CHAPTER XXII
THE case of Blagdonv.Blagdon and Lumley divided the County into factions and separated chief friends. Some said, thatnowthey thoroughly understood why Blagdon was reluctant to produce his wife in Society; obviously she was mentally unsound—a woman who ran away, and returned to him the next day! She had been a shy, odd creature from the first. The opposition were violent partisans, and declared that a girl so young, pretty, and innocent, had been driven to desperation by the brutality of her monster of a husband. It was a curious but not uncommon circumstance, that most of the women took the part of the man; whilst the men-folk, and in great numbers, were solid for the lady.
Letty’s few relatives lived in Ireland, and were not a little shocked to learn of her being mixed up in a scandal. They hid the paper from their friends, and discussed their black sheep in horrified whispers. The character of Mr. Blagdon had not been wafted across the Irish sea.
When the newly married couple were in London, one or two of the Irish clan had attempted to make their cousin’s acquaintance—not because she had made a great match, but that it was an opportunity of seeing poor Dermot’s daughter, and blood is thicker thanwater. However, their civil advances were rudely repulsed by Hugo (who hated the Irish as a nation) and did not want to be bothered with a pack of his wife’s relatives; and they merely saw a heavy-browed, formidable personage, and a pretty, shy girl with stiff manners. And now this pretty, shy girl had come to grief—wealth and importance had turned her silly little head. It was a pity!
The Blagdon-Lumley case, was entirely circumstantial, and the chain of evidence complete; the petitioner, a wealthy man; no enterprising legal firm came forward as a speculation to take up the co-respondent’s side, and the suit was undefended. Lumley had again repaired to Mr. Ross (Ross, Carbery & Co.), and told a plain, unvarnished tale, assuring them of the lady’s innocence on his solemn word of honour. The firm listened with agreeable sympathy, but declared, that there was nothing to be done, but face the consequences of an act of folly. Mrs. Blagdon had run away from her husband, leaving a letter of confession; she had joined their client in London openly, and left the hotel in his company. It was true, that she had repented, and next day presented herself at home in the character of a reformed wife; but it wouldn’t do—no, it wouldnotdo.
“I understand, that she is extraordinarily good-looking,” added Mr. Ross, “and that might give her a chance with the jury; but if you will take my advice, Captain Lumley, and speaking in the character of a friend, you will not attempt to defend the case. Theless mud-throwing the better—all can be arranged between Mr. Blagdon’s lawyers and ourselves; at the end of six months there will be the usual decree, and I take it for granted, that you will marry the lady?”
But, as it happened, the lady absolutely refused to marry Lumley. For some time she had been in a state of collapse, under the roof and the care of her friend at Oldcourt. She seemed to be in a dazed condition, her recent experience appeared to have exercised an almost paralysing effect on her thinking faculties, and when she recovered, and was informed that the trial was over, that Hugo had generously settled five hundred a year upon her, and she was free to marry again; she assured Maude Hesketh and Mrs. Denton that nothing in the world would induce her to do so. No arguments affected her, and she positively declined to see Lancelot Lumley.
“I have done him enough harm as it is,” she pleaded, “and I only hope he may forget me.”
So Captain Lumley went out to his new regiment, which was quartered in Peshawur, with an empty pocket, a sore heart, and a somewhat damaged reputation.
It is perhaps needless to mention, that Mrs. Fenchurch did not spare the culprit when she came to Oldcourt to visit and upbraid her. Letty sat listening and gazing in helpless silence, whilst her aunt had her ‘say.’ After a vigorous arraignment of her conduct, and her shameful abandonment of a splendid position, she concluded:
“I merely came to tell you, that I wash my hands of you, Letty, and I am thankful that my poor dear husband did not live to see this day. I have one piece of advice to give you, and that is, that you marry Captain Lumley. I believe he is ready to make you his wife—go out to him in India, and remain there. I understand that as Society in the East is onlytoowell accustomed to scandals and divorces, you will probably be received, and enabled to make a fresh start. Thanks to Hugo’s generosity, and with a captain’s Indian pay, you will be quite comfortably off.”
To all this advice the inquisitor received no reply, and rising red-faced from her seat, she added angrily:
“I see it’s no use talking to you for your good. You are in one of your tempers. Ihadintended offering you your uncle’s P. & O. trunks; but I shall donothingfurther—good-bye!”
