“I am glad you think so,” said Agnes, with flushing cheeks. “I wonder whether he will ever be an Academician?”
“Would you feel more sure of his gifts—in that case?”
There was a slight note of sarcasm in the question.
“It is stupid of me, I know,” said Agnes frankly, “but one can't help feeling rather shy until one's opinions are officially endorsed.”
“How British!”
“I suppose it is my bringing-up. It sounds very feeble. I often feel that if I once began—really began—to think for myself I wouldn't stick at anything.”
“That is British, too,” said Sara, laughing. “You are a trueJaneBull! But as you are going to marry a public man, that is as well. Your life will have many absorbing interests.”
“Oh yes,” returned Agnes; “I hope to help Beauclerk in his constituency, and with the members of his Association.”
“So far as I can make out they are a weak, selfish lot, but these qualities do not affect the question of his duties toward them.”
“You express, better than I could, my own feeling. I fear they don't always appreciate his motives.”
“Beauclerk,” said Sara slowly, “is impulsive. He is never afraid of changing his mind. Many peopleare called firm merely because they haven't the moral courage to own their second thoughts.”
Agnes drew a long sigh, slackened her pace, and stood looking at the strange, autumnal lights in the sky, the martins flying over the paddocks toward the wood, and the crescent moon which already shone out above them.
“I suppose it does mean lack of courage, half the time,” she said at last; “and yet how disastrous it is to wonder about the wisdom of any decision once arrived at, of any step once taken! I daresay every one shrinks a little at first from the responsibility of undertaking another person's happiness.”
“Not every one,” replied Sara; “the generous ones only.”
“You have known Beauclerk ever since he was a boy, haven't you?” asked Agnes.
“Yes. He was such a handsome lad, and he has always been the same.”
“I am devoted to him,” said Agnes. “I am proud to think that he has chosen me for his wife. But one thought is perpetually coming up in my mind: Shall I be able to make him happy? A girl, as a rule, seems to believe that she can make a man happy merely by loving him. Again and again friends of mine have married in this idea. And the hope seldom answers.”
She spoke very quietly, yet there was great feeling, even great bitterness in her tone. She was thinkingof David Rennes. Sara had a curious magnetism which attracted all those with whom she came into friendly relations. Being imaginative, though never inquisitive, her quick sympathies rendered the most trivial interchange of ideas an emotional exercise. This power, which would have made her a successful actress, found its usual outlet in her pianoforte playing, which affected her hearers as only extraordinary nervous and passionate force can affect people. She had neither the patience nor the sternness of mental quality which is required in a creative genius: the little songs and poems which she sometimes composed were insipid to an astonishing degree. Hers were the executant's gifts, and the fascination which she exerted over men and women depended wholly on the natural charm of a temperament made up of fire and honey. Agnes had always regarded Lady Sara as an odd but chivalrous girl. The stories told in society about her eccentric tastes, sayings, and doings were never to her heart's discredit, no matter how much they puzzled, or dismayed, the conventional set into which she had been born. It was felt that she could be trusted, and, although many were afraid of her brains, no one had ever known her to betray a confidence, to injure another woman's reputation, to show the least spite, or to insist upon an undue share of men's attention. The sex may, and do, pardon the first three sins, but the last has yet to find its atoning virtue. All declaredthat Sara, with many shortcomings, was neither a poacher nor a grabber. Girls consulted her in their love troubles, and not a few owed their marriages to her wise arbitration. She had the gypsy's spell. Thus it happened, therefore, that Agnes, who was habitually reserved, found herself thinking aloud in the presence of this mysterious but not hostile personality.
“When does Beauclerk return from the North of France?” asked Sara.
“He is coming back with Mr. Orange next Wednesday. I had a letter this morning.” Her voice grew husky, and with evident agitation she halted once more.
“You know Beauclerk so well,” she said at last, “that I want to ask you something, and you must answer me truly—without the least dread of giving offence—because a great deal may depend on what you tell me. Do you think he seems altogether settled in his mind?”
Sara guessed, from the nature of the question, that the truth in this case would be a relief—not a blow.
“He doesn't seem quite himself—if you understand me,” she said, without hesitation.
Agnes caught her arm a little more closely and walked with a lighter step.
“I don't think we love each other sufficiently for marriage,” she exclaimed; “his last letter was soaffectionate and so full of kindness that it brought tears to my eyes. I saw the effort under it all. We are making a tragic mistake. We drifted into it. We were such good friends, and we felt, I daresay, that it was our duty to love each other. His family were pleased and so were mine. We seem to have pleased everybody except ourselves. Not that I ever expected the joy and stuff, and inward feelings which one reads of. I am too sensible for that. But I wanted to feelestablished—whereas we are both, in reality, rather upset. I am sure of this.”
“Perhaps when you see each other——“
“Our letters are far more satisfactory than our meetings. I know he is fond of me.”
“You couldn't doubt that. It is worship.”
