Lady Markham turned pale with alarm and horror. “Oh, I have always been afraid of this! I had a presentiment,” she cried. Then rallying a little: “But, Sir Thomas, no one thinks now that fever is brought on by mental causes. It must be bad water or defective drainage.”
“It may be—anything; I can’t tell; I am no doctor. But the fact is, the young fellow is lying delirious, raving. I heard him myself—about stakes and chances and losses, and how he will make it up to-morrow. There are other things too. He seems to have had hard lines, poor fellow, if all is true.”
Frances had rushed forward, unable to restrain herself. “Oh, his mother, his mother—we must send for his mother,” she cried.
“I will go and see him to-morrow,” said Lady Markham. “I had a presentiment. Hehas been on my mind ever since I saw him first. I blame myself for losing sight of him. But to-morrow——”
“To-morrow—to-morrow; that is what the poor fellow says.”
Lady Markhamdid not forget her promise. Whatever else a great lady may forget in these days, her sick people, her hospitals, she is sure never to forget. She went early to the lodgings, which were not far off, hidden in one of the quaint corners of little old lanes behind Piccadilly, where poor Gaunt was. She did not object to the desire of Frances to go with her, nor to the anxiety she showed. The man was ill; he had become a “case;” it was natural and right that he should be an object of interest. For herself, so far as Lady Markham’s thoughts were free at all, George Gaunt was much more than a case to her. A little while ago, she would have given him a large share in her thoughts, with a remorseful consciousness almost of a personal part in theinjury which had been done him. But now there were so many other matters in the foreground of her mind, that this, though it gave her one sharp twinge, and an additional desire to do all that could be done for him, had yet fallen into the background. Besides, things had arrived at a climax: there was no longer any means of delivering him, no further anxiety about his daily movements; there he lay, incapable of further action. It was miserable, yet it was a relief. Markham and Markham’s associates had no more power over a sick man.
Lady Markham managed her affairs always in a business-like way. She sent to inquire what was the usual hour of the doctor’s visit, and timed her arrival so as to meet him, and receive all the information he could give. Even the medical details of the case were not beyond Lady Markham’s comprehension. She had a brief but very full consultation with the medical man in the little parlour down-stairs, and promptly issued her orders for nurses and all that could possibly be wanted for the patient. Two nurses at once—one for the day, and the other for thenight; ice by the cart-load; the street to be covered with hay; any traffic that it was possible to stop, arrested. These directions Frances heard while she sat anxious and trembling in the brougham, and watched the doctor—a humble and undistinguished practitioner of the neighbourhood, stirred into excited interest by the sudden appearance of the great lady, with her liberal ideas, upon the scene—hurrying away. Lady Markham then disappeared again into the house,—the small, trim, shallow, London lodging-house, with a few scrubby plants in its little balconies on the first floor, where the windows were open, but veiled by sun-blinds. Something that sounded like incessant talking came from these windows—a sound to which Frances paid no attention at first, thinking it nothing but a conversation, though curiously carried on without break or pause. But after a while the monotony of the sound gave her a painful sensation. The street was very quiet, even without the hay. Now and then a cart or carriage would come round the corner, taking a short-cut from one known locality to another.Sometimes a street cry would echo through the sunshine. A cart full of flowering-plants, with a hoarse-voiced proprietor, went along in stages, stopping here and there; but through all ran the strain of talk, monologue or conversation, never interrupted. The sound affected the girl’s nerves, she could not tell why. She opened the door of the brougham at last, and went into the narrow little doorway of the house, where it became more distinct,—a persistent dull strain of speech. All was deserted on the lower floor, the door of the sitting-room standing open, the narrow staircase leading to the sick man’s rooms above. Frances felt her interest, her eager curiosity, grow at every moment. She ran lightly, quickly up-stairs. The door of the front room, the room with the balconies, was ajar; and now it became evident that the sound was that of a single voice, hoarse, not always articulate, talking. Oh, the weary strain of talk, monotonous, unending—sometimes rising faintly, sometimes falling lower, never done, without a pause. That could not be raving, Frances said to herself. Oh, not raving! Cries ofexcitement and passion would have been comprehensible. But there was something more awful in the persistency of the dull choked voice. She said to herself it was not George Gaunt’s voice: she did not know what it was. But as she put forth all these arguments to herself, trembling, she drew ever nearer and nearer to the door.
“Red—red—and red. Stick to my colour: my colour—my coat, Markham, and the ribbon, her ribbon. I say red. Play, play—all play—always: amusement: her ribbon, red. No, no; not red, black, colour death—no colour: means nothing, all nothing. Markham, play. Gain or lose—all—all: nothing kept back. Red, I say; and red—blood—blood colour. Mother, mother! no, it’s black, black. No blood—no blood—no reproach. Death—makes up all—death. Black—red—black—all death colours, all death, death.” Then there was a little change in the voice. “Constance?—India; no, no; not India. Anywhere—give up everything. Amusement, did you say amusement? Don’t say so, don’t say so. Sport to you—but death, death:—colour ofdeath, black: or red—blood: all death colours, death. Mother! don’t put on black—red ribbons like hers—red, heart’s blood. No bullet, no—her little hand, little white hand—and then blood-red. Constance! Play—play—nothing left—play.”
Frances stood outside and shuddered. Was this, then, what they called raving? She shrank within herself; her heart failed her; a sickness which took the light from her eyes, made her limbs tremble and her head swim. Oh, what sport had he been to the two—the two who were nearest to her in the world! What had they done with him, Mrs Gaunt’s boy—the youngest, the favourite? There swept through the girl’s mind like a bitter wind a cry against—Fate was it, or Providence? Had they but let alone, had each stayed in her own place, it would have been Frances who should have met, with a fresh heart, the young man’s early fancy. They would have met sincere and faithful, and loved each other, and all would have been well. But there was no Frances; there was only Constance, to throw his heart away.She seemed to see it all as in a picture—Constance with the red ribbons on her grey dress, with the smile that said it was only amusement; with the little hand, the little white hand, that gave the blow. And then all play, all play, red or black, what did it matter? and the bullet; and the mother in mourning, and Markham. Constance and Markham! murderers. This was the cry that came from the bottom of the girl’s heart. Murderers!—of two; of him and of herself; of the happiness that was justly hers, which at this moment she claimed, and wildly asserted her right to have, in the clamour of her angry heart. She seemed to see it all in a moment: how he was hers; how she had given her heart to him before she ever saw him; how she could have made him happy. She would not have shrunk from India or anywhere. She would have made him happy. And Constance, for a jest, had come between; for amusement, had broken his heart. And Markham, for amusement—for amusement!—had destroyed his life; and hers as well. There are moments when the gentle and simple mind becomes more terrible thanany fury. She saw it all as in a picture—with one clear sudden revelation. And her heart rose against it with a sensation of wrong, which was intolerable—of misery, which she could not, would not bear.
