MRS IRETON P. BEMBRIDGE.
The experiment which Dr. Merle had sanctioned proved successful. The
wise physician had calmed the apprehensions with which her husband and
son regarded the swoon into which Mrs. Carruthers had fallen upon
recognizing George, and had hinted that on her recovery the mother and
son should be left alone.
"The old gentleman," said Dr. Merle to Mr. Felton, "and a fine old
gentleman he is--a little peculiar, but it would not do the world any
harm to have a few more of this sort in it--has told me a good deal of
the family history intentionally, and some of it unintentionally; and
I have not the least doubt that the root of Mrs. Carruthers's disease
is simply her son."
"He has given her some trouble, I know," said Mark Felton, with a
sigh; "but hardly so much as that comes to, I fancy."
"Well, well, I won't be positive; but I think so. No young man ever
tells all the truth about his follies; and, indeed, no middle-aged or
old man, for that matter; and rely upon it, his mother knows more than
any one else. She will do well, Mr. Felton. She sees him all right, no
matter how wrong he may have been; there's nothing gravely amiss now.
We may leave her to time now, and her son's society."
"Do you think I may venture to see her soon?"
"Impossible to say, for a day or two, my dear sir; impossible to say.
Mr. Carruthers and Mr. Dallas must explain your coming to her. I don't
prescribe _two_ shocks, you know, even pleasant ones; and then I have
no doubt you will perfect the cure."
Mr. Felton acknowledged the smooth speech with an absent sort of
smile, and Dr. Merle took his leave.
"You are sure there is nothing wrong with you, George? You are quite
sure you are in no danger?" said Mrs. Carruthers, late in the
afternoon of that day, to her son, as she lay quietly on a large sofa
drawn close to the window, where the panes were glittering in the
dying light. Her face was turned towards him, her dark eyes a little
troubled, and not so bright as they had been, resting fondly and with
a puzzled expression upon his face, and one thin hand fondly clasped
in his. George was lying on the floor beside her sofa, his head
resting against her pillow, and the fingers of her other hand were
moving softly among his rich brown curls.
"Nothing, indeed, mother. All is well with me--much, much better than
I ever expected or hoped; but you must not agitate yourself, or ask
any questions. Dr. Merle and Mr. Carruthers have put me on my honour
not to talk to you of the past, and we must keep our word, you know;"
and the young man tenderly kissed the hand he held in his.
"Yes, yes," she said, in an absent, searching tone; "but there is
something--there was something--I--"
"Hush, mother! In the time to come you shall know everything, but for
the present you must simply trust me. Indeed, there is nothing wrong.
I am here with you, brought here and welcomed by Mr. Carruthers. You
remember that he did not like me, and he had good cause; yes, he had
good cause, but that is all over now. I am here with his full sanction
and approbation, and you must be content to know that, to feel it, and
_to rest_. You have to get strong and well now, mother, and then we
shall all be quite happy."
"Yes, George, yes. I can rest now," said his mother. And she nestled
down upon her sofa, and he drew the coverings around her, and they
both kept silence; and presently, in the autumnal evening, when the
moon rose over the dark Taunus, and the lights began to sparkle all
over the little white town, Mrs. Carruthers fell asleep, with her hand
clasped in that of her son and her worn but always handsome face
resting against his brown curls.
The days went by, and with the lapse of each Mrs. Carruthers made an
advance towards the recovery of her health and her faculties. Very
shortly after their meeting George had spoken to her of his uncle; and
though he found it difficult to fix her attention or engage her
interest, he succeeded in ascertaining that she remembered all the
circumstances of her brother's life, and that he had expressed a wish
and intention to come to England.
"Mark is not happy in his son," she said one day to Mr. Carruthers and
George, who had been talking to her by preconcerted arrangement on the
subject. "I fear he has given him a great deal of trouble. I remember
in many of his letters he said he was not blessed, like me, with a son
of whom he could be proud."
