts of her income and that is large.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Leaving the good lady a fine fat fourth.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Compare her with other wealthy people.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘And does she outshine the majority still with her personal attractions. + </p> + <p> + Carling was instigated by the praise he had bestowed on his wife to + separate himself from a female pretender so ludicrous; he sought + Fenellan’s nearest ear, emitting the sound of ‘hum.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘In other respects, unimpeachable!’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Oh! quite!’ + </p> + <p> + ‘There was a fishfag of classic Billingsgate, who had broken her husband’s + nose with a sledgehammer fist, and swore before the magistrate, that the + man hadn’t a crease to complain of in her character. We are condemned, Mr. + Carling, sometimes to suffer in the flesh for the assurance we receive of + the inviolability of those moral fortifications.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Character, yes, valuable—I do wish you had named to-night for doing + me the honour of dining with me!’ said the lawyer impulsively, in a + rapture of the appetite for anecdotes. ‘I have a ripe Pichon Longueville, + ‘65.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘A fine wine. Seductive to hear of. I dine with my friend Victor Radnor. + And he knows wine.—There are good women in the world, Mr. Carling, + whose characters...’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Of course, of course there are; and I could name you some. We + lawyers...!’ + </p> + <p> + ‘You encounter all sorts.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Between ourselves,’ Carling sank his tones to the indiscriminate, where + it mingled with the roar of London. + </p> + <p> + ‘You do?’ Fenellan hazarded a guess at having heard enlightened liberal + opinions regarding the sex. ‘Right!’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Many!’ + </p> + <p> + ‘I back you, Mr. Carling.’ + </p> + <p> + The lawyer pushed to yet more confidential communication, up to the verge + of the clearly audible: he spoke of examples, experiences. Fenellan backed + him further. + </p> + <p> + ‘Acting on behalf of clients, you understand, Mr. Fenellan.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Professional, but charitable; I am with you.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Poor things! we—if we have to condemn—we owe them something.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘A kind word for poor Polly Venus, with all the world against her! She + doesn’t hear it often.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘A real service,’ Carling’s voice deepened to the legal ‘without + prejudice,’—‘I am bound to say it—a service to Society.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Ah, poor wench! And the kind of reward she gets?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘We can hardly examine... mysterious dispensations... here we are to make + the best we can of it.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘For the creature Society’s indebted to? True. And am I to think there’s a + body of legal gentlemen to join with you, my friend, in founding an + Institution to distribute funds to preach charity over the country, and + win compassion for her, as one of the principal persons of her time, that + Society’s indebted to for whatever it’s indebted for?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Scarcely that,’ said Carling, contracting. + </p> + <p> + ‘But you ‘re for great Reforms?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Gradual.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Then it’s for Reformatories, mayhap.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘They would hardly be a cure.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘You ‘re in search of a cure?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘It would be a blessed discovery.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘But what’s to become of Society?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘It’s a puzzle to the cleverest.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘All through History, my dear Mr. Carling, we see that. + </p> + <p> + ‘Establishments must have their sacrifices. Beware of interfering: eh?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘By degrees, we may hope....’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Society prudently shuns the topic; and so ‘ll we. For we might tell of + one another, in a fit of distraction, that t’ other one talked of it, and + we should be banished for an offence against propriety. You should read my + friend Durance’s Essay on Society. Lawyers are a buttress of Society. But, + come: I wager they don’t know what they support until they read that + Essay.’ + </p> + <p> + Carling had a pleasant sense of escape, in not being personally asked to + read the Essay, and not hearing that a copy of it should be forwarded to + him. + </p> + <p> + He said: ‘Mr. Radnor is a very old friend?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Our fathers were friends; they served in the same regiment for years. I + was in India when Victor Radnor took the fatal!’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Followed by a second, not less...?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘In the interpretation of a rigid morality arming you legal gentlemen to + make it so!’ + </p> + <p> + ‘The Law must be vindicated.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘The law is a clumsy bludgeon.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘We think it the highest effort of human reason—the practical + instrument.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘You may compare it to a rustic’s finger on a fiddlestring, for the + murdered notes you get out of the practical instrument. + </p> + <p> + ‘I am bound to defend it, clumsy bludgeon or not.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘You are one of the giants to wield it, and feel humanly, when, by chance, + down it comes on the foot an inch off the line.—Here’s a peep of Old + London; if the habit of old was not to wash windows. I like these old + streets!’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Hum,’ Carling hesitated. ‘I can remember when the dirt at the windows was + appalling.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Appealing to the same kind of stuff in the passing youngster’s green-scum + eye: it was. And there your Law did good work.—You’re for Bordeaux. + What is your word on Burgundy?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Our Falernian!’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Victor Radnor has the oldest in the kingdom. But he will have the best of + everything. A Romanee! A Musigny! Sip, my friend, you embrace the Goddess + of your choice above. You are up beside her at a sniff of that wine.—And + lo, venerable Drury! we duck through the court, reminded a bit by our + feelings of our first love, who hadn’t the cleanest of faces or nicest of + manners, but she takes her station in memory because we were boys then, + and the golden halo of youth is upon her.’ + </p> + <p> + Carling, as a man of the world, acquiesced in souvenirs he did not share. + He said urgently: ‘Understand me; you speak of Mr. Radnor; pray, believe I + have the greatest respect for Mr. Radnor’s abilities. He is one of our + foremost men... proud of him. Mr. Radnor has genius; I have watched him; + it is genius; he shows it in all he does; one of the memorable men of our + times. I can admire him, independent of—well, misfortune of that + kind... a mistaken early step. Misfortune, it is to be named. Between + ourselves—we are men of the world—if one could see the way! + She occasionally... as I have told you. I have ventured suggestions. As I + have mentioned, I have received an impression...’ + </p> + <p> + ‘But still, Mr. Carling, if the lady doesn’t release him and will keep his + name, she might stop her cowardly persecutions.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Can you trace them?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Undisguised!’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Mrs. Burman Radnor is devout. I should not exactly say revengeful. We + have to discriminate. I gather, that her animus is, in all honesty, + directed at the—I quote—state of sin. We are mixed, you know.’ + </p> + <p> + The Winegod in the blood of Fenellan gave a leap. ‘But, fifty thousand + times more mixed, she might any moment stop the state of sin, as she calls + it, if it pleased her.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘She might try. Our Judges look suspiciously on long delayed actions. And + there are, too, women who regard the marriage-tie as indissoluble. She has + had to combat that scruple.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Believer in the renewing of the engagement overhead!—well. But put + a by-word to Mother Nature about the state of sin. Where, do you imagine, + she would lay it? You’ll say, that Nature and Law never agreed. They + ought.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘The latter deferring to the former?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Moulding itself on her swelling proportions. My dear dear sir, the state + of sin was the continuing to live in defiance of, in contempt of, in + violation of, in the total degradation of, Nature.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘He was under no enforcement to take the oath at the altar.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘He was a small boy tempted by a varnished widow, with pounds of barley + sugar in her pockets;—and she already serving as a test-vessel or + mortar for awful combinations in druggery! Gilt widows are equal to + decrees of Fate to us young ones. Upon my word, the cleric who unites, and + the Law that sanctions, they’re the criminals. Victor Radnor is the + noblest of fellows, the very best friend a man can have. I will tell you: + he saved me, after I left the army, from living on the produce of my pen—which + means, if there is to be any produce, the prostrating of yourself to the + level of the round middle of the public: saved me from that! Yes, Mr. + Carling, I have trotted our thoroughfares a poor Polly of the pen; and it + is owing to Victor Radnor that I can order my thoughts as an individual + man again before I blacken paper. Owing to him, I have a tenderness for + mercenaries; having been one of them and knowing how little we can help + it. He is an Olympian—who thinks of them below. The lady also is an + admirable woman at all points. The pair are a mated couple, such as you + won’t find in ten households over Christendom. Are you aware of the + story?’ + </p> + <p> + Carling replied: ‘A story under shadow of the Law, has generally two very + distinct versions.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Hear mine.—And, by Jove! a runaway cab. No, all right. But a crazy + cab it is, and fit to do mischief in narrow Drury. Except that it’s sheer + riff-raff here to knock over.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Hulloa?—come!’ quoth the wary lawyer. + </p> + <p> + ‘There’s the heart I wanted to rouse to hear me! One may be sure that the + man for old Burgundy has it big and sound, in spite of his legal + practices; a dear good spherical fellow! Some day, we’ll hope, you will be + sitting with us over a magnum of Victor Radnor’s Romance Conti aged + thirty-one: a wine, you’ll say at the second glass, High Priest for the + celebration of the uncommon nuptials between the body and the soul of + man.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘You hit me rightly,’ said Carting, tickled and touched; sensually excited + by the bouquet of Victor Radnor’s hospitality and companionship, which + added flavour to Fenellan’s compliments. These came home to him through + his desire to be the ‘good spherical fellow’; for he, like modern + diplomatists in the track of their eminent Berlinese New Type of the time, + put on frankness as an armour over wariness, holding craft in reserve: his + aim was at the refreshment of honest fellowship: by no means to discover + that the coupling of his native bias with his professional duty was + unprofitable nowadays. Wariness, however, was not somnolent, even when he + said: ‘You know, I am never the lawyer out of my office. Man of the world + to men of the world; and I have not lost by it. I am Mrs. Barman Radnor’s + legal adviser: you are Mr. Victor Radnor’s friend. They are, as we see + them, not on the best of terms. I would rather—at its lowest, as a + matter of business—be known for having helped them to some kind of + footing than send in a round bill to my client—or another. I gain + more in the end. Frankly, I mean to prove, that it’s a lawyer’s interest + to be human.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Because, now, see!’ said Fenellan, ‘here’s the case. Miss Natalia + Dreighton, of a good Yorkshire family—a large one, reads an + advertisement for the post of companion to a lady, and answers it, and + engages herself, previous to the appearance of the young husband. Miss + Dreighton is one of the finest young women alive. She has a glorious + contralto voice. Victor and she are encouraged by Mrs. Barman to sing + duets together. Well? + </p> + <p> + Why, Euclid would have theorem’d it out for you at a glance at the trio. + You have only to look on them, you chatter out your three Acts of a Drama + without a stop. If Mrs. Barman cares to practise charity, she has only to + hold in her Fury-forked tongue, or her Jarniman I think ‘s the name.’ + </p> + <p> + Carting shrugged. + </p> + <p> + ‘Let her keep from striking, if she’s Christian,’ pursued Fenetlan, ‘and + if kind let her resume the name of her first lord, who did a better thing + for himself than for her, when he shook off his bars of bullion, to rise + the lighter, and left a wretched female soul below, with the devil’s own + testimony to her attractions—thousands in the Funds, houses in the + City. She threw the young couple together. And my friend Victor Radnor is + of a particularly inflammable nature. Imagine one of us in such a + situation, Mr. Carting!’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Trying!’ said the lawyer. + </p> + <p> + ‘The dear fellow was as nigh death as a man can be and know the sweetness + of a woman’s call to him to live. And here’s London’s garden of pines, + bananas, oranges; all the droppings of the Hesperides here! We don’t + reflect on it, Mr. Carling.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Not enough, not enough.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘I feel such a spout of platitudes that I could out With a Leading Article + on a sheet of paper on your back while you’re bending over the baskets. I + seem to have got circularly round again to Eden when I enter a garden. + Only, here we have to pay for the fruits we pluck. Well, and just the same + there; and no end to the payment either. We’re always paying! By the way, + Mrs. Victor Radnor’s dinner-table’s a spectacle. Her taste in flowers + equals her lord’s in wine. But age improves the wine and spoils the + flowers, you’ll say. Maybe you’re for arguing that lovely women show us + more of the flower than the grape, in relation to the course of time. I + pray you not to forget the terrible intoxicant she is. We reconcile it, + Mr. Carling, with the notion that the grape’s her spirit, the flower her + body. Or is it the reverse? Perhaps an intertwining. But look upon + bouquets and clusters, and the idea of woman springs up at once, proving + she’s composed of them. I was about to remark, that with deference to the + influence of Mrs. Burman’s legal adviser, an impenitent or penitent + sinner’s pastor, the Reverend gentleman ministering to her spiritual + needs, would presumptively exercise it, in this instance, in a superior + degree.’ + </p> + <p> + Carling murmured: ‘The Rev. Groseman Buttermore’; and did so for something + of a cover, to continue a run of internal reflections: as, that he was + assuredly listening to vinous talk in the streets by day; which impression + placed him on a decorous platform above the amusing gentleman; to whom, + however, he grew cordial, in recognizing consequently, that his exuberant + flow could hardly be a mask; and that an indication here and there of a + trap in his talk, must have been due rather to excess of wariness, + habitual in the mind of a long-headed man, whose incorrigibly impulsive + fits had necessarily to be rectified by a vigilant dexterity. + </p> + <p> + ‘Buttermore!’ ejaculated Fenellan: ‘Groseman Buttermore! Mrs. Victor’s + Father Confessor is the Rev. Septimus Barmby. Groseman Buttermore—Septimus + Barmby. Is there anything in names? Truly, unless these clerical gentlemen + take them up at the crossing of the roads long after birth, the names + would appear the active parts of them, and themselves mere marching + supports, like the bearers of street placard-advertisements. Now, I know a + Septimus Barmby, and you a Groseman Buttermore, and beyond the fact that + Reverend starts up before their names without mention, I wager it’s about + all we do know of them. They’re Society’s trusty rock-limpets, no doubt.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘My respect for the cloth is extreme.’ Carling’s short cough prepared the + way for deductions. ‘Between ourselves, they are men of the world.’ + </p> + <p> + Fenellan eyed benevolently the worthy attorney, whose innermost imp burst + out periodically, like a Dutch clocksentry, to trot on his own small + grounds for thinking himself of the community of the man of the world. + ‘You lawyers dress in another closet,’ he said. ‘The Rev. Groseman has the + ear of the lady?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘He has:—one ear.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Ah? She has the other open for a man of the world, perhaps.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Listens to him, listens to me, listens to Jarniman; and we neither of us + guide her. She’s very curious—a study. You think you know her—next + day she has eluded you. She’s emotional, she’s hard; she’s a woman, she’s + a stone. Anything you like; but don’t count on her. And another thing—I’m + bound to say it of myself,’ Carling claimed close hearing of Fenellan over + a shelf of saladstuff, ‘no one who comes near her has any real weight with + her in this matter.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Probably you mix cream in your salad of the vinegar and oil,’ said + Fenellan. ‘Try jelly of mutton.’—‘You give me a new idea. Latterly, + fond as I am of salads, I’ve had rueful qualms. We’ll try it.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘You should dine with Victor Radnor.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘French cook, of course!’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Cordon bleu.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘I like to be sure of my cutlet.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘I like to be sure of a tastiness in my vegetables.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘And good sauces!’ + </p> + <p> + ‘And pretty pastry. I said, Cordon bleu. The miracle is, it ‘s a woman + that Victor Radnor has trained: French, but a woman; devoted to him, as + all who serve him are. Do I say “but” a woman? There’s not a Frenchman + alive to match her. Vatel awaits her in Paradise with his arms extended; + and may he wait long!’ + </p> + <p> + Carling indulged his passion for the genuine by letting a flutter of real + envy be seen. ‘My wife would like to meet such a Frenchwoman. It must be a + privilege to dine with him—to know him. I know what he has done for + English Commerce, and to build a colossal fortune: genius, as I said: and + his donations to Institutions. Odd, to read his name and Mrs. Burman + Radnor’s at separate places in the lists! Well, we’ll hope. It’s a case + for a compromise of sentiments and claims.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘A friend of mine, spiced with cynic, declares that there’s always an + amicable way out of a dissension, if we get rid of Lupus and Vulpus.’ + </p> + <p> + Carling spied for a trap in the citation of Lupus and Vulpus; he saw none, + and named the square of his residence on the great Russell property, and + the number of the house, the hour of dinner next day. He then hung silent, + breaking the pause with his hand out and a sharp ‘Well?’ that rattled a + whirligig sound in his head upward. His leave of people was taken in this + laughing falsetto, as of one affected by the curious end things come to. + </p> + <p> + Fenellan thought of him for a moment or two, that he was a better than the + common kind of lawyer; who doubtless knew as much of the wrong side of the + world as lawyers do, and held his knowledge for the being a man of the + world:—as all do, that have not Alpine heights in the mind to mount + for a look out over their own and the world’s pedestrian tracks. I could + spot the lawyer in your composition, my friend, to the exclusion of the + man he mused. But you’re right in what you mean to say of yourself: you’re + a good fellow, for a lawyer, and together we may manage somehow to score a + point of service to Victor Radnor. + </p> + <p> + <a name="link2HCH0008" id="link2HCH0008"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + CHAPTER VIII. SOME FAMILIAR GUESTS + </h2> + <p> + Nesta read her mother’s face when Mrs. Victor entered the drawing-room to + receive the guests. She saw a smooth fair surface, of the kind as much + required by her father’s eyes as innocuous air by his nostrils: and it was + honest skin, not the deceptive feminine veiling, to make a dear man happy + over his volcano. Mrs. Victor was to meet the friends with whom her + feelings were at home, among whom her musical gifts gave her station: they + liked her for herself; they helped her to feel at home with herself and be + herself: a rarer condition with us all than is generally supposed. So she + could determine to be cheerful in the anticipation of an evening that + would at least be restful to the outworn sentinel nerve of her heart, + which was perpetually alert and signalling to the great organ; often + colouring the shows and seems of adverse things for an apeing of reality + with too cruel a resemblance. One of the scraps of practical wisdom gained + by hardened sufferers is, to keep from spying at horizons when they drop + into a pleasant dingle. Such is the comfort of it, that we can dream, and + lull our fears, and half think what we wish: and it is a heavenly truce + with the fretful mind divided from our wishes. + </p> + <p> + Nesta wondered at her mother’s complacent questions concerning this + Lakelands: the house, the county, the kind of people about, the features + of the country. Physically unable herself to be regretful under a burden + three parts enrapturing her, the girl expected her mother to display a + shadowy vexation, with a proud word or two, that would summon her + thrilling sympathy in regard to the fourth part: namely, the aristocratic + iciness of country magnates, who took them up and cast them off; as they + had done, she thought, at Craye Farm and at Creckholt: she remembered it, + of the latter place, wincingly, insurgently, having loved the dear home + she had been expelled from by her pride of the frosty surrounding people—or + no, not all, but some of them. And what had roused their pride? + </p> + <p> + Striking for a reason, her inexperience of our modern England, + supplemented by readings in the England of a preceding generation, had hit + on her father’s profession of merchant. It accounted to her for the + behaviour of the haughty territorial and titled families. But certain of + the minor titles headed City Firms, she had heard; certain of the families + were avowedly commercial. ‘They follow suit,’ her father said at + Creckholt, after he had found her mother weeping, and decided instantly to + quit and fly once more. But if they followed suit in such a way, then Mr. + Durance must be right when he called the social English the most sheepy of + sheep:—and Nesta could not consent to the cruel verdict, she adored + her compatriots. Incongruities were pacified for her by the suggestion of + her quick wits, that her father, besides being a merchant, was a + successful speculator; and perhaps the speculator is not liked by + merchants; or they were jealous of him; or they did not like his being + both. + </p> + <p> + She pardoned them with some tenderness, on a suspicion that a quaint old + high-frilled bleached and puckered Puritanical rectitude (her thoughts + rose in pictures) possibly condemned the speculator as a description of + gambler. An erratic severity in ethics is easily overlooked by the + enthusiast for things old English. She was consciously ahead of them in + the knowledge that her father had been, without the taint of gambling, a + beneficent speculator. The Montgomery colony in South Africa, and his + dealings with the natives in India, and his Railways in South America, his + establishment of Insurance Offices, which were Savings Banks, and the + Stores for the dispensing of sound goods to the poor, attested it. O and + he was hospitable, the kindest, helpfullest of friends, the dearest, the + very brightest of parents: he was his girl’s playmate. She could be critic + of him, for an induction to the loving of him more justly: yet if he had + an excessive desire to win the esteem of people, as these keen young + optics perceived in him, he strove to deserve it; and no one could accuse + him of laying stress on the benefits he conferred. Designedly, frigidly to + wound a man so benevolent, appeared to her as an incomprehensible + baseness. The dropping of acquaintanceship with him, after the taste of + its privileges, she ascribed, in the void of any better elucidation, to a + mania of aristocratic conceit. It drove her, despite her youthful contempt + of politics, into a Radicalism that could find food in the epigrams of Mr. + Colney Durance, even when they passed her understanding; or when he was + not too distinctly seen by her to be shooting at all the parties of her + beloved England, beneath the wicked semblance of shielding each by turns. + </p> + <p> + The young gentleman introduced to the Radnor Concert-parties by Lady Grace + Halley as the Hon. Dudley Sowerby, had to bear the sins of his class. + Though he was tall, straight-featured, correct in costume, appearance, + deportment, second son of a religious earl and no scandal to the + parentage, he was less noticed by Nesta than the elderly and the + commoners. Her father accused her of snubbing him. She reproduced her + famous copy of the sugared acid of Mr. Dudley Sowerby’s closed mouth: a + sort of sneer in meekness, as of humility under legitimate compulsion; + deploring Christianly a pride of race that stamped it for this cowled + exhibition: the wonderful mimicry was a flash thrown out by a born + mistress of the art, and her mother was constrained to laugh, and so was + her father; but he wilfully denied the likeness. He charged her with + encouraging Colney Durance to drag forth the sprig of nobility, in the + nakedness of evicted shell-fish, on themes of the peril to England, + possibly ruin, through the loss of that ruling initiative formerly + possessed, in the days of our glory, by the titular nobles of the land. + Colney spoke it effectively, and the Hon. Dudley’s expressive lineaments + showed print of the heaving word Alas, as when a target is penetrated, + centrally. And he was not a particularly dull fellow ‘for his class and + country,’ Colney admitted; adding: ‘I hit his thought and out he came.’ + One has, reluctantly with Victor Radnor, to grant, that when a man’s + topmost unspoken thought is hit, he must be sharp on his guard to keep + from coming out:—we have won a right to him. + </p> + <p> + ‘Only, it’s too bad; it ‘s a breach of hospitality,’ Victor said, both to + Nesta and to Nataly, alluding to several instances of Colney’s ironic + handling of their guests, especially of this one, whom Nesta would attack, + and Nataly would not defend. + </p> + <p> + They were alive at a signal to protect the others. Miss Priscilla Graves, + an eater of meat, was ridiculous in her ant’alcoholic exclusiveness and + scorn: Mr. Pempton, a drinker of wine, would laud extravagantly the more + transparent purity of vegetarianism. Dr. Peter Yatt jeered at globules: + Dr. John Cormyn mourned over human creatures treated as cattle by big + doses. The Rev. Septimus Barmby satisfactorily smoked: Mr. Peridon traced + mortal evil to that act. Dr. Schlesien had his German views, Colney + Durance his ironic, Fenellan his fanciful and free-lance. And here was an + optimist, there a pessimist; and the rank Radical, the rigid Conservative, + were not wanting. All of them were pointedly opposed, extraordinarily for + so small an assembly: absurdly, it might be thought: but these provoked a + kind warm smile, with the exclamation: ‘They are dears!’ They were the + dearer for their fads and foibles. + </p> + <p> + Music harmonized them. Music, strangely, put the spell on Colney Durance, + the sayer of bitter things, manufacturer of prickly balls, in the form of + Discord’s apples of whom Fenellan remarked, that he took to his music like + an angry little boy to his barley-sugar, with a growl and a grunt. All + these diverse friends could meet and mix in Victor’s Concert-room with an + easy homely recognition of one another’s musical qualities, at times + enthusiastic; and their natural divergencies and occasional clashes added + a salient tastiness to the group of whom Nesta could say: ‘Mama, was there + ever such a collection of dear good souls with such contrary minds?’ Her + mother had the deepest of reasons for loving them, so as not to wish to + see the slightest change in their minds, that the accustomed features + making her nest of homeliness and real peace might be retained, with the + humour of their funny silly antagonisms and the subsequent march in + concord; excepting solely as regarded the perverseness of Priscilla Graves + in her open contempt of Mr. Pempton’s innocent two or three wine-glasses. + The vegetarian gentleman’s politeness forbore to direct attention to the + gobbets of meat Priscilla consumed, though he could express disapproval in + general terms; but he entertained sentiments as warlike to the lady’s + habit of ‘drinking the blood of animals.’ The mockery of it was, that + Priscilla liked Mr. Pempton and admired his violoncello-playing, and he + was unreserved in eulogy of her person and her pure soprano tones. Nataly + was a poetic match-maker. Mr. Peridon was intended for Mademoiselle de + Seilles, Nesta’s young French governess; a lady of a courtly bearing, with + placid speculation in the eyes she cast on a foreign people, and a voluble + muteness shadowing at intervals along the line of her closed lips. + </p> + <p> + The one person among them a little out of tune with most, was Lady Grace + Halley. Nataly’s provincial gentlewoman’s traditions of the manners + indicating conduct, reproved unwonted licences assumed by Lady Grace; who, + in allusion to Hymen’s weaving of a cousinship between the earldom of + Southweare and that of Cantor, of which Mr. Sowerby sprang, set her mouth + and fan at work to delineate total distinctions, as it were from the egg + to the empyrean. Her stature was rather short, all of it conversational, + at the eyebrows, the shoulders, the finger-tips, the twisting shape; a + ballerina’s expressiveness; and her tongue dashed half sentences through + and among these hieroglyphs, loosely and funnily candid. Anybody might + hear that she had gone gambling into the City, and that she had got + herself into a mess, and that by great good luck she had come across + Victor Radnor, who, with two turns of the wrist, had plucked her out of + the mire, the miraculous man! And she had vowed to him, never again to run + doing the like without his approval. + </p> + <p> + The cause of her having done it, was related with the accompaniments; + brows twitching, flitting smiles, shrugs, pouts, shifts of posture: she + was married to a centaur; out of the saddle a man of wood, ‘an excellent + man.’ For the not colloquial do not commit themselves. But one wants a + little animation in a husband. She called on bell-motion of the head to + toll forth the utter nightcap negative. He had not any: out of the saddle, + he was asleep:—‘next door to the Last Trump,’ Colney Durance + assisted her to describe the soundest of sleep in a husband, after wooing + her to unbosom herself. She was awake to his guileful arts, and sailed + along with him, hailing his phrases, if he shot a good one; prankishly + exposing a flexible nature, that took its holiday thus in a grinding + world, among maskers, to the horrification of the prim. So to refresh + ourselves, by having publicly a hip-bath in the truth while we shock our + hearers enough to be discredited for what we reveal, was a dexterous merry + twist, amusing to her; but it was less a cynical malice than her nature + that she indulged, ‘A woman must have some excitement.’ The most innocent + appeared to her the Stock Exchange. The opinions of husbands who are not + summoned to pay are hardly important; they vary. + </p> + <p> + Colney helped her now and then to step the trifle beyond her stride, but + if he was humorous, she forgave; and if together they appalled the + decorous, it was great gain. Her supple person, pretty lips, the style she + had, gave a pass to the wondrous confidings, which were for masculine + ears, whatever the sex. Nataly might share in them, but women did not lead + her to expansiveness; or not the women of the contracted class: Miss + Graves, Mrs. Cormyn, and others at the Radnor Concerts. She had a special + consideration for Mademoiselle de Seilles, owing to her exquisite French, + as she said; and she may have liked it, but it was the young Frenchwoman’s + air of high breeding that won her esteem. Girls were spring frosts to her. + Fronting Nesta, she put on her noted smile, or wood-cut of a smile, with + its label of indulgence; except when the girl sang. Music she loved. She + said it was the saving of poor Dudley. It distinguished him in the group + of the noble Evangelical Cantor Family; and it gave him a subject of + assured discourse in company; and oddly, it contributed to his comelier + air. Flute [This would be the German Blockeflute or our Recorder. D.W.] in + hand, his mouth at the blow-stop was relieved of its pained updraw by the + form for puffing; he preserved a gentlemanly high figure in his exercises + on the instrument, out of ken of all likeness to the urgent insistency of + Victor Radnor’s punctuating trunk of the puffing frame at almost every bar—an + Apollo brilliancy in energetic pursuit of the nymph of sweet sound. Too + methodical one, too fiery the other. + </p> + <p> + In duets of Hauptmann’s, with Nesta at the piano, the contrast of dull + smoothness and overstressed significance was very noticeable beside the + fervent accuracy of her balanced fingering; and as she could also flute, + she could criticize; though latterly, the flute was boxed away from lips + that had devoted themselves wholly to song: song being one of the damsel’s + present pressing ambitions. She found nothing to correct in Mr. Sowerby, + and her father was open to all the censures; but her father could plead + vitality, passion. He held his performances cheap after the vehement + display; he was a happy listener, whether to the babble of his ‘dear old + Corelli,’ or to the majesty of the rattling heavens and swaying forests of + Beethoven. + </p> + <p> + His air of listening was a thing to see; it had a look of disembodiment; + the sparkle conjured up from deeps, and the life in the sparkle, as of a + soul at holiday. Eyes had been given this man to spy the pleasures and + reveal the joy of his pasture on them: gateways to the sunny within, + issues to all the outer Edens. Few of us possess that double significance + of the pure sparkle. It captivated Lady Grace. She said a word of it to + Fenellan: ‘There is a man who can feel rapture!’ He had not to follow the + line of her sight: she said so on a previous evening, in a similar tone; + and for a woman to repeat herself, using the very emphasis, was quaint. + She could feel rapture; but her features and limbs were in motion to + designate it, between simply and wilfully; she had the instinct to be + dimpling, and would not for a moment control it, and delighted in its + effectiveness: only when observing that winged sparkle of eyes did an idea + of envy, hardly a consciousness, inform her of being surpassed; and it + might be in the capacity to feel besides the gift to express. Such a + reflection relating to a man, will make women mortally sensible that they + are the feminine of him. + </p> + <p> + ‘His girl has the look,’ Fenellan said in answer. + </p> + <p> + She cast a glance at Nesta, then at Nataly. + </p> + <p> + And it was true, that the figure of a mother, not pretending to the + father’s vividness, eclipsed it somewhat in their child. The mother gave + richness of tones, hues and voice, and stature likewise, and the thick + brown locks, which in her own were threads of gold along the brush from + the temples: she gave the girl a certain degree of the composure of manner + which Victor could not have bestowed; she gave nothing to clash with his + genial temper; she might be supposed to have given various qualities, + moral if you like. But vividness was Lady Grace’s admirable meteor of the + hour: she was unable to perceive, so as to compute, the value of obscurer + lights. Under the charm of Nataly’s rich contralto during a duet with + Priscilla Graves, she gesticulated ecstasies, and uttered them, and + genuinely; and still, when reduced to meditations, they would have had no + weight, they would hardly have seemed an apology for language, beside + Victor’s gaze of pleasure in the noble forthroll of the notes. + </p> + <p> + Nataly heard the invitation of the guests of the evening to Lakelands next + day. + </p> + <p> + Her anxieties were at once running about to gather provisions for the + baskets. She spoke of them at night. But Victor had already put the matter + in the hands of Madame Callet; and all that could be done, would be done + by Armandine, he knew. ‘If she can’t muster enough at home, she’ll be off + to her Piccadilly shop by seven A.M. Count on plenty for twice the + number.’ + </p> + <p> + Nataly was reposing on the thought that they were her friends, when Victor + mentioned his having in the afternoon despatched a note to his relatives, + the Duvidney ladies, inviting them to join him at the station to-morrow, + for a visit of inspection to the house of his building on his new estate. + He startled her. The Duvidney ladies were, to his knowledge, of the order + of the fragile minds which hold together by the cement of a common + trepidation for the support of things established, and have it not in them + to be able to recognize the unsanctioned. Good women, unworldly of the + world, they were perforce harder than the world, from being narrower and + more timorous. + </p> + <p> + ‘But, Victor, you were sure they would refuse!’ + </p> + <p> + He answered: ‘They may have gone back to Tunbridge Wells. By the way, they + have a society down there I want for Fredi. Sure, do you say, my dear? + Perfectly sure. But the accumulation of invitations and refusals in the + end softens them, you will see. We shall and must have them for Fredi.’ + </p> + <p> + She was used to the long reaches of his forecasts, his burning activity on + a project; she found it idle to speak her thought, that his ingenuity + would have been needless in a position dictated by plain prudence, and so + much happier for them. + </p> + <p> + They talked of Mrs. Burman until she had to lift a prayer to be saved from + darker thoughts, dreadfully prolific, not to be faced. Part of her prayer + was on behalf of Mrs. Burman, for life to be extended to her, if the poor + lady clung to life—if it was really humane to wish it for her: and + heaven would know: heaven had mercy on the afflicted. + </p> + <p> + Nataly heard the snuffle of hypocrisy in her prayer. She had to cease to + pray. + </p> + <p> + <a name="link2HCH0009" id="link2HCH0009"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + CHAPTER IX. AN INSPECTION OF LAKELANDS + </h2> + <p> + One may not have an intention to flourish, and may be pardoned for a + semblance of it, in exclaiming, somewhat royally, as creator and owner of + the place: ‘There you see Lakelands.’ + </p> + <p> + The conveyances from the railway station drew up on a rise of road + fronting an undulation, where our modern English architect’s fantasia in + crimson brick swept from central gables to flying wings, over pents, + crooks, curves, peaks, cowled porches, balconies, recesses, projections, + away to a red village of stables and dependent cottages; harmonious in + irregularity; and coloured homely with the greensward about it, the pines + beside it, the clouds above it. Not many palaces would be reckoned as + larger. The folds and swells and stream of the building along the roll of + ground, had an appearance of an enormous banner on the wind. Nataly + looked. Her next look was at Colney Durance. She sent the expected nods to + Victor’s carriage. She would have given the whole prospect for the + covering solitariness of her chamber. A multitude of clashing sensations, + and a throat-thickening hateful to her, compelled her to summon so as to + force herself to feel a groundless anger, directed against none, against + nothing, perfectly crazy, but her only resource for keeping down the great + wave surgent at her eyes. + </p> + <p> + Victor was like a swimmer in morning sea amid the exclamations encircling + him. He led through the straight passage of the galleried hall, offering + two fair landscapes at front door and at back, down to the lake, Fredi’s + lake; a good oblong of water, notable in a district not abounding in the + commodity. He would have it a feature of the district; and it had been + deepened and extended; up rose the springs, many ran the ducts. Fredi’s + pretty little bathshed or bower had a space of marble on the three-feet + shallow it overhung with a shade of carved woodwork; it had a diving-board + for an eight-feet plunge; a punt and small row-boat of elegant build hard + by. Green ran the banks about, and a beechwood fringed with birches + curtained the Northward length: morning sun and evening had a fair face of + water to paint. Saw man ever the like for pleasing a poetical damsel? So + was Miss Fredi, the coldest of the party hitherto, and dreaming a + preference of ‘old places’ like Creckholt and Craye Farm, ‘captured to be + enraptured,’ quite according to man’s ideal of his beneficence to the sex. + She pressed the hand of her young French governess, Louise de Seilles. As + in everything he did for his girl, Victor pointed boastfully to his + forethought of her convenience and her tastes: the pine-panels of the + interior, the shelves for her books, pegs to hang her favourite drawings, + and the couch-bunk under a window to conceal the summerly recliner while + throwing full light on her book; and the hearth-square for logs, when she + wanted fire: because Fredi bathed in any weather: the oaken towel-coffer; + the wood-carvings of doves, tits, fishes; the rod for the flowered silken + hangings she was to choose, and have shy odalisque peeps of sunny water + from her couch. + </p> + <p> + ‘Fredi’s Naiad retreat, when she wishes to escape Herr Strauscher or + Signor Ruderi,’ said Victor, having his grateful girl warm in an arm; ‘and + if they head after her into the water, I back her to leave them puffing; + she’s a dolphin. That water has three springs and gets all the drainage of + the upland round us. I chose the place chiefly on account of it and the + pines. I do love pines!’ + </p> + <p> + ‘But, excellent man! what do you not love?’ said Lady Grace, with the + timely hit upon the obvious, which rings. + </p> + <p> + ‘It saves him from accumulation of tissue,’ said Colney. + </p> + <p> + ‘What does?’ was eagerly asked by the wife of the homoeopathic Dr. John + Cormyn, a sentimental lady beset with fears of stoutness. + </p> + <p> + Victor cried: ‘Tush; don’t listen to Colney, pray.’ + </p> + <p> + But she heard Colney speak of a positive remedy; more immediately + effective than an abjuration of potatoes and sugar. She was obliged by her + malady to listen, although detesting the irreverent ruthless man, who + could direct expanding frames, in a serious tone, to love; love everybody, + everything; violently and universally love; and so without intermission + pay out the fat created by a rapid assimilation of nutriment. Obeseness is + the most sensitive of our ailments: probably as being aware, that its + legitimate appeal to pathos is ever smothered in its pudding-bed of the + grotesque. She was pained, and showed it, and was ashamed of herself for + showing it; and that very nearly fetched the tear. + </p> + <p> + ‘Our host is an instance in proof,’ Colney said. He waved hand at the + house. His meaning was hidden; evidently he wanted victims. Sight of + Lakelands had gripped him with the fell satiric itch; and it is a passion + to sting and tear, on rational grounds. His face meanwhile, which had + points of the handsome, signified a smile asleep, as if beneath a cloth. + Only those who knew him well were aware of the claw-like alertness under + the droop of eyelids. + </p> + <p> + Admiration was the common note, in the various keys. The station selected + for the South-eastward aspect of the dark-red gabled pile on its white + shell-terrace, backed by a plantation of tall pines, a mounded and + full-plumed company, above the left wing, was admired, in files and in + volleys. Marvellous, effectively miraculous, was the tale of the vow to + have the great edifice finished within one year: and the strike of + workmen, and the friendly colloquy with them, the good reasoning, the + unanimous return to duty; and the doubling, the trebling of the number of + them; and the most glorious of sights—O the grand old English + working with a will! as Englishmen do when they come at last to heat; and + they conquer, there is then nothing that they cannot conquer. So the + conqueror said.—And admirable were the conservatories running three + long lines, one from the drawing-room, to a central dome for tropical + growths. And the parterres were admired; also the newly-planted Irish + junipers bounding the West-walk; and the three tiers of stately descent + from the three green terrace banks to the grassy slopes over the lake. + Again the lake was admired, the house admired. Admiration was evoked for + great orchid-houses ‘over yonder,’ soon to be set up. + </p> + <p> + Off we go to the kitchen-garden. There the admiration is genial, + practical. We admire the extent of the beds marked out for asparagus, and + the French disposition of the planting at wide intervals; and the French + system of training peach, pear, and plum trees on the walls to win length + and catch sun, we much admire. We admire the gardener. We are induced + temporarily to admire the French people. They are sagacious in + fruit-gardens. They have not the English Constitution, you think rightly; + but in fruit-gardens they grow for fruit, and not, as Victor quotes a + friend, for wood, which the valiant English achieve. We hear and we see + examples of sagacity; and we are further brought round to the old + confession, that we cannot cook; Colney Durance has us there; we have not + studied herbs and savours; and so we are shocked backward step by step + until we retreat precipitately into the nooks where waxen tapers, + carefully tended by writers on the Press, light-up mysterious images of + our national selves for admiration. Something surely we do, or we should + not be where we are. But what is it we do (excepting cricket, of course) + which others cannot do? Colney asks; and he excludes cricket and football. + </p> + <p> + An acutely satiric man in an English circle, that does not resort to the + fist for a reply to him, may almost satiate the excessive fury roused in + his mind by an illogical people of a provocative prosperity, mainly + tongueless or of leaden tongue above the pressure of their necessities, as + he takes them to be. They give him so many opportunities. They are angry + and helpless as the log hissing to the saw. Their instinct to make use of + the downright in retort, restrained as it is by a buttoned coat of + civilization, is amusing, inviting. Colney Durance allured them to the + quag’s edge and plunged them in it, to writhe patriotically; and although + it may be said, that they felt their situation less than did he the venom + they sprang in his blood, he was cruel; he caused discomfort. But these + good friends about him stood for the country, an illogical country; and as + he could not well attack his host Victor Radnor, an irrational man, he + selected the abstract entity for the discharge of his honest spite. + </p> + <p> + The irrational friend was deeper at the source of his irritation than the + illogical old motherland. This house of Lakelands, the senselessness of + his friend in building it and designing to live in it, after experiences + of an incapacity to stand in a serene contention with the world he + challenged, excited Colney’s wasp. He was punished, half way to frenzy + behind his placable demeanour, by having Dr. Schlesien for chorus. And + here again, it was the unbefitting, not the person, which stirred his + wrath. A German on English soil should remember the dues of a guest. At + the same time, Colney said things to snare the acclamation of an observant + gentleman of that race, who is no longer in his first enthusiasm for + English beef and the complexion of the women. ‘Ah, ya, it is true, what + you say: “The English grow as fast as odders, but they grow to corns + instead of brains.” They are Bull. Quaat true.’ He bellowed on a laugh the + last half of the quotation. + </p> + <p> + Colney marked him. His encounters with Fenellan were enlivening + engagements and left no malice; only a regret, when the fencing passed his + guard, that Fenellan should prefer to flash for the minute. He would have + met a pert defender of England, in the person of Miss Priscilla Graves, if + she had not been occupied with observation of the bearing of Lady Grace + Halley toward Mr. Victor Radnor; which displeased her on behalf of Mrs. + Victor; she was besides hostile by race and class to an aristocratic + assumption of licence. Sparing Colney, she with some scorn condemned Mr. + Pempton for allowing his country to be ridiculed without a word. Mr. + Pempton believed that the Vegetarian movement was more progressive in + England than in other lands, but he was at the disadvantage with the fair + Priscilla, that eulogy of his compatriots on this account would win her + coldest approval. ‘Satire was never an argument,’ he said, too evasively. + </p> + <p> + The Rev. Septimus Barmby received the meed of her smile, for saying in his + many-fathom bass, with an eye on Victor: ‘At least we may boast of + breeding men, who are leaders of men.’ + </p> + <p> + The announcement of luncheon, by Victor’s butler Arlington, opportunely + followed and freighted the remark with a happy recognition of that which + comes to us from the hands of conquerors. Dr. Schlesien himself, no + antagonist to England, but like Colney Durance, a critic, speculated in + view of the spread of pic-nic provision beneath the great glass dome, as + to whether it might be, that these English were on another start out of + the dust in vigorous commercial enterprise, under leadership of one of + their chance masterly minds-merchant, in this instance: and be debated + within, whether Genius, occasionally developed in a surprising superior + manner by these haphazard English, may not sometimes wrest the prize from + Method; albeit we count for the long run, that Method has assurance of + success, however late in the race to set forth. + </p> + <p> + Luncheon was a merry meal, with Victor and Nataly for host and hostess; + Fenellan, Colney Durance, and Lady Grace Halley for the talkers. A gusty + bosom of sleet overhung the dome, rattled on it, and rolling Westward, + became a radiant mountain-land, partly worthy of Victor’s phrase: ‘A range + of Swiss Alps in air.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘With periwigs Louis Quatorze for peaks,’ Colney added. + </p> + <p> + And Fenellan improved on him: ‘Or a magnified Bench of Judges at the trial + of your caerulean Phryne.’ + </p> + <p> + The strip of white cloud flew on a whirl from the blue, to confirm it. + </p> + <p> + But Victor and Lady Grace rejected any play of conceits upon nature. + Violent and horrid interventions of the counterfeit, such mad similes + appeared to them, when pure coin was offered. They loathed the Rev. + Septimus Barmby for proclaiming, that he had seen ‘Chapters of Hebrew + History in the grouping of clouds.’ + </p> + <p> + His gaze was any one of the Chapters upon Nesta. The clerical gentleman’s + voice was of a depth to claim for it the profoundest which can be thought + or uttered; and Nesta’s tender youth had taken so strong an impression of + sacredness from what Fenellan called ‘his chafer tones,’ that her looks + were often given him in gratitude, for the mere sound. Nataly also had her + sense of safety in acquiescing to such a voice coming from such a garb. + Consequently, whenever Fenellan and Colney were at him, drawing him this + way and that for utterances cathedral in sentiment and sonorousness, these + ladies shed protecting beams; insomuch that he was inspired to the + agreeable conceptions whereof frequently rash projects are an issue. + </p> + <p> + Touching the neighbours of Lakelands, they were principally enriched + merchants, it appeared; a snippet or two of the fringe of aristocracy lay + here and there among them; and one racy-of-the-soil old son of Thames, + having the manners proper to last century’s yeoman. Mr. Pempton knew + something of this quaint Squire of Hefferstone, Beaves Urmsing by name; a + ruddy man, right heartily Saxon; a still glowing brand amid the ashes of + the Heptarchy hearthstone; who had a song, The Marigolds, which he would + troll out for you anywhere, on any occasion. To have so near to the + metropolis one from the centre of the venerable rotundity of the country, + was rare. Victor exclaimed ‘Come!’ in ravishment over the picturesqueness + of a neighbour carrying imagination away to the founts of England; and his + look at Nataly proposed. Her countenance was inapprehensive. He perceived + resistance, and said: ‘I have met two or three of them in the train: + agreeable men: Gladding, the banker; a General Fanning; that man + Blathenoy, great billbroker. But the fact is, close on London, we’re + independent of neighbours; we mean to be. Lakelands and London practically + join.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘The mother city becoming the suburb,’ murmured Colney, in report of the + union. + </p> + <p> + ‘You must expect to be invaded, sir,’ said Mr. Sowerby; and Victor + shrugged: ‘We are pretty safe.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘The lock of a door seems a potent security until some one outside is + heard fingering the handle nigh midnight,’ Fenellan threw out his airy + nothing of a remark. + </p> + <p> + It struck on Nataly’s heart. ‘So you will not let us be lonely here,’ she + said to her guests. + </p> + <p> + The Rev. Septimus Barmby was mouthpiece for congregations. Sound of a + subterranean roar, with a blast at the orifice, informed her of their + ‘very deep happiness in the privilege.’ + </p> + <p> + He comforted her. Nesta smiled on him thankfully. + </p> + <p> + ‘Don’t imagine, Mrs. Victor, that you can be shut off from neighbours, in + a house like this; and they have a claim,’ said Lady Grace, quitting the + table. + </p> + <p> + Fenellan and Colney thought so: + </p> + <p> + ‘Like mice at a cupboard.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Beetles in a kitchen.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘No, no-no, no!’ Victor shook head, pitiful over the good people likened + to things unclean, and royally upraising them: in doing which, he + scattered to vapour the leaden incubi they had been upon his flatter moods + of late. ‘No, but it’s a rapture to breathe the air here!’ His lifted + chest and nostrils were for the encouragement of Nataly to soar beside + him. + </p> + <p> + She summoned her smile and nodded. + </p> + <p> + He spoke aside to Lady Grace: ‘The dear soul wants time to compose herself + after a grand surprise.’ + </p> + <p> + She replied: ‘I think I could soon be reconciled. How much land?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘In treaty for some hundred and eighty or ninety acres... in all at + present three hundred and seventy, including plantations, lake, + outhouses.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Large enough; land paying as it does—that is, not paying. We shall + be having to gamble in the City systematically for subsistence.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘You will not so much as jest on the subject.’ + </p> + <p> + Coming from such a man, that was clear sky thunder. The lady played it off + in a shadowy pout and shrug while taking a stamp of his masterfulness, not + so volatile. + </p> + <p> + She said to Nataly: ‘Our place in Worcestershire is about half the size, + if as much. Large enough when we’re not crowded out with gout and can open + to no one. Some day you will visit us, I hope.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘You we count on here, Lady Grace.’ + </p> + <p> + It was an over-accentuated response; unusual with this well-bred woman; + and a bit of speech that does not flow, causes us to speculate. The lady + resumed: ‘I value the favour. We’re in a horsey-doggy-foxy circle down + there. We want enlivening. If we had your set of musicians and talkers!’ + </p> + <p> + Nataly smiled in vacuous kindness, at a loss for the retort of a + compliment to a person she measured. Lady Grace also was an amiable + hostile reviewer. Each could see, to have cited in the other, defects + common to the lower species of the race, admitting a superior personal + quality or two; which might be pleaded in extenuation; and if the apology + proved too effective, could be dispersed by insistence upon it, under an + implied appeal to benevolence. When we have not a liking for the creature + whom we have no plain cause to dislike, we are minutely just. + </p> + <p> + During the admiratory stroll along the ground-floor rooms, Colney Durance + found himself beside Dr. Schlesien; the latter smoking, striding, + emphasizing, but bearable, as the one of the party who was not perpetually + at the gape in laudation. Colney was heard to say: ‘No doubt: the German + is the race the least mixed in Europe: it might challenge aboriginals for + that. Oddly, it has invented the Cyclopaedia for knowledge, the sausage + for nutrition! How would you explain it?’ + </p> + <p> + Dr. Schlesien replied with an Atlas shrug under fleabite to the + insensately infantile interrogation. + </p> + <p> + He in turn was presently heard. + </p> + <p> + ‘But, my good sir! you quote me your English Latin. I must beg of you you + write it down. It is orally incomprehensible to Continentals.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘We are Islanders!’ Colney shrugged in languishment. + </p> + <p> + ‘Oh, you do great things...’ Dr. Schlesien rejoined in kindness, making + his voice a musical intimation of the smallness of the things. + </p> + <p> + ‘We build great houses, to employ our bricks’ + </p> + <p> + ‘No, Colney, to live in,’ said Victor. + </p> + <p> + ‘Scarcely long enough to warm them.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘What do you... fiddle!’ + </p> + <p> + ‘They are not Hohenzollerns!’ + </p> + <p> + ‘It is true,’ Dr. Schlesien called. ‘No, but you learn discipline; you + build. I say wid you, not Hohenzollerns you build! But you shall look + above: Eyes up. Ire necesse est. Good, but mount; you come to something. + Have ideas.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Good, but when do we reach your level?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Sir, I do not say more than that we do not want instruction from + foreigners.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Pupil to paedagogue indeed. You have the wreath in Music, in + Jurisprudence, Chemistry, Scholarship, Beer, Arms, Manners.’ + </p> + <p> + Dr. Schlesien puffed a tempest of tobacco and strode. + </p> + <p> + ‘He is chiselling for wit in the Teutonic block,’ Colney said, falling + back to Fenellan. + </p> + <p> + Fenellan observed: ‘You might have credited him with the finished + sculpture.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘They’re ahead of us in sticking at the charge of wit.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘They’ve a widening of their swallow since Versailles.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Manners?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Well, that’s a tight cravat for the Teutonic thrapple! But he’s off by + himself to loosen it.’ + </p> + <p> + Victor came on the couple testily. ‘What are you two concocting! I say, do + keep the peace, please. An excellent good fellow; better up in politics + than any man I know; understands music; means well, you can see. You two + hate a man at all serious. And he doesn’t bore with his knowledge. A + scholar too.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘If he’ll bring us the atmosphere of the groves of Academe, he may swing + his ferule pickled in himself, and welcome,’ said Fenellan. + </p> + <p> + ‘Yes!’ Victor nodded at a recognized antagonism in Fenellan; ‘but Colney’s + always lifting the Germans high above us.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘It’s to exercise his muscles.’ + </p> + <p> + Victor headed to the other apartments, thinking that the Rev. Septimus and + young Sowerby, Old England herself, were spared by the diversion of these + light skirmishing shots from their accustomed victims to the ‘masculine + people of our time. His friends would want a drilling to be of aid to him + in his campaign to come. For it was one, and a great one. He remembered + his complete perception of the plan, all the elements of it, the forward + whirling of it, just before the fall on London Bridge. The greatness of + his enterprise laid such hold of him that the smallest of obstacles had a + villanous aspect; and when, as anticipated, Colney and Fenellan were + sultry flies for whomsoever they could fret, he was blind to the reading + of absurdities which caused Fredi’s eyes to stream and Lady Grace beside + him to stand awhile and laugh out her fit. Young Sowerby appeared + forgiving enough—he was a perfect gentleman: but Fredi’s appalling + sense of fun must try him hard. And those young fellows are often more + wounded by a girl’s thoughtless laughter than by a man’s contempt. Nataly + should have protected him. Her face had the air of a smiling general + satisfaction; sign of a pleasure below the mark required; sign too of a + sleepy partner for a battle. Even in the wonderful kitchen, arched and + pillared (where the explanation came to Nesta of Madame Callet’s frequent + leave of absence of late, when an inferior dinner troubled her father in + no degree), even there his Nataly listened to the transports of the guests + with benign indulgence. + </p> + <p> + ‘Mama!’ said Nesta, ready to be entranced by kitchens in her bubbling + animation: she meant the recalling of instances of the conspirator her + father had been. + </p> + <p> + ‘You none of you guessed Armandine’s business!’ Victor cried, in a glee + that pushed to make the utmost of this matter and count against chagrin. + ‘She was off to Paris; went to test the last inventions:—French + brains are always alert:—and in fact, those kitchen-ranges, gas and + coal, and the apparatus for warming plates and dishes, the whole of the + battery is on the model of the Duc d’Ariane’s—finest in Europe. + Well,’ he agreed with Colney, ‘to say France is enough.’ + </p> + <p> + Mr. Pempton spoke to Miss Graves of the task for a woman to conduct a + command so extensive. And, as when an inoffensive wayfarer has chanced to + set foot near a wasp’s nest, out on him came woman and her champions, the + worthy and the sham, like a blast of powder. + </p> + <p> + Victor ejaculated: ‘Armandine!’ Whoever doubted her capacity, knew not + Armandine; or not knowing Armandine, knew not the capacity in women. + </p> + <p> + With that utterance of her name, he saw the orangey spot on London Bridge, + and the sinking Tower and masts and funnels, and the rising of them, on + his return to his legs; he recollected, that at the very edge of the fall + he had Armandine strongly in his mind. She was to do her part: Fenellan + and Colney on the surface, she below: and hospitality was to do its part, + and music was impressed—the innocent Concerts; his wealth, all his + inventiveness were to serve;—and merely to attract and win the + tastes of people, for a social support to Lakelands! Merely that? Much + more:—if Nataly’s coldness to the place would but allow him to form + an estimate of how much. At the same time, being in the grasp of his + present disappointment, he perceived a meanness in the result, that was + astonishing and afflicting. He had not ever previously felt imagination + starving at the vision of success. Victor had yet to learn, that the man + with a material object in aim, is the man of his object; and the nearer to + his mark, often the farther is he from a sober self; he is more the arrow + of his bow than bow to his arrow. This we pay for scheming: and success is + costly; we find we have pledged the better half of ourselves to clutch it; + not to be redeemed with the whole handful of our prize! He was, however, + learning after his leaping fashion. Nataly’s defective sympathy made him + look at things through the feelings she depressed. A shadow of his missed + Idea on London Bridge seemed to cross him from the close flapping of a + wing within reach. He could say only, that it would, if caught, have been + an answer to the thought disturbing him. + </p> + <p> + Nataly drew Colney Durance with her eyes to step beside her, on the + descent to the terrace. Little Skepsey hove in sight, coming swift as the + point of an outrigger over the flood. + </p> + <p> + <a name="link2HCH0010" id="link2HCH0010"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + CHAPTER X. SKEPSEY IN MOTION + </h2> + <p> + The bearer of his master’s midday letters from London shot beyond Nataly + as soon as seen, with an apparent snap of his body in passing. He steamed + to the end of the terrace and delivered the packet, returning at the same + rate of speed, to do proper homage to the lady he so much respected. He + had left the railway-station on foot instead of taking a fly, because of a + calculation that he would save three minutes; which he had not lost for + having to come through the raincloud. ‘Perhaps the contrary,’ Skepsey + said: it might be judged to have accelerated his course: and his hat + dripped, and his coat shone, and he soaped his hands, cheerful as an + ouzel-cock when the sun is out again. + </p> + <p> + ‘Many cracked crowns lately, in the Manly Art?’ Colney inquired of him. + And Skepsey answered with precision of statement: ‘Crowns, no, sir; the + nose, it may happen; but it cannot be said to be the rule.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘You are of opinion, that the practice of Scientific Pugilism offers us + compensation for the broken bridge of a nose?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘In an increase of manly self-esteem: I do, sir, yes.’ + </p> + <p> + Skepsey was shy of this gentleman’s bite; and he fancied his defence had + been correct. Perceiving a crumple of the lips of Mr. Durance, he took the + attitude of a watchful dubiety. + </p> + <p> + ‘But, my goodness, you are wet through!’ cried Nataly, reproaching herself + for the tardy compassion; and Nesta ran up to them and heaped a thousand + pities on her ‘poor dear Skip,’ and drove him in beneath the glass-dome to + the fragments of pic-nic, and poured champagne for him, ‘lest his wife + should have to doctor him for a cold,’ and poured afresh, when he had + obeyed her: ‘for the toasting of Lakelands, dear Skepsey!’ impossible to + resist: so he drank, and blinked; and was then told, that before using his + knife and fork he must betake himself to some fire of shavings and chips, + where coffee was being made, for the purpose of drying his clothes. But + this he would not hear of: he was pledged to business, to convey his + master’s letters, and he might have to catch a train by the last + quarter-minute, unless it was behind the time-tables; he must hold himself + ready to start. Entreated, adjured, commanded, Skepsey commiseratingly + observed to Colney Durance, ‘The ladies do not understand, sir!’ For Turk + of Constantinople had never a more haremed opinion of the unfitness of + women in the brave world of action. The persistence of these ladies + endeavouring to obstruct him in the course of his duty, must have + succeeded save that for one word of theirs he had two, and twice the + promptitude of motion. He explained to them, as to good children, that the + loss of five minutes might be the loss of a Post, the loss of thousands of + pounds, the loss of the character of a Firm; and he was away to the + terrace. Nesta headed him and waved him back. She and her mother rebuked + him: they called him unreasonable; wherein they resembled the chief + example of the sex to him, in a wife he had at home, who levelled that + charge against her husband when most she needed discipline: the woman laid + hand on the very word legitimately his own for the justification of his + process with her. + </p> + <p> + ‘But, Skips! if you are ill and we have to nurse you!’ said Nesta. + </p> + <p> + She forgot the hospital, he told her cordially, and laughed at the notion + of a ducking producing a cold or a cold a fever, or anything consumption, + with him. So the ladies had to keep down their anxious minds and allow him + to stand in wet clothing to eat his cold pie and salad. + </p> + <p> + Miss Priscilla Graves entering to them, became a witness that they were + seductresses for inducing him to drink wine—and a sparkling wine. + </p> + <p> + ‘It is to warm him,’ they pleaded; and she said: ‘He must be warm from his + walk’; and they said: ‘But he is wet’; and said she, without a show of + feeling: ‘Warm water, then’; and Skepsey writhed, as if in the grasp of + anatomists, at being the subject of female contention or humane + consideration. Miss Graves caught signs of the possible proselyte in him; + she remarked encouragingly: + </p> + <p> + ‘I am sure he does not like it; he still has a natural taste.’ + </p> + <p> + She distressed his native politeness, for the glass was in his hand, and + he was fully aware of her high-principled aversion; and he profoundly + bowed to principles, believing his England to be pillared on them; and the + lady looked like one who bore the standard of a principle; and if we slap + and pinch and starve our appetites, the idea of a principle seems entering + us to support. Subscribing to a principle, our energies are refreshed; we + have a faith in the country that was not with us before the act; and of a + real well-founded faith come the glowing thoughts which we have at times: + thoughts of England heading the nations; when the smell of an English lane + under showers challenges Eden, and the threading of a London crowd tunes + discords to the swell of a cathedral organ. It may be, that by the + renunciation of any description of alcohol, a man will stand + clearer-headed to serve his country. He may expect to have a clearer + memory, for certain: he will not be asking himself, unable to decide, + whether his master named a Mr. Journeyman or a Mr. Jarniman, as the person + he declined to receive. Either of the two is repulsed upon his + application, owing to the guilty similarity of sounds but what we are to + think of is, our own sad state of inefficiency in failing to remember; + which accuses our physical condition, therefore our habits.—Thus the + little man debated, scarcely requiring more than to hear the right word, + to be a convert and make him a garland of the proselyte’s fetters. + </p> + <p> + Destructively for the cause she advocated, Miss Priscilla gestured the + putting forth of an abjuring hand, with the recommendation to him, so to + put aside temptation that instant; and she signified in a very ugly jerk + of her features, the vilely filthy stuff Morality thought it, however + pleasing it might be to a palate corrupted by indulgence of the sensual + appetites. + </p> + <p> + But the glass had been handed to him by the lady he respected, who looked + angelical in offering it, divinely other than ugly; and to her he could + not be discourteous; not even to pay his homage to the representative of a + principle. He bowed to Miss Graves, and drank, and rushed forth; hearing + shouts behind him. + </p> + <p> + His master had a packet of papers ready, easy for the pocket. + </p> + <p> + ‘By the way, Skepsey,’ he said, ‘if a man named Jarniman should call at + the office, I will see him.’ + </p> + <p> + Skepsey’s grey eyes came out. + </p> + <p> + Or was it Journeyman, that his master would not see; and Jarniman that he + would? + </p> + <p> + His habit of obedience, pride of apprehension, and the time to catch the + train, forbade inquiry. Besides he knew of himself of old, that his + puzzles were best unriddled running. + </p> + <p> + The quick of pace are soon in the quick of thoughts. + </p> + <p> + Jarniman, then, was a man whom his master, not wanting to see, one day, + and wanting to see, on another day, might wish to conciliate: a case of + policy. Let Jarniman go. Journeyman, on the other hand, was nobody at all, + a ghost of the fancy. Yet this Journeyman was as important an individual, + he was a dread reality; more important to Skepsey in the light of patriot: + and only in that light was he permitted of a scrupulous conscience and + modest mind to think upon himself when the immediate subject was his + master’s interests. For this Journeyman had not an excuse for existence in + Mr. Radnor’s pronunciation: he was born of the buzz of a troubled ear, + coming of a disordered brain, consequent necessarily upon a disorderly + stomach, that might protest a degree of comparative innocence, but would + be shamed utterly under inspection of the eye of a lady of principle. + </p> + <p> + What, then, was the value to his country of a servant who could not + accurately recollect his master’s words! Miss Graves within him asked the + rapid little man, whether indeed his ideas were his own after draughts of + champagne. + </p> + <p> + The ideas, excited to an urgent animation by his racing trot, were a + quiverful in flight over an England terrible to the foe and dancing on the + green. Right so: but would we keep up the dance, we must be red iron to + touch: and the fighter for conquering is the one who can last and has the + open brain;—and there you have a point against alcohol. Yes, and + Miss Graves, if she would press it, with her natural face, could be + pleasant and persuasive: and she ought to be told she ought to marry, for + the good of the country. Women taking liquor: Skepsey had a vision of his + wife with rheumy peepers and miauly mouth, as he had once beheld the + creature:—Oh! they need discipline not such would we have for the + mothers of our English young. Decidedly the women of principle are bound + to enter wedlock; they should be bound by law. Whereas, in the opposing + case—the binding of the unprincipled to a celibate state—such + a law would have saved Skepsey from the necessitated commission of deeds + of discipline with one of the female sex, and have rescued his progeny + from a likeness to the corn-stalk reverting to weed. He had but a son for + England’s defence; and the frame of his boy might be set quaking by a + thump on the wind of a drum; the courage of William Barlow Skepsey would + not stand against a sheep; it would wind-up hares to have a run at him out + in the field. Offspring of a woman of principle!... but there is no + rubbing out in life: why dream of it? Only that one would not have one’s + country the loser! + </p> + <p> + Dwell a moment on the reverse—and first remember the lesson of the + Captivity of the Jews and the outcry of their backsliding and repentance:—see + a nation of the honourably begotten; muscular men disdaining the luxuries + they will occasionally condescend to taste, like some tribe in Greece; + boxers, rowers, runners, climbers; braced, indomitable; magnanimous, as + only the strong can be; an army at word, winning at a stroke the double + battle of the hand and the heart: men who can walk the paths through the + garden of the pleasures. They receive fitting mates, of a build to promise + or aid in ensuring depth of chest and long reach of arm for their progeny. + </p> + <p> + Down goes the world before them. + </p> + <p> + And we see how much would be due for this to a corps of ladies like Miss + Graves, not allowed to remain too long on the stalk of spinsterhood. Her + age might count twenty-eight: too long! She should be taught that men can, + though truly ordinary women cannot, walk these orderly paths through the + garden. An admission to women, hinting restrictions, on a ticket marked + ‘in moderation’ (meaning, that they may pluck a flower or fruit along the + pathway border to which they are confined), speedily, alas, exhibits them + at a mad scramble across the pleasure-beds. They know not moderation. + Neither for their own sakes nor for the sakes of Posterity will they hold + from excess, when they are not pledged to shun it. + </p> + <p> + The reason is, that their minds cannot conceive the abstract, as men do. + </p> + <p> + But there are grounds for supposing that the example before them of a sex + exercising self-control in freedom, would induce women to pledge + themselves to a similar abnegation, until they gain some sense of touch + upon the impalpable duty to the generations coming after us thanks to the + voluntary example we set them. + </p> + <p> + The stupendous task, which had hitherto baffled Skepsey in the course of + conversational remonstrances with his wife;—that of getting the Idea + of Posterity into the understanding of its principal agent, might then be + mastered. + </p> + <p> + Therefore clearly men have to begin the salutary movement: it manifestly + devolves upon them. Let them at once take to rigorous physical training. + Women under compulsion, as vessels: men in their magnanimity, + patriotically, voluntarily. + </p> + <p> + Miss Graves must have had an intimation for him; he guessed it; and it + plunged him into a conflict with her, that did not suffer him to escape + without ruefully feeling the feebleness of his vocabulary: and + consequently he made a reluctant appeal to figures, and it hung upon the + bolder exhibition of lists and tables as to whether he was beaten; and if + beaten, he was morally her captive; and this being the case, nothing could + be more repulsive to Skepsey; seeing that he, unable of his nature + passively or partially to undertake a line of conduct, beheld himself + wearing a detestable ‘ribbon,’ for sign of an oath quite needlessly sworn + (simply to satisfy the lady overcoming him with nimbler tongue), and + blocking the streets, marching in bands beneath banners, howling hymns. + </p> + <p> + Statistics, upon which his master and friends, after exchanging opinions + in argument, always fell back, frightened him. As long as they had no + opponents of their own kind, they swept the field, they were intelligible, + as the word ‘principle’ had become. But the appearance of one body of + Statistics invariably brought up another; and the strokes and + counterstrokes were like a play of quarter-staff on the sconce, to knock + all comprehension out of Skepsey. Otherwise he would not unwillingly have + inquired to-morrow into the Statistics of the controversy between the + waters of the wells and of the casks, prepared to walk over to the + victorious, however objectionable that proceeding. He hoped to question + his master some day except that his master would very naturally have a + tendency to sum-up in favour of wine—good wine, in moderation; just + as Miss Graves for the cup of tea—not so thoughtfully stipulating + that it should be good and not too copious. Statistics are according to + their conjurors; they are not independent bodies, with native colours; + they needs must be painted by the different hands they pass through, and + they may be multiplied; a nought or so counts for nothing with the teller. + Skepsey saw that. Yet they can overcome: even as fictitious battalions, + they can overcome. He shrank from the results of a ciphering match having + him for object, and was ashamed of feeling to Statistics as women to + giants; nevertheless he acknowledged that the badge was upon him, if Miss + Graves should beat her master in her array of figures, to insist on his + wearing it, as she would, she certainly would. And against his internal + conviction perhaps; with the knowledge that the figures were an + unfortified display, and his oath of bondage an unmanly servility, the + silliest of ceremonies! He was shockingly feminine to Statistics. + </p> + <p> + Mr. Durance despised them: he called them, arguing against Mr. Radnor, + ‘those emotional things,’ not comprehensibly to Skepsey. But Mr. Durance, + a very clever gentleman, could not be right in everything. He made strange + remarks upon his country. Dr. Yatt attributed them to the state of ‘his + digestion. + </p> + <p> + And Mr. Fenellan had said of Mr. Durance that, as ‘a barrister wanting + briefs, the speech in him had been bottled too long and was an overripe + wine dripping sour drops through the rotten cork.’ Mr. Fenellan said it + laughing, he meant no harm. Skepsey was sure he had the words. He heard no + more than other people hear; he remembered whole sentences, and many: on + one of his runs, this active little machine, quickened by motion to fire, + revived the audible of years back; whatever suited his turn of mind at the + moment rushed to the rapid wheels within him. His master’s business and + friends, his country’s welfare and advancement, these, with records, + items, anticipations, of the manlier sports to decorate, were his current + themes; all being chopped and tossed and mixed in salad accordance by his + fervour of velocity. And if you would like a further definition of Genius, + think of it as a form of swiftness. It is the lively young great-grandson, + in the brain, of the travelling force which mathematicians put to paper, + in a row of astounding ciphers, for the motion of earth through space; to + the generating of heat, whereof is multiplication, whereof deposited + matter, and so your chaos, your half-lighted labyrinth, your, ceaseless + pressure to evolvement; and then Light, and so Creation, order, the work + of Genius. What do you say? + </p> + <p> + Without having a great brain, the measure of it possessed by Skepsey was + alive under strong illumination. In his heart, while doing penance for his + presumptuousness, he believed that he could lead regiments of men. He was + not the army’s General, he was the General’s Lieutenant, now and then + venturing to suggest a piece of counsel to his Chief. On his own + particular drilled regiments, his Chief may rely; and on his knowledge of + the country of the campaign, roads, morasses, masking hills, dividing + rivers. He had mapped for himself mentally the battles of conquerors in + his favourite historic reading; and he understood the value of a plan, and + the danger of sticking to it, and the advantage of a big army for + flanking; and he manoeuvred a small one cunningly to make it a bolt at the + telling instant. Dartrey Fenellan had explained to him Frederick’s oblique + attack, Napoleon’s employment of the artillery arm preparatory to the + hurling of the cataract on the spot of weakness, Wellington’s parallel + march with Marmont up to the hour of the decisive cut through the latter + at Salamanca; and Skepsey treated his enemy to the like, deferentially + reporting the engagement to a Chief whom his modesty kept in eminence, for + the receiving of the principal honours. As to his men, of all classes and + sorts, they are so supple with training that they sustain a defeat like + the sturdy pugilist a knock off his legs, and up smiling a minute after—one + of the truly beautiful sights on this earth! They go at the double half a + day, never sounding a single pair of bellows among them. They have their + appetites in full control, to eat when they can, or cheerfully fast. They + have healthy frames, you see; and as the healthy frame is not artificially + heated, it ensues that, under any title you like, they profess the + principles—into the bog we go, we have got round to it!—the + principles of those horrible marching and chanting people! + </p> + <p> + Then, must our England, to be redoubtable to the enemy, be a detestable + country for habitation? + </p> + <p> + Here was a knot. + </p> + <p> + Skepsey’s head dropped lower, he went as a ram. The sayings of Mr. Durance + about his dear England: that ‘her remainder of life is in the activity of + her diseases’—that ‘she has so fed upon Pap of Compromise as to be + unable any longer to conceive a muscular resolution’: that ‘she is + animated only as the carcase to the blow-fly’; and so forth:—charged + on him during his wrestle with his problem. And the gentlemen had said, + had permitted himself to say, that our England’s recent history was a + provincial apothecary’s exhibition of the battle of bane and antidote. Mr. + Durance could hardly mean it. But how could one answer him when he spoke + of the torpor of the people, and of the succeeding Governments as a change + of lacqueys—or the purse-string’s lacqueys? He said, that Old + England has taken to the arm-chair for good, and thinks it her whole + business to pronounce opinions and listen to herself; and that, in the + face of an armed Europe, this great nation is living on sufferance. Oh! + </p> + <p> + Skepsey had uttered the repudiating exclamation. + </p> + <p> + ‘Feel quite up to it?’ he was asked by his neighbour. + </p> + <p> + The mover of armed hosts for the defence of the country sat in a + third-class carriage of the train, approaching the first of the stations + on the way to town. He was instantly up to the level of an external world, + and fell into give and take with a burly broad communicative man; located + in London, but born in the North, in view of Durham cathedral, as he + thanked his Lord; who was of the order of pork-butcher; which succulent + calling had carried him down to near upon the borders of Surrey and + Sussex, some miles beyond the new big house of a Mister whose name he had + forgotten, though he had heard it mentioned by an acquaintance interested + in the gentleman’s doings. But his object was to have a look at a rare + breed of swine, worth the journey; that didn’t run to fat so much as to + flavour, had longer legs, sharp snouts to plump their hams; over from + Spain, it seemed; and the gentleman owning them was for selling them, + finding them wild past correction. But the acquaintance mentioned, who was + down to visit t’ other gentleman’s big new edifice in workmen’s hands, had + a mother, who had been cook to a family, and was now widow of a cook’s + shop; ham, beef, and sausages, prime pies to order; and a good specimen + herself; and if ever her son saw her spirit at his bedside, there wouldn’t + be room for much else in that chamber—supposing us to keep our + shapes. But he was the right sort of son, anxious to push his mother’s + shop where he saw a chance, and do it cheap; and those foreign pigs, after + a disappointment to their importer, might be had pretty cheap, and were + accounted tasty. + </p> + <p> + Skepsey’s main thought was upon war: the man had discoursed of pigs. + </p> + <p> + He informed the man of his having heard from a scholar, that pigs had been + the cause of more bloody battles than any other animal. + </p> + <p> + How so? the pork-butcher asked, and said he was not much of a scholar, and + pigs might be provoking, but he had not heard they were a cause of strife + between man and man. For possession of them, Skepsey explained. Oh! + possession! Why, we’ve heard of bloody battles for the possession of + women! Men will fight for almost anything they care to get or call their + own, the pork-butcher said; and he praised Old England for avoiding war. + Skepsey nodded. How if war is forced on us? Then we fight. Suppose we are + not prepared?—We soon get that up. Skepsey requested him to state + the degree of resistance he might think he could bring against a pair of + skilful fists, in a place out of hearing of the police. + </p> + <p> + ‘Say, you!’ said the pork-butcher, and sharply smiled, for he was a man of + size. + </p> + <p> + ‘I would give you two minutes,’ rejoined Skepsey, eyeing him intently and + kindly: insomuch that it could be seen he was not in the conundrum vein. + </p> + <p> + ‘Rather short allowance, eh, master?’ said the bigger man. ‘Feel here’; he + straightened out his arm and doubled it, raising a proud bridge of muscle. + </p> + <p> + Skepsey performed the national homage to muscle. + </p> + <p> + ‘Twice that, would not help without the science,’ he remarked, and let his + arm be gripped in turn. + </p> + <p> + The pork-butcher’s throat sounded, as it were, commas and colons, + punctuations in his reflections, while he tightened fingers along the iron + lump. ‘Stringy. You’re a wiry one, no mistake.’ It was encomium. With the + ingrained contempt of size for a smallness that has not yet taught it the + prostrating lesson, he said: ‘Weight tells.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘In a wrestle,’ Skepsey admitted. ‘Allow me to say, you would not touch + me.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘And how do you know I’m not a trifle handy with the maulers myself?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘You will pardon me for saying, it would be worse for you if you were.’ + </p> + <p> + The pork-butcher was flung backward. ‘Are you a Professor, may I inquire?’ + </p> + <p> + Skepsey rejected the title. ‘I can engage to teach young men, upon a + proper observance of first principles.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘They be hanged!’ cried the ruffled pork-butcher. ‘Our best men never got + it out of books. Now, you tell me—you’ve got a spiflicating style of + talk about you—no brag, you tell me—course, the best man wins, + if you mean that: now, if I was one of ‘em, and I fetches you a bit of a + flick, how then? Would you be ready to step out with a real Professor?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘I should claim a fair field,’ was the answer, made in modesty. + </p> + <p> + ‘And you’d expect to whop me with they there principles of yours?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘I should expect to.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Bang me!’ was roared. After a stare at the mild little figure with the + fitfully dead-levelled large grey eyes in front of him, the pork-butcher + resumed: ‘Take you for the man you say you be, you’re just the man for my + friend Jam and me. He dearly loves to see a set-to, self the same. What + prettier? And if you would be so obliging some day as to favour us with a + display, we’d head a cap conformably, whether you’d the best of it, + according to your expectations, or t’ other way:—For there never was + shame in a jolly good licking as the song says: that is, if you take it + and make it appear jolly good. And find you an opponent meet and fit, + never doubt. Ever had the worse of an encounter, sir?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Often, Sir.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Well, that’s good. And it didn’t destroy your confidence?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Added to it, I hope.’ + </p> + <p> + At this point, it became a crying necessity for Skepsey to escape from an + area of boastfulness, into which he had fallen inadvertently; and he + hastened to apologize ‘for his personal reference,’ that was intended for + an illustration of our country caught unawares by a highly trained picked + soldiery, inferior in numbers to the patriotic levies, but sharp at the + edge and knowing how to strike. Measure the axe, measure the tree; and + which goes down first? + </p> + <p> + ‘Invasion, is it?—and you mean, we’re not to hit back?’ the + pork-butcher bellowed, and presently secured a murmured approbation from + an audience of three, that had begun to comprehend the dialogue, and + strengthened him in a manner to teach Skepsey the foolishness of ever + urging analogies of too extended a circle to close sharply on the mark. He + had no longer a chance, he was overborne, identified with the fated + invader, rolled away into the chops of the Channel, to be swallowed up + entire, and not a rag left of him, but John Bull tucking up his + shirtsleeves on the shingle beach, ready for a second or a third; crying + to them to come on. + </p> + <p> + Warmed by his Bullish victory, and friendly to the vanquished, the + pork-butcher told Skepsey he should like to see more of him, and + introduced himself on a card Benjamin Shaplow, not far from the Bank. + </p> + <p> + They parted at the Terminus, where three shrieks of an engine, sounding + like merry messages of the damned to their congeners in the anticipatory + stench of the cab-droppings above, disconnected sane hearing; perverted + it, no doubt. Or else it was the stamp of a particular name on his mind, + which impressed Skepsey, as he bored down the street and across the + bridge, to fancy in recollection, that Mr. Shaplow, when reiterating the + wish for self and friend to witness a display of his cunning with the + fists, had spoken the name of Jarniman. An unusual name yet more than one + Jarniman might well exist. And unlikely that a friend of the pork-butcher + would be the person whom Mr. Radnor first prohibited and then desired to + receive. It hardly mattered:—considering that the Dutch Navy did + really, incredible as it seems now, come sailing a good way up the River + Thames, into the very main artery of Old England. And what thought the + Tower of it? Skepsey looked at the Tower in sympathy, wondering whether + the Tower had seen those impudent Dutch a nice people at home, he had + heard. Mr. Shaplow’s Jarniman might actually be Mr. Radnor’s, he inclined + to think. At any rate he was now sure of the name. + </p> + <p> + <a name="link2HCH0011" id="link2HCH0011"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + CHAPTER XI. WHEREIN WE BEHOLD THE COUPLE JUSTIFIED OF LOVE HAVING SIGHT OF + THEIR SCOURGE + </h2> + <p> + Fenellan, in a musing exclamation, that was quite spontaneous, had put a + picture on the departing Skepsey, as observed from an end of the Lakelands + upper terrace-walk. + </p> + <p> + ‘Queer little water-wagtail it is!’ And Lady Grace Halley and Miss Graves + and Mrs. Cormyn, snugly silken dry ones, were so taken with the pretty + likeness after hearing Victor call the tripping dripping creature the + happiest man in England, that they nursed it in their minds for a Bewick + tailpiece to the chapter of a pleasant rural day. It imbedded the day in + an idea that it had been rural. + </p> + <p> + We are indebted almost for construction to those who will define us + briefly: we are but scattered leaves to the general comprehension of us + until such a work of binding and labelling is done. And should the + definition be not so correct as brevity pretends to make it at one stroke, + we are at least rendered portable; thus we pass into the conceptions of + our fellows, into the records, down to posterity. Anecdotes of England’s + happiest man were related, outlines of his personal history requested. His + nomination in chief among the traditionally very merry Islanders was + hardly borne out by the tale of his enchainment with a drunken yokefellow—unless + upon the Durance version of the felicity of his countrymen; still, the + water-wagtail carried it, Skepsey trotted into memories. Heroes conducted + up Fame’s temple-steps by ceremonious historians, who are studious, when + the platform is reached, of the art of setting them beneath the flambeau + of a final image, before thrusting them inside to be rivetted on their + pedestals, have an excellent chance of doing the same, let but the + provident narrators direct that image to paint the thing a moth-like + humanity desires, in the thing it shrinks from. Miss Priscilla Graves now + fastened her meditations upon Skepsey; and it was important to him. + </p> + <p> + Tobacco withdrew the haunting shadow of the Rev. Septimus Barmby from + Nesta. She strolled beside Louise de Seilles, to breathe sweet-sweet in + the dear friend’s ear and tell her she loved her. The presence of the + German had, without rousing animosity, damped the young Frenchwoman, even + to a revulsion when her feelings had been touched by hearing praise of her + France, and wounded by the subjects of the praise. She bore the national + scar, which is barely skin-clothing of a gash that will not heal since her + country was overthrown and dismembered. Colney Durance could excuse the + unreasonableness in her, for it had a dignity, and she controlled it, and + quietly suffered, trusting to the steady, tireless, concentrated aim of + her France. In the Gallic mind of our time, France appears as a + prematurely buried Glory, that heaves the mound oppressing breath and + cannot cease; and calls hourly, at times keenly, to be remembered, rescued + from the pain and the mould-spots of that foul sepulture. Mademoiselle and + Colney were friends, partly divided by her speaking once of revanche; + whereupon he assumed the chair of the Moralist, with its right to lecture, + and went over to the enemy; his talk savoured of a German. Our holding of + the balance, taking two sides, is incomprehensible to a people quivering + with the double wound to body and soul. She was of Breton blood. Cymric + enough was in Nesta to catch any thrill from her and join to her mood, if + it hung out a colour sad or gay, and was noble, as any mood of this dear + Louise would surely be. + </p> + <p> + Nataly was not so sympathetic. Only the Welsh and pure Irish are quick at + the feelings of the Celtic French. Nataly came of a Yorkshire stock; she + had the bravery, humaneness and generous temper of our civilized North, + and a taste for mademoiselle’s fine breeding, with a distaste for the + singular air of superiority in composure which it was granted to + mademoiselle to wear with an unassailable reserve when the roughness of + the commercial boor was obtrusive. She said of her to Colney, as they + watched the couple strolling by the lake below: ‘Nesta brings her out of + her frosts. I suppose it’s the presence of Dr. Schlesien. I have known it + the same after an evening of Wagner’s music.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Richard Wagner Germanized ridicule of the French when they were down,’ + said Colney. ‘She comes of a blood that never forgives.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘“Never forgives” is horrible to think of! I fancied you liked your + “Kelts,” as you call them.’ + </p> + <p> + Colney seized on a topic that shelved a less agreeable one that he saw + coming. ‘You English won’t descend to understand what does not resemble + you. The French are in a state of feverish patriotism. You refuse to treat + them for a case of fever. They are lopped of a limb: you tell them to be + at rest!’ + </p> + <p> + ‘You know I am fond of them.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘And the Kelts, as they are called, can’t and won’t forgive injuries; look + at Ireland, look at Wales, and the Keltic Scot. Have you heard them talk? + It happened in the year 1400: it’s alive to them as if it were yesterday. + Old History is as dead to the English as their first father. They beg for + the privilege of pulling the forelock to the bearers of the titles of the + men who took their lands from them and turn them to the uses of cattle. + The Saxon English had, no doubt, a heavier thrashing than any people + allowed to subsist ever received: you see it to this day; the crick of the + neck at the name of a lord is now concealed and denied, but they have it + and betray the effects; and it’s patent in their Journals, all over their + literature. Where it’s not seen, another blood’s at work. The Kelt won’t + accept the form of slavery. Let him be servile, supple, cunning, + treacherous, and to appearance time-serving, he will always remember his + day of manly independence and who robbed him: he is the poetic animal of + the races of modern men.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘You give him Pagan colours.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Natural colours. He does not offer the other cheek or turn his back to be + kicked after a knock to the ground. Instead of asking him to forgive, + which he cannot do, you must teach him to admire. A mercantile community + guided by Political Economy from the ledger to the banquet presided over + by its Dagon Capital, finds that difficult. However, there ‘s the secret + of him; that I respect in him. His admiration of an enemy or oppressor + doing great deeds, wins him entirely. He is an active spirit, not your + negative passive letter-of-Scripture Insensible. And his faults, short of + ferocity, are amusing.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘But the fits of ferocity!’ + </p> + <p> + ‘They are inconscient, real fits. They come of a hot nerve. He is + manageable, sober too, when his mind is charged. As to the French people, + they are the most mixed of any European nation; so they are packed with + contrasts: they are full of sentiment, they are sharply logical; + free-thinkers, devotees; affectionate, ferocious; frivolous, tenacious; + the passion of the season operating like sun or moon on these qualities; + and they can reach to ideality out of sensualism. Below your level, + they’re above it: a paradox is at home with them!’ + </p> + <p> + ‘My friend, you speak seriously—an unusual compliment,’ Nataly said, + and ungratefully continued: ‘You know what is occupying me. I want your + opinion. I guess it. I want to hear—a mean thirst perhaps, and you + would pay me any number of compliments to avoid the subject; but let me + hear:—this house!’ + </p> + <p> + Colney shrugged in resignation. ‘Victor works himself out,’ he replied. + </p> + <p> + ‘We are to go through it all again?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘If you have not the force to contain him.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘How contain him?’ + </p> + <p> + Up went Colney’s shoulders. + </p> + <p> + ‘You may see it all before you,’ he said, ‘straight as the Seine chaussee + from the hill of La Roche Guyon.’ + </p> + <p> + He looked for her recollection of the scene. + </p> + <p> + ‘Ah, the happy ramble that year!’ she cried. ‘And my Nesta just seven. We + had been six months at Craye. Every day of our life together looks happy + to me, looking back, though I know that every day had the same troubles. I + don’t think I’m deficient in courage; I think I could meet.... But the + false position so cruelly weakens me. I am no woman’s equal when I have to + receive or visit. It seems easier to meet the worst in life-danger, death, + anything. Pardon me for talking so. Perhaps we need not have left Craye or + Creckholt...?’ she hinted an interrogation. ‘Though I am not sorry; it is + not good to be where one tastes poison. Here it may be as deadly, worse. + Dear friend, I am so glad you remember La Roche Guyon. He was popular with + the dear French people.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘In spite of his accent.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘It is not so bad?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘And that you’ll defend!’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Consider: these neighbours we come among; they may have heard...’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Act on the assumption.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘You forget the principal character. Victor promises; he may have learnt a + lesson at Creckholt. But look at this house he has built. How can I—any + woman—contain him! He must have society.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Paraitre!’ + </p> + <p> + ‘He must be in the front. He has talked of Parliament.’ + </p> + <p> + Colney’s liver took the thrust of a skewer through it. He spoke as in + meditative encomium: ‘His entry into Parliament would promote himself and + family to a station of eminence naked over the Clock Tower of the House.’ + </p> + <p> + She moaned. ‘At the vilest, I cannot regret my conduct—bear what I + may. I can bear real pain: what kills me is, the suspicion. And I feel it + like a guilty wretch! And I do not feel the guilt! I should do the same + again, on reflection. I do believe it saved him. I do; oh! I do, I do. I + cannot expect my family to see with my eyes. You know them—my + brother and sisters think I have disgraced them; they put no value on my + saving him. It sounds childish; it is true. He had fallen into a terrible + black mood.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘He had an hour of gloom.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘An hour!’ + </p> + <p> + ‘But an hour, with him! It means a good deal.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Ah, friend, I take your words. He sinks terribly when he sinks at all.—Spare + us a little while.—We have to judge of what is good in the + circumstances: I hear your reply! But the principal for me to study is + Victor. You have accused me of being the voice of the enamoured woman. I + follow him, I know; I try to advise; I find it is wisdom to submit. My + people regard my behaviour as a wickedness or a madness. I did save him. I + joined my fate with his. I am his mate, to help, and I cannot oppose him, + to distract him. I do my utmost for privacy. He must entertain. Believe + me, I feel for them—sisters and brother. And now that my sisters are + married... My brother has a man’s hardness.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Colonel Dreighton did not speak harshly, at our last meeting.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘He spoke of me?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘He spoke in the tone of a brother.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Victor promises—I won’t repeat it. Yes, I see the house! There + appears to be a prospect, a hope—I cannot allude to it. Craye and + Creckholt may have been some lesson to him. Selwyn spoke of me kindly? Ah, + yes, it is the way with my people to pretend that Victor has been the ruin + of me, that they may come round to family sentiments. In the same way, his + relatives, the Duvidney ladies, have their picture of the woman misleading + him. Imagine me the naughty adventuress!’—Nataly falsified the + thought insurgent at her heart, in adding: ‘I do not say I am blameless.’ + It was a concession to the circumambient enemy, of whom even a good friend + was apart, and not better than a respectful emissary. The dearest of her + friends belonged to that hostile world. Only Victor, no other, stood with + her against the world. Her child, yes; the love of her child she had; but + the child’s destiny was an alien phantom, looking at her with harder eyes + than she had vision of in her family. She did not say she was blameless, + did not affect the thought. She would have wished to say, for small + encouragement she would have said, that her case could be pleaded. + </p> + <p> + Colney’s features were not inviting, though the expression was not + repellent. She sighed deeply; and to count on something helpful by + mentioning it, reverted to the ‘prospect’ which there appeared to be. + ‘Victor speaks of the certainty of his release.’ + </p> + <p> + His release! Her language pricked a satirist’s gallbladder. Colney + refrained from speaking to wound, and enjoyed a silence that did it. + </p> + <p> + ‘Do you see any possibility?—you knew her,’ she said coldly. + </p> + <p> + ‘Counting the number of times he has been expecting the release, he is + bound to believe it near at hand.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘You don’t?’ she asked: her bosom was up in a crisis of expectation for + the answer: and on a pause of half-a-minute, she could have uttered the + answer herself. + </p> + <p> + He perceived the insane eagerness through her mask, and despised it, + pitying the woman. ‘And you don’t,’ he said. ‘You catch at delusions, to + excuse the steps you consent to take. Or you want me to wear the blinkers, + the better to hoodwink your own eyes. You see it as well as I: If you + enter that house, you have to go through the same as at Creckholt:—and + he’ll be the first to take fright.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘He finds you in tears: he is immensely devoted; he flings up all to + protect “his Nataly.”’ + </p> + <p> + ‘No: you are unjust to him. He would fling up all:’— + </p> + <p> + ‘But his Nataly prefers to be dragged through fire? As you please!’ + </p> + <p> + She bowed to her chastisement. One motive in her consultation with him + came of the knowledge of his capacity to inflict it and his honesty in the + act, and a thirst she had to hear the truth loud-tongued from him; + together with a feeling that he was excessive and satiric, not to be read + by the letter of his words: and in consequence, she could bear the lash + from him, and tell her soul that he overdid it, and have an + unjustly-treated self to cherish.