She pushed open the door, scarcely knowing what she did. The bed was pulled out from the wall, almost into the centre of the room; and behind, while this strange husky monologue of confused passion was going on unnoted, Lady Markham and the landlady stood together talking in calm undertones of the treatment to be employed. Frances’ senses, all stimulated to the highest point, took in, without meaning to do so, every particular of the scene and every word that was said.
“I can do no good by staying now,” Lady Markham was saying. “There is so little to be done at this stage. The ice to his head, that is all till the nurse comes. She will be here before one o’clock. And in the meantime, you must watch him carefully, and if anything occurs, let me know. Be very careful to tell me everything; for the slightest symptom is important.”
“Yes, my lady; I’ll take great care, my lady.” The woman was overawed, yet excited, by this unexpected visitor, who had turned the dull drama of the lodger’s illness into a great, important, and exciting conflict, conducted by the highest officials, against disease and death.
“As I go home, I shall call at Dr——’s”—naming the great doctor of the moment—“who will meet the other gentleman here; and after that, if they decide on ice-baths or any other active treatment—— But there will be time to think of that. In the meantime, if anything important occurs, communicate with me at once, at Eaton Square.”
“Yes, my lady; I’ll not forget nothing. My ’usband will run in a moment to let your ladyship know.”
“That will be quite right. Keep him in the house, so that he may get anything that is wanted.” Lady Markham gave her orders with the liberality of a woman who had never known any limit to the possibilities of command in this way. She went up to the bed and looked at the patient, who lay all unconscious of inspection, continuing the hoarse talk, to whichshe had ceased to attend, through which she had carried on her conversation in complete calm. She touched his forehead for a moment with the back of her ungloved hand, and shook her head. “The temperature is very high,” she said. There was a semi-professional calm in all she did. Now that he was under treatment, he could be considered dispassionately as a “case.” When she turned round and saw Frances within the door, she held up her finger. “Look at him, if you wish, for a moment, poor fellow; but not a word,” she said. Frances, from the passion of anguish and wrong which had seized upon her, sank altogether into a confused hush of semi-remorseful feeling. Her mother at least was occupied with nothing that was not for his good.
“I told you that I mistrusted Markham,” she said, as they drove away. “He did not mean any harm. But that is his life. And I think I told you that I was afraid Constance—— Oh, my dear, a mother has a great many hard offices to undertake in her life—to make up for things which her children may have done—en gaieté du cœur, without thought.”
“Gaieté du cœur—is that what you call it,” cried Frances, “when you murder a man?” Her voice was choked with the passion that filled her.
“Frances! Murder! You are the last one in the world from whom I should have expected anything violent.”
“Oh,” cried the girl, flushed and wild, her eyes gleaming through an angry dew of pain, “what word is there that is violent enough? He was happy and good, and there were—there might have been—people who could have loved him, and—and made him happy. When one comes in, one who had no business there, one who—and takes him from—the others, and makes a sport of him and a toy to amuse herself, and flings him broken away. It is worse than murder—if there is anything worse than murder,” she cried.
Lady Markham could not have been more astonished if some passer-by had presented a pistol at her head. “Frances!” she cried, and took the girl’s hot hands into her own, endeavouring to soothe her; “you speak as if she meant to do it—as if she had some interest in doing it. Frances, you must be just!”
“If I were just—if I had the power to be just—is there any punishment which could be great enough? His life? But it is more than his life. It is misery and torture and wretchedness, to him first, and then to—to his mother—to——” She ended as a woman, as a poor little girl, scarcely yet woman grown, must—in an agony of tears.
All that a tender mother and that a kind woman could do—with due regard to the important business in her hands, and a glance aside to see that the coachman did not mistake Sir Joseph’s much frequented door—Lady Markham did to quench this extraordinary passion, and bring back calm to Frances. She succeeded so far, that the girl, hurriedly drying her tears, retiring with shame and confusion into herself, recovered sufficient self-command to refrain from further betrayal of her feelings. In the midst of it all, though she was not unmoved by her mother’s tenderness, she had a kind of fierce perception of Lady Markham’s anxiety about Sir Joseph’s door, and her eagerness not to lose any time in conveying her message to him, which she did rapidly in herown person, putting the footman aside, corrupting somehow by sweet words and looks the incorruptible functionary who guarded the great doctor’s door. It was all for poor Gaunt’s sake, and done with care for him, as anxious and urgent as if he had been her own son; and yet it was business too, which, had Frances been in a mood to see the humour of it, might have lighted the tension of her feelings. But she was in no mind for humour—a thing which passion has never any eyes for or cognisance of. “That is all quite right. He will meet the other doctor this afternoon; and we may be now comfortable that he is in the best hands,” Lady Markham said, with a sigh of satisfaction. She added: “I suppose, of course, his parents will not hesitate about the expense?” in a faintly inquiring tone; but did not insist on any reply. Nor could Frances have given any reply. But amid the chaos of her mind, there came a consciousness of poor Mrs Gaunt’s dismay, could she have known. She would have watched her son night and day; and there was not one of the little community at Bordighera—Mrs Durant, with all herlittle pretences; Tasie, with her airs of young-ladyhood—who would not have shared the vigil. But the two expensive nurses, with every accessory that new-fangled science could think of—this would have frightened out of their senses the two poor parents, who would not “hesitate about the expense,” or any expense that involved their son’s life. In this point, too, the different classes could not understand each other. The idea flew through the girl’s mind with a half-despairing consciousness that this, too, had something to do with the overwhelming revolution in her own circumstances. A man of her own species would have understood Constance; he would have known Markham’s reputation and ways. The pot of iron and the pot of clay could not travel together without damage to the weakest. This went vaguely through Frances’ mind in the middle of her excitement, and perhaps helped to calm her. It also stilled, if it did not calm her, to see that her mother was a little afraid of her in her new development.
Lady Markham, when she returned to the brougham after her visit to Sir Joseph, manifestly avoided the subject. She was careful not to say anything of Markham or of Constance. Her manner was anxious, deprecatory, full of conciliation. She advised Frances, with much tenderness, to go and rest a little when they got home. “I fear you have been doing too much, my darling,” she cried, and followed her to her room with some potion in a glass.
“I am quite well,” Frances said; “there is nothing the matter with me.”
“But I am sure, my dearest, that you are overdone.” Her anxious and conciliatory looks were of themselves a tonic to Frances, and brought her back to herself.
Markham, when he appeared in the evening, showed unusual feeling too. He was at the crisis, it seemed, of his own life, and perhaps other sentiments had therefore an easier hold upon him. He came in looking very downcast, with none of his usual banter in him. “Yes, I know. I have heard all about it, bless you. What else, do you think, are those fellows talking about? Poor beggar. Who ever thought he’d have gone down like that in so short a time? Now, mother, the onlything wanting is that you should say ‘I told you so.’ And Fan,—no, Fan can do worse; she can tell me that she thought he was safe in my hands.”
