One day as Cecil was sauntering down Piccadilly, he was astonished to see Frank Forrester, in a superb cab, with tiger behind, drive up to Burlington Arcade, and there, arrayed in dashing style, step out as if the lord and master of three thousand a year, at least.
The contrast between his appearance at that moment, and the last time Cecil had seen him, when in the final stage of seediness, he had gambled away even his dinner, so amazed Cecil, that he rubbed his eyes as one awaking from a dream.
"Ah! Cis, my boy, how are you?" said Frank, grasping him by the hand. "Why, you're quite a stranger.—I am so glad to see you. Flourishing now, damn my whiskers! flourishing, Cis, as you perceive. Nobby style, eh? Correct thing that, I hope."
"Quite—But whence this change?"
"Oh! tell you that presently. Just step up the arcade with me.—I'm only going to look in upon Jeffs, to see if Paul de Kock's last novel has arrived, and then command me."
He put his arm within Cecil's, and marched up the arcade, playing with an elegant watch-chain which drooped from his waistcoat button, and winking at every woman they passed.
When they turned into Jeffs' shop, that worthy bibliopole, albeit accustomed daily to a strange variety of customers, from noblemen and their flunkies, to dingy, sallow, foreigners, redolent of garlic, and bearded like pards, opened his eyes at such a strange apparition as the resplendent, insolent Frank, arm in arm with the careworn, battered, shabby, Cecil.
"Paul de Kock arrived yet?" said Frank.
"No, sir," replied Jeffs, "but we expect our case to-morrow."
"I think your to-morrow never arrives—at any rate, your case doesn't arrive with it. Is your case a pleasing fiction, or a reality?"
"It will be here to-morrow, sir, I have no doubt. In fact I expected it yesterday."
"Well, then, send me up Paul de Kock the instant you get it; will you?"
"Certainly, sir."
"Come along, Cis, my boy."
"You are quite agrand seigneur, I perceive, Frank," said Cecil, as they strolled out of the shop. "Cab—tiger—chains—French novels—have you come into an inheritance?"
"Something like it, but jump into my cab, and I'll tell you all about it."
They got in, and Frank, handling the reins with no small degree of pride, drove into the Park, and thus explained his present fortune.
"The fact is, Cis, I have discovered the true method of playing. I broke the bank at No. 14, last Saturday; and have won no trifle since. You see all the martingales yet invented have some inherent imperfection. They go smoothly enough in theory; but damn the practice, say I!"
"Is not yours a martingale, then?'
"No: it is simply playing with skill. To explain it in a few words: you know that there are constantly runs upon a colour; sometimes it is the red, sometimes the black. You also know that they dodge about, and that the red will alternately win and lose every successive coup. My plan is to wait quietly while the game is dodging, and directly I see a run, I back in heavily. If the red has turned up three times, the chances are, that there is to be a run on that colour, and I back it till it loses. D'ye understand?'
"Perfectly. But I don't so clearly see how you must win at it."
"Bah—that'sthe very best proof! In every martingale, don't you on the contrary clearly see how you must win, but does that prevent your losing when you begin to play? So, you may not see how I must win, but I see how I do win—that's enough for me."
They dined together that day, and Frank, who had a box at Drury Lane, proposed that Cecil should accompany him, but Cecil was too unwell, and went home brooding on his friend's prosperity, and playing imaginary games with fantastic success.
All the next day he was moody and irritable. He would not even notice his child, but walked up and down his small room, or sat with his feet on the fender, cowering over the fire, his head buried in his hands.
Towards evening, he wrote to Captain Heath a hypocritical letter, the object of which was, as may be expected, to extract a few pounds from him. He was less moody after sending this off; but Blanche observed a strange wandering in his thoughts.
On the morrow he received a cold, firm answer from the captain, who stated that he had already advanced as much money on the picture as he could afford to pay for it, and that he was therefore forced to refuse.
"Damn him!" Cecil muttered, as he read the letter and crumpled it between his fingers.
Blanche guessed the contents by that action; but she made no remark.
For at least an hour did he sit looking fixedly on the ground, keeping the crumpled letter in his closed hand; and then she saw him slowly open it, smooth the paper, and examine it attentively. While she was thus watching his countenance, curious as to what could be his motive for examining so minutely a handwriting he knew, he suddenly looked up at her. A strange expression distorted his face as he shouted,—
"What the devil are you looking at me for?"
"I ... I ... Cecil..."
"You don't suspect anything, do you?" he fiercely asked.
"Suspect, Cecil; and what?"
"What's that to you?" he said brusquely, and again turned away his head.
She began to fear that he was getting insane.
"Are you not well, dearest?"
"No."
"What is the matter?"
"Nothing. Don't bother me! It must be near dinner, is it not?"
"Yes. Are you hungry?"
"Very; go and see about it."
She left the room.
A few minutes afterwards he was seated at the table, with Captain Heath's letter before him, carefully copying the writing, and comparing his copy with the original. He smiled grimly at his own success; and after several further trials, he forged a check for eighty pounds, which he had just folded and thrust into his waistcoat pocket, when Blanche returned with the dinner.
His agitation and the eager manner with which he caught up some scraps of paper, and threw them into the fire, did not escape her.
He sat down to dinner, but he could not swallow a morsel; and his hand shook so, that he dared not venture to raise it to his mouth.
"You are ill, dearest," she said. "I am sure you are."
"Pooh! it's want of exercise. I will take a walk."
"Do not go out such weather as this; see how fast the snow falls."
"It won't hurt me. I must go out."
She dared not further interpose; and in a few minutes he was gone.
Left alone, she meditated on the singular change in his manner—on his fierceness when he had observed her watching him—his paleness—his agitation—and his throwing those pieces of paper into the fire.
She opened his writing-case. There, among some loose pieces of blank paper, she found one with some writing on it. A film overspread her eyes, as she recognised in it a copy of Captain Heath's writing—so like it, that had not the characters been traced on a stray slip of paper, she could never have suspected it to be other than his writing.
Rushing upon her like an overwhelming tide, came the swift and terrible thoughts which revealed that her husband had committed a forgery. In the desperate hope that she might not yet be too late to save him from the last act—that she might yet meet him at the banker's and save him—she threw a shawl around her, put on her bonnet, and in an instant she was in a cab driving furiously to Charing Cross; in her anxiety too much excited to feel the horror of her situation.