—But in very truth she was a woman + who loved to hear the truth; she was formed to love the truth her position + reduced her to violate; she esteemed the hearing it as medical to her; she + selected for counsellor him who would apply it: so far she went on the + straight way; and the desire for a sustaining deception from the mouth of + a trustworthy man set her hanging on his utterances with an anxious hope + of the reverse of what was to come and what she herself apprehended, such + as checked her pulses and iced her feet and fingers. The reason being, not + that she was craven or absurd or paradoxical, but that, living at an + intenser strain upon her nature than she or any around her knew, her + strength snapped, she broke down by chance there where Colney was rendered + spiteful in beholding the display of her inconsequent if not puling sex. + </p> + <p> + She might have sought his counsel on another subject, if a paralyzing + chill of her frame in the foreview of it had allowed her to speak: she + felt grave alarms in one direction, where Nesta stood in the eye of her + father; besides an unformed dread that the simplicity in generosity of + Victor’s nature was doomed to show signs of dross ultimately, under the + necessity he imposed upon himself to run out his forecasts, and scheme, + and defensively compel the world to serve his ends, for the protection of + those dear to him. + </p> + <p> + At night he was particularly urgent with her for the harmonious duet in + praise of Lakelands; and plied her with questions all round and about it, + to bring out the dulcet accord. He dwelt on his choice of costly marbles, + his fireplace and mantelpiece designs, the great hall, and suggestions for + imposing and beautiful furniture; concordantly enough, for the large, the + lofty and rich of colour won her enthusiasm; but overwhelmingly to any + mood of resistance; and strangely in a man who had of late been adopting, + as if his own, a modern tone, or the social and literary hints of it, + relating to the right uses of wealth, and the duty as well as the delight + of living simply. + </p> + <p> + ‘Fredi was pleased.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Yes, she was, dear.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘She is our girl, my love. “I could live and die here!” Live, she may. + There’s room enough.’ + </p> + <p> + Nataly saw the door of a covert communication pointed at in that remark. + She gathered herself for an effort to do battle. + </p> + <p> + ‘She’s quite a child, Victor.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘The time begins to run. We have to look forward now:—I declare, + it’s I who seem the provident mother for Fredi!’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Let our girl wait; don’t hurry her mind to... She is happy with her + father and mother. She is in the happiest time of her life, before those + feelings distract.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘If we see good fortune for her, we can’t let it pass her.’ + </p> + <p> + A pang of the resolution now to debate the case with Victor, which would + be of necessity to do the avoided thing and roll up the forbidden curtain + opening on their whole history past and prospective, was met in Nataly’s + bosom by the more bitter immediate confession that she was not his match. + To speak would be to succumb; and shamefully after the effort; and + hopelessly after being overborne by him. There was not the anticipation of + a set contest to animate the woman’s naturally valiant heart; he was too + strong: and his vividness in urgency overcame her in advance, fascinated + her sensibility through recollection; he fanned an inclination, lighted it + to make it a passion, a frenzied resolve—she remembered how and + when. She had quivering cause to remember the fateful day of her step, in + a letter received that morning from a married sister, containing no word + of endearment or proposal for a meeting. An unregretted day, if Victor + would think of the dues to others; that is, would take station with the + world to see his reflected position, instead of seeing it through their + self-justifying knowledge of the honourable truth of their love, and + pressing to claim and snatch at whatsoever the world bestows on its + orderly subjects. + </p> + <p> + They had done evil to no one as yet. Nataly thought that; not-withstanding + the outcry of the ancient and withered woman who bore Victor Radnor’s + name: for whom, in consequence of the rod the woman had used, this + tenderest of hearts could summon no emotion. If she had it, the thing was + not to be hauled up to consciousness. Her feeling was, that she forgave + the wrinkled Malignity: pity and contrition dissolving in the effort to + produce the placable forgiveness. She was frigid because she knew rightly + of herself, that she in the place of power would never have struck so + meanly. But the mainspring of the feeling in an almost remorseless bosom + drew from certain chance expressions of retrospective physical distaste on + Victor’s part;—hard to keep from a short utterance between the + nuptial two, of whom the unshamed exuberant male has found the sweet + reverse in his mate, a haven of heavenliness, to delight in:—these + conjoined with a woman’s unspoken pleading ideas of her own, on her own + behalf, had armed her jealously in vindication of Nature. + </p> + <p> + Now, as long as they did no palpable wrong about them, Nataly could argue + her case in her conscience—deep down and out of hearing, where women + under scourge of the laws they have not helped decree may and do deliver + their minds. She stood in that subterranean recess for Nature against the + Institutions of Man: a woman little adapted for the post of revel; but to + this, by the agency of circumstances, it had come; she who was designed by + nature to be an ornament of those Institutions opposed them and when + thinking of the rights and the conduct of the decrepit Legitimate—virulent + in a heathen vindictiveness declaring itself holy—she had Nature’s + logic, Nature’s voice, for self-defence. It was eloquent with her, to the + deafening of other voices in herself, even to the convincing of herself, + when she was wrought by the fires within to feel elementally. The other + voices within her issued of the acknowledged dues to her family and to the + world—the civilization protecting women: sentences thereanent in + modern books and Journals. But the remembrance of moods of fiery + exaltation, when the Nature she called by name of Love raised the chorus + within to stop all outer buzzing, was, in a perpetual struggle with a + whirlpool, a constant support while she and Victor were one at heart. The + sense of her standing alone made her sway; and a thought of differences + with him caused frightful apprehensions of the abyss. + </p> + <p> + Luxuriously she applied to his public life for witness that he had + governed wisely as well as affectionately so long; and he might therefore, + with the chorussing of the world of public men, expect a woman blindfold + to follow his lead. But no; we may be rebels against our time and its + Laws: if we are really for Nature, we are not lawless. Nataly’s untutored + scruples, which came side by side with her ability to plead for her acts, + restrained her from complicity in the ensnaring of a young man of social + rank to espouse the daughter of a couple socially insurgent-stained, to + common thinking, should denunciation come. The Nature upholding her fled + at a vision of a stranger entangled. Pitiable to reflect, that he was not + one of the adventurer-lords of prey who hunt and run down shadowed + heiresses and are congratulated on their luck in a tolerating country! How + was the young man to be warned? How, under the happiest of suppositions, + propitiate his family! And such a family, if consenting with knowledge, + would consent only for the love of money. It was angling with as vile a + bait as the rascal lord’s. Humiliation hung on the scheme; it struck to + scorching in the contemplation of it. And it darkened her reading of + Victor’s character. + </p> + <p> + She did not ask for the specification of a ‘good fortune that might pass’; + wishing to save him from his wonted twists of elusiveness, and herself + with him from the dread discussion it involved upon one point. + </p> + <p> + ‘The day was pleasant to all, except perhaps poor mademoiselle,’ she said. + </p> + <p> + ‘Peridon should have come?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Present or absent, his chances are not brilliant, I fear.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘And Pempton and Priscy!’ + </p> + <p> + ‘They are growing cooler!’ + </p> + <p> + ‘With their grotesque objections to one another’s habits at table!’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Can we ever hope to get them over it?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘When Priscy drinks Port and Pempton munches beef, Colney says.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘I should say, when they feel warmly enough to think little of their + differences.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Fire smoothes the creases, yes; and fire is what they’re both wanting in. + Though Priscy has Concert-pathos in her voice:—couldn’t act a bit! + And Pempton’s ‘cello tones now and then have gone through me—simply + from his fiddle-bow, I believe. Don’t talk to me of feeling in a couple, + within reach of one another and sniffing objections.—Good, then, for + a successful day to-day so far?’ + </p> + <p> + He neared her, wooing her; and she assented, with a franker smile than she + had worn through the day. + </p> + <p> + The common burden on their hearts—the simple discussion to come of + the task of communicating dire actualities to their innocent Nesta—was + laid aside. + </p> + <p> + <a name="link2HCH0012" id="link2HCH0012"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + CHAPTER XII. TREATS OF THE DUMBNESS POSSIBLE WITH MEMBERS OF A HOUSEHOLD + HAVING ONE HEART + </h2> + <p> + Two that live together in union are supposed to be intimate on every leaf. + Particularly when they love one another and the cause they have at heart + is common to them in equal measure, the uses of a cordial familiarity + forbid reserves upon important matters between them, as we think; not + thinking of an imposed secretiveness, beneath the false external of + submissiveness, which comes of an experience of repeated inefficiency to + maintain a case in opposition, on the part of the loquently weaker of the + pair. In Constitutional Kingdoms a powerful Government needs not to be + tyrannical to lean oppressively; it is more serviceable to party than + agreeable to country; and where the alliance of men and women binds a + loving couple, of whom one is a torrent of persuasion, their differings + are likely to make the other resemble a log of the torrent. It is borne + along; it dreams of a distant corner of the way for a determined stand; it + consents to its whirling in anticipation of an undated hour when it will + no longer be neutral. + </p> + <p> + There may be, moreover, while each has the key of the fellow breast, a + mutually sensitive nerve to protest against intrusion of light or sound. + The cloud over the name of their girl could now strike Nataly and Victor + dumb in their taking of counsel. She divined that his hint had encouraged + him to bring the crisis nearer, and he that her comprehension had become + tremblingly awake. They shrank, each of them, the more from an end drawing + closely into view. All subjects glooming off or darkening up to it were + shunned by them verbally, and if they found themselves entering beneath + that shadow, conversation passed to an involuntary gesture, more explicit + with him, significant of the prohibited, though not acknowledging it. + </p> + <p> + All the stronger was it Victor’s purpose, leaping in his fashion to the + cover of action as an escape from perplexity, to burn and scheme for the + wedding of their girl—the safe wedding of that dearest, to have her + protected, secure, with the world warm about her. And he well knew why his + Nataly had her look of a closed vault (threatening, if opened, to thunder + upon Life) when he dropped his further hints. He chose to call it feminine + inconsistency, in a woman who walked abroad with a basket of marriage-ties + for the market on her arm. He knew that she would soon have to speak the + dark words to their girl; and the idea of any doing of it, caught at his + throat. Reasonably she dreaded the mother’s task; pardonably indeed. But + it is for the mother to do, with a girl. He deputed it lightly to the + mother because he could see himself stating the facts to a son. ‘And, my + dear boy, you will from this day draw your five thousand a year, and we + double it on the day of your marriage, living at Lakelands or where you + will.’ + </p> + <p> + His desire for his girl’s protection by the name of one of our great + Families, urged him to bind Nataly to the fact, with the argument, that it + was preferable for the girl to hear their story during her green early + youth, while she reposed her beautiful blind faith in the discretion of + her parents, and as an immediate step to the placing of her hand in a + husband’s. He feared that her mother required schooling to tell the story + vindicatingly and proudly, in a manner to distinguish instead of degrading + or temporarily seeming to accept degradation. + </p> + <p> + The world would weigh on her confession of the weight of the world on her + child; she would want inciting and strengthening, if one judged of her + capacity to meet the trial by her recent bearing; and how was he to do it! + He could not imagine himself encountering the startled, tremulous, nascent + intelligence in those pure brown darklashed eyes of Nesta; he pitied the + poor mother. Fancifully directing her to say this and that to the girl, + his tongue ran till it was cut from his heart and left to wag dead + colourless words. + </p> + <p> + The prospect of a similar business of exposition, certainly devolving upon + the father in treaty with the fortunate youth, gripped at his vitals a + minute, so intense was his pride in appearing woundless and scarless, a + shining surface, like pure health’s, in the sight of men. Nevertheless he + skimmed the story, much as a lecturer strikes his wand on the prominent + places of a map, that is to show us how he arrived at the principal point, + which we are all agreed to find chiefly interesting. This with Victor was + the naming of Nesta’s bridal endowment. He rushed to it. ‘My girl will + have ten thousand a year settled on her the day of her marriage.’ Choice + of living at Lakelands was offered. + </p> + <p> + It helped him over the unpleasant part of that interview. At the same + time, it moved him to a curious contempt of the youth. He had to + conjure-up an image of the young man in person, to correct the sentiment:—and + it remained as a kind of bruise only half cured. + </p> + <p> + Mr. Dudley Sowerby was not one of the youths whose presence would rectify + such an abstract estimate of the genus pursuer. He now came frequently of + an evening, to practise a duet for flutes with Victor;—a Mercadante, + honeyed and flowing; too honeyed to suit a style that, as Fenellan + characterized it to Nataly, went through the music somewhat like an + inquisitive tourist in a foreign town, conscientious to get to the end of + the work of pleasure; until the notes had become familiar, when it rather + resembled a constable’s walk along the midnight streets into collision + with a garlanded roysterer; and the man of order and the man of passion, + true to the measure though they were, seeming to dissent, almost to + wrangle, in their different ways of winding out the melody, on to the last + movement; which was plainly a question between home to the strayed + reveller’s quarters or off to the lockup. Victor was altogether the + younger of the two. But his vehement accompaniment was a tutorship; Mr. + Sowerby improved; it was admitted by Nesta and mademoiselle that he gained + a show of feeling; he had learnt that feeling was wanted. Passion, he had + not a notion of: otherwise he would not be delaying; the interview, + dramatized by the father of the young bud of womanhood, would be taking + place, and the entry into Lakelands calculable, for Nataly’s comfort, as + under the aegis of the Cantor earldom. Gossip flies to a wider circle + round the members of a great titled family, is inaudible; or no longer the + diptherian whisper the commonalty hear of the commonalty: and so we see + the social uses of our aristocracy survive. We do not want the shield of + any family; it is the situation that wants it; Nataly ought to be awake to + the fact. One blow and we have silenced our enemy: Nesta’s wedding-day has + relieved her parents. + </p> + <p> + Victor’s thoughts upon the instrument for striking that, blow, led him to + suppose Mr. Sowerby might be meditating on the extent of the young lady’s + fortune. He talked randomly of money, in a way to shatter Nataly’s + conception of him. He talked of City affairs at table, as it had been his + practice to shun the doing; and hit the resounding note on mines, which + have risen in the market like the crest of a serpent, casting a certain + spell upon the mercantile understanding. ‘Fredi’s diamonds from her own + mine, or what once was—and she still reserves a share,’ were to be + shown to Mr. Sowerby. + </p> + <p> + Nataly respected the young fellow for not displaying avidity at the + flourish of the bait, however it might be affecting him; and she fancied + that he did laboriously, in his way earnestly, study her girl, to sound + for harmony between them, previous to a wooing. She was a closer reader of + social character than Victor; from refraining to run on the broad lines + which are but faintly illustrative of the individual one in being common + to all—unless we have hit by chance on an example of the downright + in roguery or folly or simple goodness. Mr. Sowerby’g bearing to Nesta was + hardly warmed by the glitter of diamonds. His next visit showed him + livelier in courtliness, brighter, fresher; but that was always his way at + the commencement of every visit, as if his reflections on the foregone had + come to a satisfactory conclusion; and the labours of the new study of the + maiden ensued again in due course to deaden him. + </p> + <p> + Gentleman he was. In the recognition of his quality as a man of principle + and breeding, Nataly was condemned by thoughts of Nesta’s future to + question whether word or act of hers should, if inclination on both sides + existed, stand between her girl and a true gentleman. She counselled + herself, as if the counsel were in requisition, to be passive; and so + doing, she more acutely than Victor—save in his chance flashes—discerned + the twist of her very nature caused by their false position. And her + panacea for ills, the lost little cottage, would not have averted it: she + would there have had the same coveting desire to name a man of breeding, + honour, station, for Nesta’s husband. Perhaps in the cottage, choosing at + leisure, her consent to see the brilliant young creature tied to the best + of dull men would have been unready, without the girl to push it. For the + Hon. Dudley was lamentably her pupil in liveliness; he took the second + part, as it is painful for a woman with the old-fashioned ideas upon the + leading of the sexes to behold; resembling in his look the deaf, who + constantly require to have an observation repeated; resembling the most + intelligent of animals, which we do not name, and we reprove ourselves for + seeing likeness. + </p> + <p> + Yet the likeness or apparent likeness would suggest that we have not so + much to fear upon the day of the explanation to him. Some gain is there. + Shameful thought! Nataly hastened her mind to gather many instances or + indications testifying to the sterling substance in young Mr. Sowerby, + such as a mother would pray for her son-in-law to possess. She discovered + herself feeling as the burdened mother, not providently for her girl, in + the choice of a mate. The perception was clear, and not the less did she + continue working at the embroidery of Mr. Sowerby on the basis of his + excellent moral foundations, all the while hoping, praying, that he might + not be lured on to the proposal for Nesta. But her subservience to the + power of the persuasive will in Victor—which was like the rush of a + conflagration—compelled her to think realizingly of any scheme he + allowed her darkly to read. + </p> + <p> + Opposition to him, was comparable to the stand of blocks of timber before + flame. Colney Durance had done her the mischief we take from the pessimist + when we are overweighted: in darkening the vision of external aid from man + or circumstance to one who felt herself mastered. Victor could make her + treacherous to her wishes, in revolt against them, though the heart + protested. His first conquest of her was in her blood, to weaken a spirit + of resistance. For the precedent of submission is a charm upon the + faint-hearted through love: it unwinds, unwills them. Nataly resolved + fixedly, that there must be a day for speaking; and she had her moral + sustainment in the resolve; she had also a tormenting consciousness of + material support in the thought, that the day was not present, was + possibly distant, might never arrive. Would Victor’s release come sooner? + And that was a prospect bearing resemblance to hopes of the cure of a + malady through a sharp operation. + </p> + <p> + These were matters going on behind the curtain; as wholly vital to her, + and with him at times almost as dominant, as the spiritual in memory, when + flesh has left but its shining track in dust of a soul outwritten; and all + their talk related to the purchase of furniture, the expeditions to + Lakelands, music, public affairs, the pardonable foibles of friends + created to amuse their fellows, operatic heroes and heroines, exhibitions + of pictures, the sorrows of Crowned Heads, so serviceable ever to mankind + as an admonition to the ambitious, a salve to the envious!—in fine, + whatsoever can entertain or affect the most social of couples, + domestically without a care to appearance. And so far they partially—dramatically—deceived + themselves by imposing on the world while they talked and duetted; for the + purchase of furniture from a flowing purse is a cheerful occupation; also + a City issuing out of hospital, like this poor City of London, inspires + good citizens to healthy activity. But the silence upon what they were + most bent on, had the sinister effect upon Victor, of obscuring his mental + hold of the beloved woman, drifting her away from him. In communicating + Fenellan’s news through the lawyer Carling of Mrs. Burman’s intentions, he + was aware that there was an obstacle to his being huggingly genial, even + candidly genial with her, until he could deal out further news, + corroborative and consecutive, to show the action of things as + progressive. Fenellan had sunk into his usual apathy:—and might + plead the impossibility of his moving faster than the woman professing to + transform herself into, beneficence out of malignity;—one could hear + him saying the words! Victor had not seen him since last Concert evening, + and he deemed it as well to hear the words Fenellan’s mouth had to say. He + called at an early hour of the Westward tidal flow at the Insurance Office + looking over the stormy square of the first of Seamen. + </p> + <p> + <a name="link2HCH0013" id="link2HCH0013"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + CHAPTER XIII. THE LATEST OF MRS. BURMAN + </h2> + <p> + After cursory remarks about the business of the Office and his friend’s + contributions to periodical literature, in which he was interested for as + long as he had assurance that the safe income depending upon official + duties was not endangered by them, Victor kicked his heels to and fro. + Fenellan waited for him to lead. + </p> + <p> + ‘Have you seen that man, her lawyer, again?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘I have dined with Mr. Carling:—capital claret.’ + </p> + <p> + Emptiness was in the reply. + </p> + <p> + Victor curbed himself and said: ‘By the way, you’re not likely to have + dealings with Blathenoy. The fellow has a screw to the back of a shifty + eye; I see it at work to fix the look for business. I shall sit on the + Board of my Bank. One hears things. He lives in style at Wrensham. By the + way, Fredi has little Mab Mountney from Creckholt staying with her. You + said of little Mabsy—“Here she comes into the room all pink and + white, like a daisy.” She’s the daisy still; reminds us of our girl at + that age.—So, then, we come to another dead block!’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Well, no; it’s a chemist’s shop, if that helps us on,’ said Fenellan, + settling to a new posture in his chair. ‘She’s there of an afternoon for + hours.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘You mean it’s she?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘The lady. I ‘ll tell you. I have it from Carling, worthy man; and lawyers + can be brought to untruss a point over a cup of claret. He’s a bit of a + “Mackenzie Man,” as old aunts of mine used to say at home—a Man of + Feeling. Thinks he knows the world, from having sifted and sorted a lot of + our dustbins; as the modern Realists imagine it’s an exposition of + positive human nature when they’ve pulled down our noses to the worst + parts—if there’s a worse where all are useful: but the Realism of + the dogs is to have us by the nose:—excite it and befoul it, and + you’re fearfully credible! You don’t read that olfactory literature. + However, friend Carling is a conciliatory carle. Three or four days of the + week the lady, he says, drives to her chemist’s, and there she sits in the + shop; round the corner, as you enter; and sees all Charing in the shop + looking-glass at the back; herself a stranger spectacle, poor lady, if + Carling’s picture of her is not overdone; with her fashionable no-bonnet + striding the contribution chignon on the crown, and a huge square green + shade over her forehead. Sits hours long, and cocks her ears at orders of + applicants for drugs across the counter, and sometimes catches wind of a + prescription, and consults her chemist, and thinks she ‘ll try it herself. + It’s a basket of medicine bottles driven to Regent’s Park pretty well + every day.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Ha! Regent’s Park!’ exclaimed Victor, and shook at recollections of the + district and the number of the house, dismal to him. London buried the + woman deep until a mention of her sent her flaring over London. ‘A + chemist’s shop! She sits there?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Mrs. Burman. We pass by the shop.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘She had always a turn for drugs.—Not far from here, did you say? + And every day! under a green shade?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Dear fellow, don’t be suggesting ballads; we’ll go now,’ said Fenellan. + ‘It ‘s true it’s like sitting on the banks of the Stygian waters.’ + </p> + <p> + He spied at an obsequious watch, that told him it was time to quit the + office. + </p> + <p> + ‘You’ve done nothing?’ Victor asked in a tone of no expectation. + </p> + <p> + ‘Only to hear that her latest medical man is Themison.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Where did you hear?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Across the counter of Boyle and Luckwort, the lady’s chemists. I called + the day before yesterday, after you were here at our last Board Meeting.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘The Themison?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘The great Dr. Themison; who kills you kindlier than most, and is much in + request for it.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘There’s one of your echoes of Colney!’ Victor cried. ‘One gets dead sick + of that worn-out old jibeing at doctors. They don’t kill, you know very + well. It ‘s not to their interest to kill. They may take the relish out of + life; and upon my word, I believe that helps to keep the patient living!’ + </p> + <p> + Fenellan sent an eye of discreet comic penetration travelling through his + friend. + </p> + <p> + ‘The City’s mending; it’s not the weary widow woman of the day when we + capsized the diurnal with your royal Old Veuve,’ he said, as they trod the + pavement. ‘Funny people, the English! They give you all the primeing + possible for amusement and jollity, and devil a sentry-box for the + exercise of it; and if you shake a leg publicly, partner or not, you’re + marched off to penitence. I complain, that they have no philosophical + appreciation of human nature.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘We pass the shop?’ Victor interrupted him. + </p> + <p> + ‘You’re in view of it in a minute. And what a square, for recreative + dancing! And what a people, to be turning it into a place of political + agitation! And what a country, where from morning to night it’s an endless + wrangle about the first conditions of existence! Old Colney seems right + now and then: they ‘re the offspring of pirates, and they ‘ve got the + manners and tastes of their progenitors, and the trick of quarrelling + everlastingly over the booty. I ‘d have band-music here for a couple of + hours, three days of the week at the least; and down in the East; and that + forsaken North quarter of London; and the Baptist South too. But just as + those omnibus-wheels are the miserable music of this London of ours, it ‘s + only too sadly true that the people are in the first rumble of the notion + of the proper way to spend their lives. Now you see the shop: Boyle and + Luckwort: there.’ + </p> + <p> + Victor looked. He threw his coat open, and pulled the waistcoat, and + swelled it, ahemming. ‘That shop?’ said he. And presently: ‘Fenellan, I’m + not superstitious, I think. Now listen; I declare to you, on the day of + our drinking Old Veuve together last—you remember it,—I walked + home up this way across the square, and I was about to step into that + identical shop, for some household prescription in my pocket, having + forgotten Nataly’s favourite City chemists Fenbird and Jay, when—I’m + stating a fact—I distinctly—I ‘m sure of the shop—felt + myself plucked back by the elbow; pulled back the kind of pull when you + have to put a foot backward to keep your equilibrium.’ + </p> + <p> + So does memory inspired by the sensations contribute an additional item + for the colouring of history. + </p> + <p> + He touched the elbow, showed a flitting face of crazed amazement in + amusement, and shrugged and half-laughed, dismissing the incident, as + being perhaps, if his hearer chose to have it so, a gem of the rubbish + tumbled into the dustcart out of a rather exceptional householder’s + experience. + </p> + <p> + Fenellan smiled indulgently. ‘Queer things happen. I recollect reading in + my green youth of a clergyman, who mounted a pulpit of the port where he + was landed after his almost solitary rescue from a burning ship at + midnight in mid-sea, to inform his congregation, that he had overnight of + the catastrophe a personal Warning right in his ear from a Voice, when at + his bed or bunk-side, about to perform the beautiful ceremony of + undressing: and the Rev. gentleman was to lie down in his full uniform, + not so much as to relieve himself of his boots, the Voice insisted twice; + and he obeyed it, despite the discomfort to his poor feet; and he jumped + up in his boots to the cry of Fire, and he got them providentially over + the scuffling deck straight at the first rush into the boat awaiting them, + and had them safe on and polished the day he preached the sermon of + gratitude for the special deliverance. There was a Warning! and it might + well be called, as he called it, from within. We’re cared for, never + doubt. Aide-toi. Be ready dressed to help yourself in a calamity, or + you’ll not stand in boots at your next Sermon, contrasting with the burnt. + That sounds like the moral.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘She could have seen me,’ Victor threw out an irritable suggestion. The + idea of the recent propinquity set hatred in motion. + </p> + <p> + ‘Scarcely likely. I’m told she sits looking on her lap, under the beetling + shade, until she hears an order for tinctures or powders, or a mixture + that strikes her fancy. It’s possible to do more suicidal things than sit + the afternoons in a chemist’s shop and see poor creatures get their + different passports to Orcus.’ + </p> + <p> + Victor stepped mutely beneath the windows of the bellied glass-urns of + chemical wash. The woman might be inside there now! She might have seen + his figure in the shop-mirror! And she there! The wonder of it all seemed + to be, that his private history was not walking the streets. The thinness + of the partition concealing it, hardly guaranteed a day’s immunity: + because this woman would live in London, in order to have her choice of a + central chemist’s shop, where she could feed a ghastly imagination on the + various recipes... and while it would have been so much healthier for her + to be living in a recess of the country! + </p> + <p> + He muttered: ‘Diseases—drugs!’ + </p> + <p> + Those were the corresponding two strokes of the pendulum which kept the + woman going. + </p> + <p> + ‘And deadly spite.’ That was the emanation of the monotonous horrible + conflict, for which, and by which, the woman lived. + </p> + <p> + In the neighbourhood of the shop, he could not but think of her through + the feelings of a man scorched by a furnace. + </p> + <p> + A little further on, he said: ‘Poor soul!’ He confessed to himself, that + latterly he had, he knew not why, been impatient with her, rancorous in + thought, as never before. He had hitherto aimed at a picturesque tolerance + of her vindictiveness; under suffering, both at Craye and Creckholt; and + he had been really forgiving. He accused her of dragging him down to + humanity’s lowest. + </p> + <p> + But if she did that, it argued the possession of a power of a sort. + </p> + <p> + Her station in the chemist’s shop he passed almost daily, appeared to him + as a sudden and a terrific rush to the front; though it was only a short + drive from the house in Regent’s Park; but having shaken-off that house, + he had pushed it back into mists, obliterated it. The woman certainly had + a power. + </p> + <p> + He shot away to the power he knew of in himself; his capacity for winning + men in bodies, the host of them, when it came to an effort of his + energies: men and, individually, women. Individually, the women were to be + counted on as well; warm supporters. + </p> + <p> + It was the admission of a doubt that he might expect to enroll them + collectively. Eyeing the men, he felt his command of them. Glancing at + congregated women, he had a chill. The Wives and Spinsters in ghostly + judicial assembly: that is, the phantom of the offended collective woman: + that is, the regnant Queen Idea issuing from our concourse of civilized + life to govern Society, and pronounce on the orderly, the tolerable, the + legal, and banish the rebellious: these maintained an aspect of the stand + against him. + </p> + <p> + Did Nataly read the case: namely, that the crowned collective woman is not + to be subdued? And what are we to say of the indefinite but forcible + Authority, when we see it upholding Mrs. Burman to crush a woman like + Nataly! + </p> + <p> + Victor’s novel exercises in reflection were bringing him by hard degrees + to conceive it to be the impalpable which has prevailing weight. Not many + of our conquerors have scored their victories on the road of that index: + nor has duration been granted them to behold the minute measure of value + left even tangible after the dust of the conquest subsides. The passing by + a shop where a broken old woman might be supposed to sit beneath her green + forehead-shade—Venetian-blind of a henbane-visage!—had + precipitated him into his first real grasp of the abstract verity: and it + opens on to new realms, which are a new world to the practical mind. But + he made no advance. He stopped in a fever of sensibility, to contemplate + the powerful formless vapour rolling from a source that was nothing other + than yonder weak lonely woman. + </p> + <p> + In other words, the human nature of the man was dragged to the school of + its truancy by circumstances, for him to learn the commonest of sums done + on a slate, in regard to payment of debts and the unrelaxing grip of the + creditor on the defaulter. Debtors are always paying like those who are + guilty of the easiest thing in life, the violation of Truth, they have + made themselves bondmen to pay, if not in substance, then in soul; and the + nipping of the soul goes on for as long as the concrete burden is + undischarged. You know the Liar; you must have seen him diminishing, until + he has become a face without features, withdrawn to humanity’s preliminary + sketch (some half-dozen frayed threads of woeful outline on our original + tapestry-web); and he who did the easiest of things, he must from such + time sweat in being the prodigy of inventive nimbleness, up to the day + when he propitiates Truth by telling it again. There is a repentance that + does reconstitute! It may help to the traceing to springs of a fable + whereby men have been guided thus far out of the wood. + </p> + <p> + Victor would have said truly that he loved Truth; that he paid every debt + with a scrupulous exactitude: money, of course; and prompt apologies for a + short brush of his temper. Nay, he had such a conscience for the smallest + eruptions of a transient irritability, that the wish to say a friendly + mending word to the Punctilio donkey of London Bridge, softened his + retrospective view of the fall there, more than once. Although this man + was a presentation to mankind of the force in Nature which drives to + unresting speed, which is the vitality of the heart seen at its beating + after a plucking of it from the body, he knew himself for the reverse of + lawless; he inclined altogether to good citizenship. So social a man could + not otherwise incline. But when it came to the examination of accounts + between Mrs. Burman and himself, spasms of physical revulsion, loathings, + his excessive human nature, put her out of Court. To men, it was + impossible for him to speak the torments of those days of the monstrous + alliance. The heavens were cognizant. He pleaded his case in their + accustomed hearing:—a youngster tempted by wealth, attracted, + besought, snared, revolted, etc. And Mrs. Burman, when roused to jealousy, + had shown it by teazing him for a confession of his admiration of splendid + points in the beautiful Nataly, the priceless fair woman living under + their roof, a contrast of very life, with the corpse and shroud; and she + seen by him daily, singing with him, her breath about him, her voice + incessantly upon every chord of his being! + </p> + <p> + He pleaded successfully. But the silence following the verdict was heavy; + the silence contained an unheard thunder. It was the sound, as when out of + Court the public is dissatisfied with a verdict. Are we expected to commit + a social outrage in exposing our whole case to the public?—Imagine + it for a moment as done. Men are ours at a word—or at least a word + of invitation. Women we woo; fluent smooth versions of our tortures, mixed + with permissible courtship, win the individual woman. And that unreasoning + collective woman, icy, deadly, condemns the poor racked wretch who so much + as remembers them! She is the enemy of Nature.—Tell us how? She is + the slave of existing conventions.—And from what cause? She is the + artificial production of a state that exalts her so long as she sacrifices + daily and hourly to the artificial. + </p> + <p> + Therefore she sides with Mrs. Burman—the foe of Nature: who, with + her arts and gold lures, has now possession of the Law (the brass idol + worshipped by the collective) to drive Nature into desolation. + </p> + <p> + He placed himself to the right of Mrs. Burman, for the world to behold the + couple: and he lent the world a sigh of disgust. + </p> + <p> + What he could not do, as in other matters he did, was to rise above the + situation, in a splendid survey and rapid view of the means of reversing + it. He was too social to be a captain of the socially insurgent; + imagination expired. + </p> + <p> + But having a courageous Nataly to second him!—how then? It was the + succour needed. Then he would have been ready to teach the world that + Nature—honest Nature—is more to be prized than Convention: a + new Era might begin. + </p> + <p> + The thought was tonic for an instant and illuminated him springingly. It + sank, excused for the flaccidity by Nataly’s want of common adventurous + daring. She had not taken to Lakelands; she was purchasing furniture from + a flowing purse with a heavy heart—unfeminine, one might say; she + preferred to live obscurely; she did not, one had to think—but it + was unjust: and yet the accusation, that she did not cheerfully make a + strain and spurt on behalf of her child, pressed to be repeated. + </p> + <p> + These short glimpses at reflection in Victor were like the verberant twang + of a musical instrument that has had a smart blow, and wails away + independent of the player’s cunning hand. He would have said, that he was + more his natural self when the cunning hand played on him, to make him + praise and uplift his beloved: mightily would it have astonished him to + contemplate with assured perception in his own person the Nature he + invoked. But men invoking Nature, do not find in her the Holy Mother she + in such case becomes to her daughters, whom she so persecutes. Men call on + her for their defence, as a favourable witness: she is a note of their + rhetoric. They are not bettered by her sustainment; they have not, as + women may have, her enaemic aid at a trying hour. It is not an effort at + epigram to say, that whom she scourges most she most supports. + </p> + <p> + An Opera-placard drew his next remark to Fenellan. + </p> + <p> + ‘How Wagner seems to have stricken the Italians! Well, now, the Germans + have their Emperor to head their armies, and I say that the German emperor + has done less for their lasting fame and influence than Wagner has done. + He has affected the French too; I trace him in Gounod’s Romeo et Juliette—and + we don’t gain by it; we have a poor remuneration for the melody gone; + think of the little shepherd’s pipeing in Mireille; and there’s another in + Sapho-delicious. I held out against Wagner as long as I could. The + Italians don’t much more than Wagnerize in exchange for the loss of + melody. They would be wiser in going back to Pergolese, Campagnole. The + Mefistofole was good—of the school of the foreign master. Aida and + Otello, no. I confess to a weakness for the old barleysugar of Bellini or + a Donizetti-Serenade. Aren’t you seduced by cadences? Never mind Wagner’s + tap of his paedagogue’s baton—a cadence catches me still. Early + taste for barley-sugar, perhaps! There’s a march in Verdi’s Attila and I + Lombardi, I declare I’m in military step when I hear them, as in the old + days, after leaving the Opera. Fredi takes little Mab Mountney to her + first Opera to-night. Enough to make us old ones envious! You remember + your first Opera, Fenellan? Sonnambula, with me. I tell you, it would task + the highest poetry—say, require, if you like—showing all + that’s noblest, splendidest, in a young man, to describe its effect on me. + I was dreaming of my box at the Opera for a year after. The Huguenots + to-night. Not the best suited for little Mabsy; but she’ll catch at the + Rataplan. Capital Opera; we used to think it the best, before we had + Tannhauser and Lohengrin and the Meistersinger.’ + </p> + <p> + Victor hinted notes of the Conspiration Scene closing the Third Act of the + Huguenots. That sombre Chorus brought Mrs. Burman before him. He drummed + the Rataplan, which sent her flying. The return of a lively disposition + for dinner and music completed his emancipation from the yoke of the + baleful creature sitting half her days in the chemist’s shop; save that a + thought of drugs brought the smell, and the smell the picture; she + threatened to be an apparition at any moment pervading him through his + nostrils. He spoke to Fenellan of hunger for dinner, a need for it; + singular in one whose appetite ran to the stroke of the hour abreast with + Armandine’s kitchen-clock. Fenellan proposed a glass of sherry and bitters + at his Club over the way. He had forgotten a shower of black-balls + (attributable to the conjurations of old Ate) on a certain past day. + Without word of refusal, Victor entered a wine-merchant’s office, where he + was unknown, and stating his wish for bitters and dry sherry, presently + received the glass, drank, nodded to the administering clerk, named the + person whom he had obliged and refreshed, and passed out, remarking to + Fenellan: ‘Colney on Clubs! he’s right; they’re the mediaeval in modern + times, our Baron’s castles, minus the Baron; dead against public life and + social duties. Business excuses my City Clubs; but I shall take my name + off my Club up West.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘More like monasteries, with a Committee for Abbot, and Whist for the + services,’ Fenellan said. ‘Or tabernacles for the Chosen, and Grangousier + playing Divinity behind the veil. Well, they’re social.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Sectionally social, means anything but social, my friend. However—and + the monastery had a bell for the wanderer! Say, I’m penniless or + poundless, up and down this walled desert of a street, I feel, I must + feel, these palaces—if we’re Christian, not Jews: not that the Jews + are uncharitable; they set an: example, in fact....’ + </p> + <p> + He rambled, amusingly to the complacent hearing of Fenellan, who thought + of his pursuit of wealth and grand expenditure. + </p> + <p> + Victor talked as a man having his mind at leaps beyond the subject. He was + nearing to the Idea he had seized and lost on London Bridge. + </p> + <p> + The desire for some good news wherewith to inspirit Nataly, withdrew him + from his ineffectual chase. He had nought to deliver; on the contrary, a + meditation concerning her comfort pledged him to concealment which was the + no step, or passive state, most abhorrent to him. + </p> + <p> + He snatched at the name of Themison. + </p> + <p> + With Dr. Themison fast in his grasp, there was a report of progress to be + made to Nataly; and not at all an empty report. + </p> + <p> + Themison, then: he leaned on Themison. The woman’s doctor should have an + influence approaching to authority with her. + </p> + <p> + Land-values in the developing Colonies, formed his theme of discourse to + Fenellan: let Banks beware. + </p> + <p> + Fenellan saw him shudder and rub the back of his head. ‘Feel the wind?’ he + said. + </p> + <p> + Victor answered him with that humane thrill of the deep tones, which at + times he had: ‘No: don’t be alarmed; I feel the devil. If one has wealth + and a desperate wish, he will speak. All he does, is to make me more + charitable to those who give way to him. I believe in a devil.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Horns and tail?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Bait and hook.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘I haven’t wealth, and I wish only for dinner,’ Fenellan said. + </p> + <p> + ‘You know that Armandine is never two minutes late. By the way, you + haven’t wealth—you have me.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘And I thank God for you!’ said Fenellan, acutely reminiscent of his + having marked the spiritual adviser of Mrs. Burman, the Rev. Groseman + Buttermore, as a man who might be useful to his friend. + </p> + <p> + <a name="link2HCH0014" id="link2HCH0014"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + CHAPTER XIV. DISCLOSES A STAGE ON THE DRIVE TO PARIS + </h2> + <p> + A fortnight later, an extremely disconcerting circumstance occurred: + Armandine was ten minutes behind the hour with her dinner. But the + surprise and stupefaction expressed by Victor, after glances at his watch, + were not so profound as Fenellan’s, on finding himself exchangeing the bow + with a gentleman bearing the name of Dr. Themison. His friend’s rapidity + in pushing the combinations he conceived, was known: Fenellan’s wonder was + not so much that Victor had astonished him again, as that he should be + called upon again to wonder at his astonishment. He did; and he observed + the doctor and Victor and Nataly: aided by dropping remarks. Before the + evening was over, he gathered enough of the facts, and had to speculate + only on the designs. Dr. Themison had received a visit from the husband of + Mrs. Victor Radnor concerning her state of health. At an interview with + the lady, laughter greeted him; he was confused by her denial of the + imputation of a single ailment: but she, to recompose him, let it be + understood, that she was anxious about her husband’s condition, he being + certainly overworked; and the husband’s visit passed for a device on the + part of the wife. She admitted a willingness to try a change of air, if it + was deemed good for her husband. Change of air was prescribed to each for + both. ‘Why not drive to Paris?’ the doctor said, and Victor was taken with + the phrase. + </p> + <p> + He told Fenellan at night that Mrs. Burman, he had heard, was by the sea, + on the South coast. Which of her maladies might be in the ascendant, he + did not know. He knew little. He fancied that Dr. Themison was + unsuspicious of the existence of a relationship between him and Mrs. + Burman: and Fenellan opined, that there had been no communication upon + private affairs. What, then, was the object in going to Dr. Themison? He + treated her body merely; whereas the Rev. Groseman Buttermore could be + expected to impose upon her conduct. Fenellan appreciated his own + discernment of the superior uses to which a spiritual adviser may be put, + and he too agreeably flattered himself for the corrective reflection to + ensue, that he had not done anything. It disposed him to think a happy + passivity more sagacious than a restless activity. We should let Fortune + perform her part at the wheel in working out her ends, should we not?—for, + ten to one, nine times out of ten we are thwarting her if we stretch out a + hand. And with the range of enjoyments possessed by Victor, why this + unceasing restlessness? Why, when we are not near drowning, catch at + apparent straws, which may be instruments having sharp edges? Themison, as + Mrs. Burman’s medical man, might tell the lady tales that would irritate + her bag of venom. + </p> + <p> + Rarely though Fenellan was the critic on his friend, the shadow cast over + his negligent hedonism by Victor’s boiling pressure, drove him into the + seat of judgement. As a consequence, he was rather a dull table-guest in + the presence of Dr. Themison, whom their host had pricked to anticipate + high entertainment from him. He did nothing to bridge the crevasse and + warm the glacier air at table when the doctor, anecdotal intentionally to + draw him out, related a decorous but pungent story of one fair member of a + sweet new sisterhood in agitation against the fixed establishment of our + chain-mail marriage-tie. An anecdote of immediate diversion was wanted, + expected: and Fenellan sat stupidly speculating upon whether the doctor + knew of a cupboard locked. So that Dr. Themison was carried on by Lady + Grace Halley’s humourous enthusiasm for the subject to dilate and discuss + and specify, all in the irony of a judicial leaning to the side of the + single-minded social adventurers, under an assumed accord with his + audience; concluding: ‘So there’s an end of Divorce.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘By the trick of multiplication,’ Fenellan, now reassured, was content to + say. And that did not extinguish the cracker of a theme; handled very + carefully, as a thing of fire, it need scarce be remarked, three young + women being present. + </p> + <p> + Nataly had eyes on her girl, and was pleased at an alertness shown by Mr. + Sowerby to second her by crossing the dialogue. As regarded her personal + feelings, she was hardened, so long as the curtains were about her to keep + the world from bending black brows of inquisition upon one of its + culprits. But her anxiety was vigilant to guard her girl from an infusion + of any of the dread facts of life not coming through the mother’s lips: + and she was a woman having the feminine mind’s pudency in that direction, + which does not consent to the revealing of much. Here was the mother’s + dilemma: her girl—Victor’s girl, as she had to think in this + instance,—the most cloudless of the young women of earth, seemed, + and might be figured as really, at the falling of a crumb off the table of + knowledge, taken by the brain to shoot up to terrific heights of surveyal; + and there she rocked; and only her youthful healthiness brought her down + to grass and flowers. She had once or twice received the electrical + stimulus, to feel and be as lightning, from a seizure of facts in + infinitesimal doses, guesses caught off maternal evasions or the + circuitous explanation of matters touching sex in here and there a + newspaper, harder to repress completely than sewer-gas in great cities: + and her mother had seen, with an apprehensive pang of anguish, how + witheringly the scared young intelligence of the innocent creature shocked + her sensibility. She foresaw the need to such a flameful soul, as bride, + wife, woman across the world, of the very princeliest of men in gifts of + strength, for her sustainer and guide. And the provident mother knew this + peerless gentleman: but he had his wife. + </p> + <p> + Delusions and the pain of the disillusioning were to be feared for the + imaginative Nesta; though not so much as that on some future day of a + perchance miserable yokemating—a subjection or an entanglement—the + nobler passions might be summoned to rise for freedom, and strike a line + to make their logically estimable sequence from a source not honourable + before the public. Constantly it had to be thought, that the girl was her + father’s child. + </p> + <p> + At present she had no passions; and her bent to the happiness she could so + richly give, had drawn her sailing smoothly over the harbour-bar of + maidenhood; where many of her sisters are disconcerted to the loss of + simplicity. If Nataly with her sleepless watchfulness and forecasts + partook of the French mother, Nesta’s Arcadian independence likened her + somewhat in manner to the Transatlantic version of the English girl. Her + high physical animation and the burden of themes it plucked for delivery + carried her flowing over impediments of virginal self-consciousness, to + set her at her ease in the talk with men; she had not gone through the + various Nursery exercises in dissimulation; she had no appearance of + praying forgiveness of men for the original sin of being woman; and no + tricks of lips or lids, or traitor scarlet on the cheeks, or assumptions + of the frigid mask, or indicated reserve-cajoleries. Neither ignorantly + nor advisedly did she play on these or other bewitching strings of her + sex, after the fashion of the stamped innocents, who are the boast of + Englishmen and matrons, and thrill societies with their winsome + ingenuousness; and who sometimes when unguarded meet an artful serenader, + that is a cloaked bandit, and is provoked by their performances, and knows + anthropologically the nature behind the devious show; a sciential rascal; + as little to be excluded from our modern circles as Eve’s own old deuce + from Eden’s garden whereupon, opportunity inviting, both the fool and the + cunning, the pure donkey princess of insular eulogy, and the sham one, are + in a perilous pass. + </p> + <p> + Damsels of the swiftness of mind of Nesta cannot be ignorant utterly amid + a world where the hints are hourly scattering seed of the inklings; when + vileness is not at work up and down our thoroughfares, proclaiming its + existence with tableau and trumpet. Nataly encountered her girl’s + questions, much as one seeks to quiet an enemy. The questions had soon + ceased. Excepting repulsive and rejected details, there is little to be + learnt when a little is known: in populous communities, density only will + keep the little out. Only stupidity will suppose that it can be done for + the livelier young. English mothers forethoughtful for their girls, have + to take choice of how to do battle with a rough-and-tumble Old England, + that lumbers bumping along, craving the precious things, which can be had + but in semblance under the conditions allowed by laziness to subsist, and + so curst of its shifty inconsequence as to worship in the concrete an + hypocrisy it abhors in the abstract. Nataly could smuggle or confiscate + here and there a newspaper; she could not interdict or withhold every one + of them, from a girl ardent to be in the race on all topics of popular + interest: and the newspapers are occasionally naked savages; the streets + are imperfectly garmented even by day; and we have our stumbling social + anecdotist, our spot-mouthed young man, our eminently silly woman; our + slippery one; our slimy one, the Rahab of Society; not to speak of Mary + the maid and the footman William. A vigilant mother has to contend with + these and the like in an increasing degree. How best? + </p> + <p> + There is a method: one that Colney Durance advocated. The girl’s + intelligence and sweet blood invited a trial of it. Since, as he argued, + we cannot keep the poisonous matter out, mothers should prepare and + strengthen young women for the encounter with it, by lifting the veil, + baring the world, giving them knowledge to arm them for the fight they + have to sustain; and thereby preserve them further from the spiritual + collapse which follows the nursing of a false ideal of our life in youth:—this + being, Colney said, the prominent feminine disease of the time, common to + all our women; that is, all having leisure to shine in the sun or wave in + the wind as flowers of the garden. + </p> + <p> + Whatever there was of wisdom in his view, he spoilt it for English + hearing, by making use of his dry compressed sentences. Besides he was a + bachelor; therefore but a theorist. And his illustrations of his theory + were grotesque; meditation on them extracted a corrosive acid to consume, + in horrid derision, the sex, the nation, the race of man. The satirist too + devotedly loves his lash to be a persuasive teacher. Nataly had excuses to + cover her reasons for not listening to him. + </p> + <p> + One reason was, as she discerned through her confusion at the thought, + that the day drew near for her speaking fully to Nesta; when, between what + she then said and what she said now, a cruel contrast might strike the + girl and in toneing revelations now, to be more consonant with them then;—in + softening and shading the edges of social misconduct, it seemed painfully + possible to be sowing in the girl’s mind something like the reverse of + moral precepts, even to smoothing the way to a rebelliousness partly or + wholly similar to her own. But Nataly’s chief and her appeasing reason for + pursuing the conventional system with this exceptional young creature, + referred to the sentiments on that subject of the kind of young man whom a + mother elects from among those present and eligible, as perhaps next to + worthy to wed the girl, by virtue of good promise in the moral department. + She had Mr. Dudley Sowerby under view; far from the man of her choice and + still the practice of decorum, discretion, a pardonable fastidiousness, + appears, if women may make any forecast of the behaviour of young men or + may trust the faces they see, to, promise a future stability in the + husband. Assuredly a Dudley Sowerby would be immensely startled to find in + his bride a young woman more than babily aware of the existence of one + particular form of naughtiness on earth. + </p> + <p> + Victor was of no help: he had not an idea upon the right education of the + young of the sex. Repression and mystery, he considered wholesome for + girls; and he considered the enlightening of them—to some extent—a + prudential measure for their defence; and premature instruction is a + fire-water to their wild-in-woods understanding; and histrionic innocence + is no doubt the bloom on corruption; also the facts of current human life, + in the crude of the reports or the cooked of the sermon in the newspapers, + are a noxious diet for our daughters; whom nevertheless we cannot hope to + be feeding always on milk: and there is a time when their adorable pretty + ignorance, if credibly it exists out of noodledom, is harmful:—but + how beautiful the shining simplicity of our dear young English girls! He + was one of the many men to whose minds women come in pictures and are + accepted much as they paint themselves. Like his numerous fellows, too, he + required a conflict with them, and a worsting at it, to be taught, that + they are not the mere live stock we scheme to dispose of for their good: + unless Love should interpose, he would have exclaimed. He broke from his + fellows in his holy horror of a father’s running counter to love. Nesta + had only to say, that she loved another, for Dudley Sowerby to be + withdrawn into the background of aspirants. But love was unknown to the + girl. + </p> + <p> + Outwardly, the plan of the Drive to Paris had the look of Victor’s + traditional hospitality. Nataly smiled at her incorrigibly lagging + intelligence of him, on hearing that he had invited a company: ‘Lady + Grace, for gaiety; Peridon and Catkin, fiddles; Dudley Sowerby and myself, + flutes; Barmby, intonation; in all, nine of us; and by the dear old + Normandy route, for the sake of the voyage, as in old times; towers of + Dieppe in the morning-light; and the lovely road to the capital! Just + three days in Paris, and home by any of the other routes. It’s the drive + we want. Boredom in wet weather, we defy; we have our Concert—an + hour at night and we’re sure of sleep.’ It had a sweet simple air, + befitting him; as when in bygone days they travelled with the joy of + children. For travelling shook Nataly out of her troubles and gave her + something of the child’s inheritance of the wisdom of life—the + living ever so little ahead of ourselves; about as far as the fox in view + of the hunt. That is the soul of us out for novelty, devouring as it runs, + an endless feast; and the body is eagerly after it, recording the + pleasures, a daily chase. Remembrance of them is almost a renewal, + anticipation a revival. She enraptured Victor with glimpses of the + domestic fun she had ceased to show sign of since the revelation of + Lakelands. Her only regret was on account of the exclusion of Colney + Durance from the party, because of happy memories associating him with the + Seine-land, and also that his bilious criticism of his countrymen was + moderated by a trip to the Continent. Fenellan reported Colney to be ‘busy + in the act of distilling one of his Prussic acid essays.’ Fenellan would + have jumped to go. He informed Victor, as a probe, that the business of + the Life Insurance was at periods ‘fearfully necrological! Inexplicably, + he was not invited. Did it mean, that he was growing dull? He looked + inside instead of out, and lost the clue. + </p> + <p> + His behaviour on the evening of the departure showed plainly what would + have befallen Mr. Sowerby on the expedition, had not he as well as Colney + been excluded. Two carriages and a cab conveyed the excursionists, as they + merrily called themselves, to the terminus. They were Victor’s guests; + they had no trouble, no expense, none of the nipper reckonings which dog + our pleasures; the state of pure bliss. Fenellan’s enviousness drove him + at the Rev. Mr. Barmby until the latter jumped to the seat beside Nesta in + her carriage, Mademoiselle de Seilles and Mr. Sowerby facing them. Lady + Grace Halley, in the carriage behind, heard Nesta’s laugh; which Mr. + Barmby had thought vacuous, beseeming little girls, that laugh at + nothings. She questioned Fenellan. + </p> + <p> + ‘Oh,’ said he, ‘I merely mentioned that the Rev. gentleman carries his + musical instrument at the bottom of his trunk.’ + </p> + <p> + She smiled: ‘And who are in the cab?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Your fiddles are in the cab, in charge of Peridon and Catkin. Those two + would have writhed like head and tail of a worm, at a division on the way + to the station. Point a finger at Peridon, you run Catkin through the + body. They’re a fabulous couple.’ + </p> + <p> + Victor cut him short. ‘I deny that those two are absurd.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘And Catkin’s toothache is a galvanic battery upon Peridon.’ + </p> + <p> + Nataly strongly denied it. Peridon and Catkin pertained to their genial + picture of the dear sweet nest in life; a dale never traversed by the + withering breath they dreaded. + </p> + <p> + Fenellan then, to prove that he could be as bad in his way as Colney, fell + to work on the absent Miss Priscilla Graves and Mr. Pempton, with a + pitchfork’s exaltation of the sacred attachment of the divergently + meritorious couple, and a melancholy reference to implacable obstacles in + the principles of each. The pair were offending the amatory corner in the + generous good sense of Nataly and Victor; they were not to be hotly + protected, though they were well enough liked for their qualities, except + by Lady Grace, who revelled in the horrifying and scandalizing of Miss + Graves. Such a specimen of the Puritan middle English as Priscilla Graves, + was eastwind on her skin, nausea to her gorge. She wondered at having + drifted into the neighbourhood of a person resembling in her repellent + formal chill virtuousness a windy belfry tower, down among those districts + of suburban London or appalling provincial towns passed now and then with + a shudder, where the funereal square bricks-up the Church, that Arctic + hen-mother sits on the square, and the moving dead are summoned to their + round of penitential exercise by a monosyllabic tribulation-bell. + Fenellan’s graphic sketch of the teetotaller woman seeing her admirer + pursued by Eumenides flagons—abominations of emptiness—to the + banks of the black river of suicides, where the one most wretched light is + Inebriation’s nose; and of the vegetarian violoncello’s horror at his + vision of the long procession of the flocks and herds into his lady’s + melodious Ark of a mouth, excited and delighted her antipathy. She was + amused to transports at the station, on hearing Mr. Barmby, in a voice all + ophicleide, remark: ‘No, I carry no instrument.’ The habitation of it at + the bottom of his trunk, was not forgotten when it sounded. + </p> + <p> + Reclining in warmth on the deck of the vessel at night, she said, just + under Victor’s ear: ‘Where are those two?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Bid me select the couple,’ said he. + </p> + <p> + She rejoined: ‘Silly man’; and sleepily gave him her hand for good night, + and so paralyzed his arm, that he had to cover the continued junction by + saying more than he intended: ‘If they come to an understanding!’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Plain enough on one side.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘You think it suitable?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Perfection; and well-planned to let them discover it.’ ‘This is really my + favourite route; I love the saltwater and the night on deck.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Go on.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘How?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Number your loves. It would tax your arithmetic.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘I can hate.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Not me?’ + </p> + <p> + Positively the contrary, an impulsive squeeze of fingers declared it; and + they broke the link, neither of them sensibly hurt; though a leaf or two + of the ingenuities, which were her thoughts, turned over in the phantasies + of the lady; and the gentleman was taught to feel that a never so slightly + lengthened compression of the hand female shoots within us both straight + and far and round the corners. There you have Nature, if you want her + naked in her elements, for a text. He loved his Nataly truly, even + fervently, after the twenty years of union; he looked about at no other + woman; it happened only that the touch of one, the chance warm touch, put + to motion the blind forces of our mother so remarkably surcharging him. + But it was without kindling. The lady, the much cooler person, did nurse a + bit of flame. She had a whimsical liking for the man who enjoyed simple + things when commanding the luxuries; and it became a fascination, by + extreme contrast, at the reminder of his adventurous enterprises in + progress while he could so childishly enjoy. Women who dance with the + warrior-winner of battles, and hear him talk his ball-room trifles to + amuse, have similarly a smell of gunpowder to intoxicate them. + </p> + <p> + For him, a turn on the deck brought him into new skies. Nataly lay in the + cabin. She used to be where Lady Grace was lying. A sort of pleadable, + transparent, harmless hallucination of the renewal of old service induced + him to refresh and settle the fair semi-slumberer’s pillow, and fix the + tarpaulin over her silks and wraps; and bend his head to the soft mouth + murmuring thanks. The women who can dare the nuit blanche, and under + stars; and have a taste for holiday larks after their thirtieth, are rare; + they are precious. Nataly nevertheless was approved for guarding her + throat from the nightwind. And a softer southerly breath never crossed + Channel! The very breeze he had wished for! Luck was with him. + </p> + <p> + Nesta sat by the rails of the vessel beside her Louise. Mr. Sowerby in + passing, exchanged a description of printed agreement with her, upon the + beauty of the night—a good neutral topic for the encounter of the + sexes not that he wanted it neutral; it furnished him with a vocabulary. + Once he perceptibly washed his hands of dutiful politeness, in addressing + Mademoiselle de Seilles, likewise upon the beauty of the night; and the + French lady, thinking—too conclusively from the breath on the glass + at the moment, as it is the Gallic habit—that if her dear Nesta must + espouse one of the uninteresting creatures called men in her native land, + it might as well be this as another, agreed that the night was very + beautiful. + </p> + <p> + ‘He speaks grammatical French,’ Nesta commented on his achievement. ‘He + contrives in his walking not to wet his boots,’ mademoiselle rejoined. + </p> + <p> + Mr. Peridon was a more welcome sample of the islanders, despite an + inferior pretension to accent. He burned to be near these ladies, and he + passed them but once. His enthusiasm for Mademoiselle de Seilles was + notorious. Gratefully the compliment was acknowledged by her, in her + demure fashion; with a reserve of comic intellectual contempt for the man + who could not see that women, or Frenchwomen, or eminently she among them, + must have their enthusiasm set springing in the breast before they can be + swayed by the most violent of outer gales. And say, that she is uprooted;—he + does but roll a log. Mr. Peridon’s efforts to perfect himself in the + French tongue touched her. + </p> + <p> + A night of May leaning on June, is little more than a deliberate wink of + the eye of light. Mr. Barmby, an exile from the ladies by reason of an + addiction to tobacco, quitted the forepart of the vessel at the first + greying. Now was the cloak of night worn threadbare, and grey astir for + the heralding of gold, day visibly ready to show its warmer throbs. The + gentle waves were just a stronger grey than the sky, perforce of an + interfusion that shifted gradations; they were silken, in places oily + grey; cold to drive the sight across their playful monotonousness for + refuge on any far fisher-sail. + </p> + <p> + Miss Radnor was asleep, eyelids benignly down, lips mildly closed. The + girl’s cheeks held colour to match a dawn yet unawakened though born. They + were in a nest shading amid silks of pale blue, and there was a languid + flutter beneath her chin to the catch of the morn-breeze. Bacchanal + threads astray from a disorderly front-lock of rich brown hair were alive + over an eyebrow showing like a seal upon the lightest and securest of + slumbers. + </p> + <p> + Mr. Barmby gazed, and devoutly. Both the ladies were in their oblivion; + the younger quite saintly; but the couple inseparably framed, elevating to + behold; a reproach to the reminiscence of pipes. He was near; and quietly + the eyelids of mademoiselle lifted on him. Her look was grave, straight, + uninquiring, soon accurately perusing; an arrow of Artemis for + penetration. He went by, with the sound in the throat of a startled + bush-bird taking to wing; he limped off some nail of the deck, as if that + young Frenchwoman had turned the foot to a hoof. Man could not be more + guiltless, yet her look had perturbed him; nails conspired; in his + vexation, he execrated tobacco. And ask not why, where reason never was. + </p> + <p> + Nesta woke babbling on the subject she had relinquished for sleep. + Mademoiselle touched a feathery finger at her hair and hood during their + silvery French chimes. + </p> + <p> + Mr. Sowerby presented the risen morning to them, with encomiums, after + they had been observing every variation in it. He spoke happily of the + pleasant passage, and of the agreeable night; particularly of the + excellent idea of the expedition by this long route at night; the prospect + of which had disfigured him with his grimace of speculation—apparently + a sourness that did not exist. Nesta had a singular notion, coming of a + girl’s mingled observation and intuition, that the impressions upon this + gentleman were in arrear, did not strike him till late. Mademoiselle + confirmed it when it was mentioned; she remembered to have noticed the + same in many small things. And it was a pointed perception. + </p> + <p> + Victor sent his girl down to Nataly, with a summons to hurry up and see + sunlight over the waters. Nataly came; she looked, and the outer wakened + the inner, she let the light look in on her, her old feelings danced to + her eyes like a string of bubbles in ascent. ‘Victor, Victor, it seems + only yesterday that we crossed, twelve years back—was it?—and + in May, and saw the shoal of porpoises, and five minutes after, Dieppe in + view. Dear French people! I share your love for France.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Home of our holidays!—the “drives”; and they may be the happiest. + And fifty minutes later we were off the harbour; and Natata landed, a + stranger; and at night she was the heroine of the town.’ + </p> + <p> + Victor turned to a stately gentleman and passed his name to Nataly: ‘Sir + Rodwell Balchington, a neighbour of Lakelands! She understood that Lady + Grace Halley was acquainted with Sir Rodwell:—hence this dash of + brine to her lips while she was drinking of happy memories, and Victor + evidently was pluming himself upon his usual luck in the fortuitous + encounter with an influential neighbour of Lakelands. He told Sir Rodwell + the story of how they had met in the salle a manger of the hotel the + impresario of a Concert in the town, who had in his hand the doctor’s + certificate of the incapacity of the chief cantatrice to appear, and waved + it, within a step of suicide. ‘Well, to be brief, my wife—“noble + dame Anglaise,” as the man announced her on the Concert platform, + undertook one of the songs, and sang another of her own-pure contralto + voice, as you will say; with the result that there was a perfect tumult of + enthusiasm. Next day, the waiters of the hotel presented her with a + bouquet of Spring flowers, white, and central violets. It was in the Paris + papers, under the heading: Une amie d’outre Manche—I think that was + it?’ he asked Nataly. + </p> + <p> + ‘I forget,’ said she. + </p> + <p> + He glanced at her: a cloud had risen. He rallied her, spoke of the old + Norman silver cross which the manager of the Concert had sent, humbly + imploring her to accept the small memento of his gratitude. She nodded an + excellent artificial brightness. + </p> + <p> + And there was the coast of France under young sunlight over the waters. + Once more her oft-petitioning wish through the years, that she had entered + the ranks of professional singers, upon whom the moral scrutiny is not so + microscopic, invaded her, resembling a tide-swell into rock-caves, which + have been filled before and left to emptiness, and will be left to + emptiness again. Nataly had the intimation visiting us when, in a decline + of physical power, the mind’s ready vivacity to conjure illusions forsakes + us; and it was, of a wall ahead, and a force impelling her against it, and + no hope of deviation. And this is the featureless thing, Destiny; not + without eyes, if we have a conscience to throw them into it to look at us. + </p> + <p> + Counsel to her to live in the hour, came, as upon others on the vessel, + from an active breath of the salt prompting to healthy hunger; and hardly + less from the splendour of the low full sunlight on the waters, the + skimming and dancing of the thousands of golden shells away from under the + globe of fire. + </p> + <p> + <a name="link2HCH0015" id="link2HCH0015"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + CHAPTER XV. A PATRIOT ABROAD + </h2> + <p> + Nine days after his master’s departure, Daniel Skepsey, a man of some + renown of late, as a subject of reports and comments in the newspapers, + obtained a passport, for the identification, if need were, of his missing + or misapprehended person in a foreign country, of the language of which + three unpronounceable words were knocking about his head to render the + thought of the passport a staff of safety; and on the morning that + followed he was at speed through Normandy, to meet his master rounding + homeward from Paris, at a town not to be spoken as it is written, by + reason of the custom of the good people of the country, with whom we would + fain live on neighbourly terms:—yes, and they had proof of it, not + so very many years back, when they were enduring the worst which can + befall us—though Mr. Durance, to whom he was indebted for the + writing of the place of his destination large on a card, and the wording + of the French sound beside it, besides the jotting down of trains and the + station for the change of railways, Mr. Durance could say, that the active + form of our sympathy consisted in the pouring of cheeses upon them when + they were prostrate and unable to resist! + </p> + <p> + A kind gentleman, Mr. Durance, as Daniel Skepsey had recent cause to know, + but often exceedingly dark; not so patriotic as desireable, it was to be + feared; and yet, strangely indeed, Mr. Durance had said cogent things on + the art of boxing and on manly exercises, and he hoped—he was + emphatic in saying he hoped—we should be regenerated. He must have + meant, that boxing—on a grand scale would contribute to it. He said, + that a blow now and then was wholesome for us all. He recommended a + monthly private whipping for old gentlemen who decline the use of the + gloves, to disperse their humours; not excluding Judges and Magistrates: + he could hardly be in earnest. He spoke in a clergyman’s voice, and said + it would be payment of good assurance money, beneficial to their souls: he + seemed to mean it. He said, that old gentlemen were bottled vapours, and + it was good for them to uncork them periodically. He said, they should be + excused half the strokes if they danced nightly—they resented + motion. He seemed sadly wanting in veneration. + </p> + <p> + But he might not positively intend what he said. Skepsey could overlook + everything he said, except the girding at England. For where is a braver + people, notwithstanding appearances! Skepsey knew of dozens of gallant + bruisers, ready for the cry to strip to the belt; worthy, with a little + public encouragement, to rank beside their grandfathers of the Ring, in + the brilliant times when royalty and nobility countenanced the manly art, + our nursery of heroes, and there was not the existing unhappy division of + classes. He still trusted to convince Mr. Durance, by means of argument + and happy instances, historical and immediate, that the English may justly + consider themselves the elect of nations, for reasons better than their + accumulation of the piles of gold-better than ‘usurers’ reasons,’ as Mr. + Durance called them. Much that Mr. Durance had said at intervals was, + although remembered almost to the letter of the phrase, beyond his + comprehension, and he put it aside, with penitent blinking at his + deficiency. + </p> + <p> + All the while, he was hearing a rattle of voluble tongues around him, and + a shout of stations, intelligible as a wash of pebbles, and blocks in a + torrent. Generally the men slouched when they were not running. At Dieppe + he had noticed muscular fellows; he admitted them to be nimbler on the + legs than ours; and that may count both ways, he consoled a patriotic + vanity by thinking; instantly rebuking the thought; for he had read + chapters of Military History. He sat eyeing the front row of figures in + his third-class carriage, musing on the kind of soldiers we might, heaven + designing it, have to face, and how to beat them; until he gazed on Rouen, + knowing by the size of it and by what Mr. Durance had informed him of the + city on the river, that it must be the very city of Rouen, not so many + years back a violated place, at the mercy of a foreign foe. Strong pity + laid hold of Skepsey. He fortified the heights for defence, but saw at a + glance that it was the city for modern artillery to command, crush and + enter. He lost idea of these afflicted people as foes, merely complaining + of their attacks on England, and their menaces in their Journals and + pamphlets; and he renounced certain views of the country to be marched + over on the road by this route to Paris, for the dictation of terms of + peace at the gates of the French capital, sparing them the shameful entry; + and this after the rout of their attempt at an invasion of the Island! + </p> + <p> + A man opposite him was looking amicably on his lively grey eyes. Skepsey + handed a card from his pocket. The man perused it, and crying: ‘Dreux?’ + waved out of the carriage-window at a westerly distance, naming Rouen as + not the place, not at all, totally other. Thus we are taught, that a + foreign General, ignorant of the language, must confine himself to + defensive operations at home; he would be a child in the hands of the + commonest man he meets. Brilliant with thanks in signs, Skepsey drew from + his friend a course of instruction in French names, for our necessities on + a line of march. The roads to Great Britain’s metropolis, and the supplies + of forage and provision at every stage of a march on London, are marked in + the military offices of these people; and that, with their barking + Journals, is a piece of knowledge to justify a belligerent return for it. + Only we pray to be let live peacefully. + </p> + <p> + Fervently we pray it when this good man, a total stranger to us, conducts + an ignorant foreigner from one station to another through the streets of + Rouen, after a short stoppage at the buffet and assistance in the + identification of coins; then, lifting his cap to us, retires. + </p> + <p> + And why be dealing wounds and death? It is a more blessed thing to keep + the Commandments. But how is it possible to keep the Commandments if you + have a vexatious wife? + </p> + <p> + Martha Skepsey had given him a son to show the hereditary energy in his + crying and coughing; and it was owing, he could plead, to her habits and + her tongue, that he sometimes, that he might avoid the doing of worse—for + she wanted correction and was improved by it—courted the excitement + of a short exhibition of skill, man to man, on publicans’ first floors. He + could have told the magistrates so, in part apology for the circumstances + dragging him the other day, so recently, before his Worship; and he might + have told it, if he had not remembered Captain Dartrey Fenellan’s words + about treating women chivalrously which was interpreted by Skepsey as + correcting them, when called upon to do it, but never exposing them only, + if allowed to account for the circumstances pushing us into the + newspapers, we should not present so guilty a look before the public. + </p> + <p> + Furthermore, as to how far it is the duty of a man to serve his master, + there is likewise question: whether is he, while receiving reproof and + punishment for excess of zeal in the service of his master, not to mention + the welfare of the country, morally—without establishing it as a + principle—exonerated? Miss Graves might be asked save that one would + not voluntarily trouble a lady on such subjects. But supposing, says the + opposing counsel, now at work in Skepsey’s conscience, supposing this act, + for which, contraveneing the law of the land, you are reproved and + punished, to be agreeable to you, how then? We answer, supposing it—and + we take uncomplainingly the magistrate’s reproof and punishment—morally + justified can it be expected of us to have the sense of guilt, although we + wear and know we wear a guilty look before the public? + </p> + <p> + His master and the dear ladies would hear of it; perhaps they knew of it + now; with them would rest the settlement of the distressing inquiry. The + ladies would be shocked ladies cannot bear any semblance of roughness, not + even with the gloves:—and knowing, as they must, that our practise + of the manly art is for their protection. + </p> + <p> + Skepsey’s grievous prospect of the hour to come under judgement of a sex + that was ever a riddle unread, clouded him on the approach to Dreux. He + studied the country and the people eagerly; he forbore to conduct great + military operations. Mr. Durance had spoken of big battles round about the + town of Dreux; also of a wonderful Mausoleum there, not equally + interesting. The little man was in deeper gloom than a day sobering on + crimson dusk when the train stopped and his quick ear caught the sound of + the station, as pronounced by his friend at Rouen. + </p> + <p> + He handed his card to the station-master. A glance, and the latter + signalled to a porter, saying: ‘Paradis’; and the porter laid hold of + Skepsey’s bag. Skepsey’s grasp was firm; he pulled, the porter pulled. + Skepsey heard explanatory speech accompanying a wrench. He wrenched back + with vigour, and in his own tongue exclaimed, that he held to the bag + because his master’s letters were in the bag, all the way from England. + For a minute, there was a downright trial of muscle and will: the porter + appeared furiously excited, Skepsey had a look of cooled steel. Then the + Frenchman, requiring to shrug, gave way to the Englishman’s eccentric + obstinacy, and signified that he was his guide. Quite so, and Skepsey + showed alacrity and confidence in following; he carried his bag. But with + the remembrance of the kindly serviceable man at Rouen, he sought to + convey to the porter, that the terms of their association were cordial. A + waving of the right hand to the heavens ratified the treaty on the French + side. Nods and smiles and gesticulations, with across-Channel vocables, as + it were Dover cliffs to Calais sands and back, pleasantly beguiled the way + down to the Hotel du Paradis, under the Mausoleum heights, where Skepsey + fumbled at his pocket for coin current; but the Frenchman, all shaken by a + tornado of negation, clapped him on the shoulder, and sang him a quatrain. + Skepsey had in politeness to stand listening, and blinking, plunged in the + contrition of ignorance, eclipsed. He took it to signify something to the + effect, that money should not pass between friends. It was the amatory + farewell address of Henri IV. to his Charmante Gabrielle; and with + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + ‘Perce de mille lords, + L’honneur m’appelle + Au champ de Mars,’ +</pre> + <p> + the Frenchman, in a backing of measured steps, apologized for his enforced + withdrawal from the stranger who had captured his heart. + </p> + <p> + Skepsey’s card was taken in the passage of the hotel. A clean-capped maid, + brave on the legs, like all he had seen of these people, preceded him at + quick march to an upper chamber. When he descended, bag in hand, she flung + open the salon-door of a table d’hote, where a goodly number were dining + and chattering; waiters drew him along to the section occupied by his + master’s party. A chair had been kept vacant for him; his master waved a + hand, his dear ladies graciously smiled; he struck the bag in front of a + guardian foot, growing happy. He could fancy they had not seen the English + newspapers. And his next observation of the table showed him wrecked and + lost: Miss Nesta’s face was the oval of a woeful O at his wild behaviour + in England during their absence. She smiled. Skepsey had nevertheless to + consume his food—excellent, very tasty soup-with the sour sauce of + the thought that he must be tongue-tied in his defence for the time of the + dinner. + </p> + <p> + ‘No, dear Skips, please! you are to enjoy yourself,’ said Nesta. + </p> + <p> + He answered confusedly, trying to assure her that he was doing so, and he + choked. + </p> + <p> + His master had fixed his arrival for twenty minutes earlier. Skepsey spoke + through a cough of long delays at stations. The Rev. Septimus Barmby, + officially peacemaker, sounded the consequent excuse for a belated comer. + It was final; such is the power of sound. Looks were cast from the French + section of the table at the owner of the prodigious organ. Some of the + younger men, intent on the charms of Albion’s daughters, expressed in a + sign and a word or two alarm at what might be beneath the flooring: and + ‘Pas encore Lui!’ and ‘Son avant-courrier!’ and other flies of speech + passed on a whiff, under politest of cover, not to give offence. But + prodigies, claim attention. + </p> + <p> + Our English, at the close of the dinner, consented to say it was good, + without specifying a dish, because a selection of this or that would have + seemed to italicize, and commit, them, in the presence of ladies, to a + notice of the matter of-course, beneath us, or the confession of a low + sensual enjoyment; until Lady Grace Halley named the particular dressing + of a tete de veau approvingly to Victor; and he stating, that he had + offered a suggestion for the menu of the day, Nataly exclaimed, that she + had suspected it: upon which Mr. Sowerby praised the menu, Mr. Barmby, + Peridon and Catkin named other dishes, there was the right after-dinner + ring in Victor’s ears, thanks to the woman of the world who had travelled + round to nature and led the shackled men to deliver themselves heartily. + One tap, and they are free. That is, in the moments after dinner, when + nature is at the gates with them. Only, it must be a lady and a prevailing + lady to give the tap. They need (our English) and will for the ages of the + process of their transformation need a queen. + </p> + <p> + Skepsey, bag in hand, obeyed the motion of his master’s head and followed + him. + </p> + <p> + He was presently back, to remain with the ladies during his master’s + perusal of letters. Nataly had decreed that he was not to be troubled; so + Nesta and mademoiselle besought him for a recital of his French + adventures; and strange to say, he had nothing to tell. The journey, + pregnant at the start, exciting in the course of it, was absolutely blank + at the termination. French people had been very kind; he could not say + more. But there was more; there was a remarkable fulness, if only he could + subordinate it to narrative. The little man did not know, that time was + wanted for imagination to make the roadway or riverway of a true story, + unless we press to invent; his mind had been too busy on the way for him + to clothe in speech his impressions of the passage of incidents at the + call for them. Things had happened, numbers of interesting minor things, + but they all slipped as water through the fingers; and he being of the + band of honest creatures who will not accept a lift from fiction, drearily + he sat before the ladies, confessing to an emptiness he was far from + feeling. + </p> + <p> + Nesta professed excessive disappointment. ‘Now, if it had been in England, + Skips!’ she said, under her mother’s gentle gloom of brows. + </p> + <p> + He made show of melancholy submission. + </p> + <p> + ‘There, Skepsey, you have a good excuse, we are sure,’ Nataly said. + </p> + <p> + And women, when they are such ladies as these, are sent to prove to us + that they can be a blessing; instead of the dreadful cry to Providence for + the reason of the spread of the race of man by their means! He declared + his readiness, rejecting excuses, to state his case to them, but for his + fear of having it interpreted as an appeal for their kind aid in obtaining + his master’s forgiveness. Mr. Durance had very considerately promised to + intercede. Skepsey dropped a hint or two of his naughty proceedings drily + aware that their untutored antipathy to the manly art would not permit of + warmth. + </p> + <p> + Nesta said: ‘Do you know, Skips, we saw a grand exhibition of fencing in + Paris.’ + </p> + <p> + He sighed. ‘Ladies can look on at fencing! foils and masks! Captain + Dartrey Fenellan has shown me, and says, the French are our masters at + it.’ He bowed constrainedly to mademoiselle. + </p> + <p> + ‘You box, M. Skepsey!’ she said. + </p> + <p> + His melancholy increased: ‘Much discouragement from Government, Society! + If ladies... but I do not venture. They are not against Games. But these + are not a protection... to them, when needed; to the country. The country + seems asleep to its position. Mr. Durance has remarked on it:—though + I would not always quote Mr. Durance... indeed, he says, that England has + invested an Old Maid’s All in the Millennium, and is ruined if it delays + to come. “Old Maid,” I do not see. I do not—if I may presume to + speak of myself in the same breath with so clever a gentleman, agree with + Mr. Durance in everything. But the chest-measurement of recruits, the + stature of the men enlisted, prove that we are losing the nursery of our + soldiers.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘We are taking them out of the nursery, Skips, if you ‘re for quoting + Captain Dartrey,’ said Nesta. ‘We’ll never haul down our flag, though, + while we have him!’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Ah! Captain Dartrey!’ Skepsey was refreshed by the invocation of the + name. + </p> + <p> + A summons to his master’s presence cut short something he was beginning to + say about Captain Dartrey. + </p> + <p> + <a name="link2HCH0016" id="link2HCH0016"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + CHAPTER XVI. ACCOUNTS FOR SKEPSEY’S MISCONDUCT, SHOWING HOW IT AFFECTED + NATALY + </h2> + <h3> + His master opened on the bristling business. + </h3> + <p> + ‘What’s this, of your name in the papers, your appearing before a + magistrate, and a fine? Tell the tale shortly.’ + </p> + <p> + Skepsey fell upon his attitude for dialectical defence the modest form of + the two hands at rolling play and the head deferentially sidecast. But + knowing that he had gratified his personal tastes in the act of serving + his master’s interests, an interfusion of sentiments plunged him into + self-consciousness; an unwonted state with him, clogging to a simple + story. + </p> + <p> + ‘First, sir, I would beg you to pardon the printing of your name beside + mine...’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Tush: on with you.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Only to say, necessitated by the circumstances of the case. I read, that + there was laughter in the court at my exculpation of my conduct—as I + have to call it; and there may have been. I may have expressed myself .... + I have a strong feeling for the welfare of the country.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘So, it seems, you said to the magistrate. Do you tell me, that the cause + of your gross breach of the law, was a consideration for the welfare of + the country? Run on the facts.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘The facts—I must have begun badly, sir.’ Skepsey rattled the dry + facts in his head to right them. From his not having begun well, they had + become dry as things underfoot. It was an error to have led off with the + sentiments. ‘Two very, two very respectable persons—respectable—were + desirous to witness a short display of my, my system, I would say; of my + science, they call it.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Don’t be nervous. To the point; you went into a field five miles out of + London, in broad day, and stood in a ring, the usual Tiff-raff about you!’ + </p> + <p> + ‘With the gloves: and not for money, Sir: for the trial of skill; not very + many people. I cannot quite see the breach of the law.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘So you told the magistrate. You were fined for your inability to quite + see. And you had to give security.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Mr. Durance was kindly responsible for me, sir: an acquaintance of the + magistrate.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘This boxing of yours is a positive mania, Skepsey. You must try to get + the better of it—must! And my name too! I’m to be proclaimed, as + having in my service an inveterate pugilist—who breaks the law from + patriotism! Male or female, these very respectable persons—the + people your show was meant for?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Male, sir. Females!... that is, not the respectable ones.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Take the opinion of the respectable ones for your standard of behaviour + in future.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘It was a mere trial of skill, sir, to prove to one of the spectators, + that I could be as good as my word. I wished I may say, to conciliate him, + partly. He would not—he judged by size—credit me with... he + backed my adversary Jerry Scroom—a sturdy boxer, without the + knowledge of the first principles.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘You beat him?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘I think I taught the man that I could instruct, sir; he was complimentary + before we parted. He thought I could not have lasted. After the second + round, the police appeared.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘And you ran!’ + </p> + <p> + ‘No, sir; I had nothing on my conscience.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Why not have had your pugilistic display in a publican’s room in town, + where you could have hammer-nailed and ding-donged to your heart’s content + for as long as you liked!’ + </p> + <p> + ‘That would have been preferable, from the point of view of safety from + intrusion, I can admit-speaking humbly. But one of the parties—I had + a wish to gratify him—is a lover of old English times and habits and + our country scenes. He wanted it to take place on green grass. We drove + over Hampstead in three carts and a gig, as a company of pleasure—as + it was. A very beautiful morning. There was a rest at a public-house. Mr. + Shaplow traces the misfortune to that. Mr. Jarniman, I hear, thinks it + what he calls a traitor in the camp. I saw no sign; we were all merry and + friendly.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Jarniman?’ said Victor sharply. ‘Who is the Jarniman?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Mr. Jarniman is, I am to understand from the acquaintance introducing us—a + Mr. Shaplow I met in the train from Lakelands one day, and again at the + corner of a street near Drury Lane, a ham and beef shop kept by a Mrs. + Jarniman, a very stout lady, who does the chief carving in the shop, and + is the mother of Mr. Jarniman: he is in a confidential place, highly + trusted.’ Skepsey looked up from the hands he soaped: ‘He is a curious + mixture; he has true enthusiasm for boxing, he believes in ghosts. He + mourns for the lost days of prize-fighting, he thinks that spectres are on + the increase. He has a very large appetite, depressed spirits. Mr. Shaplow + informs me he is a man of substance, in the service of a wealthy lady in + poor health, expecting a legacy and her appearance to him. He has the look—Mr. + Shaplow assures me he does not drink to excess: he is a slow drinker.’ + </p> + <p> + Victor straightened: ‘Bad way of health, you said?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Mr. Jarniman spoke of his expectations, as being immediate: he put it, + that he expected her spirit to be out for him to meet it any day—or + night. He desires it. He says, she has promised it—on oath, he says, + and must feel that she must do her duty to him before she goes, if she is + to appear to him with any countenance after. But he is anxious for her in + any case to show herself, and says, he should not have the heart to + reproach her. He has principles, a tear for suffering; he likes to be made + to cry. Mrs. Jarniman, his mother, he is not married, is much the same so + far, except ghosts; she will not have them; except after strong tea, they + come, she says, come to her bed. She is foolish enough to sleep in a + close-curtained bed. But the poor lady is so exceedingly stout that a puff + of cold would carry her off, she fears.’ + </p> + <p> + Victor stamped his foot. ‘This man Jarniman serves a lady now in a—serious, + does he say? Was he precise?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Mr. Jarniman spoke of a remarkable number of diseases; very complicated, + he says. He has no opinion of doctors. He says, that the lady’s doctor and + the chemist—she sits in a chemist’s shop and swallows other people’s + prescriptions that take her fancy. He says, her continuing to live is + wonderful. He has no reason to hurry her, only for the satisfaction of a + natural curiosity.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘He mentioned her name?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘No name, sir.’ + </p> + <p> + Skepsey’s limpid grey eyes confirmed the negative to Victor, who was + assured that the little man stood clean of any falsity. + </p> + <p> + ‘You are not on equal terms. You and the magistrate have helped him to + know who it is you serve, Skepsey.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Would you please to direct me, sir.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Another time. Now go and ease your feet with a run over the town. We have + music in half an hour. That you like, I know. See chiefly to amusing + yourself.’ + </p> + <p> + Skepsey turned to go; he murmured, that he had enjoyed his trip. + </p> + <p> + Victor checked him: it was to ask whether this Jarniman had specified one, + any one of the numerous diseases afflicting his aged mistress. + </p> + <p> + Now Jarniman had shocked Skepsey with his blunt titles for a couple of the + foremost maladies assailing the poor lady’s decayed constitution: not to + be mentioned, Skepsey’s thought, in relation to ladies; whose organs and + functions we, who pay them a proper homage by restricting them to the + sphere so worthily occupied by their mothers up to the very oldest date, + respectfully curtain; their accepted masters are chivalrous to them, + deploring their need at times for the doctors and drugs. He stood looking + most unhappy. ‘She was to appear, sir, in a few—perhaps a week, a + month.’ + </p> + <p> + A nod dismissed him. + </p> + <p> + The fun of the expedition (and Dudley Sowerby had wound himself up to + relish it) was at night in the towns, when the sound of instrumental and + vocal music attracted crowds beneath the windows of the hotel, and they + heard zon, zon, violon, fete et basse; not bad fluting, excellent + fiddling, such singing as a maestro, conducting his own Opera, would have + approved. So Victor said of his darlings’ voices. Nesta’s and her mother’s + were a perfect combination; Mr. Barmby’s trompe in union, sufficiently + confirmed the popular impression, that they were artistes. They had been + ceremoniously ushered to their carriages, with expressions of gratitude, + at the departure from Rouen; and the Boniface at Gisors had entreated them + to stay another night, to give an entertainment. Victor took his pleasure + in letting it be known, that they were a quiet English family, simply + keeping-up the habits they practiced in Old England: all were welcome to + hear them while they were doing it; but they did not give entertainments. + </p> + <p> + The pride of the pleasure of reversing the general idea of English dulness + among our neighbours, was perceived to have laid fast hold of Dudley + Sowerby at Dreux. He was at the window from time to time, counting heads + below. For this reason or a better, he begged Nesta to supplant the flute + duet with the soprano and contralto of the Helena section of the + Mefistofele, called the Serenade: La Luna immobile. She consulted her + mother, and they sang it. The crowds below, swollen to a block of the + street, were dead still, showing the instinctive good manners of the + people. Then mademoiselle astonished them with a Provencal or Cevennes + air, Huguenot, though she was Catholic; but it suited her mezzo-soprano + tones; and it rang massively of the martial-religious. To what heights of + spiritual grandeur might not a Huguenot France have marched! Dudley + Sowerby, heedlessly, under an emotion that could be stirred in him with + force, by the soul of religion issuing through music, addressed his + ejaculation to Lady Grace Halley. She did nor shrug or snub him, but + rejoined: ‘I could go to battle with that song in the ears.’ She liked + seeing him so happily transformed; and liked the effect of it on Nesta + when his face shone in talking. He was at home with the girl’s eyes, as he + had never been. A song expressing in one of the combative and devotional, + went to the springs of his blood; for he was of an old warrior race, + beneath the thick crust of imposed peaceful maxims and commercial pursuits + and habitual stiff correctness. As much as wine, will music bring out the + native bent of the civilized man: endow him with language too. He was as + if unlocked; he met Nesta’s eyes and ran in a voluble interchange, that + gave him flattering after-thoughts; and at the moment sensibly a new and + assured, or to some extent assured, station beside a girl so vivid; by + which the young lady would be helped to perceive his unvoiced solider + gifts. + </p> + <p> + Nataly observed them, thinking of Victor’s mastering subtlety. She had + hoped (having clearly seen the sheep’s eye in the shepherd) that Mr. + Barmby would be watchful to act as a block between them; and therefore she + had stipulated for his presence on the journey. She remembered Victor’s + rapid look of readiness to consent:—he reckoned how naturally Mr. + Barmby would serve as a foil to any younger man. Mr. Barmby had tried all + along to perform his part: he had always been thwarted; notably once at + Gisors, where by some cunning management he and mademoiselle found + themselves in the cell of the prisoner’s Nail-wrought work while Nesta had + to take Sowerby’s hand for help at a passage here and there along the + narrow outer castle-walls. And Mr. Barmby, upon occasions, had set that + dimple in Nesta’s cheek quivering, though Simeon Fenellan was not at hand, + and there was no telling how it was done, beyond the evidence that Victor + willed it so. + </p> + <p> + From the day of the announcement of Lakelands, she had been brought more + into contact with his genius of dexterity and foresight than ever + previously: she had bent to the burden of it more; had seen herself and + everybody else outstripped—herself, of course; she did not count in + a struggle with him. But since that red dawn of Lakelands, it was almost + as if he had descended to earth from the skies. She now saw his mortality + in the miraculous things he did. The reason of it was, that through the + perceptible various arts and shifts on her level, an opposing spirit had + plainer view of his aim, to judge it. She thought it a mean one. + </p> + <p> + The power it had to hurry her with the strength of a torrent to an end she + dreaded, impressed her physically; so far subduing her mind, in + consequence, as to keep the idea of absolute resistance obscure, though + her bosom heaved with the breath; but what was her own of a mind hung + hovering above him, criticizing; and involuntarily, discomfortingly. She + could have prayed to be led blindly or blindly dashed on: she could trust + him for success; and her critical mind seemed at times a treachery. Still + she was compelled to judge. + </p> + <p> + When he said to her at night, pressing both her hands: ‘This is the news + of the day, my love! It’s death at last. We shall soon be thanking heaven + for freedom’; her fingers writhed upon his and gripped them in a torture + of remorse on his behalf. A shattering throb of her heart gave her sight + of herself as well. For so it is with the woman who loves in subjection, + she may be a critic of the man, she is his accomplice.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘You have a letter, Victor?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Confirmation all round: Fenellan, Themison, and now Skepsey.’ + </p> + <p> + He told her the tale of Skepsey and Jarniman, colouring it, as any + interested animated conduit necessarily will. Neither of them smiled. + </p> + <p> + The effort to think soberly exhausted and rolled her back on credulity. + </p> + <p> + It might not be to-day or next week or month: but so much testimony + pointed to a day within the horizon, surely! + </p> + <p> + She bowed her head to heaven for forgiveness. The murderous hope stood up, + stood out in forms and pictures. There was one of a woman at her ease at + last in the reception of guests; contrasting with an ironic haunting + figure of the woman of queenly air and stature under a finger of scorn for + a bold-faced impostor. Nataly’s lips twitched at the remembrance of quaint + whimpers of complaint to the Fates, for directing that a large instead of + a rather diminutive woman should be the social offender fearing exposure. + Majesty in the criminal’s dock, is a confounding spectacle. To the bosom + of the majestic creature, all her glorious attributes have become the + executioner’s implements. She must for her soul’s health believe that a + day of release and exoneration approaches. + </p> + <p> + ‘Barmby!—if my dear girl would like him best,’ Victor said, in + tenderest undertones, observing the shadowing variations of her face; and + pierced her cruelly, past explanation or understanding;—not that she + would have objected to the Rev. Septimus as officiating clergyman. + </p> + <p> + She nodded. Down rolled the first big tear. + </p> + <p> + We cry to women; Land, ho!—a land of palms after storms at sea; and + at once they inundate us with a deluge of eye-water. + </p> + <p> + ‘Half a minute, dear Victor, not longer,’ Nataly said, weeping, near on + laughing over his look of wanton abandonment to despair at sight of her + tears. ‘Don’t mind me. I am rather like Fenellan’s laundress, the tearful + woman whose professional apparatus was her soft heart and a cake of soap. + Skepsey has made his peace with you?’ + </p> + <p> + Victor answered: ‘Yes, yes; I see what he has been about. We’re a mixed + lot, all of us-the best! You’ve noticed, Skepsey has no laugh: however + absurd the thing he tells you, not a smile!’ + </p> + <p> + ‘But you trust his eyes; you look fathoms into them. Captain Dartrey + thinks him one of the men most in earnest of any of his country.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘So Nataly of course thinks the same. And he’s a worthy little velocipede, + as Fenellan calls him. One wishes Colney had been with us. Only Colney!—pity + one can’t cut his talons for the space before they grow again.’ + </p> + <p> + Ay, and in the presence of Colney Durance, Victor would not have been so + encouraging, half boyishly caressing, with Dudley Sowerby! It was the very + manner to sow seed of imitativeness in the girl, devoted as she was to her + father. Nataly sighed, foreseeing evil, owning it a superstition, feeling + it a certainty. We are easily prophets, sure of being justified, when the + cleverness of schemes devoted to material ends appears most delicately + perfect. History, the tales of households, the tombstone, are with us to + inspire. In Nataly’s bosom, the reproof of her inefficiency for offering + counsel where Victor for his soul’s sake needed it, was beginning to + thunder at whiles as a reproach of unfittingness in his mate, worse than a + public denunciation of the sin against Society. + </p> + <p> + It might be decreed that she and Society were to come to reconcilement. A + pain previously thought of, never previously so realized, seized her at + her next sight of Nesta. She had not taken in her front mind the contrast + of the innocent one condemned to endure the shadow from which the guilty + was by a transient ceremony released. Nature could at a push be eloquent + to defend the guilty. Not a word of vindicating eloquence rose up to clear + the innocent. Nothing that she could do; no devotedness, not any + sacrifice, and no treaty of peace, no possible joy to come, nothing could + remove the shadow from her child. She dreamed of the succour in eloquence, + to charm the ears of chosen juries while a fact spoke over the population, + with a relentless rolling out of its one hard word. But eloquence, + powerful on her behalf, was dumb when referred to Nesta. It seemed a cruel + mystery. How was it permitted by the Merciful Disposer! .... Nataly’s + intellect and her reverence clashed. They clash to the end of time if we + persist in regarding the Spirit of Life as a remote Externe, who plays the + human figures, to bring about this or that issue, instead of being beside + us, within us, our breath, if we will; marking on us where at each step we + sink to the animal, mount to the divine, we and ours who follow, offspring + of body or mind. She was in her error, from judgeing of the destiny of man + by the fate of individuals. Chiefly her error was, to try to be thinking + at all amid the fevered tangle of her sensations. + </p> + <p> + A darkness fell upon the troubled woman, and was thicker overhead when her + warm blood had drawn her to some acceptance of the philosophy of + existence, in a savour of gratification at the prospect of her equal + footing with the world while yet she lived. She hated herself for taking + pleasure in anything to be bestowed by a world so hap-hazard, + ill-balanced, unjust; she took it bitterly, with such naturalness as not + to be aware that it was irony and a poisonous irony moving her to welcome + the restorative ceremony because her largeness of person had a greater + than common need of the protection. + </p> + <p> + <a name="link2HCH0017" id="link2HCH0017"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + CHAPTER XVII. CHIEFLY UPON THE THEME OF A YOUNG MAID’S IMAGININGS + </h2> + <p> + That Mausoleum at Dreux may touch to lift us. History, pleads for the + pride of the great discrowned Family giving her illumination there. The + pride is reverently postured, the princely mourning-cloak it wears + becomingly braided at the hem with fair designs of our mortal humility in + the presence of the vanquisher; against whom, acknowledgeing a visible + conquest of the dust, it sustains a placid contention in coloured glass + and marbles. + </p> + <p> + Mademoiselle de Seilles, a fervid Orleanist, was thanked for having + advised the curvature of the route homeward to visit ‘the spot of so + impressive a monument’: as it, was phrased by the Rev. Septimus Barmby; + whose exposition to Nesta of the beautiful stained-glass pictures of + incidents in the life of the crusading St. Louis, was toned to be likewise + impressive:—Colney Durance not being at hand to bewail the pathos of + his exhaustless ‘whacking of the platitudes’; which still retain their + tender parts, but cry unheard when there is no cynic near. Mr. Barmby + laid-on solemnly. + </p> + <p> + Professional devoutness is deemed more righteous on such occasions than + poetic fire. It robes us in the cloak of the place, as at a funeral. + Generally, Mr. Barmby found, and justly, that it is in superior estimation + among his countrymen of all classes. They are shown by example how to + look, think, speak; what to do. Poets are disturbing; they cannot be + comfortably imitated, they are unsafe, not certainly the metal, unless you + have Laureates, entitled to speak by their pay and decorations; and these + are but one at a time-and a quotation may remind us of a parody, to + convulse the sacred dome! Established plain prose officials do better for + our English. The audience moved round with heads of undertakers. + </p> + <p> + Victor called to recollection Fenellan’s ‘Rev. Glendoveer’ while Mr. + Barmby pursued his discourse, uninterrupted by tripping wags. And those + who have schemes, as well as those who are startled by the criticism in + laughter to discover that they have cause for shunning it, rejoice when + wits are absent. Mr. Sowerby and Nesta interchanged a comment on Mr. + Barmby’s remarks: The Fate of Princes! The Paths of Glory! St. Louis was a + very distant Roman Catholic monarch; and the young gentleman of + Evangelical education could admire him as a Crusader. St. Louis was for + Nesta a figure in the rich hues of royal Saintship softened to homeliness + by tears. She doated on a royalty crowned with the Saint’s halo, that swam + down to us to lift us through holy human showers. She listened to Mr. + Barmby, hearing few sentences, lending his eloquence all she felt: he + rolled forth notes of a minster organ, accordant with the devotional + service she was holding mutely. Mademoiselle upon St. Louis: ‘Worthy to be + named King of Kings!’ swept her to a fount of thoughts, where the thoughts + are not yet shaped, are yet in the breast of the mother emotions. Louise + de Seilles had prepared her to be strangely and deeply moved. The girl had + a heart of many strings, of high pitch, open to be musical to simplest + wandering airs or to the gales. This crypt of the recumbent sculptured + figures and the coloured series of acts in the passage of the crowned + Saint thrilled her as with sight of flame on an altar-piece of History. + But this King in the lines of the Crucifixion leading, gave her a lesson + of life, not a message from death. With such a King, there would be union + of the old order and the new, cessation to political turmoil: Radicalism, + Socialism, all the monster names of things with heads agape in these our + days to gobble-up the venerable, obliterate the beautiful, leave a + stoniness of floods where field and garden were, would be appeased, + transfigured. She hoped, she prayed for that glorious leader’s advent. + </p> + <p> + On one subject, conceived by her only of late, and not intelligibly, not + communicably: a subject thickly veiled; one which struck at her through + her sex and must, she thought, ever be unnamed (the ardent young creature + saw it as a very thing torn by the winds to show hideous gleams of a body + rageing with fire behind the veil): on this one subject, her hopes and + prayers were dumb in her bosom. It signified shame. She knew not the how, + for she had no power to contemplate it: there was a torment of earth and a + writhing of lurid dust-clouds about it at a glimpse. But if the new + crusading Hero were to come attacking that—if some born prince nobly + man would head the world to take away the withering scarlet from the face + of women, she felt she could kiss the print of his feet upon the ground. + Meanwhile she had enjoyment of her plunge into the inmost forest-well of + mediaeval imaginativeness, where youthful minds of good aspiration through + their obscurities find much akin to them. + </p> + <p> + She had an eye for little Skepsey too: unaware that these French Princes + had hurried him off to Agincourt, for another encounter with them and the + old result—poor dear gentlemen, with whom we do so wish to be + friendly! What amused her was, his evident fatigue in undergoing the slow + parade, and sheer deference to his betters, as to the signification of a + holiday on arrested legs. Dudley Sowerby’s attention to him, in + elucidating the scenes with historical scraps, greatly pleased her. The + Rev. Septimus of course occupied her chiefly. + </p> + <p> + Mademoiselle was always near, to receive his repeated expressions of + gratitude for the route she had counselled. Without personal objections to + a well-meaning orderly man, whose pardonable error it was to be aiming too + considerably higher than his head, she did but show him the voluble + muteness of a Frenchwoman’s closed lips; not a smile at all, and certainly + no sign of hostility; when bowing to his reiterated compliment in the + sentence of French. Mr. Barmby had noticed (and a strong sentiment + rendered him observant, unwontedly) a similar alert immobility of her + lips, indicating foreign notions of this kind or that, in England: an all + but imperceptible shortening or loss of corners at the mouth, upon mention + of marriages of his clergy: particularly once, at his reading of a lengthy + report in a newspaper of a Wedding Ceremony involving his favourite Bishop + for bridegroom: a report to make one glow like Hymen rollicking the Torch + after draining the bumper to the flying slipper. He remembered the look, + and how it seemed to intensify on the slumbering features, at a statement, + that his Bishop was a widower, entering into nuptials in his fifty-fourth + year. Why not? But we ask it of Heaven and Man, why not? Mademoiselle was + pleasant: she was young or youngish; her own clergy were celibates, and—no, + he could not argue the matter with a young or youngish person of her sex. + Could it be a reasonable woman—a woman!—who, disapproved the + holy nuptials of the pastors of the flocks? But we are forbidden to + imagine the conducting of an argument thereon with a lady. + </p> + <p> + Luther... but we are not in Luther’s time:—Nature... no, nor can + there possibly be allusions to Nature. Mr. Barmby wondered at Protestant + parents taking a Papistical governess for their young flower of English + womanhood. However, she venerated St. Louis; he cordially also; there they + met; and he admitted, that she had, for a Frenchwoman, a handsome face, + and besides an agreeably artificial ingenuousness in the looks which could + be so politely dubious as to appear only dubiously adverse. + </p> + <p> + The spell upon Nesta was not blown away on English ground; and when her + father and mother were comparing their impressions, she could not but keep + guard over the deeper among her own. At the Chateau de Gisors, leftward + off Vernon on Seine, it had been one of romance and wonderment, with + inquisitive historic soundings of her knowledge and mademoiselle’s, a + reverence for the prisoner’s patient holy work, and picturings of his + watchful waiting daily, Nail in hand, for the heaven-sent sunlight on the + circular dungeon-wall through the slits of the meurtrieres. But the + Mausoleum at Dreux spake religiously; it enfolded Mr. Barmby, his voice + re-edified it. The fact that he had discoursed there, though not a word of + the discourse was remembered, allied him to the spirit of a day rather + increasing in sacredness as it receded and left her less the possessor of + it, more the worshipper. + </p> + <p> + Mademoiselle had to say to herself: ‘Impossible!’ after seeing the drift + of her dear Nesta’s eyes in the wake of the colossal English clergyman. + She fed her incredulousness indignantly on the evidence confounding it. + Nataly was aware of unusual intonations, treble-stressed, in the Bethesda + and the Galilee of Mr. Barmby on Concert evenings: as it were, the + towering wood-work of the cathedral organ in quake under emission of its + multitudinous outroar. The ‘Which?’ of the Rev. Septimus, addressed to + Nesta, when song was demanded of him; and her ‘Either’; and his gentle + hesitation, upon a gaze at her for the directing choice, could not be + unnoticed by women. + </p> + <p> + Did he know a certain thing?—and dream of urging the suit, as an + indulgent skipper of parental pages? + </p> + <p> + Such haunting interrogations were the conspirators’ daggers out at any + instant, or leaping in sheath, against Nataly’s peace of mind. But she + trusted her girl’s laughing side to rectify any little sentimental + overbalancing. She left the ground where maternal meditations are serious, + at an image of Mr. Barmby knocking at Nesta’s heart as a lover. Was it + worth inquiry? + </p> + <p> + A feminine look was trailed across the eyes of mademoiselle, with mention + of Mr. Barmby’s name. + </p> + <p> + Mademoiselle rippled her shoulders. ‘We are at present much enamoured of + Bethesda.’ + </p> + <p> + That watchfullest showing no alarm, the absurdity of the suspicion + smothered it. + </p> + <p> + Nataly had moreover to receive startling new guests: + </p> + <p> + Lady Rodwell Blachington: Mrs. Fanning, wife of the General: young Mrs. + Blathenoy, wife of the great bill-broker: ladies of Wrensham and about. + And it was a tasking of her energies equal to the buffeting of recurrent + waves on deep sea. The ladies were eager for her entry into Lakelands. She + heard that Victor had appointed Lady Blachington’s third son to the + coveted post of clerk in the Indian house of Inchling and Radnor. These + are the deluge days when even aristocracy will cry blessings on the man + who procures a commercial appointment for one of its younger sons offended + and rebutted by the barrier of Examinations for the Civil Service. ‘To + have our Adolphus under Mr. Victor Radnor’s protection, is a step!’ Lady + Blachington said. Nataly was in an atmosphere of hints and revealings. + There were City Dinners, to which one or other of the residents about + Lakelands had been taken before he sat at Victor’s London table. He was + already winning his way, apparently without effort, to be the popular man + of that neighbourhood. A subterranean tide or a slipping of earth itself + seemed bearing her on. She had his promise indeed, that he would not ask + of her to enter Lakelands until the day of his freedom had risen; but + though she could trust to his word, the heart of the word went out of it + when she heard herself thanked by Lady Blachington (who could so well + excuse her at such a time of occupation for not returning her call, that + she called in a friendly way a second time, warmly to thank her) for + throwing open the Concert room at Lakelands in August, to an Entertainment + in assistance of the funds for the purpose of erecting an East of London + Clubhouse, where the children of the poor by day could play, and their + parents pass a disengaged evening. Doubtless a worthy Charity. Nataly was + alive to the duties of wealth. Had it been simply a demand for a donation, + she would not have shown that momentary pucker of the brows, which Lady + Blachington read as a contrast with the generous vivacity of the husband. + </p> + <p> + Nataly read a leaf of her fate in this announcement. Nay, she beheld + herself as the outer world wexedly beholds a creature swung along to the + doing of things against the better mind. An outer world is thoughtless of + situations which prepare us to meet the objectionable with a will + benumbed;—if we do not, as does that outer world, belong to the + party of the readily heroical. She scourged her weakness: and the + intimation of the truth stood over her, more than ever manifest, that the + deficiency affecting her character lay in her want of language. A tongue + to speak and contend, would have helped her to carve a clearer way. But + then again, the tongue to speak must be one which could reproach, and + strike at errors; fence, and continually summon resources to engage the + electrical vitality of a man like Victor. It was an exultation of their + life together, a mark of his holiness for them both, that they had never + breathed a reproach upon one another. + </p> + <p> + She dropped away from ideas of remonstrance; faintly seeing, in her sigh + of submission, that the deficiency affecting her character would have been + supplied by a greater force of character, pressing either to speech or + acts. The confession of a fated inevitable in the mind, is weakness + prostrate. She knew it: but she could point to the manner of man she was + matched with; and it was not a poor excuse. + </p> + <p> + Mr. Barmby, she thought, deserved her gratitude in some degree for + stepping between Mr. Sowerby and Nesta. The girl not having inclinations, + and the young gentleman being devoid of stratagem, they were easily kept + from the dangerous count of two. + </p> + <p> + Mademoiselle would have said, that the shepherd also had rarely if ever a + minute quite alone with her lamb. Incredulously she perceived signs of a + shock. The secret following the signs was betrayed by Nesta in return for + a tender grasp of hands and a droll flutter of eyelids. Out it came, on a + nod first; then a dreary mention of a date, and an incident, to bring it + nearer to comprehension. Mr. Barmby—and decide who will whether it + is that Love was made to elude or that curates impelled by his fires are + subtle as nether—had outwitted French watchfulness by stealing + minutes enough on a day at Lakelands to declare himself. And no wonder the + girl looked so forlorn: he had shivered her mediaeval forest-palace of + illuminated glass, to leave her standing like a mountain hind, that sniffs + the tainted gale off the crag of her first quick leap from hounds; her + instincts alarmed, instead of rich imagination colouring and fostering. + </p> + <p> + She had no memory for his words; so, and truly, she told her Louise: + meaning that she had only a spiceless memory; especially for the word love + in her ears from the mouth of a man. + </p> + <p> + There had been a dream of it; with the life-awakening marvel it would be, + the humbleness it would bring to her soul beneath the golden clothing of + her body: one of those faint formless dreams, which are as the bend of + grasses to the breath of a still twilight. She lived too spiritedly to + hang on any dream; and had moreover a muffled dread-shadow-sister to the + virginal desire—of this one, as of a fateful power that might drag + her down, disorder, discolour. But now she had heard it: the word, the + very word itself! in her own ears! addressed to her! in a man’s voice! The + first utterance had been heard, and it was over; the chapter of the book + of bulky promise of the splendours and mysteries;—the shimmering + woods and bushy glades, and the descent of the shape celestial, and the + recognition—the mutual cry of affinity; and overhead the crimson + outrolling of the flag of beneficent enterprises hand in hand, all was at + an end. These, then, are the deceptions our elders tell of! That masculine + voice should herald a new world to the maiden. The voice she had heard did + but rock to ruin the world she had been living in. + </p> + <p> + Mademoiselle prudently forbore from satirical remarks on his person or on + his conduct. Nesta had nothing to defend: she walked in a bald waste. + </p> + <p> + ‘Can I have been guilty of leading him to think...?’ she said, in a tone + that writhed, at a second discussion of this hapless affair. + </p> + <p> + ‘They choose to think,’ mademoiselle replied. ‘It is he or another. My + dear and dearest, you have entered the field where shots fly thick, as + they do to soldiers in battle; and it is neither your fault nor any one’s, + if you are hit.’ + </p> + <p> + Nesta gazed at her, with a shy supplicating cry of ‘Louise.’ + </p> + <p> + Mademoiselle immediately answered the tone of entreaty. ‘Has it happened + to me? I am of the age of eight and twenty; passable, to look at: yes, my + dear, I have gone through it. To spare you the questions tormenting you, I + will tell you, that perhaps our experience of our feelings comes nigh on a + kind of resemblance. The first gentleman who did me the honour to inform + me of his passion, was a hunchback.’ + </p> + <p> + Nesta cried ‘Oh!’ in a veritable pang of sympathy, and clapped hands to + her ears, to shut out Mr. Barmby’s boom of the terrific word attacking + Louise from that deformed one. + </p> + <p> + Her disillusionment became of the sort which hears derision. A girl of + quick blood and active though unregulated intellect, she caught at the + comic of young women’s hopes and experiences, in her fear of it. + </p> + <p> + ‘My own precious poor dear Louise! what injustice there is in the world + for one like my Louise to have a hunchback to be the first...!’ + </p> + <p> + ‘But, my dear, it did me no harm.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘But if it had been known!’ + </p> + <p> + ‘But it was known!’ + </p> + <p> + Nesta controlled a shuddering: ‘It is the knowledge of it in ourselves—that + it has ever happened;—you dear Louise, who deserve so much better! + And one asks—Oh, why are we not left in peace! And do look at the + objects it makes of us!’ Mademoiselle: could see, that the girl’s + desperation had got hold of her humour for a life-buoy. ‘It is really + worse to have it unknown—when you are compelled to be his partner in + sharing the secret, and feel as if it were a dreadful doll you conceal for + fear that everybody will laugh at its face.’ + </p> + <p> + She resumed her seriousness: ‘I find it so hard to be vexed with him and + really really like him. For he is a good man; but he will not let one + shake him off. He distresses: because we can’t quite meet as we did. Last + Wednesday Concert evening, he kept away; and I am annoyed that I was + glad.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Moths have to pass through showers, and keep their pretty patterns from + damage as best they can,’ said mademoiselle. + </p> + <p> + Nesta transformed herself into a disciple of Philosophy on the spot. ‘Yes, + all these feelings of ours are moth-dust! One feels them. I suppose they + pass. They must. But tell me, Louise, dear soul, was your poor dear good + little afflicted suitor—was he kindly pitied?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Conformably with the regulations prescribed to young damsels who are in + request to surrender the custody of their hands. It is easy to commit a + dangerous excess in the dispensing of that article they call pity of + them.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘And he—did he?—vowed to you he could not take No for an + answer?’ + </p> + <p> + At this ingenuous question, woefully uttered, mademoiselle was pricked, to + smile pointedly. Nesta had a tooth on her under-lip. Then, shaking vapours + to the winds, she said: ‘It is an honour, to be asked; and we cannot be + expected to consent. So I shall wear through it.—Only I do wish that + Mr. Fenellan would not call him The Inchcape Bell!’ She murmured this to + herself. + </p> + <p> + Mr. Barmby was absent for two weeks. ‘Can anything have offended him?’ + Victor inquired, in some consternation, appreciating the man’s worth, and + the grand basso he was; together with the need for him at the Lakelands + Concert in August. + </p> + <p> + Nataly wrote Mr. Barmby a direct invitation. She had no reply. Her + speculations were cut short by Victor, who handed her a brief note + addressed to him and signed by the Rev. Septimus, petitioning for a + private interview. + </p> + <p> + The formality of the request incensed Victor. ‘Now, dear love, you see + Colney’s meaning, when he says, there are people who have no intimacy in + them. Here’s a man who visits me regularly once a week or more, has been + familiar for years—four, at least; and he wants to speak to me, and + must obtain the “privilege” by special appointment! What can be the + meaning of it?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘You will hear to-morrow afternoon,’ Nataly said, seeing one paved way to + the meaning—a too likely meaning... ‘He hasn’t been... nothing about + Fredi, surely!’ + </p> + <p> + ‘I have had no information.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Impossible! Barmby has good sense; Bottesini can’t intend to come + scraping on that string. But we won’t lose him; he’s one of us. Barmby + counts for more at a Charity Concert than all the catalogue, and + particularly in the country. But he’s an excellent fellow—eh?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘That he is,’ Nataly agreed. + </p> + <p> + Victor despatched a cheerful curt consent to see Mr. Barmby privately on + the late afternoon of the day to follow. + </p> + <p> + Nesta, returning home from the park at that hour of the interview, + ignorant of Mr. Barmby’s purpose though she was, had her fires + extinguished by the rolling roar of curfew along the hall-passage, out of + the library. + </p> + <p> + <a name="link2HCH0018" id="link2HCH0018"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + CHAPTER XVIII. SUITORS FOR THE HAND OF NESTA VICTORIA + </h2> + <p> + When, upon the well-known quest, the delightful singer Orpheus took that + downward way, coming in sight of old Cerberus centiceps, he astutely + feigned inattention to the hostile appearances of the multiple beast, and + with a wave of his plectrum over the responsive lyre, he at the stroke + raised voice. This much you know. It may be communicated to you, that + there was then beheld the most singular spectacle ever exhibited on the + dizzy line of division between the living and the dead. For those + unaccustomed musical tones in the last thin whiff of our sustaining air + were so smartingly persuasive as to pierce to the vitals of the faithful + Old Dog before his offended sentiments had leisure to rouse their heads + against a beggar of a mortal. The terrible sugariness which poured into + him worked like venom to cause an encounter and a wrestling: his battery + of jaws expressed it. They gaped. At the same time, his eyeballs gave up. + All the Dog, that would have barked the breathing intruder an hundredfold + back to earth, was one compulsory centurion yawn. Tears, issue of the + frightful internal wedding of the dulcet and the sour (a ravishing rather + of the latter by the former), rolled off his muzzles. + </p> + <p> + Now, if you are not for insisting that a magnificent simile shall be + composed of exactly the like notes in another octave, you will catch the + fine flavour of analogy and be wafted in a beat of wings across the scene + of the application of the Rev. Septimus Barmby to Mr. Victor Radnor, that + he might enter the house in the guise of suitor for the hand of Nesta + Victoria. It is the excelling merit of similes and metaphors to spring us + to vault over gaps and thickets and dreary places. But, as with the visits + of Immortals, we must be ready to receive them. Beware, moreover, of + examining them too scrupulously: they have a trick of wearing to vapour if + closely scanned. Let it be gratefully for their aid. + </p> + <p> + So far the comparison is absolute, that Mr. Barmby passed: he was at + liberty to pursue his quest. + </p> + <p> + Victor could not explain how he had been brought to grant it. He was at + pains to conceal the bewilderment Mr. Barmby had cast on him, and make + Nataly see the smallness of the grant:—both of them were unwilling + to lose Barmby; there was not the slightest fear about Fredi, he said; and + why should not poor Barmby have his chance with the others in the race!—and + his Nataly knew that he hated to speak unkindly: he could cry the negative + like a crack of thunder in the City. But such matters as these! and a man + pleading merely for the right to see the girl!—and pleading in a + tone... ‘I assure you, my love, he touched chords.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Did he allude to advantages in the alliance with him?’ Nataly asked + smoothly. + </p> + <p> + ‘His passion—nothing else. Candid enough. And he had a tone—he + has a tone, you know. It ‘s not what he said. Some allusion to belief in a + favourable opinion of him... encouragement... on the part of the mama. She + would have him travelling with us! I foresaw it.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘You were astonished when it came.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘We always are.’ + </p> + <p> + Victor taunted her softly with having encouraged Mr. Barmby. + </p> + <p> + She had thought in her heart—not seriously; on a sigh of despondency—that + Mr. Barmby espousing the girl would smooth a troubled prospect: and a + present resentment at her weakness rendered her shrewd to detect Victor’s + cunning to cover his own: a thing imaginable of him previously in + sentimental matters, yet never accurately and so legibly printed on her + mind. It did not draw her to read him with a novel familiarity; it drew + her to be more sensible of foregone intimations of the man he was—irresistible + in attack, not impregnably defensive. Nor did he seem in this instance + humanely considerate: if mademoiselle’s estimate of the mind of the girl + was not wrong, then Mr. Barmby’s position would be both a ridiculous and a + cruel one. She had some silly final idea that the poor man might now serve + permanently to check the more dreaded applicant: a proof that her ordinary + reflectiveness was blunted. + </p> + <p> + Nataly acknowledged, after rallying Victor for coming to have his weakness + condoned, a justice in his counter-accusation, of a loss of her natural + cheerfulness, and promised amendment, with a steely smile, that his lips + mimicked fondly; and her smile softened. To strengthen the dear soul’s + hopes, he spoke, as one who had received the latest information, of Dr. + Themison and surgeons; little conscious of the tragic depths he struck or + of the burden he gave her heart to bear. Her look alarmed him. She seemed + to be hugging herself up to the tingling scalp, and was in a moment marble + to sight and touch. She looked like the old engravings of martyrs taking + the bite of the jaws of flame at the stake. + </p> + <p> + He held her embraced, feeling her body as if it were in the awful grip of + fingers from the outside of life. + </p> + <p> + The seizure was over before it could be called ominous. When it was once + over, and she had smiled again and rebuked him for excessive anxiety, his + apprehensions no longer troubled him, but subsided sensationally in wrath + at the crippled woman who would not obey the dictate of her ailments + instantly to perish and spare this dear one annoyance. + </p> + <p> + Subsequently, later than usual, he performed his usual mental penance for + it. In consequence, the wrath, and the wish, and the penitence, haunted + him, each swelling to possession of him in turn; until they united to head + a plunge into retrospects; which led to his reviewing the army of charges + against Mrs. Burman. + </p> + <p> + And of this he grew ashamed, attributing it to the morbid indulgence in + reflection: a disease never afflicting him anterior to the stupid fall on + London Bridge. He rubbed instinctively for the punctilio-bump, and could + cheat his fancy to think a remainder of it there, just below, half an inch + to the right of, the spot where a phrenologist, invited by Nataly in old + days, had marked philo-progenitiveness on his capacious and enviable + cerebrum. He knew well it was a fancy. But it was a fact also, that since + the day of the fall (never, save in merest glimpses, before that day), he + had taken to look behind him, as though an eye had been knocked in the + back of his head. + </p> + <p> + Then, was that day of the announcement of Lakelands to Nataly, to be + accounted a gloomy day? He would not have it so. + </p> + <p> + She was happily occupied with her purchases of furniture, Fredi with her + singing lessons, and he with his business; a grasp of many ribands, + reining-in or letting loose; always enjoyable in the act. Recently only + had he known when at home, a relaxation, a positive pleasure in looking + forward to the hours of the City office. This was odd, but so it was; and + looking homeward from the City, he had a sense of disappointment when it + was not Concert evening. The Cormyns, the Yatts, and Priscilla Graves, and + Pempton, foolish fellow, and that bothering Barmby, and Peridon and + Catkin, were the lineing of his nest. Well, and so they had been before + Lakelands rose. What had induced!... he suddenly felt foreign to himself. + The shrouded figure of his lost Idea on London Bridge went by. + </p> + <p> + A peep into the folds of the shroud was granted him:—Is it a truth, + that if we are great owners of money, we are so swollen with a force not + native to us, as to be precipitated into acts the downright contrary of + our tastes? + </p> + <p> + He inquired it of his tastes, which have the bad habit of unmeasured + phrasing when they are displeased, and so they yield no rational answer. + Still he gave heed to violent extraneous harpings against money. Epigrams + of Colney’s; abuse of it and the owners of it by Socialist orators + reported in some newspaper corner; had him by the ears. + </p> + <p> + They ceased in the presence of Lady Grace Halley, who entered his office + to tell him she was leaving town for Whinfold, her husband’s family-seat, + where the dear man lay in evil case. She signified her resignation to the + decrees from above, saying generously: + </p> + <p> + ‘You look troubled, my friend. Any bad City news?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘I look troubled?’ Victor said laughing, and bethought him of what the + trouble might be. ‘City news would not cause the look. Ah, yes;—I + was talking in the street to a friend of mine on horseback the other day, + and he kept noticing his horse’s queer starts. We spied half a dozen + children in the gutter, at the tail of the horse, one of them plucking at + a hair. “Please, sir, may I have a hair out of your horse’s tail?” said + the mite. We patted the poor horse that grew a tail for urchins to pluck + at. Men come to the fathers about their girls. It’s my belief that mothers + more easily say no. If they learn the word as maids, you’ll say! However, + there’s no fear about my girl. Fredi’s hard to snare. And what brings you + Cityward?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘I want to know whether I shall do right in selling out of the Tiddler + mine.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘You have multiplied your investment by ten.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘If it had been thousands!’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Clearly, you sell; always jump out of a mounted mine, unless you’re at + the bottom of it.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘There are City-articles against the mine this morning—or I should + have been on my way to Whinfold at this moment. The shares are lower.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘The merry boys are at work to bring your balloon to the ground, that you + may quit it for them to ascend. Tiddler has enemies, like the best of + mines: or they may be named lovers, if you like. And mines that have gone + up, go down for a while before they rise again; it’s an affair of + undulations; rocket mines are not so healthy. The stories are false, for + the time. I had the latest from Dartrey Fenellan yesterday. He’s here next + month; some time in August.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘He is married, is he not?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Was.’ + </p> + <p> + Victor’s brevity sounded oddly to Lady Grace. + </p> + <p> + ‘Is he not a soldier?’ she said. + </p> + <p> + ‘Soldiers and parsons!’ Victor interjected. + </p> + <p> + Now she saw. She understood the portent of Mr. Barmby’s hovering offer of + the choice of songs, and the recent tremulousness of the welling Bethesda. + </p> + <p> + But she had come about her own business; and after remarking, that when + there is a prize there must be competition, or England will have to lower + her flag, she declared her resolve to stick to Tiddler, exclaiming: ‘It’s + only in mines that twenty times the stake is not a dream of the past!’ + </p> + <p> + ‘The Riviera green field on the rock is always open to you,’ said Victor. + </p> + <p> + She put out her hand to be taken. ‘Not if you back me here. It really is + not gambling when yours is the counsel I follow. And if I’m to be a widow, + I shall have to lean on a friend, gifted like you. I love adventure, + danger;—well, if we two are in it; just to see my captain in a + storm. And if the worst happens, we go down together. It ‘s the + detestation of our deadly humdrum of modern life; some inherited love of + fighting.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Say, brandy.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Does not Mr. Durance accuse you of an addiction to the brandy novel?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Colney may call it what he pleases. If I read fiction, let it be fiction; + airier than hard fact. If I see a ballet, my troop of short skirts must + not go stepping like pavement policemen. I can’t read dull analytical + stuff or “stylists” when I want action—if I’m to give my mind to a + story. I can supply the reflections. I’m English—if Colney ‘s right + in saying we always come round to the story with the streak of + supernaturalism. + </p> + <p> + I don’t ask for bloodshed: that’s what his “brandy” means.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘But Mr. Durance is right, we require a shedding; I confess I expect it + where there’s love; it’s part of the balance, and justifies one’s + excitement. How otherwise do you get any real crisis? I must read and live + something unlike this flat life around us.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘There’s the Adam life and the Macadam life, Fenellan says. Pass it in + books, but in life we can have quite enough excitement coming out of our + thoughts. No brandy there! And no fine name for personal predilections or + things done in domino!’ Victor said, with his very pleasant face, pressing + her hand, to keep the act of long holding it in countenance and bring it + to a well-punctuated conclusion: thinking involuntarily of the other fair + woman, whose hand was his, and who betrayed a beaten visage despite—or + with that poor kind of—trust in her captain. But the thought was not + guilty of drawing comparisons. ‘This is one that I could trust, as captain + or mate,’ he pressed the hand again before dropping it. + </p> + <p> + ‘You judge entirely by the surface, if you take me for a shifty person at + the trial,’ said Lady Grace. + </p> + <p> + Skepsey entered the room with one of his packets, and she was reminded of + trains and husbands. + </p> + <p> + She left Victor uncomfortably rufed: and how? for she had none of the + physical charms appealing peculiarly to the man who was taken with + grandeur of shape. She belonged rather to the description physically + distasteful to him. + </p> + <p> + It is a critical comment on a civilization carelessly distilled from the + jealous East, when visits of fair women to City offices can have this + effect. If the sexes are separated for an hour, the place where one is + excluded or not common to see, becomes inflammable to that appearing + spark. He does outrage to a bona Dea: she to the monasticism of the Court + of Law: and he and she awaken unhallowed emotions. Supposing, however, + that western men were to de-orientalize their gleeful notions of her, and + dis-Turk themselves by inviting the woman’s voluble tongue to sisterly + occupation there in the midst of the pleading Court, as in the domestic + circle: very soon would her eyes be harmless: unless directed upon us with + intent. + </p> + <p> + That is the burning core of the great Question, our Armageddon in + Morality: Is she moral? Does she mean to be harmless? Is she not untamable + Old Nature? And when once on an equal footing with her lordly half, would + not the spangled beauty, in a turn, like the realistic + transformation-trick of a pantomime, show herself to be that wanton old + thing—the empress of disorderliness? You have to recollect, as the + Conservative acutely suggests, that her timidities, at present urging her + to support Establishments, pertain to her state of dependence. The party + views of Conservatism are, must be, founded, we should remember, on an + intimate acquaintance with her in the situations where she is almost + unrestrictedly free and her laughter rings to confirm the sentences of + classical authors and Eastern sages. Conservatives know what they are + about when they refuse to fling the last lattice of an ancient harem open + to air and sun-the brutal dispersers of mystery, which would despoil an + ankle of its flying wink. + </p> + <p> + Victor’s opinions were those of the entrenched majority; objecting to the + occult power of women, as we have the women now, while legislating to + maintain them so; and forbidding a step to a desperately wicked female + world lest the step should be to wickeder. His opinions were in the + background, rarely stirred; but the lady had brought them forward; and he + fretted at his restlessness, vexed that it should be due to the intrusion + of the sex instead of to the charms of the individual. No sting of the + sort had bothered him, he called to mind, on board the Channel + boat-nothing to speak of. ‘Why does she come here! Why didn’t she go to + her husband! She gets into the City scramble blindfold, and catches at the + nearest hand to help her out! Nice woman enough.’ Yes, but he was annoyed + with her for springing sensations that ran altogether heartless to the + object, at the same time that they were disloyal to the dear woman their + natural divinity. And between him and that dear woman, since the + communication made by Skepsey in the town of Dreux, nightly the dividing + spirit of Mrs. Burman lay cold as a corpse. They both felt her there. They + kissed coldly, pressed a hand, said good night. + </p> + <p> + Next afternoon the announcement by Skepsey of the Hon. Dudley Sowerby, + surprised Victor’s eyebrows at least, and caused him genially to review + the visit of Lady Grace. + </p> + <p> + Whether or not Colney Durance drew his description of a sunken nobility + from the ‘sick falcon’ distinguishing the handsome features of Mr. + Sowerby, that beaked invalid was particularly noticeable to Victor during + the statement of his case, although the young gentleman was far from being + one, in Colney’s words, to enliven the condition of domestic fowl with an + hereditary turn for ‘preying’; eminently the reverse; he was of good moral + repute, a worker, a commendable citizen. But there was the obligation upon + him to speak—it is expected in such cases, if only as a formality—of + his ‘love’: hard to do even in view and near to the damsel’s reddening + cheeks: it perplexed him. He dropped a veil on the bashful topic; his tone + was the same as when he reverted to the material points; his present + income, his position in the great Bank of Shotts and Co., his prospects, + the health of the heir to the Cantor earldom. He considered that he spoke + to a member of the City merchants, whose preference for the plain + positive, upon the question of an alliance between families by marriage, + lends them for once a resemblance to lords. When a person is not read by + character, the position or profession is called on to supply raised print + for the finger-ends to spell. + </p> + <p> + Hard on poor Fredi! was Victor’s thought behind the smile he bent on this + bald Cupid. She deserved a more poetical lover! His paternal sympathies + for the girl besought in love, revived his past feelings as a wooer; + nothing but a dread of the influence of Mr. Barmby’s toned eloquence upon + the girl, after her listening to Dudley Sowerby’s addresses, checked his + contempt for the latter. He could not despise the suitor he sided with + against another and seemingly now a more dangerous. Unable quite to + repress the sentiment, he proceeded immediately to put it to his uses. For + we have no need to be scrupulously formal and precise in the exposition of + circumstances to a fellow who may thank the stars if such a girl + condescends to give him a hearing. He had this idea through the conception + of his girl’s generosity. And furthermore, the cognizant eye of a + Lucretian Alma Mater having seat so strongly in Victor, demanded as a + right an effusion of the promising amorous graces on the part of the + acceptable applicant to the post of husband of that peerless. These being + absent, evidently non-existent, it seemed sufficient for the present, + after the fashion of the young gentleman, to capitulate the few material + matters briefly. + </p> + <p> + They were dotted along with a fine disregard of the stateliness of the sum + to be settled on Nesta Victoria, and with a distant but burning wish all + the while, that the suitor had been one to touch his heart and open it, + inspiriting it—as could have been done—to disclose for good + and all the things utterable. Victor loved clear honesty, as he loved + light: and though he hated to be accused of not showing a clean face in + the light, he would have been moved and lifted to confess to a spot by the + touch at his heart. Dudley Sowerby’s deficiencies, however, were + outweighed by the palpable advantages of his birth, his prospects, and his + good repute for conduct; add thereto his gentlemanly manners. Victor + sighed again over his poor Fredi; and in telling Mr. Sowerby that the + choice must be left to her, he had the regrets of a man aware of his + persuasive arts and how they would be used, to think that he was actually + making the choice. + </p> + <p> + Observe how fatefully he who has a scheme is the engine of it; he is no + longer the man of his tastes or of his principles; he is on a line of + rails for a terminus; and he may cast languishing eyes across waysides to + right and left, he has doomed himself to proceed, with a self-devouring + hunger for the half desired; probably manhood gone at the embrace of it. + This may be or not, but Nature has decreed to him the forfeit of pleasure. + She bids us count the passage of a sober day for the service of the + morrow; that is her system; and she would have us adopt it, to keep in us + the keen edge for cutting, which is the guarantee of enjoyment: doing + otherwise, we lose ourselves in one or other of the furious matrix + instincts; we are blunt to all else. + </p> + <p> + Young Dudley fully agreed that the choice must be with Miss Radnor; he + alluded to her virtues, her accomplishments. He was waxing to fervidness. + He said he must expect competitors; adding, on a start, that he was to + say, from his mother, she, in the case of an intention to present Miss + Radnor at Court.... + </p> + <p> + Victor waved hand for a finish, looking as though, his head had come out + of hot water. He sacrificed Royalty to his necessities, under a kind of + sneer at its functions: ‘Court! my girl? But the arduous duties are over + for the season. We are a democratic people retaining the seductions of + monarchy, as a friend says; and of course a girl may like to count among + the flowers of the kingdom for a day, in the list of Court presentations; + no harm. Only there’s plenty of time... very young girls have their heads + turned—though I don’t say, don’t imagine, my girl would. By and by + perhaps.’ + </p> + <p> + Dudley was ushered into Mr. Inchling’s room and introduced to the + figure-head of the Firm of Inchling, Pennergate, and Radnor: a respectable + City merchant indeed, whom Dudley could read-off in a glimpse of the + downright contrast to his partner. He had heard casual remarks on the + respectable City of London merchant from Colney Durance. A short + analytical gaze at him, helped to an estimate of the powers of the man who + kept him up. Mr. Inchling was a florid City-feaster, descendant of a line + of City merchants, having features for a wife to identify; as drovers, + they tell us, can single one from another of their round-bellied beasts. + Formerly the leader of the Firm, he was now, after dreary fits of + restiveness, kickings, false prophecies of ruin, Victor’s obedient + cart-horse. He sighed in set terms for the old days of the Firm, when, + like trouts in the current, the Firm had only to gape for shoals of good + things to fatten it: a tale of English prosperity in quiescence; narrated + interjectorily among the by-ways of the City, and wanting only metre to + make it our national Poem. + </p> + <p> + Mr. Inchling did not deny that grand mangers of golden oats were still + somehow constantly allotted to him. His wife believed in Victor, and + deemed the loss of the balancing Pennergate a gain. Since that lamentable + loss, Mr. Inchling, under the irony of circumstances the Tory of Commerce, + had trotted and gallopped whither driven, racing like mad against his will + and the rival nations now in the field to force the pace; a name for + enterprise; the close commercial connection of a man who speculated—who, + to put it plainly, lived on his wits; hurried onward and onward; always + doubting, munching, grumbling at satisfaction, in perplexity of the + gratitude which is apprehensive of black Nemesis at a turn of the road,—to + confound so wild a whip as Victor Radnor. He had never forgiven the + youth’s venture in India of an enormous purchase of Cotton many years + back, and which he had repudiated, though not his share of the hundreds of + thousands realized before the refusal to ratify the bargain had come to + Victor. Mr. Inchling dated his first indigestion from that disquieting + period. He assented to the praise of Victor’s genius, admitting benefits; + his heart refused to pardon, and consequently his head wholly to trust, + the man who robbed him of his quondam comfortable feeling of security. And + if you will imagine the sprite of the aggregate English Taxpayer + personifying Steam as the malignant who has despoiled him of the blessed + Safety-Assurance he once had from his God Neptune against invaders, you + will comprehend the state of Mr. Inchling’s mind in regard to his terrific + and bountiful, but very disturbing partner. + </p> + <p> + He thanked heaven to his wife often, that he had nothing to do with North + American or South American mines and pastures or with South Africa and, + gold and diamonds: and a wife must sometimes listen, mastering her inward + comparisons. Dr. Schlesien had met and meditated on this example of the + island energy. Mr. Inchling was not permitted by his wife to be much the + guest of the Radnor household, because of the frequent meeting there with + Colney Durance; Colney’s humour for satire being instantly in bristle at + sight of his representative of English City merchants: ‘over whom,’ as he + wrote of the venerable body, ‘the disciplined and instructed Germans not + deviously march; whom acute and adventurous Americans, with half a cock of + the eye in passing, compassionately outstrip.’ He and Dr. Schlesien agreed + upon Mr. Inchling. Meantime the latter gentleman did his part at the + tables of the wealthier City Companies, and retained his appearance of + health; he was beginning to think, upon a calculation of the increased + treasures of those Companies and the country, that we, the Taxpayer, ought + not to leave it altogether to Providence to defend them; notwithstanding + the watchful care of us hitherto shown by our briny Providence, to save us + from anxiety and expense. But there are, he said, ‘difficulties’; and the + very word could stop him, as commonly when our difficulty lies in the + exercise of thinking. + </p> + <p> + Victor’s African room, containing large wall-maps of auriferous regions, + was inspected; and another, where clerks were busy over miscellaneous + Continents. Dudley Sowerby hoped he might win the maiden. + </p> + <p> + He and Victor walked in company Westward. The shop of Boyle and Luckwort, + chemists, was not passed on this occasion. Dudley grieved that he had to + be absent from the next Concert for practise, owing to his engagement to + his mother to go down to the family seat near Tunbridge Wells. Victor + mentioned his relatives, the Duvidney maiden ladies, residing near the + Wells. They measured the distance between Cronidge and Moorsedge, the two + houses, as for half an hour on horseback. + </p> + <p> + Nesta told her father at home that the pair of them had been observed + confidentially arm in arm, and conversing so profoundly. + </p> + <p> + ‘Who, do you think, was the topic?’ Victor asked. + </p> + <p> + She would not chase the little blue butterfly of a guess. + </p> + <p> + <a name="link2HCH0019" id="link2HCH0019"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + CHAPTER XIX. TREATS OF NATURE AND CIRCUMSTANCE AND THE DISSENSION BETWEEN + THEM AND OF A SATIRIST’S MALIGNITY IN THE DIRECTION OF HIS COUNTRY + </h2> + <p> + There is at times in the hearts of all men of active life a vivid wild + moment or two of dramatic dialogue between the veteran antagonists, Nature + and Circumstance, when they, whose business it should be to be joyfully + one, furiously split; and the Dame is up with her shrillest querulousness + to inquire of her offspring, for the distinct original motive of his + conduct. Why did he bring her to such a pass! And what is the gain? If he + be not an alienated issue of the great Mother, he will strongly incline to + her view, that he put himself into harness to join with a machine going + the dead contrary way of her welfare; and thereby wrote himself donkey, + for his present reading. Soldiers, heroes, even the braided, even the + wearers of the gay cock’s feathers, who get the honours and the + pocket-pieces, know the moment of her electrical eloquence. They have no + answer for her, save an index at the machine pushing them on yet farther + under the enemy’s line of fire, where they pluck the golden wreath or the + livid, and in either case listen no more. They glorify her topping wisdom + while on the march to confound it. She is wise in her way. But, it is + asked by the disputant, If we had followed her exclusively, how far should + we have travelled from our starting-point? We of the world and its prizes + and duties must do her an injury to make her tongue musical to us, and her + argument worthy of attention. So it seems. How to keep the proper balance + between those two testy old wranglers, that rarely pull the right way + together, is as much the task for men in the grip of the world, as for the + wanton youthful fry under dominion of their instincts; and probably, when + it is done, man will have attained the golden age of his retirement from + service. + </p> + <p> + Why be scheming? Victor asked. Unlike the gallant soldiery, his question + was raised in the blush of a success, from an examination of the quality + of the thing won; although it had not changed since it was first coveted; + it was demonstrably the same: and an astonishing dry stick he held, as a + reward for perpetual agitations and perversions of his natural tastes. + Here was a Dudley Sowerby, the direct issue of the conception of + Lakelands; if indeed they were not conceived together in one; and the + young gentleman had moral character, good citizen substance, and station, + rank, prospect of a title; and the grasp of him was firm. Yet so far was + it from hearty, that when hearing a professed satirist like Colney Durance + remark on the decorous manner of Dudley’s transparent courtship of the + girl, under his look of an awakened approval of himself, that he appeared + to be asking everybody:—Do you not think I bid fair for an excellent + father of Philistines?—Victor had a nip of spite at the thought of + Dudley’s dragging him bodily to be the grandfather. Poor Fredi, too!—necessarily + the mother: condemned by her hard fate to feel proud of Philistine babies! + Though women soon get reconciled to it! Or do they? They did once. What if + his Fredi turned out one of the modern young women, who have drunk of + ideas? He caught himself speculating on that, as on a danger. The alliance + with Dudley really seemed to set him facing backward. + </p> + <p> + Colney might not have been under prompting of Nataly when he derided + Dudley; but Victor was at war with the picture of her, in her compression + of a cruel laugh, while her eyelids were hard shut, as if to exclude the + young patriarch of Philistines’ ridiculous image. + </p> + <p> + He hearkened to the Nature interrogating him, why had he stepped on a path + to put division between himself and his beloved?—the smallest of + gaps; and still the very smallest between nuptial lovers is a division—and + that may become a mortal wound to their one-life. Why had he roused a + slumbering world? Glimpses of the world’s nurse-like, old-fashioned, + mother-nightcap benevolence to its kicking favourites; its long-suffering + tolerance for the heroic breakers of its rough-cast laws, while the decent + curtain continues dropped, or lifted only ankle-high; together with many + scenes, lively suggestions, of the choice of ways he liked best, told of + things, which were better things, incomprehensibly forfeited. So that the + plain sense of value insisted on more than one weighing of the gain in + hand: a dubious measure. + </p> + <p> + He was as little disposed to reject it as to stop his course at a goal of + his aim. Nevertheless, a gain thus poorly estimated, could not command him + to do a deed of humiliation on account of it. The speaking to this dry + young Dudley was not imperative at present. A word would do in the day to + come. + </p> + <p> + Nataly was busy with her purchases of furniture, and the practise for the + great August Concert. He dealt her liberal encouragements, up to the verge + of Dr. Themison’s latest hummed words touching Mrs. Burman, from which he + jumped in alarm lest he should paralyze her again: the dear soul’s dreaded + aspect of an earthy pallor was a spectre behind her cheeks, ready to rush + forth. Fenellan brought Carling to dine with him; and Themison was + confirmed by Carting, with incidents in proof; Caning by Jarniman, also + with incidents; one very odd one—or so it seemed, in the fury of the + first savour of it:—she informed Jarniman, Skepsey said his friend + Jarniman said, that she had dreamed of making her appearance to him on the + night of the 23rd August, and of setting the date on the calendar over his + desk, when she entered his room: ‘Sitting-room, not bedroom; she was + always quite the lady,’ Skepsey reported his Jarniman. Mrs. Burman, as a + ghost, would respect herself; she would keep to her character. Jarniman + quite expected the dream to be verified; she was a woman of her word: he + believed she had received a revelation of the approaching fact: he was + preparing for the scene. + </p> + <p> + Victor had to keep silent and discourse of general prosperity. His happy + vivaciousness assisted him to feel it by day. Nataly heard him at night, + on a moan: ‘Poor soul!’ and loudly once while performing an abrupt + demi-vault from back to side: ‘Perhaps now!’ in a voice through doors. She + schooled herself to breathe equably. + </p> + <p> + Not being allowed to impart the distressing dose of comfort he was charged + with, he swallowed it himself; and these were the consequences. And an + uneasy sleep was traditionally a matter for grave debate in the Radnor + family. The Duvidney ladies, Dorothea and Virginia, would have cited + ancestral names, showing it to be the worst of intimations. At night, + lying on his back beneath a weight of darkness, one heavily craped figure, + distinguishable through the gloom, as a blot on a black pad, accused the + answering darkness within him, until his mind was dragged to go through + the whole case by morning light; and the compassionate man appealed to + common sense, to stamp and pass his delectable sophistries; as, that it + was his intense humaneness, which exposed him to an accusation of + inhumanity; his prayer for the truly best to happen, which anticipated + Mrs. Burman’s expiry. They were simple sophistries, fabricated to suit his + needs, readily taking and bearing the imprimatur of common sense. They + refreshed him, as a chemical scent a crowded room. + </p> + <p> + All because he could not open his breast to Nataly, by reason of her + feebleness; or feel enthusiasm in the possession of young Dudley! A dry + stick indeed beside him on the walk Westward. Good quality wood, no doubt, + but dry, varnished for conventional uses. Poor dear Fredi would have to + crown it like the May-day posy of the urchins of Craye Farm and Creckholt! + </p> + <p> + Dudley wished the great City-merchant to appreciate him as a diligent + student of commercial matters: rivalries of Banks; Foreign and Municipal + Loans, American Rails, and Argentine; new Companies of wholesome + appearance or sinister; or starting with a dram in the stomach, or born to + bleat prostrate, like sheep on their backs in a ditch; Trusts and + Founders; Breweries bursting vats upon the markets, and England prone + along the gutters, gobbling, drunk for shares, and sober in the possession + of certain of them. But when, as Colney says, a grateful England has + conferred the Lordship on her Brewer, he gratefully hands-over the + establishment to his country; and both may disregard the howls of a + Salvation Army of shareholders.—Beaten by the Germans in Brewery, + too! Dr. Schlesien has his right to crow. We were ahead of them, and they + came and studied us, and they studied Chemistry as well; while we went on + down our happy-go-lucky old road; and then had to hire their young + Professors, and then to import their beer. + </p> + <p> + Have the Germans more brains than we English? Victor’s blood up to the + dome of his cranium knocked the patriotic negative. But, as old Colney + says (and bother him, for constantly intruding!), the comfortably + successful have the habit of sitting, and that dulls the brain yet more + than it eases the person: hence are we outpaced; we have now to know we + are racing. Victor scored a mark for one of his projects. A well-conducted + Journal of the sharpest pens in the land might, at a sacrifice of money + grandly sunk, expose to his English how and to what degree their sports, + and their fierce feastings, and their opposition to ideas, and their + timidity in regard to change, and their execration of criticism applied to + themselves, and their unanimous adoption of it for a weapon against + others, are signs of a prolonged indulgence in the cushioned seat. Victor + saw it. But would the people he loved? He agreed with Colney, forgetting + the satirist’s venom: to-wit; that the journalists should be close under + their editor’s rod to put it in sound bold English;—no metaphors, no + similes, nor flowery insubstantiality: but honest Saxon manger stuff: and + put it repeatedly, in contempt of the disgust of iteration; hammering so a + soft place on the Anglican skull, which is rubbed in consequence, and + taught at last through soreness to reflect.—A Journal?—with + Colney Durance for Editor?—and called conformably THE WHIPPING-TOP? + Why not, if it exactly hits the signification of the Journal and that + which it would have the country do to itself, to keep it going and truly + topping? For there is no vulgarity in a title strongly signifying the + intent. Victor wrote it at night, naming Colney for Editor, with a sum of + his money to be devoted to the publication, in a form of memorandum; and + threw it among the papers in his desk. + </p> + <p> + Young Dudley had a funny inquisitiveness about Dartrey Fenellan; owing to + Fredi’s reproduction or imitation of her mother’s romantic sentiment for + Dartrey, doubtless: a bit of jealousy, indicating that the dry fellow had + his feelings. Victor touched—off an outline of Dartrey’s history and + character:—the half-brother of Simeon, considerably younger, and + totally different. ‘Dartrey’s mother was Lady Charlotte Kiltorne, one of + the Clanconans; better mother than wife, perhaps; and no reproach on her, + not a shadow; only she made the General’s Bank-notes fly black paper. And—if + you ‘re for heredity—the queer point is, that Simeon, whose mother + was a sober-minded woman, has always been the spendthrift. Dartrey married + one of the Hennen women, all an odd lot, all handsome. I met her once. + Colney said, she came up here with a special commission from the Prince of + Darkness. There are women who stir the unholy in men—whether they + mean it or not, you know.’ + </p> + <p> + Dudley pursed to remark, that he could not say he did know. And good for + Fredi if he did not know, and had his objections to the knowledge! But he + was like the men who escape colds by wrapping in comforters instead of + trusting to the spin of the blood. + </p> + <p> + ‘She played poor Dartrey pranks before he buried—he, behaved well to + her; and that says much for him; he has: a devil of a temper. I ‘ve seen + the blood in his veins, mount to cracking. But there’s the man: because + she was a woman, he never let it break out with her. And, by heaven, he + had cause. She couldn’t be left. She tricked him, and she loved + him-passionately, I believe. You don’t understand women loving the husband + they drag through the mire?’ + </p> + <p> + Dudley did not. He sharpened his mouth. + </p> + <p> + ‘Buried, you said, sir?—a widower?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘I’ve no positive information; we shall hear when he: comes back,’ Victor + replied hurriedly. ‘He got a drenching of all the damns in the British + service from his. Generalissimo one day at a Review, for a trooper’s + negligence-button or stock missing, or something; and off goes Dartrey to + his hut, and breaks his sword, and sends in his resignation. Good soldier + lost. And I can’t complain; he has been a right-hand man to me over in + Africa. But a man ought to have some control of his temper, especially a + soldier.’ + </p> + <p> + Dudley put emphasis into his acquiescence. + </p> + <p> + ‘Worse than that temper of Dartrey’s, he can’t forgive an injury. He bears + a grudge against his country. You’ve heard Colney Durance abuse old + England. It’s three parts factitious-literary exercise. It ‘s milk beside + the contempt of Dartrey’s shrug. He thinks we’re a dead people, if a + people; “subsisting on our fat,” as Colney says.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘I am not of opinion that we show it,’ observed Dudley. + </p> + <p> + ‘We don’t,’ Victor agreed. He disrelished his companion’s mincing tone of + a monumental security, and yearned for Dartrey or Simeon or Colney to be + at his elbow rather than this most commendable of orderly citizens, who + little imagined the treacherous revolt from him in the bosom of the + gentleman cordially signifying full agreement. But Dudley was not gifted + to read behind words and looks. + </p> + <p> + They were in the Park of the dwindling press of carriages, and here was + this young Dudley saying, quite commendably: ‘It’s a pity we seem to have + no means of keeping our parks select.’ + </p> + <p> + Victor flung Simeon Fenellan at him in thought. He remembered a fable of + Fenellan’s, about a Society of the Blest, and the salt it was to them to + discover an intruder from below, and the consequent accelerated measure in + their hymning. + </p> + <p> + ‘Have you seen anything offensive to you?’ he asked. + </p> + <p> + ‘One sees notorious persons.’ + </p> + <p> + Dudley spoke aloof from them—‘out of his cold attics,’ Fenellan + would have said. + </p> + <p> + Victor approved: with the deadened feeling common to us when first in sad + earnest we consent to take life as it is. + </p> + <p> + He perceived, too, the comicality of his having to resign himself to the + fatherly embrace of goodness. + </p> + <p> + Lakelands had him fast, and this young Dudley was the kernel of Lakelands. + If he had only been intellectually a little flexible in his morality! But + no; he wore it cap a pie, like a mediaeval knight his armour. One had to + approve. And there was no getting away from him. He was good enough to + stay in town for the practise of the opening overture of the amateurs, and + the flute-duet, when his family were looking for him at Tunbridge Wells; + and almost every day Victor was waylaid by him at a corner of the Strand. + </p> + <p> + Occasionally, Victor appeared at the point of interception armed with + Colney Durance, for whom he had called in the Temple, bent on + self-defence, although Colney was often as bitter to his taste as to + Dudley’s. Latterly the bitter had become a tonic. We rejoice in the + presence of goodness, let us hope; and still an impersonation of + conventional, goodness perpetually about us depresses. Dudley drove him to + Colney for relief. Besides it pleased Nataly that he should be bringing + Colney home; it looked to her as if he were subjecting Dudley to critical + inspection before he decided a certain question much, and foolishly, + dreaded by the dear soul. That quieted her. And another thing, she liked + him to be with Colney, for a clog on him; as it were, a tuning-fork for + the wild airs he started. A little pessimism, also, she seemed to like; + probably as an appeasement after hearing, and having to share, high + flights. And she was, in her queer woman’s way, always reassured by his + endurance of Colney’s company:—she read it to mean, that he could + bear Colney’s perusal of him, and satiric stings. Victor had seen these + petty matters among the various which were made to serve his double and + treble purposes; now, thanks to the operation of young Dudley within him, + he felt them. Preferring Fenellan’s easy humour to Colney’s acid, he was + nevertheless braced by the latter’s antidote to Dudley, while reserving + his entire opposition in the abstract. + </p> + <p> + For Victor Radnor and Colney Durance were the Optimist and Pessimist of + their society. They might have headed those tribes in the country. At a + period when the omnibus of the world appears to its quaint occupants to be + going faster, men are shaken into the acceptation, if not performance, of + one part or the other as it is dictated to them by their temperaments. + Compose the parts, and you come nigh to the meaning of the Nineteenth + Century: the mother of these gosling affirmatives and negatives divorced + from harmony and awakened by the slight increase of incubating motion to + vitality. Victor and Colney had been champion duellists for the rosy and + the saturnine since the former cheerfully slaved for a small stipend in + the City of his affection, and the latter entered on an inheritance + counted in niggard hundreds, that withdrew a briefless barrister disposed + for scholarship from the forlornest of seats in the Courts. They had + foretold of one another each the unfulfilled; each claimed the actual as + the child of his prediction. Victor was to have been ruined long back; + Colney the prey of independent bachelors. Colney had escaped his harpy, + and Victor could be called a millionaire and more. Prophesy was crowned by + Colney’s dyspepsia, by Victor’s ticklish domestic position. Their pity for + one another, their warm regard, was genuine; only, they were of different + temperaments; and we have to distinguish, that in many estimable and some + gifted human creatures, it is the quality of the blood which directs the + current of opinion. + </p> + <p> + Victor played-off Colney upon Dudley, for his internal satisfaction, and + to lull Nataly and make her laugh; but he could not, as she hoped he was + doing, take Colney into his confidence; inasmuch as the Optimist, impelled + by his exuberant anticipatory trustfulness, is an author, and does things; + whereas the Pessimist is your chaired critic, with the delivery of a + censor, generally an undoer of things. Our Optimy has his instinct to tell + him of the cast of Pessimy’s countenance at the confession of a + dilemma-foreseen! He hands himself to Pessimy, as it were a sugar-cane, + for the sour brute to suck the sugar and whack with the wood. But he + cannot perform his part in return; he gets no compensation: Pessimy is + invulnerable. You waste your time in hurling a common ‘tu-quoque’ at one + who hugs the worst. + </p> + <p> + The three walking in the park, with their bright view, and black view, and + neutral view of life, were a comical trio. They had come upon the days of + the unfanned electric furnace, proper to London’s early August when it is + not pipeing March. Victor complacently bore heat as well as cold: but + young Dudley was a drought, and Colney a drug to refresh it; and why was + he stewing in London? It was for this young Dudley, who resembled a London + of the sparrowy roadways and wearisome pavements and blocks of fortress + mansions, by chance a water-cart spirting a stale water: or a London of + the farewell dinner-parties, where London’s professed anecdotist lays the + dust with his ten times told: Why was not Nataly relieved of her dreary + round of the purchases of furniture! They ought all now to be in + Switzerland or Tyrol. Nesta had of late been turning over leaves of an + Illustrated book of Tyrol, dear to her after a run through the Innthal to + the Dolomites one splendid August; and she and Nataly had read there of + Hofer, Speckbacker, Haspinger; and wrath had filled them at the meanness + of the Corsican, who posed after it as victim on St. Helena’s rock; the + scene in grey dawn on Mantua’s fortress-walls blasting him in the Courts + of History, when he strikes for his pathetic sublime. + </p> + <p> + Victor remembered how he had been rhetorical, as the mouthpiece of his + darlings. But he had in memory prominently now the many glorious pictures + of that mountain-land beckoning to him, waving him to fly forth from the + London oven:—lo, the Tyrolese limestone crags with livid peaks and + snow lining shelves and veins of the crevices; and folds of pinewood + undulations closed by a shoulder of snow large on the blue; and a dazzling + pinnacle rising over green pasture-Alps, the head of it shooting aloft as + the blown billow, high off a broken ridge, and wide-armed in its pure + white shroud beneath; tranced, but all motion in immobility, to the heart + in the eye; a splendid image of striving, up to crowned victory. And see + the long valley-sweeps of the hanging meadows and maize, and lower + vineyards and central tall green spires! Walking beside young Dudley, + conversing, observing too, Victor followed the trips and twists of a rill, + that was lured a little further down through scoops, ducts, and scaffolded + channels to serve a wainwright. + </p> + <p> + He heard the mountain-song of the joyful water: a wren-robin-thrush on the + dance down of a faun; till it was caught and muted, and the silver foot + slid along the channel, swift as moonbeams through a cloud, with an air of + ‘Whither you will, so it be on’; happy for service as in freedom. Then the + yard of the inn below, and the rillwater twirling rounded through the + trout-trough, subdued, still lively for its beloved onward: dues to + business, dues to pleasure; a wedding of the two, and the wisest on + earth:-eh? like some one we know, and Nataly has made the comparison. + Fresh forellen for lunch: rhyming to Fenellan, he had said to her; and + that recollection struck the day to blaze; for his friend was a ruined + military captain living on a literary quill at the time; and Nataly’s + tender pleading, ‘Could you not help to give him another chance, dear + Victor?’—signifying her absolute trust in his ability to do that or + more or anything, had actually set him thinking of the Insurance Office; + which he started to prosperity, and Fenellan in it, previously an + untutored rill of the mountains, if ever was one. + </p> + <p> + Useless to be dwelling on holiday pictures: Lakelands had hold of him! + </p> + <p> + Colney or somebody says, that the greater our successes, the greater the + slaves we become.—But we must have an aim, my friend, and success + must be the aim of any aim!—Yes, and, says Colney, you are to + rejoice in the disappointing miss, which saved you from being damned by + your bullet on the centre.—You’re dead against Nature, old Colney.—That + is to carry the flag of Liberty.—By clipping a limb! + </p> + <p> + Victor overcame the Pessimist in his own royal cranium-Court. He + entertained a pronounced dissension with bachelors pretending to + independence. It could not be argued publicly, and the more the pity:—for + a slight encouragement, he would have done it: his outlook over the waves + of bachelors and (by present conditions mostly constrained) spinsters—and + another outlook, midnight upon Phlegethon to the thoughts of men, made him + deem it urgent. And it helped the plea in his own excuse, as Colney + pointed out to the son of Nature. That, he had to admit, was true. He + charged it upon Mrs. Burman, for twisting the most unselfish and noblest + of his thoughts; and he promised himself it was to cease on the instant + when the circumstance, which Nature was remiss in not bringing about + to-day or to-morrow, had come to pass. He could see his Nataly’s pained + endurance beneath her habitual submission. Her effort was a poor one, to + conceal her dread of the day of the gathering at Lakelands. + </p> + <p> + On the Sunday previous to the day, Dr. Themison accompanied the amateurs + by rail to Wrensham, to hear ‘trial of the acoustics’ of the Concert-hall. + They were a goodly company; and there was fun in the railway-carriage over + Colney’s description of Fashionable London’s vast octopus Malady-monster, + who was letting the doctor fly to the tether of its longest filament for + an hour, plying suckers on him the while. He had the look, to general + perception, of a man but half-escaped: and as when the notes of things + taken by the vision in front are being set down upon tablets in the head + behind. Victor observed his look at Nataly. The look was like a door + aswing, revealing in concealing. She was not or did not appear struck by + it; perhaps, if observant, she took it for a busy professional gentleman’s + holiday reckoning of the hours before the return train to his harness, and + his arrangements for catching it. She was, as she could be on a day of + trial, her enchanting majestic self again—defying suspicions. She + was his true mate for breasting a world honoured in uplifting her. + </p> + <p> + Her singing of a duet with Nesta, called forth Dr. Themison’s very warm + applause. He named the greatest of contraltos. Colney did better service + than Fenellan at the luncheon-table: he diverted Nataly and captured Dr. + Themison’s ear with the narrative of his momentous expedition of European + Emissaries, to plead the cause of their several languages at the Court of + Japan: a Satiric Serial tale, that hit incidentally the follies of the + countries of Europe, and intentionally, one had to think, those of Old + England. Nesta set him going. Just when he was about to begin, she made + her father laugh by crying out in a rapture, ‘Oh! Delphica!’ For she was + naughtily aware of Dudley Sowerby’s distaste for the story and disgust + with the damsel Delphica. + </p> + <p> + Nesta gave Dr. Themison the preliminary sketch of the grand object of the + expedition: indeed one of the eminent ones of the world; matter for an + Epic; though it is to be feared, that our part in it will not encourage a + Cis-Atlantic bard. To America the honours from beginning to end belong. + </p> + <p> + So, then, Japan has decided to renounce its language, for the adoption of + the language it may choose among the foremost famous European tongues. + Japan becomes the word for miraculous transformations of a whole people at + the stroke of a wand; and let our English enrol it as the most precious of + the powerful verbs. An envoy visits the principal Seats of Learning in + Europe. He is of a gravity to match that of his unexampled and all but + stupefying mission. A fluent linguist, yet an Englishman, the slight + American accent contracted during a lengthened residence in the United + States is no bar to the patriotism urging him to pay his visit of + exposition and invitation from the Japanese Court to the distinguished + Doctor of Divinity Dr. Bouthoin. The renown of Dr. Bouthoin among the + learned of Japan has caused the special invitation to him; a scholar + endowed by an ample knowledge and persuasive eloquence to cite and + instance as well as illustrate the superior advantages to Japan and + civilization in the filial embrace of mother English. ‘For to this it must + come predestinated,’ says the astonishing applicant. ‘We seem to see a + fitness in it,’ says the cogitative Rev. Doctor. ‘And an Island England in + those waters, will do wonders for Commerce,’ adds the former. ‘We think of + things more pregnant,’ concludes the latter, with a dry gleam of + ecclesiastical knowingness. And let the Editor of the Review upon his + recent pamphlet, and let the prelate reprimanding him, and let the + newspapers criticizing his pure Saxon, have a care! + </p> + <p> + Funds, universally the most convincing of credentials, are placed at Dr. + Bouthoin’s disposal: only it is requested, that for the present the + expedition be secret. ‘Better so,’ says pure Saxon’s champion. On a day + patented for secresy, and swearing-in the whole American Continent through + the cables to keep the secret by declaring the patent, the Rev. Dr. + Bouthoin, accompanied by his curate, the Rev. Mancate Semhians, stumbling + across portmanteaux crammed with lexicons and dictionaries and other tubes + of the voice of Hermes, takes possession of berths in the ship Polypheme, + bound, as they mutually conceive, for the biggest adventure ever embarked + on by a far-thoughted, high-thoughted, patriotic pair speaking pure Saxon + or other. + </p> + <p> + Colney, with apologies to his hearers, avoided the custom of our period + (called the Realistic) to create, when casual opportunity offers, a belief + in the narrative by promoting nausea in the audience. He passed under veil + the Rev. Doctor’s acknowledgement of Neptune’s power, and the temporary + collapse of Mr. Semhians. Proceeding at once to the comments of these + high-class missionaries on the really curious inquisitiveness of certain + of the foreign passengers on board, he introduced to them the indisputably + learned, the very argumentative, crashing, arrogant, pedantic, dogmatic, + philological German gentleman, Dr. Gannius, reeking of the Teutonic + Professor, as a library volume of its leather. With him is his fairhaired + artless daughter Delphica. An interesting couple for the beguilement of a + voyage: she so beautifully moderates his irascible incisiveness! Yet there + is a strange tone that they have. What, then, of the polite, the anecdotic + Gallic M. Falarique, who studiously engages the young lady in colloquy + when Mr. Semhians is agitating outside them to say a word? What of that + outpouring, explosive, equally voluble, uncontrolled M. Bobinikine, a + Mongol Russian, shaped, featured, hued like the pot-boiled, round and + tight young dumpling of our primitive boyhood, which smokes on the dish + from the pot? And what of another, hitherto unnoticed, whose nose is of + the hooked vulturine, whose name transpires as Pisistratus Mytharete? He + hears Dr. Bouthoin declaim some lines of Homer, and beseeches him for the + designation of that language. Greek, is it? Greek of the Asiatic ancient + days of the beginning of the poetic chants? Dr. Gannius crashes + cachinnation. Dr. Bouthoin caps himself with the offended Don. Mr. + Semhians opens half an eye and a whole mouth. There must be a mystery, + these two exclaim to one another in privacy. Delphica draws Mr. Semhians + aside. + </p> + <p> + Blushing over his white necktie, like the coast of Labrador at the + transient wink of its Jack-in-the-box Apollo, Mr. Semhians faintly tells + of a conversation he has had with the ingenuous fair one; and she ardent + as he for the throning of our incomparable Saxon English in the mouths of + the races of mankind. Strange!—she partly suspects the Frenchman, + the Russian, the attentive silent Greek, to be all of them bound for the + Court of Japan. Concurrents? Can it be? We are absolutely to enter on a + contention with rivals? Dr. Bouthoin speaks to Dr. Gannius. He is + astonished, he says; he could not have imagined it! + </p> + <p> + ‘Have you ever imagined anything?’ Dr. Gannius asks him. Entomologist, + botanist, palaeontologist, philologist, and at sound of horn a ready + regimental corporal, Dr. Gannius wears good manners as a pair of + bath-slippers, to rally and kick his old infant of an Englishman; who, in + awe of his later renown and manifest might, makes it a point of discretion + to be ultra-amiable; for he certainly is not in training, he has no + alliances, and he must diplomatize; and the German is a strong one; a + relative too; he is the Saxon’s cousin, to say the least. This German has + the habit of pushing past politeness to carry his argumentative war into + the enemy’s country: and he presents on all sides a solid rampart of + recent great deeds done, and mailed readiness for the doing of more, if we + think of assailing him in that way. We are really like the poor beasts + which have cast their shells or cases, helpless flesh to his beak. So we + are cousinly. + </p> + <p> + Whether more amused than amazed, we know not, Dr. Gannius hears from ‘our + simpleton of the pastures,’ as he calls the Rev. Doctor to his daughter, + that he and Mr. Semhians have absolutely pushed forth upon this most + mighty of enterprises naked of any backing from their Government! Babes in + the Wood that they are! ‘a la grace de dieu’ at every turn that cries for + astutia, they show no sign or symbol of English arms behind them, to + support—and with the grandest of national prizes in view!—the + pleading oration before the Court of the elect, erudites, we will call + them, of an intelligent, yet half barbarous, people; hesitating, these, + between eloquence and rival eloquence, cunning and rival cunning. Why, in + such a case, the shadow-nimbus of Force is needed to decide the sinking of + the scale. But have these English never read their Shakespeare, that they + show so barren an acquaintance with human, to say nothing of + semi-barbaric, nature? But it is here that we Germans prove our claim to + being the sons of his mind.—Dr. Gannius, in contempt, throws off the + mask: he also is a concurrent. And not only is he the chosen by election + of the chief Universities of his land, he has behind him, as Athene + dilating Achilles, the clenched fist of the Prince of thunder and + lightning of his time. German, Japan shall be! he publicly swears before + them all. M. Falarique damascenes his sharpest smile; M. Bobinikine + double-dimples his puddingest; M. Mytharete rolls a forefinger over his + beak; Dr. Bouthoin enlarges his eye on a sunny mote. And such is the + masterful effect of a frank diplomacy, that when one party shows his hand, + the others find the reverse of concealment in hiding their own. + </p> + <p> + Dr. Bouthoin and Mr. Semhians are compelled to suspect themselves to be + encompassed with rivals, presumptively supported by their Governments. The + worthy gentlemen had hoped to tumble into good fortune, as in the blessed + old English manner. ‘It has even been thus with us: unhelped we do it!’ + exclaims the Rev. Doctor. He is roused from dejection by hearing Mr. + Semhians shyly (he has published verse) tell of the fairtressed Delphica’s + phosphorial enthusiasm for our galaxy of British Poets. Assisted by Mr. + Semhians, he begins to imagine, that he has, in the person of this artless + devotee an ally, who will, through her worship of our poets (by treachery + to her sire-a small matter) sacrifice her guttural tongue, by enabling him + (through the exercise of her arts, charms, intrigues—also a small + matter) to obtain the first audience of the Japanese erudites. Delphica, + with each of the rivals in turn, is very pretty Comedy. She is aware that + M. Falarique is her most redoubtable adversary, by the time that the vast + fleet of steamboats (containing newspaper reporters) is beheld from the + decks of the Polypheme puffing past Sandy Hook. + </p> + <p> + There Colney left them, for the next instalment of the serial. + </p> + <p> + Nesta glanced at Dudley Sowerby. She liked him for his pained frown at the + part his countrymen were made to play, but did wish that he would keep + from expressing it in a countenance that suggested a worried knot; and + mischievously she said: ‘Do you take to Delphica?’ + </p> + <p> + He replied, with an evident sincerity, ‘I cannot say I do.’ + </p> + <p> + Had Mr. Semhians been modelled on him? + </p> + <p> + ‘One bets on the German, of course—with Colney Durance,’ Victor said + to Dr. Themison, leading him over the grounds of Lakelands. + </p> + <p> + ‘In any case, the author teaches us to feel an interest in the rivals. I + want to know what comes of it,’ said the doctor. + </p> + <p> + ‘There’s a good opportunity, one sees. But, mark me, it will all end in + satire upon poor Old England. According to Colney, we excel in nothing.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘I do not think there is a country that could offer the entertainment for + which I am indebted to you to-day.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Ah, my friend, and you like their voices? The contralto?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Exquisite.’ + </p> + <p> + Dr. Themison had not spoken the name of Radnor. + </p> + <p> + ‘Shall we see you at our next Concert-evening in town?’ said Victor; and + hearing ‘the privilege’ mentioned, his sharp bright gaze cleared to + limpid. ‘You have seen how it stands with us here!’ At once he related + what indeed Dr. Themison had begun speculatively to think might be the + case. + </p> + <p> + Mrs. Burman Radnor had dropped words touching a husband, and of her desire + to communicate with him, in the event of her being given over to the + surgeons: she had said, that her husband was a greatly gifted man; setting + her head in a compassionate swing. This revelation of the husband soon + after, was filling. And this Mr. Radnor’s comrade’s manner of it, was + winning: a not too self-justifying tone; not void of feeling for the elder + woman; with a manly eulogy of the younger, who had flung away the world + for him and borne him their one dear child. Victor took the blame wholly + upon himself. ‘It is right that you should know,’ he said to the doctor’s + thoughtful posture; and he stressed the blame; and a flame shot across his + eyeballs. He brought home to his hearer the hurricane of a man he was in + the passion: indicating the subjection of such a temperament as this + Victor Radnor’s to trials of the moral restraints beyond his human power. + </p> + <p> + Dr. Themison said: ‘Would you—we postpone that as long as we can: + but supposing the poor lady...?’ + </p> + <p> + Victor broke in: ‘I see her wish: I will.’ + </p> + <p> + The clash of his answer rang beside Dr. Themison’s faltering query. + </p> + <p> + We are grateful when spared the conclusion of a sentence born to stammer. + If for that only, the doctor pressed Victor’s hand warmly. + </p> + <p> + ‘I may, then, convey some form of assurance, that a request of the kind + will be granted?’ he said. + </p> + <p> + ‘She has but to call me to her,’ said Victor, stiffening his back. + </p> + <p> + <a name="link2HCH0020" id="link2HCH0020"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + CHAPTER XX. THE GREAT ASSEMBLY AT LAKELANDS + </h2> + <p> + Round the neighbourhood of Lakelands it was known that the day of the + great gathering there had been authoritatively foretold as fine, by Mr. + Victor Radnor; and he delivered his prophecy in the teeth of the + South-western gale familiar to our yachting month; and he really inspired + belief or a kind of trust; some supposing him to draw from reserves of + observation, some choosing to confide in the singularly winged sparkle of + his eyes. Lady Rodwell Blachington did; and young Mrs. Blathenoy; and Mrs. + Fanning; they were enamoured of it. And when women stand for Hope, and any + worshipped man for Promise, nothing less than redoubled confusion of him + dissolves the union. Even then they cling to it, under an ejaculation, + that it might and should have been otherwise; fancy partly has it + otherwise, in her caerulean home above the weeping. So it is good at all + points to prophecy with the aspect of the radiant day foretold. + </p> + <p> + A storm, bearing battle overhead, tore the night to pieces. Nataly’s faith + in the pleasant prognostic wavered beneath the crashes. She had not much + power of heart to desire anything save that which her bosom disavowed. + Uproar rather appeased her, calmness agitated. She wished her beloved to + be spared from a disappointment, thinking he deserved all successes, + because of the rigours inflicted by her present tonelessness of blood and + being. Her unresponsive manner with him was not due to lack of fire in the + blood or a loss of tenderness. The tender feeling, under privations + unwillingly imposed, though willingly shared, now suffused her + reflections, owing to a gratitude induced by a novel experience of him; + known, as it may chance, and as it does not always chance, to both sexes + in wedded intimacy here and there; known to women whose mates are proved + quick to compliance with delicate intuitions of their moods of nature. A + constant, almost visible, image of the dark thing she desired, and was + bound not to desire, and was remorseful for desiring, oppressed her; a + perpetual consequent warfare of her spirit and the nature subject to the + thousand sensational hypocrisies invoked for concealment of its reviled + brutish baseness, held the woman suspended from her emotions. She coldly + felt that a caress would have melted her, would have been the temporary + rapture. Coldly she had the knowledge that the considerate withholding of + it helped her spirit to escape a stain. Less coldly, she thanked at heart + her beloved, for being a gentleman in their yoke. It plighted them over + flesh. + </p> + <p> + He talked to her on the pillow, just a few sentences; and, unlike himself, + a word of City affairs: ‘That fellow Blathenoy, with his increasing + multitude of bills at the Bank: must watch him there, sit there regularly. + One rather likes his wife. By the way, if you see him near me to-morrow, + praise the Spanish climate; don’t forget. He heads the subscription list + of Lady Blachington’s Charity.’ + </p> + <p> + Victor chuckled at Colney’s humping of shoulders and mouth, while the + tempest seemed echoing a sulphurous pessimist. ‘If old Colney had listened + to me, when India gave proof of the metal and South Africa began heaving, + he’d have been a fairly wealthy man by now... ha! it would have genialized + him. A man may be a curmudgeon with money: the rule is for him to cuddle + himself and take a side, instead of dashing at his countrymen all round + and getting hated. Well, Colney popular, can’t be imagined; but + entertaining guests would have diluted his acid. He has the six hundred or + so a year he started old bachelor on; add his miserable pay for Essays. + Literature! Of course, he sours. But don’t let me hear of bachelors + moralists. There he sits at his Temple Chambers hatching epigrams... + pretends to have the office of critic! Honest old fellow, as far as his + condition permits. I tell him it will be fine to-morrow.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘You are generally right, dear,’ Nataly said. + </p> + <p> + Her dropping breath was audible. + </p> + <p> + Victor smartly commended her to slumber, with heaven’s blessing on her and + a dose of soft nursery prattle. + </p> + <p> + He squeezed her hand. He kissed her lips by day. She heard him sigh + settling himself into the breast of night for milk of sleep, like one of + the world’s good children. She could have turned to him, to show him she + was in harmony with the holy night and loving world, but for the fear + founded on a knowledge of the man he was; it held her frozen to the + semblance of a tombstone lady beside her lord, in the aisle where horror + kindles pitchy blackness with its legions at one movement. Verily it was + the ghost of Mrs. Burman come to the bed, between them. + </p> + <p> + Meanwhile the sun of Victor Radnor’s popularity was already up over the + extended circle likely to be drenched by a falsification of his daring + augury, though the scud flew swift, and the beeches raved, and the oaks + roared and snarled, and pine-trees fell their lengths. Fine tomorrow, to a + certainty! he had been heard to say. The doubt weighed for something; the + balance inclined with the gentleman who had become so popular: for he had + done the trick so suddenly, like a stroke of the wizard; and was a real + man, not one of your spangled zodiacs selling for sixpence and hopping to + a lucky hit, laughed at nine times out of ten. The reasoning went—and + it somewhat affected the mansion as well as the cottage,—that if he + had become popular in this astonishing fashion, after making one of the + biggest fortunes of modern times, he might, he must, have secret gifts. + ‘You can’t foretell weather!’ cried a pothouse sceptic. But the workmen at + Lakelands declared that he had foretold it. Sceptics among the common folk + were quaintly silenced by other tales of him, being a whiff from the + delirium attending any mention of his name. + </p> + <p> + How had he become suddenly so popular as to rouse in the mind of Mr. + Caddis, the sitting Member for the division of the county (said to have + the seat in his pocket), a particular inquisitiveness to know the bearing + of his politics? Mr. Radnor was rich, true: but these are days when + wealthy men, ambitious of notoriety, do not always prove faithful to their + class; some of them are cunning to bid for the suffrages of the + irresponsible, recklessly enfranchised, corruptible masses. Mr. Caddis, if + he had the seat in his pocket, had it from the support of a class trusting + him to support its interests: he could count on the landowners, on the + clergy, on the retired or retiring or comfortably cushioned merchants + resident about Wrensham, on the many obsequious among electoral shopmen; + annually he threw open his grounds, and he subscribed, patronized, did + what was expected; and he was not popular; he was unpopular. Why? But why + was the sun of this 23rd August, shining from its rise royally upon + pacified, enrolled and liveried armies of cloud, more agreeable to earth’s + populations than his pinched appearance of the poor mopped red nose and + melancholic rheumy eyelets on a January day! Undoubtedly Victor Radnor + risked his repute of prophet. Yet his popularity would have survived the + continuance of the storm and deluge. He did this:—and the mystery + puzzling the suspicious was nothing wonderful: in addition to a + transparent benevolence, he spread a sort of assurance about him, that he + thought the better of the people for their thinking well of themselves. It + came first from the workmen at his house. ‘The right sort, and no humbug: + likes you to be men.’ Such a report made tropical soil for any new seed. + </p> + <p> + Now, it is a postulate, to strengthen all poor commoners, that not even in + comparison with the highest need we be small unless we yield to think it + of ourselves. Do but stretch a hand to the touch of earth in you, and you + spring upon combative manhood again, from the basis where all are equal. + Humanity’s historians, however, tell us, that the exhilaration bringing us + consciousness of a stature, is gas which too frequently has to be + administered. Certes the cocks among men do not require the process; they + get it off the sight of the sun arising or a simple hen submissive: but we + have our hibernating bears among men, our yoked oxen, cab horses, beaten + dogs; we have on large patches of these Islands, a Saxon population, much + wanting assistance, if they are not to feel themselves beaten, driven, + caught by the neck, yoked and heavyheaded. Blest, then, is he who gives + them a sense of the pride of standing on legs. Beer, ordinarily their + solitary helper beneath the iron canopy of wealth, is known to them as a + bitter usurer; it knocks them flat in their persons and their fortunes, + for the short spell of recreative exaltation. They send up their rough + glory round the name of the gentleman—a stranger, but their friend: + and never is friend to be thought of as a stranger—who manages to + get the holiday for Wrensham and thereabout, that they may hurl away for + one jolly day the old hat of a doddered humbleness, and trip to the + strains of the internal music he has unwound. + </p> + <p> + Says he: Is it a Charity Concert? Charity begins at home, says he: and if + I welcome you gentry on behalf of the poor of London, why, it follows you + grant me the right to make a beginning with the poor of our parts down + here. He puts it so, no master nor mistress neither could refuse him. Why, + the workmen at his house were nigh pitching the contractors all sprawling + on a strike, and Mr. Radnor takes train, harangues ‘em and rubs ‘em + smooth; ten minutes by the clock, they say; and return train to his + business in town; by reason of good sense and feeling, it was; poor men + don’t ask for more. A working man, all the world over, asks but justice + and a little relaxation—just a collar of fat to his lean. + </p> + <p> + Mr. Caddis, M.P., pursuing the riddle of popularity, which irritated and + repelled as constantly as it attracted him, would have come nearer to an + instructive presentment of it, by listening to these plain fellows, than + he was in the line of equipages, at a later hour of the day. The remarks + of the comfortably cushioned and wheeled, though they be eulogistic to + extravagance, are vapourish when we court them for nourishment; + substantially, they are bones to the cynical. He heard enumerations of Mr. + Radnor’s riches, eclipsing his own past compute. A merchant, a holder of + mines, Director of a mighty Bank, projector of running rails, a princely + millionaire, and determined to be popular—what was the aim of the + man? It is the curse of modern times, that we never can be sure of our + Parliamentary seat; not when we have it in our pockets! The Romans have + left us golden words with regard to the fickleness of the populace; we + have our Horace, our Juvenal, we have our Johnson; and in this vaunted age + of reason it is, that we surrender ourselves into the hands of the + populace! Panem et circenses! Mr. Caddis repeated it, after his fathers; + his fathers and he had not headed them out of that original voracity. + There they were, for moneyed legislators to bewail their appetites. And it + was an article of his legislation, to keep them there. + </p> + <p> + Pedestrian purchasers of tickets for the Charity Concert, rather openly, + in an envelope of humour, confessed to the bait of the Radnor bread with + bit of fun. Savoury rumours were sweeping across Wrensham. Mr. Radnor had + borrowed footmen of the principal houses about. Cartloads of provisions + had been seen to come. An immediate reward of a deed of benevolence, is a + thing sensibly heavenly; and the five-shilling tickets were paid for as if + for a packet on the counter. Unacquainted with Mr. Radnor, although the + reports of him struck a summons to their gastric juices, resembling in its + effect a clamorous cordiality, they were chilled, on their steps along the + halfrolled new gravel-roads to the house, by seeing three tables of + prodigious length, where very evidently a feast had raged: one to plump + the people—perhaps excessively courted by great gentlemen of late; + shopkeepers, the villagers, children. These had been at it for two merry + hours. They had risen. They were beef and pudding on legs; in some + quarters, beer amiably manifest, owing to the flourishes of a military + band. Boys, who had shaken room through their magical young corporations + for fresh stowage, darted out of a chasing circle to the crumbled + cornucopia regretfully forsaken fifteen minutes back, and buried another + tart. Plenty still reigned: it was the will of the Master that it should. + </p> + <p> + We divert our attention, resigned in stoic humour, to the bill of the + Concert music, handed us with our tickets at the park-gates: we have no + right to expect refreshment; we came for the music, to be charitable. + Signora Bianca Luciani: of whom we have read almost to the hearing her; + enough to make the mistake at times. The grand violinist Durandarte: + forcibly detained on his way to America. Mr. Radnor sent him a blank + cheque:—no!