“It is not my way to say I told you so, Markham; but yet——”
“You could do it, mammy, if you tried—that is well known. I’m rather glad he is ill, poor beggar; it stops the business. But there are things to pay, that is the worst.”
“Surely, if it is to a gentleman, he will forgive him,” cried Frances, “when he knows——”
“Forgive him! Poor Gaunt would rather die. It would be as much as a man’s life was worth to offer to—forgive another man. But how should the child know? That’s the beauty of Society and the rules of honour, Fan. You can forgive a man many things, but not a shilling you’ve won from him. And how is he to mend, good life! with the thought of having to pay up in the end?” Markham repeated this despondent speech several times before he went gloomily away. “I had rather die straight off, and make no fuss. But even then, he’d have to pay up, or somebody forhim. If I had known what I know now, I’d have eaten him sooner than have taken him among those fellows, who have no mercy.”
“Markham, if you would listen to me, you would give them up—you too.”
“Oh, I——” he said, with his short laugh. “They can’t do much harm to me.”
“But you must change—in that as well as other things, if——”
“Ah, if,” he said, with a curious grimace; and took up his hat and went away.
Thus, Frances said to herself, his momentary penitence and her mother’s pity melted away in consideration of themselves. They could not say a dozen words on any other subject, even such an urgent one as this, before their attention dropped, and they relapsed into the former question about themselves. And such a question!—Markham’s marriage, which depended upon Nelly Winterbourn’s widowhood and the portion her rich husband left her. Markham was an English peer, the head of a family which had been known for centuries, which even had touched the history of England here andthere; yet this was the ignoble way in which he was to take the most individual step of a man’s life. Her heart was full almost to bursting of these questions, which had been gradually awakening in her mind. Lady Markham, when left alone, turned always to the consolation of her correspondence—of those letters to write which filled up all the interstices of her other occupations. Perhaps she was specially glad to take refuge in this assumed duty, having no desire to enter again with her daughter into any discussion of the events of the day. Frances withdrew into a distant corner. She took a book with her, and did her best to read it, feeling that anything was better than to allow herself to think, to summon up again the sound of that hoarse broken voice running on in the feverish current of disturbed thought. Was he still talking, talking, God help him! of death and blood and the two colours, and her ribbon, and the misery which was all play? Oh, the misery, causeless, unnecessary, to no good purpose, that had come merely from this—that Constance had put herself in Frances’ place,—that the pot of iron had thrust itself in the road of the pot of clay. But she must not think—she must not think, the girl said to herself with feverish earnestness, and tried the book again. Finding it of no avail, however, she put it down, and left her corner and came, in a moment of leisure between two letters, behind her mother’s chair. “May I ask you a question, mamma?”
“As many as you please, my dear;” but Lady Markham’s face bore a harassed look. “You know, Frances, there are some to which there is no answer—which I can only ask with an aching heart, like yourself,” she said.
“This is a very simple one. It is, Have I any money—of my own?”
Lady Markham turned round on her chair and looked at her daughter. “Money!” she said. “Are you in need of anything? Do you want money, Frances? I shall never forgive myself, if you have felt yourself neglected.”
“It is not that. I mean—have I anything of my own?”
After a little pause. “There is a—smallprovision made for you by my marriage settlement,” Lady Markham said.
“And—once more—could, oh, could I have it, mamma?”
“My dear child! you must be out of your senses. How could you have it at your age—unless you were going to marry?”
This suggestion Frances rejected with the contempt it merited. “I shall never marry,” she said; “and there never could be a time when it would be of so much importance to me to have it as now. Oh, tell me, is there no way by which I could have it now?”
“Sir Thomas is one of our trustees. Ask him. I do not think he will let you have it, Frances. But perhaps you could tell him what you want, if you will not have confidence in me. Money is just the thing that is least easy for me. I could give you almost anything else; but money I have not. What can you want money for, a girl like you?”
Frances hesitated before she replied. “I would rather not tell you,” she said; “for very likely you would not approve; but it is nothing—wrong.”
“You are very honest, my dear. I do not suppose for a moment it is anything wrong. Ask Sir Thomas,” Lady Markham said, with a smile. The smile had meaning in it, which to Frances was incomprehensible. “Sir Thomas—will refuse nothing he can in reason give—of that I am sure.”
Sir Thomas, when he came in shortly afterwards, said that he would not disturb Lady Markham. “For I see you are busy, and I have something to say to Frances.”
“Who has also something to say to you,” Lady Markham said, with a benignant smile. Her heart gave a throb of satisfaction. It was all she could do to restrain herself, not to tell the dear friend to whom she was writing that there was every prospect of amost happyestablishment for dear Frances. And her joy was quite genuine and almost innocent, notwithstanding all she knew.
“You have written to your father?” Sir Thomas said. “My dear Frances, I have got the most hopeful letter from him, the first I have had for years. He asks me if I know what state Hilborough is in—if it is habitable? That looks like coming home, don’t you think? And it is years since he has written to me before.”
Frances did not know what Hilborough was; but she disliked showing her ignorance. And this idea was not so comforting to her as Sir Thomas expected. She said: “I do not think he will come,” with downcast eyes.
But Sir Thomas was strong in his own way of thinking. He was excited and pleased by the letter. He told her again and again how he had desired this—how happy it made him to think he was about to be successful at last. “And just at the moment when all is likely to be arranged—when Markham—— You have brought me luck, Frances. Now, tell me what it was you wanted from me?”
Frances’ spirits had fallen lower and lower while his rose. Her mind ranged over the new possibilities with something like despair. It would be Constance, not she, who would have done it, if he came back—Constance, who had taken her place from her—the love that ought to have been hers—her father—and who now, on her return, would resume her place with hermother too. Ah, what would Constance do? Would she do anything for him who lay yonder in the fever, for his father and his mother, poor old people!—anything to make up for the harm she had done? Her heart burned in her agitated, troubled bosom. “It is nothing,” she said—“nothing that you would do for me. I had a great wish—but I know you would not let me do it, neither you nor my mother.”
“Tell me what it is, and we shall see.”
Frances felt her voice die away in her throat. “We went this morning to see—to see——”
“You mean poor Gaunt. It is a sad sight, and a sad story—too sad for a young creature like you to be mixed up in. Is it anything for him, that you want me to do?”
She looked at him through those hot gathering tears which interrupt the vision of women, and blind them when they most desire to see clearly. A sense of the folly of her hope, of the impossibility of making any one understand what was in her mind, overwhelmed her. “I cannot, I cannot,” she cried. “Oh, I know you are very kind. I wanted my own money,if I have any. But I know you will not give it me, nor think it right, nor understand what I want to do with it.”
“Have you so little trust in me?” said Sir Thomas. “I hope, if you told me, I could understand. I cannot give you your own money, Frances; but if it were for a good—no, I will not say that—for a sensible, for a practicable purpose, you should have some of mine.”