“I can say, at any rate, that I am so sure of his affection that it gives me no pain—not the least—to miss the—the other quality.”
“My dear, you are not in love with him, or you couldn't be so resigned.”
“I suppose you are right. I have never told him that I loved him. He has never asked me. Perhaps he took it for granted. As for me, I thought that the respect and esteem I felt would do.”
Sara shook her head.
“Not for us. We are different, I know, but we have hearts. We can suffer, we can endure, we can be resigned, we can be everything except uncertain, or luke-warm. Isn't that true?”
“Yes,” said Agnes, and she laughed a little. “It isn't my way,” she went on, “to talk like this about myself. Yet I can't help seeing that all this keeping silence, and disguising facts from one's own reason, is actually weak. I don't want to be weak. It isn't English. I don't want to be supine. That isn't English either. I want to be just and square all round—in my dealings with others and in my dealings with my own conscience. Papa has always taught us a great deal about individual liberty, and freedom of will. I am beginning to wonder what liberty means.”
“That's the first step toward a great change.”
The young girl set her lips, and looked steadfastly before her, as though she would pierce the gathering twilight with her bright and candid eyes.
“I daresay you are right. Anyhow, our talk has been a help. When I may seem to lack courage, it is because I lack conviction. Once convinced, I can depend upon myself.”
“When did these ideas come to you?” asked Sara.
“They have been coming for some time. I have been abroad a good deal, and I have been meeting people who make opinions. I never gave in when I was with them, but I must have been influenced.”
The slight emphasis on the wordspeopleandthemwas too studied to escape Sara's trained hearing. She knew the force of a woman's rhetorical plural.
“I believe you have your convictions now, at this moment,” she said quietly.
“No—not in the final shape.”
“But you can predict the final shape?”
“One more day and then I will decide irrevocably.”
“Why do you hesitate?”
“For this reason—I must grieve papa and disappoint my mother.”
“Still, both these things have to be done. Some of the best men have been obliged to displease their parents in choosing a vocation. Women, in their marriages, are often driven to the same sad straits.”
“I know, but the prospect is most painful. I feel I could bear my own disappointment far better than I could bear theirs. Surely you understand?”
“Too well.”
They had now reached the house, and Agnes's habitual manner at once re-asserted itself. Her voice, which had many rich notes, fell into the one unchanging tone she used in ordinary conversation. Her countenance seemed as placid as a pink geranium under glass.
“Thank you for a very pleasant walk,” she said to Sara. “I sha'n't forget it.”
“Nor I. And, please, after this, always call me Sara. And may I call you Agnes? We have just time now to write a few letters before dinner.”
Robert, accompanied by Lord Reckage, arrived in London the following Wednesday. Pensée and Brigit went from St. Malo to Paris, where the unhappy girl hoped to enter the Conservatoire. All had been arranged by Robert himself, and he had shown a calmness during the ordeal which might have deceived his two friends had they been even a little insincere themselves or a shade less fond. His Journal at that period contains two entries, however, which show that neither Lady Fitz Rewes nor Reckage were wrong in fearing he had received a mortal blow which no earthly influence could make endurable.
Oct., 1869.—I am once more at Almouth House. Beauclerk's consideration for me is almost more than I can bear. The rest is not borne. If it were not cowardly, I would go away alone, and brood at my leisure and yield to the appalling yet all but irresistible wretchedness which calls me, which I actually crave. An effort not to depress or discourage others may be right and my duty. I cannot be sure of this. Sometimes I feel as though it would be wiser to meet the dark hours and make acquaintance with them.... And what is to become of her? The longing to see her—even in the distance....To-night I talked with Reckage about his Bond of Association. Most of the members feel toward him that insipid kind of hatred which passes for friendship in public life. If he were naturally observant, he would see this; if he were given at all to self-doubt, he would feel it. But his way is to regard most men as ill-mannered and well-meaning.Tuesday.—Another day. I begin to see that I have been called to make every sacrifice—marriage, ambition, happiness, all must be abandoned: abandoned while I live, not after I have made myself, by years of self-discipline, indifferent to such considerations.... But for its piety, theImitationis, I think, the most pessimistic book in the world. TheExercisesof St. Ignatius (perhaps because he was a saint) produce quite an opposite effect upon me; they exhort us to hope, action, courage. They make one a citizen of both worlds. Merely to read him is a campaign in the open air against a worthy foe. I defy any man to go through theExerciseswith his whole heart, and even whine again. I have resolved to write willingly no more, to speak willingly no more, on the subject of my marriage. That page is turned for ever: there shall be no glancing back. Moods inevitably must come; spasms of despair are as little tractable as spasms of physical pain. But I can at least keep silent about their true cause. The first step toward the cure of egoism is to lock away one's Journal. I shall add no more to this till I have mastered my present state. And I wonder what that mastery will mean? Are some victories better lost?