—so Mr. Radnor besought him in person: he is + irresistible; a great musician himself; it is becoming quite the modern + style. We have now English noblemen who play the horn, the fife—the + drum, some say! We may yet be Merrie England again, with our nobles taking + the lead. + </p> + <p> + England’s nobles as a musical band at the head of a marching and dancing + population, pictured happily an old Conservative country, that retained + its members of aristocracy in the foremost places while subjecting them to + downright uses. Their ancestors, beholding them there, would be satisfied + on the point of honour; perhaps enlivened by hearing them at fife and + drum. + </p> + <p> + But middle-class pedestrians, having paid five shillings for a ticket to + hear the music they love, and not having full assurance of refreshment, + are often, latterly, satirical upon their superiors; and, over this + country at least, require the refreshment, that the democratic sprouts in + them may be reconciled with aristocracy. Do not listen to them further on + the subject. They vote safely enough when the day comes, if there is no + praetematurally strong pull the other way. + </p> + <p> + They perceive the name of the Hon. Dudley Sowerby, fourth down the + Concert-bill; marked for a flute-duet with Mr. Victor Radnor, Miss Nesta + Victoria Radnor accompanying at the piano. It may mean?... do you want a + whisper to suggest to you what it may mean? The father’s wealth is + enormous; the mother is a beautiful majestic woman in her prime. And see, + she sings: a wonderful voice. And lower down, a duet with her daughter: + violins and clarionet; how funny; something Hungarian. And in the Second + Part, Schubert’s Ave Maria—Oh! when we hear that, we dissolve. She + was a singer before he married her, they say: a lady by birth one of the + first County families. But it was a gift, and she could not be kept from + it, and was going, when they met—and it was love! the most perfect + duet. For him she abandoned the Stage. You must remember, that in their + young days the Stage was many stages beneath the esteem entertained for it + now. Domestic Concerts are got up to gratify her: a Miss Fredericks: good + old English name. Mr. Radnor calls his daughter, Freddy; so Mr. Taplow, + the architect, says. They are for modern music and ancient. Tannhauser, + Wagner, you see. Pergolese. + </p> + <p> + Flute-duet, Mercadante. Here we have him! O—Durandarte: Air Basque, + variations—his own. Again, Senor Durandarte, Mendelssohn. Encore + him, and he plays you a national piece. A dark little creature a + Life-guardsman could hold-up on his outstretched hand for the fifteen + minutes of the performance; but he fills the hall and thrills the heart, + wafts you to heaven; and does it as though he were conversing with his + Andalusian lady-love in easy whispers about their mutual passion for + Spanish chocolate all the while: so the musical critic of the Tirra-Lirra + says. Express trains every half hour from London; all the big people of + the city. Mr. Radnor commands them, like Royalty. Totally different from + that old figure of the wealthy City merchant; young, vigorous, elegant, a + man of taste, highest culture, speaks the languages of Europe, patron of + the Arts, a perfect gentleman. His mother was one of the Montgomerys, Mr. + Taplow says. + </p> + <p> + And it was General Radnor, a most distinguished officer, dying knighted. + But Mr. Victor Radnor would not take less than a Barony—and then + only with descent of title to his daughter, in her own right. + </p> + <p> + Mr. Taplow had said as much as Victor Radnor chose that he should say. + </p> + <p> + Carriages were in flow for an hour: pedestrians formed a wavy coil. + Judgeing by numbers, the entertainment was a success; would the hall + contain them? Marvels were told of the hall. Every ticket entered and was + enfolded; almost all had a seat. Chivalry stood. It is a breeched + abstraction, sacrificeing voluntarily and genially to the Fair, for a + restoring of the balance between the sexes, that the division of good + things be rather in the fair ones’ favour, as they are to think: with the + warning to them, that the establishment of their claim for equality puts + an end to the priceless privileges of petticoats. Women must be mad, to + provoke such a warning; and the majority of them submissively show their + good sense. They send up an incense of perfumery, all the bouquets of the + chemist commingled; most nourishing to the idea of woman in the nose of + man. They are a forest foliage—rustle of silks and muslins, magic + interweaving, or the mythology, if you prefer it. See, hear, smell, they + are Juno, Venus, Hebe, to you. We must have poetry with them; otherwise + they are better in the kitchen. Is there—but there is not; there is + not present one of the chivalrous breeched who could prefer the shocking + emancipated gristly female, which imposes propriety on our sensations and + inner dreams, by petrifying in the tender bud of them. + </p> + <p> + Colonel Corfe is the man to hear on such a theme. He is a colonel of + Companies. But those are his diversion, as the British Army has been to + the warrior. Puellis idoneus, he is professedly a lady’s man, a + rose-beetle, and a fine specimen of a common kind: and he has been that + thing, that shining delight of the lap of ladies, for a spell of years, + necessitating a certain sparkle of the saccharine crystals preserving him, + to conceal the muster. He has to be fascinating, or he would look outworn, + forlorn. On one side of him is Lady Carmine; on the other, Lady Swanage; + dames embedded in the blooming maturity of England’s conservatory. Their + lords (an Earl, a Baron) are of the lords who go down to the City to sow a + title for a repair of their poor incomes, and are to be commended for + frankly accepting the new dispensation while they retain the many + advantages of the uncancelled ancient. Thus gently does a maternal Old + England let them down. Projectors of Companies, Directors, Founders; + Railway magnates, actual kings and nobles (though one cannot yet persuade + old reverence to do homage with the ancestral spontaneity to the + uncrowned, uncoroneted, people of our sphere); holders of Shares in gold + mines, Shares in Afric’s blue mud of the glittering teeth we draw for + English beauty to wear in the ear, on the neck, at the wrist; Bankers and + wives of Bankers. Victor passed among them, chatting right and left. + </p> + <p> + Lady Carmine asked him: ‘Is Durandarte counted on?’ + </p> + <p> + He answered: ‘I made sure of the Luciani.’ + </p> + <p> + She serenely understood. Artistes are licenced people, with a Bohemian + instead of the titular glitter for the bewildering of moralists; as paste + will pass for diamonds where the mirror is held up to Nature by bold + supernumeraries. + </p> + <p> + He wished to introduce Nesta. His girl was on the raised orchestral + flooring. Nataly held her fast to a music-scroll. + </p> + <p> + Mr. Peridon, sad for the absence and cause of absence of Louise de + Seilles,—summoned in the morning abruptly to Bourges, where her + brother lay with his life endangered by an accident at Artillery practise,—Mr. + Peridon was generally conductor. Victor was to lead the full force of + amateurs in the brisk overture to Zampa. He perceived a movement of + Nataly, Nesta, and Peridon. ‘They have come,’ he said; he jumped on the + orchestra boards and hastened to greet the Luciani with Durandarte in the + retiring-room. + </p> + <p> + His departure raised the whisper that he would wield the baton. An opinion + was unuttered. His name for the flute-duet with the Hon. Dudley Sowerby + had not provoked the reserve opinion; it seemed, on the whole, a pretty + thing in him to condescend to do: the sentiment he awakened was not + flustered by it. But the act of leading, appeared as an official thing to + do. Our soufe of sentiment will be seen subsiding under a breath, without + a repressive word to send it down. Sir Rodwell Blachington would have + preferred Radnor’s not leading or playing either. Colonel Corfe and Mr. + Caddis declined to consider such conduct English, in a man of station... + notwithstanding Royal Highnesses, who are at least partly English: partly, + we say, under our breath, remembering our old ideal of an English + gentleman, in opposition to German tastes. It is true, that the whole + country is changeing, decomposing! + </p> + <p> + The colonel fished for Lady Carmine’s view. And Lady Swanage too? Both of + the distinguished ladies approved of Mr. Radnor’s leading—for a + leading off. Women are pleased to see their favourite in the place of + prominence—as long as Fortune swims him unbuffeted, or one should + say, unbattered, up the mounting wave. Besides these ladies had none of + the colonel’s remainder of juvenile English sense of the manly, his + adolescent’s intolerance of the eccentric, suspicion and contempt of any + supposed affectation, which was not ostentatiously, stalkingly practised + to subdue the sex. And you cannot wield a baton without looking affected. + And at one of the Colonel’s Clubs in town, only five years back, an + English musical composer, who had not then made his money—now by the + mystery of events knighted!—had been (he makes now fifteen thousand + a year) black-balled. ‘Fiddler? no; can’t admit a Fiddler to associate on + equal terms with gentlemen.’ Only five years back: and at present we are + having the Fiddler everywhere. + </p> + <p> + A sprinkling of the minor ladies also would have been glad if Mr. Radnor + had kept himself somewhat more exclusive. Dr. Schlesien heard remarks, + upon which his weighty Teutonic mind sat crushingly. Do these English care + one bit for music?—for anything finer than material stuffs?—what + that man Durance calls, ‘their beef, their beer, and their pew in + eternity’? His wrath at their babble and petty brabble doubted that they + did. + </p> + <p> + But they do. Art has a hold of them. They pay for it; and the thing + purchased grapples. It will get to their bosoms to breathe from them in + time: entirely overcoming the taste for feudalism, which still a little + objects to see their born gentleman acting as leader of musicians. A + people of slow movement, developing tardily, their country is wanting in + the distincter features, from being always in the transitional state, like + certain sea-fish rolling head over-you know not head from tail. Without + the Welsh, Irish, Scot; in their composition, there would not be much of + the yeasty ferment: but it should not be forgotten that Welsh, Irish, + Scot, are now largely of their numbers; and the taste for elegance, and + for spiritual utterance, for Song, nay, for Ideas, is there among them, + though it does not everywhere cover a rocky surface to bewitch the eyes of + aliens;—like Louise de Seilles and Dr. Schlesien, for example; + aliens having no hostile disposition toward the people they were compelled + to criticize; honourably granting, that this people has a great history. + Even such has the Lion, with Homer for the transcriber of his deeds. But + the gentle aliens would image our emergence from wildness as the unsocial + spectacle presented by the drear menagerie Lion, alone or mated; with + hardly an animated moment save when the raw red joint is beneath his paw, + reminding him of the desert’s pasture. + </p> + <p> + Nevertheless, where Strength is, there is hope:—it may be said more + truly than of the breath of Life; which is perhaps but the bucket of + breath, muddy with the sediment of the well: whereas we have in Strength a + hero, if a malefactor; whose muscles shall haul him up to the light he + will prove worthy of, when that divinity has shown him his uncleanness. + And when Strength is not exercising, you are sure to see Satirists jump on + his back. Dozens, foreign and domestic, are on the back of Old England; a + tribute to our quality if at the same time an irritating scourge. The + domestic are in excess; and let us own that their view of the potentate, + as an apathetic beast of power, who will neither show the power nor woo + the graces; pretending all the while to be eminently above the beast, and + posturing in an inefficient mimicry of the civilized, excites to satire. + Colney Durance had his excuses. He could point to the chief creative minds + of the country for generations, as beginning their survey genially, ending + venomously, because of an exasperating unreason and scum in the bubble of + the scenes, called social, around them. Viola under his chin, he gazed + along the crowded hall, which was to him a rich national pudding of the + sycophants, the hypocrites, the burlies, the idiots; dregs of the depths + and froth of the surface; bowing to one, that they may scorn another; + instituting a Charity, for their poorer fawning fellows to relieve their + purses and assist them in tricking the world and their Maker: and so + forth, a tiresome tirade: and as it was not on his lips, but in the + stomach of the painful creature, let him grind that hurdy-gurdy for + himself. His friend Victor set it stirring: Victor had here what he aimed + at! + </p> + <p> + How Success derides Ambition! And for this he imperilled the happiness of + the worthy woman he loved! Exposed her to our fen-fogs and foul snakes—of + whom one or more might be in the assembly now: all because of his insane + itch to be the bobbing cork on the wave of the minute! Colney’s rapid + interjections condensed upon the habitual shrug at human folly, just when + Victor, fronting the glassy stare of Colonel Corfe, tapped to start his + orchestra through the lively first bars of the overture to Zampa. + </p> + <p> + We soon perceive that the post Mr. Radnor fills he thoroughly fills, + whatever it may be. Zampa takes horse from the opening. We have no amateur + conductor riding ahead: violins, ‘cellos, piano, wind-stops: Peridon, + Catkin, Pempton, Yatt, Cormyn, Colney, Mrs. Cormyn, Dudley Sowerby: they + are spirited on, patted, subdued, muted, raised, rushed anew, away, held + in hand, in both hands. Not earnestness worn as a cloak, but issuing, we + see; not simply a leader of musicians, a leader of men. The halo of the + millionaire behind, assures us of a development in the character of + England’s merchant princes. The homage we pay him flatters us. A + delightful overture, masterfully executed; ended too soon; except that the + programme forbids the ordinary interpretation of prolonged applause. Mr. + Radnor is one of those who do everything consummately. And we have a + monition within, that a course of spiritual enjoyment will rouse the call + for bodily refreshment. His genial nod and laugh and word of commendation + to his troop persuade us oddly, we know not how, of provision to come. At + the door of the retiring-room, see, he is congratulated by Luciani and + Durandarte. Miss Priscilla Graves is now to sing a Schumann. Down later, + it is a duet with the Rev. Septimus Barmby. We have nothing to be ashamed + of in her, before an Italian Operatic singer! Ices after the first part is + over. + </p> + <p> + <a name="link2HCH0021" id="link2HCH0021"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + CHAPTER XXI. DARTREY FENELLAN + </h2> + <p> + Had Nataly and Nesta known who was outside helping Skepsey to play ball + with the boys, they would not have worked through their share of the + performance with so graceful a composure. Even Simeon Fenellan was unaware + that his half-brother Dartrey had landed in England. Dartrey went first to + Victor’s office, where he found Skepsey packing the day’s letters and + circulars into the bag for the delivery of them at Lakelands. They sprang + a chatter, and they missed the last of the express trains which did, not + greatly signify, Skepsey said, ‘as it was a Concert.’ To hear his hero + talk, was the music for him; and he richly enjoyed the pacing along the + railway-platform. + </p> + <p> + Arrived on the grounds, they took opposite sides in a game of rounders, at + that moment tossing heads or tails for innings. These boys were slovenly + players, and were made unhappy by Skepsey’s fussy instructions to them in + smartness. They had a stupid way of feeding the stick, and they ran + sprawling; it concerned Great Britain for them to learn how to use their + legs. It was pitiful for the country to see how lumpish her younger + children were. Dartrey knew his little man and laughed, after warning him + that his English would want many lessons before they stomached the mixture + of discipline and pleasure. So it appeared: the pride of the boys in + themselves, their confidence, enjoyment of the game, were all gone; and + all were speedily out but Skepsey; who ran for the rounder, with his coat + off, sharp as a porpoise, and would have got it, he had it in his grasp, + when, at the jump, just over the line of the goal, a clever fling, if ever + was, caught him a crack on that part of the human frame where sound is + best achieved. Then were these young lumps transformed to limber, lither, + merry fellows. They rejoiced Skepsey’s heart; they did everything better, + ran and dodged and threw in a style to win the nod from the future + official inspector of Games and Amusements of the common people; a deputy + of the Government, proposed by Skepsey to his hero with a deferential + eagerness. Dartrey clapped him on the shoulder, softly laughing. + </p> + <p> + ‘System—Mr. Durance is right—they must have system, if they + are to appreciate a holiday,’ Skepsey said; and he sent a wretched gaze + around, at the justification of some of the lurid views of Mr. Durance, in + signs of the holiday wasted;—impoverishing the country’s manhood in + a small degree, it may be argued, but we ask, can the country afford it, + while foreign nations are drilling their youth, teaching them to be ready + to move in squads or masses, like the fist of a pugilist. Skepsey left it + to his look to speak his thought. He saw an enemy in tobacco. The + drowsiness of beer had stretched various hulks under trees. Ponderous + cricket lumbered half-alive. Flabby fun knocked-up a yell. And it was + rather vexatious to see girls dancing in good time to the band-music. One + had a male-partner, who hopped his loutish burlesque of the thing he could + not do. + </p> + <p> + Apparently, too certainly, none but the girls had a notion of orderly + muscular exercise. Of what use are girls! Girls have their one mission on + earth; and let them be healthy by all means, for the sake of it; only, + they should not seem to prove that old England is better represented on + the female side. Skepsey heard, with a nip of spite at his bosom, a small + body of them singing in chorus as they walked in step, arm in arm, + actually marched: and to the rearward, none of these girls heeding; there + were the louts at their burlesque of jigs and fisticuffs! ‘Cherry Ripe,’ + was the song. + </p> + <p> + ‘It’s delightful to hear them!’ said Dartrey. + </p> + <p> + Skepsey muttered jealously of their having been trained. + </p> + <p> + The song, which drew Dartrey Fenellan to the quick of an English home, + planted him at the same time in Africa to hear it. Dewy on a parched + forehead it fell, England the shedding heaven. + </p> + <p> + He fetched a deep breath, as of gratitude for vital refreshment. He had + his thoughts upon the training of our English to be something besides the + machinery of capitalists, and upon the country as a blessed mother instead + of the most capricious of maudlin step-dames. + </p> + <p> + He flicked his leg with the stick he carried, said: ‘Your master’s the man + to make a change among them, old friend!’ and strolled along to a group + surrounding two fellows who shammed a bout at single-stick. Vacuity in the + attack on either side, contributed to the joint success of the defense. + They paused under inspection; and Dartrey said: ‘You’re burning to give + them a lesson, Skepsey.’ + </p> + <p> + Skepsey had no objection to his hero’s doing so, though at his personal + cost. + </p> + <p> + The sticks were handed to them; the crowd increased; their rounders boys + had spied them, and came trooping to the scene. Skepsey was directed to + hit in earnest. His defensive attitude flashed, and he was at head and + right and left leg, and giving point, recovering, thrusting madly, and + again at shoulder and thigh, with bravos for reward of a man meaning + business; until a topper on his hat, a cut over the right thigh, and the + stick in his middlerib, told the spectators of a scientific adversary; and + loudly now the gentleman was cheered. An undercurrent of warm feeling ran + for the plucky little one at it hot again in spite of the strokes, and + when he fetched his master a handsome thud across the shoulder, and the + gentleman gave up and complimented him, Skepsey had applause. + </p> + <p> + He then begged his hero to put the previous couple in position, through a + few of the opening movements. They were horribly sheepish at first. + Meantime two boys had got hold of sticks, and both had gone to work in + Skepsey’s gallant style; and soon one was howling. He excused himself, + because of the funny-bone, situated, in his case, higher than usual up the + arm. And now the pair of men were giving and taking cuts to make a + rhinoceros caper. + </p> + <p> + ‘Very well; begin that way; try what you can bear,’ said Dartrey. + </p> + <p> + Skepsey watched them, in felicity for love of the fray, pained by the + disregard of science. + </p> + <p> + Comments on the pretty play, indicating a reminiscent acquaintance with + it, and the capacity for critical observations, were started. Assaults, + wonderful tricks of a slashing Life-Guardsman, one spectator had witnessed + at an exhibition in a London hall. Boxing too. You may see displays of + boxing still in places. How about a prizefight?—With money on it?—Eh, + but you don’t expect men to stand up to be knocked into rumpsteaks for + nothing?—No, but it’s they there bets!—Right, and that’s a + game gone to ruin along of outsiders.—But it always was and it + always will be popular with Englishmen! + </p> + <p> + Great English names of young days, before the wintry shadow of the Law had + blighted them, received their withered laurels. Emulous boys were in the + heroic posture. Good! sparring does no hurt: Skepsey seized a likely lad, + Dartrey another. Nature created the Ring for them. Now then, arms and head + well up, chest hearty, shoulders down, out with the right fist, just below + the level of the chin; out with the left fist farther, right out, except + for that bit of curve; so, and draw it slightly back for wary-pussy at the + spring. Firm you stand, feeling the muscles of both legs, left half a pace + ahead, right planted, both stringy. None of your milk-pail looks; show us + jaw, you bulldogs. Now then, left from the shoulder, straight at right of + head.—Good, and alacrity called on vigour in Skepsey’s pupil; + Dartrey’s had the fist on his mouth before he could parry right arm up. + ‘Foul blow!’ Dartrey cried. Skepsey vowed to the contrary. Dartrey + reiterated his charge. Skepsey was a figure of negation, gesticulating and + protesting. Dartrey appealed tempestuously to the Ring; Skepsey likewise, + in a tone of injury. He addressed a remonstrance to Captain Dartrey. + </p> + <p> + ‘Hang your captain, sir! I call you a coward; come on,’ said the resolute + gentleman, already in ripe form for the attack. His blue eyes were like + the springing sunrise over ridges of the seas; and Skepsey jumped to his + meaning. + </p> + <p> + Boys and men were spectators of a real scientific set-to, a lovely show. + They were half puzzled, it seemed so deadly. And the little one got in his + blows at the gentleman, who had to be hopping. Only, the worse the + gentleman caught it, the friendlier his countenance became. That was the + wonder, and that gave them the key. But it was deliciously near to the + real thing. + </p> + <p> + Dartrey and Skepsey shook hands. + </p> + <p> + ‘And now, you fellows, you’re to know, that this is one of the champions; + and you take your lesson from him and thank him,’ Dartrey said, as he + turned on his heel to strike and greet the flow from the house. + </p> + <p> + ‘Dartrey come!’ Victor, Fenellan, Colney, had him by the hand in turn. + Pure sweetness of suddenly awakened joy sat in Nataly’s eyes as she swam + to welcome him, Nesta moved a step, seemed hesitating, and she tripped + forward. ‘Dear Captain Dartrey!’ + </p> + <p> + He did not say: ‘But what a change in you!’ + </p> + <p> + ‘It is blue-butterfly, all the same,’ Nataly spoke to his look. + </p> + <p> + Victor hurriedly pronounced the formal introduction between the Hon. + Dudley Sowerby and Captain Dartrey Fenellan. The bronze face and the milky + bowed to one another ceremoniously; the latter faintly flushing. + </p> + <p> + ‘So here you are at last,’ Victor said. ‘You stay with us.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘To-morrow or later, if you’ll have me. I go down to my people to-night.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘But you stay in England now?’ Nataly’s voice wavered on the question. + </p> + <p> + ‘There’s a chance of my being off to Upper Burmah before the week’s + ended.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Ah, dear, dear!’ sighed Fenellan; ‘and out of good comes evil!—as + grandfather Deucalion exclaimed, when he gallantly handed up his dripping + wife from the mud of the Deluge waters. Do you mean to be running and + Dewing it on for ever, with only a nod for friends, Dart?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Lord, Simmy, what a sound of home there is in your old nonsense!’ Dartrey + said. + </p> + <p> + His eyes of strong dark blue colour and the foreign swarthiness of his + brows and cheeks and neck mixed the familiar and the strange, in the sight + of the women who knew him. + </p> + <p> + The bill-broker’s fair-tressed young wife whispered of curiosity + concerning him to Nataly. He dressed like a sailor, he stood like a + soldier: and was he married? Yes, he was married. + </p> + <p> + Mrs. Blathenoy imagined a something in Mrs. Radnor’s tone. She could + account for it; not by the ordinary reading of the feminine in the + feminine, but through a husband who professed to know secrets. She was + young in years and experience, ten months wedded, disappointedly awakened, + enlivened by the hour, kindled by a novel figure of man, fretful for a + dash of imprudence. This Mrs. Radnor should be the one to second her very + innocent turn for a galopade; her own position allowed of any little + diverting jig or reel, or plunge in a bath—she required it, for the + domestic Jacob Blathenoy was a dry chip: proved such, without a day’s + variation during the whole of the ten wedded months. Nataly gratified her + spoken wish. Dartrey Fenellan bowed to the lady, and she withdrew him, + seeing composedly that other and greater ladies had the wish ungratified. + Their husbands were not so rich as hers, and their complexions would + hardly have pleased the handsome brown-faced officer so well. + </p> + <p> + Banquet, equal to a blast of trumpet, was the detaining word for the + multitude. It circulated, one knows not how. Eloquent as the whiffs to the + sniffs (and nowhere is eloquence to match it, when the latter are + sharpened from within to without), the word was very soon over the field. + Mr. Carling may have helped; he had it from Fenellan; and he was among the + principal groups, claiming or making acquaintances, as a lawyer should do. + The Concert was complimentarily a topic: Durandarte divine!—did not + everybody think so? Everybody did, in default of a term for overtopping + it. Our language is poor at hyperbole; our voices are stronger. Gestures + and heaven-sent eyeballs invoke to display the ineffable. Where was + Durandarte now? Gone; already gone; off with the Luciani for evening + engagements; he came simply to oblige his dear friend Mr. Radnor. Cheque + fifty guineas: hardly more on both sides than an exchange of smiles. Ah, + these merchant-princes! What of Mr. Radnor’s amateur instrumentalists? + Amateurs, they are not to be named: perfect musicians. Mr. Radnor is the + perfection of a host. Yes, yes; Mrs. Radnor; Miss Radnor too: delicious + voices; but what is it about Mr. Radnor so captivating! He is not quite + English, yet he is not at all foreign. Is he very adventurous in business, + as they say? + </p> + <p> + ‘Soundest head in the City of London,’ Mr. Blathenoy remarked. + </p> + <p> + Sir Rodwell Blachington gave his nod. + </p> + <p> + The crowd interjected, half-sighing. We ought to be proud of such a man! + Perhaps we are a trifle exaggerating, says its heart. But that we are + wholly grateful to him, is a distinct conclusion. And he may be one of the + great men of his time: he has a quite individual style of dress. + </p> + <p> + Lady Rodwell Blachington observed to Colney Durance: + </p> + <p> + ‘Mr. Radnor bids fair to become the idol of the English people.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘If he can prove himself to be sufficiently the dupe of the English + people,’ said Colney. + </p> + <p> + ‘Idol—dupe?’ interjected Sir Rodwell, and his eyebrows fixed at the + perch of Colney’s famous ‘national interrogation’ over vacancy of + understanding, as if from the pull of a string. He had his audience with + him; and the satirist had nothing but his inner gush of acids at sight of + a planted barb. + </p> + <p> + Colney was asked to explain. He never explained. He performed a series of + astonishing leaps, like the branchy baboon above the traveller’s head in + the tropical forest, and led them into the trap they assisted him to + prepare for them. ‘No humour, do you say? The English have no humour?’ a + nephew of Lady Blachington’s inquired of him, with polite pugnacity, and + was cordially assured, that ‘he vindicated them.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘And Altruistic! another specimen of the modern coinage,’ a classical + Church dignitary, in grammarian disgust, remarked to a lady, as they + passed. + </p> + <p> + Colney pricked-up his ears. It struck him that he might fish for + suggestions in aid of the Grand Argument before the Elders of the Court of + Japan. Dr. Wardan, whose recognition he could claim, stated to him, that + the lady and he were enumerating words of a doubtfully legitimate quality + now being inflicted upon the language. + </p> + <p> + ‘The slang from below is perhaps preferable?’ said Colney. + </p> + <p> + ‘As little-less.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘But a pirate-tongue, cut-off from its roots, must continue to practise + piracy, surely, or else take reinforcements in slang, otherwise it is + inexpressive of new ideas.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Possibly the new ideas are best expressed in slang.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘If insular. They will consequently be incommunicable to foreigners. You + would, then, have us be trading with tokens instead of a precious + currency? Yet I cannot perceive the advantage of letting our ideas be + clothed so racy of the obscener soil; considering the pretensions of the + English language to become the universal. If we refuse additions from + above, they force themselves on us from below.’ + </p> + <p> + Dr. Wardan liked the frame of the observations, disliked the substance. + </p> + <p> + ‘One is to understand that the English language has these pretensions?’ he + said:—he minced in his manner, after the well-known mortar-board and + tassel type; the mouthing of a petrifaction: clearly useless to the + pleadings of the patriotic Dr. Bouthoin and his curate. + </p> + <p> + He gave no grip to Colney, who groaned at cheap Donnish sarcasm, and let + him go, after dealing him a hard pellet or two in a cracker-covering. + </p> + <p> + There was Victor all over the field netting his ephemerae! And he who + feeds on them, to pay a price for their congratulations and flatteries, he + is one of them himself! + </p> + <p> + Nesta came tripping from the Rev. Septimus Barmby. ‘Dear Mr. Durance, + where is Captain Dartrey?’ + </p> + <p> + Mrs. Blathenoy had just conducted her husband through a crowd, for an + introduction of him to Captain Dartrey. That was perceptible. + </p> + <p> + Dudley Sowerby followed Nesta closely: he struck across the path of the + Rev. Septimus: again he had the hollow of her ear at his disposal. + </p> + <p> + ‘Mr. Radnor was excellent. He does everything consummately: really, we are + all sensible of it. I am. He must lead us in a symphony. These light + “champagne overtures” of French composers, as Mr. Fenellan calls them, do + not bring out his whole ability:—Zampa, Le Pre aux clercs, + Masaniello, and the like.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Your duet together went well.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Thanks to you—to you. You kept us together.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Papa was the runaway or strain-the-leash, if there was one.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘He is impetuous, he is so fervent. But, Miss Radnor, I could not be the + runaway-with you... with you at the piano. Indeed, I... shall we stroll + down? I love the lake.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘You will hear the bell for your cold dinner very soon.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘I am not hungry. I would so much rather talk—hear you. But you are + hungry? You have been singing twice: three times! Opera singers, they say, + eat hot suppers; they drink stout. And I never heard your voice more + effective. Yours is a voice that... something of the feeling one has in + hearing cathedral voices: carry one up. I remember, in Dresden, once, a + Fraulein Kuhnstreich, a prodigy, very young, considering her + accomplishments. But it was not the same.’ + </p> + <p> + Nesta wondered at Dartrey Fenellan for staying so long with Mr. and Mrs. + Blathenoy. + </p> + <p> + ‘Ah, Mr. Sowerby, if I am to have flattery, I cannot take it as a + milliner’s dumb figure wears the beautiful dress; I must point out my view + of some of my merits.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Oh! do, I beg, Miss... You have a Christian name and I too: and once ... + not Mr. Sowerby: yes, it was Dudley! + </p> + <p> + ‘Quite accidentally, and a world of pardons entreated.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘And Dudley begged Dudley might be Dudley always!’ + </p> + <p> + He was deepening to the Barmby intonation—apparently Cupid’s; but a + shade more airily Pagan, not so fearfully clerical. + </p> + <p> + Her father had withdrawn Dartrey Fenellan from Mr. and Mrs. Blathenoy. Dr. + Schlesien was bowing with Dartrey. + </p> + <p> + ‘And if Durandarte would only—but you are one with Miss Graves to + depreciate my Durandarte, in favour of the more classical Jachimo; whom we + all admire; but you shall be just,’ said she, and she pouted. She had seen + her father plant Dartrey Fenellan in the midst of a group of City + gentlemen. + </p> + <p> + Simeon touched among them to pluck at his brother. He had not a chance; he + retired, and swam into the salmon-net of seductive Mrs. Blathenoy’s broad + bright smile. + </p> + <p> + ‘It’s a matter of mines, and they’re hovering in the attitude of the + query, like corkscrews over a bottle, profoundly indifferent to + blood-relationships,’ he said to her. + </p> + <p> + ‘Pray, stay and be consoled by me,’ said the fair young woman. ‘You are to + point me out all the distinguished people. Is it true, that your brother + has left the army?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Dartrey no longer wears the red. Here comes Colonel Corfe, who does. + England has her army still!’ + </p> + <p> + ‘His wife persuaded him?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘You see he is wearing the black.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘For her? How very very sad! Tell me—what a funnily dressed woman + meeting that gentleman!’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Hush—a friend of the warrior. Splendid weather, Colonel Corfe.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Superb toilettes!’ The colonel eyed Mrs. Blathenoy dilatingly, advanced, + bowed, and opened the siege. + </p> + <p> + She decided a calculation upon his age, made a wall of it, smilingly + agreed with his encomium of the Concert, and toned her voice to Fenellan’s + comprehension: ‘Did it occur recently?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Months; in Africa; I haven’t the date.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Such numbers of people one would wish to know! Who are those ladies + holding a Court, where Mr. Radnor is?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Lady Carmine, Lady Swanage—if it is your wish?’ interposed the + colonel. + </p> + <p> + She dealt him a forgiving smile. ‘And that pleasant-looking old + gentleman?’ + </p> + <p> + Colonel Corfe drew-up. Fenellan said: ‘Are we veterans at forty or so?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Well, it ‘s the romance, perhaps!’ She raised her shoulders. + </p> + <p> + The colonel’s intelligence ran a dog’s nose for a lady’s interjections. + ‘The romance?... at forty, fifty? gone? Miss Julinks, the great heiress + and a beauty; has chosen him over the heads of all the young men of his + time. Cranmer Lotsdale. Most romantic history!’ + </p> + <p> + ‘She’s in love with that, I suppose.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Now you direct my attention to him,’ said Fenellan, ‘the writing of the + romantic history has made the texture look a trifle thready. You have a + terrible eye.’ + </p> + <p> + It was thrown to where the person stood who had first within a few minutes + helped her to form critical estimates of men, more consciously to read + them. + </p> + <p> + ‘Your brother stays in England?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘The fear is, that he’s off again.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Annoying for you. If I had a brother, I would not let him go.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘How would you detain him?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Locks and bolts, clock wrong, hands and arms, kneeling—the fourth + act of the Huguenots!’ + </p> + <p> + ‘He went by way of the window, I think. But that was a lover.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Oh! well!’ she flushed. She did not hear the ‘neglected and astonished + colonel speak, and she sought diversion in saying to Fenellan: ‘So many + people of distinction are assembled here to-day! Tell me, who is that + pompous gentleman, who holds his arms up doubled, as he walks?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Like flappers of a penguin: and advances in jerks: he is head of the + great Firm of Quatley Brothers: Sir Abraham: finances or farms one of the + South American Republics: we call him, Pride of Port. He consumes it and + he presents it.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘And who is that little man, who stops everybody?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘People of distinction indeed! That little man—is your upper lip + underrateing him?... When a lady’s lip is erratically disdainful, it + suggests a misuse of a copious treasury, deserving to be mulcted, punished—how?—who + can say?—that little man, now that little man, with a lift of his + little finger, could convulse the Bacon Market!’ + </p> + <p> + Mrs. Blathenoy shook. Hearing Colonel Corfe exclaim: + </p> + <p> + ‘Bacon Market!’ she let fly a peal. Then she turned to a fresh satellite, + a round and a ruddy, ‘at her service ever,’ Mr. Beaves Urmsing, and + repeated Fenellan’s words. He, in unfeigned wonderment at such unsuspected + powers, cried: ‘Dear me!’ and stared at the little man, making the pretty + lady’s face a twinkling dew. + </p> + <p> + He had missed the Concert. Was it first-rate? Ecstasy answered in the + female voice. + </p> + <p> + ‘Hem’d fool I am to keep appointments!’ he muttered. + </p> + <p> + She reproved him: ‘Fie, Mr. Urmsing; it’s the making of them, not the + keeping!’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Ah, my dear ma’am, if I’d had Blathenoy’s luck when he made a certain + appointment. And he was not so much older than me? The old ones get the + prizes!’ + </p> + <p> + Mr. Beaves Urmsing prompted Colonel Corfe to laugh in triumph. The + colonel’s eyebrows were up in fixity over sleepy lids. He brightened to + propose the conducting of the pretty woman to the banquet. + </p> + <p> + ‘We shall see them going in,’ said she. ‘Mr. Radnor has a French cook, who + does wonders. But I heard him asking for Mr. Beaves Urmsing. I’m sure he + expected The Marigolds at his Concert.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Anything to oblige the company,’ said the rustic ready chorister, + clearing his throat. + </p> + <p> + The lady’s feet were bent in the direction of a grassy knoll, where + sunflowers, tulips, dahlias, peonies, of the sex eclipsed at a distance + its roses and lilies. Fenellan saw Dartrey, still a centre of the + merchantmen, strolling thither. + </p> + <p> + ‘And do you know, your brother is good enough to dine with us next week, + Thursday, down here,’ she murmured. ‘I could venture to command?—if + you are not induced.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Whichever word applies to a faithful subject.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘I do so wish your brother had not left the army!’ + </p> + <p> + ‘You have one son of Mars.’ + </p> + <p> + Her eyes took the colonel up to cast him down: he was not the antidote. + She said to him: ‘Luciani’s voice wears better than her figure.’ + </p> + <p> + The colonel replied: ‘I remember,’ and corrected himself, ‘at Eton, in + jackets: she was not so particularly slim; never knew how to dress. You + beat Italians there! She moved one as a youngster.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Eton boys are so susceptible!’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Why, hulloa, don’t I remember her coming out!—and do you mean to + tell me,’ Mr. Beaves Urmsing brutally addressed the colonel, ‘that you + were at Eton when... why, what age do you give the poor woman, then!’ He + bellowed, ‘Eh?’ as it were a bull crowing. + </p> + <p> + The colonel retreated to one of his defensive corners. ‘I am not aware + that I meant to tell you anything.’ + </p> + <p> + Mr. Beaves Urmsing turned square-breasted on Fenellan: ‘Fellow’s a born + donkey!’ + </p> + <p> + ‘And the mother lived?’ said Fenellan. + </p> + <p> + Mr. Beaves Urmsing puffed with wrath at the fellow. + </p> + <p> + Five minutes later, in the midst of the group surrounding and felicitating + Victor, he had sight of Fenellan conversing with fair ones, and it struck + a light in him; he went three steps backward, with shouts. ‘Dam funny + fellow! eh? who is he? I must have that man at my table. Worth fifty + Colonel Jackasses! And I ‘ve got a son in the Guards: and as much laugh in + him, he ‘s got, as a bladder. But we’ll make a party, eh, Radnor? with + that friend o’ yours. Dam funny fellow! and precious little of it going on + now among the young lot. They’re for seeing ghosts and gaping their jaws; + all for the quavers instead of the capers.’ + </p> + <p> + He sounded and thrummed his roguish fling-off for the capers. A second + glimpse of Fenellan agitated the anecdote, as he called it, seizing + Victor’s arm, to have him out of earshot of the ladies. Delivery, not + without its throes, was accomplished, but imperfectly, owing to + sympathetic convulsions, under which Mr. Beaves Urmsing’s countenance was + crinkled of many colours, as we see the Spring rhubarb-leaf. Unable to + repeat the brevity of Fenellan’s rejoinder, he expatiated on it to convey + it, swearing that it was the kind of thing done in the old days, when men + were witty dogs:—‘pat! and pat back! as in the pantomime.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Repartee!’ said Victor. ‘He has it. You shall know him. You’re the man + for him.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘He for me, that he is!—“Hope the mother’s doing well? My card”:—eh? + Grave as an owl! Look, there goes the donkey, lady to right and left, all + ears for him—ha! ha! I must have another turn with your friend. + “Mother lived, did she?” Dam funny fellow, all of the olden time! And a + dinner, bachelor dinner, six of us, at my place, next week, say Wednesday, + half-past six, for a long evening—flowing bowl—eh, shall it + be?’ + </p> + <p> + Nesta came looking to find her Captain Dartrey. + </p> + <p> + Mr. Beaves Urmsing grew courtly of the olden time. He spied Colonel Corfe + anew, and ‘Donkey!’ rose to split the roar at his mouth, and full of his + anecdote, he pursued some congenial acquaintances, crying to his host: + ‘Wednesday, mind! eh? by George, your friend’s gizzarded me for the day!’ + </p> + <p> + Plumped with the rich red stream of life, this last of the squires of old + England thumped along among the guests, a very tuning-fork to keep them at + their pitch of enthusiasm. He encountered Mr. Caddis, and it was an + encounter. Mr. Caddis represented his political opinions; but here was + this cur of a Caddis whineing his niminy note from his piminy nob, when he + was asked for his hearty echo of the praises of this jolly good fellow + come to waken the neighbourhood, to be a blessing, a blazing hearth, a + fall of manna:—and thank the Lord for him, you desertdog! ‘He ‘s a + merchant prince, and he’s a prince of a man, if you’re for titles. Eh? you + “assent to my encomiums.” You’ll be calling me Mr. Speaker next. Hang me, + Caddis, if those Parliamentary benches of yours aren’t freezing you from + your seat up, and have got to your jaw—my belief!’ + </p> + <p> + Mr. Caddis was left reflecting, that we have, in the dispensations of + Providence, when we have a seat, to submit to castigations from butcherly + men unaccountably commissioned to solidify the seat. He could have + preached a discourse upon Success, to quiet the discontentment of the + unseated. And our world of seats oddly gained, quaintly occupied, + maliciously beset, insensately envied, needs the discourse. But it was not + delivered, else would it have been here written down without mercy, as a + medical prescript, one of the grand specifics. He met Victor, and, between + his dread of him and the counsels of a position subject to stripes, he was + a genial thaw. Victor beamed; for Mr. Caddis had previously stood eminent + as an iceberg of the Lakelands’ party. Mr. Inchling and Mr. Caddis were + introduced. The former in Commerce, the latter in Politics, their + sustaining boast was, the being our stable Englishmen; and at once, with + cousinly minds, they fell to chatting upon the nothings agreeably and + seriously. Colney Durance forsook a set of ladies for fatter prey, and + listened to them. What he said, Victor did not hear. The effect was always + to be seen, with Inchling under Colney. Fenellan did better service, + really good service. + </p> + <p> + Nataly played the heroine she was at heart. Why think of her as having to + act a character! Twice had Carling that afternoon, indirectly and + directly, stated Mrs. Burman to be near the end we crape a natural, a + defensible, satisfaction to hear of:—not wishing it—poor + woman!—but pardonably, before man and all the angels, wishing, + praying for the beloved one to enter into her earthly peace by the agency + of the other’s exit into her heavenly. + </p> + <p> + Fenellan and Colney came together, and said a word apiece of their friend. + </p> + <p> + ‘In his element! The dear old boy has the look of a goldfish, king of his + globe.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘The dear old boy has to me the look of a pot on the fire, with a loose + lid.’ + </p> + <p> + I may have the summons from Themison to-morrow, Victor thought. The + success of the day, was a wine that rocked the soberest of thoughts. For, + strange to confess, ever since the fall on London Bridge, his heart, + influenced in some degree by Nataly’s depression perhaps, had been + shadowed by doubts of his infallible instinct for success. Here, at a + stroke, and before entering the house, he had the whole neighbourhood + about him: he could feel that he and Nataly stood in the minds of the + worthy people variously with the brightness if not with the warmth + distinguishable in the bosom of Beaves Urmsing—the idea of whom gave + Lakelands an immediate hearth-glow. + </p> + <p> + Armandine was thirteen minutes, by his watch, behind the time she had + named. Small blame to her. He excused her to Lady Carmine, Lady Swanage, + Lady Blachington, Mrs. Fanning, Sir Abraham Quatley, Mr. Danny (of Bacon + fame) and the rest of the group surrounding Nataly on the mound leftward + of the white terraces descending to the lake; where she stood beating her + foot fretfully at the word brought by Nesta, that Dartrey Fenellan had + departed. It was her sunshine departed. But she went through her task of + conversing amiably. Colney, for a wonder, consented to be useful in + assisting Fenellan to relate stories of French Cooks; which were, like the + Royal Hanoverian oyster, of an age for offering acceptable flavour to + English hearers. Nesta drew her mother’s attention to Priscilla Graves and + Skepsey; the latter bending head and assenting. Nataly spoke of the charm + of Priscilla’s voice that day, in her duet with the Rev. Septimus. Mr. + Pempton looked; he saw that Priscilla was proselytizing. She was + perfection to him but for one blotting thing. With grief on his eyelids, + he said to Nataly or to himself: ‘Meat!’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Dear friend, don’t ride your hobby over us,’ she replied. + </p> + <p> + ‘But it’s with that object they mount it,’ said Victor. + </p> + <p> + The greater ladies of the assembly were quite ready to accuse the + sections, down to the individuals, of the social English (reserving our + elect) of an itch to be tyrants. + </p> + <p> + Colney was apologizing for them, with his lash: ‘It’s merely the sensible + effect of a want of polish of the surface when they rub together.’ + </p> + <p> + And he heard Carling exclaim to Victor: ‘How comes the fellow here!’ + </p> + <p> + Skepsey had rushed across an open space to intercept a leisurely + progressive man, whose hat was of the shape Victor knew; and the man wore + the known black gaiters. In appearance, he had the likeness of a fallen + parson. + </p> + <p> + Carling and Victor crossed looks that were questions carrying their + answers. + </p> + <p> + Nataly’s eyes followed Victor’s. ‘Who is the man?’ she said; and she got + no reply beyond a perky sparkle in his gaze. + </p> + <p> + Others were noticing the man, who was trying to pass by Skepsey, now on + his right side, now on his left. + </p> + <p> + ‘There’ll be no stopping him,’ Carling said, and he slipped to the rear.’ + </p> + <p> + At this juncture, Armandine’s mellow bell proclaimed her readiness. + </p> + <p> + Victor rubbed the back of his head. Nataly asked him: ‘Dear, is it that + man?’ + </p> + <p> + He nodded scantly: ‘Expected, expected. I think we have our summons from + Armandine. One moment—poor soul! poor soul! Lady Carmine—Sir + Abraham Quatley. Will you lead? Lady Blachington, I secure you. One + moment.’ + </p> + <p> + He directed Nataly to pair a few of the guests; he hurried down the slope + of sward. + </p> + <p> + Nataly applied to Colney Durance. ‘Do you know the man?—is it that + man?’ + </p> + <p> + Colney rejoined: ‘The man’s name is Jarniman.’ + </p> + <p> + Armandine’s bell swung melodiously. The guests had grouped, thickening for + the stream to procession. Mrs. Blathenoy claimed Fenellan; she requested + him to tell her whether he had known Mrs. Victor Radnor many years. She + mused. ‘You like her?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘One likes one’s dearest of friends among women, does one not?’ + </p> + <p> + The lady nodded to his response. ‘And your brother?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Dartrey is devoted to her.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘I am sure,’ said she, ‘your brother is a chivalrous gentleman. I like her + too.’ She came to her sentiment through the sentiment of the chivalrous + gentleman. Sinking from it, she remarked that Mr. Radnor was handsome + still. Fenellan commended the subject to her, as one to discourse of when + she met Dartrey. A smell of a trap-hatch, half-open, afflicted and + sharpened him. It was Blathenoy’s breath: husbands of young wives do these + villanies, for the sake of showing their knowledge. Fenellan forbore to + praise Mrs. Victor: he laid his colours on Dartrey. The lady gave ear till + she reddened. He meant no harm, meant nothing but good; and he was + lighting the most destructive of our lower fires. + </p> + <p> + Visibly, that man Jarniman was disposed of with ease. As in the + street-theatres of crowing Punch, distance enlisted pantomime to do the + effective part of the speeches. Jarniman’s hat was off, he stood bent, he + delivered his message. He was handed over to Skepsey’s care for the + receiving of meat and drink. Victor returned; he had Lady Blachington’s + hand on his arm; he was all hers, and in the heart of his company of + guests at the same time. Eyes that had read him closely for years, were + unable to spell a definite signification on his face, below the + overflowing happiness of the hospitable man among contented guests. He had + in fact something within to enliven him; and that was the more than + suspicion, amounting to an odour of certainty, that Armandine intended one + of her grand surprises for her master, and for the hundred and fifty or so + to be seated at her tables in the unwarmed house of Lakelands. + </p> + <p> + <a name="link2HCH0022" id="link2HCH0022"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + CHAPTER XXII. CONCERNS THE INTRUSION OF JARNIMAN + </h2> + <p> + Armandine did her wonders. There is not in the wide range of the Muses a + more responsive instrument than man to his marvellous cook; and if his + notes were but as flowing as his pedals are zealous, we should be carried + on the tale of the enthusiasm she awakened, away from the rutted highroad, + where History now thinks of tightening her girdle for an accelerated pace. + </p> + <p> + The wonders were done: one hundred and seventy guests plenteously fed at + tables across the great Concert Hall, down a length of the + conservatory-glass, on soups, fish, meats, and the kitchen-garden, under + play of creative sauces, all in the persuasive steam of savouriness; every + dish, one may say, advancing, curtseying, swimming to be your partner, + instead of passively submitting to the eye of appetite, consenting to the + teeth, as that rather melancholy procession of the cold, resembling + established spinsters thrice-corseted in decorum, will appear to do. + Whether Armandine had the thought or that she simply acted in conformity + with a Frenchwoman’s direct good sense, we do require to smell a sort of + animation in the meats we consume. We are still perhaps traceably related + to the Adamite old-youngster just on his legs, who betrayed at every turn + his Darwinian beginnings, and relished a palpitating unwillingness in the + thing refreshing him; only we young-oldsters cherish the milder taste for + willingness, with a throb of the vanquished in it. And a seeming of that + we get from the warm roast. The banquet to be fervently remembered, should + smoke, should send out a breath to meet us. Victor’s crowded + saloon-carriage was one voice of eulogy, to raise Armandine high as the + finale rockets bursting over Wrensham Station at the start Londonward. How + had she managed? We foolishly question the arts of magicians. + </p> + <p> + Mr. Pempton was an apparent dissentient, as the man must be who is half a + century ahead of his fellows in humaneness, and saddened by the display of + slaughtered herds and their devourers. He had picked out his vegetable and + farinaceous morsels, wherever he could get them uncontaminated; enough for + sustenance; and the utmost he could show was, that he did not complain. + When mounted and ridden by the satirist, in wrath at him for + systematically feasting the pride of the martyr on the maceration of his + animal part, he put on his martyr’s pride, which assumed a perfect + contentment in the critical depreciation of opposing systems: he was drawn + to state, as he had often done, that he considered our animal part + shamefully and dangerously over nourished, and that much of the immorality + of the world was due to the present excessive indulgence in meats. ‘Not in + drink?’ Miss Graves inquired. ‘No,’ he said boldly; ‘not equally; meats + are more insidious. I say nothing of taking life—of fattening for + that express purpose: diseases of animals: bad blood made: cruelty + superinduced: it will be seen to be, it will be looked back on, as a form + of, a second stage of, cannibalism. Let that pass. I say, that for excess + in drinking, the penalty is paid instantly, or at least on the morrow.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Paid by the drunkard’s wife, you should say.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Whereas intemperance in eating, corrupts constitutionally, more + spiritually vitiates, we think: on the whole, gluttony is the + least-generous of the vices.’ + </p> + <p> + Colney lured Mr. Pempton through a quagmire of the vices to declare, that + it brutalized; and stammeringly to adopt the suggestion, that our breeding + of English ladies—those lights of the civilized world—can + hardly go with a feeding upon flesh of beasts. Priscilla regretted that + champagne should have to be pleaded in excuse of impertinences to her sex. + They were both combative, nibbed for epigram, edged to inflict wounds; and + they were set to shudder openly at one another’s practises; they might + have exposed to Colney which of the two maniacal sections of his English + had the vaster conceit of superiority in purity; they were baring + themselves, as it were with a garment flung-off at each retort. He + reproached them for undermineing their countrymen; whose Falstaff panics + demanded blood of animals to restore them; and their periods of bragging, + that they should brandify their wits to imagine themselves Vikings. + </p> + <p> + Nataly interposed. She was vexed with him. He let his eyelids drop: but + the occasion for showing the prickliness of the bristly social English, + could not be resisted. Dr. Peter Yatt was tricked to confess, that small + annoyances were, in his experience, powerful on the human frame; and Dr. + John Cormyn was very neatly brought round to assure him he was mistaken if + he supposed the homoeopathic doctor who smoked was exercising a + destructive influence on the efficacy of the infinitesimal doses he + prescribed; Dr. Yatt chuckled a laugh at globules; Dr. Cormyn at patients + treated as horses; while Mr. Catkin was brought to praise the smoke of + tobacco as our sanctuary from the sex; and Mr. Peridon quietly denied, + that the taking of it into his nostrils from the puffs of his friend + caused him sad silences: Nesta flew to protect the admirer of her beloved + Louise. Her subsiding young excitement of the day set her Boating on that + moony melancholy in Mr. Peridon. + </p> + <p> + No one could understand the grounds for Colney’s more than usual + waspishness. He trotted out the fulgent and tonal Church of the Rev. + Septimus; the skeleton of worship, so truly showing the spirit, in that of + Dudley Sowerby’s family; maliciously admiring both; and he had a spar with + Fenellan, ending in a snarl and a shout. Victor said to him: ‘Yes, here, + as much as you like, old Colney, but I tell you, you’ve staggered that + poor woman Lady Blachington to-day, and her husband too; and I don’t know + how many besides. What the pleasure of it can be, I can’t guess.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Nor I,’ said Fenellan, ‘but I’ll own I feel envious; like the girl among + a family of boys I knew, who were all of them starved in their infancy by + a miserly father, that gave them barely a bit of Graves to eat and not a + drop of Pempton to drink; and on the afternoon of his funeral, I found + them in the drawing-room, four lank fellows, heels up, walking on their + hands, from long practice; and the girl informed me, that her brothers + were able so to send the little blood they had in their bodies to their + brains, and always felt quite cheerful for it, happy, and empowered to + deal with the problems of the universe; as they couldn’t on their legs; + but she, poor thing, was forbidden to do the same! And I’m like her. I + care for decorum too much to get the brain to act on Colney’s behaviour; + but I see it enraptures him and may be comprehensible to the topsy-turvy.’ + </p> + <p> + Victor rubbed hands. It was he who filled Colney’s bag of satiric spite. + In addition to the downright lunacy of the courting of country society, by + means of the cajolements witnessed this day, a suspicion that Victor was + wearing a false face over the signification—of Jarniman’s visit and + meant to deceive the trustful and too-devoted loving woman he seemed bound + to wreck, irritated the best of his nature. He had a resolve to pass an + hour with the couple, and speak and insist on hearing plain words before + the night had ended. But Fenellan took it out of him. Victor’s show of a + perfect contentment emulating Pempton’s, incited Colney to some of his + cunning rapier-thrusts with his dancing adversary; and the heat which is + planted in us for the composition: of those cool epigrams, will not allow + plain words to follow. Or, handing him over to the police of the + Philistines, you may put it, that a habit of assorting spices will render + an earnest simplicity distasteful. He was invited by Nataly to come home + with them; her wish for his presence, besides personal, was moved by an + intuition, that his counsel might specially benefit them. He shrugged; he + said he had work at his chambers. + </p> + <p> + ‘Work!’ Victor ejaculated: he never could reach to a right comprehension + of labour, in regard to the very unremunerative occupation of literature. + Colney he did not want, and he let him go, as Nataly noticed, without a + sign of the reluctance he showed when the others, including Fenellan, + excused themselves. + </p> + <p> + ‘So! we’re alone?’ he said, when the door of the hall had closed on them. + He kept Nesta talking of the success of the day until she, observing her + mother’s look, simulated the setting-in of a frenzied yawn. She was + kissed, and she tripped to her bed. + </p> + <p> + ‘Now we are alone,’ Nataly said. + </p> + <p> + ‘Well, dear, and the day was, you must own... ‘ he sought to trifle with + her heavy voice; but she recalled him: ‘Victor!’ and the naked anguish in + her cry of his name was like a foreign world threatening the one he + filled. + </p> + <p> + ‘Ah, yes; that man, that Jarniman. You saw him, I remember. You + recollected him?—stouter than he was. In her service ever since. + Well, a little drop of bitter, perhaps: no harm, tonic.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Victor, is she very ill?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘My love, don’t feel at your side: she is ill, ill, not the extreme case: + not yet: old and ill. I told Skepsey to give the man refreshment: he had + to do his errand.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘What? why did he come?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Curious; he made acquaintance with Skepsey, and appears to have outwitted + poor Skepsey, as far as I see it. But if that woman thinks of intimidating + me now—!’ His eyes brightened; he had sprung from evasions. ‘Living + in flagrant sin, she says: you and I! She will not have it; warns me. + Heard this day at noon of company at Lakelands. Jarniman off at once. Are + to live in obscurity;—you and I! if together! Dictates from her + death-bed-I suppose her death-bed.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Dearest,’ Nataly pressed hand on her left breast, ‘may we not think that + she may be right?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘An outrageous tyranny of a decrepit woman naming herself wife when she is + only a limpet of vitality, with drugs for blood, hanging-on to blast the + healthy and vigorous! I remember old Colney’s once, in old days, calling + that kind of marriage a sarcophagus. It was to me. There I lay—see + myself lying! wasting! Think what you can good of her, by all means! From + her bed! despatches that Jarniman to me from her bedside, with the word, + that she cannot in her conscience allow—what imposition was it I + practised?... flagrant sin?—it would have been an infinitely + viler.... She is the cause of suffering enough: I bear no more from her; + I’ve come to the limit. She has heard of Lakelands: she has taken one of + her hatreds to the place. She might have written, might have sent me a + gentleman, privately. No: it must be done in dramatic style-for effect: + her confidential—lawyer?—doctor?—butler! Perhaps to + frighten me:—the boy she knew, and—poor soul! I don’t mean to + abuse her: but such conduct as this is downright brutal. I laugh at it, I + snap my fingers. I can afford to despise it. Only I do say it deserves to + be called abominable.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Victor, has she used a threat?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Am I brought to listen to any of her threats!—Funny thing, I ‘m + certain that woman never can think of me except as the boy she knew. I saw + her first when she was first a widow. She would keep talking to me of the + seductions of the metropolis—kept informing me I was a young man... + shaking her head. I ‘ve told you. She—well, I know we are mixtures, + women as well as men. I can, I hope, grant the same—I believe I can—allowances + to women as to men; we are poor creatures, all of using one sense: though + I won’t give Colney his footing; there’s a better way of reading us. I + hold fast to Nature. No violation of Nature, my good Colney! We can live + the lives of noble creatures; and I say that happiness was meant for us:—just + as, when you sit down to your dinner, you must do it cheerfully, and you + make good blood: otherwise all’s wrong. There’s the right answer to + Colney! But when a woman like that .... and marries a boy: well, + twenty-one—not quite that: and an innocent, a positive innocent—it + may seem incredible, after a term of school-life: it was a fact: I can + hardly understand it myself when I look back. Marries him! And then sets + to work to persecute him, because he has blood in his veins, because he + worships beauty; because he seeks a real marriage, a real mate. And, I say + it! let the world take its own view, the world is wrong! because he + preferred a virtuous life to the kind of life she would, she must—why, + necessarily!—have driven him to, with a mummy’s grain of nature in + his body. And I am made of flesh, I admit it.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Victor, dearest, her threat concerns only your living at Lakelands.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Pray, don’t speak excitedly, my love,’ he replied to the woman whose + tones had been subdued to scarce more than waver. ‘You see how I meet it: + water off a duck’s back, or Indian solar beams on the skin of a Hindoo! I + despise it hardly worth contempt;—But, come: our day was a good one. + Fenellan worked well. Old Colney was Colney Durance, of course. He did no + real mischief.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘And you will not determine to enter Lakelands—not yet, dear?’ said + Nataly. + </p> + <p> + ‘My own girl, leave it all to me.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘But, Victor, I must, must know.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘See the case. You have lots of courage. We can’t withdraw. Her intention + is mischief. I believe the woman keeps herself alive for it: we’ve given + her another lease!—though it can only be for a very short time; + Themison is precise; Carling too. If we hold back—I have great faith + in Themison—the woman’s breath on us is confirmed. We go down, then; + complete the furnishing, quite leisurely; accept—listen—accept + one or two invitations: impossible to refuse!—but they are accepted!—and + we defy her: a crazy old creature: imagines herself the wife of the + ex-Premier, widow of Prince Le Boo, engaged to the Chinese Ambassador, et + caetera. Leave the tussle with that woman to me. No, we don’t repeat the + error of Crayc Farm and Creckholt. And here we have stout friends. Not to + speak of Beaver Urmsing: a picture of Old Christmas England! You took to + him?—must have taken to Beaver Urmsing! The Marigolds! And Sir + Rodwell and Lady Blachington are altogether above the mark of Sir Humphrey + and Lady Pottil, and those half and half Mountneys. There’s a warm centre + of home in Lakelands. But I know my Nataly: she is thinking of our girl. + Here is the plan: we stand our ground: my dear soul won’t forsake me only + there’s the thought of Fredi, in the event... improbable enough. I lift + Fredi out of the atmosphere awhile; she goes to my cousins the Duvidney + ladies.’ + </p> + <p> + Nataly was hit by a shot. ‘Can you imagine it, Victor?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Regard it as done.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘They will surely decline!’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Their feeling for General Radnor is a worship.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘All the more...?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘The son inherits it. He goes to them personally. Have you ever known me + personally fail? Fredi stays at Moorsedge for a month or two. Dorothea and + Virginia Duvidney will give her a taste of a new society; good for the + girl. All these little shiftings can be turned to good. Meantime, I say, + we stand our ground: but you are not to be worried; for though we have + gone too far to recede, we need not and we will not make the entry into + Lakelands until—you know: that is, auspiciously, to suit you in + every way. Thus I provide to meet contingencies. What one may really fancy + is, that the woman did but threaten. There’s her point of view to be + considered: silly, crazy; but one sees it. We are not sure that she struck + a blow at Craye or Creckholt. I wonder she never wrote. She was + frightened, when she came to manage her property, of signing her name to + anything. Absurd, that sending of Jarniman! However, it’s her move; we + make a corresponding disposition of our chessmen.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘And I am to lose my Nesta for a month?’ Nataly said, after catching here + and there at the fitful gleams of truce or comfort dropped from his words. + And simultaneously, the reproach of her mind to her nature for again and + so constantly yielding to the domination of his initiative: unable to find + the words, even the ideas, to withstand him,—brought big tears. + Angry at herself both for the internal feebleness and the exhibition of + it, she blinked and begged excuse. There might be nothing that should call + her to resist him. She could not do much worse than she had done to-day. + The reflection, that to-day she had been actually sustained by the + expectation of a death to come, diminished her estimate of to-morrow’s + burden on her endurance, in making her seem a less criminal woman, who + would have no such expectation: which was virtually a stab at a fellow + creature’s future. Her head was acute to work in the direction of the + casuistries and the sensational webs and films. Facing Victor, it was a + block. + </p> + <p> + But the thought came: how could she meet those people about Lakelands, + without support of the recent guilty whispers! She said coldly, her heart + shaking her: ‘You think there has been a recovery?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Invalids are up and down. They are—well, no; I should think she + dreads the...’ he kept ‘surgeon’ out of hearing. ‘Or else she means this + for the final stroke: “though I’m lying here, I can still make him feel.” + That, or—poor woman—she has her notions of right and wrong.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Could we not now travel for a few weeks, Victor?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Certainly, dear; we will, after we have kept our engagements to dine—I + accepted—with the Blathenoys, the Blachingtons, Beaver Urmsing.’ + </p> + <p> + Nataly’s vision of the peaceful lost little dairy cottage swelled to + brilliance, like the large tear at the fall; darkening under her present + effort to comprehend the necessity it was for him to mix and be foremost + with the world. Unable to grasp it perfectly in mind, her compassionate + love embraced it: she blamed herself, for being the obstruction to him. + </p> + <p> + ‘Very well,’ she said on a sigh. ‘Then we shall not have to let our girl + go from us?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Just a few weeks. In the middle of dinner, I scribbled a telegram to the + Duvidneys, for Skepsey to take.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Speaking of Nesta?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Of my coming to-morrow. They won’t stop me. I dine with them, sleep at + the Wells; hotel for a night. We are to be separated for a night.’ + </p> + <p> + She laid her hand in his and gave him a passing view of her face: ‘For + two, dear. I am... that man’s visit—rather shaken: I shall have a + better chance of sleeping if I know I am not disturbing you.’ + </p> + <p> + She was firm; and they kissed and parted. Each had an unphrased + speculation upon the power of Mrs. Burman to put division between them. + </p> + <p> + <a name="link2HCH0023" id="link2HCH0023"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + CHAPTER XXIII. TREATS OF THE LADIES’ LAPDOG TASSO FOR AN INSTANCE OF + MOMENTOUS EFFECTS PRODUCED BY VERY MINOR CAUSES + </h2> + <p> + The maiden ladies Dorothea and Virginia Duvidney were thin—sweet + old-fashioned grey gentlewomen, demurely conscious of their excellence and + awake to the temptation in the consciousness, who imposed a certain reflex + primness on the lips of the world when addressing them or when alluding to + them. For their appearance was picturesque of the ancestral time, and + their ideas and scrupulousness of delivery suggested the belated in + ripeness; orchard apples under a snow-storm; or any image that will + ceremoniously convey the mind’s profound appreciation together with the + tooth’s panic dread of tartness. They were by no means tart; only, as you + know, the tooth is apprehensively nervous; an uninviting sign will set it + on edge. Even the pen which would sketch them has a spell on it and must + don its coat of office, walk the liveried footman behind them. + </p> + <p> + Their wealth, their deeds of charity, their modesty, their built grey + locks, their high repute; a ‘Chippendale elegance’ in a quaintly formal + correctness, that they had, as Colney Durance called it; gave them some + queenliness, and allowed them to claim the ear as an oracle and banish + rebellious argument. Intuitive knowledge, assisted by the Rev. Stuart Rem + and the Rev. Abram Posterley, enabled them to pronounce upon men and + things; not without effect; their country owned it; the foreigner beheld + it. Nor were they corrupted by the servility of the surrounding ear. They + were good women, striving to be humbly good. They might, for all the + little errors they nightly unrolled to then perceptions, have stood before + the world for a study in the white of our humanity. And this may be but a + washed wall, it is true: revolutionary sceptics are measuring the depths + of it. But the hue refreshes, the world admires; and we know it an object + of aim to the bettermost of the wealthy. If, happily, complacent + circumstances have lifted us to the clean paved platform out of grip of + puddled clay and bespattering wheeltracks, we get our chance of coming to + it. + </p> + <p> + Possessing, for example, nine thousand pounds per annum in Consols, and + not expending the whole of it upon our luxuries, we are, without further + privation, near to kindling the world’s enthusiasm for whiteness. Yet + there, too, we find, that character has its problems to solve; there are + shades in salt. We must be charitable, but we should be just; we give to + the poor of the land, but we are eminently the friends of our servants; + duty to mankind diverts us not from the love we bear to our dog; and with + a pathetic sorrow for silt, we discard it from sight and hearing. We hate + dirt. Having said so much, having shown it, by sealing the mouth of Mr. + Stuart Rem and iceing the veins of Mr. Abram Posterley, in relation to a + dreadful public case and a melancholy private, we have a pleased sense of + entry into the world’s ideal. + </p> + <p> + At the same time, we protest our unworthiness. Acknowledgeing that they + were not purely spotless, these ladies genuinely took the tiny fly-spot + for a spur to purification; and they viewed it as a patch to raise in + relief their goodness. They gazed on it, saw themselves in it, and veiled + it: warned of the cunning of an oft-defeated Tempter. + </p> + <p> + To do good and sleep well, was their sowing and their reaping. Uneasy + consciences could not have slept. The sleeping served for proof of an + accurate reckoning and an expungeing of the day’s debits. They differed in + opinion now and then, as we see companion waves of the river, blown by a + gust, roll a shadow between them; and almost equally transient were their + differences with a world that they condemned when they could not feel they + (as an embodiment of their principles) were leading it. The English world + at times betrayed a restiveness in the walled pathway of virtue; for, + alas, it closely neighbours the French; only a Channel, often dangerously + smooth, to divide: but it is not perverted for long; and the English Funds + are always constant and a tower. Would they be suffered to be so, if + libertinism were in the ascendant? + </p> + <p> + Colney Durance was acquainted with the Duvidney ladies. Hearing of the + journey to them and the purport of it, he said, with the mask upon glee: + ‘Then Victor has met his match!’ Nataly had sent for him to dine with her + in Victor’s absence: she was far from grieved, as to the result, by his + assurance to her, that Victor had not a chance. Colney thought so. ‘Just + like him! to be off gaily to try and overcome or come over the greatest + power in England.’ They were England herself; the squat old woman she has + become by reason of her overlapping numbers of the comfortable fund-holder + annuitants: a vast body of passives and negatives, living by precept, + according to rules of precedent, and supposing themselves to be + righteously guided because of their continuing undisturbed. Them he + branded, as hypocritical materialists, and the country for pride in her + sweetmeat plethora of them:—mixed with an ancient Hebrew fear of + offence to an inscrutable Lord, eccentrically appeasable through the + dreary iteration of the litany of sinfulness. He was near a truth; and he + had the heat of it on him. + </p> + <p> + Satirists in their fervours might be near it to grasp it, if they could be + moved to moral distinctness, mental intention, with a preference of strong + plain speech over the crack of their whips. Colney could not or would not + praise our modern adventurous, experimental, heroic, tramping active, as + opposed to yonder pursy passives and negatives; he had occasions for + flicking the fellow sharply: and to speak of the Lord as our friend + present with us, palpable to Reason, perceptible to natural piety solely + through the reason, which justifies punishment; that would have stopped + his mouth upon the theme of God-forsaken creatures. Our satirist is an + executioner by profession, a moralist in excuse, or at the tail of it; + though he thinks the position reversed, when he moralizes angrily to have + his angry use of the scourge condoned. Nevertheless, he fills a + serviceable place; and certainly he is not happy in his business. Colney + suffered as heavily as he struck. If he had been no more than a mime in + the motley of satire, he would have sucked compensation from the acid of + his phrases, for the failure to prick and goad, and work amendment. + </p> + <p> + He dramatized to Nataly some of the scene going on at the Wells: Victor’s + petition; his fugue in urgency of it; the brief reply of Miss Dorothea and + her muted echo Miss Virginia. He was rather their apologist for refusing. + But, as when, after himself listening to their ‘views,’ he had + deferentially withdrawn from the ladies of Moorsedge, and had then beheld + their strangely-hatted lieutenants and the regiments of the toneless + respectable on the pantiles and the mounts, the curse upon the satirist + impelled him to generalize. The quiet good ladies were multiplied: they + were ‘the thousands of their sisters, petticoated or long-coated or + buck-skinned; comfortable annuitants under clerical shepherding, close + upon outnumbering the labourers they paralyze at home and stultify + abroad.’ Colney thumped away. The country’s annuitants had for type ‘the + figure with the helmet of the Owl-Goddess and the trident of the + Earth-shaker, seated on a wheel, at the back of penny-pieces; in whom you + see neither the beauty of nakedness nor the charm of drapery; not the + helmet’s dignity or the trident’s power; but she has patently that which + stops the wheel; and poseing for representative of an imperial nation, she + helps to pass a penny.’ So he passed his epigram, heedless of the + understanding or attention of his hearer; who temporarily misjudged him + for a man impelled by the vanity of literary point and finish, when indeed + it was hot satiric spite, justified of its aim, which crushed a class to + extract a drop of scathing acid, in the interests of the country, mankind + as well. Nataly wanted a picture painted, colours and details, that she + might get a vision of the scene at Moorsedge. She did her best to feel an + omen and sound it, in his question ‘whether the yearly increasing army of + the orderly annuitants and their parasites does not demonstrate the proud + old country as a sheath for pith rather than of the vital run of sap.’ + </p> + <p> + Perhaps it was patriotic to inquire; and doubtless she was the weakest of + women; she could follow no thought; her heart was beating blindly beside + Victor, hopeing for the refusal painful to her through his disappointment. + </p> + <p> + ‘You think me foolish,’ she made answer to one of Colney’s shrugs; ‘and it + has come to that pitch with me, that I cannot be sensible of a merit + except in being one with him—obeying, is the word. And I have never + yet known him fail. That terrible Lakelands wears a different look to me, + when I think of what he can do; though I would give half my days to escape + it.’ + </p> + <p> + She harped on the chord of feverish extravagance; the more hateful to + Colney because of his perceiving, that she simulated a blind devotedness + to stupefy her natural pride; and he was divided between stamping on her + for an imbecile and dashing at Victor for a maniac. But her situation + rendered her pitiable. ‘You will learn tomorrow what Victor has done,’ he + said, and thought how the simple words carried the bitterness. + </p> + <p> + That was uttered within a few minutes of midnight, when the ladies of + Moorsedge themselves, after an exhausting resistance to their dearest + relative, were at the hall-door of the house with Victor, saying the + good-night, to which he responded hurriedly, cordially, dumbly, a baffled + man. They clasped hands. Miss Dorothea said: + </p> + <p> + ‘You, Victor, always.’ Miss Virginia said: ‘You will be sure of welcome.’ + He walked out upon the moonless night; and for lack of any rounded object + in the smothering darkness to look at, he could nowhere take moorings to + gather himself together and define the man who had undergone so portentous + a defeat. He was glad of quarters at an hotel, a solitary bed, absence + from his Nataly. + </p> + <p> + For their parts, the ladies were not less shattered. They had no triumph + in their victory: the weight of it bore them down. They closed, locked, + shot the bolts and fastened the chain of the door. They had to be reminded + by the shaking of their darling dog Tasso’s curly silky coat, that he had + not taken his evening’s trot to notify malefactors of his watchfulness and + official wrath at sound of footfall or a fancied one. Without + consultation, they unbolted the door, and Tasso went forth, to ‘compose + his vesper hymn,’ as Mr. Posterley once remarked amusingly. + </p> + <p> + Though not pretending to the Muse’s crown so far, the little dog had + qualities to entrance the spinster sex. His mistresses talked of him; of + his readiness to go forth; of the audible first line of his hymn or + sonnet; of his instinct telling him that something was wrong in the + establishment. For most of the servants at Moorsedge were prostrated by a + fashionable epidemic; a slight attack, the doctor said; but Montague, the + butler, had withdrawn for the nursing of his wife; Perrin, the footman, + was confined to his chamber; Manton, the favourite maid, had appeared in + the morning with a face that caused her banishment to bed; and the cook, + Mrs. Bannister, then sighingly agreed to send up cold meat for the ladies’ + dinner. Hence their melancholy inhospitality to their cousin Victor, who + had, in spite of his errors, the right to claim his place at their table, + was ‘of the blood,’ they said. He was recognized as the living prince of + it. His every gesture, every word, recalled the General. The trying scene + with him had withered them, they did not speak of it; each had to the + other the look of a vessel that has come out of a gale. Would they sleep? + They scarcely dared ask it of themselves. They had done rightly; silence + upon that reflection seemed best. It was the silence of an inward + agitation; still they knew the power of good consciences to summon sleep. + </p> + <p> + Tasso was usually timed for five minutes. They were astonished to discover + by the clock, that they had given him ten. He was very quiet: if so, and + for whatever he did, he had his reason, they said: he was a dog endowed + with reason: endowed—and how they wished that Mr. Stuart Rem would + admit it!—with, their love of the little dog believed (and Mr. + Posterley acquiesced), a soul. Do but think it of dear animals, and any + form of cruelty to them becomes an impossibility, Mr. Stuart Rem! But he + would not be convinced: ungenerously indeed he named Mr. Posterley a + courtier. The ladies could have retorted, that Mr. Posterley had not a + brother who was the celebrated surgeon Sir Nicholas Rem. + </p> + <p> + Usually Tasso came running in when the hall-door was opened to him. Not a + sound of him could be heard. The ladies blew his familiar whistle. He + trotted back to a third appeal, and was, unfortunately for them, not + caressed; he received reproaches from two forefingers directed straight at + his reason. He saw it and felt it. The hug of him was deferred to the + tender good-night to him in his basket at the foot of the ladies’ beds. + </p> + <p> + On entering their spacious bed-chamber, they were so fatigued that sleep + appeared to their minds the compensating logical deduction. Miss Dorothea + suppressed a yawn, and inflicted it upon Miss Virginia, who returned it, + with an apology, and immediately had her sister’s hand on her shoulder, + for, an attempted control of one of the irresistibles; a spectacle + imparting bitter shudders and shots to the sympathetic jawbones of an + observer. Hand at mouth, for not in privacy would they have been guilty of + exposing a grimace, they signified, under an interim smile, their maidenly + submission to the ridiculous force of nature: after which, Miss Virginia + retired to the dressing-room, absorbed in woeful recollection of the + resolute No they had been compelled to reiterate, in response to the most + eloquent and, saving for a single instance, admirable man, their cousin, + the representative of ‘the blood,’ supplicating them. A recreant + thankfulness coiled within her bosom at the thought, that Dorothea, true + to her office of speaker, had tasked herself with the cruel utterance and + repetition of the word. Victor’s wonderful eyes, his voice, yet more than + his urgent pleas; and also, in the midst of his fiery flood of speech, his + gentleness, his patience, pathos, and a man’s tone through it all; were + present to her. + </p> + <p> + Disrobed, she knocked at the door. + </p> + <p> + ‘I have called to you twice,’ Dorothea said; and she looked a motive for + the call. + </p> + <p> + ‘What is it?’ said Virginia, with faltering sweetness, with a terrible + divination. + </p> + <p> + The movement of a sigh was made. ‘Are you aware of anything, dear?’ + </p> + <p> + Virginia was taken with the contrary movement of a sniff. But the fear + informing it prevented it from being venturesome. Doubt of the pure + atmosphere of their bed-chamber, appeared to her as too heretic even for + the positive essay. In affirming, that she was not aware of anything, her + sight fell on Tasso. His eyeballs were those of a little dog that has been + awfully questioned. + </p> + <p> + ‘It is more than a suspicion,’ said Dorothea; and plainly now, while open + to the seductions of any pleasing infidel testimony, her nose in + repugnance convicted him absolutely. + </p> + <p> + Virginia’s nose was lowered a few inches; it inhaled and stopped midway. + ‘You must be mistaken, dear. He never... ‘ + </p> + <p> + ‘But are you insensible to the...’ Dorothea’s eyelids fainted. + </p> + <p> + Virginia dismissed the forlornest of efforts at incredulity. A whiff of + Tasso had smitten her. ‘Ah!’ she exclaimed and fell away. ‘Is it Tasso! + How was it you noticed nothing before undressing, dear?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Thinking of what we have gone through to-night! I forgot him. At last the + very strange... The like of it I have not ever!... And upon that thick + coat! And, dear, it is late. We are in the morning hours.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘But, my dear-Oh, dear, what is to be done with him?’ + </p> + <p> + That was the crucial point for discussion. They had no servant to give + them aid; Manton, they could not dream of disturbing. And Tasso’s + character was in the estimate; he hated washing; it balefully depraved his + temper; and not only, creature of habit that he was, would he decline to + lie down anywhere save in their bedroom, he would lament, plead, insist + unremittingly, if excluded; terrifying every poor invalid of the house. + Then again, were they at this late hour to dress themselves, and take him + downstairs, and light a fire in the kitchen, and boil sufficient water to + give him a bath and scrubbing? Cold water would be death to him. Besides, + he would ring out his alarum for the house to hear, pour out all his + poetry, poor dear, as Mr. Posterley called it, at a touch of cold water. + The catastrophe was one to weep over, the dilemma a trial of the strongest + intelligences. + </p> + <p> + In addition to reviews of their solitary alternative-the having of a + befouled degraded little dog in their chamber through the night, they were + subjected to a conflict of emotions when eyeing him: and there came to + them the painful, perhaps irreverent, perhaps uncharitable, thought:—that + the sinner who has rolled in the abominable, must cleanse him and do + things to polish him and perfume before again embraced even by the mind: + if indeed we can ever have our old sentiment for him again! Mr. Stuart Rem + might decide it for them. Nay, before even the heart embraces him, he must + completely purify himself. That is to say, the ordinary human sinner—save + when a relative. Contemplating Tasso, the hearts of the ladies gushed out + in pity of an innocent little dog, knowing not evil, dependent on his + friends for help to be purified;—necessarily kept at a distance: the + very look of him prescribed extreme separation, as far as practicable. But + they had proof of a love almost greater than it was previous to the + offence, in the tender precautions they took to elude repulsion. + </p> + <p> + He was rolling on the rug, communicating contagion. Flasks of + treble-distilled lavender water, and their favourite, traditional in the + family, eau d’Arquebusade, were on the toilet-table. They sprinkled his + basket, liberally sprinkled the rug and the little dog. Perfume-pastilles + were in one of the sitting-rooms below; and Virginia would have gone down + softly to fetch a box, but Dorothea restrained her, in pity for the + servants, with the remark: ‘It would give us a nightmare of a Roman + Catholic Cathedral!’ A bit of the window was lifted by Dorothea, + cautiously, that prowling outsiders might not be attracted. Tasso was + wooed to his basket. He seemed inquisitive; the antidote of his + naughtiness excited him; his tail circled after his muzzle several times; + then he lay. A silken scarf steeped in eau d’Arquebusade was flung across + him. + </p> + <p> + Their customary devout observances concluded, lights were extinguished, + and the ladies kissed, and entered their beds. + </p> + <p> + Their beds were not homely to them. Dorothea thought that Virginia was + long in settling herself. Virginia did not like the sound of Dorothea’s + double sigh. Both listened anxiously for the doings of Tasso. He rested. + </p> + <p> + He was uneasy; he was rounding his basket once more; unaware of the + exaggeration of his iniquitous conduct, poor innocent, he shook that + dreadful coat of his! He had displaced the prophylactic cover of the + scarf. + </p> + <p> + He drove them in a despair to speculate on the contention between the + perfume and the stench in junction, with such a doubt of the victory of + which of the two, as drags us to fear our worst. It steals into our + nostrils, possesses them. As the History of Mankind has informed us, we + were led up to our civilization by the nose. But Philosophy warns us on + that eminence; to beware of trusting exclusively to our conductor, lest + the mind of us at least be plunged back into barbarism. The ladies hated + both the cause and the consequence, they had a revulsion from the object, + of the above contention. But call it not a contention: there is nobility + in that. This was a compromise, a degrading union, with very sickening + results. Whether they came of an excess of the sprinkling, could not well + be guessed. The drenching at least was righteously intended. + </p> + <p> + Beneath their shut eyelids, they felt more and more the oppression of a + darkness not laden with slumber. They saw it insolidity; themselves as + restless billows, driven dashing to the despondent sigh. Sleep was denied + them. + </p> + <p> + Tasso slept. He had sinned unknowingly, and that is not a spiritual sin; + the chastisement confers the pardon. + </p> + <p> + But why was this ineffable blessing denied to them? Was it that they might + have a survey of all the day’s deeds and examine them under the cruel + black beams of Insomnia? + </p> + <p> + Virginia said: ‘You are wakeful.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Thoughtful,’ was the answer. + </p> + <p> + A century of the midnight rolled on. + </p> + <p> + Dorothea said: ‘He behaved very beautifully.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘I looked at the General’s portrait while he besought us,’ Virginia + replied. + </p> + <p> + ‘One sees him in Victor, at Victor’s age. Try to sleep.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘I do. I pray that you may.’ + </p> + <p> + Silence courted slumber. Their interchange of speech from the posture of + bodies on their backs, had been low and deliberate, in the tone of the + vaults. Dead silence recalled the strangeness of it. The night was + breathless; their open window a peril bestowing no boon. They were + mutually haunted by sound of the gloomy query at the nostrils of each when + drawing the vital breath. But for that, they thought they might have + slept. + </p> + <p> + Bed spake to bed: + </p> + <p> + ‘The words of Mr. Stuart Rem last Sunday!’ ‘He said: “Be just.” Could one + but see direction!’ + </p> + <p> + ‘In obscurity, feeling is a guide.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘The heart.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘It may sometimes be followed.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘When it concerns the family.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘He would have the living, who are seeking peace, be just.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Not to assume the seat of justice.’ + </p> + <p> + Again they lay as tombstone effigies, that have committed the passage of + affairs to another procession of the Ages. + </p> + <p> + There was a gentle sniff, in hopeless confirmation of the experience of + its predecessors. A sister to it ensued. + </p> + <p> + ‘Could Victor have spoken so, without assurance in his conscience, that + his entreaty was righteously addressed to us? that we...’ + </p> + <p> + ‘And no others!’ + </p> + <p> + ‘I think of his language. He loves the child.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘In heart as in mind, he is eminently gifted; acknowledgeing error.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘He was very young.’ + </p> + <p> + The huge funereal minutes conducted their sonorous hearse, the hour. + </p> + <p> + It struck in the bed-room: Three. + </p> + <p> + No more than three of the clock, it was the voice telling of half the + precious restorative night-hours wasted. + </p> + <p> + Now, as we close our eyelids when we would go to sleep, so must we, in + expectation of the peace of mind granting us the sweet oblivion, + preliminarily do something which invokes, that we may obtain it. + </p> + <p> + ‘Dear,’ Dorothea said. + </p> + <p> + ‘I know indeed,’ said Virginia. + </p> + <p> + ‘We may have been!’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Not designingly.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Indeed not. But harsh it may be named, if the one innocent is to be the + sufferer.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘The child can in no sense be adjudged guilty.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘It is Victor’s child.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘He adores the child.’ + </p> + <p> + Wheels were in mute motion within them; and presently the remark was + tossed-up: + </p> + <p> + ‘In his coming to us, it is possible to see paternal solicitude’ + </p> + <p> + Thence came fruit of reflection: + </p> + <p> + ‘To be instrumental as guides to a tender young life!’ + </p> + <p> + Reflection heated with visions: + </p> + <p> + ‘Once our dream!’ + </p> + <p> + They had the happier feeling of composure, though Tasso possessed the + room. Not Tasso, but a sublimated offensiveness, issue of the + antagonistically combined, dispersed to be the more penetrating; insomuch + that it seemed to them they could not ever again make use of eau + d’Arquebusade without the vitiating reminder. So true were the words of + Mr. Stuart Rem: ‘Half measures to purification are the most delusive of + our artifices.’ Fatigue and its reflections helped to be peacefuller. + Their souls were mounting to a serenity above the nauseating degradation, + to which the poor little dog had dragged them. + </p> + <p> + ‘Victor gave his promise.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘At least, concession would not imply contact with the guilty.’ + </p> + <p> + Both sighed as they took up the burden of the vaporous Tasso to drop him; + with the greater satisfaction in the expelling of their breath. + </p> + <p> + ‘It might be said, dear, that concession to his entreaty does not in any + way countenance the sin.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘I can see, dear, how it might be read as a reproof.’ + </p> + <p> + Their exchange of sentences followed meditative pauses; Dorothea leading. + </p> + <p> + ‘To one so sensitive as Victor!’ + </p> + <p> + ‘A month or two of our society for the child!’ + </p> + <p> + ‘It is not the length of time.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘The limitation assures against maternal claims.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘She would not dare.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘He used the words: “her serious respect” for us. I should not wish to + listen to him often.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘We listen to a higher.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘It may really be, that the child is like him.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Not resembling Mr. Stuart Rem’s Clementina!’ + </p> + <p> + ‘A week of that child gave us our totally sleepless night.’ ‘One thinks + more hopefully of a child of Victor’s.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘He would preponderate.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘He would.’ + </p> + <p> + They sighed; but it was now with the relief of a lightened oppression. + </p> + <p> + ‘If, dear, in truth the father’s look is in the child, he has the greater + reason to desire for her a taste of our atmosphere.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Do not pursue it. Sleep.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘One prayer!’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Your mention of our atmosphere, dear, destroys my power to frame one. Do + you, for two. But I would cleanse my heart.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘There is none purer.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Hush.’ + </p> + <p> + Virginia spoke a more fervent word of praise of her sister, and had not + the hushing response to it. She heard the soft regular breathing. Her own + was in downy fellowship with it a moment later. + </p> + <p> + At the hour of nine, in genial daylight, sitting over the crumbs of his + hotel breakfast, Victor received a little note that bore the handwriting + of Dorothea Duvidney. + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + ‘Dear Victor, we are prepared to receive the child for a month. + In haste, before your train. Our love. D. and V.’ +</pre> + <p> + His face flashed out of cloud. + </p> + <p> + A more precious document had never been handed to him. It chased back to + midnight the doubt hovering over his belief in himself;—phrased to + say, that he was no longer the Victor Radnor known to the world. And it + extinguished a corpse-like recollection of a baleful dream in the night. + Here shone radiant witness of his being the very man; save for the spot of + his recent confusion in distinguishing his identity or in feeling that he + stood whole and solid.—Because of two mature maiden ladies? Yes, + because of two maiden ladies, my good fellow. And friend Colney, you know + the ladies, and what the getting round them for one’s purposes really + means. + </p> + <p> + The sprite of Colney Durance had struck him smartly overnight. Victor’s + internal crow was over Colney now. And when you have the optimist and + pessimist acutely opposed in a mixing group, they direct lively + conversations at one another across the gulf of distance, even of time. + For a principle is involved, besides the knowledge of the other’s triumph + or dismay. The couple are scales of a balance; and not before last night + had Victor ever consented to think of Colney ascending while he dropped + low to graze the pebbles. + </p> + <p> + He left his hotel for the station, singing the great aria of the fourth + Act of the Favorita: neglected since that mighty German with his Rienzi, + and Tannhauser, and Tristan and Isolda, had mastered him, to the + displacement of his boyhood’s beloved sugary -inis and -antes and-zettis; + had clearly mastered, not beguiled, him; had wafted him up to a new realm, + invigorating if severer. But now his youth would have its voice. He + travelled up to town with Sir Abraham Quatley and talked, and took and + gave hints upon City and Commercial affairs, while the honeyed Italian of + the conventional, gloriously animal, stress and flutter had a revel in his + veins, now and then mutedly ebullient at the mouth: honeyed, golden, rich + in visions;—having surely much more of Nature’s encouragement to her + children? + </p> + <p> + <a name="link2HCH0024" id="link2HCH0024"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + CHAPTER XXIV. NESTA’S ENGAGEMENT + </h2> + <p> + A word in his ear from Fenellan, touching that man Blathenoy, set the + wheels of Victor’s brain at work upon his defences, for a minute, on the + walk Westward. Who knew?—who did not know! He had a torpid + consciousness that he cringed to the world, with an entreaty to the great + monster to hold off in ignorance; and the next instant, he had caught its + miserable spies by the lurcher neck and was towering. He dwelt on his + contempt of them, to curtain the power they could stir. + </p> + <p> + ‘The little woman, you say, took to Dartrey?’ + </p> + <p> + Fenellan, with the usual apologetic moderation of a second statement, + thought ‘there was the look of it.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Well, we must watch over her. Dartrey!—but Dartrey’s an honest + fellow with women. But men are men. Very few men spare a woman when the + mad fit is on her. A little woman-pretty little woman!—wife to Jacob + Blathenoy! She mustn’t at her age have any close choosing—under her + hand. And Dartrey’s just the figure to strike a spark in a tinder-box + head.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘With a husband who’d reduce Minerva’s to tinder, after a month of him!’ + </p> + <p> + ‘He spent his honeymoon at his place at Wrensham; told me so.’ Blathenoy + had therefore then heard of the building of Lakelands by the Victor Radnor + of the City; and had then, we guess—in the usual honeymoon boasting + of a windbag with his bride—wheezed the foul gossip, to hide his + emptiness and do duty for amusement of the pretty little caged bird. + Probably so. But Victor knew that Blathenoy needed him and feared him. + Probably the wife had been enjoined to keep silence; for the Blachingtons, + Fannings and others were, it could be sworn, blank and unscratched folio + sheets on the subject:—as yet; unless Mrs. Burman had dropped venom. + </p> + <p> + ‘One pities the little woman, eh, Fenellan?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Dartrey won’t be back for a week or so; and they’re off to Switzerland, + after the dinner they give. I heard from him this morning; one of the + Clanconans is ill. + </p> + <p> + ‘Lucky. But wherever Blathenoy takes her, he must be the same “arid bore,” + as old Colney says.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘A domestic simoom,’ said Fenellan, booming it: and Victor had a shudder. + </p> + <p> + ‘Awful thing, marriage, to some women! We chain them to that domestic + round; most of them haven’t the means of independence or a chance of + winning it; and all that’s open to them, if they’ve made a bad cast for a + mate—and good Lord! how are they to know before it’s too late!—they + haven’t a choice except to play tricks or jump to the deuce or sit and + “drape in blight,” as Colney has it; though his notion of the optional + marriages, broken or renewed every seven years!—if he means it. You + never know, with him. It sounds like another squirt of savage irony. It’s + donkey nonsense, eh?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘The very hee-haw of nonsense,’ Fenellan acquiesced. + </p> + <p> + ‘Come, come; read your Scriptures; donkeys have shown wisdom,’ Victor + said, rather leaning to the theme of a fretfulness of women in the legal + yoke. ‘They’re donkeys till we know them for prophets. Who can tell! + Colney may be hailed for one fifty years hence.’ + </p> + <p> + Fenellan was not invited to enter the house, although the loneliness of + his lodgeings was known, and also, that he played whist at his Club. + Victor had grounds for turning to him at the door and squeezing his hand + warmly, by way of dismissal. In ascribing them to a weariness at + Fenellan’s perpetual acquiescence, he put the cover on them, and he + stamped it with a repudiation of the charge, that Colney’s views upon the + great Marriage Question were the ‘very hee-haw of nonsense.’ They were not + the hee-haw; in fact, viewing the host of marriages, they were for + discussion; there was no bray about them. He could not feel them to be + absurd while Mrs. Burman’s tenure of existence barred the ceremony. + Anything for a phrase! he murmured of Fenellan’s talk; calling him, Dear + old boy, to soften the slight. + </p> + <p> + Nataly had not seen Fenellan or heard from Dartrey; so she continued to be + uninformed of her hero’s release; and that was in the order of happy + accidents. She had hardly to look her interrogation for the news; it + radiated. But he stated such matter-of-course briefly. ‘The good ladies + are ready to receive our girl.’ + </p> + <p> + Her chagrin resolved to a kind of solace of her draggled pride, in the + idea, that he who tamed everybody to submission, might well have command + of her. + </p> + <p> + The note, signed D. and V., was shown. + </p> + <p> + There stood the words. And last night she had been partly of the opinion + of Colney Durance. She sank down among the unreasoning abject;—not + this time with her perfect love of him, but with a resistance and a + dubiety under compression. For she had not quite comprehended why Nesta + should go. This readiness of the Duvidney ladies to receive the girl, + stopped her mental inquiries. + </p> + <p> + She begged for a week’s delay; ‘before the parting’; as her dear old silly + mother’s pathos whimpered it, of the separation for a month! and he smiled + and hummed pleasantly at any small petition, thinking her in error to + expect Dartrey’s return to town before the close of a week; and then + wondering at women, mildly denouncing in his heart the mothers who ran + risk of disturbing their daughters’ bosoms with regard to particular + heroes married or not. Dartrey attracted women: he was one of the men who + do it without effort. Victor’s provident mind blamed the mother for the + indiscreetness of her wish to have him among them. But Dudley had been + making way bravely of late; he improved; he began to bloom, like a Spring + flower of the garden protected from frosts under glass; and Fredi was the + sheltering and nourishing bestower of the lessons. One could see, his + questions and other little points revealed, that he had a certain lover’s + dread of Dartrey Fenellan; a sort of jealousy: Victor understood the + feeling. To love a girl, who has her ideal of a man elsewhere in another; + though she may know she never can wed the man, and has not the hope of it; + is torment to the lover quailing, as we do in this terrible season of the + priceless deliciousness, stripped against all the winds that blow; + skinless at times. One gets up a sympathy for the poor shy dependent + shivering lover. Nevertheless, here was young Dudley waking, visibly + becoming bolder. As in the flute-duets, he gained fire from concert. The + distance between Cronidge and Moorsedge was two miles and a quarter. + </p> + <p> + Instead of the delay of a whole week, Victor granted four days, which + embraced a musical evening at Mrs. John Cormyn’s on the last of the days, + when Nesta was engaged to sing with her mother a duet of her own + composition, the first public fruit of her lessons in counterpoint from + rigid Herr Strauscher, who had said what he had said, in letting it pass: + eulogy, coming from him. So Victor heard, and he doated am the surprise to + come for him, in a boyish anticipation. The girl’s little French ballads + under tutelage of Louise de Seilles promised, though they were imitative. + If Strauscher let this pass... Victor saw Grand Opera somewhere to follow; + England’s claim to be a creative musical nation vindicated; and the genius + of the fair sex as well. + </p> + <p> + He heard the duet at Mrs. Cormyn’s; and he imagined a hearing of his + Fredi’s Opera, and her godmother’s delight in it; the once famed + Sanfredini’s consent to be the diva at a rehearsal, and then her + compelling her hidalgo duque to consent further: an event not + inconceivable. For here was downright genius; the flowering aloe of the + many years in formation; and Colney admitted the song to have a streak of + genius; though he would pettishly and stupidly say, that our modern + newspaper Press is able now to force genius for us twenty or so to the + month, excluding Sundays-our short pauses for the incubation of it. Real + rare genius was in that song, nothing forced; and exquisite melody; one of + those melodies which fling gold chains about us and lead us off, lead us + back into Eden. Victor hummed at bars of it on the drive homeward. His + darlings had to sing it again in the half-lighted drawing-room. The + bubble-happiness of the three was vexed only by tidings heard from Colney + during the evening of a renewed instance of Skepsey’s misconduct. + Priscilla Graves had hurried away to him at the close of Mr. John Cormyn’s + Concert, in consequence; in grief and in sympathy. Skepsey was to appear + before the magistrate next morning, for having administered physical + chastisement to his wife during one of her fits of drunkenness. Colney had + seen him. His version of the story was given, however, in the + objectionable humorous manner: none could gather from it of what might be + pleaded for Skepsey. His ‘lesson to his wife in the art of pugilism, + before granting her Captain’s rank among the Defensive Amazons of Old + England,’ was the customary patent absurdity. But it was odd, that Skepsey + always preferred his appeal for help to Colney Durance. Nesta proposed + following Priscilla that night. She had hinted her wish, on the way home; + she was urgent, beseeching, when her father lifted praises of her: she had + to start with her father by the train at seven in the morning, and she + could not hear of poor Skepsey for a number of hours. She begged a day’s + delay; which would enable her, she said, to join them in dining at the + Blachingtons’, and seeing dear Lakelands again. ‘I was invited, you know.’ + She spoke in childish style, and under her eyes she beheld her father and + mother exchange looks. He had a fear that Nataly might support the girl’s + petition. Nataly read him to mean, possible dangers among the people at + Wrensham. She had seemed hesitating. After meeting Victor’s look, her + refusal was firm. She tried to make it one of distress for the use of the + hard word to her own dear girl. Nesta spied beneath. + </p> + <p> + But what was it? There was a reason for her going! She had a right to + stay, and see and talk with Captain Dartrey, and she was to be deported! + </p> + <p> + So now she set herself to remember little incidents at Creckholt: + particularly a conversation in a very young girl’s hearing, upon Sir + Humphrey and Lady Pottil’s behaviour to the speakers, her parents. She had + then, and she now had, an extraordinary feeling, as from a wind striking + upon soft summer weather off regions of ice, that she was in her parents’ + way. How? The feeling was irrational; it could give her no reply, or only + the multitudinous which are the question violently repeated. She slept on + it. + </p> + <p> + She and her father breakfasted by the London birds’ first twitter. They + talked of Skepsey. She spoke of her going as exile. ‘No,’ said he, ‘you’re + sure to meet friends.’ + </p> + <p> + Her cheeks glowed. It came wholly through the suddenness of the + recollection, that the family-seat of one among the friends was near the + Wells. + </p> + <p> + He was allowed to fancy, as it suited him to fancy, that a vivid secret + pleasure laid the colour on those ingenuous fair cheeks. + </p> + <p> + ‘A solitary flute for me, for a month! I shall miss my sober comrade: got + the habit of duetting: and he’s gentle, bears with me.’ + </p> + <p> + Tears lined her eyelids. ‘Who would not be, dearest dada! But there is + nothing to bear except the honour.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘You like him? You and I always have the same tastes, Fredi.’ + </p> + <p> + Now there was a reddening of the sun at the mount; all the sky aflame. How + could he know that it was not the heart in the face! She reddened because + she had perused his wishes; had detected a scheme striking off from them, + and knew a man to be the object of it; and because she had at the same + time the sense of a flattery in her quick divination; and she was + responsively emotional, her blood virginal; often it was a tropical + lightning. + </p> + <p> + It looked like the heart doing rich painter’s work on maiden features. + Victor was naturally as deceived as he wished to be. + </p> + <p> + From his being naturally so, his remarks on Dudley had an air of embracing + him as one of the family. ‘His manner to me just hits me.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘I like to see him with you,’ she said. + </p> + <p> + Her father let his tongue run: ‘One of the few young men I feel perfectly + at home with! I do like dealing with a gentleman. I can confide in a + gentleman: honour, heart, whatever I hold dearest.’ + </p> + <p> + There he stopped, not too soon. The girl was mute, fully agreeing, + slightly hardening. She had a painful sense of separation from her dear + Louise. And it was now to be from her mother as well: she felt the pain + when kissing her mother in bed. But this was moderated by the prospect of + a holiday away out of reach of Mr. Barmby’s pursuing voice, whom her + mother favoured: and her mother was concealing something from her; so she + could not make the confidante of her mother. Nataly had no forewarnings. + Her simple regrets filled her bosom. All night she had been taking her + chastisement, and in the morning it seemed good to her, that she should be + denuded, for her girl to learn the felicity of having relatives. + </p> + <p> + For some reason, over which Nataly mused in the succeeding hours, the girl + had not spoken of any visit her mother was to pay to the Duvidney ladies + or they to her. Latterly she had not alluded to her mother’s family. It + might mean, that the beloved and dreaded was laying finger on a dark thing + in the dark; reading syllables by touch; keeping silence over the + communications to a mind not yet actively speculative, as it is a way with + young women. ‘With young women educated for the market, to be timorous, + consequently secretive, rather snaky,’ Colney Durance had said. Her Nesta + was not one of the ‘framed and glazed’ description, cited by him, for an + example of the triumph of the product; ‘exactly harmonious with the ninny + male’s ideal of female innocence.’ No; but what if the mother had opened + her heart to her girl? It had been of late her wish or a dream, shaping + hourly to a design, now positively to go through that furnace. Her + knowledge of Victor’s objection, restrained an impulse that had not won + spring enough to act against his counsel or vivify an intelligence grown + dull in slavery under him, with regard to the one seeming right course. + The adoption of it would have wounded him—therefore her. She had + thought of him first; she had also thought of herself, and she blamed + herself now. She went so far as to think, that Victor was guilty of the + schemer’s error of counting human creatures arithmetically, in the sum, + without the estimate of distinctive qualities and value here and there. + His return to a shivering sensitiveness on the subject of his girl’s + enlightenment ‘just yet,’ for which Nataly pitied and loved him, sharing + it, with humiliation for doing so, became finally her excuse. We must have + some excuse, if we would keep to life. + </p> + <p> + Skepsey’s case appeared in the evening papers. He confessed, ‘frankly,’ he + said, to the magistrate, that, ‘acting under temporary exasperation, he + had lost for a moment a man’s proper self-command.’ He was as frank in + stating, that he ‘occupied the prisoner’s place before his Worship a + second time, and was a second time indebted to the gentleman, Mr. Colney + Durance, who so kindly stood by him.’ There was hilarity in the Court at + his quaint sententious envelopment of the idiom of the streets, which he + delivered with solemnity: ‘He could only plead, not in absolute + justification—an appeal to human sentiments—the feelings of a + man of the humbler orders, returning home in the evening, and his thoughts + upon things not without their importance, to find repeatedly the guardian + of his household beastly drunk, and destructive.’ Colney made the case + quite intelligible to the magistrate; who gravely robed a strain of the + idiomatic in the officially awful, to keep in tune with his delinquent. No + serious harm had been done to the woman. Skepsey was admonished and + released. His wife expressed her willingness to forgive him, now he had + got his lesson; and she hoped he would understand, that there was no need + for a woman to learn pugilism. Skepsey would have explained; but the case + was over, he was hustled out. + </p> + <p> + However, a keen young reporter present smelt fun for copy; he followed the + couple; and in a particular evening Journal, laughable matter was printed + concerning Skepsey’s view of the pugilism to be imparted to women for + their physical-protection in extremity, and the distinction of it from the + blow conveying the moral lesson to them; his wife having objected to the + former, because it annoyed her and he pestered her; and she was never, she + said, ready to stand up to him for practice, as he called it, except when + she had taken more than he thought wholesome for her: he had no sense. + There was a squabble between them, because he chose to scour away to his + master’s office instead of conducting her home with the honours. Nesta + read the young reporter’s version, with shrieks. She led the ladies of + Moorsedge to discover amusement in it. + </p> + <p> + At first, as her letter to her mother described them, they were like a + pair of pieces of costly China, with the settled smile, and cold. She saw + but the outside of them, and she continued reporting the variations, which + steadily determined the warmth. On the night of the third day, they kissed + her tenderly; they were human figures. + </p> + <p> + No one could be aware of the trial undergone by the good ladies in + receiving her: Victor’s child; but, as their phrase would have run, had + they dared to give it utterance to one another, a child of sin. How + foreign to them, in that character, how strange, when she was looked on as + an inhabitant of their house, they hardly dared to estimate; until the + timorous estimation, from gradually swelling, suddenly sank; nature + invaded them; they could discard the alienating sense of the taint; and + not only did they no longer fear the moment when Mr. Stuart Rem or Mr. + Posterley might call for evening tea, but they consulted upon inviting the + married one of those gentlemen, to ‘divert dear Nesta.’ Every night she + slept well. In all she did, she proved she was ‘of the blood.’ She had + Victor’s animated eyes; she might have, they dreaded to think, his + eloquence. They put it down to his eloquence entirely, that their + resistance to his petition had been overcome, for similarly with the + treatment of the private acts of royal personages by lacquey History, + there is, in the minds of the ultra-civilized, an insistance, that any + event having a consequence in matters personal to them, be at all hazards + recorded with the utmost nicety in decency. By such means, they preserve + the ceremonial self-respect, which is a necessity of their existence; and + so they maintain the regal elevation over the awe-struck subjects of their + interiors; who might otherwise revolt, pull down, scatter, dishonour, + expose for a shallow fiction the holiest, the most vital to them. A + democratic evil spirit is abroad, generated among congregations, often + perilously communicating its wanton laughter to the desperate wickedness + they know (not solely through the monition of Mr. Stuart Rem) to lurk + within. It has to be excluded: on certain points they must not think. The + night of Tasso was darkly clouded in the minds of the pure ladies: a rift + would have seized their half-slumbering sense of smell, to revive the + night, perhaps disorder the stately march of their intelligences. + </p> + <p> + Victor’s eloquence, Victor’s influence, Victor’s child he carried them as + a floodstream, insomuch, that their reception of this young creature of + the blot on her birth, was regarded by them in the unmentioned abstract, + and the child’s presence upon earth seen with the indulgence (without the + naughty curiosity) of the loyal moral English for the numerous offspring + of the peccadillos of their monarchs. These things pass muster from being + ‘Britannically cocooned in the purple,’ says our irreverent satirist; and + the maiden ladies’ passion of devotion to ‘the blood’ helped to blind + them; but still more so did the imperious urgency to curtain closely the + night of Tasso, throwing all its consequences upon Victor’s masterful + tongue. Whence it ensued (and here is the danger for illogical individuals + as well as vast communities, who continue to batten upon fiction when the + convenience of it has taken the place of pleasure), that they had need to + exalt his eloquence, for a cloak to their conduct; and doing it, they fell + into a habit of yielding to him; they disintegrated under him; rules, + principles, morality, were shaken to some confusion. And still proceeding + thus, they now and then glanced back, more wonderingly than convicted + sinners upon their days of early innocence, at the night when successfully + they withstood him. They who had doubted of the rightness of letting + Victor’s girl come into collision with two clerical gentlemen, one of whom + was married, permitted him now to bring the Hon. Dudley Sowerby to their + house, and make appointments to meet Mr. Dudley Sowerby under a roof that + sheltered a young lady, evidently the allurement to the scion of + aristocracy; of whose family Mr. Stuart Rem had spoken in the very + kindling hushed tones, proper to the union of a sacerdotal and an English + citizen’s veneration. + </p> + <p> + How would it end? And if some day this excellent Mr. Dudley Sowerby + reproached them! He could not have a sweeter bride, one more truly a lady + in education and manners; but the birth! the child’s name! Their trouble + was emitted in a vapour of interjections. Very perplexing was it for the + good ladies of strict principles to reflect, as dimly they did, that the + concrete presence of dear Nesta silenced and overcame objections to her + being upon earth. She seemed, as it were, a draught of redoubtable Nature + inebriating morality. But would others be similarly affected? Victor might + get his release, to do justice to the mother: it would not cover the + child. Prize as they might the quality of the Radnor blood (drawn from the + most ancient of original Britain’s princes), there was also the Cantor + blood for consideration; and it was old, noble, proud. Would it be + satisfied in matching itself with great wealth, a radiant health, and the + good looks of a young flower? For the sake of the dear girl, the ladies + hoped that it would; and they enlarged the outline of their wedding + present, while, in their minds, the noble English family which could be + satisfied so, was lowered, partaking of the taint they had personally + ceased to recognize. + </p> + <p> + Of one thing they were sure, and it enlisted them: the gentleman loved the + girl. Her love of him, had it been prominent to view, would have stirred a + feminine sigh; not more, except a feminine lecture to follow. She was + quite uninflamed, fresh and cool as a spring. His ardour had no disguise. + They measured him by the favourite fiction’s heroes of their youth, and + found him to gaze, talk, comport himself, according to the prescription; + correct grammar, finished sentences, all that is expected of a gentleman + enamoured; and ever with the watchful intentness for his lady’s faintest + first dawn of an inclining to a wish. Mr. Dudley Sowerby’s eye upon Nesta + was really an apprentice. There is in Love’s young season a magnanimity in + the male kind. Their superior strength and knowledge are made subservient + to the distaff of the weaker and shallower: they crown her queen; her look + is their mandate. So was it when Sir Charles and Sir Rupert and the + estimable Villiers Davenant touched maidenly hearts to throb: so is it + now, with the Hon. Dudley Sowerby. + </p> + <p> + Very haltingly, the ladies were guilty of a suggestion to Victor. ‘Oh! + Fredi?’ said he; ‘admires her, no doubt; and so do I, so we all do; she’s + one of the nice girls; but as to Cupid’s darts, she belongs to the + cucumber family, and he shoots without fireing. We shall do the mischief + if we put an interdict. Don’t you remember the green days when obstacles + were the friction to light that match?’ Their pretty nod of assent + displayed the virgin pride of the remembrance: they dreamed of having once + been exceedingly wilful; it refreshed their nipped natures; and dwelling + on it, they forgot to press their suggestion. Incidentally, he named the + sum his Fredi would convey to her husband; with, as was calculable, the + further amount his only child would inherit. A curious effect was produced + on them. Though they were not imaginatively mercenary, as the creatures + tainted with wealth commonly are, they talked of the sum over and over in + the solitude of their chamber. ‘Dukes have married for less.’ Such an + heiress, they said, might buy up a Principality. Victor had supplied them + with something of an apology to the gentleman proposing to Nesta in their + house. + </p> + <p> + The chronicle of it is, that Dudley Sowerby did this on the fifteenth day + of September; and that it was not known to the damsel’s parents before the + twenty-third; as they were away on an excursion in South Tyrol:—away, + flown, with just a word of the hurried departure to their envious, exiled + girl; though they did not tell her of new constructions at the London + house partly causing them to fly. Subject to their consent, she wrote, she + had given hers. The letter was telegramic on the essential point. She + wrote of Mr. Barmby’s having visited Mr. Posterley at the Wells, and she + put it just as flatly. Her principal concern, to judge by her writing, + was, to know what Mr. Durance had done, during her absence, with the group + of emissary-advocates of the various tongues of Europe on board the + steam-Liner conducting them the first stage of their journey to the Court + of Japan. + </p> + <p> + Mr. Simeon Fenellan had written his opinion, that all these delegates of + the different European nationalities were nothing other than dupes of a + New-York Syndicate of American Humorists, not without an eye on the + mainchance; and he was sure they would be set to debate publicly, before + an audience of high-priced tickets, in the principal North American + Cities, previous to the embarcation for Japan at San Francisco. Mr. + Fenellan eulogized the immense astuteness of Dr. Gannius in taking his + daughter Delphica with him. Dr. Gannius had singled forth poor Dr. + Bouthoin for the object of his attacks; but Nesta was chiefly anxious to + hear of Delphica’s proceedings; she was immensely interested in Delphica, + and envied her; and the girl’s funny speculations over the play of + Delphica’s divers arts upon the Greek, and upon the Russian, and upon the + English curate Mr. Semhians, and upon M. Falarique—set Gallically + pluming and crowing out of an Alsace-Lorraine growl—were clever. + Only, in such a letter, they were amazing. + </p> + <p> + Nataly received it at Campiglio, when about to start for an excursion down + the Sarca Valley to Arco. Her letter of reply was delayed. One to Victor + from Dudley Sowerby, awaited them, on their return. ‘Confirms Fredi,’ he + said, showing it, and praising it as commendable, properly fervid. She + made pretence to read, she saw the words. + </p> + <p> + Her short beat of wings was over. She had joined herself with Victor’s + leap for a change, thirsting for the scenery of the white peaks in heaven, + to enjoy through his enjoyment, if her own capacity was dead: and she had + found it revive, up to some recovery of her old songful readiness for + invocations of pleasure. Escape and beauty beckoned ahead; behind were the + chains. These two letters of the one fact plucked her back. The chained + body bore the fluttering spirit: or it was the spirit in bonds, that + dragged the body. Both were abashed before the image of her girl. Out of + the riddle of her strange Nesta, one thing was clear: she did not love the + man: and Nataly tasted gladness in that, from the cup of poisonous regrets + at the thought. Her girl’s heart would not be broken. But if he so + strongly loved her, as to hold to this engagement?... It might then be + worse. She dropped a plumb-line into the young man, sounding him by what + she knew of him and judged. She had to revert to Nesta’s charm, for the + assurance of his anchored attachment. + </p> + <p> + Her holiday took the burden of her trouble, and amid the beauty of a + disenchanted scene, she resumed the London incubus. + </p> + <p> + ‘You told him of her being at the Wells? in the neighbourhood, Victor?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Didn’t you know, my dear, the family-seat is Cronidge, two miles out from + the Wells?—and particularly pretty country.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘I had forgotten, if I ever heard. You will not let him be in ignorance?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘My dear love, you are pale about it. This is a matter between men. I + write, thanking for the honour and so forth; and I appoint an interview; + and I show him my tablets. He must be told, necessarily. Incidents of this + kind come in their turn. If Dudley does not account himself the luckiest + young fellow in the kingdom, he’s not worthy of his good fortune. I wish + they were both here now, honeymooning among these peaks, seeing the + crescent over one, as we did last night!’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Have you an idea, in reading Nesta’s letter?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Seems indifferent?—mere trick to hide the blushes. And I, too, I’m + interested in Delphica. Delphica and Falarique will be fine stage + business. Of course, Dr. Bouthoin and his curate!—we know what Old + England has to expect from Colney.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘At any rate, Mr. Durance hurts no one. You will, in your letter, appoint + the day of the interview?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Hurts himself! Yes, dearest; appoint for—ten days homeward—eleventh + day from to-day. And you to Fredi: a bit of description—as you can, + my Nataly! Happy to be a dolomite, to be painted by Nataly’s pen.’ + </p> + <p> + The sign is evil, when we have a vexatious ringing in the ear of some + small piece of familiar domestic chatter, and subject it to scrutiny, hang + on it, worry and magnify it. What will not creatures under sway of the + sensational life, catch at to emphasize and strengthen distaste, until + distaste shall have a semblance of reason, in the period of the mind’s + awakening to revolt! Nataly shrank from the name of dolomite, detested the + name, though the scenes regained their beauty or something of it beneath + her showery vision. Every time Victor spoke of dolomites on the journey + homeward, she had at heart an accusation of her cowardice, her duplicity, + frailty, treachery to the highest of her worship and sole support of her + endurance in the world: not much blaming him: but the degrading view of + herself sank them both. On a shifty soil, down goes the idol. For him she + could plead still, for herself she could not. + </p> + <p> + The smell of the Channel brine inspirited her sufficiently to cast off the + fit and make it seem, in the main, a bodily depression; owing to causes, + of which she was beginning to have an apprehensive knowledge: and they + were not so fearful to her as the gloom they displaced. + </p> + <p> + <a name="link2HCH0025" id="link2HCH0025"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + CHAPTER XXV. NATALY IN ACTION + </h2> + <p> + A ticket of herald newspapers told the world of Victor’s returning to his + London. Pretty Mrs. Blathenoy was Nataly’s first afternoon visitor, and + was graciously received; no sign of inquiry for the cause of the lady’s + alacrity to greet her being shown. Colney Durance came in, bringing the + rumour of an Australian cantatrice to kindle Europe; Mr. Peridon, a seeker + of tidings from the city of Bourges; Miss Priscilla Graves, reporting of + Skepsey, in a holiday Sunday tone, that his alcoholic partner might at any + moment release him; Mr. Septimus Barmby, with a hanged heavy look, + suggestive of a wharfside crane swinging the ponderous thing he had to + say. ‘I have seen Miss Radnor.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘She was well?’ the mother asked, and the grand basso pitched forth an + affirmative. + </p> + <p> + ‘Dear sweet girl she is!’ Mrs. Blathenoy exclaimed to Colney. + </p> + <p> + He bowed. ‘Very sweet. And can let fly on you, like a haggis, for a + scratch.’ + </p> + <p> + She laughed, glad of an escape from the conversational formalities imposed + on her by this Mrs. Victor Radnor’s mighty manner. ‘But what girl worth + anything!... + </p> + <p> + We all can do that, I hope, for a scratch!’ + </p> + <p> + Mr. Barmby’s Profession dissented. + </p> + <p> + Mr. Catkin appeared; ten minutes after his Peridon. He had met Victor near + the Exchange, and had left him humming the non fu sogno of ERNANI. + </p> + <p> + ‘Ah, when Victor takes to Verdi, it’s a flat City, and wants a burst of + drum and brass,’ Colney said; and he hummed a few bars of the march in + Attila, and shrugged. He and Victor had once admired that blatancy. + </p> + <p> + Mr. Pempton appeared, according to anticipation. He sat himself beside + Priscilla. Entered Mrs. John Cormyn, voluminous; Mrs. Peter Yatt, + effervescent; Nataly’s own people were about her and she felt at home. + </p> + <p> + Mrs. Blathenoy pushed a small thorn into it, by speaking of Captain + Fenellan, and aside, as if sharing him with her. Nataly heard that Dartrey + had been the guest of these Blathenoys. Even Dartrey was but a man! + </p> + <p> + Rather lower under her voice, the vain little creature asked: ‘You knew + her?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Her?’ + </p> + <p> + The cool counter-interrogation was disregarded. ‘So sad! In the desert! a + cup of pure water worth more than barrow-loads of gold! Poor woman!’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Who?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘His wife.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Wife!’ + </p> + <p> + ‘They were married?’ + </p> + <p> + Nataly could have cried: Snake! Her play at brevity had certainly been + foiled. She nodded gravely. A load of dusky wonders and speculations + pressed at her bosom. She disdained to question the mouth which had bitten + her. + </p> + <p> + Mrs. Blathenoy, resolving, that despite the jealousy she excited, she + would have her friend in Captain Fenellan, whom she liked—liked, she + was sure, quite as innocently as any other woman of his acquaintance did, + departed and she hugged her innocence defiantly, with the mournful pride + which will sometimes act as a solvent. + </p> + <p> + A remark or two passed among the company upon her pretty face. + </p> + <p> + Nataly murmured to Colney: ‘Is there anything of Dartrey’s wife?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Dead,’ he answered. + </p> + <p> + ‘When?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Months back. I had it from Simeon. You didn’t hear?’ + </p> + <p> + She shook her head. Her ears buzzed. If he had it from Simeon Fenellan, + Victor must have known it. + </p> + <p> + Her duties of hostess were conducted with the official smile. + </p> + <p> + As soon as she stood alone, she dropped on a chair, like one who has taken + a shot in the heart, and that hideous tumult of wild cries at her ears + blankly ceased. Dartrey, Victor, Nesta, were shifting figures of the + might-have-been for whom a wretched erring woman, washed clean of her + guilt by death, in a far land, had gone to her end: vainly gone: and now + another was here, a figure of wood, in man’s shape, conjured up by one of + the three, to divide the two others; likely to be fatal to her or to them: + to her, she hoped, if the choice was to be: and beneath the leaden hope, + her heart set to a rapid beating, a fainter, a chill at the core. + </p> + <p> + She snatched for breath. She shut her eyes, and with open lips, lay + waiting; prepared to thank the kindness about to hurry her hence, out of + the seas of pain, without pain. + </p> + <p> + Then came sighs. The sad old servant in her bosom was resuming his + labours. + </p> + <p> + But she had been near it—very near it? A gush of pity for Victor, + overwhelmed her hardness of mind. + </p> + <p> + Unreflectingly, she tried her feet to support her, and tottered to the + door, touched along to the stairs, and descended them, thinking strangely + upon such a sudden weakness of body, when she would no longer have thought + herself the weak woman. Her aim was to reach the library. She sat on the + stairs midway, pondering over the length of her journey: and now her head + was clearer; for she was travelling to get Railway-guides, and might have + had them from the hands of a footman, and imagined that she had considered + it prudent to hide her investigation of those books: proofs of an + understanding fallen backward to the state of infant and having to begin + our drear ascent again. + </p> + <p> + A slam of the kitchen stair-door restored her. She betrayed no infirmity + of footing as she walked past Arlington in the hall; and she was alive to + the voice of Skepsey presently on the door-steps. Arlington brought her a + note. + </p> + <p> + Victor had written: ‘My love, I dine with Blathenoy in the City, at the + Walworth. Business. Skepsey for clothes. Eight of us. Formal. A thousand + embraces. Late.’ + </p> + <p> + Skepsey was ushered in. His wife had expired at noon, he said; and he + postured decorously the grief he could not feel, knowing that a lady would + expect it of him. His wife had fallen down stone steps; she died in + hospital. He wished to say, she was no loss to the country; but he was + advised within of the prudence of abstaining from comment and trusting to + his posture, and he squeezed a drop of conventional sensibility out of it, + and felt improved. + </p> + <p> + Nataly sent a line to Victor: ‘Dearest, I go to bed early, am tired. Dine + well. Come to me in the morning.’ + </p> + <p> + She reproached herself for coldness to poor Skepsey, when he had gone. The + prospect of her being alone until the morning had been so absorbing a + relief. + </p> + <p> + She found a relief also in work at the book of the trains. A walk to the + telegraph-station strengthened her. Especially after despatching a + telegram to Mr. Dudley Sowerby at Cronidge, and one to Nesta at Moorsedge, + did she become stoutly nerved. The former was requested to meet her at + Penhurst station at noon. Nesta was to be at the station for the Wells at + three o’clock. + </p> + <p> + From the time of the flying of these telegrams, up to the tap of Victor’s + knuckle on her bed-room door next morning, she was not more reflectively + conscious than a packet travelling to its destination by pneumatic tube. + Nor was she acutely impressionable to the features and the voice she + loved. + </p> + <p> + ‘You know of Skepsey?’ she said. + </p> + <p> + ‘Ah, poor Skepsey!’ Victor frowned and heaved. + </p> + <p> + ‘One of us ought to stand beside him at the funeral.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Colney or Fenellan?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘I will ask Mr. Durance.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Do, my darling.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Victor, you did not tell me of Dartrey’s wife.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘There again! They all get released! Yes, Dartrey! Dartrey has his luck + too.’ + </p> + <p> + She closed her eyes, with the desire to be asleep. + </p> + <p> + ‘You should have told me, dear.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Well, my love! Well—poor Dartrey! I fancy I hadn’t a confirmation + of the news. I remember a horrible fit of envy on hearing the hint: not + much more than a hint: serious illness, was it?—or expected event. + Hardly worth while to trouble my dear soul, till certain. Anything about + wives, forces me to think of myself—my better self!’ + </p> + <p> + ‘I had to hear of it first from Mrs. Blathenoy.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘You’ve heard of duels in dark rooms:—that was the case between + Blathenoy and me last night for an hour.’ + </p> + <p> + She feigned somnolent fatigue over her feverish weariness of heart. He + kissed her on the forehead. + </p> + <p> + Her spell-bound intention to speak of Dudley Sowerby to him, was broken by + the sounding of the hall-door, thirty minutes later. She had lain in a + trance. + </p> + <p> + Life surged to her with the thought, that she could decide and take her + step. Many were the years back since she had taken a step; less + independently then than now; unregretted, if fatal. Her brain was heated + for the larger view of things and the swifter summing of them. It could + put the man at a remove from her and say, that she had lived with him and + suffered intensely. It gathered him to her breast rejoicing in their + union: the sharper the scourge, the keener the exultation. But she had one + reproach to deafen and beat down. This did not come on her from the world: + she and the world were too much foot to foot on the antagonist’s line, for + her to listen humbly. It came of her quick summary survey of him, which + was unnoticed by the woman’s present fiery mind as being new or strange in + any way: simply it was a fact she now read; and it directed her to + reproach herself for an abasement beneath his leadership, a blind + subserviency and surrender of her faculties to his greater powers, such as + no soul of a breathing body should yield to man: not to the highest, not + to the Titan, not to the most Godlike of men. Under cloak, they demand it. + They demand their bane. + </p> + <p> + And Victor!... She had seen into him. + </p> + <p> + The reproach on her was, that she, in her worship, had been slave, not + helper. Scarcely was she irreproachable in the character of slave. If it + had been utter slave! she phrased the words, for a further reproach. She + remembered having at times murmured, dissented. And it would have been a + desperate proud thought to comfort a slave, that never once had she known + even a secret opposition to the will of her lord. + </p> + <p> + But she had: she recalled instances. Up they rose; up rose everything her + mind ranged over, subsiding immediately when the service was done. She had + not conceived her beloved to be infallible, surest of guides in all + earthly-matters. Her intellect had sometimes protested. + </p> + <p> + What, then, had moved her to swamp it? + </p> + <p> + Her heart answered. And that heart also was arraigned: and the heart’s + fleshly habitation acting on it besides: so flagellant of herself was she: + covertly, however, and as the chaste among women can consent to let our + animal face them. Not grossly, still perceptibly to her penetrative hard + eye on herself, she saw the senses of the woman under a charm. She saw, + and swam whirling with a pang of revolt from her personal being and this + mortal kind. + </p> + <p> + Her rational intelligence righted her speedily. She could say in truth, by + proof, she loved the man: nature’s love, heart’s love, soul’s love. She + had given him her life. + </p> + <p> + It was a happy cross-current recollection, that the very beginning and + spring of this wild cast of her life, issued from something he said and + did (merest of airy gestures) to signify the blessing of life—how + good and fair it is. A drooping mood in her had been struck; he had a look + like the winged lyric up in blue heavens: he raised the head of the young + flower from its contemplation of grave-mould. That was when he had much to + bear: Mrs. Burman present: and when the stranger in their household had + begun to pity him and have a dread of her feelings. The lucent splendour + of his eyes was memorable, a light above the rolling oceans of Time. + </p> + <p> + She had given him her life, little aid. She might have closely counselled, + wound in and out with his ideas. Sensible of capacity, she confessed to + the having been morally subdued, physically as well; swept onward; and she + was arrested now by an accident, like a waif of the river-floods by the + dip of a branch. Time that it should be! But was not Mr. Durance, + inveighing against the favoured system for the education of women, right + when he declared them to be unfitted to speak an opinion on any matter + external to the household or in a crisis of the household? She had not + agreed with him: he presented stinging sentences, which irritated more + than they enlightened. Now it seemed to her, that the model women of men + make pleasant slaves, not true mates: they lack the worldly training to + know themselves or take a grasp of circumstances. + </p> + <p> + There is an exotic fostering of the senses for women, not the + strengthening breath of vital common air. If good fortune is with them, + all may go well: the stake of their fates is upon the perpetual smooth + flow of good fortune. She had never joined to the cry of the women. Few + among them were having it in the breast as loudly. + </p> + <p> + Hard on herself, too, she perceived how the social rebel had reduced her + mind to propitiate a simulacrum, reflected from out, of an enthroned + Society within it, by an advocacy of the existing laws and rules and + habits. Eminently servile is the tolerated lawbreaker: none so + conservative. Not until we are driven back upon an unviolated Nature, do + we call to the intellect to think radically: and then we begin to think of + our fellows. + </p> + <p> + Or when we have set ourselves in motion direct for the doing of the right + thing: have quitted the carriage at the station, and secured the ticket, + and entered the train, counting the passage of time for a simple rapid + hour before we have eased heart in doing justice to ourself and to + another; then likewise the mind is lighted for radiation. That doing of + the right thing, after a term of paralysis, cowardice—any evil name—is + one of the mighty reliefs, equal to happiness, of longer duration. + </p> + <p> + Nataly had it. But her mind was actually radiating, and the comfort to her + heart evoked the image of Dartrey Fenellan. She saw a possible reason for + her bluntness to the coming scene with Dudley. + </p> + <p> + At once she said, No! and closed the curtain; knowing what was behind, + counting it nought. She repeated almost honestly her positive negative. + How we are mixed of the many elements! she thought, as an observer; and + self-justifyingly thought on, and with truth, that duty urged her upon + this journey; and proudly thought, that she had not a shock of the painful + great organ in her breast at the prospect at the end, or any apprehension + of its failure to carry her through. + </p> + <p> + Yet the need of peace or some solace needed to prepare her for her + interview turned her imagination burningly on Dartrey. She would not allow + herself to meditate over hopes and schemes:—Nesta free: Dartrey + free. She vowed to her soul sacredly—and she was one of those in + whom the Divinity lives, that they may do so—not to speak a word for + the influencing of Dudley save the one fact. Consequently, for a personal + indulgence, she mused; she caressed maternally the object of her musing; + of necessity, she excluded Nesta; but in tenderness she gave Dartrey a + fair one to love him. + </p> + <p> + The scene was waved away. That one so loving him, partly worthy of him, + ready to traverse the world now beside him—who could it be other + than she who knew and prized his worth? Foolish! It is one of the + hatefuller scourges upon women whenever, a little shaken themselves, they + muse upon some man’s image, that they cannot put in motion the least bit + of drama without letting feminine self play a part; generally to develop + into a principal part... The apology makes it a melancholy part. + </p> + <p> + Dartrey’s temper of the caged lion dominated by his tamer, served as + keynote for any amount of saddest colouring. He controlled the brute: but + he held the contempt of danger, the love of strife, the passion for + adventure; he had crossed the desert of human anguish. He of all men + required a devoted mate, merited her. Of all men living, he was the + hardest to match with a woman—with a woman deserving him. + </p> + <p> + The train had quitted London. Now for the country, now for free breathing! + She who two days back had come from Alps, delighted in the look on flat + green fields. It was under the hallucination of her saying in flight adieu + to them, and to England; and, that somewhere hidden, to be found in Asia, + Africa, America, was the man whose ideal of life was higher than + enjoyment. His caged brute of a temper offered opportunities for delicious + petting; the sweetest a woman can bestow: it lifts her out of timidity + into an adoration still palpitatingly fearful. Ah, but familiarity, + knowledge, confirmed assurance of his character, lift her to another + stage, above the pleasures. May she not prove to him how really matched + with him she is, to disdain the pleasures, cheerfully accept the burdens, + meet death, if need be; readily face it as the quietly grey to-morrow: at + least, show herself to her hero for a woman—the incredible being to + most men—who treads the terrors as well as the pleasures of humanity + beneath her feet, and may therefore have some pride in her stature. Ay, + but only to feel the pride of standing not so shamefully below his level + beside him. + </p> + <p> + Woods were flying past the carriage-windows. Her solitary companion was of + the class of the admiring gentlemen. Presently he spoke. She answered. He + spoke again. Her mouth smiled, and her accompanying look of abstract + benevolence arrested the tentative allurement to conversation. + </p> + <p> + New ideas were set revolving in her. Dartrey and Victor grew to a + likeness; they became hazily one man, and the mingled phantom complimented + her on her preserving a good share of the beauty of her youth. The face + perhaps: the figure rather too well suits the years! she replied. To + reassure her, this Dartrey-Victor drew her close and kissed her; and she + was confused and passed into the breast of Mrs. Burman expecting an + operation at the hands of the surgeons. The train had stopped. ‘Penhurst?’ + she said. + </p> + <p> + ‘Penhurst is the next station,’ said the gentleman. Here was a theme for + him! The stately mansion, the noble grounds, and Sidney! He discoursed of + them. + </p> + <p> + The handsome lady appeared interested. She was interested also by his + description of a neighbouring village, likely one hundred years hence to + be a place of pilgrimage for Americans and for Australians. Age, he said, + improves true beauty; and his eyelids indicated a levelling to perform the + soft intentness. Mechanically, a ball rose in her throat; the remark was + illuminated by a saying of Colney’s, with regard to his countrymen at the + play of courtship. No laughter came. The gentleman talked on. + </p> + <p> + All fancies and internal communications left her. Slowness of motion + brought her to the plain piece of work she had to do, on a colourless + earth, that seemed foggy; but one could see one’s way. Resolution is a + form of light, our native light in this dubious world. + </p> + <p> + Dudley Sowerby opened her carriage-door. They greeted. + </p> + <p> + ‘You have seen Nesta?’ she said. + </p> + <p> + ‘Not for two days. You have not heard? The Miss Duvidneys have gone to + Brighton.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘They are rather in advance of the Season.’ + </p> + <p> + She thanked him for meeting her. He was grateful for the summons. + </p> + <p> + Informing the mother of his betrothed, that he had ridden over from + Cronidge, he speculated on the place to select for her luncheon, and he + spoke of his horse being led up and down outside the station. Nataly + inquired for the hour of the next train to London. He called to one of the + porters, obtained and imparted the time; evidently now, as shown by an + unevenness of his lifted brows, expecting news of some little weight. + </p> + <p> + ‘Your husband is quite well?’ he said, in affection for the name of + husband. + </p> + <p> + ‘Mr. Radnor is well; I have to speak to you; I have more than time.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘You will lunch at the inn?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘I shall not eat. We will walk.’ + </p> + <p> + They crossed the road and passed under trees. + </p> + <p> + ‘My mother was to have called on the Miss Duvidneys. They left hurriedly; + I think it was unanticipated by Nesta. I venture... you pardon the + liberty... she allows me to entertain hopes. Mr. Radnor, I am hardly too + bold in thinking... I trust, in appealing to you... at least I can + promise! + </p> + <p> + ‘Mr. Sowerby, you have done my daughter the honour to ask her hand in + marriage.’ + </p> + <p> + He said: ‘I have,’ and had much to say besides, but deferred: a blow was + visible. The father had been more encouraging to him than the mother. + </p> + <p> + ‘You have not known of any circumstance that might cause hesitation in + asking?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Miss Radnor?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘My daughter:—you have to think of your family.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Indeed, Mrs. Radnor, I was coming to London tomorrow, with the consent of + my family.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘You address me as Mrs. Radnor. I have not the legal right to the name.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Not legal!’ said he, with a catch at the word. + </p> + <p> + He spun round in her sight, though his demeanour was manfully rigid. + </p> + <p> + ‘Have I understood, madam...?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘You would not request me to repeat it. Is that your horse the man is + leading?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘My horse: it must be my horse.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Mount and ride back. Leave me: I shall not eat. Reflect, by yourself. You + are in a position of one who is not allowed to decide by his feelings. Mr. + Radnor you know where to find.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘But surely, some food? I cannot have misapprehended?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘I cannot eat. I think you have understood me clearly.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘You wish me to go?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘I beg.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘It pains me, dear madam.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘It relieves me, if you will. Here is your horse.’ + </p> + <p> + She gave her hand. He touched it and bent. He looked at her. A surge of + impossible questions rolled to his mouth and rolled back, with the thought + of an incredible thing, that her manner, more than her words, held him + from doubting. + </p> + <p> + ‘I obey you,’ he said. + </p> + <p> + ‘You are kind.’ + </p> + <p> + He mounted horse, raised hat, paced on, and again bowing, to one of the + wayside trees, cantered. The man was gone; but not from Nataly’s vision + that face of wet chalk under one of the shades of fire. + </p> + <p> + <a name="link2HCH0026" id="link2HCH0026"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + CHAPTER XXVI. IN WHICH WE SEE A CONVENTIONAL GENTLEMAN ENDEAVOURING TO + EXAMINE A SPECTRE OF HIMSELF + </h2> + <p> + Dudley rode back to Cronidge with his thunderstroke. It filled him, as in + those halls of political clamour, where explanatory speech is not + accepted, because of a drowning tide of hot blood on both sides. He sought + to win attention by submitting a resolution, to the effect, that he would + the next morning enter into the presence of Mr. Victor Radnor, bearing his + family’s feelings, for a discussion upon them. But the brutish tumult, in + addition to surcharging, encased him: he could not rightly conceive the + nature of feelings: men were driving shoals; he had lost hearing and touch + of individual men; had become a house of angrily opposing parties. + </p> + <p> + He was hurt, he knew; and therefore he supposed himself injured, though + there were contrary outcries, and he admitted that he stood free; he had + not been inextricably deceived. + </p> + <p> + The girl was caught away to the thinnest of wisps in a dust-whirl. + Reverting to the father and mother, his idea of a positive injury, that + was not without its congratulations, sank him down among his disordered + deeper sentiments; which were a diver’s wreck, where an armoured livid + subtermarine, a monstrous puff-ball of man, wandered seriously light in + heaviness; trembling his hundredweights to keep him from dancing like a + bladder-block of elastic lumber; thinking occasionally, amid the mournful + spectacle, of the atmospheric pipe of communication with the world above, + whereby he was deafened yet sustained. One tug at it, and he was up on the + surface, disengaged from the hideous harness, joyfully no more that burly + phantom cleaving green slime, free! and the roaring stopped; the world + looked flat, foreign, a place of crusty promise. His wreck, animated by + the dim strange fish below, appeared fairer; it winked lurefully when + abandoned. + </p> + <p> + The internal state of a gentleman who detested intangible metaphor as + heartily as the vulgarest of our gobblegobbets hate it, metaphor only can + describe; and for the reason, that he had in him just something more than + is within the compass of the language of the meat-markets. He had—and + had it not the less because he fain would not have had—sufficient + stuff to furnish forth a soul’s epic encounter between Nature and + Circumstance: and metaphor, simile, analysis, all the fraternity of old + lamps for lighting our abysmal darkness, have to be rubbed, that we may + get a glimpse of the fray. + </p> + <p> + Free, and rejoicing; without the wish to be free; at the same time humbly + and sadly acquiescing in the stronger claim of his family to pronounce the + decision: such was the second stage of Dudley’s perturbation after the + blow. A letter of Nesta’s writing was in his pocket: he knew her address. + He could not reply to her until he had seen her father: and that interview + remained necessarily prospective until he had come to his exact resolve, + not omitting his critical approval of the sentences giving it shape, + stamp, dignity—a noble’s crest, as it were. + </p> + <p> + Nesta wrote briefly. The apostrophe was, ‘Dear Mr. Sowerby.’ She had + engaged to send her address. Her father had just gone. The Miss Duvidneys + had left the hotel yesterday for the furnished house facing the sea. + According to arrangements, she had a livery-stable hack, and had that + morning trotted out to the downs with a riding-master and company, one of + whom was ‘an agreeable lady.’ + </p> + <p> + He noticed approvingly her avoidance of an allusion to the ‘Delphica’ of + Mr. Durance’s incomprehensible serial story, or whatever it was; which, as + he had shown her, annoyed him, for its being neither fact nor fun; and she + had insisted on the fun; and he had painfully tried to see it or anything + of a meaning; and it seemed to him now, that he had been humiliated by the + obedience to her lead: she had offended by her harping upon Delphica. + However, here it was unmentioned. He held the letter out to seize it in + the large, entire. + </p> + <p> + Her handwriting was good, as good as the writing of the most agreeable + lady on earth. Dudley did not blame her for letting the lady be deceived + in her—if she knew her position. She might be ignorant of it. And to + strangers, to chance acquaintances, even to friends, the position, of the + loathsome name, was not materially important. Marriage altered the view. + He sided with his family. + </p> + <p> + He sided, edgeing away, against his family. But a vision of the earldom + coming to him, stirred reverential objections, composed of all which his + unstained family could protest in religion, to repudiate an alliance with + a stained house, and the guilty of a condonation of immorality. Who would + have imagined Mr. Radnor a private sinner flaunting for one of the + righteous? And she, the mother, a lady—quite a lady; having really a + sense of duty, sense of honour! That she must be a lady, Dudley was + convinced. He beheld through a porous crape, woven of formal + respectfulness, with threads of personal disgust, the scene, striking him + drearly like a distant great mansion’s conflagration across moorland at + midnight, of a lady’s breach of bonds and plunge of all for love. How had + it been concealed? In Dudley’s upper sphere, everything was exposed: + Scandal walked naked and unashamed-figurante of the polite world. But + still this lady was of the mint and coin, a true lady. Handsome now, she + must have been beautiful. And a comprehensible pride (for so would Dudley + have borne it) keeps the forsaken man silent up to death:... grandly + silent; but the loss of such a woman is enough to kill a man! Not in time, + though! Legitimacy evidently, by the mother’s confession, cannot protect + where it is wanted. Dudley was optically affected by a round spot of the + world swinging its shadow over Nesta. + </p> + <p> + He pitied, and strove to be sensible of her. The effort succeeded so well, + that he was presently striving to be insensible. The former state, was the + mounting of a wall; the latter, was a sinking through a chasm. There would + be family consultations, abhorrent; his father’s agonized amazement at the + problem presented to a family of scrupulous principles and pecuniary + requirements; his mother’s blunt mention of the abominable name—mediaevally + vindicated in champions of certain princely families indeed, but morally + condemned; always under condemnation of the Church: a blot: and handed + down: Posterity, and it might be a titled posterity, crying out. A man in + the situation of Dudley could not think solely of himself. The nobles of + the land are bound in honour to their posterity. There you have one of the + prominent permanent distinctions between them and the commonalty. + </p> + <p> + His mother would again propose her chosen bride for him: Edith Averst, + with the dowry of a present one thousand pounds per annum, and prospect of + six or so, excluding Sir John’s estate, Carping, in Leicestershire; a fair + estate, likely to fall to Edith; consumption seized her brothers as they + ripened. A fair girl too; only Dudley did not love her; he wanted to love. + He was learning the trick from this other one, who had become obscured and + diminished, tainted, to the thought of her; yet not extinct. Sight of her + was to be dreaded. + </p> + <p> + Unguiltily tainted, in herself she was innocent. That constituted the + unhappy invitation to him to swallow one half of his feelings, which had + his world’s blessing on it, for the beneficial enlargement and + enthronement of the baser unblest half, which he hugged and distrusted. + Can innocence issue of the guilty? He asked it, hopeing it might be + possible: he had been educated in his family to believe, that the laws + governing human institutions are divine—until History has altered + them. They are altered, to present a fresh bulwark against the infidel. + His conservative mind, retiring in good order, occupied the next rearward + post of resistance. Secretly behind it, the man was proud of having a + heart to beat for the cause of the besiegeing enemy, in the present + instance. When this was blabbed to him, and he had owned it, he attributed + his weakness to excess of nature, the liking for a fair face.—Oh, + but more! spirit was in the sweet eyes. She led him—she did lead him + in spiritual things; led him out of common circles of thought, into + refreshing new spheres; he had reminiscences of his having relished the + juices of the not quite obviously comic, through her indications: and + really, in spite of her inferior flimsy girl’s education, she could boast + her acquirements; she was quick, startlingly; modest, too, in commerce + with a slower mind that carried more; though she laughed and was a needle + for humour: she taught him at times to put away his contempt of the + romantic; she had actually shown him, that his expressed contempt of it + disguised a dread: as it did, and he was conscious of the foolishness of + it now while pursuing her image, while his intelligence and senses gave + her the form and glory of young morning. + </p> + <p> + Wariness counselled him to think it might be merely the play of her youth; + and also the disposition of a man in harness of business, exaggeratingly + to prize an imagined finding of the complementary feminine of himself. + Venerating purity as he did, the question, whether the very sweetest of + pure young women, having such an origin, must not at some time or other + show trace of the origin, surged up. If he could only have been sure of + her moral exemption from taint, a generous ardour, in reserve behind his + anxious dubieties, would have precipitated Dudley to quench disapprobation + and brave the world under a buckler of those monetary advantages, which he + had but stoutly to plead with the House of Cantor, for the speedy + overcoming of a reluctance to receive the nameless girl and prodigious + heiress. His family’s instruction of him, and his inherited tastes, + rendered the aspect of a Nature stripped of the clothing of the laws + offensive down to devilish: we grant her certain steps, upon certain + conditions accompanied by ceremonies; and when she violates them, she + becomes visibly again the revolutionary wicked old beast bent on levelling + our sacredest edifices. An alliance with any of her votaries, appeared to + Dudley as an act of treason to his house, his class, and his tenets. And + nevertheless he was haunted by a cry of criminal happiness for and at the + commission of the act. + </p> + <p> + He would not decide to be ‘precipitate,’ and the days ran their course, + until Lady Grace Halley arrived at Cronidge, a widow. Lady Cantor spoke to + her of Dudley’s unfathomable gloom. Lady Grace took him aside. + </p> + <p> + She said, without preface: ‘You’ve heard, have you!’ + </p> + <p> + ‘You were aware of it?’ said he, and his tone was irritable with a rebuke. + </p> + <p> + ‘Coming through town, for the first time yesterday. I had it—of all + men!—from a Sir Abraham Quatley, to whom I was recommended to go, + about my husband’s shares in a South American Railway; and we talked, and + it came out. He knows; he says, it is not generally known; and he likes, + respects Mr. Victor Radnor; we are to keep the secret. Hum? He had heard + of your pretensions; and our relationship, etc.: “esteemed” it—you + know the City dialect—his duty to mention, etc. That was after I had + spied on his forehead the something I wormed out of his mouth. What are + you going to do?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘What can I do!’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Are you fond of the girl?’ + </p> + <p> + An attachment was indicated, as belonging to the case. She was not a woman + to whom the breathing of pastoral passion would be suitable; yet he saw + that she despised him for a lover; and still she professed to understand + his dilemma. Perplexity at the injustice of fate and persons universally, + put a wrinkled mask on his features and the expression of his feelings. + They were torn, and the world was torn; and what he wanted, was delay, + time for him to define his feelings and behold a recomposed picture of the + world. He had already taken six days. He pleaded the shock to his family. + </p> + <p> + ‘You won’t have such a chance again,’ she said. Shrugs had set in. + </p> + <p> + They agreed as to the behaviour of the girl’s mother. It reflected on the + father, he thought. + </p> + <p> + ‘Difficult thing to proclaim, before an engagement!’ Her shoulders were + restless. + </p> + <p> + ‘When a man’s feelings get entangled!’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Oh! a man’s feelings! I’m your British Jury for, a woman’s.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘He has married her?’ + </p> + <p> + She declared to not knowing particulars. She could fib smoothly. + </p> + <p> + The next day she was on the line to London, armed with the proposal of an + appointment for the Hon. Dudley to meet ‘the girl’s father.’ + </p> + <p> + <a name="link2HCH0027" id="link2HCH0027"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + CHAPTER XXVII. CONTAINS WHAT IS A SMALL THING OR A GREAT, AS THE SOUL OF + THE CHIEF ACTOR MAY DECIDE + </h2> + <p> + Skepsey ushered Lady Grace into his master’s private room, and entertained + her during his master’s absence. He had buried his wife, he said: she + feared, seeing his posture of the soaping of hands at one shoulder, that + he was about to bewail it; and he did wish to talk of it, to show his + modest companionship with her in loss, and how a consolation for our + sorrows may be obtained: but he won her approval, by taking the acceptable + course between the dues to the subject and those to his hearer, as a model + cab should drive considerate equally of horse and fare. + </p> + <p> + A day of holiday at Hampstead, after the lowering of the poor woman’s + bones into earth, had been followed by a descent upon London; and at night + he had found himself in the immediate neighbourhood of a public house, + noted for sparring exhibitions and instructions on the first floor; and he + was melancholy, unable quite to disperse ‘the ravens’ flocking to us on + such days: though, if we ask why we have to go out of the world, there is + a corresponding inquiry, of what good was our coming into it; and unless + we are doing good work for our country, the answer is not satisfactory—except, + that we are as well gone. Thinking which, he was accosted by a young + woman: perfectly respectable, in every way: who inquired if he had seen a + young man enter the door. She described him, and reviled the temptations + of those houses; and ultimately, as she insisted upon going in to look for + the young man and use her persuasions to withdraw him from ‘that snare of + Satan,’ he had accompanied her, and he had gone upstairs and brought the + young man down. But friends, or the acquaintances they call friends, were + with him, and they were ‘in drink,’ and abused the young woman; and she + had her hand on the young man’s arm, quoting Scripture. Sad to relate of + men bearing the name of Englishmen—and it was hardly much better if + they pleaded intoxication!—they were not content to tear the young + man from her grasp, they hustled her, pushed her out, dragged her in the + street. + </p> + <p> + ‘It became me to step to her defence: she was meek,’ said Skepsey. ‘She + had a great opinion of the efficacy of quotations from Scripture; she did + not recriminate. I was able to release her and the young man she + protected, on condition of my going upstairs to give a display of my + proficiency. I had assured them, that the poor fellows who stood against + me were not a proper match. And of course, they jeered, but they had the + evidence, on the pavement. So I went up with them. I was heavily + oppressed, I wanted relief, I put on the gloves. He was a bigger man; they + laughed at the little one. I told them, it depended upon a knowledge of + first principles, and the power to apply them. I will not boast, my lady: + my junior by ten years, the man went down; he went down a second time; and + the men seemed surprised; I told them, it was nothing but first principles + put into action. I mention the incident, for the extreme relief it + afforded me at the close of a dark day.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘So you cured your grief!’ said Lady Grace; and Skepsey made way for his + master. + </p> + <p> + Victor’s festival-lights were kindled, beholding her; cressets on the + window-sill, lamps inside. + </p> + <p> + ‘Am I so welcome?’ There was a pull of emotion at her smile. ‘What with + your little factotum and you, we are flattered to perdition when we come + here. He has been proposing, by suggestion, like a Court-physician, the + putting on of his boxing-gloves, for the consolation of the widowed:—meant + most kindly! and it’s a thousand pities women haven’t their padded + gloves.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Oh! but our boxing-gloves can do mischief enough. You have something to + say, I see.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘How do you see?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Tusk, tush.’ + </p> + <p> + The silly ring of her voice and the pathless tattle changed; she talked to + suit her laden look. ‘You hit it. I come from Dudley. He knows the facts. + I wish to serve you, in every way.’ + </p> + <p> + Victor’s head had lifted. + </p> + <p> + ‘Who was it?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘No enemy.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Her mother. She did rightly! + </p> + <p> + ‘Certainly she did,’ said Victor, and he thought that instantaneously of + the thing done. ‘Oh, then she spoke to him! She has kept it from me. For + now nearly a week—six days—I’ve seen her spying for something + she expected, like a face behind a door three inches ajar. She has not + been half alive; she refused explanations;—she was expecting to hear + from him, of him:—the decision, whatever it’s to be!’ + </p> + <p> + ‘I can’t aid you there,’ said Lady Grace. ‘He’s one of the unreadables. He + names Tuesday next week.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘By all means.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘She?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Fredi?—poor Fredi!—ah, my poor girl, yes!—No, she knows + nothing. Here is the truth of it.—she, the legitimate, lives: they + say she lives. Well, then, she lives against all rules physical or + medical, lives by sheer force of will—it’s a miracle of the power of + a human creature to .... I have it from doctors, friends, attendants, they + can’t guess what she holds on, to keep her breath. All the happiness in + life!—if only it could benefit her. But it ‘s the cause of death to + us. Do you see, dear friend;—you are a friend, proved friend,’ he + took her hand, and held and pressed it, in great need of a sanguine + response to emphasis; and having this warm feminine hand, his ideas ran + off with it. ‘The friend I need! You have courage. My Nataly, poor dear—she + can endure, in her quiet way. A woman of courage would take her place + beside me and compel the world to do her homage, help;—a bright + ready smile does it! She would never be beaten. Of course, we could have + lived under a bushel—stifled next to death! But I am for light, + air-battle, if you like. I want a comrade, not a—not that I + complain. I respect, pity, love—I do love her, honour: only, we want + something else—courage—to face the enemy. Quite right, that + she should speak to Dudley Sowerby. He has to know, must know; all who + deal closely with us must know. But see a moment: I am waiting to see the + impediment dispersed, which puts her at an inequality with the world: and + then I speak to all whom it concerns—not before: for her sake. How + is it now? Dudley will ask... you understand. And when I am forced to + confess, that the mother, the mother of the girl he seeks in marriage, is + not yet in that state herself, probably at that very instant the obstacle + has crumbled to dust! I say, probably: I have information—doctors, + friends, attendants—they all declare it cannot last outside a week. + But you are here—true, I could swear! a touch of a hand tells me. A + woman’s hand? Well, yes: I read by the touch of a woman’s hand:—betrays + more than her looks or her lips!’ He sank his voice. ‘I don’t talk of + condoling: if you are in grief, you know I share it.’ He kissed her hand, + and laid it on her lap; eyed it, and met her eyes; took a header into her + eyes, and lost himself. A nip of his conscience moved his tongue to say: + ‘As for guilt, if it were known... a couple of ascetics—absolutely!’ + But this was assumed to be unintelligible; and it was merely the apology + to his conscience in communion with the sprite of a petticoated fair one + who was being subjected to tender little liberties, necessarily addressed + in enigmas. He righted immediately, under a perception of the + thoroughbred’s contempt for the barriers of wattled sheep; and caught the + word ‘guilt,’ to hide the Philistine citizen’s lapse, by relating + historically, in abridgement, the honest beauty of the passionate loves of + the two whom the world proscribed for honestly loving. There was no guilt. + He harped on the word, to erase the recollection of his first use of it. + </p> + <p> + ‘Fiddle,’ said Lady Grace. ‘The thing happened. You have now to carry it + through. You require a woman’s aid in a social matter. Rely on me, for + what I can do. You will see Dudley on Tuesday? I will write. Be plain with + him; not forgetting the gilding, I need not remark. Your Nesta has no + aversion?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Admires, respects, likes; is quite—is willing.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Good enough beginning.’ She rose, for the atmosphere was heated, rather + heavy. ‘And if one proves to be of aid, you’ll own that a woman has her + place in the battle.’ + </p> + <p> + The fair black-clad widow’s quick and singular interwreathing of the + evanescent pretty pouts and frowns dimpled like the brush of the wind on a + sunny pool in a shady place; and her forehead was close below his chin, + her lips not far. Her apparel was attractively mourning. + </p> + <p> + Widows in mourning, when they do not lean over extremely to the Stygian + shore, with the complexions of the drugs which expedited the defunct to + the ferry, provoke the manly arm within reach of them to pluck their + pathetic blooming persons clean away from it. What of the widow who + visibly likes the living? Compassion; sympathy, impulse; and gratitude, + impulse again, living warmth; and a spring of the blood to wrestle with + the King of Terrors for the other poor harper’s half-night capped + Eurydice; and a thirst, sudden as it is overpowering; and the solicitude, + a reflective solicitude, to put the seal on a thing and call it a fact, to + the astonishment of history; and a kick of our naughty youth in its + coffin; all the insurgencies of Nature, with her colonel of the regiment + absent, and her veering trick to drive two vessels at the cross of a track + into collision, combine for doing that, which is very much more, and which + affects us at times so much less than did the pressure of a soft wedded + hand by our own elsewhere pledged one. On the contrary, we triumph, we + have the rich flavour of the fruit for our pains; we commission the + historian to write in hieroglyphs a round big fact. + </p> + <p> + The lady passed through the trial submitting, stiffening her shoulders, + and at the close, shutting her eyes. She stood cool in her blush, and eyed + him, like one gravely awakened. Having been embraced and kissed, she had + to consider her taste for the man, and acknowledge a neatness of + impetuosity in the deed; and he was neither apologizing culprit nor + glorying-bandit when it was done, but something of the lyric God tempering + his fervours to a pleased sereneness, not offering a renewal of them. He + glowed transparently. He said: ‘You are the woman to take a front place in + the battle!’ With this woman beside him, it was a conquered world. + </p> + <p> + Comparisons, in the jotting souvenirs of a woman of her class and set, + favoured him; for she disliked enterprising libertines and despised + stumbling youths; and the genial simple glow of his look assured her, that + the vanished fiery moment would not be built on by a dating master. She + owned herself. Or did she? Some understanding of how the other woman had + been won to the leap with him, was drawing in about her. She would have + liked to beg for the story; and she could as little do that as bring her + tongue to reproach. If we come to the den! she said to her thought of + reproach. Our semi-civilization makes it a den, where a scent in his + nostrils will spring the half-tamed animal away to wildness. And she had + come unanticipatingly, without design, except perhaps to get a superior + being to direct and restrain a gambler’s hand perhaps for the fee of a + temporary pressure. + </p> + <p> + ‘I may be able to help a little—I hope!’ she fetched a breath to + say, while her eyelids mildly sermonized; and immediately she talked of + her inheritance of property in stocks and shares. + </p> + <p> + Victor commented passingly on the soundness of them, and talked of + projects he entertained:—Parliament! ‘But I have only to mention it + at home, and my poor girl will set in for shrinking.’ + </p> + <p> + He doated on the diverse aspect of the gallant woman of the world. + </p> + <p> + ‘You succeed in everything you do,’ said she, and she cordially believed + it; and that belief set the neighbour memory palpitating. Success folded + her waist, was warm upon her lips: she worshipped the figure of Success. + </p> + <p> + ‘I can’t consent to fail, it’s true, when my mind is on a thing,’ Victor + rejoined. + </p> + <p> + He looked his mind on Lady Grace. The shiver of a maid went over her. + These transparent visages, where the thought which is half design is + perceived as a lightning, strike lightning into the physically feebler. + Her hand begged, with the open palm, her head shook thrice; and though she + did not step back, he bowed to the negation, and then she gave him a + grateful shadow of a smile, relieved, with a startled view of how greatly + relieved, by that sympathetic deference in the wake of the capturing + intrepidity. + </p> + <p> + ‘I am to name Tuesday for Dudley?’ she suggested. + </p> + <p> + ‘At any hour he pleases to appoint.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘A visit signifies...’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Whatever it signifies!’ + </p> + <p> + ‘I’m thinking of the bit of annoyance.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘To me? Anything appointed, finds me ready the next minute.’ + </p> + <p> + Her smile was flatteringly bright. ‘By the way, keep your City people + close about you: entertain as much as possible; dine them,’ she said. + </p> + <p> + ‘At home?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Better. Sir Rodwell Blachington, Sir Abraham Quatley: and their wives. + There’s no drawing back now. And I will meet them.’ + </p> + <p> + She received a compliment. She was on the foot to go. + </p> + <p> + But she had forgotten the Tiddler mine. + </p> + <p> + The Tiddler mine was leisurely mounting. Victor stated the figures; he + saluted her hand, and Lady Grace passed out, with her heart on the top of + them, and a buzz about it of the unexpected having occurred She had her + experiences to match new patterns in events; though not very many. + Compared with gambling, the game of love was an idle entertainment. + Compared with other players, this man was gifted. + </p> + <p> + Victor went in to Mr. Inchling’s room, and kept Inchling from speaking, + that he might admire him for he knew not what, or knew not well what. The + good fellow was devoted to his wife. Victor in old days had called the + wife Mrs. Grundy. She gossiped, she was censorious; she knew—could + not but know—the facts; yet never by a shade was she disrespectful. + He had a curious recollection of how his knowledge of Inchling and his + wife being always in concert, entirely—whatever they might think in + private—devoted to him in action, had influenced, if it had not + originally sprung, his resolve to cast off the pestilential cloak of + obscurity shortening his days, and emerge before a world he could illumine + to give him back splendid reflections. Inchling and his wife, it was: + because the two were one: and if one, and subservient to him, knowing all + the story, why, it foreshadowed a conquered world. + </p> + <p> + They were the one pulse of the married Grundy beating in his hand. So it + had been. + </p> + <p> + He rattled his views upon Indian business, to hold Inchling silent, and + let his mind dwell almost lovingly on the good faithful spouse, who had no + phosphorescent writing of a recent throbbing event on the four walls of + his room. + </p> + <p> + Nataly was not so generously encountered in idea. + </p> + <p> + He felt and regretted this. He greeted her with a doubled + affectionateness. Her pitiable deficiency of courage, excusing a man for + this and that small matter in the thick of the conflict, made demands on + him for gentle treatment. + </p> + <p> + ‘You have not seen any one?’ she asked. + </p> + <p> + ‘City people. And you, my love?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Mr. Barmby called. He has gone down to Tunbridge Wells for a week, to + some friend there.’ She added, in pain of thought: ‘I have seen Dartrey. + He has brought Lord Clanconan to town, for a consultation, and expects he + will have to take him to Brighton.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Brighton? What a life for a man like Dartrey, at Brighton!’ + </p> + <p> + Her breast heaved. ‘If I cannot see my Nesta there, he will bring her up + to me for a day: + </p> + <p> + ‘But, my dear, I will bring her up to you, if it is your wish to see her.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘It is becoming imperative that I should.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘No hurry, no hurry: wait till the end of next week. And I must see + Dartrey, on business, at once!’ + </p> + <p> + She gave the address in a neighbouring square. He had minutes to spare + before dinner, and flew. She was not inquisitive. + </p> + <p> + Colney Durance had told Dartrey that Victor was killing her. She had + little animation; her smiles were ready, but faint. After her interview + with Dudley, there had been a swoon at home; and her maid, sworn to + secrecy, willingly spared a tender-hearted husband—so good a master. + </p> + <p> + <a name="link2HCH0028" id="link2HCH0028"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + CHAPTER XXVIII. MRS. MARSETT + </h2> + <p> + Little acts of kindness were not beyond the range of Colney Durance, and + he ran down to Brighton, to give the exiled Nesta some taste of her + friendly London circle. The Duvidney ladies knew that the dreaded + gentleman had a regard for the girl. Their own, which was becoming warmer + than they liked to think, was impressed by his manner of conversing with + her. ‘Child though she was,’ he paid her the compliment of a sober as well + as a satirical review of the day’s political matter and recent + publications; and the ladies were introduced, in a wonderment, to the + damsel Delphica. They listened placidly to a discourse upon her + performances, Japanese to their understandings. + </p> + <p> + At New York, behold, another adventurous representative and advocate of + the European tongues has joined the party: Signor Jeridomani: a + philologer, of course; a politician in addition; Macchiavelli redivivus, + it seems to fair Delphica. The speech he delivers at the Syndicate + Delmonico Dinner, is justly applauded by the New York Press as a + masterpiece of astuteness. He appears to be the only one of the party who + has an eye for the dark. She fancies she may know a more widely awake in + the abstract. But now, thanks to jubilant Journals and Homeric laughter + over the Continent, the secret is out, in so far as the concurrents are + all unmasked and exposed for the edification of the American public. Dr. + Bouthoin’s eyebrows are up, Mr. Semhians disfigures his name by greatly + gaping. Shall they return to their Great Britain indignant? Patriotism, + with the sauce of a luxurious expedition at no cost to the private purse, + restrains them. Moreover, there is no sign of any one of the others + intending to quit the expedition; and Mr. Semhians has done a marvel or + two in the cricket-field: Old England looks up where she can. What is + painfully extraordinary to our couple, they find in the frigid attitude of + the Americans toward their ‘common tongue’; together with the rumour of a + design to despatch an American rival emissary to Japan. + </p> + <p> + Nesta listened, inquired, commented, laughed; the ladies could not have a + doubt that she was interested and understood. She would have sketches of + scenes between Delphica and M. Falarique, with whom the young Germania was + cleverly ingenuous indeed—a seminary Celimene; and between Delphica + and M. Mytharete, with whom she was archaeological, ravishingly amoebaean + of Homer. Dr. Gannius holds a trump card in his artless daughter, + conjecturally, for the establishment of the language of the gutturals in + the far East. He has now a suspicion, that the inventive M. Falarique, + melted down to sobriety by misfortune, may some day startle their camp by + the cast of more than a crow into it, and he is bent on establishing + alliances; frightens the supple Signor Jeridomani to lingual fixity; + eulogizes Football, with Dr. Bouthoin; and retracts, or modifies, his + dictum upon the English, that, ‘masculine brawn they have in their bodies, + but muscle they have not in their feminine minds’; to exalt them, for a + signally clean, if a dense, people: ‘Amousia, not Alousia, is their + enemy:’—How, when we have the noblest crop of poets? ‘You have never + heartily embraced those aliens among you until you learnt from us, that + you might brag of them.’—Have they not endowed us with the richest + of languages? ‘The words of which are used by you, as old slippers, for + puns.’ Mr. Semhians has been superciliously and ineffectively punning in + foreign presences: he and his chief are inwardly shocked by a new + perception; What if, now that we have the populace for paymaster, + subservience to the literary tastes of the populace should reduce the + nation to its lowest mental level, and render us not only unable to + compete with the foreigner, but unintelligible to him, although so proudly + paid at home! Is it not thus that nations are seen of the Highest to be + devouring themselves? + </p> + <p> + ‘For,’ says Dr. Gannius, as if divining them, ‘this excessive and + applauded productiveness, both of your juvenile and your senile, in your + modern literature, is it ever a crop? Is it even the restorative + perishable stuff of the markets? Is it not rather your street-pavement’s + patter of raindrops, incessantly in motion, and as fruitful?’ Mr. Semhians + appeals to Delphica. ‘Genius you have,’ says she, stiffening his + neck-band, ‘genius in superabundance’:—he throttles to the + complexion of the peony:—‘perhaps criticism is wanting.’ Dr. Gannius + adds: ‘Perhaps it is the drill-sergeant everywhere wanting for an + unrivalled splendid rabble!’ + </p> + <p> + Colney left the whole body of concurrents on the raised flooring of a + famous New York Hall, clearly entrapped, and incited to debate before an + enormous audience, as to the merits of their respective languages. ‘I + hear,’ says Dr. Bouthoin to Mr. Semhians (whose gape is daily extending), + ‘that the tickets cost ten dollars!’ + </p> + <p> + There was not enough of Delphicafor Nests. + </p> + <p> + Colney asked: ‘Have you seen any of our band?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘No,’ she said, with good cheer, and became thoughtful, conscious of a + funny reason for the wish to hear of the fictitious creature disliked by + Dudley. A funny and a naughty reason, was it? Not so very naughty: but it + was funny; for it was a spirit of opposition to Dudley, without an + inferior feeling at all, such as girls should have. + </p> + <p> + Colney brought his viola for a duet; they had a pleasant musical evening, + as in old days at Creckholt; and Nesta, going upstairs with the ladies to + bed, made them share her father’s amused view of the lamb of the flock + this bitter gentleman became when he had the melodious instrument tucked + under his chin. He was a guest for the night. Dressing in the early hour, + Nests saw him from her window on the parade, and soon joined him, to hear + him at his bitterest, in the flush of the brine. ‘These lengths of + blank-faced terraces fronting sea!’ were the satirist’s present black + beast. ‘So these moneyed English shoulder to the front place; and that is + the appearance they offer to their commercial God!’ He gazed along the + miles of ‘English countenance,’ drearily laughing. Changeful ocean seemed + to laugh at the spectacle. Some Orphic joke inspired his exclamation: + ‘Capital!’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Come where the shops are,’ said Nesta. + </p> + <p> + ‘And how many thousand parsons have you here?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Ten, I think,’ she answered in his vein, and warmed him; leading him + contemplatively to scrutinize her admirers: the Rev. Septimus; Mr. + Sowerby. + </p> + <p> + ‘News of our friend of the whimpering flute?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Here? no. I have to understand you!’ + </p> + <p> + Colney cast a weariful look backward on the ‘regiments of Anglo-Chinese’ + represented to him by the moneyed terraces, and said: ‘The face of a + stopped watch!—the only meaning it has is past date.’ + </p> + <p> + He had no liking for Dudley Sowerby. But it might have been an allusion to + the general view of the houses. But again, ‘the meaning of it past date,’ + stuck in her memory. A certain face close on handsome, had a fatal + susceptibility to caricature. + </p> + <p> + She spoke of her ‘exile’: wanted Skepsey to come down to her; moaned over + the loss of her Louise. The puzzle of the reason for the long separation + from her parents, was evident in her mind, and unmentioned. + </p> + <p> + They turned on to the pier. + </p> + <p> + Nesta reminded him of certain verses he had written to celebrate her visit + to the place when she was a child: + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + ‘“And then along the pier we sped, + And there we saw a Whale + He seemed to have a Normous Head, + And not a bit of Tail!”’ +</pre> + <p> + ‘Manifestly a foreigner to our shores, where the exactly inverse condition + rules,’ Colney said. + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + ‘“And then we scampered on the beach, + To chase the foaming wave; + And when we ran beyond its reach + We all became more brave.”’ +</pre> + <p> + Colney remarked: ‘I was a poet—for once.’ + </p> + <p> + A neat-legged Parisianly-booted lady, having the sea, winds very + enterprising with her dark wavy, locks and jacket and skirts, gave a cry + of pleasure and—a silvery ‘You dear!’ at sight of Nesta; then at + sight of one of us, moderated her tone to a propriety equalling the most + conventional. ‘We ride to-day?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘I shall be one,’ said Nesta. + </p> + <p> + ‘It would not be the commonest pleasure to me, if you were absent.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Till eleven, then!’ + </p> + <p> + ‘After my morning letter to Ned.’ + </p> + <p> + She sprinkled silvery sound on that name or on the adieu, blushed, + blinked, frowned, sweetened her lip-lines, bit at the underone, and passed + in a discomposure. + </p> + <p> + ‘The lady?’ Colney asked. + </p> + <p> + ‘She is—I meet her in the troop conducted by the riding-master: Mrs. + Marsett.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘And who is Ned?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘It is her husband, to whom she writes every morning. He is a captain in + the army, or was. He is in Norway, fishing.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Then the probability is, that the English officer continues his military + studies.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Do you not think her handsome, Mr. Durance?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Ned may boast of his possession, when he has trimmed it and toned it a + little! + </p> + <p> + ‘She is different, if you are alone with her.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘It is not unusual,’ said Colney. + </p> + <p> + At eleven o’clock he was in London, and Nesta rode beside Mrs. Marsett + amid the troop. + </p> + <p> + A South-easterly wind blew the waters to shifty goldleaf prints of + brilliance under the sun. + </p> + <p> + ‘I took a liberty this morning, I called you “Dear” this morning,’ the + lady said. ‘It’s what I feel, only I have no right to blurt out everything + I feel, and I was ashamed. I am sure I must have appeared ridiculous. I + got quite nervous.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘You would not be ridiculous to me.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘I remember I spoke of Ned! + </p> + <p> + ‘You have spoken of him before.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Oh! I know: to you alone. I should like to pluck out my heart and pitch + it on the waves, to see whether it would sink or swim. That’s a funny + idea, isn’t it! I tell you everything that comes up. What shall I do when + I lose you! You always make me feel you’ve a lot of poetry ready-made in + you.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘We will write. And you will have your husband then.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘When I had finished my letter to Ned, I dropped my head on it and behaved + like a fool for several minutes. I can’t bear the thought of losing you!’ + </p> + <p> + ‘But you don’t lose me,’ said Nesta; ‘there is no ground for your + supposing that you will. And your wish not to lose me, binds me to you + more closely.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘If you knew!’ Mrs. Marsett caught at her slippery tongue, and she + carolled: ‘If we all knew everything, we should be wiser, and what a naked + lot of people we should be!’ + </p> + <p> + They were crossing the passage of a cavalcade of gentlemen, at the end of + the East Cliff. One among them, large and dominant, with a playful voice + of brass, cried out: + </p> + <p> + ‘And how do you do, Mrs. Judith Marsett—ha? Beautiful morning?’ + </p> + <p> + Mrs. Marsett’s figure tightened; she rode stonily erect, looked level + ahead. Her woman’s red mouth was shut fast on a fighting underlip. + </p> + <p> + ‘He did not salute you,’ Nesta remarked, to justify her for not having + responded. + </p> + <p> + The lady breathed a low thunder: ‘Coward!’ + </p> + <p> + ‘He cannot have intended to insult you,’ said Nesta. + </p> + <p> + ‘That man knows I will not notice him. He is a beast. He will learn that I + carry a horsewhip.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Are you not taking a little incident too much to heart?’ + </p> + <p> + The sigh of the heavily laden came from Mrs. Marsett. + </p> + <p> + ‘Am I pale? I dare say. I shall go on my knees tonight hating myself that + I was born “one of the frail sex.” We are, or we should ride at the coward + and strike him to the ground. Pray, pray do not look distressed! Now you + know my Christian name. That dog of a man barks it out on the roads. It + doesn’t matter.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘He has offended you before?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘You are near me. They can’t hurt me, can’t touch me, when I think that I + ‘m talking with you. How I envy those who call you by your Christian + name!’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Nesta,’ said smiling Nesta. The smile was forced, that she might show + kindness, for the lady was jarring on her. + </p> + <p> + Mrs. Marsett opened her lips: ‘Oh, my God, I shall be crying!—let’s + gallop. No, wait, I’ll tell you. I wish I could! I will tell you of that + man. That man is Major Worrell. One of the majors who manage to get to + their grade. A retired warrior. He married a handsome woman, above him in + rank, with money; a good woman. She was a good woman, or she would have + had her vengeance, and there was never a word against her. She must have + loved that—Ned calls him, full-blooded ox. He spent her money and he + deceived her.—You innocent! Oh, you dear! I’d give the world to have + your eyes. I’ve heard tell of “crystal clear,” but eyes like yours have to + tell me how deep and clear. Such a world for them to be in! I did pray, + and used your name last night on my knees, that you—I said Nesta—might + never have to go through other women’s miseries. Ah me! I have to tell you + he deceived her. You don’t quite understand.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘I do understand,’ said Nesta. + </p> + <p> + ‘God help you!—I am excited to-day. That man is poison to me. His + wife forgave him three times. On three occasions, that unhappy woman + forgave him. He is great at his oaths, and a big breaker of them. She + walked out one November afternoon and met him riding along with a + notorious creature. You know there are bad women. They passed her, + laughing. And look there, Nesta, see that groyne; that very one.’ Mrs. + Marsett pointed her whip hard out. ‘The poor lady went down from the + height here; she walked into that rough water look!—steadying + herself along it, and she plunged; she never came out alive. A week after + her burial, Major Worrell—I ‘ve told you enough.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘We ‘ll gallop now,’ said Nesta. + </p> + <p> + Mrs. Marsett’s talk, her presence hardly less, affected the girl with + those intimations of tumult shown upon smooth waters when the great + elements are conspiring. She felt that there was a cause why she had to + pity, did pity her. It might be, that Captain Marsett wedded one who was + of inferior station,’ and his wife had to bear blows from cruel people. + The supposition seemed probable. The girl accepted it; for beyond it, as + the gathering of the gale masked by hills, lay a brewing silence. What? + She did not reflect. Her quick physical sensibility curled to some breath + of heated atmosphere brought about her by this new acquaintance: not + pleasant, if she had thought of pleasure: intensely suggestive of our life + at the consuming tragic core, round which the furnace pants. But she was + unreflecting, feeling only a beyond and hidden. + </p> + <p> + Besides, she was an exile. Spelling at dark things in the dark, getting to + have the sight which peruses darkness, she touched the door of a mystery + that denied her its key, but showed the lock; and her life was beginning + to know of hours that fretted her to recklessness. Her friend Louise was + absent: she had so few friends—owing to that unsolved reason: she + wanted one, of any kind, if only gentle: and this lady seemed to need her: + and she flattered; Nesta was in the mood for swallowing and digesting and + making sweet blood of flattery. + </p> + <p> + At one time, she liked Mrs. Marsett best absent: in musing on her, wishing + her well, having said the adieu. For it was wearisome to hear praises of + ‘innocence’; and women can do so little to cure that ‘wickedness of men,’ + among the lady’s conversational themes; and ‘love’ too: it may be a + ‘plague,’ and it may be ‘heaven’: it is better left unspoken of. But there + were times when Mrs. Marsett’s looks and tones touched compassion to press + her hand: an act that had a pledgeing signification in the girl’s bosom: + and when, by the simple avoidance of ejaculatory fervours, Mrs. Marsett’s + quieted good looks had a shadow of a tender charm, more pathetic than her + outcries were. + </p> + <p> + These had not always the sanction of polite usage: and her English was + guilty of sudden lapses to the Thameswater English of commerce and + drainage instead of the upper wells. But there are many uneducated ladies + in the land. Many, too, whose tastes in romantic literature betray now and + then by peeps a similarity to Nesta’s maid Mary’s. Mrs. Marsett liked + love, blood, and adventure. She had, moreover, a favourite noble poet, and + she begged Nesta’s pardon for naming him, and she would not name him, and + told her she must not read him until she was a married woman, because he + did mischief to girls. Thereupon she fell into one of her silences, + emerging with a cry of hate of herself for having ever read him. She did + not blame the bard. And, ah, poor bard! he fought his battle: he shall not + be named for the brand on the name. He has lit a sulphur match for the + lover of nature through many a generation; and to be forgiven by sad frail + souls who could accuse him of pipeing devil’s agent to them at the + perilous instant—poor girls too!—is chastisement enough. This + it is to be the author of unholy sweets: a Posterity sitting in judgement + will grant, that they were part of his honest battle with the hypocrite + English Philistine, without being dupe of the plea or at all the thirsty + swallower of his sugary brandy. Mrs. Marsett expressed aloud her gladness + of escape in never having met a man like him; followed by her regret that + ‘Ned’ was so utterly unlike; except ‘perhaps’—and she hummed; she + was off on the fraternity in wickedness. + </p> + <p> + Nesta’s ears were fatigued. ‘My mother writes of you,’ she said, to vary + the subject. + </p> + <p> + Mrs. Marsett looked. She sighed downright: ‘I have had my dream of a + friend!—It was that gentleman with you on the pier! Your mother + objects?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘She has inquired, nothing more.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘I am not twenty-three: not as old as I should be, for a guide to you. I + know I would never do you harm. That I know. I would walk into that water + first, and take Mrs. Worrell’s plunge:—the last bath; a thorough + cleanser for a woman! Only, she was a good woman and didn’t want it, as we—as + lots of us do:—to wash off all recollection of having met a man! + Your mother would not like me to call you Nesta! I have never begged you + to call me Judith. Damnable name!’ Mrs. Marsett revelled in the heat of + the curse on it, as a relief to torture of the breast, until a sense of + the girl’s alarmed hearing sent the word reverberating along her nerves + and shocked her with such an exposure of our Shaggy wild one on a lady’s + lips. She murmured: ‘Forgive me,’ and had the passion to repeat the + epithet in shrieks, and scratch up male speech for a hatefuller; but the + twitch of Nesta’s brows made her say: ‘Do pardon me. I did something in + Scripture. Judith could again. Since that brute Worrell crossed me riding + with you, I loathe my name; I want to do things. I have offended you.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘We have been taught differently. I do not use those words. Nothing else.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘They frighten you.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘They make me shut; that is all.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Supposing you were some day to discover... ta-tata, all the things there + are in the world.’ Mrs. Marsett let fly an artificial chirrup. ‘You must + have some ideas of me.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘I think you have had unhappy experiences.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Nesta... just now and then! the first time we rode out together, coming + back from the downs, I remember, I spoke, without thinking—I was + enraged—of a case in the newspapers; and you had seen it, and you + were not afraid to talk of it. I remember I thought, Well, for a girl, + she’s bold! I thought you knew more than a girl ought to know: until—you + did—you set my heart going. You spoke of the poor women like an + angel of compassion. You said, we were all mixed up with their fate—I + forget the words. But no one ever heard in Church anything that touched me + so. I worshipped you. You said, you thought of them often, and longed to + find out what you could do to help. And I thought, if they could hear you, + and only come near you, as I was—ah, my heaven! Unhappy experiences? + Yes. But when men get women on the slope to their perdition, they have no + mercy, none. They deceive, and they lie; they are false in acts and words; + they do as much as murder. They’re never hanged for it. They make the + Laws! And then they become fathers of families, and point the finger at + the “wretched creatures.” They have a dozen names against women, for one + at themselves.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘It maddens me at times to think...!’ said Nesta, burning with the sting + of vile names. + </p> + <p> + Oh, there are bad women as well as bad men: but men have the power and the + lead, and they take advantage of it; and then they turn round and execrate + us for not having what they have robbed us of!’ + </p> + <p> + ‘I blame women—if I may dare, at my age,’ said Nesta, and her bosom + heaved. ‘Women should feel for their sex; they should not allow the names; + they should go among their unhappier sisters. At the worst, they are + sisters! I am sure, that fallen cannot mean—Christ shows it does + not. He changes the tone of Scripture. The women who are made outcasts, + must be hopeless and go to utter ruin. We should, if we pretend to be + better, step between them and that. There cannot be any goodness unless it + is a practiced goodness. Otherwise it is nothing more than paint on + canvas. You speak to me of my innocence. What is it worth, if it is only a + picture and does no work to help to rescue? I fear I think most of the + dreadful names that redden and sicken us.—The Old Testament!—I + have a French friend, a Mademoiselle Louise de Seines—you should + hear her: she is intensely French, and a Roman Catholic, everything which + we are not: but so human, so wise, and so full of the pride of her sex! I + love her. It is love. She will never marry until she meets a man who has + the respect for women, for all women. We both think we cannot separate + ourselves from our sisters. She seems to me to wither men, when she speaks + of their injustice, their snares to mislead and their cruelty when they + have succeeded. She is right, it is the—brute: there is no other + word.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘And French and good!’ Mrs. Marsett ejaculated. ‘My Ned reads French + novels, and he says, their women.... But your mademoiselle is a real one. + If she says all that, I could kneel to her, French or not. Does she talk + much about men and women?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Not often: we lose our tempers. She wants women to have professions; at + present they have not much choice to avoid being penniless. Poverty, and + the sight of luxury! It seems as if we produced the situation, to create + an envious thirst, and cause the misery. Things are improving for them; + but we groan at the slowness of it.’ + </p> + <p> + Mrs. Marsett now declared a belief, that women were nearly quite as bad as + men. ‘I don’t think I could take up with a profession. Unless to be a + singer. Ah! Do you sing?’ + </p> + <p> + Nesta smiled: ‘Yes, I sing.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘How I should like to hear you! My Ned’s a thorough Englishman—gentleman, + you know: he cares only for sport; Shooting, Fishing, Hunting; and + Football, Cricket, Rowing, and matches. He’s immensely proud of England in + those things. And such muscle he has! though he begins to fancy his + heart’s rather weak. It’s digestion, I tell him. But he takes me to the + Opera sometimes—Italian Opera; he can’t stand German. Down at his + place in Leicestershire, he tells me, when there ‘s company, he has—I’m + sure you sing beautifully. When I hear beautiful singing, even from a + woman they tell tales of, upon my word, it’s true, I feel my sins all + melting out of me and I’m new-made: I can’t bear Ned to speak. Would you + one day, one afternoon, before the end of next week?—it would do me + such real good, you can’t guess how much; if I could persuade you! I know + I’m asking something out of rules. For just half an hour: I judge by your + voice in talking. Oh! it would do me good-good-good to hear you sing. + There is a tuned piano—a cottage; I don’t think it sounds badly. You + would not see any great harm in calling on me? once!’ + </p> + <p> + ‘No,’ said Nesta. And it was her nature that projected the word. Her + awakened wits were travelling to her from a distance, and she had an + intimation of their tidings; and she could not have said what they were; + or why, for a moment, she hesitated to promise she would come. Her vision + of the reality of things was without written titles, to put the stamp of + the world on it. She felt this lady to be one encompassed and in the hug + of the elementary forces, which are the terrors to inexperienced pure + young women. But she looked at her, and dared trust those lips, those + eyes. She saw, through whatever might be the vessel, the spirit of the + woman; as the upper nobility of our brood are enabled to do in a crisis + mixed of moral aversion and sisterly sympathy, when nature cries to them, + and the scales of convention, the mud-spots of accident, even naughtiness, + even wickedness, all misfortune’s issue, if we but see the one look + upward, fall away. Reason is not excluded from these blind throbs of a + blood that strikes to right the doings of the Fates. Nesta did not err in + her divination of the good and the bad incarnate beside her, though both + good and bad were behind a curtain; the latter sparing her delicate + senses, appealing to chivalry, to the simply feminine claim on her. + Reason, acting in her heart as a tongue of the flames of the forge where + we all are wrought, told her surely that the good predominated. She had + the heart which is at our primal fires when nature speaks. + </p> + <p> + She gave the promise to call on Mrs. Marsett and sing to her. + </p> + <p> + ‘An afternoon? Oh! what afternoon?’ she was asked, and she said: ‘This + afternoon, if you like.’ + </p> + <p> + So it was agreed: Mrs. Marsett acted violently the thrill of delight she + felt in the prospect. + </p> + <p> + The ladies Dorothea and Virginia, consulted, and pronounced the name of + Marsett to be a reputable County name. ‘There was a Leicestershire baronet + of the name of Marsett.’ They arranged to send their button-blazing boy at + Nesta’s heels. Mrs. Marsett resided in a side-street not very distant from + the featureless but washed and orderly terrace of the glassy stare at sea. + </p> + <p> + <a name="link2HCH0029" id="link2HCH0029"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + CHAPTER XXIX. SHOWS ONE OF THE SHADOWS OF THE WORLD CROSSING A VIRGIN’S + MIND + </h2> + <p> + Nasta and her maid were brought back safely through the dusk by their + constellation of a boy, to whom the provident ladies had entrusted her. + They could not but note how short her syllables were. Her face was only + partly seen. They had returned refreshed from their drive on the populous + and orderly parade—-so fair a pattern of their England!—after + discoursing of ‘the dear child,’ approving her manners, instancing proofs + of her intelligence, nay, her possession of ‘character.’ They did so, + notwithstanding that these admissions were worse than their growing love + for the girl, to confound established ideas. And now, in thoughtfulness on + her behalf, Dorothea said, ‘We have considered, Nesta, that you may be + lonely; and if it is your wish, we will leave our card on your new + acquaintance.’ Nesta took her hand and kissed it; she declined, saying, + ‘No,’ without voice. + </p> + <p> + They had two surprises at the dinner-hour. One was the card of Dartrey + Fenellan, naming an early time next day for his visit; and the other was + the appearance of the Rev. Stuart Rem, a welcome guest. He had come to + meet his Bishop. + </p> + <p> + He had come also with serious information for the ladies, regarding the + Rev. Abram Posterley. No sooner was this out of his mouth than both ladies + exclaimed: + </p> + <p> + ‘Again!’ So serious was it, that there had been a consultation at the + Wells; Mr. Posterley’s friend, the Rev. Septimus Barmby, and his own + friend, the Rev. Groseman Buttermore, had journeyed from London to sit + upon the case: and, ‘One hoped,’ Mr. Stuart Rem said, ‘poor Posterley + would be restored to the senses he periodically abandoned.’ He laid a hand + on Tasso’s curls, and withdrew it at a menace of teeth. Tasso would submit + to rough caresses from Mr. Posterley; he would not allow Mr. Stuart Rem to + touch him. Why was that? Perhaps for the reason of Mr. Posterley’s being + so emotional as perpetually to fall a victim to some bright glance and + require the rescue of his friends; the slave of woman had a magnet for + animals! + </p> + <p> + Dorothea and Virginia were drawn to compassionate sentiments, in spite of + the provokeing recurrence of Mr. Posterley’s malady. He had not an income + to support a wife. Always was this unfortunate gentleman entangling + himself in a passion for maid or widow of the Wells and it was desperate, + a fever. Mr. Stuart Rem charitably remarked on his taking it so severely + because of his very scrupulous good conduct. They pardoned a little wound + to their delicacy, and asked: ‘On this occasion?’ Mr. Stuart Rem named a + linendraper’s establishment near the pantiles, where a fair young woman + served. ‘And her reputation?’ That was an article less presentable through + plate-glass, it seemed: Mr. Stuart Rem drew a prolonged breath into his + nose. + </p> + <p> + ‘It is most melancholy!’ they said in unison. ‘Nothing positive,’ said he. + ‘But the suspicion of a shadow, Mr. Stuart Rem! You will not permit it?’ + He stated, that his friend Buttermore might have influence. Dorothea said: + ‘When I think of Mr. Posterley’s addiction to ceremonial observances, and + to matrimony, I cannot but think of a sentence that fell from Mr. Durance + one day, with reference to that division of our Church: he called it:—you + frown! and I would only quote Mr. Durance to you in support of your purer + form, as we hold it to be—with the candles, the vestments, + Confession, alas! he called it, “Rome and a wife.”’ + </p> + <p> + Mr. Stuart Rem nodded an enforced assent: he testily dismissed mention of + Mr. Durance, and resumed on Mr. Posterley. + </p> + <p> + The good ladies now, with some of their curiosity appeased, considerately + signified to him, that a young maiden was present. + </p> + <p> + The young maiden had in heart stuff to render such small gossip a hum of + summer midges. She did not imagine the dialogue concerned her in any way. + She noticed Mr. Stuart Rem’s attentive scrutiny of her from time to time. + She had no sensitiveness, hardly a mind for things about her. To-morrow + she was to see Captain Dartrey. She dwelt on that prospect, for an escape + from the meshes of a painful hour—the most woeful of the hours she + had yet known-passed with Judith Marsett: which dragged her soul through a + weltering of the deeps, tossed her over and over, still did it with her + ideas. It shocked her nevertheless to perceive how much of the world’s + flayed life and harsh anatomy she had apprehended, and so coldly, previous + to Mrs. Marsett’s lift of the veil in her story of herself: a skipping + revelation, terrible enough to the girl; whose comparison of the + previously suspected things with the things now revealed imposed the + thought of her having been both a precocious and a callous young woman: a + kind of ‘Delphica without the erudition,’ her mind phrased it airily over + her chagrin.—And the silence of Dudley proved him to have discovered + his error in choosing such a person—he was wise, and she thanked + him. She had an envy of the ignorant-innocents adored by the young man she + cordially thanked for quitting her. She admired the white coat of armour + they wore, whether bestowed on them by their constitution or by prudence. + For while combating mankind now on Judith Marsett’s behalf, personally she + ran like a hare from the mere breath of an association with the very minor + sort of similar charges; ardently she desired the esteem of mankind; she + was at moments abject. But had she actually been aware of the facts now + known? + </p> + <p> + Those wits of the virgin young, quickened to shrewdness by their budding + senses—and however vividly—require enlightenment of the + audible and visible before their sterner feelings can be heated to break + them away from a blushful dread and force the mind to know. As much as the + wilfully or naturally blunted, the intelligently honest have to learn by + touch: only, their understandings cannot meanwhile be so wholly obtuse as + our society’s matron, acting to please the tastes of the civilized man—a + creature that is not clean-washed of the Turk in him—barbarously + exacts. The signor aforesaid is puzzled to read the woman, who is after + all in his language; but when it comes to reading the maiden, she appears + as a phosphorescent hieroglyph to some speculative Egyptologer; and he + insists upon distinct lines and characters; no variations, if he is to + have sense of surety. Many a young girl is misread by the amount she seems + to know of our construction, history, and dealings, when it is not more + than her sincere ripeness of nature, that has gathered the facts of life + profuse about her, and prompts her through one or other of the instincts, + often vanity, to show them to be not entirely strange to her; or haply her + filly nature is having a fling at the social harness of hypocrisy. If you + (it is usually through the length of ears of your Novelist that the + privilege is yours) have overheard queer communications passing between + girls, and you must act the traitor eavesdropper or Achilles masquerader + to overhear so clearly, these, be assured, are not specially the signs of + their corruptness. Even the exceptionally cynical are chiefly to be + accused of bad manners. Your Moralist is a myopic preacher, when he stamps + infamy, on them, or on our later generation, for the kick they have at + grandmother decorum, because you do not or cannot conceal from them the + grinning skeleton behind it. + </p> + <p> + Nesta once had dreams of her being loved: and she was to love in return + for a love that excused her for loving double, treble; as not her lover + could love, she thought with grateful pride in the treasure she was to + pour out at his feet; as only one or two (and they were women) in the + world had ever loved. Her notion of the passion was parasitic: man the + tree, woman the bine: but the bine was flame to enwind and to soar, + serpent to defend, immortal flowers to crown. The choice her parents had + made for her in Dudley, behind the mystery she had scent of, nipped her + dream, and prepared her to meet, as it were, the fireside of a November + day instead of springing up and into the dawn’s blue of full summer with + swallows on wing. Her station in exile at the Wells of the weariful rich, + under the weight of the sullen secret, unenlivened by Dudley’s courtship, + subdued her to the world’s decrees; phrased thus: ‘I am not to be a + heroine.’ The one golden edge to the view was, that she would greatly + please her father. + </p> + <p> + Her dream of a love was put away like a botanist’s pressed weed. But after + hearing Judith Marsett’s wild sobs, it had no place in her cherishing. + For, above all, the unhappy woman protested love to have been the cause of + her misery. She moaned of ‘her Ned’; of his goodness, his deceitfulness, + her trustfulness; his pride and the vileness of his friends; her + longsuffering and her break down of patience. It was done for the proof of + her unworthiness of Nesta’s friendship: that she might be renounced, and + embraced. She told the pathetic half of her story, to suit the gentle ear, + whose critical keenness was lost in compassion. How deep the compassion, + mixed with the girl’s native respect for the evil-fortuned, may be judged + by her inaccessibility to a vulgar tang that she was aware of in the + deluge of the torrent, where Innocence and Ned and Love and a proud Family + and that beast Worrell rolled together in leaping and shifting + involutions. + </p> + <p> + A darkness of thunder was on the girl. Although she was not one to shrink + beneath it like the small bird of the woods, she had to say within herself + many times, ‘I shall see Captain Dartrey to-morrow,’ for a recovery and a + nerving. And with her thought of him, her tooth was at her underlip, she + struggled abashed, in hesitation over men’s views of her sex, and how to + bring a frank mind to meet him; to be sure of his not at heart despising; + until his character swam defined and bright across her scope. ‘He is good + to women.’ Fragments of conversation, principally her father’s, had + pictured Captain Dartrey to her most manfully tolerant toward a frivolous + wife. + </p> + <p> + He came early in the morning, instantly after breakfast. + </p> + <p> + Not two minutes had passed before she was at home with him. His words, his + looks, revived her spirit of romance, gave her the very landscapes, and + new ones. Yes, he was her hero. But his manner made him also an adored big + brother, stamped splendid by the perils of life. He sat square, as if + alert to rise, with an elbow on a knee, and the readiest turn of head to + speakers, the promptest of answers, eyes that were a brighter accent to + the mouth, so vividly did look accompany tone. He rallied her, chatted and + laughed; pleased the ladies by laughing at Colney Durance, and inspired + her with happiness when he spoke of England:—that ‘One has to be in + exile awhile, to see the place she takes.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Oh, Captain Dartrey, I do like to hear you say so,’ she cried; his voice + was reassuring also in other directions: it rang of true man. + </p> + <p> + He volunteered, however, a sad admission, that England had certainly lost + something of the great nation’s proper conception of Force: the meaning of + it, virtue of it, and need for it. ‘She bleats for a lesson, and will get + her lesson.’ + </p> + <p> + But if we have Captain Dartrey, we shall come through! So said the sparkle + of Nesta’s eyes. + </p> + <p> + ‘She is very like her father,’ he said to the ladies. + </p> + <p> + ‘We think so,’ they remarked. + </p> + <p> + ‘There’s the mother too,’ said he; and Nesta saw that the ladies shadowed. + </p> + <p> + They retired. Then she begged him to ‘tell her of her own dear mother.’ + The news gave comfort, except for the suspicion, that the dear mother was + being worn by her entertaining so largely. ‘Papa is to blame,’ said Nesta. + </p> + <p> + ‘A momentary strain. Your father has an idea of Parliament; one of the + London Boroughs.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘And I, Captain Dartrey, when do I go back to them?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Your mother comes down to consult with you. And now, do we ride + together?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘You are free?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘My uncle, Lord Clan, lets me out.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘To-day?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Why, yes!’ + </p> + <p> + ‘This morning?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘In an hour’s time.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘I will be ready.’ + </p> + <p> + Nesta sent a line of excuse to Mrs. Marsett, throwing in a fervent + adjective for balm. + </p> + <p> + That fair person rode out with the troop under conduct of the hallowing + squire of the stables, and passed by Nesta on horseback beside Dartrey + Fenellan at the steps of a huge hotel; issuing from which, pretty Mrs. + Blathenoy was about to mount. Mrs. Marsett looked ahead and coloured, but + she could not restrain one look at Nesta, that embraced her cavalier. + Nesta waved hand to her, and nodded. Mrs. Marsett withdrew her eyes; her + doing so, silent though it was, resembled the drag back to sea of the + shingle-wave below her, such a screaming of tattle she heard in the + questions discernible through the attitude of the cavalier and of the + lady, who paused to stare, before the leap up in the saddle. ‘Who is she?—what + is she?—how did you know her?—where does she come from?—wears + her hat on her brows!—huge gauntlets out of style!—shady! + shady! shady!’ And as always during her nervous tumults, the name of + Worrell made diapason of that execrable uproar. Her hat on her brows had + an air of dash, defying a world it could win, as Ned well knew. But she + scanned her gauntlets disapprovingly. This town, we are glad to think, has + a bright repute for glove-shops. And Mrs. Marsett could applaud herself + for sparing Ned’s money; she had mended her gloves, if they were in the + fashion.—But how does the money come? Hark at that lady and that + gentleman questioning Miss Radnor of everything, everything in the world + about her! Not a word do they get from Miss Radnor. And it makes them the + more inquisitive. Idle rich people, comfortably fenced round, are so + inquisitive! And Mrs. Marsett, loving Nesta for the notice of her, + maddened by the sting of tongues it was causing, heard the wash of the + beach, without consciousness of analogies, but with a body ready to jump + out of skin, out of life, in desperation at the sound. + </p> + <p> + She was all impulse; a shifty piece of unmercenary stratagem occasionally + directing it. Arrived at her lodgings, she wrote to Nesta: ‘I entreat you + not to notice me, if you pass me on the road again. Let me drop, never + mind how low I go. I was born to be wretched. A line from you, just a line + now and then, only to show me I am not forgotten. I have had a beautiful + dream. I am not bad in reality; I love goodness, I know. I cling to the + thought of you, as my rescue, I declare. Please, let me hear: if it’s not + more than “good day” and your initials on a post-card.’ + </p> + <p> + The letter brought Nesta in person to her. + </p> + <p> + <a name="link2HCH0030" id="link2HCH0030"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + CHAPTER XXX. THE BURDEN UPON NESTA + </h2> + <p> + Could there be confidences on the subject of Mrs. Marsett with Captain + Dartrey?—Nesta timidly questioned her heart: she knocked at an iron + door shut upon a thing alive. The very asking froze her, almost to + stopping her throbs of pity for the woman. With Captain Dartrey, if with + any one; but with no one. Not with her mother even. Toward her mother, she + felt guilty of knowing. Her mother had a horror of that curtain. Nesta had + seen it, and had taken her impressions; she, too, shrank from it; the more + when impelled to draw near it. Louise de Seilles would have been another + self; Louise was away; when to return, the dear friend could not state. + Speaking in her ear, would have been possible; the theme precluded + writing. + </p> + <p> + It was ponderous combustible new knowledge of life for a girl to hold + unaided. In the presence of the simple silvery ladies Dorothea and + Virginia, she had qualms, as if she were breaking out in spots before + them. The ladies fancied, that Mr. Stuart Rem had hinted to them oddly of + the girl; and that he might have meant, she appeared a little too + cognizant of poor Mr. Abram Posterley’s malady—as girls in these + terrible days, only too frequently, too brazenly, are. They discoursed to + her of the degeneracy of the manners, nay, the morals of young + Englishwomen, once patterns! They sketched the young English gentlewoman + of their time; indeed a beauty; with round red cheeks, and rounded open + eyes, and a demure shut mouth, a puppet’s divine ignorance; inoffensive in + the highest degree, rightly worshipped. They were earnest, and Nesta + struck at herself. She wished to be as they had been, reserving her + painful independence. + </p> + <p> + They were good: they were the ideal women of our country; which demands if + it be but the semblance of the sureness of stationary excellence; such as + we have in Sevres and Dresden, polished bright and smooth as ever by the + morning’s flick of a duster; perhaps in danger of accidents—accidents + must be kept away; but enviable, admirable, we think, when we are not + thinking of seed sown or help given to the generations to follow. Nesta + both envied and admired; she revered them; yet her sharp intelligence, + larger in the extended boundary of thought coming of strange + crimson-lighted new knowledge, discerned in a dimness what blest + conditions had fixed them on their beautiful barren eminence. Without + challengeing it, she had a rebellious rush of sympathy for our + evil-fortuned of the world; the creatures in the battle, the wounded, + trodden, mud-stained: and it alarmed her lest she should be at heart one + out of the fold. + </p> + <p> + She had the sympathy, nevertheless, and renewing and increasing with the + pulsations of a compassion that she took for her reflective survey. The + next time she saw Dartrey Fenellan, she was assured of him, as being the + man who might be spoken to; and by a woman: though not by a girl; not + spoken to by her. The throb of the impulse precipitating speech subsided + to a dumb yearning. He noticed her look: he was unaware of the human sun + in the girl’s eyes taking an image of him for permanent habitation in her + breast. That face of his, so clearly lined, quick, firm, with the blue + smile on it like the gleam of a sword coming out of sheath, did not mean + hardness, she could have vowed. O that some woman, other than the unhappy + woman herself, would speak the words denied to a girl! He was the man who + would hearken and help. Essential immediate help was to be given besides + the noble benevolence of mind. Novel ideas of manliness and the world’s + need for it were printed on her understanding. For what could women do in + aid of a good cause! She fawned: she deemed herself very despicably her + hero’s inferior. The thought of him enclosed her. In a prison, the gaoler + is a demi-God-hued bright or black, as it may be; and, by the present + arrangement between the sexes, she, whom the world allowed not to have an + intimation from eye or ear, or from nature’s blood-ripeness in commune + with them, of certain matters, which it suffers to be notorious, + necessarily directed her appeal almost in worship to the man, who was the + one man endowed to relieve, and who locked her mouth for shame. + </p> + <p> + Thus was she, too, being put into her woman’s harness of the bit and the + blinkers, and taught to know herself for the weak thing, the gentle + parasite, which the fiction of our civilization expects her, caressingly + and contemptuously, to become in the active, while it is exacted of hero + Comedy of Clowns!—that in the passive she be a rockfortress + impregnable, not to speak of magically encircled. She must also have her + feelings; she must not be an unnatural creature. And she must have a + sufficient intelligence; for her stupidity does not flatter the possessing + man. It is not an organic growth that he desires in his mate, but a happy + composition. You see the world which comes of the pair. + </p> + <p> + This burning Nesta, Victor’s daughter, tempered by Nataly’s milder blood, + was a girl in whom the hard shocks of the knowledge of life, perforce of + the hardness upon pure metal, left a strengthening for generous + imagination. She did not sit to brood on her injured senses or set them + through speculation touching heat; they were taken up and consumed by the + fire of her mind. Nor had she leisure for the abhorrences, in a heart all + flowing to give aid, and uplift and restore. Self was as urgent in her as + in most of the young; but the gift of humour, which had previously + diverted it, was now the quick feeling for her sisterhood, through the one + piteous example she knew; and broadening it, through her insurgent + abasement on their behalf, which was her scourged pride of sex. She but + faintly thought of blaming the men whom her soul besought for justice, for + common kindness, to women. There was the danger, that her aroused young + ignorance would charge the whole of the misery about and abroad upon the + stronger of those two: and another danger, that the vision of the facts + below the surface would discolour and disorder her views of existence. But + she loved, she sprang to, the lighted world; and she had figures of male + friends, to which to cling; and they helped in animating glorious + historical figures on the world’s library-shelves or under yet palpitating + earth. Promise of a steady balance of her nature, too, was shown in the + absence of any irritable urgency to be doing, when her bosom bled to help. + Beyond the resolve, that she would not abandon the woman who had made + confession to her, she formed no conscious resolutions. Far ahead down her + journey of the years to come, she did see muffled things she might hope + and would strive to do. They were chrysalis shapes. Above all, she flew + her blind quickened heart on the wings of an imaginative force; and those + of the young who can do that, are in their blood incorruptible by dark + knowledge, irradiated under darkness in the mind. Let but the throb be + kept for others. That is the one secret, for redemption; if not for + preservation. + </p> + <p> + Victor descended on his marine London to embrace his girl, full of regrets + at Fredi’s absence from the great whirl ‘overhead,’ as places of + multitudinous assembly, where he shone, always appeared to him. But it was + not to last long; she would soon be on the surface again! At the first + clasp of her, he chirped some bars of her song. He challenged her to duet + before the good ladies, and she kindled, she was caught up by his gaiety, + wondering at herself; faintly aware of her not being spontaneous. And she + made her father laugh, just in the old way; and looked at herself in his + laughter, with the thought, that she could not have become so changed; by + which the girl was helped to jump to her humour. Victor turned his full + front to Dorothea and Virginia, one sunny beam of delight and although it + was Mr. Stuart Rem who was naughty Nesta’s victim, and although it seemed + a trespass on her part to speak in such a manner of a clerical gentleman, + they were seized; they were the opposite partners of a laughing quadrille, + lasting till they were tired out. + </p> + <p> + Victor had asked his girl, if she sang on a Sunday. The ladies remembered, + that she had put the question for permission to Mr. Stuart Rem, who was + opposed to secular singing. + </p> + <p> + ‘And what did he say?’ said Victor. + </p> + <p> + Nesta shook her head: ‘It was not what he said, papa; it was his look. His + duty compelled him, though he loves music. He had the look of a Patriarch + putting his handmaiden away into the desert.’ + </p> + <p> + Dorothea and Virginia, in spite of protests within, laughed to streams. + They recollected the look; she had given the portrait of Mr. Stuart Rem in + the act of repudiating secular song. + </p> + <p> + ‘Victor conjured up a day when this darling Fredi, a child, stood before a + famous picture in the Brera, at Milan; when he and her mother noticed the + child’s very studious graveness; and they had talked of it; he remarking, + that she disapproved of the Patriarch; and Nataly, that she was taken with + Hagar’s face. + </p> + <p> + He seemed surprised at her not having heard from Dudley. + </p> + <p> + ‘How is that?’ said he. + </p> + <p> + ‘Most probably because he has not written, papa.’ + </p> + <p> + He paused after the cool reply. She had no mournful gaze at all; but in + the depths of the clear eyes he knew so well, there was a coil of + something animate, whatever it might be. And twice she drew a heavy + breath. + </p> + <p> + He mentioned it in London. Nataly telegraphed at night for her girl to + meet her next day at Dartrey’s hotel. + </p> + <p> + Their meeting was incomprehensibly joyless to the hearts of each, though + it was desired, and had long been desired, and mother was mother, daughter + daughter, without diminution of love between them. They held hands, they + kissed and clasped, they showered their tender phrases with full warm + truth, and looked into eyes and surely saw one another. But the heart of + each was in a battle of its own, taking wounds or crying for supports. + Whether to speak to her girl at once, despite the now vehement contrary + counsel of Victor, was Nataly’s deliberation, under the thought of the + young creature’s perplexity in not seeing her at the house of the Duvidney + ladies: while Nesta conjured in a flash the past impressions of her + mother’s shrinking distaste from any such hectic themes as this which + burdened and absorbed her; and she was almost joining to it, through + sympathy with any thought or feeling of one in whom she had such pride; + she had the shudder of revulsion. Further, Nataly put on, rather cravenly + an air, of distress, or she half designingly permitted her trouble to be + seen, by way of affecting her girl’s recollection when the confession was + to come, that Nesta might then understand her to have been restrained from + speaking, not evasive of her duty. The look was interpreted by Nesta as + belonging to the social annoyances dating, in her calendar, from + Creckholt, apprehensively dreaded at Lakelands. She hinted asking, and her + mother nodded; not untruthfully; but she put on a briskness after the nod; + and a doubt was driven into Nesta’s bosom. + </p> + <p> + Her dear Skepsey was coming down to her for a holiday, she was glad to + hear. Of Dudley, there was no word. Nataly shunned his name, with a + superstitious dread lest any mention of him should renew pretensions that + she hoped, and now supposed, were quite withdrawn. So she had told poor + Mr. Barmby only yesterday, at his humble request to know. He had seen + Dudley on the pantiles, walking with a young lady, he said. And ‘he + feared,’ he said; using, a pardonable commonplace of deceit. Her + compassion accounted for the ‘fear’ which was the wish, and caused her not + to think it particularly strange, that he should imagine Dudley to have + quitted the field. Now that a disengaged Dartrey Fenellan was at hand, + poor Mr. Barmby could have no chance. + </p> + <p> + Dartrey came to her room by appointment. She wanted to see him alone, and + he informed her, that Mrs. Blathenoy was in the hotel, and would certainly + receive and amuse Nesta for any length of time. + </p> + <p> + ‘I will take her up,’ said Nataly, and rose, and she sat immediately, and + fluttered a hand at her breast. She laughed: ‘Perhaps I’m tired!’ + </p> + <p> + Dartrey took Nesta. + </p> + <p> + He returned, saying: ‘There’s a lift in the hotel. Do the stairs affect + you at all?’ + </p> + <p> + She fenced his sharp look. ‘Laziness, I fancy; age is coming on. How is it + Mrs. Blathenoy is here?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Well! how?’ ‘Foolish curiosity?’ ‘I think I have made her of service. I + did not bring the lady here.’ ‘Of service to whom?’ ‘Why, to Victor!’ ‘Has + Victor commissioned you?’ ‘You can bear to hear it. Her husband knows the + story. He has a grudge... commercial reasons. I fancy it is, that Victor + stood against his paper at the table of the Bank. Blathenoy vowed blow for + blow. But I think the little woman holds him in. She says she does.’ + ‘Victor prompted you?’ ‘It occurred as it occurred.’ ‘She does it for love + of us?—Oh! I can’t trifle. Dartrey!’ ‘Tell me.’ ‘First, you haven’t + let me know what you think of my Nesta.’ ‘She’s a dear good girl.’ ‘Not so + interesting to you as a flighty little woman!’ ‘She has a speck of some + sort on her mind.’ Nataly spied at Dudley’s behaviour, and said: ‘That + will wear away. Is Mr. Blathenoy much here?’ ‘As often as he can come, I + believe.’ ‘That is...?’ ‘I have seen him twice.’ ‘His wife remains?’ + ‘Fixed here for the season.’ ‘My friend!’ ‘No harm, no harm!’ ‘But-to + her!’ ‘You have my word of honour.’ ‘Yes: and she is doing you a service, + at your request; you occasionally reward her with thanks; and she sees you + are a man of honour. Do you not know women?’ + </p> + <p> + Dartrey blew his pooh-pooh on feminine suspicions. ‘There’s very little + left of the Don Amoroso in me. Women don’t worship stone figures.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘They do: like the sea-birds. And what do you say to me, Dartrey?—I + can confess it: I am one of them: I love you. When last you left England, + I kissed your hand. It was because of your manly heart in that stone + figure. I kept from crying: you used to scorn us English for the + “whimpering fits” you said we enjoy and must have in books, if we can’t + get them up for ourselves. I could have prayed to have you as brother or + son. I love my Victor the better for his love of you. Oh!—poor soul—how + he is perverted since that building of Lakelands! He cannot take soundings + of the things he does. Formerly he confided in me, in all things: now not + one;—I am the chief person to deceive. If only he had waited! We are + in a network of intrigues and schemes, every artifice in London—tempting + one to hate simple worthy people, who naturally have their views, and see + me an impostor, and tolerate me, fascinated by him:—or bribed—it + has to be said. There are ways of bribeing. I trust he may not have in the + end to pay too heavily for succeeding. He seems a man pushed by Destiny; + not irresponsible, but less responsible than most. He is desperately + tempted by his never failing. Whatever he does!.. it is true! And it sets + me thinking of those who have never had an ailment, up to a certain age, + when the killing blow comes. Latterly I have seen into him: I never did + before. Had I been stronger, I might have saved, or averted.... But, you + will say, the stronger woman would not have occupied my place. I must have + been blind too. I did not see, that his nature shrinks from the thing it + calls up. He dreads the exposure he courts—or has to combat with all + his powers. It has been a revelation to me of him life as well. Nothing + stops him. Now it is Parliament—a vacant London Borough. He counts + on a death: Ah! terrible! I have it like a snake’s bite night and day.’ + </p> + <p> + Nataly concluded: ‘There: it has done me some good to speak. I feel so + base.’ She breathed heavily. + </p> + <p> + Dartrey took her hand and bent his lips to it. ‘Happy the woman who has + not more to speak! How long will Nesta stay here?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘You will watch over her, Dartrey? She stays-her father wishes—up to—ah! + We can hardly be in such extreme peril. He has her doctor, her lawyer, and + her butler—a favourite servant—to check, and influence, her: + She—you know who it is!—does not, I am now convinced, mean + persecution. She was never a mean-minded woman. Oh! I could wish she were. + They say she is going. Then I am to be made an “honest woman of.” Victor + wants Nesta, now that she is away, to stay until... You understand. He + feels she is safe from any possible kind of harm with those good ladies. + And I feel she is the safer for having you near. Otherwise, how I should + pray to have you with us! Daily I have to pass through, well, something + like the ordeal of the red-hot ploughshares—and without the + innocence, dear friend! But it’s best that my girl should not have to be + doing the same; though she would have the innocence. But she writhes under + any shadow of a blot. And for her to learn the things that are in the + world, through her mother’s history!—and led to know it by the + falling away of friends, or say, acquaintances! However ignorant at + present, she learns from a mere nothing. I dread!.... In a moment, she is + a blaze of light. There have been occurrences. Only Victor could have + overcome them! I had to think it better for my girl, that she was absent. + We are in such a whirl up there! So I work round again to “how long?” and + the picture of myself counting the breaths of a dying woman. The other day + I was told I was envied!’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Battle, battle, battle; for all of us, in every position!’ said Dartrey + sharply, to clip a softness: ‘except when one’s attending on an invalid + uncle. Then it’s peace; rather like extinction. And I can’t be crying for + the end either. I bite my moustache and tap foot on the floor, out of his + hearing; make believe I’m patient. Now I ‘ll fetch Nesta.’ + </p> + <p> + Mrs. Blathenoy came down with an arm on Nesta’s shoulder. She held a + telegram, and said to Nataly— + </p> + <p> + ‘What can this mean? It’s from my husband; he puts “Jacob”: my husband’s + Christian name:—so like my husband, where there’s no concealment! + There—he says: + </p> + <p> + “Down to-night else pack ready start to-morrow.” Can it signify, affairs + are bad with my husband in the city?’ + </p> + <p> + It had that signification to Nataly’s understanding. At the same time, the + pretty little woman’s absurd lisping repetition of ‘my husband’ did not + seem without design to inflict the wound it caused. + </p> + <p> + In reality, it was not malicious; it came of the bewitchment of a silly + tongue by her knowledge of the secret to be controlled: and after + contrasting her fortunes with Nataly’s, on her way downstairs, she had + comforted herself by saying, that at least she had a husband. She was not + aware that she dealt a hurt until she had found a small consolation in the + indulgence: for Captain Dartrey Fenellan admired this commanding figure of + a woman, who could not legally say that which the woman he admired less, + if at all, legally could say. + </p> + <p> + ‘I must leave you to interpret,’ Nataly remarked. + </p> + <p> + Mrs. Blathenoy resented her unbefitting queenly style. For this reason, + she abstained from an intended leading up to mention of the + ‘singular-looking lady’ seen riding with Miss Radnor more than once; and + as to whom, Miss Radnor (for one gives her the name) had not just now, + when questioned, spoken very clearly. So the mother’s alarms were not + raised. + </p> + <p> + And really it was a pity, Mrs. Blathenoy said to Dartrey subsequently; + finding him colder than before Mrs. Radnor’s visit; it was a pity, because + a young woman in Miss Radnor’s position should not by any possibility be + seen in association with a person of commonly doubtful appearance. + </p> + <p> + She was denied the petulant satisfaction of rousing the championship + bitter to her. Dartrey would not deliver an opinion on Miss Radnor’s + conduct. He declined, moreover, to assist in elucidating the telegram by + ‘looking here,’ and poring over the lines beside a bloomy cheek. He was + petulantly whipped on the arm with her glove, and pouted at. And it was + then—and then only or chiefly through Nataly’s recent allusion—that + the man of honour had his quakings in view of the quagmire, where he was + planted on an exceedingly narrow causeway, not of the firmest. For she was + a pretty little woman, one of the prize gifts of the present education of + women to the men who are for having them quiescent domestic patterns; and + her artificial ingenuousness or candid frivolities came to her by nature + to kindle the nature of the gentleman on the other bank of the stream, and + witch him to the plunge, so greatly mutually regretted after taken: an old + duet to the moon. + </p> + <p> + Dartrey escaped to the Club, where he had a friend. The friend was Colonel + Sudley, one of the modern studious officers, not in good esteem with the + authorities. He had not forgiven Dartrey for the intemperateness which cut + off a brilliant soldier from the service. He was reduced to acknowledge, + however, that there was a sparkling defence for him to reply with, in the + shape of a fortune gained and where we have a Society forcing us to live + up to an expensive level, very trying to a soldier’s income, a fortune + gained will offer excuses for misconduct short of disloyal or illegal. + They talked of the state of the Army: we are moving. True, and at the last + Review, the ‘march past’ was performed before a mounted generalissimo + profoundly asleep, head on breast. Our English military ‘moving’ may now + be likened to Somnolency on Horseback. ‘Oh, come, no rancour,’ said the + colonel; ‘you know he’s a kind old boy at heart; nowhere a more + affectionate man alive!’ + </p> + <p> + ‘So the sycophants are sure of posts!’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Come, I say! He’s devoted to the Service.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Invalid him, and he shall have a good epitaph.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘He’s not so responsible as the taxpayer.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘There you touch home. Mother Goose can’t imagine the need for defence + until a hand’s at her feathers.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘What about her shrieks now and then?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Indigestion of a surfeit?’ + </p> + <p> + They were in a laughing wrangle when two acquaintances of the colonel’s + came near. One of them recognized Dartrey. He changed a prickly subject to + one that is generally as acceptable to the servants of Mars. His companion + said: ‘Who is the girl out with Judith Marsett?’ He flavoured eulogies of + the girl’s good looks in easy garrison English. She was praised for + sitting her horse well. One had met her on the parade, in the afternoon, + walking with Mrs. Marsett. Colonel Sudley had seen them on horseback. He + remarked to Dartrey: + </p> + <p> + ‘And by the way, you’re a clean stretch ahead of us. I’ve seen you go by + these windows, with the young lady on one side, and a rather pretty woman + on the other too.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Nothing is unseen in this town!’ Dartrey rejoined. + </p> + <p> + Strolling to his quarters along the breezy parade at night, he proposed to + himself, that he would breathe an immediate caution to Nesta. How had she + come to know this Mrs. Marsett? But he was more seriously thinking of what + Colney Durance called ‘The Mustard Plaster’; the satirist’s phrase for + warm relations with a married fair one: and Dartrey, clear of any design + to have it at his breast, was beginning to take intimations of pricks and + burns. They are an almost positive cure of inflammatory internal + conditions. They were really hard on him, who had none to be cured. + </p> + <p> + The hour was nigh midnight. As he entered his hotel, the porter ran off to + the desk in his box, and brought him a note, saying, that a lady had left + it at half-past nine. Left it?—Then the lady could not be the + alarming lady. He was relieved. The words of the letter were cabalistic; + these, beneath underlined address: + </p> + <p> + ‘I beg you to call on me, if I do not see you this evening. It is urgent; + you will excuse me when I explain. Not late to-morrow. I am sure you will + not fail to come. I could write what would be certain to bring you. I dare + not trust any names to paper.’ + </p> + <p> + The signature was, Judith Marsett. + </p> + <p> + <a name="link2HCH0031" id="link2HCH0031"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + CHAPTER XXXI. SHOWS HOW THE SQUIRES IN A CONQUEROR’S SERVICE HAVE AT TIMES + TO DO KNIGHTLY CONQUEST OF THEMSELVES + </h2> + <p> + By the very earliest of the trains shot away to light and briny air from + London’s November gloom, which knows the morning through increase of + gasjets, little Skepsey was hurried over suburban chimneys, in his + friendly third-class carriage; where we have reminders of ancient pastoral + times peculiar to our country, as it may chance; but where a man may speak + to his neighbour right off without being deemed offensive. That is homely. + A social fellow knitting closely to his fellows when he meets them, enjoys + it, even at the cost of uncushioned seats he can, if imps are in him, + merryandrew as much as he pleases; detested punctilio does not reign + there; he can proselytize for the soul’s welfare; decry or uphold the + national drink; advertize a commercial Firm deriving prosperity from the + favour of the multitude; exhort to patriotism. All is accepted. Politeness + is the rule, according to Skepsey’s experience of the Southern part of the + third-class kingdom. And it is as well to mark the divisions, for the + better knowledge of our countrymen. The North requires volumes to itself. + </p> + <p> + The hard-grained old pirate-stock Northward has built the land, and is to + the front when we are at our epic work. Meanwhile it gets us a blowzy + character, by shouldering roughly among the children of civilization. + Skepsey, journeying one late afternoon up a Kentish line, had, in both + senses of the word, encountered a long-limbed navvy; an intoxicated, he + was compelled by his manly modesty to desire to think; whose loathly talk, + forced upon the hearing of a decent old woman opposite him, passed + baboonish behaviour; so much so, that Skepsey civilly intervened; + subsequently inviting him to leave the carriage and receive a lesson at + the station they were nearing. Upon his promising faithfully, that it + should be a true and telling lesson, the navvy requested this pygmy spark + to flick his cheek, merely to show he meant war in due sincerity; and he + as faithfully, all honour, promising not to let it bring about a breakage + of the laws of the Company, Skepsey promptly did the deed. So they went + forth. + </p> + <p> + Skepsey alluded to the incident, for an example of the lamentable + deficiency in science betrayed by most of our strong men when put to it; + and the bitter thought, that he could count well nigh to a certainty on + the total absence of science in the long-armed navvy, whose fist on his + nose might have been as the magnet of a pin, was chief among his + reminiscences after the bout, destroying pleasure for the lover of Old + England’s might. One blow would have sent Skepsey travelling. He was not + seriously struck once. They parted, shaking hands; the navvy confessing + himself to have ‘drunk a drop’; and that perhaps accounted for his having + been ‘topped by a dot on him.’ + </p> + <p> + He declined to make oath never to repeat his offence; but said, sending + his vanquisher to the deuce, with an amicable push at his shoulder, + ‘Damned if I ever forget five foot five stretched six foot flat!’ + </p> + <p> + Skepsey counted his feet some small amount higher; but our hearty rovers’ + sons have their ballad moods when giving or taking a thrashing. One of the + third-class passengers, a lad of twenty, became Skepsey’s pupil, and + turned out clever with the gloves, and was persuaded to enter the militia, + and grew soon to be a corporal. Thus there was profit of the affair, + though the navvy sank out of sight. Let us hope and pray he will not + insult the hearing of females again. If only females knew how necessary it + is, for their sakes, to be able to give a lesson now and then! Ladies are + positively opposed. And Judges too, who dress so like them. The manhood of + our country is kept down, in consequence. Mr. Durance was right, when he + said something about the state of war being wanted to weld our races + together: and yet we are always praying for the state of peace, which + causes cracks and gaps among us! Was that what he meant by illogical? It + seemed to Skepsey—oddly, considering his inferior estimate of the + value of the fair sex—that a young woman with whom he had recently + made acquaintance; and who was in Brighton now, upon missionary work; a + member of the ‘Army,’ an officer of advancing rank, Matilda Pridden, by + name; was nearer to the secret of the right course of conduct for + individual citizens and the entire country than any gentleman he knew. + </p> + <p> + Yes, nearer to it than his master was! Thinking of Mr. Victor Radnor, + Skepsey fetched a sigh. He had knocked at his master’s door at the office + one day, and imagining the call to enter, had done so, and had seen a + thing he could not expunge. Lady Grace Halley was there. From matters he + gathered, Skepsey guessed her to be working for his master among the great + folks, as he did with Jarniman, and Mr. Fenellan with Mr. Carling. But is + it usual; he asked himself—his natural veneration framing the rebuke + to his master thus—to repay the services of a lady so warmly?—We + have all of us an ermined owl within us to sit in judgement of our + superiors as well as our equals; and the little man, notwithstanding a + servant’s bounden submissiveness, was forced to hear the judicial + pronouncement upon his master’s behaviour. His master had, at the same + time, been saying most weighty kind words more and more of late: one + thing:—that, if he gave all he had to his fellows, and did all he + could, he should still be in their debt. And he was a very wealthy + gentleman. What are we to think? The ways of our superiors are wonderful. + We do them homage: still we feel, we painfully feel, we are beginning to + worship elsewhere. It is the pain of a detachment of the very roots of our + sea-weed heart from a rock. Mr. Victor Radnor was an honour to his + country. Skepsey did not place the name of Matilda Pridden beside it or in + any way compare two such entirely different persons. At the same time and + most earnestly, while dreading to hear, he desired to have Matilda + Pridden’s opinion of the case distressing him. He never could hear it, + because he could never be allowed to expound the case to her. Skepsey + sighed again: he as much as uttered: Oh, if we had a few thousands like + her!—But what if we do have them? They won’t marry! There they are, + all that the country requires in wives and mothers; and like Miss + Priscilla Graves, they won’t marry! + </p> + <p> + He looked through sad thoughts across the benches of the compartments to + the farther end of the carriage, where sat the Rev. Septimus Barmby, + looking at him through a meditation as obscure if not so mournful. Few are + the third-class passengers outward at that early hour in the winter + season, and Skepsey’s gymnastics to get beside the Rev. Septimus were + unimpeded; though a tight-packed carriage of us poor journaliers would not + have obstructed them with as much as a sneer. Mr. Barmby and Skepsey + greeted. The latter said, he had a holiday, to pay a visit to Miss Nesta. + The former said, he hoped he should see Miss Nesta. Skepsey then rapidly + brought the conversation to a point where Matilda Pridden was comprised. + He discoursed of the ‘Army’ and her position in the Army, giving instances + of her bravery, the devotion shown by her to the cause of morality, in all + its forms. Mr. Barmby had his fortunes on his hands at the moment, he + could not lend an attentive ear; and he disliked this Army, the title it + had taken, and the mixing of women and men in its ranks; not to speak of a + presumption in its proceedings, and the public marching and singing. + Moreover, he enjoyed his one or two permissible glasses: he doubted that + the Chiefs of the Army had common benevolence for the inoffensive pipe. + But the cause of morality was precious to him; morality and a fit of + softness, and the union of the happiest contrast of voices, had set him + for a short while, before the dawn of Nesta’s day, hankering after + Priscilla Graves. Skepsey’s narrative of Matilda Pridden’s work down at + the East of London; was effective; it had the ring to thrill a responsive + chord in Mr. Barmby, who mused on London’s East, and martyrly service + there. His present expectations were of a very different sort; but a + beautiful bride, bringing us wealth, is no misleading beam, if we direct + the riches rightly. Septimus, a solitary minister in those grisly haunts + of the misery breeding vice, must needs accomplish less than a Septimus + the husband of one of England’s chief heiresses:—only not the most + brilliant, owing to circumstances known to the Rev. Groseman Buttermore: + strangely, and opportunely, revealed: for her exceeding benefit, it may be + hoped. She is no longer the ignorant girl, to reject the protecting hand + of one whose cloth is the best of cloaking. A glance at Dudley Sowerby’s + defection, assures our worldly wisdom too, that now is the time to sue. + </p> + <p> + Several times while Mr. Barmby made thus his pudding of the desires of the + flesh and the spirit, Skepsey’s tales of Matilda Pridden’s heroism caught + his attention. He liked her deeds; he disliked the position in which the + young woman placed herself to perform them; and he said so. Women are to + be women, he said. + </p> + <p> + Skepsey agreed: ‘If we could get men to do the work, sir!’ + </p> + <p> + Mr. Barmby was launching forth: Plenty of men!—His mouth was blocked + by the reflection, that we count the men on our fingers; often are we, as + it were, an episcopal thumb surveying scarce that number of followers! He + diverged to censure of the marchings and the street-singing: the + impediment to traffic, the annoyance to a finely musical ear. He + disapproved altogether of Matilda Pridden’s military display, pronouncing + her to be, ‘Doubtless a worthy young person.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Her age is twenty-seven,’ said Skepsey, spying at the number of his own. + </p> + <p> + ‘You have known her long?’ Mr. Barmby asked. + </p> + <p> + ‘Not long, sir. She has gone through trouble. She believes very strongly + in the will:—If I will this, if I will that, and it is the right + will, not wickedness, it is done—as good as done; and force is quite + superfluous. In her sermons, she exhorts to prayer before action.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Preaches?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘She moves a large assembly, sir.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘It would seem, that England is becoming Americanized!’ exclaimed the + Conservative in Mr. Barmby. Almost he groaned; and his gaze was fish-like + in vacancy, on hearing the little man speak of the present intrepid + forwardness of the sex to be publicly doing. It is for men the most + indigestible fact of our century: one that—by contrast throws an + overearthly holiness on our decorous dutiful mothers, who contentedly + worked below the surface while men unremittingly attended to their + interests above. + </p> + <p> + Skepsey drew forth a paper-covered shilling-book: a translation from the + French, under a yelling title of savage hate of Old England and cannibal + glee at her doom. Mr. Barmby dropped his eyelashes on it, without comment; + nor did he reply to Skepsey’s forlorn remark: ‘We let them think they + could do it!’ + </p> + <p> + Behold the downs. Breakfast is behind them. Miss Radnor likewise: if the + poor child has a name. We propose to supply the deficiency. She does not + declare war upon tobacco. She has a cultured and a beautiful voice. We + abstain from enlargeing on the charms of her person. She has resources, + which representatives of a rival creed would plot to secure. + </p> + <p> + ‘Skepsey, you have your quarters at the house of Miss Radnor’s relatives?’ + said Mr. Barmby, as they emerged from tunnelled chalk. + </p> + <p> + ‘Mention, that I think of calling in the course of the day.’ + </p> + <p> + A biscuit had been their breakfast without a name. + </p> + <p> + They parted at the station, roused by the smell of salt to bestow a more + legitimate title on the day’s restorative beginning. Down the hill, along + by the shops, and Skepsey, in sight of Miss Nesta’s terrace, considered it + still an early hour for a visitor; so, to have the sea about him, he paid + pier-money, and hurried against the briny wings of a South-wester; green + waves, curls of foam, flecks of silver, under low-flying grey-dark + cloud-curtains shaken to a rift, where at one shot the sun had a line of + Nereids nodding, laughing, sparkling to him. Skepsey enjoyed it, at the + back of thoughts military and naval. Visible sea, this girdle of Britain, + inspired him to exultations in reverence. He wished Mr. Durance could + behold it now and have such a breastful. He was wishing he knew a song of + Britain and sea, rather fancying Mr. Durance to be in some way a bar to + patriotic poetical recollection, when he saw his Captain Dartrey mounting + steps out of an iron anatomy of the pier, and looking like a razor off a + strap. + </p> + <p> + ‘Why, sir!’ cried Skepsey. + </p> + <p> + ‘Just a plunge and a dozen strokes,’ Dartrey said; ‘and you’ll come to my + hotel and give me ten minutes of the “recreation”; and if you don’t come + willingly, I shall insult your country.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Ah! I wish Mr. Durance were here,’ Skepsey rejoined. + </p> + <p> + ‘It would upset his bumboat of epigrams. He rises at ten o’clock to a + queasy breakfast by candlelight, and proceeds to composition. His picture + of the country is a portrait of himself by the artist.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘But, sir, Captain Dartrey, you don’t think as Mr. Durance does of + England!’ + </p> + <p> + ‘There are lots to flatter her, Skepsey! A drilling can’t do her harm. + You’re down to see Miss Nesta. Ladies don’t receive quite so early. And + have you breakfasted? Come on with me quick.’ Dartrey led him on, saying: + ‘You have an eye at my stick. It was a legacy to me, by word of mouth, + from a seaman of a ship I sailed in, who thought I had done him a service; + and he died after all. He fell overboard drunk. He perished of the villain + stuff. One of his messmates handed me the stick in Cape Town, sworn to + deliver it. A good knot to grasp; and it ‘s flexible and strong; stick or + rattan, whichever you please; it gives point or caresses the shoulder; + there’s no break in it, whack as you may. They call it a Demerara + supple-jack. I’ll leave it to you.’ + </p> + <p> + Skepsey declared his intention to be the first to depart. He tried the + temper of the stick, bent it a bit, and admired the prompt straightening. + </p> + <p> + ‘It would give a good blow, sir.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Does its business without braining.’ + </p> + <p> + Perhaps for the reason, that it was not a handsome instrument for display + on fashionable promenades, Dartrey chose it among his collection by + preference; as ugly dogs of a known fidelity are chosen for companions. + The Demerara supple-jack surpasses bull-dogs in its fashion of assisting + the master; for when once at it, the clownish-looking thing reflects upon + him creditably, by developing a refined courtliness of style, while in no + way showing a diminution of jolly ardour for the fray. It will deal you + the stroke of a bludgeon with the playfulness of a cane. It bears + resemblance to those accomplished natural actors, who conversationally + present a dramatic situation in two or three spontaneous flourishes, and + are themselves again, men of the world, the next minute. + </p> + <p> + Skepsey handed it back. He spoke of a new French rifle. He mentioned, in + the form of query for no answer, the translation of the barking little + volume he had shown to Mr. Barmby: he slapped at his breast-pocket, where + it was. Not a ship was on the sea-line; and he seemed to deplore that + vacancy. + </p> + <p> + ‘But it tells both ways,’ Dartrey said. ‘We don’t want to be hectoring in + the Channel. All we want, is to be sure of our power, so as not to go + hunting and fawning for alliances. Up along that terrace Miss Nesta lives. + Brighton would be a choice place for a landing.’ + </p> + <p> + Skepsey temporized, to get his national defences, by pleading the + country’s love of peace. + </p> + <p> + ‘Then you give-up your portion of the gains of war—an awful + disgorgement,’ said Dartrey. ‘If you are really for peace, you toss all + your spare bones to the war-dogs. Otherwise, Quakerly preaching is taken + for hypocrisy.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘I ‘m afraid we are illogical, sir,’ said Skepsey, adopting one of the + charges of Mr. Durance, to elude the abominable word. + </p> + <p> + ‘In you run, my friend.’ Dartrey sped him up the steps of the hotel. + </p> + <p> + A little note lay on his breakfast-table. His invalid uncle’s valet gave + the morning’s report of the night. + </p> + <p> + The note was from Mrs. Blathenoy: she begged Captain Dartrey, in double + underlinings of her brief words, to mount the stairs. He debated, and he + went. + </p> + <p> + She was excited, and showed a bosom compressed to explode: she had been + weeping. ‘My husband is off. He bids me follow him. What would you have me + do?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Go.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘You don’t care what may happen to your friends, the Radnors?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Not at the cost of your separation from your husband.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘You have seen him!’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Be serious.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Oh, you cold creature! You know—you see: I can’t conceal. And you + tell me to go. “Go!” Gracious heavens! I’ve no claim on you; I haven’t + been able to do much; I would have—never mind! believe me or not. + And now I’m to go: on the spot, I suppose. You’ve seen the man I ‘m to go + to, too. I would bear it, if it were not away from... out of sight of I’m + a fool of a woman, I know. There’s frankness for you! and I could declare + you’re saying “impudence” in your heart—or what you have for one. + Have you one?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘My dear soul, it ‘s a flint. So just think of your duty.’ Dartrey played + the horrid part of executioner with some skill. + </p> + <p> + Her bosom sprang to descend into abysses. + </p> + <p> + ‘And never a greater fool than when I sent for you to see such a face as + I’m showing!’ she cried, with lips that twitched and fingers that plucked + at her belt. ‘But you might feel my hatred of being tied to—dragged + about over the Continent by that... perhaps you think a woman is not + sensible of vulgarity in her husband! I ‘m bothering you? I don’t say I + have the slightest claim. You never made love to me, never! Never so much + as pressed my hand or looked. Others have—as much as I let them. And + before I saw you, I had not an idea of another man but that man. So you + advise me to go?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘There’s no other course.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘No other course. I don’t see one. What have I been dreaming of! Usually a + woman feeling...’ she struck at her breast, ‘has had a soft word in her + ear. “Go!” I don’t blame you, Captain Dartrey. At least, you ‘re not the + man to punish a woman for stripping herself, as I ‘ve done. I call myself + a fool—I’m a lunatic. Trust me with your hand.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘There you are.’ + </p> + <p> + She grasped the hand, and shut her eyes to make a long age of the holding + on to him. ‘Oh, you dear dear fellow!—don’t think me unwomanly; I + must tell you now: I am naked and can’t disguise. I see you are ice—feel: + and if you were different, I might be. You won’t be hurt by hearing you’ve + made yourself dear to me—without meaning to, I know! It began that + day at Lakelands; I fell in love with you the very first minute I set eyes + on you! There’s a confession for a woman to make! and a married woman! I’m + married, and I no more feel allegiance, as they call it, than if there + never had been a ceremony and no Jacob Blathenoy was in existence. And why + I should go to him! But you shan’t be troubled. I did not begin to live, + as a woman, before I met you. I can speak all this to you because—we + women can’t be deceived in that—you are one of the men who can be + counted on for a friend.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘I hope so,’ Dartrey said, and his mouth hardened as nature’s electricity + shot sparks into him from the touch and rocked him. + </p> + <p> + ‘No, not yet: I will soon let it drop,’ said she, and she was just then + thrillingly pretty; she caressed the hand, placing it at her throat and + moving her chin on it, as women fondle birds. ‘I am positively to go, + then?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Positively, you are to go; and it’s my command.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Not in love with any one at all?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Not with a soul.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Not with a woman?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘With no woman.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Nor maid?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘No! and no to everything. And an end to the catechism!’ + </p> + <p> + ‘It is really a flint that beats here?’ she said, and with a shyness in + adventurousness, she struck the point of her forefinger on the rib. ‘Fancy + me in love with a flint! And running to be dutiful to a Jacob Blathenoy, + at my flint’s command. I’m half in love with doing what I hate, because + this cold thing here bids me do it. I believe I married for money, and now + it looks as if I were to have my bargain with poverty to bless it.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘There I may help,’ said Dartrey, relieved at sight of a loophole, to + spring to some initiative out of the paralysis cast on him by a pretty + little woman’s rending of her veil. A man of honour alone with a woman who + has tossed concealment to the winds, is a riddled target indeed: he is + tempted to the peril of cajoleing, that he may escape from the torment and + the ridicule; he is tempted to sigh for the gallant spirit of his naughty + adolescence. ‘Come to me—will you?—apply to me, if there’s + ever any need. I happen to have money. And forgive me for naming it.’ + </p> + <p> + She groaned: ‘Don’t! I’m, sure, and I thought it from the first, you’re + one of the good men, and the woman who meets you is lucky, and wretched, + and so she ought to be! Only to you should I!... do believe that! I won’t + speak of what excuses I’ve got. You’ve seen.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Don’t think of them: there’ll be danger in it. + </p> + <p> + ‘Shall you think of me in danger?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Silly, silly! Don’t you see you have to do with a flint! I’ve gone + through fire. And if I were in love with you, I should start you off to + your husband this blessed day.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘And you’re not the slightest wee wee bit in love with me!’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Perfectly true; but I like you; and if we’re to be hand in hand, in the + time to come, you must walk firm at present.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘I’m to go to-day?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘You are.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Without again.’ + </p> + <p> + The riddled target kicked. Dartrey contrasted Jacob Blathenoy with the + fair wife, and commiseratingly exonerated her; he lashed at himself for + continuing to be in this absurdest of postures, and not absolutely secure + for all that. His head shook. ‘Friends, you’ll find best.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Well!’ she sighed, ‘I feel I’m doomed to go famished through life. + There’s never to be such a thing as, love, for me! I can’t tell you no + woman could: though you’ll say I’ve told enough. I shall burn with shame + when I think of it. I could go on my knees to have your arms round me + once. I could kill myself for saying it!—I should feel that I had + one moment of real life.—I know I ought to admire you. They say a + woman hates if she’s refused. I can’t: I wish I were able to. I could have + helped the Radnors better by staying here and threatening never to go to + him unless he swore not to do them injury. He’s revengeful. Just as you + like. You say “Go,” and I go. There. I may kiss your hand?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Give me yours.’ + </p> + <p> + Dartrey kissed the hand. She kissed the mark of his lips. He got himself + away, by promising to see her to the train for Paris. Outside her door, he + was met by the reflection, coming as a thing external, that he might + veraciously and successfully have pleaded a passionate hunger for + breakfast: nay, that he would have done so, if he had been downright in + earnest. For she had the prettiness to cast a spell; a certain curve at + the lips, a fluttering droop of the eyelids, a corner of the eye, that led + long distances away to forests and nests. This little woman had the + rosy-peeping June bud’s plumpness. What of the man who refused to kiss her + once? Cold antecedent immersion had to be thanked; and stringent vacuity; + perhaps a spotting ogre-image of her possessor. Some sense of right-doing + also, we hope. Dartrey angrily attributed his good conduct to the lowest + motives. He went so far as to accuse himself of having forborne to speak + of breakfast, from a sort of fascinated respect for the pitch of a + situation that he despised and detested. Then again, when beginning to + eat, his good conduct drew on him a chorus of the jeers of all the martial + comrades he had known. But he owned he would have had less excuse than + they, had he taken advantage of a woman’s inability, at a weak moment, to + protect herself: or rather, if he had not behaved in a manner to protect + her from herself. He thought of his buried wife, and the noble in the base + of that poor soul; needing constantly a present helper, for the nobler to + conquer. Be true man with a woman, she must be viler than the devil has + yet made one, if she does not follow a strong right lead:—but be + patient, of course. And the word patience here means more than most men + contain. Certainly a man like Jacob Blathenoy was a mouthful for any + woman: and he had bought his wife, he deserved no pity. Not? Probably not. + That view, however, is unwholesome and opens on slides. Pity of his wife, + too, gets to be fervidly active with her portrait, fetches her breath + about us. As for condemnation of the poor little woman, her case was not + unexampled, though the sudden flare of it startled rather. Mrs. Victor + could read men and women closely. Yes, and Victor, when he schemed—but + Dartrey declined to be throwing blame right or left. More than by his + breakfast, and in a preferable direction, he was refreshed by Skepsey’s + narrative of the deeds of Matilda Pridden. + </p> + <p> + ‘The right sort of girl for you to know, Skepsey,’ he said. ‘The best in + life is a good woman.’ + </p> + <p> + Skepsey exhibited his book of the Gallic howl. + </p> + <p> + ‘They have their fits now and then, and they’re soon over and forgotten,’ + Dartrey said. ‘The worst of it is, that we remember.’ + </p> + <p> + After the morning’s visit to his uncle, he peered at half a dozen sticks + in the corner of the room, grasped their handles, and selected the + Demerara supple-jack, for no particular reason; the curved knot was easy + to the grasp. It was in his mind, that this person signing herself Judith + Marsett, might have something to say, which intimately concerned Nesta. He + fell to brooding on it, until he wondered why he had not been made a + trifle anxious by the reading of the note overnight. Skepsey was left at + Nesta’s house. + </p> + <p> + Dartrey found himself expected by the servant waiting on Mrs. Marsett. + </p> + <p> + <a name="link2HCH0032" id="link2HCH0032"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + CHAPTER XXXII. SHOWS HOW TEMPER MAY KINDLE TEMPER AND AN INDIGNANT WOMAN + GET HER WEAPON + </h2> + <p> + Judith Marsett stood in her room to receive Nesta’s hero. She was flushed, + and had thinned her lips for utterance of a desperate thing, after the + first severe formalities. + </p> + <p> + Her aim was to preserve an impressive decorum. She was at the same time + burning to speak out furious wrath, in words of savage rawness, if they + should come, as a manner of slapping the world’s cheek for the state to + which it reduces its women; whom one of the superior creatures can insult, + and laugh. + </p> + <p> + Men complaining of the ‘peace which is near their extinction,’ have but to + shuffle with the sex; they will experience as remarkable a change as if + they had passed off land on to sea. + </p> + <p> + Dartrey had some flitting notion of the untamed original elements women + can bring about us, in his short observant bow to Mrs. Marsett, following + so closely upon the scene with Mrs. Blathenoy. + </p> + <p> + But this handsome woman’s look of the dull red line of a sombre fire, that + needed only stir of a breath to shoot the blaze, did not at all alarm him. + He felt refreshingly strung by it. + </p> + <p> + She was discerned at a glance to be an aristocratic member of regions + where the senses perpetually simmer when they are not boiling. The talk at + the Club recurred to him. How could Nesta have come to know the woman? His + questioning of the chapter of marvellous accidents, touched Nesta simply, + as a young girl to be protected, without abhorrently involving the woman. + He had his ideas of the Spirit of Woman stating her case to the One Judge, + for lack of an earthly just one: a story different from that which is + proclaimed pestilential by the body of censors under conservatory glass; + where flesh is delicately nurtured, highly prized; spirit not so much so; + and where the pretty tricking of the flesh is taken for a spiritual + ascendancy. + </p> + <p> + In spite of her turbulent breast’s burden to deliver, Mrs. Marsett’s + feminine acuteness was alive upon Dartrey, confirming here and there + Nesta’s praises of him. She liked his build and easy carriage of a + muscular frame: her Ned was a heavy man. More than Dartrey’s figure, as + she would have said, though the estimate came second, she liked his manner + with her. Not a doubt was there, that he read her position. She could + impose upon some: not upon masculine eyes like these. They did not + scrutinize, nor ruffle a smooth surface with a snap at petty impressions; + and they were not cynically intimate or dominating or tentatively amorous: + clear good fellowship was in them. And it was a blessedness (whatever + might be her feeling later, when she came to thank him at heart) to be in + the presence of a man whose appearance breathed of offering her common + ground, whereon to meet and speak together, unburdened by the hunting + world, and by the stoneing world. Such common ground seems a kind of + celestial to the better order of those excluded from it. + </p> + <p> + Dartrey relieved her midway in a rigid practice of the formalities: ‘I + think I may guess that you have something to tell me relating to Miss + Radnor?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘It is.’ Mrs. Marsett gathered up for an immediate plunge, and deferred + it. ‘I met her—we went out with the riding-master. She took to me. I + like her—I could say’ (the woman’s voice dropped dead low, in a + tremble), ‘I love her. She is young: I could kneel to her. Do you know a + Major Worrell?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Worrell? no.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘He is a-calls himself a friend of my—of Captain Marsett’s. He met + us out one day.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘He permitted himself to speak to Miss Radnor?’ + </p> + <p> + She rejoiced in Dartrey’s look. ‘Not then. First let me tell you. I can + hardly tell you. But Miss Radnor tells me you are not like other men. You + have made your conclusions already. Are you asking what right I had to be + knowing her? It is her goodness. Accident began it; I did not deceive her; + as soon as ever I could I—I have Captain Marsett’s promise to me: at + present he’s situated, he—but I opened my heart to her: as much as a + woman can. It came! Did I do very wrong?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘I’m not here to decide: continue, pray.’ + </p> + <p> + Mrs. Marsett aimed at formal speech, and was driving upon her natural in + anger. ‘I swear I did it for the best. She is an innocent girl... young + lady: only she has a head; she soon reads things. I saw the kind of cloud + in her. I spoke. I felt bound to: she said she would not forsake me.—I + was bound to! And it was enough to break my heart, to think of her + despising me. No, she forgave, pitied;—she was kind. Those are the + angels who cause us to think of changeing. I don’t care for sermons, but + when I meet charity: I won’t bore you!’ + </p> + <p> + ‘You don’t.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘My... Captain Marsett can’t bear—he calls it Psalmody. He thinks + things ought always to be as they are, with women and men; and women + preachers he does detest. She is not one to preach. You are waiting to + hear what I have to tell. That man Major Worrell has tried to rob me of + everything I ever had to set a value on:—love, I ‘d say;—he + laughs at a woman like me loving.’ + </p> + <p> + Dartrey nodded, to signify a known sort of fellow. + </p> + <p> + ‘She came here.’ Mrs. Marsett’s tears had risen. ‘I ought not to have let + her come. I invited her—for once: I am lonely. None of my sex—none + I could respect! I meant it for only once. She promised to sing to me. + And, Oh! how she sings! You have heard her. My whole heart came out. I + declare I believe girls exist who can hear our way of life—and I’m + not so bad except compared with that angel, who heard me, and was and is, + I could take oath, no worse for it. Some girls can; she is one. I am all + for bringing them up in complete innocence. If I was a great lady, my + daughters should never know anything of the world until they were married. + But Miss Radnor is a young lady who cannot be hurt. She is above us. Oh! + what a treasure for a man!—and my God! for any man born of woman to + insult a saint, as she is!—He is a beast!’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Major Worrell met her here?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Blame me as much as you like: I do myself. Half my rage with him is at + myself for putting her in the way of such a beast to annoy. Each time she + came, I said it was to be the last. I let her see what a mercy from heaven + she was to me. She would come. It has not been many times. She wishes me + either to... Captain Marsett has promised. And nothing seems hard—to + me when my own God’s angel is by. She is! I’m not such a bad woman, but I + never before I knew her knew the meaning of the word virtue. There is the + young lady that man worried with his insulting remarks! though he must + have known she was a lady:—because he found her in my rooms.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘You were present when, as you say, he insulted her?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘I was. Here it commenced; and he would see her downstairs.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘You heard?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Of course, I never left her.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Give me a notion...’ + </p> + <p> + ‘To get her to make an appointment: to let him conduct her home.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘She was alone?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Her maid was below.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘And this happened...?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Yesterday, after dark. My Ned—Captain Marsett encourages him to be + familiar. I should be the lowest of women if I feared the threats of such + a reptile of a man. I could tell you more. I can’t always refuse his + visits, though if Ned knew the cur he is! Captain Marsett is easy-going.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘I should like to know where he lives.’ + </p> + <p> + She went straight to the mantelpiece, and faced about with a card, handing + it, quite aware that it was a charge of powder. + </p> + <p> + Desperate things to be done excused the desperate said; and especially + they seemed a cover to the bald and often spotty language leaping out of + her, against her better taste, when her temper was up. + </p> + <p> + ‘Somewhere not very distant,’ said Dartrey perusing. ‘Is he in the town + to-day, do you know?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘I am not sure; he may be. Her name...’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Have no fear. Ladies’ names are safe.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘I am anxious that she may not be insulted again.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Did she show herself conscious of it?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘She stopped speaking: she looked at the door. She may come again—or + never! through that man!’ + </p> + <p> + ‘You receive him, at his pleasure?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Captain Marsett wishes me to. He is on his way home. He calls Major + Worrell my pet spite. All I want is; not to hear of the man. I swear he + came yesterday on the chance of seeing—for he forced his way up past + my servant; he must have seen Miss Radnor’s maid below.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘You don’t mean, that he insulted her hearing?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Oh! Captain Fenellan, you know the style.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Well, I thank you,’ Dartrey said. ‘The young lady is the daughter of my + dearest friends. She’s one of the precious—you’re quite right. Keep + the tears back.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘I will.’ She heaved open-mouthed to get physical control of the tide. + ‘When you say that of her!—how can I help it? It’s I fear, because I + fear... and I’ve no right to expect ever... but if I’m never again to look + on that dear face, tell her I shall—I shall pray for her in my + grave. Tell her she has done all a woman can, an angel can, to save my + soul. I speak truth: my very soul! I could never go to the utter bad after + knowing her. I don’t—you know the world—I’m a poor helpless + woman!—don’t swear to give up my Ned if he does break the word he + promised once; I can’t see how I could. I haven’t her courage. I haven’t—what + it is! You know her: it’s in her eyes and her voice. If I had her beside + me, then I could starve or go to execution—I could, I am certain. + Here I am, going to do what you men hate. Let me sit.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Here’s a chair,’ said Dartrey. ‘I’ve no time to spare; good day, for the + present. You will permit me to call.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Oh! come’; she cried, out of her sobs, for excuse. They were genuine, or + she would better have been able to second her efforts to catch a distinct + vision of his retreating figure. + </p> + <p> + She beheld him, when he was in the street, turn for the district where + Major Worrell had his lodgeings. That set her mind moving, and her tears + fell no longer. + </p> + <p> + Major Worrell was not at home. Dartrey was informed that he might be at + his Club. + </p> + <p> + At the Club he heard of the major as having gone to London and being + expected down in the afternoon. Colonel Sudley named the train: an early + train; the major was engaged to dine at the Club. Dartrey had information + supplied to him concerning Major Worrell and Captain Marsett, also Mrs. + Marsett. She had a history. Worthy citizens read the description of + history with interest when the halo of Royalty is round it. They may, if + their reading extends, perceive, that it has been the main turbid stream + in old Mammon’s train since he threw his bait for flesh. They might ask, + too, whether it is likely to cease to flow while he remains potent. The + lady’s history was brief, and bore recital in a Club; came off quite + honourably there. Regarding Major Worrell, the tale of him showed him to + have a pass among men. He managed cleverly to get his pleasures out of a + small income and a ‘fund of anecdote.’ His reputation indicated an + anecdotist of the table, prevailing in the primitive societies, where the + art of conversing does not come by nature, and is exercised in + monosyllabic undertones or grunts until the narrator’s well-masticated + popular anecdote loosens a digestive laughter, and some talk ensues. He + was Marsett’s friend, and he boasted of not letting Ned Marsett make a + fool of himself. + </p> + <p> + Dartrey was not long in shaping the man’s character: Worrell belonged to + the male birds of upper air, who mangle what female prey they are + forbidden to devour. And he had Miss Radnor’s name: he had spoken her name + at the Club overnight. He had roused a sensation, because of a man being + present, Percy Southweare, who was related to a man as good as engaged to + marry her. The major never fell into a quarrel with sons of nobles, if he + could help it, or there might have been a pretty one. + </p> + <p> + So Colonel Sudley said. + </p> + <p> + Dartrey spoke musing: ‘I don’t know how he may class me; I have an account + to square with him.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘It won’t do in these days, my good friend. Come and cool yourself; and + we’ll lunch here. I shan’t leave you.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘By all means. We’ll lunch, and walk up to the station, and you will point + him out to me.’ + </p> + <p> + Dartrey stated Major Worrell’s offence. The colonel was not astonished; + but evidently he thought less of Worrell’s behaviour to Miss Radnor in + Mrs. Marsett’s presence than of the mention of her name at the Club: and + that, he seemed to think, had a shade of excuse against the charge of + monstrous. He blamed the young lady who could go twice to visit a Mrs. + Marsett; partly exposed a suspicion of her. Dartrey let him talk. They + strolled along the parade, and were near the pier. + </p> + <p> + Suddenly saying: ‘There, beside our friend in clerical garb: here she + comes; judge if that is the girl for the foulest of curs to worry, no + matter where she’s found.’ Dartrey directed the colonel’s attention to + Nesta and Mr. Barmby turning off the pier and advancing. + </p> + <p> + He saluted. She bowed. There was no contraction of her eyelids; and her + face was white. The mortal life appeared to be deadened in her cold wide + look; as when the storm-wind banks a leaden remoteness, leaving blown + space of sky. + </p> + <p> + The colonel said: ‘No, that’s not the girl a gentleman would offend.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘What man!’ cried Dartrey. ‘If we had a Society for the trial of your + gentleman!—but he has only to call himself gentleman to get grant of + licence: and your Society protects him. It won’t punish, and it won’t let + you. But you saw her: ask yourself—what man could offend that girl!’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Still, my friend, she ought to keep clear of the Marsetts.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘When I meet him, I shall treat him as one out of the law.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘You lead on to an ultimate argument with the hangman.’ + </p> + <p> + We ‘ll dare it, to waken the old country. Old England will count none but + Worrells in time. As for discreet, if you like!—the young lady might + have been more discreet. She’s a girl with a big heart. If we were all + everlastingly discreet!’ + </p> + <p> + Dartrey may have meant, that the consequence of a prolonged conformity + would be the generation of stenches to shock to purgeing tempests the + tolerant heavens over such smooth stagnancy. He had his ideas about + movement; about the good of women, and the health of his England. The + feeling of the hopelessness of pleading Nesta’s conduct, for the perfect + justification of it to son or daughter of our impressing conventional + world—even to a friend, that friend a true man, a really chivalrous + man—drove him back in a silence upon his natural brotherhood with + souls that dare do. It was a wonder, to think of his finding this kinship + in a woman. In a girl?—and the world holding that virgin spirit to + be unclean or shadowed because its rays were shed on foul places? He + clasped the girl. Her smitten clear face, the face of the second sigh + after torture, bent him in devotion to her image. + </p> + <p> + The clasping and the worshipping were independent of personal ardours: + quaintly mixed with semi-paternal recollections of the little ‘blue + butterfly’ of the days at Craye. Farm and Creckholt; and he had heard of + Dudley Sowerby’s pretensions to; her hand. Nesta’s youthfulness cast + double age on him from the child’s past. He pictured the child; pictured + the girl, with her look of solitariness of sight; as in the desolate wide + world, where her noble compassion for a woman had unexpectedly, painfully, + almost by transubstantiation, rack-screwed her to woman’s mind. And above + sorrowful, holy were those eyes. + </p> + <p> + They held sway over Dartrey, and lost it some steps on; his demon temper + urgeing him to strike at Major Worrell, as the cause of her dismayed + expression. He was not the happier for dropping to his nature; but we + proceed more easily, all of us, when the strain which lifts us a foot or + two off our native level is relaxed. + </p> + <p> + <a name="link2HCH0033" id="link2HCH0033"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + CHAPTER XXXIII. A PAIR OF WOOERS + </h2> + <p> + That ashen look of the rise out of death from one of our mortal wounds, + was caused by deeper convulsions in Nesta’s bosom than Dartrey could + imagine. + </p> + <p> + She had gone for the walk with Mr. Barmby, reading the omen of his tones + in the request. Dorothea and Virginia would have her go. The clerical + gentleman, a friend of the Rev. Abram Posterley; and one who deplored poor + Mr. Posterley’s infatuation; and one besides who belonged to Nesta’s + musical choir in London: seemed a safe companion for the child. The grand + organ of Mr. Barmby’s voice, too, assured them of a devout seriousness in + him, that arrested any scrupulous little questions. They could not + conceive his uttering the nonsensical empty stuff, compliments to their + beauty and what not, which girls hear sometimes from inconsiderate + gentlemen, to the having of their heads turned. Moreover, Nesta had rashly + promised her father’s faithful servant Skepsey to walk, out with him in + the afternoon; and the ladies hoped she would find the morning’s walk to + have been enough; good little man though Skepsey was, they were sure. But + there is the incongruous for young women of station on a promenade. + </p> + <p> + Mr. Barmby headed to the pier. After pacing up and down between the briny + gulls and a polka-band, he made his way forethoughtfully to the + glass-sheltered seats fronting East: where, as his enthusiasm for the + solemnity of the occasion excited him to say, ‘We have a view of the + terraces and the cliffs’; and where not more than two enwrapped invalid + figures were ensconsed. Then it was, that Nesta recalled her anticipation + of his possible design; forgotten by her during their talk of her dear + people: Priscilla Graves and Mr. Pempton, and the Yatts, and Simeon + Fenellan, Peridon and Catkin, and Skepsey likewise; and the very latest + news of her mother. She wished she could have run before him, to spare + him. He would not notice a sign. Girls must wait and hear. + </p> + <p> + It was an oratorio. She watched the long wave roll on to the sinking into + its fellow; and onward again for the swell and the weariful lapse; and up + at last bursting to the sheet of white. The far-heard roar and the near + commingled, giving Mr. Barmby a semblance to the powers of ocean. + </p> + <p> + At the first direct note, the burden of which necessitated a pause, she + petitioned him to be her friend, to think of himself as her friend. + </p> + <p> + But a vessel laden with merchandize, that has crossed wild seas for this + particular port, is hardly to be debarred from discharging its goods on + the quay by simple intimations of their not being wanted. We are + precipitated both by the aim and the tedium of the lengthened voyage to + insist that they be seen. We believe perforce in their temptingness; and + should allurement fail, we fall back to the belief in our eloquence. An + eloquence to expose the qualities they possess, is the testification in + the promise of their excellence. She is to be induced by feeling to see + it. We are asking a young lady for the precious gift of her hand. We + respect her; and because of our continued respect, despite an obstruction, + we have come to think we have a claim upon her gratitude; could she but be + led to understand how different we are from some other man!—from one + hitherto favoured among them, unworthy of this prize, however personally + exalted and meritorious. + </p> + <p> + The wave of wide extension rolled and sank and rose, heaving lifeless + variations of the sickly streaks on its dull green back. + </p> + <p> + Dudley Sowerby’s defection was hinted at and accounted for, by the worldly + test of worldly considerations. + </p> + <p> + What were they?—Nesta glanced. + </p> + <p> + An indistinct comparison was modestly presented, of one unmoved by worldly + considerations. + </p> + <p> + But what were they? She was wakened by a lamp, and her darkness was all + inflammable to it. + </p> + <p> + ‘Oh! Mr. Barmby, you have done me the honour to speak before; you know my + answer,’ she said. + </p> + <p> + ‘You were then subject to an influence. A false, I may say wicked, + sentiment upholding celibacy.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘My poor Louise? She never thought of influencing me. She has her views, I + mine. Our friendship does not depend on a “treaty of reciprocity.” We are + one at heart, each free to judge and act, as it should be in friendship. I + heard from her this morning. Her brother will be able to resume his + military duties next month. Then she will return to me.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘We propose!’ rejoined Mr. Barmby. + </p> + <p> + Beholding the involuntary mercurial rogue-dimple he had started from a + twitch at the corner, of her lips, the good gentleman pursued: ‘Can we + dare write our designs for the month to come? Ah!—I will say—Nesta! + give me the hope I beg to have. See the seriousness. You are at liberty. + That other has withdrawn his pretensions. We will not blame him. He is in + expectation of exalted rank. Where there is any shadow...!’ Mr. Barmby + paused on his outroll of the word; but immediately, not intending to weigh + down his gentle hearer with the significance in it, resumed at a yet more + sonorous depth: ‘He is under the obligation to his family; an old, a + venerable family. In the full blaze of public opinion! His conduct can be + palliated by us, too. There is a right and wrong in minor things, + independent of the higher rectitude. We pardon, we can partly support, the + worldly view.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘There is a shadow?’ said Nesta; and her voice was lurefully encouraging. + </p> + <p> + He was on the footing where men are precipitated by what is within them to + blunder. ‘On you—no. On you personally, not at all. No. It could not + be deemed so. Not by those knowing, esteeming—not by him who loves + you, and would, with his name, would, with his whole strength, envelop, + shield ... certainly, certainly not.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘It is on my parents?’ she said. + </p> + <p> + ‘But to me nothing, nothing, quite nought! To confound the innocent with + the guilty!... and excuses may exist. We know but how little we know!’ + </p> + <p> + ‘It is on both my parents?’ she said; with a simplicity that induced him + to reply: ‘Before the world. But not, I repeat...’ + </p> + <p> + The band-instruments behind the sheltering glass flourished on their + termination of a waltz. + </p> + <p> + She had not heeded their playing. Now she said: + </p> + <p> + ‘The music is over; we must not be late at lunch’; and she stood up and + moved. + </p> + <p> + He sprang to his legs and obediently stepped out: + </p> + <p> + ‘I shall have your answer to-day, this evening? Nesta!’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Mr. Barmby, it will be the same. You will be kind to me in not asking me + again.’ + </p> + <p> + He spoke further. She was dumb. + </p> + <p> + Had he done ill or well for himself and for her when he named the shadow + on her parents? He dwelt more on her than on himself: he would not have + wounded her to win the blest affirmative. Could she have been entirely + ignorant?—and after Dudley Sowerby’s defection? For such it was: the + Rev. Stuart Rem had declared the union between the almost designated head + of the Cantor family and a young person of no name, of worse than no + birth, impossible: ‘absolutely and totally impossible,’ he, had said, in + his impressive fashion, speaking from his knowledge of the family, and an + acquaintance with Dudley. She must necessarily have learnt why Dudley + Sowerby withdrew. No parents of an attractive daughter should allow her to + remain unaware of her actual position in the world. It is criminal, a + reduplication of the criminality! Yet she had not spoken as one + astonished. She was mysterious. Women are so: young women most of all. It + is undecided still whether they do of themselves conceive principles, or + should submit to an imposition of the same upon them in terrorem. + Mysterious truly, but most attractive! As Lady Bountiful of a district, + she would have in her maturity the majestic stature to suit a dispensation + of earthly good things. And, strangely, here she was, at this moment, + rivalling to excelling all others of her sex (he verified it in the crowd + of female faces passing), when they, if they but knew the facts, would + visit her very appearance beside them on a common footing as an intrusion + and a scandal. To us who know, such matters are indeed wonderful! + </p> + <p> + Moved by reflective compassion, Mr. Barmby resumed the wooer’s note, some + few steps after he had responded to the salutation of Dartrey Fenellan and + Colonel Sudley. She did not speak. She turned her forehead to him; and the + absence of the world from her eyes chilled his tongue. + </p> + <p> + He declined the pleasure of the lunch with the Duvidney ladies. He desired + to be alone, to question himself fasting, to sound the deed he had done; + for he had struck on a suspicion of selfishness in it: and though Love + must needs be an egoism, Love is no warrant for the doing of a hurt to the + creature beloved. Thoughts upon Skepsey and the tale of his Matilda + Pridden’s labours in poor neighbourhoods, to which he had been inattentive + during the journey down to the sea, invaded him; they were persistent. He + was a worthy man, having within him the spiritual impulse curiously ready + to take the place where a material disappointment left vacancy. The vulgar + sort embrace the devil at that stage. Before the day had sunk, Mr. + Barmby’s lowest wish was, to be a light, as the instrument of his Church + in her ministrations amid the haunts of sin and slime, to such plain souls + as Daniel Skepsey and Matilda Pridden. And he could still be that, if + Nesta, in the chapters of the future, changed her mind. She might; for her + good she would; he reserved the hope. His light was one to burn beneath an + extinguisher. + </p> + <p> + At the luncheon table of the Duvidney ladies, it was a pain to Dorothea + and Virginia to witness how poor the appetite their Nesta brought in from + the briny blowy walk. They prophesied against her chances of a good sleep + at night, if she did not eat heartily. Virginia timidly remarked on her + paleness. Both of them put their simple arts in motion to let her know, + that she was dear to them: so dear as to make them dread the hour of + parting. They named their dread of it. They had consulted in private and + owned to one another, that they did really love the child, and dared not + look forward to what they would do without her. The dear child’s paleness + and want of appetite (they remembered they were observing a weak innocent + girl) suggested to them mutually the idea of a young female heart + sickening, for the old unhappy maiden reason. But, if only she might + return with them to the Wells, the Rev. Stuart Rem would assure her to + convince her of her not being quite, quite forsaken. He, or some one + having sanction from Victor, might ultimately (the ladies waiting + anxiously in the next room, to fold her on the warmth of their bosoms when + she had heard) impart to her the knowledge of circumstances, which would, + under their further tuition concerning the particular sentiments of great + families and the strict duties of the scions of the race, help to account + for and excuse the Hon. Dudley Sowerby’s behaviour. + </p> + <p> + They went up to the drawing-room, talking of Skepsey and his tale of Miss + Pridden, for Nesta’s amusement. Any talk of her Skepsey usually quickened + her lips to reminiscent smiles and speech. Now she held on to gazeing; and + sadly, it seemed; as if some object were not present. + </p> + <p> + For a vague encouragement, Dorothea said: ‘One week, and we are back home + at Moorsedge!’—not so far from Cronidge, was implied, for the + administering of some foolish temporary comfort. And it was as when a fish + on land springs its hollow sides in alien air for the sustaining element; + the girl panted; she clasped Dorothea’s hand and looked at Virginia: ‘My + mother—I must see her!’ she said. They were slightly stupefied by + the unwonted mention of her mother. They made no reply. They never had + done so when there was allusion to her mother. Their silence now struck a + gong at the girl’s bosom. + </p> + <p> + Dorothea had it in mind to say, that if she thirsted for any special + comfort, the friends about her would offer consolation for confidence. + </p> + <p> + Before she could speak, Perrin the footman entered, bearing the card of + the Hon. Dudley Sowerby. + </p> + <p> + Mr. Dudley Sowerby begged for an immediate interview with Miss Radnor. + </p> + <p> + The ladies were somewhat agitated, but no longer perplexed as to their + duties. They had quitted Moorsedge to avoid the visit of his family. If he + followed, it signified that which they could not withstand:—The + ‘Tivoli falls!’ as they named the fateful tremendous human passion, from + the reminiscences of an impressive day on their travels in youth; when the + leaping torrent had struck upon a tale of love they were reading. They + hurriedly entreated Nesta to command her nerves; peremptorily requested + her to stay where she was; showed her spontaneously, by way of histrionic + adjuration, the face to be worn by young ladies at greetings on these + occasions; kissed her and left her; Virginia whispering: ‘He is true!’ + </p> + <p> + Dudley entered the drawing-room, charged with his happy burden of a love + that had passed through the furnace. She stood near a window, well in the + light; she hardly gave him welcome. His address to her was hurried, rather + uncertain, coherent enough between the drop and the catch of articulate + syllables. He found himself holding his hat. He placed it on the table, + and it rolled foolishly; but soon he was by her side, having two free + hands to claim her one. + </p> + <p> + ‘You are thinking, you have not heard from me! I have been much occupied,’ + he said. ‘My brother is ill, very ill. I have your pardon?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Indeed you have—if it has to be asked.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘I have it?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Have I to grant it?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘I own to remissness! + </p> + <p> + ‘I did not blame you.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Nesta...!’ + </p> + <p> + Her coldness was unshaken. + </p> + <p> + He repeated the call of her name. ‘I should have written—I ought to + have written!—I could not have expressed... You do forgive? So many + things!’ + </p> + <p> + ‘You come from Cronidge to-day?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘From my family—to you.’ + </p> + <p> + She seemed resentful. His omissions as a correspondent were explicable in + a sentence. It had to be deferred. + </p> + <p> + Reviewing for a moment the enormous internal conflict undergone by him + during the period of the silence between them, he wondered at the vastness + of the love which had conquered objections, to him so poignant. + </p> + <p> + There was at least no seeing of the public blot on her birth when looking + on her face. Nor when thinking of the beauty of her character, in absence + or in presence, was there any. He had mastered distaste to such a degree, + that he forgot the assistance he had received from the heiress for + enabling him to appreciate the fair young girl. Money is the imperious + requirement of superior station; and more money and more: in these our + modern days of the merchant’s wealth, and the miner’s, and the gigantic + American and Australian millionaires, high rank is of necessity vowed, in + peril of utter eclipse; to the possession of money. Still it is, when + assured, a consideration far to the rear with a gentleman in whose bosom + love and the buzzing world have fought their battle out. He could believe + it thoroughly fought out, by the prolonged endurance of a contest lasting + many days and nights; in the midst of which, at one time, the task of + writing to tell her of his withdrawal from the engagement, was the cause + of his omission to write. + </p> + <p> + As to her character, he dwelt on the charm of her recovered features, to + repress an indicative dread of some intrepid force behind it, that might + be unfeminine, however gentle the external lineaments. Her features, her + present aristocratic deficiency of colour, greatly pleased him; her + character would submit to moulding. Of all young ladies in the world, she + should be the one to shrink from a mental independence and hold to the + guidance of the man ennobling her. Did she? Her eyes were reading him. She + had her father’s limpid eyes, and when they concentrated rays, they shot. + </p> + <p> + ‘Have you seen my parents, Mr. Sowerby?’ + </p> + <p> + He answered smilingly, for reassuringly: ‘I have seen them.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘My mother?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘From your mother first. But am I not to be Dudley?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘She spoke to you? She told you?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘And yesterday your father—a second time.’ + </p> + <p> + Some remainder of suspicion in the dealing with members of this family, + urged Dudley to say: ‘I understood from them, you were not?... that you + were quite...?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘I have heard: I have guessed: it was recently—this morning, as it + happened. I wish to go to my mother to-day. I shall go to her to-morrow.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘I might offer to conduct you-now!’ + </p> + <p> + ‘You are kind; I have Skepsey.’ She relieved the situation of its + cold-toned strain in adding: ‘He is a host.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘But I may come?—now! Have I not the right? You do not deny it me?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘You are very generous.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘I claim the right, then. Always. And subsequently, soon after, my mother + hopes to welcome you at Cronidge. She will be glad to hear of your naming + of a day. My father bids me... he and all our family.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘They are very generous.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘I may send them word this evening of a day you name?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘No, Mr. Sowerby. + </p> + <p> + ‘Dudley?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘I cannot say it. I have to see my parents.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Between us, surely?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘My whole heart thanks you for your goodness to me. I am unable to say + more.’ + </p> + <p> + He had again observed and he slightly crisped under the speculative look + she directed on him: a simple unstrained look, that had an air of reading + right in, and was worse to bear with than when the spark leaped upon some + thought from her eyes: though he had no imagination of anything he + concealed—or exposed, and he would have set it down to her temporary + incredulousness of his perfect generosity or power to overcome the world’s + opinion of certain circumstances. That had been a struggle! The peculiar + look was not renewed. She spoke warmly of her gratitude. She stated, that + she must of necessity see her parents at once. She submitted to his + entreaty to conduct her to them on the morrow. It was in the manner of one + who yielded step by step, from inability to contend. + </p> + <p> + Her attitude continuing unchanged, he became sensible of a monotony in the + speech with which he assailed it, and he rose to leave, not dissatisfied. + She, at his urgent request, named her train for London in the early + morning. He said it was not too early. He would have desired to be warmed; + yet he liked her the better for the moral sentiment controlling the + physical. He had appointments with relatives or connections in the town, + and on that pretext he departed, hoping for the speedy dawn of the morrow + as soon as he had turned his back on the house. + </p> + <p> + No, not he the man to have pity of women underfoot! That was the thought, + unrevolved, unphrased, all but unconscious, in Nesta: and while her heart + was exalting him for his generosity. Under her present sense of the + chilling shadow, she felt the comfort there was in being grateful to him + for the golden beams which his generosity cast about her. But she had an + intelligence sharp to pierce, virgin though she was; and with the mark in + sight, however distant, she struck it, unerring as an Artemis for blood of + beasts: those shrewd young wits, on the lookout to find a champion, + athirst for help upon a desolate road, were hard as any judicial to + pronounce the sentence upon Dudley in that respect. She raised him high; + she placed herself low; she had a glimpse of the struggle he had gone + through; love of her had helped him, she believed. And she was melted; and + not the less did the girl’s implacable intuition read with the keenness of + eye of a man of the world the blunt division in him, where warm humanity + stopped short at the wall of social concrete forming a part of this + rightly esteemed young citizen. She, too, was divided: she was at his + feet; and she rebuked herself for daring to judge—or rather, it was, + for having a reserve in her mind upon a man proving so generous with her. + She was pulled this way and that by sensibilities both inspiring to blind + gratitude and quickening her penetrative view. The certainty of an + unerring perception remained. + </p> + <p> + Dorothea and Virginia were seated in the room below, waiting for their + carriage, when the hall-door spoke of the Hon. Dudley’s departure; soon + after, Nesta entered to them. She swam up to Dorothea’s lap, and dropped + her head on it, kneeling. + </p> + <p> + The ladies feared she might be weeping. Dorothea patted her thick brown + twisted locks of hair. Unhappiness following such an interview, struck + them as an ill sign. + </p> + <p> + Virginia bent to the girl’s ear, and murmured: ‘All well?’ + </p> + <p> + She replied: ‘He has been very generous.’ + </p> + <p> + Her speaking of the words renewed an oppression, that had darkened her on + the descent of stairs. For sensibilities sharp as Nesta’s, are not to be + had without their penalties: and she who had gone nigh to summing in a + flash the nature of Dudley, sank suddenly under that affliction often + besetting the young adventurous mind, crushing to young women:—the + fascination exercised upon them by a positive adverse masculine attitude + and opinion. Young men know well what it is: and if young women have by + chance overcome their timidity, to the taking of any step out of the trim + pathway, they shrink, with a sense of forlornest isolation. It becomes a + subjugation; inciting to revolt, but a heavy weight to cast off. Soon it + assumed its material form for the contention between her and Dudley, in + the figure of Mrs. Marsett. The Nesta who had been instructed to know + herself to be under a shadow, heard, she almost justified Dudley’s + reproaches to her, for having made the acquaintance of the unhappy woman, + for having visited her, for having been, though but for a minute, at the + mercy of a coarse gentleman’s pursuit. The recollection was a smart + buffet. + </p> + <p> + Her lighted mind punished her thus through her conjuring of Dudley’s + words, should news of her relations with Mrs. Marsett reach him:—and + she would have to tell him. Would he not say: ‘I have borne with the + things concerning your family. All the greater reason why I must insist’—he + would assuredly say he insisted (her humour caught at the word, as being + the very word one could foresee and clearly see him uttering in a fit of + vehemence) on her immediate abandonment of ‘that woman.’ + </p> + <p> + And with Nesta’s present enlightenment by dusky beams, upon her parentage, + she listened abjectly to Dudley, or the opinion of the majority. Would he + not say or think, that her clinging to Mrs. Marsett put them under a kind + of common stamp, or gave the world its option to class them together? + </p> + <p> + These were among the ideas chasing in a head destined to be a battle-field + for the enrichment of a harvest-field of them, while the girl’s face was + hidden on Dorothea’s lap, and her breast heaved and heaved. + </p> + <p> + She distressed them when she rose, by saying she must instantly see her + mother. + </p> + <p> + They saw the pain their hesitation inflicted, and Dorothea said: ‘Yes, + dear; any day you like.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘To-morrow—I must go to her to-morrow!’ + </p> + <p> + A suggestion of her mother’s coming down, was faintly spoken by one lady, + echoed in a quaver by the other. + </p> + <p> + Nesta shook her head. To quiet the kind souls, she entreated them to give + their promise that they would invite her again. + </p> + <p> + Imagining the Hon. Dudley to have cast her off, both ladies embraced her: + not entirely yielding-up their hearts to her, by reason of the pernicious + new ideas now in the world to sap our foundations of morality; which + warned them of their duty to uphold mentally his quite justifiable + behaviour, even when compassionating the sufferings of the guiltless + creature loved by them. + </p> + <p> + <a name="link2HCH0034" id="link2HCH0034"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + CHAPTER XXXIV. CONTAINS DEEDS UNRELATED AND EXPOSITIONS OF FEELINGS + </h2> + <p> + All through the afternoon and evening Skepsey showed indifference to meals + by continuing absent: and he was the one with whom Nesta would have felt + at home; more at home than with her parents. He and the cool world he + moved in were a transparency of peace to her mind; even to his giving of + some portion of it, when she had the dear little man present to her in a + vivid image of a fish in a glass globe, wandering round and round, now and + then shooting across, just as her Skepsey did: he carried his head + semihorizontally at his arrowy pace; plain to read though he was, he + appeared, under that image created of him, animated by motives inducing to + speculation. + </p> + <p> + She thought of him till she could have reproached him for not returning + and helping her to get away from the fever of other thoughts:—this + anguish twisting about her parents, and the dreadful trammels of gratitude + to a man afflictingly generous, the frown of congregated people. + </p> + <p> + The latter was the least of evils; she had her charges to bring against + them for injustice: uncited, unstirred charges, they were effective as a + muffled force to sustain her: and the young who are of healthy lively + blood and clean conscience have either emotion or imagination to fold them + defensively from an enemy world; whose power to drive them forth into the + wilderness they acknowledge. But in the wilderness their souls are not + beaten down by breath of mortals; they burn straight flame there up to the + parent Spirit. + </p> + <p> + She could not fancy herself flying thither;—where to be shorn and + naked and shivering is no hardship, for the solitude clothes, and the sole + true life in us resolves to that steady flame;—she was restrained by + Dudley’s generosity, which held her fast to have the forgiveness for her + uncommitted sin dashed in her face. He surprised her; the unexpected + quality in him seemed suddenly to have snared her fast: and she did not + obtain release after seeing behind it;—seeing it, by the light of + what she demanded, personal, shallow, a lover’s generosity. So her keen + intellect saw it; and her young blood (for the youthful are thus divided) + thrilled in thinking it must be love! The name of the sacred passion + lifted it out of the petty cabin of the individual into a quiring + cathedral universal, and subdued her. It subdued her with an unwelcome + touch of tenderness when she thought of it as involving tenderness for her + mother, some chivalrous respect for her mother. Could he love the daughter + without some little, which a more intimate knowledge of her dear mother + would enlarge? The girl’s heart flew to her mother, clung to her, + vindicated her dumbly. It would not inquire, and it refused to hear, + hungering the while. She sent forth her flights of stories in elucidation + of the hidden; and they were like white bird after bird winging to covert + beneath a thundercloud; until her breast ached for the voice of the + thunder: harsh facts: sure as she was of her never losing her filial hold + of the beloved. She and her mother grew together, they were one. Accepting + the shadow, they were the closer one beneath it. She had neither vision + nor active thought of her father, in whom her pride was. + </p> + <p> + At the hour of ten, the ladies retired for the enjoyment of their sweet + reward. Manton, their maid, came down to sit with Nesta on the watch for + Skepsey. Perrin, the footman, returning, as late as twenty minutes to + eleven, from his tobacco promenade along the terrace, reported to Manton + ‘a row in town’; and he repeated to Nesta the policeman’s opinion and his + own of the ‘Army’ fellows, and the way to treat them. Both were for + rigour. + </p> + <p> + ‘The name of “Army” attracts poor Skepsey so, I am sure he would join it, + if they would admit him,’ Nesta said. + </p> + <p> + ‘He has an immense respect for a young woman, who belongs to his “Army”; + and one doesn’t know what may have come,’ said Manton. + </p> + <p> + Two or three minutes after eleven, a feeble ring at the bell gained + admission for some person: whispering was heard in the passage. + </p> + <p> + Manton played eavesdropper, and suddenly bursting on Skepsey, arrested him + when about to dash upstairs. His young mistress’s voice was a sufficient + command; he yielded; he pitched a smart sigh and stepped into her presence + for his countenance to be seen, or the show of a countenance, that it + presented. + </p> + <p> + ‘Skepsey wanted to rush to bed without saying good night to me?’ said she; + leaving unnoticed, except for woefulness of tone, his hurried shuffle of + remarks on ‘his appearance,’ and ‘little accidents’; ending with an + inclination of his disgraceful person to the doorway, and a petition: ‘If + I might, Miss Nesta?’ The implied pathetic reference to a + surgically-treated nose under a cross of strips of plaster, could not + obtain dismissal for him. And he had one eye of sinister hue, showing + beside its lighted-grey fellow as if a sullen punished dragonwhelp had + couched near some quick wood-pigeon. The two eyes blinked rapidly. He was + a picture of Guilt in the nude, imploring to be sent into concealment. + </p> + <p> + The cruelty of detaining him was evident. + </p> + <p> + ‘Yes, if you must,’ Nesta said. ‘But, dear Skepsey, will it be the + magistrate again to-morrow?’ + </p> + <p> + He feared it would be; he fancied it would needs be. He concluded by + stating, that he was bound to appear before the magistrate in the morning; + and he begged assistance to keep it from the knowledge of the Miss + Duvidneys, who had been so kind to him. + </p> + <p> + ‘Has there been bailing of you again, Skepsey?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘A good gentleman, a resident,’ he replied; ‘a military gentleman; indeed, + a colonel of the cavalry; but, it may so be, retired; and anxious about + our vast possessions; though he thinks a translation of a French attack on + England unimportant. He says, the Germans despise us most.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Then this gentleman thinks you have a good case?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘He is a friend of Captain Dartrey’s.’ + </p> + <p> + Hearing that name, Nesta said: ‘Now, Skepsey, you must tell me everything. + You are not to mind your looks. I believe, I do always believe you mean + well.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Miss Nesta, it depends upon the magistrate’s not being prejudiced against + the street-processionists! + </p> + <p> + ‘But you may expect justice from the magistrate, if your case is good?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘I would not say no, Miss Nesta. But we find, the opinion of the public + has its effect with magistrates—their sentences. They are severe on + boxing. They have latterly treated the “Army” with more consideration, + owing to the change in the public view. I myself have changed.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Have you joined it?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘I cannot say I am a member of it.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘You walked in the ranks to-day, and you were maltreated? Your friend was + there?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘I walked with Matilda Pridden; that is, parallel, along the pavement.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘I hope she came out of it unhurt?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘It is thanks to Captain Dartrey, Miss Nesta?’ + </p> + <p> + This time Nesta looked her question. + </p> + <p> + Manton interposed: ‘You are to speak, Mr. Skepsey’; and she stopped a + flood of narrative, that was knocking in his mind to feel its head and to + leap—an uninterrupted half-minute more would have shaped the story + for the proper flow. + </p> + <p> + He began, after attending to the throb of his bruises in a manner to + correct them rather than solace; and the beginning was the end: ‘Captain + Dartrey rescued us, before Matilda Pridden suffered harm, to mention—the + chin, slight, teeth unshaken; a beautiful set. She is angry with Captain + Dartrey, for having recourse to violence in her defence: it is against her + principles. “Then you die,” she says; and our principles are to gain more + by death. She says, we are alive in them; but worse if we abandon them for + the sake of living.—I am a little confused; she is very abstruse.—Because, + that is the corruptible life, she says. I have found it quite impossible + to argue with her; she has always a complete answer; wonderful. In case of + Invasion, we are to lift our voices to the Lord; and the Lord’s will shall + be manifested. If we are robbed, we ask, How came we by the goods? It is + unreasonable; it strikes at rights of property. But I have to go on + thinking. When in danger, she sings without excitement. When the blow + struck her, she stopped singing only an instant. She says, no one fears, + who has real faith. She will not let me call her brave. She cannot admire + Captain Dartrey. Her principles are opposed. She said to him, “Sir, you + did what seemed to you right.” She thinks every blow struck sends us back + to the state of the beasts. Her principles...’ + </p> + <p> + ‘How was it Captain Dartrey happened to be present, Skepsey?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘She is very firm. You cannot move her.—Captain Dartrey was on his + way to the station, to meet a gentleman from London, Miss Nesta. He + carried a stick—a remarkable stick—he had shown to me in the + morning, and he has given it me now. He says, he has done his last with + it. He seems to have some of Matilda Pridden’s ideas about fighting, when + it’s over. He was glad to be rid of the stick, he said.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘But who attacked you? What were the people?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Captain Dartrey says, England may hold up her head while she breeds young + women like Matilda Pridden: right or wrong, he says: it is the substance.’ + </p> + <p> + Hereupon Manton, sick of Miss Pridden, shook the little man with a + snappish word, to bring him to attention. She got him together + sufficiently for him to give a lame version of the story; flat until he + came to his heroine’s behaviour, when he brightened a moment, and he sank + back absorbed in her principles and theories of life. It was understood by + Nesta, that the processionists, going at a smart pace, found their way + blocked and were assaulted in one of the sidestreets; and that Skepsey + rushed to the defence of Matilda Pridden; and that, while they were + engaged, Captain Dartrey was passing at the end of the street, and + recognized one he knew in the thick of it and getting the worst of it, + owing to numbers. ‘I will show you the stick he did it with, Miss Nests’; + said Skepsey, regardless of narrative; and darted out of the room to bring + in the Demerara supple-jack; holding which, he became inspired to relate + something of Captain Dartrey’s deeds. + </p> + <p> + They gave no pleasure to his young lady, as he sadly perceived:—thus + it is with the fair sex ever, so fond of heroes! She shut her eyes from + the sight of the Demerara supple-jack descending right and left upon the + skulls of a couple of bully lads. ‘That will do—you were rescued. + And now go to bed, Skepsey; and be up at seven to breakfast with me,’ + Nesta said, for his battle-damaged face would be more endurable to behold + after an interval, she hoped; and she might in the morning dissociate its + evil look from the deeds of Captain Dartrey. + </p> + <p> + The thought of her hero taking active part in a streetfray, was repulsive + to her; it swamped his brilliancy. And this distressed her, by withdrawing + the support which the thought of him had been to her since mid-day. She + lay for sleepless hours, while nursing a deeper pain, under oppression of + repugnance to battle-dealing, bloodshedding men. It was long before she + grew mindful of the absurdity of the moan recurring whenever reflection + wearied. Translated into speech, it would have run: + </p> + <p> + ‘In a street of the town! with a stick!’—The vulgar picture pursued + her to humiliation; it robbed her or dimmed her possession of the one + bright thing she had remaining to her. So she deemed it during the heavy + sighs of night; partly conscious, that in some strange way it was as much + as tossing her to the man who never could have condescended to the + pugnacious using of a stick in a street. He, on the contrary, was a cover + to the shamefaced. + </p> + <p> + Her heart was weak that night. She hovered above it, but not so detached + as to scorn it for fawning to one—any one—who would offer her + and her mother a cover from scorn. And now she exalted Dudley’s + generosity, now clung to a low idea of a haven in her father’s wealth; and + she was unaware, that the second mood was deduced from the first. She did + know herself cowardly: she had, too, a critic in her clear head, to spurn + at the creature who could think of purchasing the world’s respect. + Dudley’s generosity sprang up to silence the voice. She could praise him, + on a review of it, for delicacy, moreover; and the delicacy laid her under + a more positive obligation. Her sense of it was not without a toneless + quaint faint savour of the romantic, that her humour little humorously + caught at, to paint her a picture of former heroes of fiction, who win + their trying lady by their perfection of good conduct on a background of + high birth; and who are not seen to be wooden before the volume closes. + Her fatigue of sleeplessness plunged her into the period of poke-bonnets + and peaky hats to admire him; giving her the kind of sweetness we may + imagine ourselves to get in the state of tired horse munching hay. If she + had gone to her bed with a noble or simply estimable plain image of one of + her friends in her heart, to sustain it, she would not have been thus + abject. Skepsey’s discoloured eye, and Captain Dartrey’s behaviour behind + it, threw her upon Dudley’s generosity, as being the shield for an + outcast. Girls, who see at a time of need their ideal extinguished in its + appearing tarnished, are very much at the disposal of the pressing suitor. + Nesta rose in the black winter morn, summoning the best she could think of + to glorify Dudley, that she might not feel so doomed. + </p> + <p> + According to an agreement overnight, she went to the bedroom of Dorothea + and Virginia, to assure them of her having slept well, and say the + good-bye to them and their Tasso. The little dog was the growl of a silken + ball in a basket. His mistresses excused him, because of his being unused + to the appearance of any person save Manton in their bedroom. Dorothea, + kissing her, said: ‘Adieu, dear child; and there is home with us always, + remember. And, after breakfast, however it may be, you will, for our + greater feeling of security, have—she has our orders—Manton—your + own maid we consider too young for a guardian—to accompany you. We + will not have it on our consciences, that by any possibility harm came to + you while you were under our charge. The good innocent girl we received + from the hands of your father, we return to him; we are sure of that.’ + </p> + <p> + Nesta said: ‘Mr. Sowerby promised he would come.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘However it may be,’ Dorothea repeated her curtaining phrase. + </p> + <p> + Virginia put in a word of apology for Tasso’s temper he enjoyed ordinarily + a slumber of half an hour’s longer duration. He was, Dorothea feelingly + added, regularity itself. Virginia murmured: ‘Except once!’ and both were + appalled by the recollection of that night. It had, nevertheless, caused + them to reperuse the Rev. Stuart Rem’s published beautiful sermon ON DIRT; + the words of which were an antidote to the night of Tasso in the nostrils + of Mnemosyne; so that Dorothea could reply to her sister, slightly by way + of a reproval, quoting Mr. Stuart Rem at his loftiest: ‘“Let us not bring + into the sacred precincts Dirt from the roads, but have a care to spread + it where it is a fructification.”’ Virginia produced the sequent sentence, + likewise weighty. Nesta stood between the thin division of their beds, her + right hand given to one, her left to the other. They had the semblance of + a haven out of storms. + </p> + <p> + She reflected, after shutting the door of their room, that the residing + with them had been a means of casting her—it was an effort to + remember how—upon the world where the tree of knowledge grows. She + had eaten; and she might be the worse for it; but she was raised to a + height that would not let her look with envy upon peace and comfort. + Luxurious quiet people were as ripening glass-house fruits. Her bitter + gathering of the knowledge of life had sharpened her intellect; and the + intellect, even in the young, is, and not less usefully, hard metal rather + than fallow soil. But for the fountain of human warmth at her breast, she + might have been snared by the conceit of intellect, to despise the simple + and conventional, or shed the pity which is charity’s contempt. She had + only to think of the kindness of the dear good ladies; her heart jumped to + them at once. And when she fancied hearing those innocent souls of women + embracing her and reproaching her for the knowledge of life she now bore, + her words down deep in her bosom were: It has helped me to bear the shock + of other knowledge! How would she have borne it before she knew of the + infinitely evil? Saving for the tender compassion weeping over her mother, + she had not much acute personal grief. + </p> + <p> + For this world condemning her birth, was the world tolerant of that + infinitely evil! Her intellect fortified her to be combative by day, after + the night of imagination; which splendid power is not so serviceable as + the logical mind in painful seasons: for night revealed the world snorting + Dragon’s breath at a girl guilty of knowing its vilest. More than she + liked to recall, it had driven her scorched, half withered, to the shelter + of Dudley. The daylight, spreading thin at the windows, restored her from + that weakness. ‘We will quit England,’ she said, thinking of her mother + and herself, and then of her father’s surely following them. She sighed + thankfully, half way through the breakfast with Skepsey, at sight of the + hour by the clock; she was hurriedly sentient of the puzzle of her + feelings, when she guessed at a chance that Dudley would be delayed. She + supposed herself as possibly feeling not so well able to keep every + thought of her head brooding on her mother in Dudley’s company. + </p> + <p> + Skepsey’s face was just sufferable by light of day, if one pitied + reflecting on his honest intentions; it ceased to discolour another. He + dropped a few particulars of his hero in action; but the heroine eclipsed. + He was heavier than ever with his Matilda Pridden. At the hour for + departure, Perrin had a conveyance at the door. Nesta sent off Skepsey + with a complimentary message to Captain Dartrey. Her maid Mary begged her + to finish her breakfast; Manton suggested the waiting a further two or + three minutes. ‘We must not be late,’ Nesta said; and when the minute-hand + of the clock marked ample time for the drive to the station, she took her + seat and started, keeping her face resolutely set seaward, having at her + ears the ring of a cry that was to come from Manton. But Manton was dumb; + she spied no one on the pavement who signalled to stop them. And no one + was at the station to greet them. They stepped into a carriage where they + were alone. Dudley with his dreaded generosity melted out of Nesta’s + thoughts, like the vanishing steam-wreath on the dip between the line and + the downs. + </p> + <p> + She passed into music, as she always did under motion of carriages and + trains, whether in happiness or sadness: and the day being one that had a + sky, the scenic of music swung her up to soar. None of her heavy burdens + enchained, though she knew the weight of them, with those of other painful + souls. The pipeing at her breast gave wings to large and small of the + visible; and along the downs went stateliest of flowing dances; a copse + lengthened to forest; a pool of cattle-water caught grey for flights + through enchantment. Cottage-children, wherever seen in groups, she + wreathed above with angels to watch them. Her mind all the while was busy + upon earth, embracing her mother, eyeing her father. Imagination and our + earthly met midway, and still she flew, until she was brought to the + ground by a shot. She struggled to rise, uplifting Judith Marsett: a woman + not so very much older than her own teens, in the count of years, and ages + older; and the world pulling at her heels to keep her low. That unhappiest + had no one but a sisterly girl to help her: and how she clung to the + slender help! Who else was there? + </p> + <p> + The good and the bad in the woman struck separate blows upon the girl’s + resonant nature. She perceived the good, and took it into her reflections. + The bad she divined: it approached like some threat of inflammation. + Natures resonant as that which animated this girl, are quick at the wells + of understanding: and she had her intimations of the world’s wisdom in + withholding contagious presences from the very mangy of the young, who may + not have an aim, or ideal, or strong human compassion, for a preservative. + She was assured of her possessing it. She asked herself in her mother’s + voice, and answered mutely. She had the certainty: for she rebuked the + slavish feverishness of the passion, as betrayed by Mrs. Marsett; and the + woman’s tone, as of strung wires ringing on a rage of the wind. Then + followed her cry for the man who could speak to Captain Marsett of his + duty in honour. An image of one, accompanying the faster beats of her + heart, beguiled her to think away from the cause. He, the one man known to + her, would act the brother’s part on behalf of the hapless creature. + </p> + <p> + Nesta just imagined her having supplicated him, and at once imagination + came to dust. She had to thank him she knelt to him. For the first time of + her life she found herself seized with her sex’s shudder in the blood. + </p> + <p> + <a name="link2HCH0035" id="link2HCH0035"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + CHAPTER XXXV. IN WHICH AGAIN WE MAKE USE OF THE OLD LAMPS FOR LIGHTING AN + ABYSMAL DARKNESS + </h2> + <p> + And if Nesta had looked out of her carriage-window soon after the train + began to glide, her eagle of imagination would have reeled from the + heights, with very different feelings, earlier, perhaps a captive, at + sight of the tardy gentleman rushing along the platform, and bending ear + to the footman Perrin, and staring for one lost. + </p> + <p> + The snaky tail of the train imparted to Dudley an apprehension of the + ominous in his having missed her. It wound away, and left regrets, which + raised a chorus of harsh congratulations from the opposite party of his + internal parliament. + </p> + <p> + Neither party could express an opinion without rousing the other to an + uproar. + </p> + <p> + He had met his cousin Southweare overnight. He had heard, that there was + talk of Miss Radnor. Her name was in the mouth of Major Worrell. It was + coupled with the name of Mrs. Marsett. A military captain, in the + succession to be Sir Edward Marsett, bestowed on her the shadow of his + name. + </p> + <p> + It could be certified, that Miss Radnor visited the woman at her house. + What are we to think of Miss Radnor, save that daughters of depraved + parents!... A torture undeserved is the Centaur’s shirt for driving us to + lay about in all directions. He who had swallowed so much—a + thunderbolt: a still undigested discharge from the perplexing heavens + jumped frantic under the pressure upon him of more, and worse. A girl + getting herself talked of at a Club! And she of all young ladies should + have been the last to draw round her that buzz of tongues. On such a + subject!—The parents pursuing their career of cynical ostentation in + London, threw an evil eye of heredity on their offspring in the egg; + making anything credible, pointing at tendencies. + </p> + <p> + An alliance with her was impossible. So said disgust. Anger came like a + stronger beast, and extinguished the safety there was in the thing it + consumed, by growing so excessive as to require tempering with drops of + compassion; which prepared the way for a formal act of cold forgiveness; + and the moment that was conceived, he had a passion to commit the horrible + magnanimity, and did it on a grand scale, and dissolved his Heart in the + grandeur, and slaved himself again. + </p> + <p> + Far from expungeing the doubt of her, forgiveness gave it a stamp and an + edge. His renewed enslavement set him perusing his tyrant keenly, as + nauseated captives do; and he saw, that forgiveness was beside the case. + For this Nesta Victoria Radnor would not crave it or accept it. He had + mentally played the woman to her superior vivaciousness too long for him + to see her taking a culprit’s attitude. What she did, she intended to do. + The mother would not have encouraged her. The father idolized her; and the + father was a frank hedonist, whose blood... speculation on horseback + gallops to barren extremes. Eyes like hers—if there had not been the + miserable dupes of girls! Conduct is the sole guide to female character. + That likewise may be the hypocrite’s mask. + </p> + <p> + Popular artists, intent to gratify the national taste for effects called + realistic, have figured in scenes of battle the raying fragments of a man + from impact of a cannon-ball on his person. Truly thus it may be when + flesh contends. But an image of the stricken and scattered mind of the man + should, though deficient in the attraction, have a greater significance, + forasmuch as it does not exhibit him entirely liquefied and showered into + space; it leaves him his legs for the taking of further steps. Dudley, + standing on the platform of Nesta’s train, one half minute too late, + according to his desire before he put himself in motion, was as wildly + torn as the vapour shredded streaming to fingers and threads off the + upright columnar shot of the shriek from the boiler. He wished every mad + antagonism to his wishes: that he might see her, be blind to her; embrace, + discard; heal his wound, and tear it wider. He thanked her for the + grossness of an offence precluding excuses. He was aware of a glimmer of + advocacy in the very grossness. He conjured-up her features, and they + said, her innocence was the sinner; they scoffed at him for the dupe he + was willing to be. She had enigma’s mouth, with the eyes of morning. + </p> + <p> + More than most girls, she was the girl-Sphinx to him because of her having + ideas—or what he deemed ideas. She struck a toneing warmth through + his intelligence, not dissimilar to the livelier circulation of the blood + in the frame breathing mountain air. She really helped him, incited him to + go along with this windy wild modern time more cheerfully, if not quite + hopefully. For she had been the book of Romance he despised when it + appeared as a printed volume: and which might have educated the young man + to read some among our riddles in the book of humanity. The white he was + ready to take for silver the black were all black; the spotted had + received corruption’s label. Her youthful French governess Mademoiselle de + Seilles was also peculiarly enigmatic at the mouth conversant, one might + expect, with the disintegrating literature of her country. In public, the + two talked of St. Louis. One of them in secret visits a Mrs. Marsett. The + Southweare women, the Hennen women, and Lady Evelina Reddish, were artless + candid creatures in their early days, not transgressing in a glance. Lady + Grace Halley had her fit of the devotional previous to marriage. No girl + known to Dudley by report or acquaintance had committed so scandalous an + indiscretion as Miss Radnor’s: it pertained to the insolently vile. + </p> + <p> + And on that ground, it started the voluble defence. For certain suspected + things will dash suspicion to the rebound, when they are very dark. As + soon as the charge against her was moderated, the defence expired. He + heard the world delivering its judgement upon her; and he sorrowfully + acquiesced. She passed from him. + </p> + <p> + When she was cut off, she sang him in the distance a remembered saying of + hers, with the full melody of her voice. One day, treating of modern + pessimism, he had draped a cadaverous view of our mortal being in a + quotation of the wisdom of the Philosopher Emperor: ‘To set one’s love + upon the swallow is a futility.’ And she, weighing it, nodded, and + replied: ‘May not the pleasure for us remain if we set our love upon the + beauty of the swallow’s flight?’ + </p> + <p> + There was, for a girl, a bit of idea, real idea, in that meaning, of + course, the picture we are to have of the bird’s wings in motion, it has + often been admired. Oh! not much of an idea in itself: feminine and vague. + But it was pertinent, opportune; in this way she stimulated. And the girl + who could think it, and call on a Mrs. Marsett, was of the class of + mixtures properly to be handed over to chemical experts for analysis! + </p> + <p> + She had her aspirations on behalf of her sex: she and Mademoiselle de + Seilles discussed them; women were to do this, do that:—necessarily + a means of instructing a girl to learn what they did do. If the lower part + of her face had been as reassuring to him as the upper, he might have put + a reluctant faith in the pure-mindedness of these aspirations, without + reverting to her origin, and also to recent rumours of her father and Lady + Grace Halley. As it was, he inquired of the cognizant, whether an + intellectual precocity, devoted by preference to questions affecting the + state of women, did not rather more than suggest the existence of urgent + senses likewise. She, a girl under twenty, had an interest in public + matters, and she called on a Mrs. Marsett. To plead her simplicity, was to + be absolutely ignorant of her. + </p> + <p> + He neighboured sagacity when he pointed that interrogation relating to + Nesta’s precociousness of the intelligence. For, as they say in + dactylomancy, the ‘psychical’ of women are not disposed in their sensitive + early days to dwell upon the fortunes of their sex: a thought or two turns + them facing away, with the repugnant shiver. They worship at a niche in + the wall. They cannot avoid imputing some share of foulness to them that + are for scouring the chamber; and the civilized male, keeping his own + chamber locked, quite shares their pale taper’s view. The full-blooded to + the finger-tips, on the other hand, are likely to be drawn to the subject, + by noble inducement as often as by base: Nature at flood being the cause + in either instance. This young Nature of the good and the bad, is the + blood which runs to power of heart as well as to thirsts of the flesh. + Then have men to sound themselves, to discover how much of Nature their + abstract honourable conception or representative eidolon of young women + will bear without going to pieces; and it will not be much, unless they + shall have taken instruction from the poet’s pen: for a view possibly of + Nature at work to cast the slough, when they see her writhing as in her + ugliest old throes. If they have learnt of Nature’s priest to respect her, + they will less distrust those rare daughters of hers who are moved by her + warmth to lift her out of slime. It is by her own live warmth that it has + to be done: cold worship at a niche in the wall will not do it.—Well, + there is an index, for the enlargement of your charity. + </p> + <p> + But facts were Dudley’s teachers. Physically, morally, mentally, he read + the world through facts; that is to say, through the facts he encountered: + and he was in consequence foredoomed to a succession of bumps; all the + heavier from his being, unlike the horned kind, not unimpressible by the + hazy things outside his experience. Even at his darkest over Nesta, it was + his indigestion of the misconduct of her parents, which denied to a + certain still small advocate within him the right to raise a voice: that + good fellow struck the attitude for pleading, and had to be silent; for he + was Instinct; at best a stammering speaker in the Court of the wigged + Facts. Instinct of this Nesta Radnor’s character would have said a brave + word, but for her deeds bearing witness to her inheritance of a lawlessly + adventurous temperament. + </p> + <p> + What to do? He was no nearer to an answer when the wintry dusk had fallen + on the promenading crowds. To do nothing, is the wisdom of those who have + seen fools perish. Facts had not taught him, that the doing nothing, for a + length of days after the first shock he sustained, was the reason of how + it came that Nesta knitted closer her acquaintance with the ‘agreeable + lady’ she mentioned in her letter to Cronidge. Those excellent counsellors + of a mercantile community gave him no warnings, that the ‘masterly + inactive’ part, so greatly esteemed by him for the conduct of public + affairs, might be perilous in dealings with a vivid girl: nor a hint, that + when facts continue undigested, it is because the sensations are as + violent as hysterical females to block them from the understanding. His + Robin Goodfellow instinct tried to be serviceable at a crux of his + meditations, where Edith Averst’s consumptive brothers waved faded hands + at her chances of inheriting largely. Superb for the chances: but what of + her offspring? And the other was a girl such as the lusty Dame Dowager of + fighting ancestors would have signalled to the heir of the House’s honours + for the perpetuation of his race. No doubt: and the venerable Dame + (beautiful in her old-lace frame, or say foliage) of the Ages backward, + temp: Ed: III. inflated him with a thought of her: and his readings in + modern books on heredity, pure blood, physical regeneration, pronounced + approval of Nesta Radnor: and thereupon instinct opened mouth to speak; + and a lockjaw seized it under that scowl of his presiding mistrust of + Nature. + </p> + <p> + He clung to his mistrust the more because of a warning he had from the + silenced natural voice: somewhat as we may behold how the Conservatism of + a Class, in a world of all the evidences showing that there is no stay to + things, comes of the intuitive discernment of its finality. His mistrust + was his own; and Nesta was not; not yet; though a step would make her his + own. Instinct prompting to the step, was a worthless adviser. It spurred + him, nevertheless. + </p> + <p> + He called at the Club for his cousin Southweare, with whom he was not in + sympathy; and had information that, Southweare said, ‘made the girl out + all right.’ Girls in these days do things which the sainted stay-at-homes + preceding them would not have dreamed of doing. Something had occurred, + relating to Major Worrell: he withdrew Miss Radnor’s name, acknowledged + himself mistaken or amended his report of her, in some way, not quite + intelligible. Dudley was accosted by Simeon Fenellan; subsequently by + Dartrey. There was gossip over the latter gentleman’s having been up + before the magistrate, talk of a queer kind of stick, and Dartrey said, + laughing, to Simeon: ‘Rather lucky I bled the rascal’;—whatever the + meaning. She nursed one of her adorations for this man, who had yesterday, + apparently, joined in a street-fray; so she partook of the stain of the + turbid defacing all these disorderly people. + </p> + <p> + At his hotel at breakfast the next morning, a newspaper furnished an + account of Captain Dartrey Fenellan’s participation in the strife, after + mention of him as nephew of the Earl of Clanconan, ‘now a visitor to our + town’; and his deeds were accordant with his birth. Such writing was + enough to send Dudley an eager listener to Colney Durance. What a people! + </p> + <p> + Mr. Dartrey Fenellan’s card compelled Dudley presently to receive him. + </p> + <p> + Dartrey, not debarred by considerations, that an allusion to Miss Radnor + could be conveyed only in the most delicately obscure manner, spared him + no more than the plain English of his relations with her. Requested to + come to the Club, at a certain hour of the afternoon, that he might hear + Major Worrell’s personal contradiction of scandal involving the young + lady’s name, together with his apology, etc., Dudley declined: and he was + obliged to do it curtly; words were wanting. They are hard to find for + wounded sentiments rendered complex by an infusion of policy. His present + mood, with the something new to digest, held the going to Major Worrell a + wrong step; he behaved as if the speaking to Dartrey Fenellan pledged him + hardly less. And besides he had a physical abhorrence, under dictate of + moral reprobation, of the broad-shouldered sinewy man, whose look of wiry + alertness pictured the previous day’s gory gutters. + </p> + <p> + Dartrey set sharp eyes on him for an instant, bowed; and went. + </p> + <p> + <a name="link2HCH0036" id="link2HCH0036"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + CHAPTER XXXVI. NESTA AND HER FATHER + </h2> + <p> + The day of Nesta’s return was one of a number of late when Victor was + robbed of his walk Westward by Lady Grace Halley, who seduced his + politeness with her various forms of blandishment to take a seat in her + carriage; and she was a practical speaker upon her quarter of the world + when she had him there. Perhaps she was right in saying—though she + had no right to say—that he and she together might have the world + under their feet. It was one of those irritating suggestions which + expedite us up to a bald ceiling, only to make us feel the gas-bladder’s + tight extension upon emptiness: It moved him to examine the poor value of + his aim, by tying him to the contemptible means: One estimate involved the + other, whichever came first. Somewhere he had an idea, that would lift and + cleanse all degradations. But it did seem as if he were not enjoying: + things pleasant enough in the passage of them were barren, if not prickly, + in the retrospect. + </p> + <p> + He sprang out at the head of the park, for a tramp round it, in the gloom + of the girdle of lights, to recover his deadened relish of the thin + phantasmal strife to win an intangible prize. His dulled physical system + asked, as with the sensations of a man at the start from sleep in the + hurrying grip of steam, what on earth he wanted to get, and what was the + substance of his gains: what! if other than a precipitous intimacy, a deep + crumbling over deeper, with a little woman amusing him in remarks of a + whimsical nudity; hardly more. Nay, not more! he said; and at the end of + twenty paces, he saw much more; the campaign gathered a circling + suggestive brilliancy, like the lamps about the winter park; the Society, + lured with glitter, hooked by greed, composed a ravishing picture; the + little woman was esteemed as a serviceable lieutenant; and her hand was a + small soft one, agreeable to fondle—and avaunt! But so it is in war: + we must pay for our allies. What if it had been, that he and she together, + with their united powers...? He dashed the silly vision aside, as vainer + than one of the bubble-empires blown by boys; and it broke, showing no + heart in it. His heart was Nataly’s. + </p> + <p> + Let Colney hint his worst; Nataly bore the strain, always did bear any + strain coming in the round of her duties: and if she would but walk, or if + she danced at parties, she would scatter the fits of despondency besetting + the phlegmatic, like this day’s breeze the morning fog; or as he did with + two minutes of the stretch of legs. + </p> + <p> + Full of the grandeur of that black pit of the benighted London, with its + ocean-voice of the heart at beat along the lighted outer ring, Victor + entered at his old door of the two houses he had knocked into one: a + surprise for Fredi!—and heard that his girl had arrived in the + morning. + </p> + <p> + ‘And could no more endure her absence from her Mammy O!’ The songful + satirical line spouted in him, to be flung at his girl, as he ran upstairs + to the boudoir off the drawing-room. + </p> + <p> + He peeped in. It was dark. Sensible of presences, he gradually discerned a + thick blot along the couch to the right of the door, and he drew near. Two + were lying folded together; mother and daughter. He bent over them. His + hand was taken and pressed by Fredi’s; she spoke; she said tenderly: + ‘Father.’ Neither of the two made a movement. He heard the shivering rise + of a sob, that fell. The dry sob going to the waste breath was Nataly’s. + His girl did not speak again. + </p> + <p> + He left them. He had no thought until he stood in his dressing-room, when + he said ‘Good!’ For those two must have been lying folded together during + the greater part of the day: and it meant, that the mother’s heart had + opened; the girl knew. Her tone: ‘Father,’ sweet, was heavy, too, with the + darkness it came out of. + </p> + <p> + So she knew. Good. He clasped them both in his heart; tempering his pity + of those dear ones with the thought, that they were of the sex which finds + enjoyment in a day of the mutual tear; and envying them; he strained at a + richness appearing in the sobs of their close union. + </p> + <p> + All of his girl’s loving soul flew to her mother; and naturally: She would + not be harsh on her father. She would say he loved! And true: he did love, + he does love; loves no woman but the dear mother. + </p> + <p> + He flicked a short wring of the hand having taken pressure from an alien + woman’s before Fredi pressed it, and absolved himself in the act; + thinking, How little does a woman know how true we can be to her when we + smell at a flower here and there!—There they are, stationary; women + the flowers, we the bee; and we are faithful in our seeming volatility; + faithful to the hive!—And if women are to be stationary, the + reasoning is not so bad. Funny, however, if they here and there + imitatively spread a wing, and treat men in that way? It is a breach of + the convention; we pay them our homage, that they may serve as flowers, + not to be volatile tempters. Nataly never had been one of the sort: Lady + Grace was. No necessity existed for compelling the world to bow to Lady + Grace, while on behalf of his Nataly he had to... Victor closed the + curtain over a gulf-revealed by an invocation of Nature, and showing the + tremendous force he partook of so largely, in her motive elements of the + devourer. Horrid to behold, when we need a gracious presentation of the + circumstances. She is a splendid power for as long as we confine her + between the banks: but she has a passion to discover cracks; and if we + give her headway, she will find one, and drive at it, and be through, + uproarious in her primitive licentiousness, unless we labour body and soul + like Dutchmen at the dam. Here she was, and not desired, almost detested! + Nature detested! It had come about through the battle for Nataly; chiefly + through Mrs. Burman’s tenacious hold of the filmy thread she took for life + and was enabled to use as a means for the perversion besides bar to the + happiness of creatures really living. We may well marvel at the Fates, and + tell them they are not moral agents! + </p> + <p> + Victor’s reflections came across Colney Durance, who tripped and stopped + them. + </p> + <p> + Dressed with his customary celerity, he waited for Nesta, to show her the + lighted grand double drawing-room: a further proof of how Fortune favoured + him: she was to be told, how he one day expressed a wish for greater + space, and was informed on the next, that the neighbour house was being + vacated, and the day following he was in treaty for the purchase of it; + returning from Tyrol, he found his place habitable. + </p> + <p> + Nesta came. Her short look at him was fond, her voice not faltering; she + laid her hand under his arm and walked round the spacious room, praising + the general design, admiring the porcelain, the ferns, friezes, hangings, + and the grand piano, the ebony inlaid music-stands, the firegrates and + plaques, the ottomans, the tone of neutral colour that, as in sound, muted + splendour. He told her it was a reception night, with music: and added: ‘I + miss my... seen anybody lately?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Mr. Sowerby?’ said she. ‘He was to have escorted me back. He may have + overslept himself.’ + </p> + <p> + She spoke it plainly; when speaking of the dear good ladies, she set a + gentle humour at play, and comforted him, as she intended, with a souvenir + of her lively spirit, wanting only in the manner of gaiety. + </p> + <p> + He allowed, that she could not be quite gay. + </p> + <p> + More deeply touched the next minute, he felt in her voice, in her look, in + her phrasing of speech, an older, much older daughter than the Fredi whom + he had conducted to Moorsedge. ‘Kiss me,’ he said. + </p> + <p> + She turned to him full-front, and kissed his right cheek and left, and his + forehead, saying: ‘My love! my papa! my own dear dada!’ all the words of + her girlhood in her new sedateness; and smiling: like the moral + crepuscular of a sunlighted day down a not totally inanimate Sunday Londen + street. + </p> + <p> + He strained her to his breast. ‘Mama soon be here?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Soon.’ + </p> + <p> + That was well. And possibly at the present moment applying, with her + cunning hand, the cosmetics and powders he could excuse for a concealment + of the traces of grief. + </p> + <p> + Satisfied in being a superficial observer, he did not spy to see more than + the world would when Nataly entered the dining-room at the quiet family + dinner. She performed her part for his comfort, though not prattling; and + he missed his Fredi’s delicious warble of the prattle running rill-like + over our daily humdrum. Simeon Fenellan would have helped. Then suddenly + came enlivenment: a recollection of news in the morning’s paper. ‘No harm + before Fredi, my dear. She’s a young woman now. And no harm, so to + speak-at least, not against the Sanfredini. She has donned her name again, + and a villa on Como, leaving her ‘duque’;—paragraph from a Milanese + musical Journal; no particulars. Now, mark me, we shall have her at + Lakelands in the Summer. If only we could have her now!’ + </p> + <p> + ‘It would be a pleasure,’ said Nataly. Her heart had a blow in the + thought, that a lady of this kind would create the pleasure by not + bringing criticism. + </p> + <p> + ‘The godmother?’ he glistened upon Nesta. + </p> + <p> + She gave him low half-notes of the little blue butterfly’s imitation of + the superb contralto; and her hand and head at turn to hint the theatrical + operatic attitude. + </p> + <p> + ‘Delicious!’ he cried, his eyelids were bedewed at the vision of the three + of them planted in the past; and here again, out of the dark wood, where + something had required to be said, and had been said; and all was happily + over, owing to the goodness and sweetness of the two dear innocents;—whom + heaven bless! Jealousy of their naturally closer heart-at-heart, had not a + whisper for him; part of their goodness and sweetness was felt to be in + the not excluding him. + </p> + <p> + Nesta engaged to sing one of the ‘old duets with her mother. She saw her + mother’s breast lift in a mechanical effort to try imaginary notes, as if + doubtful of her capacity, more at home in the dumb deep sigh they fell to. + Her mother’s heroism made her a sacred woman to the thoughts of the girl, + overcoming wonderment at the extreme submissiveness. + </p> + <p> + She put a screw on her mind to perceive the rational object there might be + for causing her mother to go through tortures in receiving and visiting; + and she was arrested by the louder question, whether she could think such + a man as her father irrational. + </p> + <p> + People with resounding names, waves of a steady stream, were announced by + Arlington, just as in the days, that seemed remote, before she went to + Moorsedge; only they were more numerous, and some of the titles had + ascended a stage. There were great lords, there were many great ladies; + and Lady Grace Halley shuffling amid them, like a silken shimmer in + voluminous robes. + </p> + <p> + They crowded about their host where he stood. ‘He, is their Law!’ Colney + said, speaking unintelligibly, in the absence of the Simeon Fenellan + regretted so loudly by Mr. Beaves Urmsing. They had an air of worshipping, + and he of swimming. + </p> + <p> + There were also City magnates, and Lakelands’ neighbours: the gentleman + representing Pride of Port, Sir Abraham Quatley; and Colonel Corfe; Sir + Rodwell and Lady Blachington; Mrs. Fanning; Mr. Caddis. Few young men and + maids were seen. Dr. John Cormyn came without his wife, not mentioning + her. Mrs. Peter Yatt touched the notes for voices at the piano. Priscilla + Graves was a vacancy, and likewise the Rev. Septimus Barmby. Peridon and + Catkin, and Mr. Pempton took their usual places. There was no fluting. A + famous Canadian lady was the principal singer. A Galician violinist, + zig-zagging extreme extensions and contractions of his corporeal frame in + execution, and described by Colney as ‘Paganini on wall,’ failed to + supplant Durandarte in Nesta’s memory. She was asked by Lady Grace for the + latest of Dudley. Sir Abraham Quatley named him with handsome emphasis. + Great dames caressed her; openly approved; shadowed the future place among + them. + </p> + <p> + Victor alluded at night to Mrs. John Cormyn’s absence. He said: ‘A + homoeopathic doctor’s wife!’ nothing more; and by that little, he prepared + Nesta for her mother’s explanation. The great London people, ignorant or + not, were caught by the strong tide he created, and carried on it. But + there was a bruiting of the secret among their set; and the one to fall + away from her, Nataly marvellingly named Mrs. John Cormyn; whose marriage + was of her making. She did not disapprove Priscilla’s behaviour. Priscilla + had come to her and, protesting affection, had openly stated, that she + required time and retirement to recover her proper feelings. Nataly smiled + a melancholy criticism of an inconsequent or capricious woman, in relating + to Nesta certain observations Priscilla had dropped upon poor faithful Mr. + Pempton, because of his concealment from her of his knowledge of things + for this faithful gentleman had been one of the few not ignorant. The + rumour was traceable to the City. + </p> + <p> + ‘Mother, we walk on planks,’ Nesta said. + </p> + <p> + Nataly answered: ‘You will grow used to it.’ + </p> + <p> + Her mother’s habitual serenity in martyrdom was deceiving. Nesta had a + transient suspicion, that she had grown, from use, to like the whirl of + company, for oblivion in the excitement; and as her remembrance of her own + station among the crowding people was a hot flush, the difference of their + feelings chilled her. + </p> + <p> + Nataly said: ‘It is to-morrow night again; we do not rest.’ She smiled; + and at once the girl read woman’s armour on the dear face, and asked + herself, Could I be so brave? The question following was a speechless + wave, that surged at her father. She tried to fathom the scheme he + entertained. The attempt obscured her conception of the man he was. She + could not grasp him, being too young for knowing, that young heads cannot + obtain a critical hold upon one whom they see grandly succeeding it is the + sun’s brilliance to their eyes. + </p> + <p> + Mother and daughter slept together that night, and their embrace was their + world. + </p> + <p> + Nesta delighted her father the next day by walking beside him into the + City, as far as the end of the Embankment, where the carriage was in + waiting with her maid to bring her back; and at his mere ejaculation of a + wish, the hardy girl drove down in the afternoon for the walk home with + him. Lady Grace Halley was at the office. ‘I’m an incorrigible Stock + Exchange gambler,’ she said. + </p> + <p> + ‘Only,’ Victor bade her beware, ‘Mines are undulating in movement, and + their heights are a preparation for their going down.’ + </p> + <p> + She said she ‘liked a swing.’ + </p> + <p> + Nesta looked at them in turn. + </p> + <p> + The day after and the day after, Lady Grace was present. She made play + with Dudley’s name. + </p> + <p> + This coming into the City daily of a girl, for the sake of walking back in + winter weather with her father, struck her as ambiguous: either a jealous + foolish mother’s device, or that of a weak man beating about for + protection. But the woman of the positive world soon read to the contrary; + helped a little by the man, no doubt. She read rather too much to the + contrary, and took the pedestrian girl for perfect simplicity in her + tastes, when Nesta had so far grown watchful as to feel relieved by the + lady’s departure. Her mother, without sympathy for the lady, was too great + of soul for jealousy. Victor had his Nataly before him at a hint from Lady + Grace: and he went somewhat further than the exact degree when affirming, + that Nataly could not scheme, and was incapable of suspecting.—Nataly + could perceive things with a certain accuracy: she would not stoop to a + meanness. ‘Plot? Nataly?’ said he, and shrugged. In fact, the void of + plot, drama, shuffle of excitement, reflected upon Nataly. He might have + seen as tragic as ever dripped on Stage, had he looked. + </p> + <p> + But the walk Westward with his girl, together with pride in a daughter who + clove her way through all weathers, won his heart to exultation. He told + her: ‘Fredi does her dada so much good’; not telling her in what, or + opening any passage to the mystery of the man he was. She was trying to be + a student of life, with her eyes down upon hard earth, despite of her + winged young head; she would have compassed him better had he dilated in + sublime fashion; but he baffled her perusal of a man of power by the + simpleness of his enjoyment of small things coming in his way;—the + lighted shops, the crowd, emergence from the crowd, or the meeting near + midwinter of a soft warm wind along the Embankment, and dark Thames + magnificently coroneted over his grimy flow. There is no grasping of one + who quickens us. + </p> + <p> + His flattery of his girl, too, restored her broken feeling of personal + value; it permeated her nourishingly from the natural breath of him that + it was. + </p> + <p> + At times he touched deep in humaneness; and he set her heart leaping on + the flash of a thought to lay it bare, with the secret it held, for his + help. That was a dream. She could more easily have uttered the words to + Captain Dartrey, after her remembered abashing holy tremour of the vision + of doing it and casting herself on noblest man’s compassionateness; and + her imagined thousand emotions;—a rolling music within her, a wreath + of cloudglory in her sky;—which had, as with virgins it may be, + plighted her body to him for sheer urgency of soul; drawn her by a single + unwitting-to-brain, conscious-in-blood, shy curl outward of the sheathing + leaf to the flowering of woman to him; even to the shore of that strange + sea, where the maid stands choosing this one man for her destiny, as in a + trance. So are these young ones unfolded, shade by shade; and a shade is + all the difference with them; they can teach the poet to marvel at the + immensity of vitality in ‘the shadow of a shade.’ + </p> + <p> + Her father shut the glimpse of a possible speaking to him of Mrs. Marsett, + with a renewal of his eulogistic allusions to Dudley Sowerby: the ‘perfect + gentleman, good citizen’; prospective heir to an earldom besides. She + bowed to Dudley’s merits; she read off the honorific pedimental letters of + a handsome statue, for a sign to herself that she passed it. + </p> + <p> + She was unjust, as Victor could feel, though he did not know how coldly + unjust. For among the exorbitant requisitions upon their fellow-creatures + made by the young, is the demand, that they be definite: no mercy is in + them for the transitional. And Dudley—and it was under her + influence, and painfully, not ignobly—was in process of development: + interesting to philosophers, if not to maidens. + </p> + <p> + Victor accused her of paying too much heed to Colney Durance’s epigrams + upon their friends. He quite joined with his English world in its opinion, + that epigrams are poor squibs when they do not come out of great guns. + Epigrams fired at a venerable nation, are surely the poorest of popgun + paper pellets. The English kick at the insolence, when they are not in the + mood for pelleting themselves, or when the armed Foreigner is + overshadowing and braceing. Colney’s pretentious and laboured Satiric + Prose Epic of ‘THE RIVAL TONGUES,’ particularly offended him, as being a + clever aim at no hitting; and sustained him, inasmuch as it was an acid + friend’s collapse. How could Colney expect his English to tolerate such a + spiteful diatribe! The suicide of Dr. Bouthoin at San Francisco was the + finishing stroke to the chances of success of the Serial;—although + we are promised splendid evolutions on the part of Mr. Semhians; who, + after brilliant achievements with bat and ball, abandons those weapons of + Old England’s modern renown, for a determined wrestle with our English + pronunciation of words, and rescue of the spelling of them from the + printer. His headache over the present treatment of the verb ‘To bid,’ was + a quaint beginning for one who had soon to plead before Japanese, and who + acknowledged now ‘in contrition of spirit,’ that in formerly opposing the + scheme for an Academy, he helped to the handing of our noble language to + the rapid reporter of news for an apathetic public. Further, he discovered + in astonishment the subordination of all literary Americans to the decrees + of their literary authorities; marking a Transatlantic point of departure, + and contrasting ominously with the unruly Islanders ‘grunting the + higgledy-piggledy of their various ways, in all the porker’s gut-gamut at + the rush to the trough.’ After a week’s privation of bat and ball, he is, + lighted or not, a gas-jet of satire upon his countrymen. As for the + ‘pathetic sublimity of the Funeral of Dr. Bouthoin,’ Victor inveighed + against an impious irony in the over dose of the pathos; and the same + might be suspected in Britannia’s elegy upon him, a strain of hot eulogy + throughout. Mr. Semhians, all but treasonably, calls it, Papboat and + Brandy:—‘our English literary diet of the day’: stimulating and not + nourishing. Britannia’s mournful anticipation, that ‘The shroud enwinding + this my son is mine!’—should the modern generation depart from the + track of him who proved himself the giant in mainly supporting her glory—was, + no doubt, a high pitch of the note of Conservatism. But considering, that + Dr. Bouthoin ‘committed suicide under a depression of mind produced by a + surfeit of unaccustomed dishes, upon a physical system inspired by the + traditions of exercise, and no longer relieved by the practice’—to + translate from Dr. Gannius: we are again at war with the writer’s + reverential tone, and we know not what to think: except, that Mr. Durance + was a Saturday meat market’s butcher in the Satiric Art. + </p> + <p> + Nesta found it pleasanter to see him than to hear of his work: which, to + her present feeling, was inhuman. As little as our native public, had she + then any sympathy for the working in the idea: she wanted throbs, visible + aims, the Christian incarnate; she would have preferred the tale of + slaughter—periodically invading all English classes as a flush from + the undrained lower, Vikings all—to frigid sterile Satire. And truly + it is not a fruit-bearing rod. Colney had to stand on the defence of it + against the damsel’s charges. He thought the use of the rod, while + expressing profound regret at a difference of opinion between him and + those noble heathens, beneficial for boys; but in relation to their + seniors, and particularly for old gentlemen, he thought that the sharpest + rod to cut the skin was the sole saving of them. Insensibility to Satire, + he likened to the hard-mouthed horse; which is doomed to the worser thing + in consequence. And consequently upon the lack of it, and of training to + appreciate it, he described his country’s male venerables as being + distinguishable from annuitant spinsters only in presenting themselves + forked. + </p> + <p> + ‘He is unsuccessful and embittered, Victor said to Nesta. ‘Colney will + find in the end, that he has lost his game and soured himself by never + making concessions. Here’s this absurd Serial—it fails, of course; + and then he has to say, it’s because he won’t tickle his English, won’t + enter into a “frowzy complicity” with their tastes.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘But—I think of Skepsey honest creatures respect Mr. Durance, and he + is always ready to help them,’ said Nesta. + </p> + <p> + ‘If he can patronize.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Does he patronize me, dada?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘You are one of his exceptions. Marry a title and live in state—and + then hear him! I am successful, and the result of it is, that he won’t + acknowledge wisdom in anything I say or do; he will hardly acknowledge the + success. It is “a dirty road to success,” he says. So that, if successful, + I must have rolled myself in mire. I compelled him to admit he was wrong + about your being received at Moorsedge: a bit of a triumph!’ + </p> + <p> + Nesta’s walks with her father were no loss of her to Nataly; the girl came + back to her bearing so fresh and so full a heart; and her father was ever + prouder of her: he presented new features of her in his quotations of her + sayings, thoughtful sayings. ‘I declare she helps one to think,’ he said. + ‘It ‘s not precocity; it ‘s healthy inquiry. She brings me nearer ideas of + my own, not yet examined, than any one else does. I say, what a wife for a + man!’ + </p> + <p> + ‘She takes my place beside you, dear, now I am not quite strong,’ said + Nataly. ‘You have not seen...?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Dudley Sowerby? He’s at Cronidge, I believe. His elder brother’s in a bad + way. Bad business, this looking to a death.’ + </p> + <p> + Nataly eyes revealed a similar gulf. + </p> + <p> + Let it be cast on Society, then! A Society opposing Nature forces us to + these murderous looks upon impediments. But what of a Society in the dance + with Nature? Victor did not approve of that. He began, under the influence + of Nesta’s companionship, to see the Goddess Nature there is in a + chastened nature. And this view shook the curtain covering his lost Idea. + He felt sure he should grasp it soon and enter into its daylight: a + muffled voice within him said, that he was kept waiting to do so by the + inexplicable tardiness of a certain one to rise ascending to her spiritual + roost. She was now harmless to strike: Themison, Carling, Jarniman, even + the Rev. Groseman Buttermore, had been won to the cause of humanity. Her + ascent, considering her inability to do further harm below, was most + mysteriously delayed. Owing to it, in a manner almost as mysterious, he + was kept crossing a bridge having a slippery bit on it. Thanks to his + gallant Fredi, he had found his feet again. But there was a bruise where, + to his honour, he felt tenderest. And Fredi away, he might be down again—for + no love of a slippery bit, proved slippery, one might guess, by a + predecessor or two. Ta-ta-ta-to and mum! Still, in justice to the little + woman, she had been serviceable. + </p> + <p> + She would be still more so, if a member of Parliament now on his back here + we are with the murder-eye again! + </p> + <p> + Nesta’s never speaking of Lakelands clouded him a little, as an intimation + of her bent of mind. + </p> + <p> + ‘And does my girl come to her dada to-day?’ he said, on the fifth morning + since her return; prepared with a villanous resignation to hear, that this + day she abstained, though he had the wish for her coming. + </p> + <p> + ‘Why, don’t you know,’ said she, ‘we all meet to have tea in Mr. Durance’s + chambers; and I walk back with you, and there we are joined by mama; and + we are to have a feast of literary celebrities.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Colney’s selection of them! And Simeon Fenellan, I hope. Perhaps Dartrey. + Perhaps... eh?’ + </p> + <p> + She reddened. So Dudley Sowerby’s unspoken name could bring the blush to + her cheeks. Dudley had his excuses in his brother’s condition. His + father’s health, too, was—but this was Dudley calculating. Where + there are coronets, calculations of this sort must needs occur; just as + where there are complications. Odd, one fancies it, that we walking along + the pavement of civilized life, should be perpetually summoning Orcus to + our aid, for the sake of getting a clear course. + </p> + <p> + ‘And supposing a fog, my dearie?’ he said. + </p> + <p> + ‘The daughter in search of her father carries a lamp to light her to him + through densest fogs as well as over deserts,’ etc. She declaimed a long + sentence, to set the ripple running in his features; and when he left the + room for a last word with Armandine, she flung arms round her mother’s + neck, murmuring: ‘Mother! mother!’ a cry equal to ‘I am sure I do right,’ + and understood so by Nataly approving it; she too on the line of her + instinct, without an object in sight. + </p> + <p> + <a name="link2HCH0037" id="link2HCH0037"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + CHAPTER XXXVII. THE MOTHER-THE DAUGHTER + </h2> + <p> + Taking Nesta’s hand, on her entry into his chambers with her father, + Colney Durance bowed over it and kissed it. The unusual performance had a + meaning; she felt she was praised. It might be because she made herself + her father’s companion. ‘I can’t persuade him to put on a great-coat,’ she + said. ‘You would defeat his aim at the particular waistcoat of his + ambition,’ said Colney, goaded to speak, not anxious to be heard. + </p> + <p> + He kept her beside him, leading her about for introductions to multiform + celebrities of both sexes; among them the gentleman editing the Magazine + which gave out serially THE RIVAL TONGUES: and there was talk of a + dragon-throated public’s queer appetite in Letters. The pained Editor + deferentially smiled at her cheerful mention of Delphica. ‘In, book form, + perhaps!’ he remarked, with plaintive’ resignation; adding: ‘You read it?’ + And a lady exclaimed: ‘We all read it!’ + </p> + <p> + But we are the elect, who see signification and catch flavour; and we are + reminded of an insatiable monster how sometimes capricious is his gorge. + ‘He may happen to be in the humour for a shaking!’ Colney’s poor + consolation it was to say of the prospects of his published book: for the + funny monster has been known to like a shaking. + </p> + <p> + ‘He takes it kinder tickled,’ said Fenellan, joining the group and + grasping Nesta’s hand with a warmth that thrilled her and set her + guessing. ‘A taste of his favourite Cayenne lollypop, Colney; it fetches + the tear he loves to shed, or it gives him digestive heat in the bag of + his literary receptacle-fearfully relaxed and enormous! And no wonder; his + is to lie him down on notion of the attitude for reading, his back; and he + has in a jiffy the funnel of the Libraries inserted into his mouth, and he + feels the publishers pouring their gallons through it unlimitedly; never + crying out, which he can’t; only swelling, which he’s obliged to do, with + a non-nutritious inflation; and that’s his intellectual enjoyment; bearing + a likeness to the horrible old torture of the baillir d’eau; and he’s + doomed to perish in the worst book-form of dropsy. You, my dear Colney, + have offended his police or excise, who stand by the funnel, in touch with + his palate, to make sure that nothing above proof is poured in; and + there’s your misfortune. He’s not half a bad fellow, you find when you + haven’t got to serve him.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Superior to his official parasites, one supposes!’ Colney murmured. + </p> + <p> + The celebrities were unaffectedly interested in a literary failure having + certain merits; they discussed it, to compliment the crownless author; and + the fervider they, the more was he endowed to read the meanness prompting + the generosity. Publication of a book, is the philosopher’s lantern upon + one’s fellows. + </p> + <p> + Colney was caught away from his private manufactory of acids by hearing + Simeon Fenellan relate to Victor some of the recent occurrences at + Brighton. Simeon’s tone was unsatisfying; Colney would have the word; he + was like steel on the grindstone for such a theme of our national + grotesque-sublime. + </p> + <p> + ‘That Demerara Supple-jack, Victor! Don’t listen to Simeon; he’s a man of + lean narrative, fit to chronicle political party wrangles and such like + crop of carcase prose: this is epical. In DRINK we have Old England’s + organic Epic; Greeks and Trojans; Parliamentary Olympus, ennobled brewers, + nasal fanatics, all the machinery to hand. Keep a straight eye on the + primary motives of man, you’ll own the English produce the material for + proud verse; they’re alive there! Dartrey’s Demerara makes a pretty + episode of the battle. I haven’t seen it—if it’s possible to look on + it: but I hear it is flexible, of a vulgar appearance in repose, Jove’s + lightning at one time, the thong of AEacus at another. Observe Dartrey + marching off to the Station, for the purpose of laying his miraculous + weapon across the shoulders of a son of Mars, who had offended. But we + have his name, my dear Victor! His name, Simeon?—Worrell; a Major + Worrell: his offence being probably, that he obtained military instruction + in the Service, and left it at his convenience, for our poor patch and + tatter British Army to take in his place another young student, who’ll + grow up to do similarly. And Dartrey, we assume, is off to stop that + system. You behold Sir Dartrey twirling the weapon in preparatory fashion; + because he is determined we shall have an army of trained officers instead + of infant amateurs heading heroic louts. Not a thought of Beer in Dartrey!—always + unpatriotic, you ‘ll say. Plato entreats his absent mistress to fix eyes + on a star: eyes on Beer for the uniting of you English! I tell you no + poetic fiction. Seeing him on his way, thus terribly armed, and knowing + his intent, Venus, to shield a former favourite servant of Mars, conjured + the most diverting of interventions, in the shape of a young woman in a + poke-bonnet, and Skepsey, her squire, marching with a dozen or so, + informing bedevilled mankind of the hideousness of our hymnification when + it is not under secluding sanction of the Edifice, and challengeing + criticism; and that was hard by, and real English, in the form of + bludgeons, wielded by a battalion of the national idol Bungay Beervat’s + boys; and they fell upon the hymners. Here you fill in with pastoral + similes. They struck the maid adored by Skepsey. And that was the blow + which slew them! Our little man drove into the press with a pair of fists + able to do their work. A valiant skiff upon a sea of enemies, he was + having it on the nob, and suddenly the Demerara lightened. It flailed to + thresh. Enough to say, brains would have come. The Bungays made a show of + fight. No lack of blood in them, to stock a raw shilling’s worth or gush + before Achilles rageing. You perceive the picture, you can almost sing the + ballad. We want only a few names of the fallen. It was the carving of a + maitre chef, according to Skepsey: right-left-and point, with supreme + precision: they fell, accurately sliced from the joint. Having done with + them, Dartrey tossed the Demerara to Skepsey, and washed his hands of + battle; and he let his major go unscathed. Phlebotomy sufficient for the + day!’ + </p> + <p> + Nesta’s ears hummed with the name of Major Worrell. + </p> + <p> + ‘Skepsey did come back to London with a rather damaged frontispiece,’ + Victor said. ‘He can’t have joined those people?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘They may suit one of your militant peacemakers,’ interposed Fenellan. + ‘The most placable creatures alive, and the surest for getting-up a + shindy.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Suit him! They’re the scandal of our streets.’ Victor was pricked with a + jealousy of them for beguiling him of his trusty servant. + </p> + <p> + ‘Look at your country, see where it shows its vitality,’ said Colney. ‘You + don’t see elsewhere any vein in movement-movement,’ he harped on the word + Victor constantly employed to express the thing he wanted to see. ‘Think + of that, when the procession sets your teeth on edge. They’re honest foes + of vice, and they move:—in England! Pulpit-preaching has no effect. + For gross maladies, gross remedies. You may judge of what you are by the + quality of the cure. Puritanism, I won’t attempt to paint—it would + barely be decent; but compare it with the spectacle of English frivolity, + and you’ll admit it to be the best show you make. It may still be the + saving of you—on the level of the orderly ox: I ‘ve not observed + that it aims at higher. And talking of the pulpit, Barmby is off to the + East, has accepted a Shoreditch curacy, Skepsey tells me.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘So there’s the reason for our not seeing him!’ Victor turned to Nesta. + </p> + <p> + ‘Papa, you won’t be angry with Skepsey if he has joined those people,’ + said Nesta. ‘I’m sure he thinks of serving his country, Mr. Durance.’ + </p> + <p> + Colney smiled on her. ‘And you too?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘If women knew how!’ + </p> + <p> + ‘They’re hitting on more ways at present than the men—in England.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘But, Mr. Durance, it speaks well for England when they’re allowed the + chance here.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Good!’ Fenellan exclaimed. ‘And that upsets his placement of the modern + national genders: Germany masculine, France feminine, Old England what + remains.’ + </p> + <p> + Victor ruffled and reddened on his shout of ‘Neuter?’ + </p> + <p> + Their circle widened. Nesta knew she was on promotion, by her being led + about and introduced to ladies. They were encouraging with her. One of + them, a Mrs. Marina Floyer, had recently raised a standard of feminine + insurrection. She said: ‘I hear your praises from Mr. Durance. He rarely + praises. You have shown capacity to meditate on the condition of women, he + says.’ + </p> + <p> + Nesta drew a shorter breath, with a hope at heart. She speculated in the + dark, as to whether her aim to serve and help was not so friendless. And + did Mr. Durance approve? But surely she stood in a glorious England if + there were men and women to welcome a girl to their councils. Oh! that is + the broad free England where gentlemen and gentlewomen accept of the + meanest aid to cleanse the land of its iniquities, and do not suffer shame + to smite a young face for touching upon horrors with a pure design. + </p> + <p> + She cried in her bosom: I feel! She had no other expression for that which + is as near as great natures may come to the conceiving of the celestial + spirit from an emissary angel; and she trembled, the fire ran through her. + It seemed to her, that she would be called to help or that certainly they + were nearing to an effacement of the woefullest of evils; and if not + helping, it would still be a blessedness for her to kneel thanking heaven. + </p> + <p> + Society was being attacked and defended. She could but studiously listen. + Her father was listening. The assailant was a lady; and she had a hearing, + although she treated Society as a discrowned monarch on trial for an + offence against a more precious: viz., the individual cramped by brutish + laws: the individual with the ideas of our time, righteously claiming + expansion out of the clutches of a narrow old-world disciplinarian-that + giant hypocrite! She flung the gauntlet at externally venerable + Institutions; and she had a hearing, where horrification, execration, the + foul Furies of Conservatism would in a shortly antecedent day have been + hissing and snakily lashing, hounding her to expulsion. Mrs. Marina Floyer + gravely seconded her. Colney did the same. Victor turned sharp on him. + ‘Yes,’ Colney said; ‘we unfold the standard of extremes in this country, + to get a single step taken: that’s how we move: we threaten death to get + footway. Now, mark: Society’s errors will be admitted.’ + </p> + <p> + A gentleman spoke. He began by admitting Society’s errors. Nevertheless, + it so distinctly exists for the common good, that we may say of Society in + relation to the individual, it is the body to the soul. We may wash, trim, + purify, but we must not maim it. The assertion of our individuality in + opposition to the Government of Society—this existing Society—is + a toss of the cap for the erasure of our civilization, et caetera. + </p> + <p> + Platitudes can be of intense interest if they approach our case.—But, + if you please, we ask permission to wash, trim, purify, and we do not get + it.—But you have it! Because we take it at our peril; and you, who + are too cowardly to grant or withhold, call-up the revolutionary from the + pits by your slackness:—etc. There was a pretty hot debate. Both + assailant and defendant, to Victor’s thinking, spoke well, and each the + right thing and he could have made use of both, but he could answer + neither. He beat about for the cause of this deficiency, and discovered it + in his position. Mentally, he was on the side of Society. Yet he was + annoyed to find the attack was so easily answerable when the defence + unfolded. But it was absurd to expect it would not be. And in fact, a + position secretly rebellious is equal to water on the brain for + stultifying us. + </p> + <p> + Before the controversy was over, a note in Nataly’s handwriting called him + home. She wrote: ‘Make my excuses. C. D. will give Nesta and some lady + dinner. A visitor here. Come alone, and without delay. Quite well, robust. + Impatient to consult with you, nothing else.’ + </p> + <p> + Nesta was happy to stay; and Victor set forth. + </p> + <p> + The visitor? plainly Dudley. Nataly’s trusting the girl to the chance of + some lady being present, was unlike her. Dudley might be tugging at the + cord; and the recent conversation upon Society, rendered one of its gilt + pillars particularly estimable.—A person in the debate had declared + this modern protest on behalf of individualism to represent Society’s + Criminal Trial. And it is likely to be a long one. And good for the world, + that we see such a Trial!—Well said or not, undoubtedly Society is + an old criminal: not much more advanced than the state of spiritual + worship where bloody sacrifice was offered to a hungry Lord. But it has a + case for pleading. We may liken it, as we have it now, to the bumping + lumberer’s raft; suitable along torrent waters until we come to smoother. + Are we not on waters of a certain smoothness at the reflecting level?—enough + to justify demands for a vessel of finer design. If Society is to subsist, + it must have the human with the logical argument against the cry of the + free-flags, instead of presenting a block’s obtuseness. That, you need not + hesitate to believe, will be rolled downward and disintegrated, sooner + than later. A Society based on the logical concrete of humane + considerateness:—a Society prohibiting to Mrs. Burman her wielding + of a life-long rod.... + </p> + <p> + The personal element again to confuse inquiry!—And Skepsey and + Barmby both of them bent on doing work without inquiry of any sort! They + were enviable: they were good fellows. Victor clung to the theme because + it hinted of next door to his lost Idea. He rubbed the back of his head, + fancying a throb there. Are civilized creatures incapable of abstract + thought when their social position is dubious? For if so, we never can be + quit of those we forsake.—Apparently Mrs. Burman’s unfathomed power + lay in her compelling him to summon the devilish in himself and play upon + the impish in Society, that he might overcome her. + </p> + <p> + Victor’s house-door stopped this current. + </p> + <p> + Nataly took his embrace. + </p> + <p> + ‘Nothing wrong?’ he said, and saw the something. It was a favourable + moment to tell her what she might not at another time regard as a small + affair. ‘News in the City to-day of that South London borough being + vacated. Quatley urges me. A death again! I saw Pempton, too. Will you + credit me when I tell you he carries his infatuation so far, that he has + been investing in Japanese and Chinese Loans, because they are less + meat-eaters than others, and vegetarians are more stable, and outlast us + all!—Dudley the visitor?’ ‘Mr. Sowerby has been here,’ she said, in + a shaking low voice. + </p> + <p> + Victor held her hand and felt a squeeze more nervous than affectionate. + </p> + <p> + ‘To consult with me,’ she added. ‘My maid will go at ten to bring Nesta; + Mr. Durance I can count on, to see her safe home. Ah!’ she wailed. + </p> + <p> + Victor nodded, saying: ‘I guess. And, my love, you will receive Mrs. John + Cormyn to-morrow morning. I can’t endure gaps. Gaps in our circle must + never be. Do I guess?—I spoke to Colney about bringing her home.’ + </p> + <p> + Nataly sighed: ‘Ah! make what provision we will! Evil—Mr. Sowerby + has had a great deal to bear.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘A worldling may think so.’ + </p> + <p> + Her breast heaved, and the wave burst: but her restraining of tears froze + her speech. + </p> + <p> + ‘Victor! Our Nesta! Mr. Sowerby is unable to explain. And how the Miss + Duvidneys!... At that Brighton!’—The voice he heard was not his + darling’s deep rich note, it had dropped to toneless hoarseness: ‘She has + been permitted to make acquaintance—she has been seen riding with—she + has called upon—Oh! it is one of those abandoned women. In her + house! Our girl! Our Nesta! She was insulted by a man in the woman’s + house. She is talked of over Brighton. The mother!—the daughter! And + grant me this—that never was girl more carefully... never till she + was taken from me. Oh! do not forget. You will defend me? You will say, + that her mother did with all her soul strive... It is not a rumour. Mr. + Sowerby has had it confirmed.’ A sob caught her voice. + </p> + <p> + Victor’s hands caressed to console: ‘Dudley does not propose to...?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Nesta must promise... but how it happened? How! An acquaintance with—contact + with!—Oh! cruel!’ Each time she ceased speaking, the wrinkles of a + shiver went over her, and the tone was of tears coming, but she locked + them in. + </p> + <p> + ‘An accident!’ said Victor; ‘some misunderstanding—there can’t be + harm. Of course, she promises—hasn’t to promise. How could a girl + distinguish! He does not cast blame on her?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Dear, if you would go down to Dartrey to-morrow. He knows:—it is + over the Clubs there; he will tell you, before a word to Nesta. Innocent, + yes! Mr. Sowerby has not to be assured of that. Ignorant of the character + of the dreadful woman? Ah, if I could ever in anything think her ignorant! + She frightens me. Mr. Sowerby is indulgent. He does me justice. My duty to + her—I must defend myself—has been my first thought. I said in + my prayers—she at least!... We have to see the more than common + reasons why she, of all girls, should—he did not hint it, he was + delicate: her name must not be public.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Yes, yes, Dudley is without parallel as a gentleman,’ said Victor. ‘It + does not suit me to hear the word “indulgent.” My dear, if you were down + there, you would discover that the talk was the talk of two or three men + seeing our girl ride by—and she did ride with a troop: why, we’ve + watched them along the parade, often. Clear as day how it happened! I’ll + go down early to-morrow.’ + </p> + <p> + He fancied Nataly was appeased. And even out of this annoyance, there was + the gain of her being won to favour Dudley’s hitherto but tolerated suit. + </p> + <p> + Nataly also had the fancy, that the calm following on her anguish, was a + moderation of it. She was kept strung to confide in her girl by the recent + indebtedness to her for words heavenly in the strengthening comfort they + gave. But no sooner was she alone than her torturing perplexities and her + abasement of the hours previous to Victor’s coming returned. + </p> + <p> + For a girl of Nesta’s head could not be deceived; she had come home with a + woman’s intelligence of the world, hard knowledge of it—a knowledge + drawn from foul wells, the unhappy mother imagined: she dreaded to probe + to the depth of it. She had in her wounded breast the world’s idea, that + corruption must come of the contact with impurity. + </p> + <p> + Nataly renewed her cry of despair: ‘The mother!—the daughter!’—her + sole revelation of the heart’s hollows in her stammered speaking to + Victor. + </p> + <p> + She thanked heaven for the loneliness of her bed, where she could repeat: + ‘The mother!—the daughter!’ hearing the world’s words:—the + daughter excused, by reason of her having such a mother; the mother + unpitied for the bruiting of her brazen daughter’s name: but both alike + consigned to the corners of the world’s dust-heaps. She cried out, that + her pride was broken. Her pride, her last support of life, had gone to + pieces. The tears she restrained in Victor’s presence, were called on to + come now, and she had none. It might be, that she had not strength for + weeping. She was very weak. Rising from bed to lock her door against + Nesta’s entry to the room on her return at night, she could hardly stand: + a chill and a clouding overcame her. The quitted bed seemed the haven of a + drifted wreck to reach. + </p> + <p> + Victor tried the handle of a locked door in the dark of the early winter + morning. ‘The mother!—the daughter!’ had swung a pendulum for some + time during the night in him, too. He would rather have been subjected to + the spectacle of tears than have heard that toneless voice, as it were the + dry torrent-bed rolling blocks instead of melodious, if afflicting, + waters. + </p> + <p> + He told Nesta not to disturb her mother, and murmured of a headache: + ‘Though, upon my word, the best cure for mama would be a look into Fredi’s + eyes!’ he said, embracing his girl, quite believing in her, just a little + afraid of her. + </p> + <p> + <a name="link2HCH0038" id="link2HCH0038"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + CHAPTER XXXVIII. NATALY, NESTA, AND DARTREY FENELLAN + </h2> + <p> + Pleasant things, that come to us too late for our savour of the sweetness + in them, toll ominously of life on the last walk to its end. Yesterday, + before Dudley Sowerby’s visit, Nataly would have been stirred where the + tears we shed for happiness or repress at a flattery dwell when seeing her + friend Mrs. John Cormyn enter her boudoir and hearing her speak + repentantly, most tenderly. Mrs. John said: ‘You will believe I have + suffered, dear; I am half my weight, I do think’: and she did not set the + smile of responsive humour moving; although these two ladies had a key of + laughter between them. Nataly took her kiss; held her hand, and at the + parting kissed her. She would rather have seen her friend than not: so far + she differed from a corpse; but she was near the likeness to the dead in + the insensibility to any change of light shining on one who best loved + darkness and silence. She cried to herself wilfully, that her pride was + broken: as women do when they spurn at the wounding of a dignity they + cannot protect and die to see bleeding; for in it they live. + </p> + <p> + The cry came of her pride unbroken, sore bruised, and after a certain + space for recovery combative. She said: + </p> + <p> + Any expiation I could offer where I did injury, I would not refuse; I + would humble myself and bless heaven for being able to pay my debt—what + I can of it. All I contend against is, injustice. And she sank into + sensational protests of her anxious care of her daughter, too proud to + phrase them. + </p> + <p> + Her one great affliction, the scourging affliction of her utter + loneliness;—an outcast from her family; daily, and she knew not how, + more shut away from the man she loved; now shut away from her girl;—seemed + under the hand of the angel of God. The abandonment of her by friends, was + merely the light to show it. + </p> + <p> + Midday’s post brought her a letter from Priscilla Graves, entreating to be + allowed to call on her next day.—We are not so easily cast off! + Nataly said, bitterly, in relation to the lady whose offending had not + been so great. She wrote: ‘Come, if sure that you sincerely wish to.’ + </p> + <p> + Having fasted, she ate at lunch in her dressing-room, with some taste of + the food, haunted by an accusation of gluttony because of her eating at + all, and a vile confession, that she was enabled to eat, owing to the + receipt of Priscilla’s empty letter: for her soul’s desire was to be doing + a deed of expiation, and the macerated flesh seemed her assurance to + herself of the courage to make amends.—I must have some strength, + she said wearifully, in apology for the morsel consumed. + </p> + <p> + Nesta’s being in the house with her, became an excessive irritation. + Doubts of the girl’s possible honesty to speak a reptile truth under + question; amazement at her boldness to speak it; hatred of, the mouth that + could: and loathing of the words, the theme; and abomination of herself + for conjuring fictitious images to rouse real emotions; all ran + counterthreads, that produced a mad pattern in the mind, affrighting to + reason: and then, for its preservation, reason took a superrational leap, + and ascribed the terrible injustice of this last cruel stroke to the + divine scourge, recognized divine by the selection of the mortal spot for + chastisement. She clasped her breast, and said: It is mortal. And that + calmed her. + </p> + <p> + She said, smiling: I never felt my sin until this blow came! Therefore the + blow was proved divine. Ought it not to be welcomed?—and she + appearing no better than one of those, the leprous of the sex! And brought + to acknowledgement of the likeness by her daughter! + </p> + <p> + Nataly drank the poison distilled from her exclamations and was ice. She + had denied herself to Nesta’s redoubled petition. Nesta knocking at the + door a third time and calling, tore the mother two ways: to have her girl + on her breast or snap their union in a word with an edge. She heard the + voice of Dartrey Fenellan. + </p> + <p> + He was admitted. ‘No, dear,’ she said to Nesta; and Nesta’s, ‘My own + mother,’ consentingly said, in tender resignation, as she retired, sprang + a stinging tear to the mother’s eyelids. + </p> + <p> + Dartrey looked at the door closing on the girl. + </p> + <p> + ‘Is it a very low woman?’ Nataly asked him in a Church whisper, with a + face abashed. + </p> + <p> + ‘It is not,’ said he, quick to meet any abruptness. + </p> + <p> + ‘She must be cunning.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘In the ordinary way. We say it of Puss before the hounds.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘To deceive a girl like Nesta!’ + </p> + <p> + ‘She has done no harm.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Dartrey, you speak to a mother. You have seen the woman? She is?—ah!’ + </p> + <p> + ‘She is womanly, womanly.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Quite one of those...?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘My dear soul! You can’t shake them off in that way. She is one of us. If + we have the class, we can’t escape from it. They are not to bear all the + burden because they exist. We are the bigger debtors. I tell you she is + womanly.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘It sounds like horrid cynicism.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Friends of mine would abuse it for the reverse.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Do not make me hate your chivalry. This woman is a rod on my back. + Provided only she has not dropped venom into Nesta’s mind!’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Don’t fear!’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Can you tell me you think she has done no harm to my girl?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘To Nesta herself?—not any: not to a girl like your girl.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘To my girl’s name? Speak at once. But I know she has. She induced Nesta + to go to her house. My girl was insulted in this woman’s house.’ + </p> + <p> + Dartrey’s forehead ridged with his old fury and a gust of present + contempt. ‘I can tell you this, that the fellow who would think harm of + it, knowing the facts ‘s not worthy of touching the tips of the fingers of + your girl.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘She is talked of!’ + </p> + <p> + ‘A good-looking girl out riding with a handsome woman on a parade of + idlers!’ + </p> + <p> + ‘The woman is notorious.’ Nataly said it shivering. + </p> + <p> + He shook his head. ‘Not true.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘She has an air of a lady?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘She sits a horse well.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Would she to any extent deceive me—impose on me here?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘No.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Ah!’ Nataly moaned.... + </p> + <p> + ‘But what?’ said Dartrey. ‘There was no pretence. Her style is not worse + than that of some we have seen. There was no effort to deceive. The + woman’s plain for you and me to read, she has few of the arts; one or two + tricks, if you like: and these were not needed for use. There are women + who have them, and have not been driven or let slip into the wilderness.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Yes; I know!—those ideas of yours!’ Nataly had once admired him for + his knightliness toward the weakest women and the women underfoot. ‘You + have spoken to this woman? She boasted of acquaintance with Nesta?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘She thanked God for having met her.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Is it one of the hysterical creatures?’ + </p> + <p> + Mrs. Marsett appeared fronting Dartrey. + </p> + <p> + He laughed to himself. ‘A clever question. There is a leaning to + excitement of manner at times. It ‘s not hysteria. Allow for her + position.’ + </p> + <p> + Nataly took the unintended blow, and bowed to it; and still more harshly + said: ‘What rank of life does the woman come from?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘The class educated for a skittish career by your popular Stage and your + Book-stalls. I am not precise?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Leave Mr. Durance. Is she in any degree commonly well bred?... behaviour, + talk-her English.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘I trench on Mr. Durance in replying. Her English is passable. You may + hear...’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Everywhere, of course! And this woman of slipshod English and excited + manners imposed upon Nesta!’ + </p> + <p> + ‘It would not be my opinion.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Did not impose on her!’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Not many would impose on Nesta Radnor for long.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Think what that says, Dartrey!’ + </p> + <p> + ‘You have had a detestable version of the story.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Because an excited creature thanks God to you for having met her!’ + </p> + <p> + ‘She may. She’s a better woman for having met her. Don’t suppose we’re for + supernatural conversions. The woman makes no show of that. But she has + found a good soul among her sex—her better self in youth, as one + guesses; and she is grateful—feels farther from exile in + consequence. She has found a lady to take her by the hand!—not a + common case. She can never go to the utterly bad after knowing Nesta. I + forget if she says it; I say it. You have heard the story from one of your + conventional gentlemen.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘A true gentleman. I have reason to thank him. He has not your ideas on + these matters, Dartrey. He is very sensitive... on Nesta’s behalf.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘With reference to marriage. I’ll own I prefer another kind of gentleman. + I ‘ve had my experience of that kind of gentleman. Many of the kind have + added their spot to the outcasts abominated for uncleanness—in holy + unction. Many?—I won’t say all; but men who consent to hear black + words pitched at them, and help to set good women facing away from them, + are pious dolts or rascal dogs of hypocrites. They, if you’ll let me quote + Colney Durance to you to-day—and how is it he is not in favour?—they + are tempting the Lord to turn the pillars of Society into pillars of salt. + Down comes the house. And priests can rest in sight of it!—They + ought to be dead against the sanctimony that believes it excommunicates + when it curses. The relationship is not dissolved so cheaply, though our + Society affects to think it is. Barmby’s off to the East End of this + London, Victor informs me:—good fellow! And there he’ll be groaning + over our vicious nature. Nature is not more responsible for vice than she + is for inhumanity. Both bad, but the latter’s the worse of the two.’ + </p> + <p> + Nataly interposed: ‘I see the contrast, and see whom it’s to strike.’ + </p> + <p> + Dartrey sent a thought after his meaning. ‘Hardly that. Let it stand. He + ‘s only one with the world: but he shares the criminal infamy for crushing + hope out of its frailest victims. They’re that—no sentiment. What a + world, too, look behind it!—brutal because brutish. The world may go + hang: we expect more of your gentleman. To hear of Nesta down there, and + doubt that she was about good work; and come complaining! He had the + privilege of speaking to her, remonstrating, if he wished. There are men + who think—men!—the plucking of sinners out of the mire a dirty + business. They depute it to certain officials. And your women—it’s + the taste of the world to have them educated so, that they can as little + take the humane as the enlightened view. Except, by the way, sometimes, in + secret;—they have a sisterly breast. In secret, they do occasionally + think as they feel. In public, the brass mask of the Idol they call + Propriety commands or supplies their feelings and thoughts. I won’t repeat + my reasons for educating them differently. At present we have but half the + woman to go through life with—and thank you.’ + </p> + <p> + Dartrey stopped. ‘Don’t be disturbed,’ he added. ‘There’s no ground for + alarm. Not of any sort.’ + </p> + <p> + Nataly said: ‘What name?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Her name is Mrs. Marsett.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘The name is...?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Captain Marsett: will be Sir Edward. He came back from the Continent + yesterday.’ + </p> + <p> + A fit of shuddering seized Nataly. It grew in violence, and speaking out + of it, with a pause of sickly empty chatter of the jaws, she said: ‘Always + that name?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Before the maiden name? May have been or not.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Not, you say?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘I don’t accurately know.’ + </p> + <p> + Dartrey sprang to his legs. ‘My dear soul! dear friend—one of the + best! if we go on fencing in the dark, there’ll be wounds. Your way of + taking this affair disappointed me. Now I understand. It’s the disease of + a trouble, to fly at comparisons. No real one exists. I wished to protect + the woman from a happier sister’s judgement, to save you from alarm + concerning Nesta:—quite groundless, if you’ll believe me. Come, + there’s plenty of benevolent writing abroad on these topics now: facts are + more looked at, and a good woman may join us in taking them without the + horrors and loathings of angels rather too much given to claim distinction + from the luckless. A girl who’s unprotected may go through adventures + before she fixes, and be a creature of honest intentions. Better if + protected, we all agree. Better also if the world did not favour the + girl’s multitude of enemies. Your system of not dealing with facts openly + is everyway favourable to them. I am glad to say, Victor recognizes what + corruption that spread of wealth is accountable for. And now I must go and + have a talk with the—what a change from the blue butterfly! Eaglet, + I ought to have said. I dine with you, for Victor may bring news.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Would anything down there be news to you, Dartrey?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘He makes it wherever he steps.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘He would reproach me for not detaining you. Tell Nesta I have to lie down + after talking. She has a child’s confidence in you.’ + </p> + <p> + A man of middle age! he said to himself. It is the particular ejaculation + which tames the senior whose heart is for a dash of holiday. He resolved, + that the mother might trust to the discretion of a man of his age; and he + went down to Nesta, grave with the weight his count of years should give + him. Seeing her, the light of what he now knew of her was an ennobling + equal to celestial. For this fair girl was one of the active souls of the + world—his dream to discover in woman’s form. She, the little Nesta, + the tall pure-eyed girl before him, was, young though she was, already in + the fight with evil: a volunteer of the army of the simply Christian. The + worse for it? Sowerby would think so. She was not of the order of young + women who, in sheer ignorance or in voluntary, consent to the peace with + evil, and are kept externally safe from the smirch of evil, and are the + ornaments of their country, glory of a country prizing ornaments higher + than qualities. + </p> + <p> + Dartrey could have been momentarily incredulous of things revealed by Mrs. + Marsett—not incredulous of the girl’s heroism: that capacity he + caught and gauged in her shape of head, cut of mouth, and the measurements + he was accustomed to make at a glance:—but her beauty, or the form + of beauty which was hers, argued against her having set foot of thought in + our fens. Here and far there we meet a young saint vowed to service along + by those dismal swamps: and saintly she looks; not of this earth. Nesta + was of the blooming earth. Where do we meet girl or woman comparable to + garden-flowers, who can dare to touch to lift the spotted of her sex? He + was puzzled by Nesta’s unlikeness in deeds and in aspect. He remembered + her eyes, on the day when he and Colonel Sudley beheld her; presently he + was at quiet grapple with her mind. His doubts cleared off. Then the + question came, How could a girl of heroical character be attached to the + man Sowerby? That entirely passed belief. + </p> + <p> + And was it possible his wishes beguiled his hearing? Her tones were + singularly vibrating. + </p> + <p> + They talked for a while before, drawing a deep breath, she said: ‘I fancy + I am in disgrace with my mother.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘You have a suspicion why?’ said he. + </p> + <p> + ‘I have.’ + </p> + <p> + She would have told him why: the words were at her lips. Previous to her + emotion on the journey home, the words would have come out. They were + arrested by the thunder of the knowledge, that the nobleness in him + drawing her to be able to speak of scarlet matter, was personally + worshipped. + </p> + <p> + He attributed the full rose upon her cheeks to the forbidding subject. + </p> + <p> + To spare pain, he said: ‘No misunderstanding with the dear mother will + last the day through. Can I help?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Oh, Captain Dartrey!’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Drop the captain. Dartrey will do.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘How could I!’ + </p> + <p> + ‘You’re not wanting in courage, Nesta.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Hardly for that!’ + </p> + <p> + ‘By-and-by, then.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Though I could not say Mr. Fenellan.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘You see; Dartrey, it must be.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘If I could!’ + </p> + <p> + ‘But the fellow is not a captain: and he is a friend, an old friend, very + old friend: he’ll be tipped with grey in a year or two.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘I might be bolder then.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Imagine it now. There is no disloyalty in your calling your friends by + their names.’ + </p> + <p> + Her nature rang to the implication. ‘I am not bound.’ Dartrey hung fast, + speculating on her visibly: ‘I heard you were?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘No. I must be free.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘It is not an engagement?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Will you laugh?—I have never quite known. My father desired it: and + my desire is to please him. I think I am vain enough to think I read + through blinds and shutters. The engagement—what there was—has + been, to my reading, broken more than once. I have not considered it, to + settle my thoughts on it, until lately: and now I may suspect it to be + broken. I have given cause—if it is known. There is no blame + elsewhere. I am not unhappy, Captain Dartrey.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Captain by courtesy. Very well. Tell me how Nesta judges the engagement + to be broken?’ + </p> + <p> + She was mentally phrasing before she said: ‘Absence.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘He was here yesterday.’ + </p> + <p> + All that the visit embraced was in her expressive look, as of sight + drawing inward, like our breath in a spell of wonderment. ‘Then I + understand; it enlightens me. + </p> + <p> + My own mother!—my poor mother! he should have come to me. I was the + guilty person, not she; and she is the sufferer. That, if in life were + direct retribution! but the very meaning of having a heart, is to suffer + through others or for them.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘You have soon seen that, dear girl,’ said Dartrey. + </p> + <p> + ‘So, my own mother, and loving me as she does, blames me!’ Nesta sighed; + she took a sharp breath. ‘You? do you blame me too?’ + </p> + <p> + He pressed her hand, enamoured of her instantaneous divination and + heavenly candour. + </p> + <p> + But he was admonished, that to speak high approval would not be honourable + advantage taken of the rival condemning; and he said: ‘Blame? Some think + it is not always the right thing to do the right thing. I’ve made + mistakes, with no bad design. A good mother’s view is not often wrong.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘You pressed my hand,’ she murmured. + </p> + <p> + That certainly had said more. + </p> + <p> + ‘Glad to again,’ he responded. It was uttered airily and was meant to be + as lightly done. + </p> + <p> + Nesta did not draw back her hand. ‘I feel strong when you press it.’ Her + voice wavered, and as when we hear a flask sing thin at the filling, + ceased upon evidence of a heart surcharged. How was he to relax the + pressure!—he had to give her the strength she craved: and he vowed + it should be but for half a minute, half a minute longer. + </p> + <p> + Her tears fell; she eyed him steadily; she had the look of sunlight in + shower. + </p> + <p> + ‘Oldish men are the best friends for you, I suppose,’ he said; and her + gaze turned elusive phrases to vapour. + </p> + <p> + He was compelled to see the fiery core of the raincloud lighting it for a + revealment, that allowed as little as it retained of a shadow of + obscurity. + </p> + <p> + The sight was keener than touch and the run of blood with blood to quicken + slumbering seeds of passion. + </p> + <p> + But here is the place of broken ground and tangle, which calls to + honourable men, not bent on sport, to be wary to guard the gunlock. He + stopped the word at his mouth. It was not in him to stop or moderate the + force of his eyes. She met them with the slender unbendingness that was + her own; a feminine of inspirited manhood. There was no soft expression, + only the direct shot of light, on both sides; conveying as much as is + borne from sun to earth, from earth to sun. And when such an exchange has + come between the two, they are past plighting, they are the wedded one. + </p> + <p> + Nesta felt it, without asking whether she was loved. She was his. She had + not a thought of the word of love or the being beloved. Showers of painful + blissfulness went through her, as the tremours of a shocked frame, while + she sat quietly, showing scarce a sign; and after he had let her hand go, + she had the pressure on it. The quivering intense of the moment of his + eyes and grasp was lord of her, lord of the day and of all days coming. + That is how Love slays Death. Never did girl so give her soul. + </p> + <p> + She would have been the last to yield it unreservedly to a man untrusted + for the character she worshipped. But she could have given it to Dartrey, + despite his love of another, because it was her soul, without any of the + cravings, except to bestow. + </p> + <p> + He perceived, that he had been carried on for the number of steps which + are countless miles and do not permit the retreat across the desert + behind; and he was in some amazement at himself, remindful of the + different nature of our restraining power when we have a couple playing on + it. Yet here was this girl, who called him up to the heights of young life + again: and a brave girl; and she bled for the weak, had no shrinking from + the women underfoot: for the reason, that she was a girl sovereignly pure, + angelically tender. Was there a point of honour to hold him back? + </p> + <p> + Nataly entered the room. She kissed Nesta, and sat silent. + </p> + <p> + ‘Mother, will you speak of me to him, if I go out?’ Nesta said. + </p> + <p> + ‘We have spoken,’ her mother replied, vexed by the unmaidenly allusion to + that theme. + </p> + <p> + She would have asked, How did you guess I knew of it?—but that the + Why should I speak of you to him? struck the louder note in her bosom: and + then, What is there that this girl cannot guess!