“Yours!” she cried, almost with indignation. “Oh no; that is not what I mean. They are nothing—nothing to you.” She paused when she had said this, and grew very pale. “I did not mean—— Sir Thomas, please do not say anything to mamma.”
He took her hand affectionately between his own. “I do not half understand,” he said; “but I will keep your secret, so far as I know it, my poor little girl.”
Lady Markham at her writing-table, with her back turned, went on with her correspondence all the time in high satisfaction and pleasure, saying to herself that it would be far better than Nelly Winterbourn’s—that it would be the finest match of the year.
Ithad seemed to Frances, as it appears naturally to all who have little experience, that a man who was so ill as Captain Gaunt must get better or get worse without any of the lingering suspense which accompanies a less violent complaint; but, naturally, Lady Markham was wiser, and entertained no such delusions. When it had gone on for a week, it already seemed to Frances as if he had been ill for a year,—as if there never had been any subject of interest in the world but the lingering course of the malady, which waxed from less to more, from days of quiet to hours of active delirium. The business-like nurses, always so cool and calm, with their professional reports, gave the foolish girl a chill to her heart, thinking, as she did, of the anxiety thatwould have filled, not the house alone in which he lay, but all the little community, had he been ill at home. Perhaps it was better for him that he was not ill at home,—that the changes in his state were watched by clear eyes, not made dim by tears or oversharp by anxiety, but which took him very calmly, as a case interesting, no doubt, but only in a scientific sense.
After a few days, Lady Markham herself wrote to his mother a very kind letter, full of detail, describing everything which she had done, and how she had taken Captain Gaunt entirely into her own hands. “I thought it better not to lose any time,” she said; “and you may assure yourself that everything has been done for him that could have been done, had you yourself been here. I have acted exactly as I should have done for my own son in the circumstances;” and she proceeded to explain the treatment, in a manner which was far too full of knowledge for poor Mrs Gaunt’s understanding, who could scarcely read the letter for tears. The best nurses, the best doctor, the most anxious care, Lady Markham’s ownpersonal supervision, so that nothing should be neglected. The two old parents held their little counsel over this letter with full hearts. It had been Mrs Gaunt’s first intention to start at once, to get to her boy as fast as express trains could carry her; but then they began to look at each other, to falter forth broken words about expense. Two nurses, the best doctor in London—and then the mother’s rapid journey, the old General left alone. How was she to do it, so anxious, so unaccustomed as she was? They decided, with many doubts and terrors, with great self-denial, and many a sick flutter of questionings as to which was best, to remain. Lady Markham had promised them news every day of their boy, and a telegram at once if there was “any change”—those awful words, that slay the very soul. Even the poor mother decided that in these circumstances it would be “self-indulgence” to go; and from henceforward, the old people lived upon the post-hours,—lived in awful anticipation of a telegram announcing a “change.” Frances was their daily correspondent. She had gone to look at him, she always said, though thenurses would not permit her to stay. He was no worse. But till another week, there could be no change. Then she would write that the critical day had passed—that there was still no change, and would not be again for a week; but that he was no worse. No worse!—this was the poor fare upon which General Gaunt and his wife lived in their little Swisspension, where it was so cheap. They gave up even their additional candle, and economised that poor little bit of expenditure; they gave up their wine; they made none of the little excursions which had been their delight. Even with all these economies, how were they to provide the expenses which were running on—the dear London lodgings, the nurses, the boundless outgoings, which it was understood they would not grudge? Grudge! No; not all the money in the world, if it could save their George. But where—where were they to get this money? Whence was it to come?
This Frances knew, but no one else. And she, too, knew that the lodgings and the nurses and the doctors were so far from being all. The poor girl spent the days much as theydid, in agonised questions and considerations. If she could but get her money, her own money, whatever it was. Later, for her own use, what would it matter? She could work, she could take care of children, it did not matter what she did: but to save him, to save them. She had learned so much, however, about life and the world in which she lived, as to know that, were her object known, it would be treated as the supremest folly. Wild ideas of Jews, of finding somebody who would lend her what she wanted, as young men do in novels, rose in her mind, and were dismissed, and returned again. But she was not a young man; she was only a girl, and knew not what to do, nor where to go. Not even the very alphabet of such knowledge was hers.
While this was going on, she was taken, all abstracted as she was, into Society—to the solemn heavinesses of dinner-parties; to dances even, in which her gravity and self-absorption were construed to mean very different things. Lady Markham had never said a word to any one of the idea which had sprung into her own mind full grown at sightof Sir Thomas holding in fatherly kindness her little girl’s hands. She had never said a word, oh, not a word. How such a wild and extraordinary rumour had got about, she could not imagine. But the ways of Society and its modes of information are inscrutable: a glance, a smile, are enough. And what so natural as this to bring a veil of gravity over even adébutantein her first season? Lucky little girl, some people said; poor little thing, some others. No wonder she was so serious; and her mother, that successful general—her mother, that triumphant match-maker, radiant, in spite, people said, of the very uncomfortable state of affairs about Markham, and the fact that, in the absence of the executor, Nelly Winterbourn knew nothing as yet as to how she was “left.”
Thus the weeks went past in great suspense for all. Markham had recovered, it need scarcely be said, from his fit of remorse; and he, perhaps, was the one to whom these uncertainties were a relief rather than an oppression. Mrs Winterbourn had retired into the country, to wait the arrival of theall—important functionary who had possession of her husband’s will, and to pass decorously the first profundity of her mourning. Naturally, Society knew everything about Nelly: how, under the infliction of Sarah Winterbourn’s society, she was quite as well as could be expected; how she was behaving herself beautifully in her retirement, seeing nobody, doing just what it was right to do. Nelly had always managed to retain the approval of Society, whatever she did. In the best circles, it was now a subject of indignant remark that Sarah Winterbourn should take it upon herself to keep watch like a dragon over the widow. For Nelly’s prevision was right, and the widow was what the men now called her, though women are not addicted to that form of nomenclature. But Sarah Winterbourn was universally condemned. Now that the poor girl had completed her time of bondage, and conducted herself so perfectly, why could not that dragon leave her alone? Markham made no remark upon the subject; but his mother, who understood him so well, believed he was glad that Sarah Winterbourn should be there, makingall visits unseemly. Lady Markham thought he was glad of the pause altogether, of the impossibility of doing anything; and to be allowed to go on without any disturbance in his usual way. She had herself made one visit to Nelly, and reported, when she came home, that notwithstanding the presence of Sarah, Nelly’s natural brightness was beginning to appear, and that soon she would be asespiègleas ever. That was Lady Markham’s view of the subject; and there was no doubt that she spoke with perfect knowledge.