Oct., 1869.—I am once more at Almouth House. Beauclerk's consideration for me is almost more than I can bear. The rest is not borne. If it were not cowardly, I would go away alone, and brood at my leisure and yield to the appalling yet all but irresistible wretchedness which calls me, which I actually crave. An effort not to depress or discourage others may be right and my duty. I cannot be sure of this. Sometimes I feel as though it would be wiser to meet the dark hours and make acquaintance with them.... And what is to become of her? The longing to see her—even in the distance....
To-night I talked with Reckage about his Bond of Association. Most of the members feel toward him that insipid kind of hatred which passes for friendship in public life. If he were naturally observant, he would see this; if he were given at all to self-doubt, he would feel it. But his way is to regard most men as ill-mannered and well-meaning.
Tuesday.—Another day. I begin to see that I have been called to make every sacrifice—marriage, ambition, happiness, all must be abandoned: abandoned while I live, not after I have made myself, by years of self-discipline, indifferent to such considerations.... But for its piety, theImitationis, I think, the most pessimistic book in the world. TheExercisesof St. Ignatius (perhaps because he was a saint) produce quite an opposite effect upon me; they exhort us to hope, action, courage. They make one a citizen of both worlds. Merely to read him is a campaign in the open air against a worthy foe. I defy any man to go through theExerciseswith his whole heart, and even whine again. I have resolved to write willingly no more, to speak willingly no more, on the subject of my marriage. That page is turned for ever: there shall be no glancing back. Moods inevitably must come; spasms of despair are as little tractable as spasms of physical pain. But I can at least keep silent about their true cause. The first step toward the cure of egoism is to lock away one's Journal. I shall add no more to this till I have mastered my present state. And I wonder what that mastery will mean? Are some victories better lost?
The Journal ends abruptly at this point, and no more was added that year. His letter to Lord Wight has been preserved because his lordship sent it toPensée in some anger, begging her to explain such callousness. Pensée, being a woman, brought a gentler understanding to the inquiry.
“Don't you see,” she said, “that his heart is broken?”
“I see,” returned his lordship drily, “he is a born R. C. ecclesiastic. Religious instinct is the ruling passion of Orange. That poor young woman—with whom he is madly in love—was merely an accident of his career. She has affected his character—yes. I suppose Cardinal Manning's wife had her influence in her day. But Robert will work better than ever after this. Whereas look at me, my dear. When I lost Sybil, I was completely done for. I tried to set up for myself, but I couldn't. I hope I am a Christian; God forbid that I should quarrel with His will. Yet I cannot think I am a better man for my poor darling's death. Don't talk to me. Don't say anything.”
The letter in question ran as follows:—
Almouth House.My dear Lord Wight,—The messages which you have sent by Lady Fitz Rewes have helped me where I most needed assistance. When I tell you this, it would be more possible for you to imagine my gratitude than for me to express it—at least, in words, and for that matter I can't see how any act of mine could prove even a fraction of it. Shall I resume my work on the 28th? I have had to learn that one does not always choose one's vocation. It is sometimes chosen for us. May I beg you, as one more favour, never to talk to me aboutthe events of the last fortnight? In one sense I am able—too able—to discuss them. This is why I must not indulge myself. In times to come I may find it, perhaps, a certain effort to speak of it all. Then I will tell you gladly anything your kindness may seek to know. But just now it is my duty to keep silent. One cannot fight the wild beasts, and describe them fairly, at the same hour. Either they seem more formidable than they are, or they are even more terrible than they seem. But the order has gone forth—“Face them.”Your affectionate and grateful,RobertdeH. Orange.
Almouth House.
My dear Lord Wight,—
The messages which you have sent by Lady Fitz Rewes have helped me where I most needed assistance. When I tell you this, it would be more possible for you to imagine my gratitude than for me to express it—at least, in words, and for that matter I can't see how any act of mine could prove even a fraction of it. Shall I resume my work on the 28th? I have had to learn that one does not always choose one's vocation. It is sometimes chosen for us. May I beg you, as one more favour, never to talk to me aboutthe events of the last fortnight? In one sense I am able—too able—to discuss them. This is why I must not indulge myself. In times to come I may find it, perhaps, a certain effort to speak of it all. Then I will tell you gladly anything your kindness may seek to know. But just now it is my duty to keep silent. One cannot fight the wild beasts, and describe them fairly, at the same hour. Either they seem more formidable than they are, or they are even more terrible than they seem. But the order has gone forth—“Face them.”
Your affectionate and grateful,
RobertdeH. Orange.
Robert himself, after he had written this final letter, decided to reply in person to a note which he had received that morning from Lady Sara. He walked to St. James's Square wondering, without much interest, whether Fate would have her absent or at home. As a matter of fact, she had felt a presentiment of his call, and he found her, beautifully dressed in violet tints, copying some Mass music in the drawing-room.