As the cab dashed round the corner, by Charles the First's statue, she saw Cecil hurry from Messrs. Drummonds' banking-house. She saw no more: her brain swam round. When the driver opened the cab door, he found her in a swoon.
It did not last long: she recovered herself; and wildly looking round her, remembered in an instant all that had passed.
"To South Audley Street!" she impatiently exclaimed.
To Captain Heath's she drove, and astonished the servant very much by hurrying up stairs, and rushing into the room as if life and death depended on her speed.
"Good God, Blanche! what is this?" he exclaimed, as the half lifeless woman threw herself speechless into his arms.
It was a long time before she could speak; and even then, in such incoherent sentences that it was with difficulty Heath understood what she meant to tell him; but he found that it was something terrible, and about Cecil; and he redoubled his attention, trying to piece together into a coherent narrative, the broken utterances of this wretched wife.
At last he understood her, and tears of deep compassion stood in his eyes as he said,—
"Cheer up, dear Blanche, cheer up! It is not so bad after all. You terrified me at first. He has only drawn on me in anticipation. You know I still owe him money for the picture,—he has paid himself,—he was doubtless close pressed."
"But," she sobbed, "he has forged."
"He has been irregular, that is all; he should have warned me of it. However, now you have told me, it is all safe. Quiet yourself."
"Oh, that I should have lived for this!"
"Courage, courage."
"Dishonoured! My Cecil dishonoured!"
"Not yet, Blanche. He has been imprudent, that is all—imprudent."
"Dishonoured!" she exclaimed, distractedly.
"Do you not see, that now I am informed of what has passed I shall be on my guard? He has been imprudent; no one knows it but ourselves. You can gently point out to him the imprudence—and he is saved. Only yesterday I heard of a situation for him in the Colonies—an excellent place. Away from England, he will have broken from his present connexion, and lose his unfortunate habits. A new sphere will call forth fresh energy. He may be saved yet, Blanche; only take courage."
She took his hand, and kissed it in mute thankfulness, but her sobs still tore her bosom, and all his persuasion could not calm her.
Now that she felt the great danger was past, she had time to feel the immensity of the blow—she could grieve.
Heath allowed her to weep without trying to soothe her; for he saw that the great crisis was over; and silently compassionating the sorrow of this broken-hearted creature, to dry whose eyes, he would have sold the world, he sat by her side holding her hand, from time to time replying to its convulsive pressure.
She rose at last to go home. He accompanied her to the door—saw her take Rose Blanche from the servant girl, and cover it with frantic kisses; and then departed sad and thoughtful to his own solitary home.
He could not, in his sympathy with her, forbear picturing to himself the contrast of what her fate would have been had she married him instead of Cecil; nor could he refrain from bitterly commenting on the truth of his own prophecies that Cecil would make her unhappy. No lover ever believes that his beloved can possibly be happy with his rival; but Heath had too clearly read Cecil's character, not to feel assured that, rivalry out of the question, Blanche was badly matched in wedding one so weak and selfish.
In one of the low gambling houses, in Leicester-square, Cecil sat, as in a dream, risking the fruits of his crime. His brain whirled round, and his heart beat every time the door opened, for he could not drive away the fear that his forgery had been detected, and that they were coming to arrest him.
He had dishonoured himself to play this new game which Frank had explained to him, and now that the crime was committed he could not profit by it!
Such a game required, above all others, consummate coolness, and self-mastery; Cecil was more agitated, his brain was more confused than ever it had been, and he played utterly at random. It would be difficult to conceive greater torture than that which he endured, for he won without satisfaction, and lost with agony; his brain was not so confused but that he had a distinct perception of his situation, and of the necessity for playing everycoupas if for life; but at the same time his brain was so drugged with horror and despair, that his will seemed paralyzed, and he was forced, as by an unseen hand, into the ruin which he saw yawning before him.
While the cards were dealt with mechanical precision by the impassive dealer, and Cecil's crime-furnished gold was passing away before his eyes, visions of his happy youth, of his early days of marriage, and healthy activity, floated before his mind; and he, the gambler, on the edge of that dark gulph which gaped before him, turned back his thoughts to those sunny days when his soul was stainless, and his life was full of love and hope, of activity and happiness; it was like a small wild flower on a mass of loosening rock, which the next gust of wind will quite unloosen, and tumble thundering into the ravine.
He thought of his mother, and of her dying injunctions, and her words of blessing fell upon his ear, just as the dealer in his passionless voice proclaimed,—
"Black wins."
And a heap of gold was swept away before him.
For hours did this tortured gamester play, becoming gradually inured to the pain he suffered, and deadened to the whispers of his conscience.
It was now eleven o'clock. The room was full of players. A succession of new faces replaced those who one by one fell off, contented with their winnings, or, and this was by far the most frequent case, desperate from their losses. But Cecil never moved. He called for wine occasionally, but nothing interrupted his play.
His last three sovereigns were staked upon the black: his life was on the hazard of that one deal. Even the old players, accustomed to every species of intense emotion, could not keep their eyes off Cecil, as with parted lips, straining eyes, and purple face, he watched the rapid progress of the game. Intensely they felt the moment was supreme.
He lost!
With a burst of uncontrollable despair, he snatched the rake from the hand of the croupier, who had just swept away his money, and with both hands snapped it in two; a murmur followed this act of violence, which only seemed preparatory to something worse; but he glared round upon the players with such a look of mad fury that they were awe-stricken.
Instead of any further violence, however, he broke out into a wild hysterical laugh, which made their blood run cold, and staggered out of the house.
In that moment which had preceded his wild laugh, a vision of his young wife and child destitute,—starving,—thinned with want and sickness, had appeared to him, and, as in a flash, revealed to him the hideous extent of his ruin.
Beggared, dishonoured, stained with a profitless crime, nought remained for him but death; and in death he resolved to still the throbbing of his agony.
As he stumbled into Leicester Square, he ran up against one of those unfortunate women, who, flaunting in satin and faded frippery, make the streets hideous after sunset.
"Now then, my dear, are you going to rush into my arms without an invitation?
'Was ever woman in this humour wooed?Was ever woman in this humour won?'"
The fumes of bad wine poisoned the breath of the speaker, but the tones struck so strangely upon Cecil's ears, that they arrested him even on the path of death.
He seized her by the wrist, and dragged her under a lamp-post. As the light fell upon both their faces, and he recognised in the wretched woman arrayed in the garb of shame, the Hester Mason whom he had known so prosperous and ambitious—and, as she recognised in the emaciated haggard wreck before her, the only man she had ever loved, he gasped with inexpressible emotion, she wept with intense shame.