George reddened violently as his mother's harmless words showed him.
how she had concealed all her grief from her brother, and struck him
with sudden shame and confusion in his stepfather's presence. Mr.
Carruthers felt inexpressibly confused also; und as readiness was not
the Grand Lama's forte, he blundered out:
"Well, my dear, never mind about his son. You would be glad to see
your brother Mark, wouldn't you?"
Mrs. Carruthers looked earnestly at him as she raised herself from her
pillows, and the faint colour in her cheek deepened into a dark flush
as she said:
"Glad to see my brother Mark! Indeed I should be. Is he here too?"
So, after long years, the brother and sister met again; and Mark
Felton was a little diverted from his anxiety about his son by the
interest and affection with which his sister inspired him, and the
strong hold which George Dallas gained upon the affections of a man
who had been sorely wounded in his own hopes and expectations. He was
not under any mistaken impression about his nephew. He knew that
George had caused his mother the deepest grief, and had for a long
time gone as wrong as a young man could go short of entering on a
criminal career. But he divided the good from the evil in his
character; he discerned something of the noble and the generous in the
young man; and if he laid too much to the account of circumstances,
and handled his follies too tenderly, it was because he had himself
suffered from all the grief which profligacy, combined with cold and
calculating meanness, can inflict upon a parent's heart.
George Dallas yielded easily to the influence of happiness. His gay
and pleasant manner was full of fascination, and of a certain easy
grace which had peculiar charms for his Transatlantic uncle; and his
love for his mother was a constant pleasure to her brother to witness,
and an irresistible testimony to the unspoiled nature of the son.
True, this affection had not availed to restrain him formerly; but the
partial uncle argued that circumstances had been against the boy, and
that he had not had fair play. It was not very sound reasoning, but
there was nothing to contradict it just at present, and Mr. Felton was
content to feel rather than to reason.
Mr. and Mrs. Routh had arrived at Homburg immediately after Mr. Felton
and George had reached that place of fashionable resort. Their
lodgings were in a more central situation than those of Mr. and Mrs.
Carruthers, and were within easy reach of all the means of diversion
which the wicked little resort of the designing and their dupes
commanded. George Dallas did not see much of Routh. He had been
disturbed and impressed by Mr. Felton's exceedingly emphatic
expression of opinion respecting that gentleman; he had been filled
with a vague regret, for which now and then he took himself to task,
as ungrateful and whimsical, for having renewed his intimacy with
Routh. His levity, his callousness, respecting the dreadful event
concerning which he had consulted him, had shocked George at the time,
and his sense of them had grown with every hour's consideration of the
matter (and they were many) in which he had since engaged. Nothing had
occurred to him to reverse or weaken the force of Routh's opinion; but
he could not get over his heartlessness. They met, indeed, frequently.
They met when George and his uncle, or his stepfather, or both, walked
about the town and its environs, or in the gardens; they met when
George strolled about the salons of the Kursaal, religiously
abstaining from play,--it was strange how the taste for it had passed
away from him, and how little he suffered, even at first, in
establishing the rule of self-restraint; but they rarely met in
private, and they had not had half an hour's conversation in the week
which had now elapsed since Routh and Harriet had arrived at Homburg.
But George had seen Harriet daily. Every afternoon he escorted his
mother during her drive, and then he called on Mrs. Routh. His visits
tortured her, and yet they pleased her too. Above all, there was
security in them. She should know everything he was doing; she should
be quite sure no other influence, stronger, dangerous, was at work,
while he came to her daily, and talked to her in the old frank way.
Routh shrank from seeing him, as Harriet well knew, and felt, also,
that there was security in his visits to her. "He will keep out of
George's way, of course," she said to herself, when she acquiesced in
the expediency of following Dallas to Homburg, and the necessity for
keeping him strictly in sight, for some time at least. "He will not
undertake the daily torture. No; that, too, must be my share. Well, I
am tied to the stake, and there is no escape; only an interval of
slumber now and then, more or less rare and brief. I don't want to tie
him to it also--he could not bear it as I can."