“I hoped you would come,” she said, when the servant had closed the door. “Nothing else could have shown me that you didn't mind my writing. I had to write. I wrote badly, but indeed I understood. It takes an eternity to sound the infinite. We won't talk of you: we can talk about other people. Ask me what I have been doing.”
All this time she held his hand, but in such sisterly, kind fashion, that he felt more at ease with her than it was ever possible to be with Pensée, who was timid, and therefore disturbing.
“Have you accepted Marshire?” he asked at once.
“No,” she said, blushing; “I do not love him sufficiently to marry him.”
“How is this?”
“You know that I always fly from important mediocrities. You think that sounds heartless. He has been so kind to me. But I love as I must—not as I ought. My dear friend, all the trouble in life is due to forced affection. Look at Beauclerk! Think of Agnes Carillon! What fiery fierceness of sorrow in both their hearts! Papa and I were at Lady Churleigh's last Sunday. Agnes was there, looking, believe me, lovely. No portrait does her justice. One finds marvellous beauty, now and again, in the middle classes. She is an exquisitebourgeoise. She is not clever enough to feel bored; she is too well brought up to be fascinating; too handsome to insist on homage. Plain women are exacting and capricious—they make themselvesworth while.Il faut se faire valoir!That is why a man will often adore an ugly woman for ever, whereas an Agnes—an Agnes——“
She paused, gave him a glance, and laughed.
“Does Beauclerk adore Agnes?” said she.
“Can one man judge another in these questions?”
“If neither are hypocrites—yes.”
“As for conscious hypocrisy, a priest of great experience once told me that in twenty years he had met but one deliberate hypocrite. You must be lesscynical. Men, however, don't watch each other closely as a rule in sentimental matters.”
“If that is a reproof, I thank you for it,” she answered. “It may do me good. This wayward soul of mine is all wrong. Be patient with me. I can't help thinking that most men living are, at the bottom, wholly selfish and truly miserable.”
“Very few people are truly miserable. If this were not the case, the world and all creatures must have perished long ago.”
“Well, I can tell you of three wretches at any rate.”
“Three—against the world and all the planets and heaven?” said he.
“Yes. They are Beauclerk, and Agnes and I. We want time and space annihilated in order that we may be happy. We must be humorous studies to those looking on, but we are, nevertheless, utterly desperate. This is true. Scold me now—if you can. Tell me what is to become of us—if you dare.”
She stood up. She clenched her small hands, set her lips, and grew so pale that the pearls around her neck seemed dark.
“Tell me what is to become of us—if you dare,” she repeated, “because mischief is certain. You belong to those who endure and fight good fights, and keep the faith. Beauclerk and I are of another order altogether. We suffer without endurance, we fight without winning, and the little faith we have isso little that it is taken away from us. As for Agnes—wait! She is encased, at present, in conventionalities. But she is gradually getting rid of these wrappings and trappings. She will surprise you all yet.”
“I can believe that. She is a woman, and a good one. All the surprising, inconceivable things are done by good women.”
“And most of the wicked things, too.”
“Possibly.”
“Let me tell you then that, if it is possible in the circumstances, Agnes ought to give Beauclerk his release. It would be no more than his right to demand this.”
“A right is something independent of circumstances, and paramount to them. But when you once talk of your rights and your wrongs in love, all love is gone, or going. I hope it hasn't come to that—with Reckage!”
“You have great knowledge of him and know how to press it home when you choose. Can't you see, plainly enough, that he is on the road to disaster?”
“No. One may easily be a long way from happiness and still be nowhere near disaster,” he said, checking a deep sigh. “Of course, if he feels that he cannot in honour remain in his present situation, he must act at once. Men who are desirous to satisfy all their friends soon become irresolute on every occasion. That is all I shall say upon the subject, and this, perhaps, may be saying more than I ought.”
“Another reproof! So be it. But I am thinking of his contentment, and you are thinking of his duty. What is duty? It generally means that which your acquaintances—for no reason and without warrant—expect of you. I take a larger view.”
“People of Beauclerk's stamp are so constituted that they can rarely find contentment by defying a general opinion.”
“But Agnes is not a pretty, crying, fluttering creature who would excite compassion. Who, for instance, could jilt Pensée? I don't wish Beauclerk to jilt anybody, however. I want Agnes to take the step.”
“Why?” he asked.
“Because he will break his heart and die—if she doesn't. There!”
“Then it will be your fault.”
“Mr. Orange!”
“You know it, and I mean it.”
She smiled at him and shrugged her shoulders.
“Do you think I would ever take the commonplace course?” she said proudly. “I did hope that you could appreciate motives for which the world at large is slow enough to give credit. Beauclerk is weak, attractive, and in perplexity; I search my heart again and again, and I find nothing but friendship there—for him. I am careful of every word I speak, and every look, and every thought. My interest is unselfish. But,” she added, “what can any of usdo, after all, toward raising either dead bodies or dead souls?”
“Dead souls?”
“Yes. Beauclerk might have been something once; he is still very clever; he will soon be a man for occasional addresses. I believe in him, you see.”