Not a word passed between them. With a suffocating sense of bitter humiliation, she wrested herself from his grasp, and darted down Cranbourne Alley. He put his hand to his brow, as if to repress its throbbing, and slowly walked on.
The cause of Hester's degradation was one which always has, and one fears always will, people our streets with those unhappy women, whom the law refuses either to acknowledge or to suppress—refuses either to protect or to punish: a lasting stigma upon our civilization!
When Sir Chetsom Chetsom was killed, she had to look about her for means of subsistence; and at first imagined that literature would be an ample field.
Thanks to the diffusion of knowledge, and to the increasing taste for reading, it is now very possible for man or woman to earn a decent and honourable livelihood by the pen; but if possible, it is not easy, and is always, with the best of talents, eminently precarious. For a woman still more so than for a man. Above all, the woman must have good friends, must be "respectable," and fortunate.
Hester had no good friends; she had many acquaintances, but no one who interested himself in her success, no one, at any rate, who both could and would assist her. Moreover, she was not "respectable;" and what was the consequence? dissolute editors were afraid of her contributions "on the score of morals."
To be brief, Hester struggled in vain to get employment; and in great danger of starving, she determined to go back to Walton. Her father consented to receive his unhappy child, and promised that "bye-gones should be bye-gones."
She had better have taken a situation as servant of all-work in a lodginghouse, than have returned to her home after what had occurred. She found her father, indeed, glad enough to receive her, and willing enough to forgive the past, on condition of not absolutelyforgettingit: from time to time he could not refrain from "throwing it in her teeth," when he was at a loss for an argument or an invective.
This is always the case when a fallen daughter returns home, or when she commits the one unpardonable fault, and stays at home: her parents, her brothers, and sisters—oh! especially the sisters—never forget that fault. It is held over her headin terrorem. It is an ever-present warning and illustration. Bridling up intheirunshaken chastity—too often unshaken because untempted—the sisters make her feel in a hundred ways, that her fault is unpardoned and unpardonable. Exasperated by this incessant and unjust retribution for a fault which the girl feels deserves more pity, she is at last driven from home and takes refuge in the streets, because her virtuous family cannot forget!
It has been often remarked that women are more pitiless towards each other, on that very point where common sympathy should make them most tolerant; and little do they know the extent of the mischief their intolerance creates.
Hester had not to suffer from the sneers and allusions of chaste and offended sisters, but she had to endure worse—the sneers and slights of the whole offended town. The reader remembers how Walton was scandalized at her flirtation, how shocked at her flight; let him then imagine the howl of outraged purity which saluted her repentant return! She, indeed, come back to a town she had disgraced! She to show herself amongst the daughters of respectable people! She to be allowed to wallow in corruption, and then as soon as she found that course led to no good, to return again to her home as if nothing had occurred! The minx!
Mrs. Ruddles hoped her husband would take notice of it from the pulpit: such an example as it was to other girls!
Mrs. Spedley expected to see many imitations of such conduct; it was such a premium on vice!
The post-mistress hoped she was as charitable as most people, but she knew what was due to herself, and as long as that creature remained in Walton, she, the post-mistress, could not think of purchasing anything at her father's shop.
Nor, for that matter, could Mrs. Spedley.
Mrs. Ruddles had never for an instant thought of such a thing. It would be a positive encouragement. Mrs. Ruddles herself had daughters. She knew something, she thought, of what constituted a well-regulated mind. She had no fears for her Arabella, Mary, and Martha Jane; but Mrs. Ruddles knew the ill effects of example.
When Hester appeared in the street, all the women instantly crossed to the other side. If she went into a shop to make a purchase, the shop immediately became empty. Women avoided her as if she were a walking pestilence.
En revanchethe men ogled her with effrontery, and even middle-aged rotundities with large families, gave themselves killing airs when in her presence.
The stupid ignorance of men! I declare the older I grow the more amazed I am at the dull, purblind, inexcusable ignorance in which one-half of the human race seems destined to remain with respect to the other half, in spite of all experience. To meet with a man who has not some gross prejudice, founded on the most blundering misconception with regard to the nature of women, and on that point, too, which one would imagine they would best understand, is really one of the rarest occurrences. The vast majority of men never seem to escape from the ideas they form about women at school; and no contradiction in the shape of experience seems to suggest to them that those ideas are essentially false. To hear men—and men of the world too—talk about women, is to hear the strangest absurdities and platitudes you can listen to on any subject; to be let into the secret of their conduct towards women, is only to see the ludicrous results to which such erroneous opinions lead them.
It is a tempting subject, but I am not going to pursue this diatribe. I have an illustration to give instead.
Hester Mason having committed afaux pas, was instantly, and from that very cause, looked upon by all the men, young and old, as a woman "to be had for the asking." In their simplicity, they could admit of no gradations between a Lucretia and Messalina. If a woman were not as chaste as ice, she must necessarily be utterly abandoned. If one man had succeeded in overcoming her scruples, of course another might. The dolts!
Perhaps it is owing to our prudery, which keeps so strict a surveillance over every word and act, that the smallest licence seems to imply the extremity of licentiousness!
The school-boy notion of the facility of women was at the bottom of their minds, and with beautiful simplicity some of the "knowing dogs" commenced the attack upon Hester's virtue, without even thinking it necessary to adopt a semblance of respect and attachment.
Certainly Hester was not a woman, under any circumstances, to have admitted the addresses of these men; but now, the undisguised insolence and fatuity of their approaches not only made her cheek burn with shame, but made her heart sick with disgust.
With scorn and withering sarcasms she discomfited them one after the other. The contemptible fools instantly joined the chorus of the women; and with good proof that at any rate, she was not altogether abandoned, they were unanimous in their execration of her infamy.
If women were not purer, stronger, and honester than the dull and coarse imaginations of most men depict them, what a world this would be! what children would these women bring forth!
Those men who have known women, known how great their influence for good and for evil, known what a well of feeling, of pure, spontaneous nature, untarnished by contact with the world, there lies hidden in a woman's breast; those who have known how this nature has moulded their own minds, refined its coarseness, giving beauty to its strength, will exclaim with me: what a world would this be were women what men generally suppose them!
