DIANA VYELL.
"Have you not finished yet?" Miss Diana closed the door, glanced from
one to the other, and laughed with a genial brutality. "Well, it's time
I came. Dear mamma, you seem to be getting your feathers pulled."
There was a byword among the Whig families at home (who, by
intermarrying, had learned to gauge another's weaknesses), that
"the Pett medal showed ill in reverse." Miss Diana had heard the
saying. As a Vyell--the Vyells were, before all things, critical--she
knew it to be just, as well as malicious; but as a dutiful daughter she
ought to have remembered.
As it was, her cool comment stung her mother to fury. The poor lady
pointed a finger at Ruth, and spluttered (there is no more elegant word
for the very inelegant exhibition),--
"A strumpet! One that has been whipped through the public streets."
There was a dreadful pause. Miss Diana, the first to recover herself,
stepped back to the door and held it open.
"You must excuse dear mamma," she said coolly. "She has overtired
herself."
But Lady Caroline continued to point a finger trembling with passion.
"Her price!" she shrilled. "Ask her that. It is all these creatures
ever understand!"
Miss Diana slipped an arm beneath her elbow and firmly conducted her
forth. Ruth, hearing the door shut, supposed that both women had
withdrawn. She sank into a chair, and was stretching out her arms over
the table to bury her face in them and sob, when the voice of the
younger said quietly behind her shoulder,--
"It is always hard, after mamma's tantrums, to bring the talk back to a
decent level. Nevertheless, shall we try?"
Ruth had drawn herself up again, rallying the spirit in her. It was
weary, bruised; but its hour of default was not yet. Her voice dragged,
but just perceptibly, as she answered Miss Vyell, who nodded, noting her
courage and wondering a little,--
"I am sorry."
"Sorry?"
"Yes; it was partly my fault--very largely my fault. But your mother
angered me from the first by assuming--what she had no right to assume.
It was horrible."
Diana Vyell seated herself, eyed her steadily for a moment, and nodded
again. "Mamma can be _raide_, there's no denying. She was wrong, of
course; that's understood. . . . Still, on the whole you have done
pretty well, and had your revenge."
Ruth's eyes widened, for this was beyond her.
Diana explained. "You have let us make the most impossible fools of
ourselves. It may have been more by luck than by good management, as
they say; but there it is. Now don't say that revenge isn't sweet.
. . . I've done you what justice I can; but if you pose as an angel from
heaven, it's asking too much." While Ruth considered this, she added,
"I don't know if you can put yourself in mamma's place for a moment; but
if you can, the hoax is complete enough, you'll admit."
"I had rather put myself in yours."
Their eyes met, and Diana's cheek reddened slightly. "You are an
extraordinary girl," she said, "and there seems no way but to be honest
with you. Unfortunately, it's not so easy, even with the best will in
the world. Can you understand _that?_"
"If you love him--"
"Oh, for pity's sake spare me!" Diana bounced up and stepped to the
window. The red on her cheek had deepened, and she averted it to stare
out at the poultry in the yard. "You are unconscionable," she said
after a while, with a vexed laugh. "I have known my cousin Oliver since
we were children together. Really, you know, you're almost as brutal as
mamma. . . . The truth? Let me see. Well, the truth, so near as I can
tell it, is that I just let mamma have her head, and waited to see what
would happen. This was her expedition, and I took no responsibility for
it from the first."
"I understand." Ruth, watching the back of her head, spoke musingly,
with pursed lips.
"Excuse me"--Diana wheeled about suddenly--"you cannot possibly
understand just yet. This last was my tenth season in London.
One grows weary . . . and then in the confusion of papa's death--
It comes to this, that I was ready for anything to get out of the old
rut. I--I--shall we say that I just cast myself on fate? It may have
been at the back of my head that whatever happened might be worse, but
couldn't well be wearier. But if you think I had any design of setting
my cap at him--"
"Hush!" said Ruth softly. "I had no such thought."