“I know that.”
She was smiling, yet almost in tears, and her voice trembled. He wished to speak, if only to break the sudden, oppressive silence which followed her last words; but neither of them could find a thought to offer. They sat facing each other, lost in following out unutterable conjectures, fancies, and doubts, each painfully aware of a certain mystery, each filled with a sure premonition of troubles to come.
“I could almost pray,” she exclaimed at last, “that you didn't trust him. Because—in spite of himself—he must disappoint every one. He is not a deliberate traitor—but a born one.”
As Sara spoke the double doors were thrown open.
Lord Reckage was announced.
“Beauclerk!” she exclaimed.
His lordship, self-absorbed, did not perceive her confusion—which she was too young to dissemble perfectly.
“The man told me that you were here,” he said, addressing Orange and seating himself by Sara. “I call this luck—finding you both together. I have just been with my Committee. They always expectthe worst of me now, and they are always cheerful in the expectation.”
Sara began to disentangle some silk fringe on her skirt; she did not look up, and she offered no comment.
“What is the matter now?” asked Robert.
“They want to get rid of me. You see, one might practise very considerably on the credulity of the members if one chose, and these fellows on the Executive wish me to take a cautious line with regard to Dr. Temple's nomination.[Mr. Gladstone's nomination of Dr. Temple to the See of Exeter.]It is all very well for Pusey to write, ‘Do you prefer your party to Almighty God and to the souls of men?’ But, as Aumerle says, Pusey is not in the House of Commons. An attack on Temple will be highly unpopular. We have sounded opinion in various quarters, and we receive the unanimous reply—‘Have nothing to do with it.’ There is a feeling in the clubs, too, that vapid, colourless orthodoxy is not wanted in England. Healthy disagreement within limits suits us. The question is, then: Ought I to go against this strong tide and get myself disliked?”
“Yes,” said Sara at once.
“You think so?”
“Beyond a doubt.”
“Of course,” said his lordship, readily enough, “a combination in defence of any article of the faith is a noble thing. My original idea was to get up acombination of High and Low and Broad Churchmen, and make a stand on purely legal grounds. For instance, how can the bishops,without previous explanation, consecrate one lying under the censure of their House? That is all. There is nothing offensive in that. We merely ask for an explanation: we offer no judgment: we state no prejudice. If Dr. Temple intends to withdraw his paper fromEssays and Reviews—well and good. Personally, he bears the highest character. He would be, in many ways, an acquisition to the Church. But does he himself believe in the Church as a Divine institution—mark you, aDivineinstitution? Neither theOutsnor theIns, I should think, could object to this question. Aumerle and the Executive, however, are dead against any proceedings at all. They think we ought to give our Association a more secular character. They say we are hampered by too vehement a religious tone. They say that broad Christian principles are more workable. Besides, the word Christian always attracts the Nonconformists in spite of themselves. They are bound to support you if you stick to the line of a believer in Christ—irrespective of particular doctrines. And so on and so on. I prefer something more hard and fast myself. Yet they may be right. One must go with the times.”
He shifted his chair several times during this speech, looking first at Orange and then at Sara for encouragement.
“Your Executive are poor creatures,” said Sara, with a curling lip; “your weak theologians have become flabby politicians—their one rule of action is to avoid everything which demands even the possibility of self-sacrifice or adverse criticism.”
“That is most unfair,” said Reckage hotly. “One must see where one is going.”
“The world,” said Sara, “in the long run, despises those who pander to it.”
“Yes, but it is in thelongrun, and no mistake! What a fellow you are, Robert! Why don't you suggest something? Are you trying to find the civilest thing you can say of the performance?”
“It is the system which you must attack in the present difficulty. The system is at fault—not Dr. Temple,” said Robert.
“No other system can be now looked to as a substitute,” answered Reckage impatiently. “The thing cannot be done away now, the danger is too near.”
“Exactly. The English can never deal with systems or ideas. They can only attack individuals—you depend in a crisis on the passions of men, never on their reason. Whereas if you overhauled their reason, worked it, and trained it, the passions, at the critical moment, would be roused with better effect, and would be properly organised. Organised passions are what you need for a strong public movement. Whirling emotions in contrary currents are utterly futile.”
“I daresay. I hoped we might make such efforts as to fix a lasting impression on both Houses that the State appointment of bishops, coupled with the farce of acongé d'élire, is rank blasphemy. This outrage on good taste ought to occupy the attention of every man. It is quite enough to fill the minds of all.”
“It won't,” said Robert. “You must remember that whatever strikes the mind of an average man, as the result of his own observation and discovery, makes always the strongest impression upon him. Now the average man is not engaged in studying Church government. He will not thank you for calling his attention to it.”
“Then what do you want Beauclerk to do?” asked Sara.