Here is Hester Mason, certainly not a good specimen of her sex: vain, capricious, wilful, sensual, perverted by sounding sophisms respecting the rights of women, and the injustice of the marriage laws; she acts up to her opinions, and throws herself away upon a rich and titled noodle for the sake of furthering her ambitious projects; she finds out her mistake, returns home repentant, and instantly a number of ill-conditioned, coarse-minded, coarse-mannered men imagine she cannot hesitate to stoop to them! Believing that she acted from unrestrained licentiousness, they interpreted one act, in this school-boy fashion, and hoped to profit by her weakness. But they found out their mistake; or rather never found it out, for they attributed her refusal to viler motives than those to which they would have attributed her consent.
The insult of their proposals struck deep into her heart—deeper far than the scorn of her own sex; and it made her so wretched, that, at last, it drove her once more from her home. Yes, home became insupportable, and in a moment of desperation she fled; fled to London, and there endeavoured to seek oblivion in the turbulent vortex of a career which one shudders to contemplate.
Of all the tortures, of all the humiliations to which she had submitted, none equalled that of meeting Cecil. In her strange unhappy life there had been but one short dream, and that was her love for Cecil; even when he had rejected her love, and humiliated her by his rejection, she still felt towards him something of that elevating, purifying attachment which forms a sort of serene heaven smiling upon the most abject condition—which is, as it were, the ideal region where the purest, brightest thoughts take refuge. And to meet him in the streets—to appear before his eyes in the flaunting finery of disgrace—to let him see the abyss into which she had fallen! Poor girl! if her errors had no other expiation than that, bitterly would she have expiated them.
While the wretched girl wandered distractedly on her way, goaded by the pangs of shame and remorse, the still more wretched Cecil, calm in his concentrated despair, was walking along the river side, pursued by the Eumenides, eager to reach a quiet spot where he might end his blighted existence.
The snow fell in large flakes that cold January night; and as each flake sank gently on the quiet bosom of the river, and silently disappeared in it, leaving no other trace than the smallest possible circle, it seemed to him an image of his own disappearance from this stormy, sunless world. In the deep, quiet bosom of Eternity was he about to vanish: from this scene of turmoil and disgrace, he was to drop into the swiftly flowing river of Eternity, in it to be absorbed like to those flakes of snow. There was comfort in that thought.
He walked on, thinking of what his wife and child would do when left by him. He thought sadly of Blanche's misery; for he knew the depth of her affection for him—for him who had so ill repaid it, who had brought such shame and sorrow on her head; but he endeavoured to console himself with the reflection that her father would take care of her, and that, perhaps, the best thing that could occur to her was to become a widow.
In those lucid moments which precede the last solemn act, he reviewed his conduct with melancholy clearness; and, undimmed by sophisms, his conduct appeared to him in its true light.
He grew calmer as he walked. He thought of his child with something like satisfaction, when he reflected that she was too young to know anything of her father's disgrace; and that, before she grew old enough even to prattle about him, all would be forgotten.
Then he thought of Hester, in her miserable finery, and followed her in imagination through the rapid stages of her inevitable career.
And he thought of Frank, then so prosperous, but soon, as he foresaw, to be dragged down from his prosperity to the destitution which must quickly follow; and he saw him dying in an hospital.
And the thought of death was sweeter to him, as he walked musingly on.
A light was dimly shining in Blanche's bedroom, and she was seated by the window looking out into the night, awaiting the return of him who was to return no more. Her child was sleeping calmly; no hint of the anguish which ploughed the hearts of its parents troubled its quiet breathing.
The clock struck twelve.
A heavy sigh issued from the watcher as the strokes fell upon her ear, and she rose to snuff the enormous wick of the neglected candle. She then resumed her seat at the window.
"When will he come?" she asked herself, sadly.
She feared to meet him—feared to look upon his face, after what had passed; feared lest he, upon whose brow she had been wont to see the imperial stamp of genius—in whose eye the lustre of a glorious mind, on whose lips the smile of unutterable tenderness,—there should now be legible the stamp of infamy, the dull look of shame, the cynical sneer of recklessness.
She feared to meet him, yet she could not repress her impatience to see him: a vague dread that he might not return, shifted to and fro before her mind, and kept her anxiously watching.
The clock struck one.
Her candle was guttering in the socket, and she lighted another. She bent over the cradle of her sleeping infant with a searching look of love; and seeing that it slept peacefully, she again resumed her seat at the window.
The snow had ceased to fall. The bright stars were lustrous in the deep, dark, moonless heavens, in which they seemed suspended. The ground was white with the untrodden snow, as also were the tops of the houses, and the branches of the trees. Not a breath of wind stirred. All was silent without, hushed in the repose of night. Not a footstep was heard; not even the distant barking of some watchful dog.
Cold, cheerless, desolate as a leafless tree, was the night out into which the watcher looked, awaiting her husband's return; but he came not, would not come!
The clock struck two.
The watcher stirred the fire, and drew the shawl closer around her. She was cold; but it was not the cold of that winter night which numbed her limbs, it was the cold icy fear which momently assumed a more definite and consistent shape.
She no longer asked: "when will he come?"
Her teeth chattered as the thought that he would never come, grew more and more like a certainty.
There was a shroud upon the earth: a pure, white, stainless shroud, prepared for one who was yet young, but who had lived too long.
To her widowed eyes this garment of snow, which nature wore, became a terrible symbol, and the stars seemed to look down upon her in infinite compassion.
He came not; could not come. The silent river had opened to receive him, and was now flowing swiftly and silently over his lifeless corpse.
The clock struck three.
A cry of agony broke from the watcher as those three small strokes with horrible distinctness fell upon her ear and seemed to utter,—
"He is dead!"
But she remained at her window looking; out into the night. For two hours longer did she sit there, and then dropped into a feverish sleep, visited by happy, though broken, dreams.
She dreamed that she had dreamed her husband had committed a forgery, and that she awoke to find it but a dream: how great her joy, as she clasped him by the hand and told him all! and how his tender eyes bent down upon her as he said,—
"What! think that ofme!"
And she awoke—awoke to find herself seated at the window—the dull winter morning struggling into obscure day—the snow heaped up on the window ledge, and covering everything without—and the crushing reality was once more threatening her!
Set down, set down that sorrow, 't is all mine.DECKAR.
Her candle was burnt out; the fire had only a few live embers which went out directly she attempted to revive it. She was numbed with cold; weary with grief; and threw herself upon the bed.
Sleep was impossible. A settled, though vague, conviction that Cecil would not return had taken possession of her mind. She fancied that he must have lost the money, and was now lying concealed for fear of the consequences of his crime.