And she bore it well--wonderfully well, on the whole, though the
simile of bodily torture is not overdrawn as representing what she
endured. By a sort of tacit mutual consent, they never alluded to
Deane, or the discovery of the murder. George, who never could bear
the sight of a woman's suffering, had a vivid recollection of the
terrible emotion she had undergone when he disclosed the truth to her,
and determined to avoid the subject for the future. She understood
this, but she felt tolerably certain that if any new complication
arose, if any occasion of doubt or hesitation presented itself, George
would seek her advice. She should not be kept in ignorance, and that
was enough. She had ascertained, before they left London, that George
had not mentioned the matter to Mr. Felton; and when the young man
told her how otherwise complete his explanation with Mr. Felton had
been, she felt a degree of satisfaction in the proof of her power and
influence afforded by this reticence.
The positive injunction which Mr. Felton had laid upon his nephew
aided George's sensitiveness with respect to Harriet. He felt
convinced that if his uncle had known her as he knew her, he would
have been satisfied to confide to her the trouble and anxiety under
which he laboured, and whose origin was assuming, to George's mind,
increasing seriousness with every day which passed by without bringing
news of Mr. Felton's son. But he would not, however he might find
relief and counsel by doing so, discuss with Harriet a matter which he
had been positively forbidden to discuss with her husband: he could
not ask her secrecy without hurting her by an explanation of Mr.
Felton's ill opinion of Routh. So it happened that these two persons
met every day, and that much liking, confidence, and esteem existed on
the man's part towards the woman, and yet unbroken silence was
maintained on the subject which deeply engaged the minds of both.
Philip Deane's name was never mentioned by Harriet, nor did Dallas
speak of Arthur Felton.
So Mrs. Carruthers improved in health. Mr. Carruthers was very
gracious and affable to his stepson, and terribly nervous and anxious
about his wife, on whom, if the worthy physician could have been
brought to consent, he would have kept Dr. Merle in perpetual
attendance, being incapable of recognizing the importance--indeed,
almost the existence--of any patient of that gentleman's, except Mrs.
Carruthers, of Poynings. Mr. Felton heard nothing of his son, and
waited, frequently discussing the subject with Mr. Carruthers and his
nephew; and the bright sweet autumn days went on. Afterwards, when
George reviewed their course, and pondered on the strange and wayward
ways through which his life had lain, he thought of the tranquillity,
the lull there had been in that time, with wonder.
The change of scene, the physical effort, a certain inevitable
deadening effect produced by the lapse of time, more powerful in cases
of extreme excitement than its space would seem to warrant, had had
their effect on Harriet's spirits and appearance. She looked more like
herself, George thought, when he came to make her his daily visit.
Perhaps he had become more accustomed to the change he had noted with
solicitude on his return to London; she was certainly more cheerful.
He did not take account of the fact that he did not see her in Routh's
company, though his uncle's comment on her husband's feelings towards
her frequently and painfully recurred to him. Harriet questioned him
frequently about his mother, and George, full of gratitude for her
kindness and sympathy, spoke freely of her, of his uncle, of the
altered position in which he stood with his stepfather, and of his
improved condition and hopes. There were only two persons of interest
to him whom he did not mention to Harriet. They were Arthur Felton and
Clare Carruthers.
"Have you ever been to the Kursaal in the evening?" he asked
Harriet one day, as they were talking, and looking at the groups of
gaily-dressed men and women lounging past the window where they were
seated.
"Yes, I have gone in there once or twice with Stewart; but I got tired
of it very soon, and I don't want to go again."
"My uncle met an old acquaintance there last evening," George went on;
"he does not particularly care about it either; but we were strolling
about the gardens until rather late, and then we went in and had a
look at the ball-room. I had been watching a lady for some time,
out-and-out the best dancer in the room, when she came up to my uncle
and spoke to him, and I find out she is quite a celebrity here."