“He must fight just the same, of course. I merely wish him to see what he has to encounter. By dragging the clergy into the movement you make it savour—to the popular intelligence—of professional jealousy. By making Dr. Temple your example, you render those who respect his character powerless to express their opinion. Given the system, he is unquestionably the fittest man to profit by it.”
Reckage took many turns round the room.
“The personal character of Dean Ethbin,” he said, at last, “is not exactly square. He acts a trimming part. But now and again he sums up a situation. He says that the English people do not choose to keep up an Established Church which shall be independent of itsSovereign and Legislature. I have seen most of the bishops and archdeacons. They are against Temple; they say very little about the system. Even men with nothing to gain by it,” he added, ingenuously, “don't appear to criticise it.”
“For all that, the Church must deliver her conscience at whatever risk. She ought to assert her will—even against her interest—in order to show England that she is her own mistress!”
“You mean that ironically! What does for Rome, however, doesn't do for us. The Church of England is It—not She—to most people. As for Rome, nothing in her belongs to humanity, except the Vatican discipline—the life of which, I confess, is a permanent miracle!”
“My best friends,” entreated Sara gaily, “do not—do not fight. Be nice to each other and listen to me. The English never read history. Why not get up a kind of Historical Commission and examine the validity of the Anglican Orders? There you can work at the roots of things. After that, introduce a Bill for the admission of clergymen to Parliament. You have spiritual peers, why not spiritual Commons?”
“One at a time,” said Reckage; “what ideas you have! Say them again. I believe they are not half bad. But do go more slowly.”
Sara, with a becoming instinct of meekness, took her favourite seat on the fender, and at the feet of the two men, looking up humbly, began to explain herselfwith that lightness of phrase only possible to those who have a profound knowledge of their subject. Her submissive attitude, her soft, musical voice, and her docile expression made both men insensible to the actual commands insinuated into the emotional wit and acute arguments of her little speech. Reckage was fascinated. He sat there drinking in her beauty and wisdom—the one stimulated his senses, the other pierced his intelligence, making him feel that, with such a companion ever by his side, he might achieve heroism with a good conscience. As matters were, he was often dissatisfied, sleepless, and oppressed—particularly under praise. He was not often set right, as he would have said it, in his own opinion—even when the world and his Executive Committee were disposed to cry out—“Well done.”
“I didn't run within pounds of my form,” was the cry of self-reproach he invariably heard above the applause of his colleagues or the commendation of the Press. Sara, he believed, would give him the courage of his own better nature. These thoughts were passing rosily in his heart, when Lord Garrow, accompanied by Agnes Carillon, entered the room.
“My love,” said Lord Garrow to Sara, “I met Miss Carillon on the steps of the London Library, and I have brought her in to tea. But why do you sit in the firelight? Why haven't they lit the gas? And who is here?”
A sudden flame from the grate illuminated the facesof Orange and Lord Reckage. The two ladies greeted each other. All spoke, and then all were silent. It was an awkward meeting for every one present. Lord Garrow rang the bell, and the small company sat there without a word, watching the footman light the gas in the glass chandelier.
“What do you suppose we have been talking about?” asked Sara desperately.
“I can't imagine, my dear,” said her father. “I am far too cross. I hate these odd ways.”
“We were discussing the validity of Anglican Orders.”
“God bless my soul!” exclaimed his lordship; “what next?”
Agnes, who was looking pale and worried, frowned with displeasure.
“But how disloyal!” she said severely. “As if one could even discuss such a question!”
“Mr. Orange is a Roman Catholic,” answered Sara, “so he is not disloyal. I am nothing—so I have no obligations. Lord Reckage is in public life and has to meet the problems of the age. Don't be narrow, dear Agnes.”
“I think it too bad, all the same,” replied Miss Carillon—“even in fun. I am sure I am right.”
Lord Reckage tried to conceal his annoyance, but his voice shook a little as he said—
“We were not joking. New men will come in, not improbably with new ideas. I must be ready for them. An ignorance of men's moods is fatal.”
He hoped she would take this warning to herself. She was, however, too stirred to consider anything except the cause of their common agitation.
“Dr. Benson was saying to papa only last week,” she answered, “that there is no apparent recognition of the Divine presence in our daily affairs. It is most shocking.”
“The clergy are doing their level best, by bigotry, to make Benson's assertion true. At any rate, I am not going about, as the French put it, with my paws in the air. I feel strongly tempted to throw up my present line, and give the whole Association to the best qualified hypocrite of my acquaintance.”
“The sure way out of that temptation is not to think yourself exposed to it,” said Robert quickly.
“I hate sophistries,” said Agnes, tightening her lips. “And I hope, Beauclerk, that you will never remain in any painful situation against your will.”
These words seemed to bear an ominous significance. Agnes herself, having uttered them, received one of those sudden inward illuminations which, in some natures, amount to second-sight. But she was unimaginative and not especially observant, sensitive, or skilled in discerning the signs of any psychological disturbance. She felt only, on this occasion, that a crisis had been reached, that Reckage was vexed with himself, with her, with life generally. She had a letter in her pocket from David Rennes—a beautiful, touching letter, full of longing for a faith, a hope—love,he said, he possessed, alas! What a difference in the two men!