As the morning fairly broke, she put on her things, and hurried to Captain Heath to ask his assistance and advice. He was at breakfast when she arrived, and her appearance so wan, and yet so strangely supernaturally calm, made him fear the worst.
"Cecil has not returned," she said quietly. "What is to be done?"
The captain at once guessed the truth, and was silent.
"He is ashamed to return," she said. "How are we to learn where he is?"
He remained silent.
"If we were to advertise in the papers," she suggested, "could we not by that means let him know that his ... imprudence ... has been overlooked?"
"Yes, yes. That is the only plan."
"Will you do it?"
"At once; but go you home, he may return every minute."
"You think, then, he will return?" she asked with more emotion in her voice than she had hitherto betrayed.
He trembled slightly as he answered,—
"At any rate ... you had better be there."
She pressed his hand mournfully, and withdrew, leaving Heath amazed and alarmed at the quietude of her manner.
On reaching Hammersmith she saw at some distance before her, a large crowd of people hurrying along. She quietly wondered what it could be; perhaps a fire; perhaps a man led to the station house; perhaps a show which the crowd followed wondering.
She walked on, till she saw the crowd stop at her own house, and then she flew, urged on by some quick sudden fear—she pierced the crowd—she entered the house—in the passage were four men bearing a corpse on a shutter: her heart told her whose corpse it was before her eyes had recognised it.
She saw no more.
When next she became conscious, she found herself in her old bedroom at her father's, her sister Violet seated by her bedside, gazing inquiringly upon her. The fever was subsiding, and her life was saved.
"Mrs. Dombey, it is very necessary that there should be some understanding arrived at between us. Your conduct does not please me, madam .... I have made you my wife. You bear my name. You are associated with my position and my reputation."
CHARLES DICKENS.
On the day on which Cecil had forged the cheque, Meredith Vyner entered his wife's boudoir with the intention of coming to a serious explanation with her.
Several times, lately, had the word "separation" been pronounced between them, without, however, her attaching much importance to it. She knew that he was miserable, she knew that his love for her had been worn away, but she knew also that he was weak, and thought he would never have courage enough to proceed to extremities.
In this she made a great mistake. Vyner was weak, it is true, but he was also obstinate; he was easily cajoled, but not easily driven from any plan he had once resolved on. Unable to resist the wildest caprices of his wife, while he loved her, she lost all power over him in losing his affection. This she did not suspect. Like many other people, she altogether miscalculated the nature of her power over him, and imagined that what she really gained by cajolery and pretended affection, she gained by mere cunning and strength of will.
Their relative positions were altogether changed. Vyner, no longer the doating husband, was now the obstinate man. He saw that it was impossible to live happily with her, and saw that if his children were once more around him—if Violet especially were once more at home—he could again resume his peaceful routine of existence.
"I am come to speak seriously to you," he said, as seating himself opposite to her, he drew out his deliberative snuff-box.
"And I am in no humour for it," she replied, "my head aches. My nerves are irritable this morning."
"What I have to say must be said, and the sooner it is said the better for both of us."
She was surprised at the firmness of his manner.
"It is on the old subject," he added; "I need not again recapitulate the many strong objections your conduct this last year has given rise to, but I wish once for all to understand whether you intend persisting in it, or whether you will pay a little more attention to what is due both to me and yourself."
"How tiresome you are on that subject! When will you understand that a young woman cannot have an old head upon her shoulders, unless it is also an ugly one? I shall be grave and sedate enough in time, I dare say; meanwhile, allow me to observe, that, although I may be fond of admiration, yet I know perfectly well what is due to myself."
"If you know it, you do not demean yourself in consequence."
"That is the question. I maintain that I do; and I suppose I am old enough to know what is right on such matters."
He shook his head.
"Can you name any one instance in which I have overstepped the limits to which even English rigidity confines a young woman?"
"Your encouragement of the attentions of Mr. Ashley...."
"Again, Mr. Ashley!"
"Of Mr. Maxwell...."
She burst out laughing; but the laugh was hollow.
"Of Lord * * * * who every day...."
"Why he's as old as you are!"
Vyner winced at the epigram, which indeed was cruel and insulting.
"It is a pity you did not think of the great disparity in our ages before you married me, Mrs. Vyner."
"A great pity."
"I have often thought so of late."
"How much better had you thought so before you made me an offer!"
"It was the greatest mistake I ever made, but—
'Sic visum Veneri, cui placeat imparesFormas atque animos sub juga aëneaSævo mittere cum joco!'"
Vyner had often made that quotation to himself, and now launched it with great satisfaction, as was evident by the noisy pinch of snuff with which he closed it.
Mrs. Vyner shrugged her shoulders.
"You have spoken," he said, "of incompatibilities, and I fear they exist. But, Mrs. Vyner, if you have destroyed my domestic happiness, you shall not destroy my future comfort. I will not be made a laughing-stock abroad, and be made miserable at home. I say I willnot. I am come, therefore, to offer you an alternative."
"Let me hear it."
"You must cease to see Mr. Maxwell and Lord * * * *"
"Impossible!"
"I say youmust. Moreover, you must change your manner entirely, both to other men and to your husband."
"What manner am I to adopt?"
"That which befits a well-conducted wife."
"Mr. Vyner, you are insulting."
"In demanding you to do your duty?"
"No; in asserting that I do anything derogatory."
"You have strange ideas, Mrs. Vyner, on that point."
"Perhaps so; but they are mine."
"They are not mine, however."
"That is unfortunate!"
"Very. I am demanding nothing extraordinary, I imagine, in insisting that you should cease to flirt with others, and should pay more respect and deference to my wishes than you have done of late. I do not demand affection..."
She again shrugged her shoulders; he perceived it.
"Because," he continued, "I know that is absurd; whatever regard you may once have had for me is gone. I do not even demand gratitude for the kindness I have ever shown you—and you must admit that I have been an indulgent husband—foolishly so. But I have a right to demand from a wife a fulfilment at least of the most ordinary duties of a wife, and a certain amount of respect, or the show of it at any rate. This I have a right to demand, and this I will have."
Mrs. Vyner was not a woman to brook such a dictatorial tone even from the man she loved; and we have seen how Maxwell, when he adopted it, only irritated her to an unusual degree; from Vyner, whom she had been accustomed to sway as she pleased; from Vyner whom she disliked, and somewhat despised, this tone was, therefore, excessively offensive.