It was very surprising, accordingly, to the ladies, when, some days after this, Lady Markham’s butler came up-stairs to say that Mrs Winterbourn was at the door, and had sent to inquire whether his mistress was at home and alone before coming up-stairs. “Of course I am at home,” said Lady Markham; “I am always at home to Mrs Winterbourn. But to no one else, remember, while she is here.” When the man went away with his message, Lady Markham had a moment of hesitation. “You may stay,” she said to Frances, “as you were present before and saw her in her trouble. ButI wonder what has brought her to town? She did not intend to come to town till the end of the season. She must have something to tell me. O Nelly, how are you, dear?” she cried, going forward and taking the young widow into her arms. Nelly was in crape from top to toe. As she had always done what was right, what people expected from her, she continued to do so till the end. A little rim of white was under the edge of her close black bonnet with its long veil. Her cuffs were white and hem-stitched in the old-fashioneddeepway. Nothing, in short, could be moredeepthan Nelly’s costume altogether. She was a very pattern for widows; and it was very becoming, as that dress seldom fails to be. It would have been natural to expect in Nelly’s countenance some consciousness of this, as well as perhaps a something at the corners of her mouth which should show that, as Lady Markham said, she would soon be asespiègleas ever. But there was nothing of this in her face. She seemed to have stiffened with her crape. She suffered Lady Markham’s embrace rather than returned it. She did not take any notice of Frances. She walked acrossthe room, sweeping with her long dress, with her long veil like an ensign of woe, and sat down with her back to the light. But for a minute or more she said nothing, and listened to Lady Markham’s questions without even a movement in reply.
“What is the matter, my dear? Is it something you have to tell me, or have you only got tired of the country?” Lady Markham said, with a look of alarm beginning to appear in her face.
“I am tired of the country,” said Mrs Winterbourn; “but I am also tired of everything else, so that does not matter much. Lady Markham, I have come to tell you a great piece of news. My trustee and Mr Winterbourn’s executor, who has been at the other end of the world, has come home.”
“Yes, Nelly?” Lady Markham’s look of alarm grew more and more marked. “You make me very anxious,” she cried. “I am sure something has happened that you did not foresee.”
“Oh, nothing has happened—that I ought not to have foreseen. I always wondered whySarah Winterbourn stuck to me so. The will has been opened and read, and I know how it all is now. I rushed to tell you, as you have been so kind.”
“Dear Nelly!” Lady Markham said, not knowing, in the growing perturbation of her mind, what else to say.
“Mr Winterbourn has been very liberal to me. He has left me everything he can leave away from his heir-at-law. Nothing that is entailed, of course; but there is not very much under the entail. They tell me I will be one of the richest women—a wealthy widow.”
“My dear Nelly, I am so very glad; but I am not surprised. Mr Winterbourn had a great sense of justice. He could not do less for you than that.”
“But Lady Markham, you have not heard all.” It was not like Nelly Winterbourn to speak in such measured tones. There was not the faintest sign of theespièglein her voice. Frances, roused by the astonished, alarmed look in her mother’s face, drew a little nearer almost involuntarily, notwithstanding her abstraction in anxieties of her own.
“Nelly, do you mind Frances being here?”
“Oh, I wish her to be here! It will do her good. If she is going to do—the same as I did, she ought to know.” She made a pause again—Lady Markham meanwhile growing pale with fright and panic, though she did not know what there could be to fear.
“There are some people who had begun to think that I was not so well ‘left’ as was expected,” she said; “but they were mistaken. I am very well ‘left.’ I am to have the house in Grosvenor Square, and the Knoll, and all the plate and carriages, and three parts or so of Mr Winterbourn’s fortune—so long as I remain Mr Winterbourn’s widow. He was, as you say, a just man.”
There was a pause. But for something in the air which tingled after Nelly’s voice had ceased, the listeners would scarcely have been conscious that anything more than ordinary had been said. Lady Markham said “Nelly?” in a breathless interrogative tone—alarmed by that thrill in the air, rather than by the words, which were so simple in their sound.
“Oh yes; he had a great sense of justice. Solong as I remain Mrs Winterbourn, I am to have all that. It was his, and I was his, and the property is to be kept together. Don’t you see, Lady Markham?—Sarah knew it, and I might have known, had I thought. He had a great respect for the name of Winterbourn—not much, perhaps, for anything else.” She paused a little, then added: “That’s all. I wished you to know.”
“Oh my dear,” cried Lady Markham, “is it possible—is it possible? You—debarred from marrying, debarred from everything—at your age!”
“Oh, I can do anything I please,” cried Nelly. “I can go to the bad if I please. He does not say so long as I behave myself—only so long as I remain the widow Winterbourn. I told you they would all call me so. Well, they can do it! That’s what I am to be all my life—the widow Winterbourn.”
“Nelly—O Nelly,” cried Lady Markham, throwing her arms round her visitor. “Oh, my poor child! And how can I tell—how am I to tell——?”
“You can tell everybody, if you please,” saidMrs Winterbourn, freeing herself from the clasping arms and rising up in her stiff crape. “He had a great sense of justice. He doesn’t say I’m to wear weeds all my life. I think I mean to come back to Grosvenor Square on Monday, and perhaps give a ball or two, and some dinners, to celebrate—for I have come into my fortune, don’t you see?” she said, with an unmoved face.
“Hush, dear—hush! You must not talk like that,” Lady Markham said, holding her arm.
“Why not! Justice is justice, whether for him or me. I was such a fool as to be wretched when he was dying, because—— But it appears that there was no love lost—no love and no faith lost. He did not believe in me, any more than I believed in him. I outwitted him when he was living, and he outwits me when he is dead. Do you hear, Frances?—that is how things go. If you do as I did, as I hear you are going to do—— Oh, do it if you please; I will never interfere. But make up your mind to this—he will have his revenge on you—or justice; it is all the same thing.Good-bye, Lady Markham. I hope you will countenance me at my first ball—for now I have come into my fortune, I mean to enjoy myself. Don’t you think these things are rather becoming? I mean to wear them out. They will make a sensation at my parties,” she said, and for the first time laughed aloud.
“This is just the first wounded feeling,” said Lady Markham. “O Nelly, you must not fly in the face of Society. You have always been so good. No, no; let us think it over. Perhaps we can find a way out of it. There is bound to be a flaw somewhere.”
“Good-bye,” said Nelly. “I have not fixed on the day for my first At Home; but the invitations will be out directly. Good-bye, Frances. You must come—and Sir Thomas. It will be a fine lesson for Sir Thomas.” She walked across the room to the door, and there stood for a moment, looking back. She looked taller, almost grand in still fury and despair with her immovable face. But as she stood there, a faint softening came to the marble. “Tell Geoff—gently,” she said, and went away. They could hear the soft sweep of her blackrobes retiring down the stair, and then the door opening, the clang of the carriage.