"Indeed," said Harriet, not vehemently interested.
"Yes, quite," said George; "and judging by what my uncle says, I
should think she was a celebrity in New York too. I should like to
show her to you, Mrs. Routh; she is like one of those impossible women
in the American novels, with clusters of currants made in carbuncles,
and bunches of cherries in flawless rubies, in their hair--you know
the kind of thing I mean. I fancy the Phoenix would look shy about
insuring her wardrobe, and Hancock feel dubious about matching her
diamonds. Such a twinkling, flashing, guttering, coaxing, flippant
mortal I never met in my life. I wonder if she dresses as gorgeously
under the sunshine as under the gas."
"She has quite taken your fancy, George. Did Mr. Felton introduce
you?"
"Yes. There she stood, looking up in his face, but I am quite sure
seeing me and every other person in the room at the same time, and
chattering like a Yankee magpie; so my uncle presented me to--Mrs.
Ireton P. Bembridge, as he called her, in American fashion. She was
there, with a whole host of people, and I didn't fancy them, 'ke-inder
didn't,' as she would say, no doubt, and went away as soon as I
could."
"Is she a widow?"
"Yes--at least, I think so; I heard nothing of Ireton P."
"She will be cultivating your uncle, or yourself, George. A handsome,
rich young widow, and an old acquaintance of your uncle's, eh?"
"I don't feel in the least like it, Mrs. Routh, and I am sure the
sparkling, flashing, dashing lady I met last night would fly at no
such mean quarry. I have rather a notion, too, that my uncle does not
like her."
"Have you? Did he seem displeased at the meeting?"
"Not exactly displeased--but--but I am beginning to understand him now
wonderfully well, and in some things he is so like my mother. Now,
with her I can always feel whether she likes a person or not without
her saying a word--I could formerly, I mean, when she was more
susceptible to impressions than she is now. It's just the same in my
uncle's case; and I knew, in a minute, he didn't like Mrs. Ireton P.
Bembridge."
"Where is she staying? At the 'Quatre Saisons,' I suppose?"
"No," said George; "she has one of the Schwarzchild houses. You know
them, Mrs. Routh?"
"Yes, I know them," said Harriet. "I saw the Frau Schwarzchild
yesterday, rejoicing in a pink parasol with a coral handle, set with
turquoises in clumps."
"That's the woman. Shouldn't wonder if the parasol were a waif from
the wardrobe of Mrs. Ireton P. Bembridge. She has, then, one of those
huge houses for herself and her attendants."
"Did she tell you all this in the ball-room?"
"All _this?_ Bless your innocence, she got through such trivialities
as these in about two minutes. I might have heard her whole history,
and Ireton P.'s, no doubt, particulars of his last illness--if he had
a last illness--included, if I had asked her to dance. And, by Jove!"
said George, starting up and pushing back the muslin curtain which
impeded Harriet's view of the street somewhat, "there she is, coming
down the street in a pony-carriage, and looking like a whole triumphal
procession on one set of wheels."
Harriet looked out with an assumption of more curiosity than she felt.
In a low, elegant, but rather over-ornamented equipage, drawn by two
gray ponies, likewise rather over-ornamented, but very handsome and of
great value, sat a lady of beauty as undeniable as that of her horses,
and elegance as striking as that of her carriage. Woman-like, Harriet
remarked the magnificence of her dress before she noticed the beauty
of her face, set off as it was by the aid of the most perfect hat and
feather ever put together by the milliner's art. That beauty was at
once of the correct and the sparkling order. Her features were of
statuesque regularity, but they had all the piquant brilliancy of
rich, glowing, passionate life. Cheeks and lips flushed with the full
colour of health, masses of hair of the darkest, glossiest brown
coiled up in endless braids and rolls under the inimitable hat; eyes
so dark that to call them black was a venial exaggeration; teeth which
shone like jewels; and in the face, the air, over the whole person and
equipment of the woman, from the wrists outstretched over the reins
she held, and on which broad bands of jewels flashed, to the tip of
the satin boot which protruded beneath the silken carriage-wrap spread
daintily over her knees, an intolerable consciousness and domineering
boldness which was simply odious. Her ponies were stepping leisurely;
her glittering eyes were looking right and left, as though she were
searching for some one among the scattered groups she passed, and
every member of which stared at her without disguise. As much of her
dress as could be seen was a magnificent mixture of satin and lace and
jewels; and even in her dress there was a daring, reckless something,
indefinable but distinct, which made the gazers feel that in staring
at her there was no offence.