“You don't understand,” said Sara. “You are right because you haven't heard enough. Mr. Orange is going to give a lecture on Church History, and Lord Reckage has promised to be chairman. They will hold the meeting at St. James's Hall, and I am sure it will be most interesting. More I cannot tell you, because they have gone no further in their plans.”
But misfortune had entered the room, and that wayfarer—once admitted—asserts her ill-will without let or hindrance. Agnes, barely touching her tea, rose to say goodbye. Lord Garrow and Reckage escorted her to the hall. They helped her into a carriage (lent her for that afternoon by the Duchess of Pevensey), and she drove away, trembling, tearful, afraid, not reminding herfiancéthat they were to meet at dinner in the evening. He walked homeward, but not until he had decided, after much hesitation, that he could scarcely go back again to Lady Sara. His thoughts were fixed now to one refrain—“I must have my freedom.” Freedom, at that moment, had a mocking, lovely face, the darkest blue eyes, and quantities of long, black hair. She wore a violet dress, her hands were white, and she talked like a Blue Book set to music by Beethoven. Yes, he must have his freedom and live.
Sara and Orange, meanwhile, left alone in the drawing-room, were exchanging interrogatory glances,“What do you think now?” she asked; “do you pretend to believe that Agnes and Beauclerk can make each other even moderately contented?”
“Then you are to blame.”
A flush swept over her face. She looked bitter reproaches, but she made no answer.
“And why are you so interested in Anglican Orders?” he continued. “How is it that you know your subject so well? For you do know it well.”
“Catholic questions always appeal to me,” she said coldly. “I have no religion, but I come from a race of politicians and soldiers—on my mother's side. I must have an intellectualpied à terre, and I require a good cause. Party politics are too parochial for me. So I am on the side of the Vatican.”
“La reine s'amuse,” said Robert. “Is that all?”
“Yes, that's all.”
She turned over the music on her writing-table and hummed some bars from the Kyrie of Mozart's Twelfth Mass.
“If you were a Jesuit,” said she, “you would try to convert me.”
“St. Ignatius never wasted time over insincere women.”
“I am not insincere,” she said frankly. “I own I may seem so. But you are not kind, and some day you may be sorry for this.”
Her eyes filled with tears—which he noticed and attributed to fatigue.
“I wonder how men ever accomplish anything!” she exclaimed.
“Why?”
“They have no insight. They mistake self-control for coldness, and despair for flippancy. Isn't that the case?”
“One can be light and true as well as light and false. Now you are witty, beautiful, brilliant—but you don't always ring true.”
She seemed confused for a minute, and hung her head.
“All the same,” she said, suddenly, “I am always sincere with you. It is not in my power to be so with every one. ‘Fate overrules my will.’”
“That is the trouble with most of us.”
Then he wished her goodbye, promising, however, to call again with regard to the Meeting. Lord Garrow met him on the staircase.
“I congratulate you on your election to Brookes's,” stammered his lordship, “but for Heaven's sake be cautious at play. Really, the younger men there are trying to revive the worst traditions in gaming. The loo was rather high at Chetwynd's last night,” he added, with a studied air of guilt. “I won £500 from my host. I call that the limit—even on old Cabinet Steinberg!”
He smiled, he waved his hand, feeling that he had displayed great taste in a situation of enormous difficulty. Something unusual, too, in the young man'sface touched his heart. It seemed to him that here was one who had felt the world's buffets.
“I have never been just in my estimate of Mr. Orange,” said he to Sara, as he re-entered the drawing-room. “I quite took to him to-day. He has a fine countenance, and I am sure he is very much cut up by this painful affair. It's a pity he's a Catholic, for he would make such an excellent canon for St. Paul's. He wouldlookthe part so well.”
“‘Happiness, that nymph with unreturning feet,’ has passed him by,” said Sara, watching herself in one of the mirrors.
“She has passed a good many,” sighed his lordship. “But play me that lovely air which Titiens sings inIl Flauto Magico.”
Agnes was too ill to appear at the Duchess of Pevensey's dinner that evening. Lord Reckage's melancholy, absent air during the entertainment, and his early withdrawal from the distinguished party, were referred, with sympathy, to the very proper distress he felt at Miss Carillon's tiresome indisposition. The time passed well enough for him—far better, in fact, than he had expected, for he was relieved from the strain of “dancing attendance” on his betrothed—a thing which he, even more than most men, found silly. In the chivalrous days of tournaments, troubadours and crusades this romantic exercise of seeming enslaved was, he held, justifiable, even interesting. But in modern life it had an appearance of over-emphasis.