—filled the mother’s + heart with apprehensive dread: and an inward cry, What things will she not + set going, to have them discussed. And the appalling theme, sitting + offensive though draped in their midst, was taken for a proof of the + girl’s unblushingness. After standing as one woman against the world so + long, Nataly was relieved to be on the side of a world now convictedly + unjust to her in the confounding of her with the shameless. Her mind had + taken the brand of that thought:—And Nesta had brought her to it:—And + Dudley Sowerby, a generous representative of the world, had kindly, having + the deputed power to do so, sustained her, only partially blaming Nesta, + not casting them off; as the world, with which Nataly felt, under a sense + of the protection calling up all her gratitude to young Dudley, would have + approved his doing. + </p> + <p> + She was passing through a fit of the cowardice peculiar to the tediously + strained, who are being more than commonly tried—persecuted, as they + say when they are not supplicating their tyrannical Authority for aid. The + world will continue to be indifferent to their view of it and behaviour + toward it until it ceases to encourage the growth of hypocrites. + </p> + <p> + These are moments when the faces we are observing drop their charm, + showing us our perversion internal, if we could but reflect, to see it. + Very many thousand times above Dudley Sowerby, Nataly ranked Dartrey + Fenellan; and still she looked at him, where he sat beside Nesta, + ungenially, critical of the very features, jealously in the interests of + Dudley; and recollecting, too, that she had once prayed for one exactly + resembling Dartrey Fenellan to be her Nesta’s husband. But, as she would + have said, that was before the indiscretion of her girl had shown her to + require for her husband a man whose character and station guaranteed + protection instead of inciting to rebellion. And Dartrey, the loved and + prized, was often in the rebel ranks; he was dissatisfied with matters as + they are; was restless for action, angry with a country denying it to him; + he made enemies, he would surely bring down inquiries about Nesta’s head, + and cause the forgotten or quiescent to be stirred; he would scarcely be + the needed hand for such a quiver of the lightnings as Nesta was. + </p> + <p> + Dartrey read Nataly’s brows. This unwonted uncomeliness of hers was an + indication to one or other of our dusky pits, not a revealing. + </p> + <p> + <a name="link2HCH0039" id="link2HCH0039"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + CHAPTER XXXIX. A CHAPTER IN THE SHADOW OF MRS. MARSETT + </h2> + <p> + He read her more closely when Arlington brought in the brown paper + envelope of the wires—to which the mate of Victor ought to have + become accustomed. She took it; her eyelids closed, and her features were + driven to whiteness. ‘Only these telegrams,’ she said, in apology. + </p> + <p> + ‘Lakelands on fire?’ Dartrey murmured to Nesta; and she answered: ‘I + should not be sorry.’ + </p> + <p> + Nataly coldly asked her why she would not be sorry. + </p> + <p> + Dartrey interposed: ‘I’m sure she thinks Lakelands worries her mother.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘That ranks low among the worries,’ Nataly sighed, opening the envelope. + </p> + <p> + Nesta touched her arm: ‘Mother! even before Captain Dartrey, if you will + let me!’—she turned to him: ‘before...’ at the end of her breath she + said: ‘Dartrey Fenellan. You shall see my whole heart, mother.’ + </p> + <p> + Her mother looked from her at him. + </p> + <p> + ‘Victor returns by the last train. He telegraphs, that he dines with—’ + She handed the paper to Dartrey. + </p> + <p> + ‘Marsett,’ he read aloud; and she flushed; she was angry with him for not + knowing, that the name was a term of opprobrium flung at her. + </p> + <p> + ‘It’s to tell you he has done what he thought good,’ said Dartrey. ‘In + other words, as I interpret, he has completed his daughter’s work. So we + won’t talk about it till he comes. You have no company this evening?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Oh! there is a pause to-night! It’s nearly as unceasing as your brother + Simeon’s old French lady in the ronde with her young bridegroom, till they + danced her to pieces. I do get now and then an hour’s repose,’ Nataly + added, with a vision springing up of the person to whom the story had + applied. + </p> + <p> + ‘My dear, you are a good girl to call me Dartrey,’ the owner of the name + said to Nesta. + </p> + <p> + Nataly saw them both alert, in the terrible manner peculiar to both, for + the directest of the bare statements. She could have protested, that her + love of truth was on an equality with theirs; and certainly, that her + regard for decency was livelier. Pass the deficiency in a man. But a girl + who could speak, by allusion, of Mrs. Marsett—of the existence of a + Mrs. Marsett—in the presence of a man: and he excusing, encouraging: + and this girl her own girl;—it seemed to her, that the world reeled; + she could hardly acknowledge the girl; save under the penitential + admission of her sin’s having found her out. + </p> + <p> + She sent Nesta to her room when they went upstairs to dress, unable to + endure her presence after seeing her show a placid satisfaction at + Dartrey’s nod to the request for him to sleep in the house that night. It + was not at all a gleam of pleasure, hardly an expression; it was a manner + of saying, One drop more in my cup of good fortune! an absurd and an + offensive exhibition of silly optimism of the young, blind that they are! + </p> + <p> + For were it known, and surely the happening of it would be known, that + Dudley Sowerby had shaken off the Nesta of no name, who was the abominable + Mrs. Marsett’s friend, a whirlwind with a trumpet would sweep them into + the wilderness on a blast frightfuller than any ever heard. + </p> + <p> + Nataly had a fit of weeping for want of the girl’s embrace, against whom + her door was jealously locked. She hoped those two would talk much, madly + if they liked, during dinner, that she might not be sensible, through any + short silence, of the ardour animating them: especially glowing in Nesta, + ready behind her quiet mask to come brazenly forth. But both of them were + mercilessly ardent; and a sickness of the fear, that they might fall on + her to capture her and hurry her along with them perforce of the allayed, + once fatal, inflammable element in herself, shook the warmth from her + limbs: causing her to say to herself aloud in a ragged hoarseness, very + strangely: Every thought of mine now has a physical effect on me! + </p> + <p> + They had not been two minutes together when she descended to them. Yet she + saw the girl’s heart brimming, either with some word spoken to her or for + joy of an unmaidenly confession. During dinner they talked, without + distressful pauses. Whatever said, whatever done, was manifestly another + drop in Nesta’s foolish happy cup. Could it be all because Dartrey + Fenellan countenanced her acquaintance with that woman? The mother had + lost hold of her. The tortured mother had lost hold of herself. + </p> + <p> + Dartrey in the course of the evening, begged to hear the contralto; and + Nataly, refusing, was astounded by the admission in her blank mind of the + truth of man’s list of charges against her sex, starting from their + capriciousness for she could have sung in a crowded room, and she had now + a desire for company, for stolid company or giddy, an ocean of it. This + led to her thinking, that the world of serious money-getters, and feasts, + and the dance, the luxurious displays, and the reverential Sunday service, + will always ultimately prove itself right in opposition to critics and + rebels, and to any one vainly trying to stand alone: and the thought + annihilated her; for she was past the age of the beginning again, and no + footing was left for an outsider not self-justified in being where she + stood. She heard Dartrey’s praise of Nesta’s voice for tearing her + mother’s bosom with notes of intolerable sweetness; and it was haphazard + irony, no doubt; we do not the less bleed for the accident of a shot. + </p> + <p> + At last, after midnight Victor arrived. + </p> + <p> + Nesta most impudently expected to be allowed to remain. ‘Pray, go, dear,’ + her mother said. Victor kissed his Fredi. ‘Some time to-morrow,’ said he; + and she forbore to beseech him. + </p> + <p> + He stared, though mildly, at sight of her taking Dartrey’s hand for the + good-night and deliberately putting her lips to it. + </p> + <p> + Was she a girl whose notion of rectifying one wrong thing done, was to do + another? Nataly could merely observe. A voice pertaining to no one + present, said in her ear:—Mothers have publicly slapped their + daughter’s faces for less than that!—It was the voice of her + incapacity to cope with the girl. She watched Nesta’s passage from the + room, somewhat affected by the simple bearing for which she was + reproaching her. + </p> + <p> + ‘And our poor darling has not seen a mountain this year!’ Victor + exclaimed, to have mentionable grounds for pitying his girl. ‘I promised + Fredi she should never count a year without Highlands or Alps. You + remember, mama?—down in the West Highlands. Fancy the dear bit of + bundle, Dartrey!—we had laid her in her bed; she was about seven or + eight; and there she lay wide awake. “What ‘s Fredi thinking of?”—“I’m + thinking of the tops of the mountains at night, dada.”—She could + climb them now; she has the legs.’ + </p> + <p> + Nataly said: ‘You have some report to make. You dined with those people?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘The Marsetts: yes:—well-suited couple enough. It’s to happen before + Winter ends—at once; before Christmas; positively before next + Spring. Fredi’s doing! He has to manage, arrange.—She’s a + good-looking woman, good height, well-rounded; well-behaved, too: she + won’t make a bad Lady Marsett. Every time that woman spoke of our girl, + the tears jumped to her eyelids.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Come to me before you go to bed,’ Nataly said, rising, her voice + foundering; ‘Good-night, Dartrey.’ + </p> + <p> + She turned to the door; she could not trust herself to shake hands with + composure. Not only was it a nauseous mixture she was forced to gulp from + Victor, it burned like a poison. + </p> + <p> + ‘Really Fredi’s doing—chiefly,’ said Victor, as soon as Dartrey and + he were alone, comfortably settled in the smoking-room. ‘I played the man + of pomp with Marsett—good heavy kind of creature: attached to the + woman. She’s the better horse, as far as brains go. Good enough Lady + Marsett. I harped on Major Worrell: my daughter insulted. He knew of it—spoke + of you properly. The man offered all apologies; he has told the Major he + is no gentleman, not a fit associate for gentlemen:—quite so—and + has cut him dead. Will marry her, as I said, make her as worthy as he can + of the honour of my daughter’s acquaintance. Rather comical grimace, when + he vowed he’d fasten the tie. He doesn’t like marriage. But, he can’t give + her up. And she’s for patronizing the institution. But she is ready to say + good-bye to him “rather than see the truest lady in the world insulted”—her + words. And so he swallows his dose for health, and looks a trifle sourish. + Antecedents, I suppose: has to stomach them. But if a man’s fond of a + woman—if he knows he saves her from slipping lower—and it’s an + awful world, for us to let a woman be under its wheels:—I say, a + woman who has a man to lean on, unless she’s as downright corrupt as two + or three of the men we’ve known:—upon my word, Dartrey, I come round + to some of your ideas on these matters. It’s this girl of mine, this wee + bit of girl in her little nightshirt with the frill, astonishes me most:—“thinking + of the tops of the mountains at night!” She has positively done the whole + of this work-main part. I smiled when I left the house, to have to own our + little Fredi starting us all on the road. It seems, Marsett had sworn he + would; amorous vow, you know; he never came nearer to doing it. I hope + it’s his better mind now; I do hope the man won’t have cause to regret it. + He speaks of Nesta—sort of rustic tone of awe. Mrs. Marsett has + impressed him. He expects the title soon, will leave the army—the + poor plucked British army, as you call it!—and lead the life of a + country squire: hunting! Well, it’s not only the army, it’s over Great + Britain, with this infernal wealth of ours!—and all for pleasure—eh?—or + Paradise lost for a sugar plum! Eh, Dartrey? Upon my word, it appears to + me, Esau’s the Englishman, Jacob the German, of these times. I wonder old + Colney hasn’t said it. If we’re not plucked, as your regiments are of the + officers who have learnt their work, we’re emasculated:—the nation’s + half made-up of the idle and the servants of the idle.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Ay, and your country squires and your manufacturers contrive to give the + army a body of consumptive louts fit for nothing else than to take the + shilling—and not worth it,’ said Dartrey. + </p> + <p> + ‘Sounds like old Colney,’ Victor remarked to himself. ‘But, believe me, + I’m ashamed of the number of servants who wait on me. It wouldn’t so much + matter, as Skepsey says, if they were trained to arms and self-respect. + That little fellow Skepsey’s closer to the right notion, and the right + practice, too, than any of us. With his Matilda Pridden! He has jumped out + of himself to the proper idea of women, too. And there’s a man who has + been up three times before the magistrates, and is considered a disorderly + subject—one among the best of English citizens, I declare! I never + think of Skepsey without the most extraordinary, witless kind of envy—as + if he were putting in action an idea I once had and never quite got hold + of again. The match for him is Fredi. She threatens to be just as devoted, + just as simple, as he. I positively doubt whether any of us could stop + her, if she had set herself to do a thing she thought right.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘I should not like to think our trying it possible,’ said Dartrey. + </p> + <p> + ‘All very well, but it’s a rock ahead. We shall have to alter our course, + my friend. You know, I dined with that couple, after the private twenty + minutes with Marsett: he formally propounded the invitation, as we were + close on his hour, rather late: and I wanted to make the woman happy, + besides putting a seal of cordiality on his good intentions—politic! + And subsequently I heard from her, that—you’ll think nothing of it!—Fredi + promised to stand by her at the altar.’ + </p> + <p> + Dartrey said, shrugging: ‘She needn’t do that.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘So we may say. You’re dealing with Nesta Victoria. Spare me a contest + with that girl, I undertake to manage any man or woman living.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘When the thing to be done is thought right by her.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘But can we always trust her judgement, my dear Dartrey?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘In this case, she would argue, that her resolution to keep her promise + would bind or help to bind Marsett to fulfil his engagement.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Odd, her mother has turned dead round in favour of that fellow Dudley + Sowerby! I don’t complain; it suits; but one thinks—eh?—women!’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Well, yes, one thinks or should think, that if you insist on having women + rooted to the bed of the river, they’ll veer with the tides, like + water-weeds, and no wonder.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Your heterodoxy on that subject is a mania, Dartrey. We can’t have women + independent.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Then don’t be exclaiming about their vagaries.’ + </p> + <p> + Victor mused: ‘It’s wonderful: that little girl of mine!—good height + now: but what a head she has! Oh, she’ll listen to reason: only mark what + I say:—with that quiet air of hers, the husband, if a young fellow, + will imagine she’s the most docile of wives in the world. And as to wife, + I’m not of the contrary opinion. But qua individual female, supposing her + to have laid fast hold of an idea of duty, it’s he who’ll have to turn the + corner second, if they’re to trot in the yoke together. Or it may be an + idea of service to a friend—or to her sex! That Mrs. Marsett says + she feels for—“bleeds” for her sex. The poor woman didn’t show to + advantage with me, because she was in a fever to please:—talks in + jerks, hot phrases. She holds herself well. At the end of the dinner she + behaved better. Odd, you can teach women with hints and a lead. But + Marsett ‘s Marsett to the end. Rather touching!—the poor fellow + said: Deuce of a bad look-out for me if Judith doesn’t have a child! + First-rate sportsman, I hear. He should have thought of his family + earlier. You know, Dartrey, the case is to be argued for the family as + well. You won’t listen. And for Society too! Off you go.’ + </p> + <p> + A battery was opened on that wall of composite. + </p> + <p> + ‘Ah, well,’ said Victor. ‘But I may have to beg your help, as to the + so-called promise to stand at the altar. I don’t mention it upstairs.’ + </p> + <p> + He went to Nataly’s room. + </p> + <p> + She was considerately treated, and was aware of being dandled, that she + might have sleep. + </p> + <p> + She consented to it, in a loathing of the topic.—Those women invade + us—we cannot keep them out! was her inward cry: with a reverberation + of the unfailing accompaniment: The world holds you for one of them! + </p> + <p> + Victor tasked her too much when his perpetual readiness to doat upon his + girl for whatever she did, set him exalting Nesta’s conduct. She thought: + Was Nesta so sympathetic with her mother of late by reason of a moral + insensibility to the offence? + </p> + <p> + This was her torture through the night of a labouring heart, that + travelled to one dull shock, again and again repeated:—the + apprehended sound, in fact, of Dudley Sowerby’s knock at the street door. + Or sometimes a footman handed her his letter, courteously phrased to + withdraw from the alliance. Or else he came to a scene with Nesta, and her + mother was dragged into it, and the intolerable subject steamed about her. + The girl was visioned as deadly. She might be indifferent to the + protection of Dudley’s name. Robust, sanguine, Victor’s child, she might—her + mother listened to a devil’s whisper—but no; Nesta’s aim was at the + heights; she was pure in mind as in body. No, but the world would bring + the accusation; and the world would trace the cause: Heredity, it would + say. Would it say falsely? Nataly harped on the interrogation until she + felt her existence dissolving to a dark stain of the earth, and she found + herself wondering at the breath she drew, doubting that another would + follow, speculating on the cruel force which keeps us to the act of + breathing.—Though I could draw wild blissful breath if I were + galloping across the moors! her worn heart said to her youth: and out of + ken of the world, I could regain a portion of my self-esteem. Nature + thereat renewed her old sustainment with gentle murmurs, that were + supported by Dr. Themison’s account of the virtuous married lady who + chafed at the yoke on behalf of her sex, and deemed the independent union + the ideal. Nataly’s brain had a short gallop over moorland. It brought her + face to face with Victor’s girl, and she dropped once more to her remorse + in herself and her reproaches of Nesta. The girl had inherited from her + father something of the cataract’s force which won its way by catching or + by mastering, uprooting, ruining! + </p> + <p> + In the morning she was heavily asleep. Victor left word with Nesta, that + the dear mother was not to be disturbed. Consequently, when Dudley called + to see Mrs. Victor Radnor, he was informed that Miss Radnor would receive + him. + </p> + <p> + Their interview lasted an hour. + </p> + <p> + Dudley came to Victor in the City about luncheon time. + </p> + <p> + His perplexity of countenance was eloquent. He had, before seeing the + young lady, digested an immense deal more, as it seemed to him, than any + English gentleman should be asked to consume. She now referred him to her + father, who had spent a day in Brighton, and would, she said, explain + whatever there was to be explained. But she added, that if she was + expected to abandon a friend, she could not. Dudley had argued with her + upon the nature of friendship, the measurement of its various dues; he had + lectured on the choice of friends, the impossibility for young ladies, + necessarily inexperienced, to distinguish the right class of friends, the + dangers they ran in selecting friends unwarranted by the stamp of + honourable families. + </p> + <p> + ‘And what did Fredi say to that?’ Victor inquired. + </p> + <p> + ‘Miss Radnor said—I may be dense, I cannot comprehend—that the + precepts were suitable for seminaries of Pharisees. When it is a question + of a young lady associating with a notorious woman!’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Not notorious. You spoil your case if you “speak extremely,” as a friend + says. I saw her yesterday. She worships “Miss Radnor.”’ + </p> + <p> + Nesta will know when she is older; she will thank me,’ said Dudley + hurriedly. ‘As it is at present, I may reckon, I hope, that the + association ceases. Her name: I have to consider my family.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Good anchorage! You must fight it out with the girl. And depend upon this—you’re + not the poorer for being the husband of a girl of character; unless you + try to bridle her. She belongs to her time. I don’t mind owning to you, + she has given me a lead.—Fredi ‘ll be merry to-night. Here’s a + letter I have from the Sanfredini, dated Milan, fresh this morning; + invitation to bring the god-child to her villa on Como in May; desirous to + embrace her. She wrote to the office. Not a word of her duque. She has + pitched him to the winds. You may like to carry it off to Fredi and please + her.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘I have business,’ Dudley replied. + </p> + <p> + ‘Away to it, then!’ said Victor. ‘You stand by me?—we expect our + South London borough to be open in January; early next year, at least; may + be February. You have family interest there.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Personally, I will do my best,’ Dudley said; and he escaped, feeling, + with the universal censor’s angry spite, that the revolutions of the world + had made one of the wealthiest of City men the head of a set of Bohemians. + And there are eulogists of the modern time! And the man’s daughter was + declared to belong to it! A visit in May to the Italian cantatrice + separated from her husband, would render the maiden an accomplished + flinger of caps over the windmills. + </p> + <p> + At home Victor discovered, that there was not much more than a truce + between Nesta and Nataly. He had a medical hint from Dr. Themison, and he + counselled his girl to humour her mother as far as could be: particularly + in relation to Dudley, whom Nataly now, womanlike, after opposing, + strongly favoured. How are we ever to get a clue to the labyrinthine + convolutions and changeful motives of the sex! Dartrey’s theories were + absurd. Did Nataly think them dangerous for a young woman? The guess + hinted at a clue of some sort to the secret of her veering. + </p> + <p> + ‘Mr. Sowerby left me with an adieu,’ said Nesta. + </p> + <p> + ‘Mr. Sowerby! My dear, he is bound, bound in honour, bound at heart. You + did not dismiss him?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘I repeated the word he used. I thought of mother. The blood leaves her + cheeks at a disappointment now. She has taken to like him.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Why, you like him!’ + </p> + <p> + ‘I could not vow.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Tush.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Ah, don’t press me, dada. But you will see, he has disengaged himself.’ + </p> + <p> + He had done it, though not in formal speech. Slow digestion of his native + antagonism to these Bohemians, to say nothing of his judicial condemnation + of them, brought him painfully round to the writing of a letter to Nataly; + cunningly addressed to the person on whom his instinct told him he had the + strongest hold. + </p> + <p> + She schooled herself to discuss the detested matter forming Dudley’s + grievance and her own with Nesta; and it was a woeful half-hour for them. + But Nataly was not the weeper. + </p> + <p> + Another interview ensued between Nesta and her suitor. Dudley bore no + resemblance to Mr. Barmby, who refused to take the word no from her, and + had taken it, and had gone to do holy work, for which she revered him. + Dudley took the word, leaving her to imagine freedom, until once more her + mother or her father, inspired by him, came interceding, her mother + actually supplicating. So that the reality of Dudley’s love rose to + conception like a London dawn over Nesta; and how, honourably, decently, + positively, to sever herself from it, grew to be an ill-visaged problem. + She glanced in soul at Dartrey Fenellan for help; she had her wild + thoughts. Having once called him Dartrey, the virginal barrier to thoughts + was broken; and but for love of her father, for love and pity of her + mother, she would have ventured the step to make the man who had her whole + being in charge accept or reject her. Nothing else appeared in prospect. + Her father and mother were urgently one to favour Dudley; and the + sensitive gentleman presented himself to receive his wound and to depart + with it. But always he returned. At last, as if under tuition, he + refrained from provoking a wound; he stood there to win her upon any + terms; and he was a handsome figure, acknowledged by the damsel to be + increasing in good looks as more and more his pretensions became + distasteful to her. The slight cast of sourness on his lower features had + almost vanished, his nature seemed to have enlarged. He complimented her + for her ‘generous benevolence,’ vaguely, yet with evident sincereness; he + admitted, that the modern world is ‘attempting difficulties with at least + commendable intentions’; and that the position of women demands + improvement, consideration for them also. He said feelingly: ‘They have to + bear extraordinary burdens!’ There he stopped. + </p> + <p> + The sharp intelligence fronting him understood, that this compassionate + ejaculation was the point where she, too, must cry halt. He had, however—still + under tuition, perhaps—withdrawn his voice from the pursuit of her; + and so she in gratitude silenced her critical mind beneath a smooth + conceit of her having led him two steps to a broader tolerance. + Susceptible as she was, she did not influence him without being affected + herself in other things than her vanity: his prudishness affected her. + Only when her heart flamed did she disdain that real haven of refuge, with + its visionary mount of superiority, offered by Society to its effect, in + the habit of ignoring the sins it fosters under cloak;—not less than + did the naked barbaric time, and far more to the vitiation of the soul. He + fancied he was moulding her; therefore winning her. It followed, that he + had the lover’s desire for assurance of exclusive possession; and + reflecting, that he had greatly pardoned, he grew exacting. He mentioned + his objections to some of Mr. Dartrey Fenellan’s ideas. + </p> + <p> + Nesta replied: ‘I have this morning had two letters to make me happy.’ + </p> + <p> + A provoking evasion. He would rather have seen antagonism bridle and + stiffen her figure. ‘Is one of them from that gentleman?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘One is from my dear friend Louise de Seilles. She comes to me early next + month.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘The other?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘The other is also from a friend.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘A dear friend?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Not so dear. Her letter gives me happiness.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘She writes—not from France: from...? you tempt me to guess.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘She writes to tell me, that Mr. Dartrey Fenellan has helped her in a way + to make her eternally thankful.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘The place she writes from is...?’ + </p> + <p> + The drag of his lips betrayed his enlightenment insisted on doubting. He + demanded assurance. + </p> + <p> + ‘It matters in no degree,’ she said. + </p> + <p> + Dudley ‘thought himself excusable for inquiring.’ + </p> + <p> + She bowed gently. + </p> + <p> + The stings and scorpions and degrading itches of this nest of wealthy + Bohemians enraged him. + </p> + <p> + ‘Are you—I beg to ask—are you still:—I can hardly think + it—Nesta!—I surely have a claim to advise:—it cannot be + with your mother’s consent:—in communication, in correspondence + with...?’ + </p> + <p> + Again she bowed her head; saying: ‘It is true.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘With that person?’ + </p> + <p> + He could not but look the withering disgust of the modern world in a + conservative gentleman who has been lured to go with it a little way, only + to be bitten. ‘I decline to believe it,’ he said with forcible sound. + </p> + <p> + ‘She is married,’ was the rather shameless, exasperating answer. + </p> + <p> + ‘Married or not!’ he cried, and murmured: ‘I have borne—. These may + be Mr. Dartrey Fenellan’s ideas; they are not mine. I have—Something + at least is due to me: Ask any lady:—there are clergymen, I know, + clergymen who are for uplifting—quite right, but not associating:—to + call one of them a friend! Ask any lady, any! Your mother...’ + </p> + <p> + ‘I beg you will not distress my mother,’ said Nesta. + </p> + <p> + ‘I beg to know whether this correspondence is to continue?’ said Dudley. + </p> + <p> + ‘All my life, if I do not feel dishonoured by it.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘You are.’ He added hastily: ‘Counsels of prudence—there is not a + lady living who would tell you otherwise. At all events, in public + opinion, if it were known—and it would certainly be known,—a + lady, wife or spinster, would suffer—would not escape the—at + least shadow of defilement from relationship, any degree of intimacy + with... hard words are wholesome in such a case: “touch pitch,” yes! My + sense is coherent.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Quite,’ said Nesta. + </p> + <p> + ‘And you do not agree with me?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘I do not.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Do you pretend to be as able to judge as I?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘In this instance, better.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Then I retire. I cannot retain my place here. You may depend upon it, the + world is not wrong when it forbids young ladies to have cognizance of + women leading disorderly lives.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Only the women, Mr. Sowerby?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Men, too, of course.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘You do not exclude the men from Society.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Oh! one reads that kind of argument in books.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Oh! the worthy books, then. I would read them, if I could find them.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘They are banned by self-respecting readers.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘It grieves me to think differently.’ + </p> + <p> + Dudley looked on this fair girl, as yet innocent girl; and contrasting her + with the foulness of the subject she dared discuss, it seemed to him, that + a world which did not puff at her and silence, if not extinguish, was in a + state of liquefaction. + </p> + <p> + Remembering his renewed repentances his absence, he said: ‘I do hope you + may come to see, that the views shared by your mother and me are not + erroneous.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘But do not distress her,’ Nesta implored him. ‘She is not well. When she + has grown stronger, her kind heart will move her to receive the lady, so + that she may not be deprived of the society of good women. I shall hope + she will not disapprove of me. I cannot forsake a friend.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘I beg to say good-bye,’ said Dudley. + </p> + <p> + She had seen a rigidity smite him as she spoke; and so little startling + was it, that she might have fancied it expected, save for her knowing + herself too serious to have played at wiles to gain her ends. + </p> + <p> + He ‘wished her prudent advisers.’ + </p> + <p> + She thanked him. ‘In a few days, Louise de Seilles will be here.’ + </p> + <p> + A Frenchwoman and Papist! was the interjection of his twist of brows. + </p> + <p> + Surely I must now be free? she thought when he had covered his farewell + under a salutation regretful in frostiness. + </p> + <p> + A week later, she had the embrace of her Louise, and Armandine was made + happy with a piece of Parisian riband. + </p> + <p> + Winter was rapidly in passage: changes were visible everywhere; Earth and + House of Commons and the South London borough exhibited them; Mrs. Burman + was the sole exception. To the stupefaction of physicians, in a manner to + make a sane man ask whether she was not being retained as an instrument + for one of the darker purposes of Providence—and where are we + standing if we ask such things?—she held on to her thread of life. + </p> + <p> + February went by. And not a word from Themison; nor from Carling, nor from + the Rev. Groseman Buttermore, nor from Jarniman. That is to say, the two + former accepted invitations to grand dinners; the two latter acknowledged + contributions to funds in which they were interested; but they had + apparently grown to consider Mrs. Burman as an establishment, one of our + fixtures. On the other hand, there was nothing to be feared from her. + Lakelands feared nothing: the entry into Lakelands was decreed for the + middle of April. Those good creatures enclosed the poor woman and + nourished her on comfortable fiction. So the death of the member for the + South London borough (fifteen years younger than the veteran in maladies) + was not to be called premature, and could by no possibility lead to an + exposure of the private history of the candidate for his vacant seat. + </p> + <p> + <a name="link2HCH0040" id="link2HCH0040"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + CHAPTER XL. AN EXPIATION + </h2> + <p> + Nataly had fallen to be one of the solitary who have no companionship save + with the wound they nurse, to chafe it rather than try at healing. So + rational a mind as she had was not long in outliving mistaken impressions; + she could distinguish her girl’s feeling, and her aim; she could speak on + the subject with Dartrey; and still her wound bled on. Louise de Seilles + comforted her partly, through an exaltation of Nesta. Mademoiselle, + however, by means of a change of tone and look when Dudley Sowerby and + Dartrey Fenellan were the themes, showed a too pronounced preference of + the more unstable one:—or rather, the man adventurous out of the + world’s highways, whose image, as husband of such a daughter as hers, + smote the wounded mother with a chillness. Mademoiselle’s occasional + thrill of fervency in an allusion to Dartrey, might have tempted a + suspicious woman to indulge suppositions, accounting for the young + Frenchwoman’s novel tenderness to England, of which Nesta proudly, very + happily boasted. The suspicion proposed itself, and was rejected: for not + even the fever of an insane body could influence Nataly’s generous + character, to let her moods divert and command her thoughts of persons. + </p> + <p> + Her thoughts were at this time singularly lucid upon everything about her; + with the one exception of the reason why she had come to favour Dudley, + and how it was she had been smitten by that woman at Brighton to see + herself in her position altogether with the world’s relentless, + unexamining hard eyes. Bitterness added, of Mrs. Marsett: She is made an + honest woman!—And there was a strain of the lower in Nataly, to + reproach the girl for causing the reflection to be cast on the unwedded. + Otherwise her mind was open; she was of aid to Victor in his confusion + over some lost Idea he had often touched on latterly. And she was the one + who sent him ahead at a trot under a light, by saying: ‘You would found a + new and more stable aristocracy of the contempt of luxury’ when he talked + of combatting the Jews with a superior weapon. That being, in fact, as + Colney Durance had pointed out to him, the weapon of self-conquest used by + them ‘before they fell away to flesh-pottery.’ Was it his Idea? He fancied + an aching at the back of his head when he speculated. But his Idea had + been surpassingly luminous, alive, a creation; and this came before him + with the yellow skin of a Theory, bred, born of books. Though Nataly’s + mention of the aristocracy of self-denying discipline struck a Lucifer in + his darkness. + </p> + <p> + Nesta likewise helped: but more in what she did than in what she said: she + spoke intelligently enough to make him feel a certain increase of alarm, + amounting to a cursory secret acknowledgement of it, both at her dealings + with Dudley and with himself. She so quietly displaced the lady visiting + him at the City offices. His girl’s disregard of hostile weather, and her + company, her talk, delighted him: still he remonstrated, at her coming + daily. She came: nor was there an instigation on the part of her mother, + clearly none: her mother asked him once whether he thought she met the + dreadful Brighton woman. His Fredi drove constantly to walk back beside + him Westward, as he loved to do whenever it was practicable; and exceeding + the flattery of his possession of the gallant daughter, her conversation + charmed him to forget a disappointment caused by the defeat and entire + exclusion of the lady visiting him so complimentarily for his advice on + stocks, shares, mines, et caetera. The lady resisted; she was vanquished, + as the shades are displaced by simple apparition of daylight. + </p> + <p> + His Fredi was like the daylight to him; she was the very daylight to his + mind, whatsoever their theme of converse for by stimulating that ready but + vagrant mind to quit the leash of the powerful senses and be a ethereally + excursive, she gave him a new enjoyment; which led to reflections—a + sounding of Nature, almost a question to her, on the verge of a doubt. Are + we, in fact, harmonious with the Great Mother when we yield to the + pressure of our natures for indulgence? Is she, when translated into us, + solely the imperious appetite? Here was Fredi, his little Fredi—stately + girl that she had grown, and grave, too, for all her fun and her sail on + wings—lifting him to pleasures not followed by clamorous, and + perfectly satisfactory, yet discomposingly violent, appeals to Nature. + They could be vindicated. Or could they, when they would not bear a + statement of the case? He could not imagine himself stating it namelessly + to his closest friend—not to Simeon Fenellan. As for speaking to + Dartrey, the notion took him with shivers:—Young Dudley would have + seemed a more possible confidant:—and he represented the Puritan + world.—And young Dudley was getting over Fredi’s infatuation for the + woman she had rescued: he was beginning to fancy he saw a right enthusiasm + in it;—in the abstract; if only the fair maid would drop an unseemly + acquaintance. He had called at the office to say so. Victor stammered the + plea for him. + </p> + <p> + ‘Never, dear father,’ came the smooth answer: a shocking answer in + contrast with the tones. Her English was as lucid as her eyes when she + continued up to the shock she dealt: ‘Do not encourage a good man to waste + his thoughts upon me. I have chosen my mate, and I may never marry him. I + do not know whether he would marry me. He has my soul. I have no shame in + saying I love him. It is to love goodness, greatness of heart. He is a + respecter of women—of all women; not only the fortunate. He is the + friend of the weaker everywhere. He has been proved in fire. He does not + sentimentalize over poor women, as we know who scorns people for doing:—and + that is better than hardness, meaning kindly. He is not one of the unwise + advocates. He measures the forces against them. He reads their breasts. He + likes me. He is with me in my plans. He has not said, has not shown, he + loves me. It is too high a thought for me until I hear it.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Has your soul!’ was all that Victor could reply, while the whole + conception of Lakelands quaked under the crumbling structure. + </p> + <p> + Remonstrance, argument, a word for Dudley, swelled to his lips and sank in + dumbness. Her seeming intuition—if it was not a perception—of + the point where submission to the moods of his nature had weakened his + character, and required her defence of him, struck Victor with a serious + fear of his girl: and it was the more illuminatingly damnatory for being + recognized as the sentiment which no father should feel. He tried to think + she ought not to be so wise of the things of the world. An effort to + imagine a reproof, showed him her spirit through her eyes: in her deeds + too: she had already done work on the road:—Colney Durance, Dartrey + Fenellan, anything but sentimentalists either of them, strongly backing + her, upholding her. Victor could no longer so naturally name her Fredi. + </p> + <p> + He spoke it hastily, under plea of some humorous tenderness, when he + ventured. When Dudley, calling on him in the City to discuss the + candidature for the South London borough, named her Fredi, that he might + regain a vantage of familiarity by imitating her father, it struck Victor + as audacious. It jarred in his recollection, though the heir of the + earldom spoke in the tone of a lover, was really at high pitch. He + appeared to be appreciating her, to have suffered stings of pain; he + offered himself; he made but one stipulation. Victor regretfully assured + him, he feared he could do nothing. The thought of his entry into + Lakelands, with Nesta Victoria refusing the foundation stone of the place, + grew dim. + </p> + <p> + But he was now canvassing for the Borough, hearty at the new business as + the braced swimmer on seas, which instantly he became, with an end in view + to be gained. + </p> + <p> + Late one April night, expecting Nataly to have gone to bed, and Nesta to + be waiting for him, he reached home, and found Nataly in her sitting-room + alone. ‘Nesta was tired,’ she said: ‘we have had a scene; she refuses Mr. + Sowerby; I am sick of pressing it; he is very much in earnest, painfully; + she blames him for disturbing me; she will not see the right course:—a + mother reads her daughter! If my girl has not guidance!—she means + rightly, she is rash.’ + </p> + <p> + Nataly could not utter all that her insaneness of feeling made her think + with regard to Victor’s daughter—daughter also of the woman whom her + hard conscience accused of inflammability. ‘Here is a note from Dr. + Themison, dear.’ + </p> + <p> + Victor seized it, perused, and drew the big breath. + </p> + <p> + ‘From Themison,’ he said; he coughed. + </p> + <p> + ‘Don’t think to deceive me,’ said she. ‘I have not read the contents, I + know them.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘The invitation at last, for to-morrow, Sunday, four P.M. Odd, that next + day at eight of the evening I shall be addressing our meeting in the + Theatre. Simeon speaks. Beaves Urmsing insists on coming, Tory though he + is. Those Tories are jollier fellows than—well, no wonder! There + will be no surgical... the poor woman is very low. A couple of days at the + outside. Of course, I go.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Hand me the note, dear.’ + </p> + <p> + It had to be given up, out of the pocket. + </p> + <p> + ‘But,’ said Victor, ‘the mention of you is merely formal.’ + </p> + <p> + She needed sleep: she bowed her head. + </p> + <p> + Nataly was the first at the breakfast-table in the morning, a fair Sunday + morning. She was going to Mrs. John Cormyn’s Church, and she asked Nesta + to come with her. + </p> + <p> + She returned five minutes before the hour of lunch, having left Nesta with + Mrs. John. Louise de Seilles undertook to bring Nesta home at the time she + might choose. Fenellan, Mr. Pempton, Peridon and Catkin, lunched and + chatted. Nataly chatted. At a quarter to three o’clock Victor’s carriage + was at the door. He rose: he had to keep an appointment. Nataly said to + him publicly: ‘I come too.’ He stared and nodded. In the carriage, he + said: ‘I’m driving to the Gardens, for a stroll, to have a look at the + beasts. Sort of relief. Poor crazy woman! However, it ‘s a comfort to her: + so...!’ + </p> + <p> + ‘I like to see them,’ said Nataly. ‘I shall see her. I have to do it.’ + </p> + <p> + Up to the gate of the Gardens Victor was arguing to dissuade his dear soul + from this very foolish, totally unnecessary, step. Alighting, he put the + matter aside, for good angels to support his counsel at the final moment. + </p> + <p> + Bears, lions, tigers, eagles, monkeys: they suggested no more than he + would have had from prints; they sprang no reflection, except, that the + coming hour was a matter of indifference to them. They were about him, and + exercised so far a distraction. He took very kindly to an old mother + monkey, relinquishing her society at sight of Nataly’s heave of the bosom. + Southward, across the park, the dread house rose. He began quoting Colney + Durance with relish while sarcastically confuting the cynic, who found + much pasture in these Gardens. Over Southward, too, he would be addressing + a popular assembly to-morrow evening. Between now and then there was a + ditch to jump. He put on the sympathetic face of grief. ‘After all, a + caged wild beast hasn’t so bad a life,’ he said.—To be well fed + while they live, and welcome death as a release from the maladies they + develop in idleness, is the condition of wealthy people:—creatures + of prey? horrible thought! yet allied to his Idea, it seemed. Yes, but + these good caged beasts here set them an example, in not troubling + relatives and friends when they come to the gasp! Mrs. Burman’s invitation + loomed as monstrous—a final act of her cruelty. His skin pricked + with dews. He thought of Nataly beside him, jumping the ditch with him, as + a relief—if she insisted on doing it. He hoped she would not, for + the sake of her composure. + </p> + <p> + It was a ditch void of bottom. But it was a mere matter of an hour, less. + The state of health of the invalid could bear only a few minutes. In any + case, we are sure that the hour will pass. Our own arrive? Certainly. + </p> + <p> + ‘Capital place for children,’ he exclaimed. And here startlingly before + him in the clusters of boys and girls, was the difference between young + ones and their elders feeling quite as young: the careless youngsters have + not to go and sit in the room with a virulent old woman, and express + penitence and what not, and hear words of pardon, after their holiday + scamper and stare at the caged beasts. + </p> + <p> + Attention to the children precipitated him upon acquaintances, hitherto + cleverly shunned. He nodded them off, after the brightest of greetings. + </p> + <p> + Such anodyne as he could squeeze from the incarcerated wild creatures, was + exhausted. He fell to work at Nataly’s ‘aristocracy of the contempt of + luxury’; signifying, that we the wealthy will not exist to pamper flesh, + but we live for the promotion of brotherhood:—ay, and that our + England must make some great moral stand, if she is not to fall to the + rear and down. Unuttered, it caught the skirts of the Idea: it evaporated + when spoken. Still, this theme was almost an exorcism of Mrs. Burman. He + consulted his watch. ‘Thirteen minutes to four. I must be punctual,’ he + said. Nataly stepped faster. + </p> + <p> + Seated in the carriage, he told her he had never felt the horror of that + place before. ‘Put me down at the corner of the terrace, dear: I won’t + drive to the door.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘I come with you, Victor,’ she replied. + </p> + <p> + After entreaties and reasons intermixed, to melt her resolve, he saw she + was firm: and he asked himself, whether he might not be constitutionally + better adapted to persuade than to dissuade. The question thumped. Having + that house of drugs in view, he breathed more freely for the prospect of + feeling his Nataly near him beneath the roof. + </p> + <p> + ‘You really insist, dear love?’ he appealed to her: and her answer: ‘It + must be,’ left no doubt: though he chose to say: ‘Not because of standing + by me?’ And she said: ‘For my peace, Victor.’ They stepped to the + pavement. The carriage was dismissed. + </p> + <p> + Seventeen houses of the terrace fronting the park led to the funereal one: + and the bell was tolled in the breast of each of the couple advancing with + an air of calmness to the inevitable black door. + </p> + <p> + Jarniman opened it. ‘His mistress was prepared to see them.’—Not + like one near death.—They were met in the hall by the Rev. Groseman + Buttermore. ‘You will find a welcome,’ was his reassurance to them: gently + delivered, on the stoop of a large person. His whispered tones were more + agreeably deadening than his words. + </p> + <p> + Mr. Buttermore ushered them upstairs. + </p> + <p> + ‘Can she bear it?’ Victor said, and heard: ‘Her wish ten minutes.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Soon over,’ he murmured to Nataly, with a compassionate exclamation for + the invalid. + </p> + <p> + They rounded the open door. They were in the drawing-room. It was + furnished as in the old time, gold and white, looking new; all the same as + of old, save for a division of silken hangings; and these were pale blue: + the colour preferred by Victor for a bedroom. He glanced at the ceiling, + to bathe in a blank space out of memory. Here she lived,—here she + slept, behind the hangings. There was refreshingly that little difference + in the arrangement of the room. The corner Northward was occupied by the + grand piano; and Victor had an inquiry in him:—tuned? He sighed, + expecting a sight to come through the hangings. Sensible that Nataly + trembled, he perceived the Rev. Groseman Buttermore half across a heap of + shawl-swathe on the sofa. + </p> + <p> + Mrs. Burman was present; seated. People may die seated; she had always + disliked the extended posture; except for the night’s rest, she used to + say; imagining herself to be not inviting the bolt of sudden death, in her + attitude when seated by day:—and often at night the poor woman had + to sit up for the qualms of her dyspepsia!—But I ‘m bound to think + humanely, be Christian, be kind, benignant, he thought, and he fetched the + spirit required, to behold her face emerge from a pale blue silk veiling; + as it were, the inanimate wasted led up from the mould by morning. + </p> + <p> + Mr. Buttermore signalled to them to draw near. + </p> + <p> + Wasted though it was, the face of the wide orbits for sunken eyes was + distinguishable as the one once known. If the world could see it and hear, + that it called itself a man’s wife! She looked burnt out. + </p> + <p> + Two chairs had been sent to front the sofa. Execution there! Victor + thought, and he garrotted the unruly mind of a man really feeling + devoutness in the presence of the shadow thrown by the dread Shade. + </p> + <p> + ‘Ten minutes,’ Mr. Buttermore said low, after obligingly placing them on + the chairs. + </p> + <p> + He went. They were alone with Mrs. Burman. + </p> + <p> + No voice came. They were unsure of being seen by the floating grey of eyes + patient to gaze from their vast distance. Big drops fell from Nataly’s. + Victor heard the French timepiece on the mantel-shelf, where a familiar + gilt Cupid swung for the seconds: his own purchase. The time of day on the + clock was wrong; the Cupid swung. + </p> + <p> + Nataly’s mouth was taking breath of anguish at moments. More than a minute + of the terrible length of the period of torture must have gone: two, if + not three. + </p> + <p> + A quaver sounded. ‘You have come.’ The voice was articulate, thinner than + the telephonic, trans-Atlantic by deep-sea cable. + </p> + <p> + Victor answered: ‘We have.’ + </p> + <p> + Another minute must have gone in the silence. And when we get to five + minutes we are on the descent, rapidly counting our way out of the house, + into the fresh air, where we were half an hour back, among those happy + beasts in the pleasant Gardens! + </p> + <p> + Mrs. Burman’s eyelids shut. ‘I said you would come.’ + </p> + <p> + Victor started to the fire-screen. ‘Your sight requires protection.’ + </p> + <p> + She dozed. ‘And Natalia Dreighton!’ she next said. + </p> + <p> + They were certainly now on the five minutes. Now for the slide downward + and outward! Nataly should never have been allowed to come. + </p> + <p> + ‘The white waistcoat!’ struck his ears. + </p> + <p> + ‘Old customs with me, always!’ he responded. ‘The first of April, always. + White is a favourite. Pale blue, too. But I fear—I hope you have not + distressing nights? In my family we lay great stress on the nights we + pass. My cousins, the Miss Duvidneys, go so far as to judge of the + condition of health by the nightly record.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Your daughter was in their house.’ + </p> + <p> + She knew everything! + </p> + <p> + ‘Very fond of my daughter—the ladies,’ he remarked. + </p> + <p> + ‘I wish her well.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘You are very kind.’ + </p> + <p> + Mrs. Burman communed within or slept. ‘Victor, Natalia, we will pray,’ she + said. + </p> + <p> + Her trembling hands crossed their fingers. Nataly slipped to her knees. + </p> + <p> + The two women mutely praying, pulled Victor into the devotional hush. It + acted on him like the silent spell of service in a Church. He forgot his + estimate of the minutes, he formed a prayer, he refused to hear the Cupid + swinging, he droned a sound of sentences to deaden his ears. Ideas of + eternity rolled in semblance of enormous clouds. Death was a black bird + among them. The piano rang to Nataly’s young voice and his. The gold and + white of the chairs welcomed a youth suddenly enrolled among the wealthy + by an enamoured old lady on his arm. Cupid tick-ticked.—Poor soul! + poor woman! How little we mean to do harm when we do an injury! An + incomprehensible world indeed at the bottom and at the top. We get on + fairly at the centre. Yet it is there that we do the mischief making such + a riddle of the bottom and the top. What is to be said! Prayer quiets one. + Victor peered at Nataly fervently on her knees and Mrs. Burman bowed over + her knotted fingers. The earnestness of both enforced an effort at a + phrased prayer in him. Plungeing through a wave of the scent of Marechale, + that was a tremendous memory to haul him backward and forward, he beheld + his prayer dancing across the furniture; a diminutive thin black figure, + elvish, irreverent, appallingly unlike his proper emotion; and he brought + his hands just to touch, and got to the edge of his chair, with split + knees. At once the figure vanished. By merely looking at Nataly, he passed + into her prayer. A look at Mrs. Burman made it personal, his own. He heard + the cluck of a horrible sob coming from him. After a repetition of his + short form of prayer deeply stressed, he thanked himself with the word + ‘sincere,’ and a queer side-thought on our human susceptibility to the + influence of posture. We are such creatures. + </p> + <p> + Nataly resumed her seat. Mrs. Burman had raised her head. She said: ‘We + are at peace.’ She presently said, with effort: ‘It cannot last with me. I + die in nature’s way. I would bear forgiveness with me, that I may have it + above. I give it here, to you, to all. My soul is cleansed, I trust. Much + was to say. My strength will not. Unto God, you both!’ + </p> + <p> + The Rev. Groseman Buttermore was moving on slippered step to the back of + the sofa. Nataly dropped before the unseeing, scarce breathing, lady for + an instant. Victor murmured an adieu, grateful for being spared the + ceremonial shake of hands. He turned away, then turned back, praying for + power to speak, to say that he had found his heart, was grateful, would + hold her in memory. He fell on a knee before her, and forgot he had done + so when he had risen. They were conducted by the Rev. gentleman to the + hall-door: he was not speechless. Jarniman uttered something. + </p> + <p> + That black door closed behind them. + </p> + <p> + <a name="link2HCH0041" id="link2HCH0041"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + CHAPTER XLI. THE NIGHT OF THE GREAT UNDELIVERED SPEECH + </h2> + <p> + To a man issuing from a mortuary where a skull had voice, London may be + restorative as air of Summer Alps. It is by contrast blooming life. + Observe the fellowship of the houses shoulder to shoulder; and that + straight ascending smoke of the preparation for dinner; and the good + policeman yonder, blessedly idle on an orderly Sabbath evening; and the + families of the minor people trotting homeward from the park to tea; here + and again an amiable carriage of the superimposed people driving to pay + visits; they are so social, friendly, inviting to him; they strip him of + the shroud, sing of the sweet old world. He cannot but be moved to the + extremity of the charitableness neighbouring on tears. + </p> + <p> + A stupefaction at the shock of the positive reminder, echo of the fact + still shouting in his breast, that he had seen Mrs. Burman, and that the + interview was over—the leaf turned and the book shut held Victor in + a silence until his gratefulness to London City was borne down by the more + human burst of gratitude to the dying woman, who had spared him, as much + as she could, a scene of the convulsive pathetic, and had not called on + him for any utterance of penitence. That worm-like thread of voice came up + to him still from sexton-depths: it sounded a larger forgiveness without + the word. He felt the sorrow of it all, as he told Nataly; at the same + time bidding her smell ‘the marvellous oxygen of the park.’ He declared it + to be quite equal to Lakelands. + </p> + <p> + She slightly pressed his arm for answer. Perhaps she did not feel so + deeply? She was free of the horrid associations with the scent of + Marechale. At any rate, she had comported herself admirably! + </p> + <p> + Victor fancied he must have shuddered when he passed by Jarniman at the + door, who was almost now seeing his mistress’s ghost—would have the + privilege to-morrow. He called a cab and drove to Mrs. John Cormyn’s, at + Nataly’s request, for Nesta and mademoiselle: enjoying the Londonized + odour of the cab. Nataly did not respond to his warm and continued + eulogies of Mrs. Burman; she rather disappointed him. He talked of the + gold and white furniture, he just alluded to the Cupid: reserving his + mental comment, that the time-piece was all astray, the Cupid regular on + the swing:—strange, touching, terrible, if really the silly gilt + figure symbolized!... And we are a silly figure to be sitting in a cab + imagining such things!—When Nesta and mademoiselle were opposite, he + had the pleasure to see Nataly take Nesta’s hand and hold it until they + reached home. Those two talking together in the brief words of their deep + feeling, had tones that were singularly alike: the mezzo-soprano filial to + the divine maternal contralto. Those two dear ones mounted to Nataly’s + room. + </p> + <p> + The two dear ones showed themselves heart in heart together once more; + each looked the happier for it. Dartrey was among their dinner-guests, and + Nataly took him to her little blue-room before she went to bed. He did not + speak of their conversation to Victor, but counselled him to keep her from + excitement. ‘My dear fellow, if you had seen her with Mrs. Burman!’ Victor + said, and loudly praised her coolness. She was never below a situation, he + affirmed. + </p> + <p> + He followed his own counsel to humour his Nataly. She began panting at a + word about Mr. Barmby’s ready services. When, however, she related the + state of affairs between Dartrey and Nesta, by the avowal of each of them + to her, he said, embracing her: ‘Your wisdom shall guide us, my love,’ and + almost extinguished a vexation by concealing it. + </p> + <p> + She sighed: ‘If one could think, that a girl with Nesta’s revolutionary + ideas of the duties of women, and their powers, would be safe—or at + all rightly guided by a man who is both one of the noblest and the wildest + in the ideas he entertains!’ + </p> + <p> + Victor sighed too. He saw the earldom, which was to dazzle the gossips, + crack on the sky in a futile rocket-bouquet. + </p> + <p> + She was distressed; she moaned: ‘My girl! my girl: I should wish to leave + her with one who is more fixed—the old-fashioned husband. New ideas + must come in politics, but in Society!—and for women! And the young + having heads, are the most endangered. Nesta vows her life to it! Dartrey + supports her!’ + </p> + <p> + ‘See Colney,’ said Victor. ‘Odd, Colney does you good; some queer way he + has. Though you don’t care for his RIVAL TONGUES,—and the last + number was funny, with Semhians on the Pacific, impressively addressing a + farewell to his cricket-bat, before he whirls it away to Neptune—and + the blue hand of his nation’s protecting God observed to seize it!—Dead + failure with the public, of course! However, he seems to seem wise with + you. The poor old fellow gets his trouncing from the critics monthly. See + Colney to-morrow, my love. Now go to sleep. We have got over the worst. I + speak at my Meeting to-morrow and am a champagne-bottle of notes and + points for them.’ + </p> + <p> + His lost Idea drew close to him in sleep: or he thought so, when awaking + to the conception of a people solidified, rich and poor, by the common + pride of simple manhood. But it was not coloured, not a luminous globe: + and the people were in drab, not a shining army on the march to meet the + Future. It looked like a paragraph in a newspaper, upon which a Leading + Article sits, dutifully arousing the fat worm of sarcastic humour under + the ribs of cradled citizens, with an exposure of its excellent folly. He + would not have it laughed at; still he could not admit it as more than a + skirt of the robe of his Idea. For let none think him a mere City + merchant, millionnaire, boon-fellow, or music-loving man of the world. He + had ideas to shoot across future Ages;—provide against the shrinkage + of our Coal-beds; against, and for, if you like, the thickening, jumbling, + threatening excess of population in these Islands, in Europe, America, all + over our habitable sphere. Now that Mrs. Burman, on her way to bliss, was + no longer the dungeon-cell for the man he would show himself to be, this + name for successes, corporate nucleus of the enjoyments, this Victor + Montgomery Radnor, intended impressing himself upon the world as a factory + of ideas. Colney’s insolent charge, that the English have no imagination—a + doomed race, if it be true!—would be confuted. For our English + require but the lighted leadership to come into cohesion, and step ranked, + and chant harmoniously the song of their benevolent aim. And that astral + head giving, as a commencement, example of the right use of riches, the + nation is one, part of the riddle of the future solved. + </p> + <p> + Surely he had here the Idea? He had it so warmly, that his bath-water + heated. Only the vision was wanted. + </p> + <p> + On London Bridge he had seen it—a great thing done to the flash of + brilliant results. That was after a fall. + </p> + <p> + There had been a fall also of the scheme of Lakelands. + </p> + <p> + Come to us with no superstitious whispers of indications and + significations in the fall!—But there had certainly been a moral + fall, fully to the level of the physical, in the maintaining of that + scheme of Lakelands, now ruined by his incomprehensible Nesta—who + had saved him from falling further. His bath-water chilled. He jumped out + and rubbed furiously with his towels and flesh-brushes, chasing the Idea + for simple warmth, to have Something inside him, to feel just that + sustainment; with the cry: But no one can say I do not love my Nataly! And + he tested it to prove it by his readiness to die for her: which is + heroically easier than the devotedly living, and has a weight of evidence + in our internal Courts for surpassing the latter tedious performance. + </p> + <p> + His Nesta had knocked Lakelands to pieces. Except for the making of money, + the whole year of an erected Lakelands, notwithstanding uninterrupted + successes, was a blank. Or rather we have to wish it were a blank. The + scheme departs: payment for the enlisted servants of it is in prospect. A + black agent, not willingly enlisted, yet pointing to proofs of service, + refuses payment in ordinary coin; and we tell him we owe him nothing, that + he is not a man of the world, has no understanding of Nature: and still + the fellow thumps and alarums at a midnight door we are astonished to find + we have in our daylight house. How is it? Would other men be so sensitive + to him? Victor was appeased by the assurance of his possession of an + exceptionally scrupulous conscience; and he settled the debate by + thinking: ‘After all, for a man like me, battling incessantly, a kind of + Vesuvius, I must have—can’t be starved, must be fed—though, + pah! But I’m not to be questioned like other men.—But how about an + aristocracy of the contempt of distinctions?—But there is no + escaping distinctions! my aristocracy despises indulgence.—And + indulges?—Say, an exceptional nature! Supposing a certain beloved + woman to pronounce on the case?—She cannot: no woman can be a just + judge of it.’—-He cried: My love of her is testified by my having + Barmby handy to right her to-day, tomorrow, the very instant the clock + strikes the hour of my release! + </p> + <p> + Mention of the clock swung that silly gilt figure. Victor entered into it, + condemned to swing, and be a thrall. His intensity of sensation launched + him on an eternity of the swinging in ridiculous nakedness to the measure + of time gone crazy. He had to correct a reproof of Mrs. Burman, as the + cause of the nonsense. He ran down to breakfast, hopeing he might hear of + that clock stopped, and that sickening motion with it. + </p> + <p> + Another letter from the Sanfredini in Milan, warmly inviting to her villa + over Como, acted on him at breakfast like the waving of a banner. ‘We go,’ + Victor said to Nataly, and flattered-up a smile about her lips—too + much a resurrection smile. There was talk of the Meeting at the theatre: + Simeon Fenellan had spoken there in the cause of the deceased Member, was + known, and was likely to have a good reception. Fun and enthusiasm might + be expected. + </p> + <p> + ‘And my darling will hear her husband speak to-night,’ he whispered as he + was departing; and did a mischief, he had to fear, for a shadowy knot + crossed Nataly’s forehead, she seemed paler. He sent back Nesta and + mademoiselle, in consequence, at the end of the Green Park. + </p> + <p> + Their dinner-hour was early; Simeon Fenellan, Colney Durance, and Mr. + Peridon—pleasing to Nataly for his faithful siege of the French + fortress—were the only guests. When they rose, Nataly drew Victor + aside. He came dismayed to Nesta. She ran to her mother. ‘Not hear papa + speak? Oh, mother, mother! Then I stay with her. But can’t she come? He is + going to unfold ideas to us. There!’ + </p> + <p> + ‘My naughty girl is not to poke her fun at orators,’ Nataly said. ‘No, + dearest; it would agitate me to go. I’m better here. I shall be at peace + when the night is over.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘But you will be all alone here, dear mother.’ + </p> + <p> + Nataly’s eyes wandered to fall on Colney. He proposed to give her his + company. She declined it. Nesta ventured another entreaty, either that she + might be allowed to stay or have her mother with her at the Meeting. + </p> + <p> + ‘My love,’ Nataly said, ‘the thought of the Meeting—’ She clasped at + her breast; and she murmured: ‘I shall be comforted by your being with + him. There is no danger there. But I shall be happy, I shall be at peace + when this night is over.’ + </p> + <p> + Colney persuaded her to have him for companion. Mr. Peridon, who was to + have driven with Nesta and mademoiselle, won admiration by proposing to + stay for an hour and play some of Mrs. Radnor’s favourite pieces. Nesta + and Victor overbore Nataly’s objections to the lover’s generosity. So Mr. + Peridon was left. Nesta came hurrying back from the step of the carriage + to kiss her mother again, saying: ‘Just one last kiss, my own! And she’s + not to look troubled. I shall remember everything to tell my own mother. + It will soon be over.’ + </p> + <p> + Her mother nodded; but the embrace was passionate. + </p> + <p> + Nesta called her father into the passage, bidding him prohibit any + delivery to her mother of news at the door. ‘She is easily startled now by + trifles—you have noticed?’ + </p> + <p> + Victor summoned his recollections and assured her he had noticed, as he + believed he had ‘The dear heart of her is fretting for the night to be + over! And think! seven days, and she is in Lakelands. A fortnight, and we + have our first Concert. Durandarte! Oh, the dear heart ‘ll be at peace + when I tell her of a triumphant Meeting. Not a doubt of that, even though + Colney turns the shadow of his back on us.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘One critic the less for you!’ said Nesta. Skepsey was to meet her + carriage at the theatre. + </p> + <p> + Ten minutes later, Victor and Simeon Fenellan were proceeding thitherward + on foot. + </p> + <p> + ‘I have my speech,’ said Victor. ‘You prepare the way for me, following + our influential friend Dubbleson; Colewort winds up; any one else they + shout for. We shall have a great evening. I suspect I shall find Themison + or Jarniman when I get home. You don’t believe in intimations? I’ve had + crapy processions all day before my eyes. No wonder, after yesterday!’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Dubbleson mustn’t drawl it out too long,’ said Fenellan. + </p> + <p> + ‘We ‘ll drop a hint. Where’s Dartrey?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘He’ll come. He’s in one of his black moods: not temper. He’s got a notion + he killed his wife by dragging her to Africa with him. She was not only + ready to go, she was glad to go. She had a bit of the heroine in her and a + certainty of tripping to the deuce if she was left to herself.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Tell Nataly that,’ said Victor. ‘And tell her about Dartrey. Harp on it. + Once she was all for him and our girl. But it’s a woman—though the + dearest! I defy any one to hit on the cause of their changes. We must make + the best of things, if we’re for swimming. The task for me to-night will + be, to keep from rolling out all I’ve got in my head. And I’m not + revolutionary, I’m for stability. Only I do see, that the firm + stepping-place asks for a long stride to be taken. One can’t get the + English to take a stride—unless it’s for a foot behind them: bother + old Colney! Too timid, or too scrupulous, down we go into the mire. There!—But + I want to say it! I want to save the existing order. I want, Christianity, + instead of the Mammonism we ‘re threatened with. Great fortunes now are + becoming the giants of old to stalk the land: or mediaeval Barons. + Dispersion of wealth, is the secret. Nataly’s of that mind with me. A + decent poverty! She’s rather wearying, wants a change. I’ve a steam-yacht + in my eye, for next month on the Mediterranean. All our set. She likes + quiet. I believe in my political recipe for it.’ + </p> + <p> + He thumped on a method he had for preserving aristocracy—true + aristocracy, amid a positively democratic flood of riches. + </p> + <p> + ‘It appears to me, you’re on the road of Priscilla Graves and Pempton,’ + observed Simeon. ‘Strike off Priscilla’s viands and friend Pempton’s + couple of glasses, and there’s your aristocracy established; but with + rather a dispersed recognition of itself.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Upon my word, you talk like old Colney, except for a twang of your own,’ + said Victor. ‘Colney sours at every fresh number of that Serial. The last, + with Delphica detecting the plot of Falarique, is really not so bad. The + four disguised members of the Comedie Francaise on board the vessel from + San Francisco, to declaim and prove the superior merits of the Gallic + tongue, jumped me to bravo the cleverness. And Bobinikine turning to the + complexion of the remainder of cupboard dumplings discovered in an + emigrant’s house-to-let! And Semhians—I forget what and Mytharete’s + forefinger over the bridge of his nose, like a pensive vulture on the + skull of a desert camel! But, I complain, there’s nothing to make the + English love the author; and it’s wasted, he’s basted, and the book ‘ll + have no sale. I hate satire.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Rough soap for a thin skin, Victor. Does it hurt our people much?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Not a bit; doesn’t touch them. But I want my friends to succeed!’ + </p> + <p> + Their coming upon Westminster Bridge changed the theme. Victor wished the + Houses of Parliament to catch the beams of sunset. He deferred to the + suggestion, that the Hospital’s doing so seemed appropriate. + </p> + <p> + ‘I’m always pleased to find a decent reason for what is,’ he said. Then he + queried: ‘But what is, if we look at it, and while we look, Simeon? She + may be going—or she’s gone already, poor woman! I shall have that + scene of yesterday everlastingly before my eyes, like a drop-curtain. + Only, you know, Simeon, they don’t feel the end, as we in health imagine. + Colney would say, we have the spasms and they the peace. I ‘ve a mind to + send up to Regent’s Park with inquiries. It would look respectful. God + forgive me!—the poor woman perverts me at every turn. Though I will + say, a certain horror of death I had—she whisked me out of it + yesterday. I don’t feel it any longer. What are you jerking at?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Only to remark, that if the thing’s done for us, we haven’t it so much on + our sensations.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘More, if we’re sympathetic. But that compels us to be philosophic—or + who could live! Poor woman!’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Waft her gently, Victor!’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Tush! Now for the South side of the Bridges; and I tell you, Simeon, what + I can’t mention to-night: I mean to enliven these poor dear people on + their forsaken South of the City. I ‘ve my scheme. Elected or not, I shall + hardly be accused of bribery when I put down my first instalment.’ + </p> + <p> + Fenellan went to work with that remark in his brain for the speech he was + to deliver. He could not but reflect on the genial man’s willingness and + capacity to do deeds of benevolence, constantly thwarted by the position + into which he had plunged himself. + </p> + <p> + They were received at the verge of the crowd outside the theatre-doors by + Skepsey, who wriggled, tore and clove a way for them, where all were + obedient, but the numbers lumped and clogged. When finally they reached + the stage, they spied at Nesta’s box, during the thunder of the rounds of + applause, after shaking hands with Mr. Dubbleson, Sir Abraham Quatley, + Dudley Sowerby, and others; and with Beaves Urmsing—a politician + ‘never of the opposite party to a deuce of a funny fellow!—go + anywhere to hear him,’ he vowed. + </p> + <p> + ‘Miss Radnor and Mademoiselle de Seilles arrived quite safely,’ said + Dudley, feasting on the box which contained them and no Dartrey Fenellan + in it. + </p> + <p> + Nesta was wondering at Dartrey’s absence. Not before Mr. Dubbleson, the + chairman, the ‘gentleman of local influence,’ had animated the drowsed + wits and respiratory organs of a packed audience by yielding place to + Simeon, did Dartrey appear. Simeon’s name was shouted, in proof of the + happy explosion of his first anecdote, as Dartrey took seat behind Nesta. + ‘Half an hour with the dear mother,’ he said. + </p> + <p> + Nesta’s eyes thanked him. She pressed the hand of a demure young woman + sitting close behind. Louise de Seilles. ‘You know Matilda Pridden.’ + </p> + <p> + Dartrey held his hand out. ‘Has she forgiven me?’ + </p> + <p> + Matilda bowed gravely, enfolding her affirmative in an outline of the no + need for it, with perfect good breeding. Dartrey was moved to think + Skepsey’s choice of a woman to worship did him honour. He glanced at + Louise. Her manner toward Matilda Pridden showed her sisterly with Nesta. + He said: ‘I left Mr. Peridon playing.—A little anxiety to hear that + the great speech of the evening is done; it’s nothing else. I’ll run to + her as soon as it’s over.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Oh, good of you! And kind of Mr. Peridon!’ She turned to Louise, who + smiled at the simple art of the exclamation, assenting. + </p> + <p> + Victor below, on the stage platform, indicated the waving of a hand to + them, and his delight at Simeon’s ringing points: which were, to Dartrey’s + mind, vacuously clever and crafty. Dartrey despised effects of oratory, + save when soldiers had to be hurled on a mark—or citizens nerved to + stand for their country. + </p> + <p> + Nesta dived into her father’s brilliancy of appreciation, a trifle pained + by Dartrey’s aristocratic air when he surveyed the herd of heads agape and + another cheer rang round. He smiled with her, to be with her, at a hit + here and there; he would not pretend an approval of this manner of winning + electors to consider the country’s interests and their own. One fellow in + the crowded pit, affecting a familiarity with Simeon, that permitted the + taking of liberties with the orator’s Christian name, mildly amused him. + He had no objection to hear ‘Simmy’ shouted, as Louise de Seilles + observed. She was of his mind, in regard to the rough machinery of + Freedom. + </p> + <p> + Skepsey entered the box. + </p> + <p> + ‘We shall soon be serious, Miss Nesta,’ he said, after a look at Matilda + Pridden. + </p> + <p> + There was a prolonged roaring—on the cheerful side. + </p> + <p> + ‘And another word about security that your candidate will keep his + promises,’ continued Simeon: ‘You have his word, my friends!’ And he told + the story of the old Governor of Goa, who wanted money and summoned the + usurers, and they wanted security; whereupon he laid his Hidalgo hand on a + cataract of Kronos-beard across his breast, and pulled forth three white + hairs, and presented them: ‘And as honourably to the usurious Jews as to + the noble gentleman himself, that security was accepted!’ + </p> + <p> + Emerging from hearty clamours, the illustrative orator fell upon the + question of political specifics:—Mr. Victor Radnor trusted to + English good sense too profoundly to be offering them positive cures, as + they would hear the enemy say he did. Yet a bit of a cure may be offered, + if we ‘re not for pushing it too far, in pursuit of the science of + specifics, in the style of the foreign physician, probably Spanish, who + had no practice, and wished for leisure to let him prosecute his + anatomical and other investigations to discover his grand medical nostrum. + So to get him fees meanwhile he advertised a cure for dyspepsia—the + resource of starving doctors. And sure enough his patient came, showing + the grand fat fellow we may be when we carry more of the deciduously + mortal than of the scraggy vital upon our persons. Any one at a glance + would have prescribed water-cresses to him: water-cresses exclusively to + eat for a fortnight. And that the good physician did. Away went his + patient, returning at the end of the fortnight, lean, and with the + appetite of a Toledo blade for succulent slices. He vowed he was the man. + Our estimable doctor eyed him, tapped at him, pinched his tender parts; + and making him swear he was really the man, and had eaten nothing whatever + but unadulterated water-cresses in the interval, seized on him in an + ecstasy by the collar of his coat, pushed him into the surgery, knocked + him over, killed him, cut him up, and enjoyed the felicity of exposing to + view the very healthiest patient ever seen under dissecting hand, by + favour of the fortunate discovery of the specific for him. All to further + science!—to which, in spite of the petitions of all the scientific + bodies of the civilized world, he fell a martyr on the scaffold, poor + gentleman! But we know politics to be no such empirical science. + </p> + <p> + Simeon ingeniously interwove his analogy. He brought it home to Beaves + Urmsing, whose laugh drove any tone of apology out of it. Yet the orator + was asked: ‘Do you take politics for a joke, Simmy?’ + </p> + <p> + He countered his questioner: ‘Just to liberate you from your moribund + state, my friend.’ And he told the story of the wrecked sailor, found + lying on the sands, flung up from the foundered ship of a Salvation + captain, and how, that nothing could waken him, and there he lay fit for + interment; until presently a something of a voice grew down into his ears; + and it was his old chum Polly, whom he had tied to a board to give her a + last chance in the surges; and Polly shaking the wet from her feathers, + and shouting: ‘Polly tho dram dry!’—which struck on the nob of + Jack’s memory, to revive all the liquorly tricks of the cabin under + Salvationism, and he began heaving, and at last he shook in a lazy way, + and then from sputter to sputter got his laugh loose; and he sat up, and + cried; ‘That did it! Now to business!’ for he was hungry. ‘And when I + catch the ring of this world’s laugh from you, my friend...!’ Simeon’s + application of the story was drowned. + </p> + <p> + After the outburst, they heard his friend again interruptingly: ‘You keep + that tongue of yours from wagging, as it did when you got round the old + widow woman for her money, Simmy!’ + </p> + <p> + Victor leaned forward. Simeon towered. He bellowed + </p> + <p> + ‘And you keep that tongue of yours from committing incest on a lie!’ + </p> + <p> + It was like a lightning-flash in the theatre. The man went under. Simeon + flowed. Conscience reproached him with the little he had done for Victor, + and he had now his congenial opportunity. + </p> + <p> + Up in the box, the powers of the orator were not so cordially esteemed. To + Matilda Pridden, his tales were barely decently the flesh and the devil + smothering a holy occasion to penetrate and exhort. Dartrey sat rigid, as + with the checked impatience for a leap. Nesta looked at Louise when some + one was perceived on the stage bending to her father: It was Mr. Peridon; + he never once raised his face. Apparently he was not intelligible or + audible but the next moment Victor sprang erect. Dartrey quitted the box. + Nesta beheld her father uttering hurried words to right and left. He + passed from sight, Mr. Peridon with him; and Dartrey did not return. + </p> + <p> + Nesta felt her father’s absence as light gone: his eyes rayed light. + Besides she had the anticipation of a speech from him, that would win + Matilda Pridden. She fancied Simeon Fenellan to be rather under the spell + of the hilarity he roused. A gentleman behind him spoke in his ear; and + Simeon, instead of ceasing, resumed his flow. Matilda Pridden’s gaze on + him and the people was painful to behold: Nesta saw her mind. She set + herself to study a popular assembly. It could be serious to the call of + better leadership, she believed. Her father had been telling her of late + of a faith he had in the English, that they (or so her intelligence + translated his remarks) had power to rise to spiritual ascendancy, and be + once more the Islanders heading the world of a new epoch abjuring + materialism—some such idea; very quickening to her, as it would be + to this earnest young woman worshipped by Skepsey. Her father’s absence + and the continued shouts of laughter, the insatiable thirst for fun, + darkened her in her desire to have the soul of the good working sister + refreshed. They had talked together; not much: enough for each to see at + either’s breast the wells from the founts of life. + </p> + <p> + The box-door opened, Dartrey came in. He took her hand. She stood-up to + his look. He said to Matilda Pridden: ‘Come with us; she will need you.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Speak it,’ said Nesta. + </p> + <p> + He said to the other: ‘She has courage.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘I could trust to her,’ Matilda Pridden replied. + </p> + <p> + Nesta read his eyes. ‘Mother?’ + </p> + <p> + His answer was in the pressure. + </p> + <p> + ‘Ill?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘No longer.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Oh! Dartrey.’ Matilda Pridden caught her fast. + </p> + <p> + ‘I can walk, dear,’ Nesta said. + </p> + <p> + Dartrey mentioned her father. + </p> + <p> + She understood: ‘I am thinking of him.’ + </p> + <p> + The words of her mother: ‘At peace when the night is over,’ rang. Along + the gassy passages of the back of the theatre, the sound coming from an + applausive audience was as much a thunder as rage would have been. It was + as void of human meaning as a sea. + </p> + <p> + <a name="link2HCH0042" id="link2HCH0042"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + CHAPTER XLII. THE LAST + </h2> + <p> + In the still dark hour of that April morning, the Rev. Septimus Barmby was + roused by Mr. Peridon, with a scribbled message from Victor, which he + deciphered by candlelight held close to the sheet of paper, between short + inquiries and communications, losing more and more the sense of it as his + intelligence became aware of what dread blow had befallen the stricken + man. He was bidden come to fulfil his promise instantly. He remembered the + bearing of the promise. Mr. Peridon’s hurried explanatory narrative made + the request terrific, out of tragically lamentable. A semblance of + obedience had to be put on, and the act of dressing aided it. Mr. Barmby + prayed at heart for guidance further. + </p> + <p> + The two gentlemen drove Westward, speaking little; they had the dry sob in + the throat. + </p> + <p> + ‘Miss Radnor?’ Mr. Barmby asked. + </p> + <p> + ‘She is shattered; she holds up; she would not break down.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘I can conceive her to possess high courage.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘She has her friend Mademoiselle de Seilles.’ + </p> + <p> + Mr. Barmby remained humbly silent. Affectionate deep regrets moved him to + say: ‘A loss irreparable. We have but one voice of sorrow. And how sudden! + The dear lady had no suffering, I trust.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘She fell into the arms of Mr. Durance. She died in his arms. She was + unconscious, he says. I left her straining for breath. She said “Victor”; + she tried to smile:—I understood I was not to alarm him.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘And he too late!’ + </p> + <p> + ‘He was too late, by some minutes.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘At least I may comfort. Miss Radnor must be a blessing to him.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘They cannot meet. Her presence excites him.’ + </p> + <p> + That radiant home of all hospitality seemed opening on from darker + chambers to the deadly dark. The immorality in the moral situation could + not be forgotten by one who was professionally a moralist. But an + incorruptible beauty in the woman’s character claimed to plead for her + memory. Even the rigorous in defence of righteous laws are softened by a + sinner’s death to hear excuses, and may own a relationship, haply perceive + the faint nimbus of the saint. Death among us proves us to be still not so + far from the Nature saying at every avenue to the mind: ‘Earth makes all + sweet.’ + </p> + <p> + Mr. Durance had prophesied a wailful end ever to the carol of Optimists! + Yet it is not the black view which is the right view. There is one + between: the path adopted by Septimus Barmby:—if he could but induce + his brethren to enter on it! The dreadful teaching of circumstances might + help to the persuading of a fair young woman, under his direction... + having her hand disengaged. Mr. Barmby started himself in the dream of his + uninterred passion for the maiden: he chased it, seized it, hurled it + hence, as a present sacrilege:—constantly, and at the pitch of our + highest devotion to serve, are we assailed by the tempter! Is it, that the + love of woman is our weakness? For if so, then would a celibate clergy + have grant of immunity. But, alas, it is not so with them! We have to + deplore the hearing of reports too credible. Again we are pushed to + contemplate woman as the mysterious obstruction to the perfect purity of + soul. Nor is there a refuge in asceticism. No more devilish nourisher of + pride do we find than in pain voluntarily embraced. And strangely, at the + time when our hearts are pledged to thoughts upon others, they are led by + woman to glance revolving upon ourself, our vile self! Mr. Barmby clutched + it by the neck. + </p> + <p> + Light now, as of a strong memory of day along the street, assisted him to + forget himself at the sight of the inanimate houses of this London, all + revealed in a quietness not less immobile than tombstones of an unending + cemetery, with its last ghost laid. Did men but know it!—The + habitual necessity to amass matter for the weekly sermon, set him noting + his meditative exclamations, the noble army of platitudes under haloes, of + good use to men: justifiably turned over in his mind for their good. He + had to think, that this act of the justifying of the act reproached him + with a lack of due emotion, in sympathy with agonized friends truly dear. + Drawing near the hospitable house, his official and a cordial emotion + united, as we see sorrowful crape-wreathed countenances. His heart struck + heavily when the house was visible. + </p> + <p> + Could it be the very house? The look of it belied the tale inside. But + that threw a ghostliness on the look. + </p> + <p> + Some one was pacing up and down. They greeted Dudley Sowerby. His ability + to speak was tasked. They gathered, that mademoiselle and ‘a Miss Pridden’ + were sitting with Nesta, and that their services in a crisis had been + precious. At such times, one of them reflected, woman has indeed her + place: when life’s battle waxes red. Her soul must be capable of mounting + to the level of the man’s, then? It is a lesson! + </p> + <p> + Dudley said he was waiting for Dr. Themison to come forth. He could not + tear himself from sight of the house. + </p> + <p> + The door opened to Dr. Themison departing, Colney Durance and Simeon + Fenellan bare-headed. Colney showed a face with stains of the lashing of + tears. + </p> + <p> + Dr. Themison gave his final counsels. ‘Her father must not see her. For + him, it may have to be a specialist. We will hope the best. Mr. Dartrey + Fenellan stays beside him:—good. As to the ceremony he calls for, a + form of it might soothe:—any soothing possible! No music. I will + return in a few hours.’ + </p> + <p> + He went on foot. + </p> + <p> + Mr. Barmby begged advice from Colney and Simeon concerning the message he + had received—the ceremony requiring his official presidency. Neither + of them replied. They breathed the morning air, they gave out long-drawn + sighs of relief, looking on the trees of the park. + </p> + <p> + A man came along the pavement, working slow legs hurriedly. Simeon ran + down to him. + </p> + <p> + ‘Humour, as much as you can,’ Colney said to Mr. Barmby. ‘Let him + imagine.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Miss Radnor?’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Not to speak of her.’ + </p> + <p> + ‘The daughter he so loves?’ + </p> + <p> + Mr. Barmby’s tender inquisitiveness was unanswered. Were they inducing him + to mollify a madman? But was it possible to associate the idea of madness + with Mr. Radnor? + </p> + <p> + Simeon ran back. ‘Jarniman,’ he remarked. ‘It’s over!’ + </p> + <p> + ‘Now!’ Colney’s shoulders expressed the comment. ‘Well, now, Mr. Barmby, + you can do the part desired. Come in. It’s morning!’ He stared at the sky. + </p> + <p> + All except Dudley passed in. + </p> + <p> + Mr. Barmby wanted more advice, his dilemma being acute. It was moderated, + though not more than moderated, when he was informed of the death of Mrs. + Burman Radnor; an event that occurred, according to Jarniman’s report, + forty-five minutes after Skepsey had a second time called for information + of it at the house in Regent’s Park—five hours and a half, as Colney + made his calculation, after the death of Nataly. He was urged by some spur + of senseless irony to verify the calculation and correct it in the + minutes. + </p> + <p> + Dudley crossed the road. No sign of the awful interior was on any of the + windows of the house either to deepen awe or relieve. They were blank as + eyeballs of the mindless. He shivered. Death is our common cloak; but + Calamity individualizes, to set the unwounded speculating whether indeed a + stricken man, who has become the cause of woeful trouble, may not be + pointing a moral. Pacing on the Park side of the house, he saw Skepsey + drive up and leap out with a gentleman, Mr. Radnor’s lawyer. Could it be, + that there was no Will written? Could a Will be executed now? The moral + was more forcibly suggested. Dudley beheld this Mr. Victor Radnor + successful up all the main steps, persuasive, popular, brightest of the + elect of Fortune, felled to the ground within an hour, he and all his + house! And if at once to pass beneath the ground, the blow would have + seemed merciful for him. Or if, instead of chattering a mixture of the + rational and the monstrous, he had been heard to rave like the utterly + distraught. Recollection of some of the things he shouted, was an anguish: + A notion came into the poor man, that he was the dead one of the two, and + he cried out: ‘Cremation? No, Colney’s right, it robs us of our last + laugh. I lie as I fall.’ He ‘had a confession for his Nataly, for her + only, for no one else.’ He had ‘an Idea.’ His begging of Dudley to listen + without any punctilio (putting a vulgar oath before it), was the sole + piece of unreasonableness in the explanation of the idea: and that was not + much wilder than the stuff Dudley had read from reports of Radical + speeches. He told Dudley he thought him too young to be ‘best man to a + widower about to be married,’ and that Barmby was ‘coming all haste to do + the business, because of no time to spare.’ + </p> + <p> + Dudley knew but the half, and he did not envy Dartrey Fenellan his task of + watching over the wreck of a splendid intelligence, humouring and + restraining. According to the rumours, Mr. Radnor had not shown the + symptoms before the appearance of his daughter. For awhile he hung, and + then fell, like an icicle. Nesta came with a cry for her father. He rose: + Dartrey was by. Hugged fast in iron muscles, the unhappy creature raved of + his being a caged lion. These things Dudley had heard in the house. + </p> + <p> + There are scenes of life proper to the grave-cloth. + </p> + <p> + Nataly’s dead body was her advocate with her family, with friends, with + the world. Victor had more need of a covering shroud to keep calamity + respected. Earth makes all sweet: and we, when the privilege is granted + us, do well to treat the terribly stricken as if they had entered to the + bosom of earth. + </p> + <p> + That night’s infinite sadness was concentrated upon Nesta. She had need of + her strength of mind and body. + </p> + <p> + The night went past as a year. The year followed it as a refreshing night. + Slowly lifting her from our abysses, it was a good angel to the girl. + Permission could not be given for her to see her father. She had a home in + the modest home of Louise de Seilles on the borders of Dauphins; and with + French hearts at their best in winningness around her, she learned again, + as an art, the natural act of breathing calmly; she had by degrees a + longing for the snow-heights. When her imagination could perch on them + with love and pride, she began to recover the throb for a part in human + action. It set her nature flowing to the mate she had chosen, who was her + counsellor, her supporter, and her sword. She had awakened to new life, + not to sink back upon a breast of love, though thoughts of the lover were + as blows upon strung musical chords of her bosom. Her union with Dartrey + was for the having an ally and the being an ally, in resolute vision of + strife ahead, through the veiled dreams that bear the blush. This was + behind a maidenly demureness. Are not young women hypocrites? Who shall + fathom their guile! A girl with a pretty smile, a gentle manner, a liking + for wild flowers up on the rocks; and graceful with resemblances to the + swelling proportions of garden-fruits approved in young women by the + connoisseur eye of man; distinctly designed to embrace the state of + marriage, that she might (a girl of singularly lucid and receptive eyes) + the better give battle to men touching matters which they howl at an + eccentric matron for naming. So it was. And the yielding of her hand to + Dartrey, would have appeared at that period of her revival, as among the + baser compliances of the fleshly, if she had not seen in him, whom she + owned for leader, her fellow soldier, warrior friend, hero, of her own + heart’s mould, but a greater. + </p> + <p> + She was on Como, at the villa of the Signora Giulia Sanfredini, when + Dudley’s letter reached her, with the supplicating offer of the share of + his earldom. An English home meanwhile was proposed to her at the house of + his mother the Countess. He knew that he did not write to a brilliant + heiress. The generosity she had always felt that he possessed, he thus + proved in figures. They are convincing and not melting. But she was moved + to tears by his goodness in visiting her father, as well as by the hopeful + news he sent. He wrote delicately, withholding the title of her father’s + place of abode. There were expectations of her father’s perfect recovery; + the signs were auspicious; he appeared to be restored to the ‘likeness to + himself’ in the instances Dudley furnished:—his appointment with him + for the flute-duet next day; and particularly his enthusiastic + satisfaction with the largeness and easy excellent service of the + residence ‘in which he so happily found himself established.’ He held it + to be, ‘on the whole, superior to Lakelands.’ The smile and the tear + rolled together in Nesta reading these words. And her father spoke + repeatedly of longing to embrace his Fredi, of the joy her last letter had + given him, of his intention to send an immediate answer: and he showed + Dudley a pile of manuscript ready for the post. He talked of public + affairs, was humorous over any extravagance or eccentricity in the views + he took; notably when he alluded to his envy of little Skepsey. He said he + really did envy; and his daughter believed it and saw fair prospects in + it. + </p> + <p> + Her grateful reply to the young earl conveyed all that was perforce + ungentle, in the signature of the name of Nesta Victoria Fenellan:—a + name he was to hear cited among the cushioned conservatives, and plead for + as he best could under a pressure of disapprobation, and compelled esteem, + and regrets. + </p> + <p> + The day following the report of her father’s wish to see her, she and her + husband started for England. On that day, Victor breathed his last. Dudley + had seen the not hopeful but an ominous illumination of the stricken man; + for whom came the peace his Nataly had in earth. Often did Nesta conjure + up to vision the palpitating form of the beloved mother with her hand at + her mortal wound in secret through long years of the wearing of the mask + to keep her mate inspirited. Her gathered knowledge of things and her + ruthless penetrativeness made it sometimes hard for her to be tolerant of + a world, whose tolerance of the infinitely evil stamped blotches on its + face and shrieked in stains across the skin beneath its gallant garb. That + was only when she thought of it as the world condemning her mother. She + had a husband able and ready, in return for corrections of his demon + temper, to trim an ardent young woman’s fanatical overflow of the sisterly + sentiments; scholarly friends, too, for such restrainings from excess as + the mind obtains in a lamp of History exhibiting man’s original sprouts to + growth and fitful continuation of them. Her first experience of the grief + that is in pleasure, for those who have passed a season, was when the old + Concert-set assembled round her. When she heard from the mouth of a living + woman, that she had saved her from going under the world’s waggon-wheels, + and taught her to know what is actually meant by the good living of a + shapely life, Nesta had the taste of a harvest happiness richer than her + recollection of the bride’s, though never was bride in fuller flower to + her lord than she who brought the dower of an equal valiancy to Dartrey + Fenellan. You are aware of the reasons, the many, why a courageous young + woman requires of high heaven, far more than the commendably timid, a + doughty husband. She had him; otherwise would that puzzled old world, + which beheld her step out of the ranks to challenge it, and could not + blast her personal reputation, have commissioned a paw to maul her + character, perhaps instructing the gossips to murmur of her parentage. + Nesta Victoria Fenellan had the husband who would have the world + respectful to any brave woman. This one was his wife. + </p> + <p> + Daniel Skepsey rejoices in service to his new master, owing to the + scientific opinion he can at any moment of the day apply for, as to the + military defences of the country; instead of our attempting to arrest the + enemy by vociferations of persistent prayer:—the sole point of + difference between him and his Matilda; and it might have been fatal but + that Nesta’s intervention was persuasive. The two members of the Army + first in the field to enrol and give rank according to the merits of + either, to both sexes, were made one. Colney Durance (practically cynical + when not fancifully, men said) stood by Skepsey at the altar. His + published exercises in Satire produce a flush of the article in the + Reviews of his books. Meat and wine in turn fence the Hymen beckoning + Priscilla and Mr. Pempton. The forms of Religion more than the Channel’s + division of races keep Louise de Seilles and Mr. Peridon asunder: and in + the uniting of them Colney is interested, because it would have so pleased + the woman of the loyal heart no longer beating. He let Victor’s end be his + expiation and did not phrase blame of him. He considered the shallowness + of the abstract Optimist exposed enough in Victor’s history. He was + reconciled to it when, looking on their child, he discerned, that for a + cancelling of the errors chargeable to them, the father and mother had + kept faith with Nature. + </p> + <p> + <br /> <br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <br /> <br /> + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + ETEXT EDITOR’S BOOKMARKS + + Admiration of an enemy or oppressor doing great deeds + All of us an ermined owl within us to sit in judgement + An incomprehensible world indeed at the bottom and at the top + Aristocratic assumption of licence + Arrest the enemy by vociferations of persistent prayer + Ask not why, where reason never was + Belief in the narrative by promoting nausea in the audience + But what is it we do (excepting cricket, of course) + Cannot be any goodness unless it is a practiced goodness + Claim for equality puts an end to the priceless privileges + Consent of circumstances + Consent to take life as it is + Continued trust in the man—is the alternative of despair + Country prizing ornaments higher than qualities + Cover of action as an escape from perplexity + Critical fashion of intimates who know as well as hear + Death is our common cloak; but Calamity individualizes + Despises hostile elements and goes unpunished + Dialogue between Nature and Circumstance + Dithyrambic inebriety of narration + Dudley was not gifted to read behind words and looks + Eminently servile is the tolerated lawbreaker + Exuberant anticipatory trustfulness + Fell to chatting upon the nothings agreeably and seriously + Feminine; coming when she willed and flying when wanted + Fire smoothes the creases + Frankness as an armour over wariness + Greater our successes, the greater the slaves we become + Half designingly permitted her trouble to be seen + Half a dozen dozen left + Happy the woman who has not more to speak + Hard to bear, at times unbearable + Haremed opinion of the unfitness of women + He sinks terribly when he sinks at all + He never acknowledged a trouble, he dispersed it + He never explained + He neared her, wooing her; and she assented + He prattled, in the happy ignorance of compulsion + Heathen vindictiveness declaring itself holy + Honest creatures who will not accept a lift from fiction + How little we mean to do harm when we do an injury + How Success derides Ambition! + If only been intellectually a little flexible in his morality + If we are robbed, we ask, How came we by the goods? + If we are really for Nature, we are not lawless + In the pay of our doctors + In bottle if not on draught (oratory) + Intrusion of hard material statements, facts + Judgeing of the destiny of man by the fate of individuals + Kelts, as they are called, can’t and won’t forgive injuries + Let but the throb be kept for others—That is the one secret + Love must needs be an egoism + Man with a material object in aim, is the man of his object + Memory inspired by the sensations + Nation’s half made-up of the idle and the servants of the idle + Naturally as deceived as he wished to be + Nature and Law never agreed + Nature could at a push be eloquent to defend the guilty + Nature’s logic, Nature’s voice, for self-defence + Next door to the Last Trump + No companionship save with the wound they nurse + Not to go hunting and fawning for alliances + Not always the right thing to do the right thing + Obeseness is the most sensitive of our ailments + Official wrath at sound of footfall or a fancied one + Once out of the rutted line, you are food for lion and jackal + One wants a little animation in a husband + Optional marriages, broken or renewed every seven years + People of a provocative prosperity + Pessimy is invulnerable + Portrait of himself by the artist + Put into her woman’s harness of the bit and the blinkers + Repeatedly, in contempt of the disgust of iteration + Satirist is an executioner by profession + Satirist too devotedly loves his lash to be a persuasive teacher + Self-deceiver may be a persuasive deceiver of another + Semblance of a tombstone lady beside her lord + Share of foulness to them that are for scouring the chamber + She was not his match—To speak would be to succumb + She disdained to question the mouth which had bitten her + Slap and pinch and starve our appetites + Slave of existing conventions + Smallest of our gratifications in life could give a happy tone + Smothered in its pudding-bed of the grotesque (obesity) + Snuffle of hypocrisy in her prayer + Startled by the criticism in laughter + State of feverish patriotism + Statistics are according to their conjurors + Subterranean recess for Nature against the Institutions of Man + Tale, which leaves the man’s mind at home + The banquet to be fervently remembered, should smoke + The homage we pay him flatters us + The effects of the infinitely little + The night went past as a year + The old confession, that we cannot cook (The English) + The worst of it is, that we remember + The face of a stopped watch + The impalpable which has prevailing weight + There is little to be learnt when a little is known + They helped her to feel at home with herself + They kissed coldly, pressed a hand, said good night + They do not live; they are engines + Thought of differences with him caused frightful apprehensions + To do nothing, is the wisdom of those who have seen fools perish + Universal censor’s angry spite + Unshamed exuberant male has found the sweet reverse in his mate + We have come to think we have a claim upon her gratitude + We must have some excuse, if we would keep to life + We cannot relinquish an idea that was ours + We’ve all a parlous lot too much pulpit in us + Whimpering fits you said we enjoy and must have in books + Who enjoyed simple things when commanding the luxuries + Who enjoyed simple things when commanding the luxuries +</pre> + <p> + <br /> <br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <br /> <br /> + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + + + +End of Project Gutenberg’s One of Our Conquerors, Complete, by George Meredith + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK ONE OF OUR CONQUERORS, COMPLETE *** + +***** This file should be named 4476-h.htm or 4476-h.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + https://www.gutenberg.org/4/4/7/4476/ + +Produced by David Widger + + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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