Her lip quivered as she replied, "This is a subject upon which we can never agree. I hold myself to be quite competent to judge of my own actions, and until I have done anything to forfeit the good opinion of the world, I shall continue to act as I think proper."
"That is your final determination?"
"It is. I hope it will be unnecessary for me to repeat it."
"In coming here I expected this, so I came prepared."
"Let me hear your alternative."
"A separation."
She started; not at the word—that she had heard before—but at the quiet, dogged resolution of the tone. A flush of angry pride ran over her cheeks and brow.
"It is very terrible, your alternative!" she said, ironically.
"Are you prepared to accept it?"
"Perfectly."
"Very well, then, in that case, I have only to see about the settlements, and in a week or two, at the farthest, the affair can be arranged."
He put back his snuff-box into his huge pocket, as he said this, and walked out of the room with a calmness that lent dignity to his lumpish figure.
She drooped her head upon her hand, and reflected. Revolted pride, anger, and fear were struggling in her breast. Irritated as she was by her husband's manner, she could not reflect upon the separation without uneasiness.
As his wife, she had an enviable position; separated from him, she not only lost the advantages of that position, in a deprivation of wealth, but also in a deprivation of the consideration with which the world regarded her. A woman separated from her husband is always equivocally placed; even when the husband is notorious as a bad character, as a man of unendurable temper, or bitten with some disgraceful vice, society always looks obliquely at the woman separated from him; and when she has no such glaring excuse, her position is more than equivocal. "Respectable" women will not receive her; or do so with a certain nuance of reluctance. Men gossip about her, and regard her as a fair mark for their gallantries.
Mrs. Vyner knew all this thoroughly; she had refused to know women in that condition; at Mrs. Langley Turner's, where she had more than once encountered these black sheep, she had turned aside her head, and by a thousand little impertinent airs made them feel the difference between her purity and their disgrace. A separation, therefore, was not a thing to be lightly thought of; yet the idea of obeying Vyner, of accepting his conditions, made her cheek burn with indignation.
Absorbed in thought she sat, weighing, as in a delicate balance, the conflicting considerations which arose within her, and ever and anon asking herself,—"What has become of Maxwell?"
Maxwell had just recovered from the effect of that broken bloodvessel which terminated the paroxysm of passion Mrs. Vyner's language and conduct had thrown him into.
At the very moment when she was asking herself, "What has become of Maxwell?" he concluded his will, arranged all his papers, burnt many letters, and, going to a drawer, took from them a pair of pocket pistols with double barrels.
He was very pale, and his veins seemed injected with bile in lieu of blood; but he was excessively calm.
In one so violent, in one whose anger was something more like madness than any normal condition of the human mind, who from childhood upwards had been unrestrained in the indulgence of his passion, this calmness was appalling.
He loaded the four barrels with extreme precision, having previously cleared the touchholes, and not only affixed the caps with care, but also took the precaution of putting some extra caps in his waistcoat pocket in case of accidents.
His hand did not tremble once; on his brow there was no scowl; on his colourless lips no grim smile; but calm, as if he were about the most indifferent act of his life, and breathing regularly as if no unusual thought was in his mind, he finished the priming of those deadly instruments, and placed them in his pocket.
Once more did he read over his will; and then having set everything in order, rang the bell.
"Fetch a cab," he said quietly to the servant who entered.
"Are you going out, sir?" asked the astonished servant.
"Don't you see I am?"
"Yes, sir,—only you are but just out of bed...."
"I am quite well enough."
There was no reply possible. The cab was brought. He stepped into it, and drove to Mrs. Vyner's.
Although she was thinking of him at the very moment when he was announced, she started at the sound of his name. His appearance startled her still more. She saw that he could only just have risen from a bed of sickness, and that sickness she knew had been caused by the vehemence of his love for her.
Affectionate as was her greeting, it brought no smile upon his lips, no light into his glazed eyes.
"The hypocrite!" was his mental exclamation.
"Oh! Maxwell, how I have longed to see you," she said "you left me in anger, and I confess I did not behave well to you; but why have you not been here before? did you not know that I was but too anxious to make it up with you?"
"How should I know that?" he quietly asked.
"How! did you not know my love for you?"
"I did not," he said, perfectly unmoved.
"You did not? Oh you ungrateful creature! Is that the return I am to meet with? Is it to say such things that you are here?"
A slight smile played in his eyes for a moment, but his lips were motionless.
"Come," she said, "you have been angry with me—I have been wrong—let us forget and forgive."
He did not touch her proffered hand, but said,—
"If for once in your life you can be frank, be so now."
"I will. What am I to say?"
Carelessly putting both hands into his coat pockets, and grasping the pistols, he rose, stretched out his coat tails, and stood before her in an attitude usual with him, and characteristic of Englishmen generally, when standing with their backs to the fire.
"You promise to be frank?" he said.
"I do."
"Then tell me whether Lord * * * * * was here yesterday."
"He was."
"Will he be here to-morrow?"
"Most likely."
"Then you have not given him his congé?"
"Not I."
Maxwell paused and looked at her keenly, his right hand grasping firmly the pistol in his pocket.
"Then may I ask the reason of your very civil reception of me to-day?"
"The reason! Civil!"
"Yes, the reason, the motive: you must have one."
"Is not my love...."
"You promised to be frank," he said, menacingly.
"I did—I am so."
"Then let us have no subterfuge of language—speak plainly—it will be better for you."
"Maxwell, if you are come here to irritate me with your jealousy, and your absurd doubts, you have chosen a bad time. I am not well. I am not happy. I do not wish to quarrel with you—do not force me to it."
"Beware!" he said, in deep solemn tones.
"Beware you! George, do not provoke me—pray do not. Sit down and talk reasonably. What is it you want to ask me?"
"I repeat: the motive for your civility to me?"
"And I repeat: my love."
"Your love!"
"There again! Why will you torment me with this absurd doubt? Why should you doubt me? Have I any interest in deceiving you? You are not my husband.—It is very strange that when I do not scruple to avow my love, you should scruple to believe me."
"My scruples arise from my knowledge of you: you are a coquette."
"I know it; but not to you."
"Solemnly—do you love me?"
"Solemnly—I do!"
He paused again, as unprepared for this dissimulation. She withstood his gaze without flinching.
An idea suddenly occurred to him.
"Mary, after what I have seen, doubts are justifiable. Are you prepared to give me a proof?"
"Yes, any; name it."