Lady Markham had dropped into a chair in her dismay, and sat with her hands clasped and her eyes wide open, listening to these sounds, as if they might throw some light on the situation. The consequences which might follow from Nelly’s freedom had been heavy on her heart; and it was possible that by-and-by this strange news might bring the usual comfort; but in the meantime, consternation overwhelmed her. “As long as she remains his widow!” she said to herself in a tone of horror, as the tension of her nerves yielded and the carriage drove away. “And how am I to tell him—gently; how am I to tell him gently?” she cried. It was as if a great catastrophe had overwhelmed the house.
In an hour or so, however, Lady Markham recovered her energy, and began to think whether there might be any way out of it. “I’ll tell you,” she cried suddenly; “there is your uncle Clarendon, Frances. He is a great lawyer. If any man can find a flaw in the will, he will do it.” She rang the bell at once, andordered the carriage. “But, oh dear,” she said, “I forgot. Lady Meliora is coming about Trotter’s Buildings, the place in Whitechapel. I cannot go. Whatever may happen, I cannot go to-day. But, my dear, you have never taken any part as yet; you need not stay for this meeting: and besides, you are a favourite in Portland Place; you are the best person to go. You can tell your uncle Clarendon—— Stop; I will write a note,” Lady Markham cried. That was always the most satisfactory plan in every case. She sent her daughter to get ready to go out; and she herself dashed off in two minutes four sheets of the clearest statement, aprécisof the whole case. Mr Clarendon, like most people, liked Lady Markham,—he did not share his wife’s prejudices; and Frances was a favourite. Surely, moved by these two influences combined, he would bestir himself and find a flaw in the will!
In less than half an hour from the time of Mrs Winterbourn’s departure, Frances found herself alone in the brougham, going towards Portland Place. Her mind was not absorbed in Nelly Winterbourn. She was not oldenough, or sufficiently used to the ways of Society, to appreciate the tragedy in this case. Nelly’s horror at the moment of her husband’s death she had understood; but Nelly’s tragic solemnity now struck her as with a jarring note. Indeed, Frances had never learned to think of money as she ought. And yet, how anxious she was about money! How her thoughts returned, as soon as she felt herself alone and free to pursue them, to the question which devoured her heart. It was a relief to her to be thus free, thus alone and silent, that she might think of it. If she could but have driven on and on for a hundred miles or so, to think of it, to find a solution for her problem! But even a single mile was something; for before she had got through the long line of Piccadilly, a sudden inspiration came to her mind. The one person in the world whom she could ask for help was the person whom she was on her way to see—her aunt Clarendon, who was rich, with whom she was a favourite; who was on the other side, ready to sympathise with all that belonged to the life of Bordighera, in opposition to Eaton Square. Nelly Winterbourn and her troubles fled like shadows from Frances’ mind. To be truly disinterested, to be always mindful of other people’s interests, it is well to have as few as possible of one’s own.
Mrs Clarendon received her, as always, with a sort of combative tenderness, as if in competition for her favour with some powerful adversary unseen. There was in her a constant readiness to outbid that adversary, to offer more than she did, of which Frances was usually uncomfortably conscious, but which to-day stimulated her like a cordial. “I suppose you are being taken to all sorts of places?” she said. “I wish I had not given up Society so much; but when the season is over, and the fine people are all in the country, then you will see that we have not forgotten you. Has Sir Thomas come with you, Frances? I supposed, perhaps, you had come to tell me——”
“Sir Thomas?” Frances said, with much surprise; but she was too much occupied with concerns more interesting to ask what her aunt could mean. “Oh, aunt Caroline,” she said, “I have come to speak to you of something Iam very, very much interested about.” In all sincerity, she had forgotten the original scope of her mission, and only remembered her own anxiety. And then she told her story—how Captain Gaunt, the son of her old friend, the youngest, the one that was best beloved, had come to town—how he had made friends who were not—nice—who made him play and lose money—though he had no money.
“Of course, my dear, I know—Lord Markham and his set.”
At this Frances coloured high. “It was not Markham. Markham has found out for me. It was some—fellows who had no mercy, he said.”
“Oh yes; they are all the same set. I am very sorry that an innocent girl like you should be in any way mixed up with such people. Whether Lord Markham plucks the pigeon himself, or gets some of his friends to do it——”
“Aunt Caroline, now you take away my last hope; for Markham is my brother; and I will never, never ask any one to help me who speaks so of my brother—he is always so kind, so kind to me.”
“I don’t see what opportunity he has ever had to be kind to you,” said Mrs Clarendon.
But Frances in her disappointment would not listen. She turned away her head, to get rid, so far as was possible, of the blinding tears—those tears which would come in spite of her, notwithstanding all the efforts she could make. “I had a little hope in you,” Frances said; “but now I have none, none. My mother sees him every day; if he lives, she will have saved his life. But I cannot ask her for what I want. I cannot ask her for more—she has done so much. And now, you make it impossible for me to ask you!”
If Frances had studied how to move her aunt best, she could not have hit upon a more effectual way. “My dear child,” cried Mrs Clarendon, hurrying to her, drawing her into her arms, “what is it, what is it that moves you so much? Of whom are you speaking? His life? Whose life is in danger? And what is it you want? If you think I, your father’s only sister, will do less for you than Lady Markham does——! Tell me, my dear, tell me what is it you want?”
Then Frances continued her story. How young Gaunt was ill of a brain-fever, and raved about his losses, and the black and red, and of his mother in mourning (with an additional ache in her heart, Frances suppressed all mention of Constance), and howsheunderstood, though nobody else did, that the Gaunts were not rich, that even the illness itself would tax all their resources, and that the money, the debts to pay, would ruin them, and break their hearts. “I don’t say he has not been wrong, aunt Caroline—oh, I suppose he has been very wrong!—but there he is lying: and oh, how pitiful it is to hear him! and the old General, who was so proud of him; and Mrs Gaunt, dear Mrs Gaunt, who always was so good to me!”
“Frances, my child, I am not a hard-hearted woman, though you seem to think so,—I can understand all that. I am very, very sorry for the poor mother; and for the young man even, who has been led astray: but I don’t see what you can do.”
“What!” cried Frances, her eyes flashing through her tears—“for their son, who is thesame as a brother—for them, whom I have always known, who have helped to bring me up? Oh, you don’t know how people live where there are only a few of them,—where there is no society, if you say that. If he had been ill there, at home, we should all have nursed him, every one. We should have thought of nothing else. We would have cooked for him, or gone errands, or done anything. Perhaps those ladies are better who go to the hospitals. But to tell me that you don’t know what I could do! Oh,” cried the girl, springing to her feet, throwing up her hands, “if I had the money, if I had only the money, I know what I would do!”
Mrs Clarendon was a woman who did not spend money, who had everything she wanted, who thought little of what wealth could procure; but she was a Quixote in her heart, as so many women are where great things are in question, though not in small. “Money?” she said, with a faint quiver of alarm in her voice. “My dear, if it was anything that was feasible, anything that was right, and you wanted it very much—the money might be found,” she said. The position, however, wastoo strange to be mastered in a moment, and difficulties rose as she spoke. “A young man. People might suppose—— And then Sir Thomas—what would Sir Thomas think?”