"Stunning, isn't she, Mrs. Routh? I beg your pardon for the slang, but
there is really no other word. Blinding, dazzling, and all the rest of
it."
"Stunning, certainly, George," said Harriet, smiling; "but, somehow, I
don't think you care particularly to be stunned."
"Not in the least. She is not a bit my style;" and George, thinking of
what "his" style was, and how widely it differed from the triumphant
figure in the ornate carriage out there, let the muslin curtain drop,
and turned away from the window. Harriet sat down and took up her
work.
"A woman whom men would love for a little while, and hate bitterly
after, I fancy; but whom women would hate at once, and always."
Mrs. Ireton P. Bembridge had not found among the loungers in the town
the individual whom her bright black eyes were seeking, when George
Dallas and Harriet Routh had marked her from the window. She had
driven rapidly away past the gardens and the Schloss, and when fully
two miles outside the town she overtook a gentleman sauntering
leisurely along, with his hands thrust deep into his pockets, and his
moody eyes fixed upon the ground. The carriage was close upon him
before he looked round, though the sound made by the wheels and the
trotting horses had been distinct in the clear air, as they came along
the empty road. Then he turned and greeted the lady with effusion. In
a moment he had taken his place beside her, and was whirled away into
the green and golden distance of the forest, under the brow-crest of
Taunus.
"How very odd that you should know him," said the gorgeous lady of the
pony-carriage to the gentleman seated beside her, as she walked her
ponies along a shady road, where the slim trees stood on guard on
either side, and the fallen leaves rustled under the wheels.
"Not so very odd. He is a near relative of one of my most intimate
friends."
"Ah, his nephew, I suppose you mean, a tall young man with good eyes,
and a remarkably rich expression of countenance."
"I recognize the description certainly, and it is not flattering. That
is the individual; his name is Dallas."
"A booby, I'm convinced. How he can be an intimate friend of yours I
cannot understand."
She said this rather sulkily, which, by adding to its character of
sincerity, made the indirect flattery in which she was a proficient
all the more delicious. Her companion's eyes flashed with pleasure as
he turned them upon her with a look which she did not raise her eyes
to receive, but which dyed her cheek a deeper rose-tint than before.
Then she went on:
"He is come here with Mr. Felton to meet his cousin, I suppose. Arthur
Felton will not like that, I fancy. He regarded this fine family
reunion as a very decided nuisance, I can assure you."
"I don't quite understand you," her companion said. "Mr. Felton's son
is not here, that I know of; he certainly had not arrived yesterday,
for Dallas was at my lodgings, and would have been sure to mention
it."
"No," replied the lady, with a slow provoking smile, which lighted her
eyes up with mischief, and showed more of her faultless teeth than
always glistened on the world. "I know he is not here, but he is
coming. I gave him a rendezvous here for this very week, in Paris,
last March."
The gentleman looked at her in such extreme surprise that it quite
amused her. She did not only smile now, she laughed.