"Will you go with me to France?"
"Run away with you?"
"You refuse!" he said, half drawing a pistol from his pocket.
She was bewildered. The suddenness of the proposition, and its tremendous importance staggered her.
A deep gloom concentrated on his face; the crisis had arrived, and he only awaited a word from her to blow her brains out.
With the indescribable rapidity of thought, her mind embraced the whole consequences of his offer—weighed the chances—exposed the peril of her situation with her husband, and permitted her to calculate whether, since separation seemed inevitable, there would not be an advantage in accepting Maxwell's offer. "He loves me," she said; "loves me as no one ever loved before. With him I shall be happy."
"I await your decision," he said.
"George, I am yours!"
She flung herself upon his neck. He was so astonished at her resolution, that at first he could not believe it, and his hands still grasped the pistols; but by degrees her embrace convinced him, and clasping her in his arms, he exclaimed,—
"Your love has saved you! You shall be a happy woman—I will be your slave!"
The discovery of Mrs. Vyner's flight was nearly coincident with the announcement of Cecil's suicide. Poor Vyner was like a madman. He reproached himself for having spoken so harshly to his wife, for having driven her to this desperate act, and thus causing her ruin. Had he been more patient, more tolerant! She was so young, so giddy, so impulsive, he ought to have had more consideration for her!
It was quite clear to Vyner's mind that he had behaved very brutally, and that his wife was an injured innocent.
In the midst of this grief, there came the horrible intelligence of Cecil's end. There again Vyner reproached himself. Why did he allow Blanche to marry that unhappy young man? On second thoughts, "he had never allowed it"; but yet it was he who encouraged Cecil—who invited him to his seat—who pressed him to stay!
In vain did Captain Heath remonstrate with him on this point; Vyner was at that moment in a remorseful, self-reproachful spirit, which no arguments could alter. He left everything to Captain Heath's management, with the helplessness of weak men, and sat desolate in his study, wringing his hands, taking ounces of snuff, and overwhelming himself with unnecessary reproaches.
Blanche, in a brain fever, was removed to her father's, where she was watched by the miserable old man, as if he had been the cause of her sorrow. Violet was sent for from her uncle's, and established herself once more in the house. Now her step-mother was gone, she could devote herself to her father.
Blanche's return to consciousness was unhappily also a return to that fierce sorrow which nothing but time could assuage. She was only induced to live by the reflection that her child needed her care. But what a prospect was it for her! How could she ever smile again! How could she ever cease to weep for her kind, affectionate, erring, but beloved Cecil!
It is the intensity of all passion which makes us think it must be eternal; and it is this very intensity which makes it so short-lived. In a few months Blanche occasionally smiled; her grief began to take less the shape of a thing present, and more that of a thing past; it was less of a sensation, and more of a reverie.
At first the image of her husband was a ghastly image of dishonour and early wreck; his face wore the stern keen look of suspicion which had agitated her when last she saw him alive; or else it wore the placidity of the corpse which she had last beheld. Behind that ghastly image stood the background of their happy early days of marriage, so shortlived, yet so exquisite!
In time the ghastliness faded away, and round the image of her husband, there was a sort of halo—the background gradually invaded the foreground, till at last the picture had no more melancholy in it than there is in some sweet sunset over a quiet sea. The tears she shed were no longer bitter: they were the sweet and pensive tears shed by that melancholy which finds pleasure in its own indulgence.
Grief had lost its pang. Her mind, familiarized with her loss, no longer dwelt upon the painful, but on the beautiful side of the past. Her child was there to keep alive the affectionate remembrance of its father, without suggesting the idea of the moody, irritable, ungenerous husband, which Cecil had at the last become.
Like a child crying itself to sleep—passing from sorrow into quiet breathing—her grief had passed into pensiveness. Cecil's image was as a star smiling down upon her from heaven: round it were clustered quiet, happy thoughts, not the less happy because shadowed with a seriousness whichhad beengrief.
Vyner soon recovered from the double shock he had sustained, and was now quite happy again with his two girls, and his excellent friend Heath, as his constant companions; while Julius and Rose were seldom two days absent from them.
For the sake of Blanche they now returned to Wytton Hall, and there her health was slowly but steadily restored.
Captain Heath was her companion in almost every walk and drive; reading to her the books she wished; daily becoming a greater favourite with little Rose Blanche, who would leave even her nurse to come to him; and daily feeling serener, as his love grew not deeper, but less unquiet: less, as he imagined, like a lover's love, and more like that of an elder brother.
Blanche was happier with him than with any one else; not that she loved him, not even that she divined his love; since Cecil's death, his manner had been even less demonstrative than it had ever been before, and it would have been impossible for the keenest observer to have imagined there was anything like love in his attentions.
What quiet blissful months those were which they then passed: Vyner once more absorbed in his Horace; Blanche daily growing stronger, and less melancholy; Heath living as one in a dream; Violet hearing, with a woman's pride in him she loves, of Marmaduke's immense success in parliament, where he was already looked up to as the future Chatham or Burke.
Every time Violet saw Marmaduke's name in the papers, her heart fluttered against the bars of its prison, and she groaned at the idea of being separated from him. Indeed her letters to Rose were so full of Marmaduke, that Rose planned with Julius a little scheme to bring the two unexpectedly together, as soon as Violet returned to town.
"I am sure Violet loves him," said Rose; "I don't at all understand what has occurred to separate them. Violet is silent on the point, and is uneasy if I allude to it. But don't you agree with me, Julius, that she must love him?"
"I think it very probable."
"Probable! Why not certain?"
"Because, you know, I am apt to be suspicious on that subject."
"I know you are," she said, laughing and shaking her locks at him, "and a pretty judge you are of a woman's heart!"
Julius allowed himself to be persuaded that Violet really did love Marmaduke, and accordingly some weeks afterwards, when the Vyners had returned, Julius arranged a pic-nic in which Marmaduke was to join, without Violet's knowledge. Fearful lest she should refuse to accompany them if she saw him before starting, it was agreed that Marmaduke should meet them at Richmond.
Imagine with what feverish impatience he awaited them, and with what a sinking, anxious heart he appeared amongst them. Violet blushed, and looked at Rose; the laughter in her eyes plainly betrayed her share in the plot, in defiance of the affected gravity of her face. He shook hands with such of the company as he knew personally, was introduced to the others, and then quietly seated himself beside Violet, in a manner so free from either embarrassment or gallantry, that it put her quite at her ease. She had determined, from the first, to frustrate Rose's kindly-intentioned scheme; and she felt that she had strength enough to do so. But his manner at once convinced her that, however he might have been brought there, it was with no intention of taking any advantage of their meeting to open forbidden subjects.