“That is why I came to you; for he will not give me my own money—if I have any money. Aunt Caroline, if you will give it me now, I will pay you back as soon as I am of age. Oh, I don’t want to take it from you—I want—— If everything could be paid before he is better, before he knows—if we could hide it, so that the General and his mother should never find out. That would be worst of all, if they were to find out—it would break their hearts. Oh, aunt Caroline, she thinks there is no one like him. She loves him so; more than—more than any one here loves anybody: and to find out all that would break her heart.”
Mrs Clarendon rose at this moment, and stood up with her face turned towards the door. “I can’t tell what is the matter with me,” she said; “I can scarcely hear what you are saying. I wonder if I am going to be ill, or what it is. I thought just then I heard a voice. Surely there issome one at the door. I am sure I heard a voice—— Oh, a voice you ought to know, if it was true. Frances—I will think of all that after—just now—— He must be dead, or else he is here!”
Frances, who thought of no possibility of death save to one, caught her aunt’s arm with a cry. The great house was very still—soft carpets everywhere—the distant sound of a closing door scarcely penetrating from below. Yet there was something, that faint human stir which is more subtle than sound. They stood and waited, the elder woman penetrated by sudden excitement and alarm, she could not tell why; the girl indifferent, yet ready for any wonder in the susceptibility of her anxious state. As they stood, not knowing what they expected, the door opened slowly, and there suddenly stood in the opening, like two people in a dream—Constance, smiling, drawing after her a taller figure. Frances, with a start of amazement, threw from her her aunt’s arm, which she held, and calling “Father!” flung herself into Waring’s arms.
“Ifoundhim in the mood; so I thought it best to strike while the iron was hot,” Constance said. She had settled down languidly in a favourite corner, as if she had never been away. She had looked for the footstool where she knew it was to be found, and arranged the cushion as she liked it. Frances had never made herself so much at home as Constance did at once. She looked on with calm amusement while her aunt poured out her delight, her wonder, her satisfaction, in Waring’s ears. She did not budge herself from her comfortable place; but she said to Frances in an undertone: “Don’t let her go on too long. She will bore him, you know; and then he will repent. And I don’t want him to repent.”
As for Frances, she saw the ground cut awayentirely from under her feet, and stood sick and giddy after the first pleasure of seeing her father was over, feeling her hopes all tumble about her. Mrs Clarendon, who had been so near yielding, so much disposed to give her the help she wanted, had forgotten her petition and her altogether in the unexpected delight of seeing her brother. And here was Constance, the sight of whom perhaps might call the sick man out of his fever, who might restore life and everything, even happiness to him, if she would. But would she? Frances asked herself. Most likely, she would do nothing, and there would be no longer any room left for Frances, who was ready to do all. She would have been more than mortal if she had not looked with a certain bitterness at this new and wonderful aspect of affairs.
“I saw mamma’s brougham at the door,” Constance said; “you must take me home. Of course, this was the place for papa to come; but I must go home. It would never do to let mamma think me devoid of feeling. How is she, and Markham—and everybody? I have scarcely had any news for three months. Wemet Algy Muncastle on the boat, and he told us some things—a great deal about Nelly Winterbourn—the widow, as they call her—and about you.”
“There could be nothing to say of me.”
“Oh, but there was, though. What a sly little thing you are, never to say a word! Sir Thomas.—Ah, you see I know. And I congratulate you with all my heart, Fan. He is rolling in money, and such a good kind old man. Why, he was a lover of mamma’sdans les temps. It is delightful to think of you consoling him. And you will be as rich as a little princess, with mamma to see that all the settlements are right.”
“I don’t know what you mean,” Frances said abruptly. She was so preoccupied and so impatient, that she would not even allow herself to inquire. She went to where her father sat talking to his sister, and stood behind his chair, putting her hand upon his arm. He did not perhaps care for her very much. He had aunt Caroline to think of, from whom he had been separated so long; and Constance, no doubt, had made him her own too, as she had madeeverybody else her own; but still he was all that Frances had, the nearest, the one that belonged to her most. To touch him like this gave her a little consolation. And he turned round and smiled at her, and put his hand upon hers. That was a little comfort too; but it did not last long. It was time she should return to her mother; and Constance was anxious to go, notwithstanding her fear that her father might be bored. “I must go and see my mother, you know, papa. It would be very disrespectful not to go. And you won’t want me, now you have got aunt Caroline. Frances is going to drive me home.” She said this as if it was her sister’s desire to go; but as a matter of fact, she had taken the command at once. Frances, reluctant beyond measure to return to the house, in which she felt she would no longer be wanted—which was a perverse imagination, born of her unhappiness—wretched to lose the prospect of help, which she had been beginning to let herself believe in, was yet too shy and too miserable to make any resistance. She remembered her mother’s note for Mr Clarendon before she went away, and she made one lastappeal to her aunt. “You will not forget what we were talking about, aunt Caroline?”
“Dear me,” said Mrs Clarendon, putting up her hand to her head. “What was it, Frances? I have such a poor memory; and your father’s coming, and all this unexpected happiness, have driven everything else away.”
Frances went down-stairs with a heart so heavy that it seemed to lie dead in her breast. Was there no help for her, then? no help for him, the victim of Constance and of Markham? no way of softening calamity to the old people? Her temper rose as her hopes fell. All so rich, so abounding, but no one who would spare anything out of his superfluity, to help the ruined and heartbroken. Oh yes, she said to herself in not unnatural bitterness, the hospitals, yes; and Trotter’s Buildings in Whitechapel. But for the people to whom they were bound so much more closely, the man who had sat at their tables, whom they had received and made miserable, nothing! oh, nothing! not a finger held out to save him. The little countenance that had been like a summer day, so innocent and fresh and candid, was clouded over. Prideprevented—pride, more effectual than any other defence—the outburst which in other circumstances would have relieved her heart. She sat in her corner, withdrawn as far as possible from Constance, listening dully, making little response. After several questions, her sister turned upon her with a surprise which was natural too.
“What is the matter?” she said. “You don’t talk as you used to do. Is it town that has spoiled you? Do you think I will interfere with you? Oh, you need not be at all afraid. I have enough of my own without meddling with you.”
“I don’t know what I have that you could interfere with,” said Frances. “Nothing here.”
“Do you want to quarrel with me?” Constance said.
“It is of no use to quarrel; there is nothing to quarrel about. I might have thought you would interfere when you came first to Bordighera. I had people then who seemed to belong to me. But here—you have the first place. Why should I quarrel? You are only coming back to your own.”
“Fan, for goodness’ sake, don’t speak in that dreadful tone. What have I done? If you think papa likes me best, you are mistaken. And as for the mother, don’t you know her yet? Don’t you know that she is nice to everybody, and cares neither for you nor me?”