Poor Agnes, however, could neither eat, nor sleep, nor rest. Her temples throbbed, her eyes ached; every nerve was a barbed wire; her soul was manacled by promises; she would not use her reason; the fever in her veins was not to be quelled, and the one agitating relief to her physical suffering was a constantperusal of David Rennes's letter. It was the first passionate love-letter she had ever received. Just as a river may stream peacefully through pastoral lands till it joins the sea and becomes one with that vast element of unrest, so the little flame of her girl's nature was absorbed at last into the great fire underlying all humanity. Was she in love? she asked herself. When she was with Rennes she became silent, incapable of conversation, of thought. All she asked was to be near him, to watch him, to hear him.
Was this love? Was it love to press his letter to her heart, to read it again and again, to keep it under her pillow at night? Was it love to think of him every moment of the day, to compare all others to him and find them wanting, to see his face always before her eyes? Was it love to know that if he called her, as he called her now, she would leave home, father, mother, friends, all things, all people, and follow him to the world's end, to the beginning of hell, or—further? At one-and-twenty such questions need no answer. They belong to the innocent rhetoric of youth which will cry out to June, “Are you fair?” and to the autumnal moon in mist, “Must there be rain?” Neither June nor the moon make reply, but youth has no doubts. The girl, weeping tears of joy over Rennes's perilous words, had but one clear regret in her mind—she could not see him for some hours. His declaration dispelled the terrible bitterness, scepticism, and indifference to all sentiment which had gradually permeated, during their acquaintance, her whole heart. Repulsed affection may turn to hatred in haughty, impatient souls. But in Agnes it produced a moral languor—a mental indolence—the feeling that no one was in earnest, and nothing ought to matter. The more this feeling deepened, the more attentively did she observe the mere outward etiquette of all that passes for seriousness, attending scrupulously to the minor obligations of existence and exhausting her courage in those petty matters which die with the day and yield no apparent fruit. How different now seemed the colourless, harsh fabric which she had mistaken for duty and wrapped—as a shroud—about her secret hopes! She had held every aspiration implying happiness as a “proverb of reproach”; she had endeavoured to believe that all poetry—except hymns—was false prophecy leading one to hard entanglements and grievous falls.
And what had been the impoverishment of her soul under this grim discipline? How could she tell the many thoughts which had travelled unquestioned over the highway of her heart during that process of disillusion? But all was changed now, and all that had been difficult, painful or obscure in the world seemed perfect with the inexhaustible glory of young passion. Rennes begged her to see him once more before he left England for some years. Would she meet him in Kensington Gardens? She had often walked there,under the old trees, with himself and Mrs. Rennes, and the place had become very dear, very familiar to her from these associations. At any other time, however, the idea of a clandestine meeting with David would have been intolerable. To go now was misery, yet she dared not stay away. The sunny morning mixed with her mood, which was one of determination to risk all in order to win all. Driven by a sense of her capabilities for endurance, she faced, with a kind of exultation, the possible disaster or remorse which might follow her action. Was there not a possible joy also? For ten days now she had been ill in body as well as mind; she had suffered a hard struggle. She knew now that she could not, could not, could not, no matter what happened, become the wife of Lord Reckage. The result of great self-delusion for so long a period was a condition of mind in which she was practically unable to distinguish between candour and disingenuousness. Any appearance of deceit—which she regarded as wrong in itself—always excited her scorn, but desperation now urged a step which might lead, she thought, to much good or much evil. That it could lead to more evil than a loveless marriage was not, however, to be feared. She started from the house with feverish cheeks, a beating pulse, and a new strange consciousness of power—power over herself, her fate, the world.
Rennes was waiting for her under the long avenueof trees by the Lancaster Gate walk. She had a tall, stately figure of that type immortalised by Du Maurier—indeed, she herself may be recognised in some of his famous society sketches about the year 1870. The clear, decisive features, the tender discerning expression, the poise of the head, were irresistibly attractive to all artists with a strong sense of grace—even artificial grace—as opposed to rude vigour or homeliness. She possessed naturally that almost unreal elegance which many painters—Frederick Walker, for instance—have been accused of inventing.
“This is very wrong of me,” she said, blushing as Rennes advanced, hat in hand, to meet her, “very wrong. I never do these things.”
“I said in my letter—right or wrong it matters not—what I thought. This is a thing which runs up into eternity, Agnes. It had to be. We needn't try to justify it.”
“I cannot—I dare not regard it as you do.”
“But you have come! Let me look at you!”
“Does it require much looking to see that I am really unhappy?”
“I see that you are beautiful, that you are here—with me. Ah, don't be unhappy! When we take into account our scanty time together”—he grew pale at the thought—“and the danger we have just missed of losing each other, perhaps for ever——“ She caught his hand for a second and he kept it.
“What is to be done?” she asked, after an agitated silence. “What will people say? Not that I can think ofanythingto do.”
“Darling, I know I have asked you to make an impossible sacrifice—to break off a most brilliant marriage, to marry me and share the despair, hardships, tortures of a life very different to any you have seen. Well has Goethe said—