"I will explain my meaning," she said, "in very few words. I have
known the Feltons all my life, and Arthur has been more or less in
love with me since he was a boy; rather less than more, perhaps, for
that's his way, and not at all to the detriment of his being quite as
much in love with any number of women besides. He and his father never
got on well. Mr. Felton did not like 'his ways' as the goodies and
gossips say, and, in particular, he did not like his being in love
with me, for he can't bear me. Frightfully bad taste, isn't it? Get
along, President," this to one of the ponies, as she touched him up
with her whip; "you've had walking enough. Awfully bad taste--thank
you, you needn't say yes; you're looking unutterable things. Of
course, I don't mind that particularly, and I don't care for Arthur
Felton in the ve-ry least," with a most enchanting drawl and the
faintest pout of the crimson lips. "He made himself a perfect nuisance
in Paris, and I really must have quarrelled with him, if I had not
gone away with some friends who wouldn't have Arthur--no, not in the
ve-ry least," and she repeated the before-mentioned little performance
quite enchantingly.
"But you agreed to meet him here?" said her companion, very moodily.
"Agreed to meet him here! How ridiculous you are! I gave him
rendezvous, which I beg to observe is not precisely the same thing as
agreeing to meet him."
"_Sounds_ like it," said the gentleman, still more sulkily.
"Very true; but it isn't. I meant to come here--I always lay my plans
long beforehand--just at this time, and I thought I might as well let
him come here as have him constantly teasing me in the mean time. It
was a long while off, remember." And her black eyes danced with
mischief and enticement.
"And where is he now?" asked her companion, after he had given her
another look which brought the burning colour to her cheeks once more.
"How on earth should _I_ know?" was her answer; and as she made it she
turned her head round, and looked him full in the face. "How on earth
should I know?" she repeated. "You don't imagine, I suppose, that I
correspond with all the friends of my youth. No, no; I never think of
people when they are out of my sight. I have no one that I care about
enough to think of in absence, and I never write a letter if I can
possibly avoid it."
"I understood, when Mr. Felton came to London, he had not heard from
his son for some time, and he has certainly not seen him there."
"Very likely; Master Arthur is not a particularly dutiful son.
However, his father will see him here, if he stays till next week,
that's a fact."
"What sort of person is Mr. Felton's son? I can't say I admire the
old gentleman much."
"No! Don't get on with him? I should think not, neither do I; but
Arthur's not in the ve-ry least like him. Not nearly so good-looking;
not like the Feltons, I should say, at all; like his mother. His
cousin, though he's a big booby, is a good-looking fellow, and looks
like a gentleman. Now that's just what Arthur does not look like."
"And what is just what he does look like?" asked her companion, who
took what he thought was a secret pleasure in hearing this unknown
admirer of the beautiful woman who had captivated his fancy spoken of
in depreciating terms. But he was quite mistaken. Mrs. Ireton P.
Bembridge discerned this amiable sentiment with perfect distinctness,
and gave it all the nutriment to be supplied by the most consummate
and dexterous coquetry.
"H'm!" she said, with a bewitching air of thought and deliberation.
"What does Arthur Felton look like? Very like a Yankee, and a little
like a Jew;" and she laughed most musically.
As Mrs. Ireton P. Bembridge drove her gray ponies towards the little
white town, the carriage passed, near a turn in one of the level shady
roads, a bench placed between two tall slim trees. Between the bench
and the road lay a broad pathway, with a grassy edge. A lady,
simply-dressed, of a small slight figure, and whose face was bent
downwards, but in whose air there was unmistakable refinement, was
sitting on the bench, and leaning a little forward, was making marks on
the ground with her parasol, less in idleness than in the abstraction
of thought. As the ponies trotted merrily by, and their mistress
laughed, rather loudly but musically, the lady looked up, and the eyes
of the two women met. The gentleman who sat by the fair American, and
who was on the side of the carriage nearest to the pathway, was so
absorbed in the animated conversation being carried on between them,
that he did not notice the solitary figure, nor see that anything had
attracted his companion's attention. Indeed, the attraction was but
momentary; the look had hardly been interchanged before the carriage
whirled past Harriet Routh.
She came forward upon the footpath, and looked after the fast-receding
figure of her husband, as he bent deferentially towards the woman she
had seen that morning, until she could see it no longer; and still
stood there when the level shaded road was blank and empty.