“No,” cried Frances, raising herself bolt upright; “I don’t know that! How dare you say it, you who are her child? Perhaps you think no one cares—not one, though you have made an end of my home. Did you hear about George Gaunt, what you have done to him? He is lying in a brain-fever, raving, raving, talking for ever, day and night; and if he dies, Markham and you will have killed him—you and Markham; but you have been the worst. It will be murder, and you should be killed for it!” the girl cried. Her eyes blazed upon her sister in the close inclosure of the little brougham. “You thought he did not care, either, perhaps.”
“Fan! Good heavens! I think you must be going out of your senses,” Constance cried.
Frances was not able to say any more. She was stifled by the commotion of her feelings,her heart beating so wildly in her breast, her emotion reaching the intolerable. The brougham stopped, and she sprang out and ran into the house, hurrying up-stairs to her own room. Constance, more surprised and disconcerted than she could have believed possible, nevertheless came in with an air of great composure, saying a word in passing to the astonished servant at the door. She was quite amiable always to the people about her. She walked up-stairs, remarking, as she passed, a pair of new vases with palms in them, which decorated the staircase, and which she approved. She opened the drawing-room door in her pretty, languid-stately, always leisurely way.
“How are you, mamma? Frances has run up-stairs; but here am I, just come back,” she said.
Lady Markham rose from her seat with a little scream of astonishment. “Constance!It is not possible. Who would have dreamed of seeing you!” she cried.
“Oh yes, it is quite possible,” said Constance, when they had kissed, with a prolonged encounter of lips and cheeks. “Surely, you did not think I could keep very long away?”
“My darling, did you get home-sick, or mammy-sick as Markham says, after all your philosophy?”
“I am so glad to see you, mamma, and looking so well. No, not home-sick, precisely, dear mother, but penetrated with the folly of stayingthere, where nothing was ever doing, when I might have been in the centre of everything: which is saying much the same thing, though in different words.”
“In very different words,” said Lady Markham, resuming her seat with a smile. “I see you have not changed at all, Con. Will you have any tea? And did you leave—your home there—with as little ceremony as you left me!”
“May I help myself, mamma? don’t you trouble. It is very nice to see your pretty china, instead of Frances’ old bizarre cups, which were much too good for me. Oh, I did not leave my—home. I—brought it back with me.”
“You brought——?”
“My father with me, mamma.”
“Oh!” Lady Markham said. She was too much astonished to say more.
“Perhaps it was because he got very tired of me, and thought there was no other way of getting rid of me; perhaps because he was tired of it himself. He came at last like a lamb. I did not really believe it till we were on the boat, and Algy Muncastle turned up, and I introduced him to my father. You should have seen how he stared.”
“Oh!” said Lady Markham again; and then she added faintly: “Is—is he here?”
“You mean papa? I left him at aunt Caroline’s. In the circumstances, that seemed the best thing to do.”
Lady Markham leaned back in her chair; she had become very pale. One shock after another had reduced her strength. She closed her eyes while Constance very comfortably sipped her tea. It was not possible that she could have dreamed it or imagined it, when, on opening her eyes again, she saw Constance sitting by the tea-table with a plate of bread and butter before her. “I have really,” she explained seriously, “eaten nothing to-day.”
Frances came down some time after, having bathed her eyes and smoothed her hair. It wasalways smooth like satin, shining in the light. She came in, in her unobtrusive way, ashamed of herself for her outburst of temper, and determined to be “good,” whatever might happen. She was surprised that there was no conversation going on. Constance sat in a chair which Frances at once recognised as having been hers from the beginning of time, wondering at her own audacity in having sat in it, when she did not know. Lady Markham was still leaning back in her chair. “Oh, it’s nothing—only a little giddiness. So many strange things are happening. Did you give your uncle Clarendon my note? I suppose Frances told you, Con, how we have been upset to-day?”
“Upset?” said Constance over her bread and butter. “I should have thought you would have been immensely pleased. It is about Sir Thomas, I suppose?”
“About Sir Thomas! Is there any news about Sir Thomas?” said Lady Markham, with an elaborately innocent look. “If so, it has not yet been confided to me.” And then she proceeded to tell to her daughter the story of Nelly Winterbourn.
“I should have thought that would all have been set right in the settlements,” Constance said.
“So it ought. But she had no one to see to the settlements—no one with a real interest in her; and it was such a magnificent match.”
“No better than Sir Thomas, mamma.”
“Ah, Sir Thomas. Is there really a story about Sir Thomas? I can only say, if it is so, that he has never confided it to me.”
“I hope no mistake will be made about the settlements in that case. And what do you suppose Markham will do?”
“What can he do? He will do nothing, Con. You know, after all, that is therôlethat suits him best. Even if all had been well, unless Nelly had asked him herself——”
“Do you think she would have minded, after all this time? But I suppose there’s an end of Nelly now,” Constance said, regretfully.
“I am afraid so,” Lady Markham replied. And then recovering, she began to tell her daughter the news—all the news of this one and the other, which Frances had never been able to understand, which Constance enteredinto as one to the manner born. They left the subject of Nelly Winterbourn, and not a word was said of young Gaunt and his fever; but apart from these subjects, everything that had happened since Constance left England was discussed between them. They talked and smiled and rippled over into laughter, and passed in review the thousand friends whose little follies and freaks both knew, and skimmed across the surface of tragedies with a consciousness, that gave piquancy to the amusement, of the terrible depths beneath. Frances, keeping behind, not willing to show her troubled countenance, from which the traces of tears were not easily effaced, listened to this light talk with a wonder which almost reached the height of awe. Her mother at least must have many grave matters in her mind; and even on Constance, the consciousness of having stirred up all the quiescent evils in the family history, of her father in England, of the meeting which must take place between the husband and wife so long parted, all by her influence, must have a certain weight. But there they sat and talked and laughed, and shot their little shafts of wit.Frances, at last feeling her heart ache too much for further repression, and that the pleasant interchange between her mother and sister exasperated instead of lightened her burdened soul, left them, and sought refuge in her room, where presently she heard their voices again as they came up-stairs to dress. Constance’s boxes had in the meantime arrived from the railway, and the conversation was very animated upon fashions and new adaptations and what to wear. Then the door of Constance’s room was closed, and Lady Markham came tapping at that of Frances. She took the girl into her arms. “Now,” she said, “my dream is going to be realised, and I shall have my two girls, one on each side of me. My little Frances, are you not glad?”
“Mother——” the girl said, faltering, and stopped, not able to say any more.
Lady Markham kissed her tenderly, and smiled, as if she were content. Was she content? Was the happiness, now she had it, as great as she said? Was she able to be light-hearted with all these complications round her? But to these questions who could give anyanswer? Presently she went to dress, shutting the door; and, between her two girls, retired so many hundred, so many thousand miles away—who could tell?—into herself.