To the friendless divorcée, Cousin Maude played the part of a good and rich Samaritan. As it was winter time she took her to the Riviera, but Letty still exhibited a lack of energy and indifference to her surroundings, which was disheartening to her companion; however, by degrees, sunshine, peace, and youth had their effect, and, as a crushed flower in water, she revived. Her beauty and grace were remarkable. She had at last ‘come into her own,’ and was now a lovely girl—no longer the pallid, cowed bride of four years previously. Since then, she had experienced matrimony, misery, love—real love—and disgrace; also the tardy realisation of her own endowment.
If in former days, Blagdon was bitterly disappointed by his wife’s insignificance, Mrs. Hesketh was now proportionately amazed at her success; by the many staring eyes that followed her companion, the éclat, the sensation she created was quite remarkable—the girl was much too conspicuous for a divorcée in retreat.
Kind, generous Maude Hesketh, though sincerely attached to her protégée, was not without certain human weaknesses. She was inclined to be pessimistic, analytical, inquisitive, and occasionally alittleirritable. In her secret heart she felt both sore and envious; she had been a notable beauty in her time, and although she had never encouraged admirers, yet was keenly alive to the homage of their eyes. To-day, all these looks and whispers were for another; whilst she was merely a well-preserved, elderly woman, to whom no one threw a second glance. She had accepted admiration as her right, and she now felt as if she had lost her youth for a second time!
For good and sundry reasons, the two ladies kept themselves in strict seclusion; they occupied a private sitting-room, and went out in a private carriage with a pair of capital horses. Now and then Mrs. Hesketh came across acquaintances, who glanced interrogatively at her graceful companion. As a rule she made no introductions, but when these could not possibly be avoided, she murmured the name of “Mrs. Glyn.”
Among the other guests at the “Calafornie,” Cannes, was a certain needy, worldly widow, Mrs. Plassy—Mrs.Bolingbroke-Plassy with a lively daughter of two-and-twenty.
This widow, made valiant attempts to attach herself to Mrs. Hesketh,—who was notoriously rich, had the air of a duchess, and a charming landau at her disposal; it was also known to her, that the most distinguished people in Cannes had left cards upon this lady. But Mrs. Hesketh—who could play thegrande dameto perfection, had ‘no use’ for Mrs. Plassy, mistrusted her worming civilities, her subdued flatteries, and kept her inflexibly at arm’s length. The pretty companion was more approachable (Letty could never repulse a dog, much less a fellow-creature), and she and Miss Plassy, drawn together by their youth, and tastes, played tennis, and sang duets. The innocent soprano little suspected how deeply and sincerely she was hated by the contralto; she thought Lydia a pleasant, lively, unaffected girl, and if her motherwas, as Cousin Maude declared, an inquisitive, marauding ‘old soldier,’ what harm did it do to anyone?
‘The old soldier’ had deeply resented Mrs. Hesketh’s uncompromising repulse; her animosity was kindled, and she instituted searching enquiries into the lady’s career,—which proved to be blameless; but, to her amazement, pretty, shrinking Mrs. Glyn, had a very black record! The fact leaked out—through a treacherous lady’s-maid—that this pretty girl was no less a person than the notorious and divorced Mrs. Blagdon! Fortunately the friends, were on the point of departure for San Remo, for Mrs. Plassy mentionedthe discovery, as a dead secret, to every woman of her acquaintance in the hotel,—and they all held up their hands in speechless horror.
At the end of six months Mrs. Hesketh returned home, and by that time the great local scandal had been succeeded by others, and was more or less forgotten. Mr. Blagdon was said to be in America; Captain Lumley was in India; no one knew the whereabouts of the lady. She was living quietly in a country town thirty miles south of London, occasionally spending a few days at Oldcourt, but, on the whole, alone. To occupy her time she had taken up music, and worked hard; practising with a view to becoming a professional singer. As Mrs. Glyn, a solitary, pretty young woman, she made no acquaintances, with the exception of two or three elderly women in the same hotel, who regarded her as an interesting mystery; she could not be a widow, since she wore no scrap of mourning—presumably she had a husband,—but where? She kept herself conspicuously aloof from other people,—and why?
All the time, this much-discussed, unhappy stranger, was filled with a simple human craving to see her child again—to hold her in her arms. To have her with her, had become a sort of obsession. At night as she lay awake and weeping, she seemed to hear her forsaken baby, forlorn and helpless, crying to her across the darkness. She had sacrificedallfor Cara—and lost her!