"And if you had, you would not have cared," said Diana, eyeing her again
long and steadily. "Mamma--you really must forgive mamma. If you knew
them, there was never a Pett that was not _impayable_. Mamma spoke of
asking your price. . . . As if, for any price, he would give you up!"
"I have no price to ask, of him or of any one."
"No, and you need have none. I am often very disagreeable," said Diana
candidly, "but my worst enemy won't charge me with disparaging good
looks in other women."
"May I use your words," said Ruth, with a shy smile, "and say that you
have no need?"
"Rubbish! And don't talk like that to me, sitting here and staring you
in the face, or I may change my mind again and hate you! I never said I
didn't _envy_. . . . But there, the fault was mine for speaking of
'good looks' when I should have said, 'Oh, you wonder!'" broke off
Diana. "May I ask it--one question?"
"Twenty, if you will."
"It is a brutal one; horrible; worse even than mamma's."
"As I remember," said Ruth gravely, "Lady Caroline asked none. It was I
who did the questioning, and--and I am afraid that led to the trouble."
Diana laughed, and after a moment the two were laughing together.
"But what is your question?"
"No, I cannot ask it now." Diana shook her head, and was grave again.
"Please!"
"Well, then, tell me--" She drew back, slightly tilting her chin and
narrowing her eyes, as one who contemplates a beautiful statue or other
work of art. "Is it true they whipped _that_, naked, through the
streets?"
Ruth bent her head.
"It is true."
"I wonder it did not kill you," Diana murmured.
"I am strong; strong and very healthy. . . . It broke something inside;
I hardly know what. But there's a story--I read it the other day--about
a man who wandered in a dark wood, and came to a place where he looked
into hell. Just one glimpse. He fainted, and when he awoke it was
daylight, with the birds singing all around him. But he was changed
more than the place, for he listened and understood all the woodland
talk--what the birds were saying, and the small creeping things.
And when he went back among men he answered at random, and yet in a way
that astonished them; for he saw and heard what their hearts were
saying, at the back of their talk. . . . Of course," smiled Ruth,
"I am not nearly so wonderful as that. But something has happened to
me--"
Diana nodded slowly. "--Something that, at any rate, makes you terribly
disconcerting. But what about Oliver? They tell me that he browbeat
the magistrates and insisted on sitting beside you."
Ruth's eyes confirmed it. They were moist, yet proud. They shone.
"I had always," mused Diana, "looked on my cousin as a carefully selfish
person, even in the matter of that Dance woman. You must have turned
his head completely."
"It was not _that_."
Diana stared, the low tone was so earnest, vehement even. "Well, at all
events I know him well enough to assure you he will never give you up."
"Ah!" Ruth drew a long sigh over the joy in her heart, and, a second
later, hated herself for it.
"--until afterwards."
"Afterwards?" the girl echoed.
"Afterwards. My cousin Oliver is a tenacious man, and you would seem to
have worked him up to temporary heroics. But I beg you to reflect that
what for you must have been a real glimpse into hell"--Diana shivered--"
was likely enough for him no more than an occasion for posing.
Fine posing, I'll allow." She paused. "It didn't degrade him, actually.
He's a Vyell; and as another of 'em I may tell you there never was a
Vyell could face out actual degradation. You almost make me wish we
were capable of it. To lose everything--" She paused again.
"You make it more alluring, somehow, than the prospect of endless London
seasons--Diana Vyell, with a fading face and her market missed--that's
how they'll put it--and, _pour me distraire_ this side of the grave, the
dower-house, a coach, a pair of wind-broken horses, and the consolations
of religion! If we were capable of it. . . . But where's the use of
talking? We're Vyells. And--here's my point--Oliver is a Vyell.
He may be strong-willed, but--did mamma happen to talk at all about the
'Family'?"
"I think," answered Ruth with another faint flash of mirth, "it was I
who asked her questions about it."