Marmaduke was in high spirits, and talked quite brilliantly. Violet was silent; but from time to time, as he turned to address a remark to her, he saw her look of admiration, and that inspired him.
I need not describe the pic-nic, for time presses, and pic-nics are all very much alike. Enough if we know that the day was spent merrily and noisily, and that dinner was noisier and merrier than all: the champagne drank, amounting to something incredible.
Evening was drawing in. The last rays of a magnificent sunset were fading in the western sky, and the cool breeze springing up warned the company that it was time to prepare for their return.
The boisterous gaiety of the afternoon and dinner had ceased. Every one knows the effect of an exhilarating feast, followed by a listless exhausted hour or two; when the excitement produced by wine and laughter has passed away, a lassitude succeeds, which in poetical minds induces a tender melancholy, in prosaic minds a desire for stimulus or sleep.
As the day went down, all the guests were exhausted, except Marmaduke and Violet, who, while the others were gradually becoming duller and duller, had insensibly wandered away, engrossed in the most enchanting conversation.
"Did I not tell you?" whispered Rose, as she pointed out to Julius the retreating figures of her sister and Marmaduke.
Away the lovers wandered, and although their hearts were full of love, although their eyes were speaking it as eloquently as love can speak, not a syllable crossed their lips which could be referred to it. A vague yearning—a dim, melancholy, o'ermastering feeling held its empire over their souls. The witching twilight, closing in so strange a day, seemed irresistibly to guide their thoughts into that one channel which they had hitherto so dexterously avoided. Her hand was on his arm—he pressed it tenderly, yet gently—so gently!—to his side. He gazed into her large lustrous eyes, and intoxicated by their beauty and tenderness, he began to speak.
"It is getting late. We must return. We must separate. Oh! Violet, before we separate, tell me that it is not for ever——"
"Marmaduke!" she stammered out, alarmed.
"Dearest, dearest Violet, we shall meet again—you will let me see you—will you not?"
She was silent, struggling.
They walked on a few paces; then he again said,—
"You will not banish me entirely—you will from time to time——"
"No, Marmaduke," she said, solemnly; "no, it will not be right. You need not look so pained—I—have I nothing to overcome when I forego the delight of seeing you? But it must not be. You know that it cannot be."
"I know nothing of the kind!" he impetuously exclaimed; "I only know that you do not love me!"
She looked reproachfully at him; but his head was turned away.
"Cold, cold as marble," he muttered as they walked on.
She did not answer him. Lovers are always unreasonable and unjust. He was furious at her "coldness;" she was hurt at his misunderstanding her. She could have implored him to be more generous; but he gave her no encouragement—he spoke no word—kept his look averted. Thus neither tried to explain away the other's misconception; neither smoothed the other's ruffled anger. In silence they walked on, environed by their pride. The longer they kept silent, the bitterer grew their feelings;—the more he internally reprobated her for coldness, the more she was hurt at his refusal to acknowledge the justness of her resolution, after all that had passed between them by letter.
In this painful state of feeling, they joined their companions just as the boats were got ready.
Rose looked inquiringly at Violet; but Violet averted her head. Julius was troubled to perceive the evident anger of Marmaduke.
The boats pushed off. The evening was exquisite, and Rose murmured to Julius the words of their favourite Leopardi:—
Dolce e chiara è la notte, e senza vento,E queta sovra i tetti e in mezzo agli ortiPosa la luna, e di lontan rivelaSerena ogni montagna.
Wearied by the excitement of the day, they were almost all plunged in reveries from which they made no effort to escape. The regular dip of the oars in the water, and the falling drops shaken from them, had a musical cadence, which fell deliciously on the ear. It was a dreamy scene. The moon rose, and shed her gentle light upon them, as they moved along, in almost unbroken silence, upon the silver stream. The last twitter of the birds had ceased; the regular and soothing sounds of the oars alone kept them in a sort of half consciousness of being awake.
Marmaduke and Violet were suffering tortures. She occasionally stole a glance at him, and with redoubled pain read upon his haughty face the expression of anger and doubt which so much distressed her. The large tears rolled over her face. She leaned over the boat side to hide them, and as she saw the river hurrying on beneath her, she thought of the unhappy Cecil, and of his untimely end. Over his dishonoured corpse had this cold river flowed, as gently as now it flowed beneath her... From Cecil her thoughts wandered to Wytton Hall, and her early inclination for him—to her scene in the field with the bull—to her first meeting with Marmaduke; and then she thought no more of Cecil.
Thus they were rowed through the silent evening. On reaching town, the party dispersed.
Marmaduke and Violet separated with cold politeness, and each went home to spend a miserable night.
For some days did Marmaduke brood over her refusal, and as he reflected on the strength of her character, and the slight probability that she would ever yield—her very frankness told him that—he took a sudden and very loverlike resolution that he would quit England, and return to Brazil.
Preparations for his departure were not delayed an instant, and with his usual impetuosity he had completed every arrangement before another would have fairly commenced.
Leave-taking began. He wrote to Vyner announcing his intention, and saying that he proposed doing himself the pleasure of bidding them adieu. He had the faint hope, which was very faint, that Violet might be present, and that he might see her for the last time. Lovers attach a very particular importance to a last farewell, and angry as Marmaduke was with Violet, the idea of quitting England for ever, without once more seeing her, was extremely painful to him.
It was a dull, drizzly day, enough to depress the most elastic of temperaments. Violet was in her father's study, looking out upon the mist of rain and cloud, debating with herself whether she should be present during Marmaduke's visit or not. After what had passed, she tried to persuade herself that it was fortunate he was going to quit England, fearing that her resolution would never hold out against his renewed entreaties; but it was in vain she sophisticated with herself, her heart told her that she was wretched, intensely wretched at his departure.
Her father's voice roused her from this reverie, and she passed into the drawing-room, where a few minutes afterwards the servant entered, and announced "Mr. Ashley."
A stream of fire seemed suddenly to pour along her veins; but by the time he had shaken hands with Vyner and Blanche, and had turned to her, she was comparatively calm. His face was very sallow, and there was a nervous quivering of his delicate nostrils, which indicated the emotion within, but which was unobserved by her, as her eyes were averted.