Diana threw out her hands, laughing. "You are invincible! Well, I
cannot hate you; and I've given you my warning. Make him marry you; you
can if you choose, and now is your time. If there should be children--
legitimate children, O my poor mamma!--there will be the devil to pay
and helpless family councils, all of which I shall charge myself to
enjoy and to report to you. If there should be none, we're safe with
Mrs. Harry. She'll breed a dozen. . . . Am I coarse? Oh, yes, the
Vyells can be coarse! while as for the Petts--but you have heard dear
mamma."
They talked together for a few minutes after this. But their talk shall
not be reported: for with what do you suppose it dealt?
--With Dress. As I am a living man, with Dress.
In the midst of it, and while Ruth listened eagerly to what Diana had to
tell of London fashions, Lady Caroline's voice was heard summoning her
daughter away.
Diana rose. "It is close upon dusk," she said, "and Mrs. Harry has
command of the waggon. She drives very well--not better than I perhaps;
but she understands this country better. All the same, the road--call
it an apology for one--bristles with tree-stumps, and mamma's temper
will be unendurable if the dark overtakes us before we reach the next
farm. I forget its name."
"Natchett?"
"Yes, Natchett. We spend the night there."
"But why did not Mr. Silk drive you over?"
"Did mamma tell you he was escorting us?"
"No. I guessed."
"Nasty little fellow. Sloppy underlip. I cannot bear him. Can you?"
"I do not like him."
"It's a marvel to me that my cousin tolerates him. . . . By the way, I
shall not wonder if he--Oliver, I mean--loses his temper heavily when he
learns of our expedition, and bundles us straight back to Europe.
I warned mamma."
"So--I am afraid--did I."
"Yes?"--and again they laughed together.
"My poor parent! . . . She assured me that her duty to the Family was
her armour of proof. Hark! She's calling again."
They found Lady Caroline impatient in the verandah. Ruth, to avoid
speech with her, walked away to the waggon. Farmer Cordery stood at the
horse's head, and Mrs. Harry beside the step, ready to mount and take
the reins.
But for some reason Mrs. Harry delayed to mount. "Is it you?" she said
vaguely and put out a hand, swaying slightly. Ruth caught it.
"Are you ill?"
They were alone together for a moment and hidden from the farmer, who
stood on the far side of the horse.
"Nothing--a sudden giddiness. It's quite absurd, too; when I've been as
strong as a donkey all my life."
Ruth asked her a question. . . . Some word of woman's lore, dropped
years ago by her own silly mother, crossed her memory. (They had been
outspoken, in the cottage above the beach.) It surprised Mrs. Harry,
who answered it before she was well aware, and so stood staring,
trembling with surmise.
"God bless you!" Ruth put out an arm on an impulse to clasp her waist,
but checked it and beckoned instead to Diana.
"_You_ take the reins and drive," she commanded.
Diana questioned her with a glance, but obeyed and climbed on board.
Ruth was helping Mrs. Harry to mount after her when Lady Caroline thrust
herself forward, by the step.
Now since Diana had hold of the reins, and Mrs. Harry was for the moment
in no condition to lend a hand, and since Lady Caroline would as lief
have touched leprosy as have accepted help from Ruth Josselin, her
ascent into the van fell something short of dignity. The rearward of
her person was ample; she hitched her skirt in the step, thus exposing
an inordinate amount of not over-clean white stocking; and, to make
matters worse, Farmer Cordery cast off at the wrong moment and stood
back from the horse's head.
"Losh! but I'm sorry," said he, gazing after the catastrophic result.
"Look at her, there, kickin' like a cast ewe. . . ." He turned a
serious face on Ruth and added, "Vigorous, too, for her years."
Ruth, returning to the verandah, bent over little Miss Quiney, who sat
unsmiling, with rigid eyes. "Dear Tatty,"--she kissed her--"were they
so very dreadful?"
Miss Quiney started as if awaking from a nightmare.
"That woman--darling, whatever her rank, I _cannot_ term her a lady!--"
"Go on, dear."
"I cannot. Sit beside me, here, for a while, and let me feel my arm
about you. . . ."
They sat thus for a long while silent, while twilight crept over the
plain and wrapped itself about the homestead.
Ruth was thinking. "If I forfeit this, it will be hardest of all."