It was all very well of him to be so flattering, but I really did n’t
see myself talking in that manner to Lady Vandeleur. I wondered why he
didn’t give her this information himself, and what particular value it
could have as coming from me. Then I said to myself that of course he
_had_ mentioned to her the truth I had impressed upon him (and which by
this time he had evidently taken home), but that to enable it to produce
its full effect upon Lady Yandeleur the further testimony of a witness
more independent was required. There was nothing for me but to go and
see her, and I went the next day, fully conscious that to execute Mr.
Tester’s commission I should have either to find myself very brave or
to find her strangely confidential; and fully prepared, also, not to be
admitted. But she received me, and the house in Upper Brook Street was
as dismal as Ambrose Tester had represented it. The December fog (the
afternoon was very dusky) seemed to pervade the muffled rooms, and her
ladyship’s pink lamplight to waste itself in the brown atmosphere.
He had mentioned to me that the heir to the title (a cousin of her
husband), who had left her unmolested for several months, was now taking
possession of everything, so that what kept her in town was the business
of her “turning out,” and certain formalities connected with her dower.
This was very ample, and the large provision made for her included the
London house. She was very gracious on this occasion, but she certainly
had remarkably little to say. Still, she was different, or at any rate
(having taken that hint), I saw her differently. I saw, indeed, that I
had never quite done her justice, that I had exaggerated her stiffness,
attributed to her a kind of conscious grandeur which was in reality much
more an accident of her appearance, of her figure, than a quality of
her character. Her appearance is as grand as you know, and on the day
I speak of, in her simplified mourning, under those vaguely gleaming
_lambris_, she looked as beautiful as a great white lily. She is very
simple and good-natured; she will never make an advance, but she will
always respond to one, and I saw, that evening, that the way to get on
with her was to treat her as if she were not too imposing. I saw also
that, with her nun-like robes and languid eyes, she was a woman who
might be immensely in love. All the same, we hadn’t much to say to
each other. She remarked that it was very kind of me to come, that she
wondered how I could endure London at that season, that she had taken a
drive and found the Park too dreadful, that she would ring for some more
tea if I did n’t like what she had given me. Our conversation wandered,
stumbling a little, among these platitudes, but no allusion was made
on either side to Ambrose Tester. Nevertheless, as I have said, she was
different, though it was not till I got home that I phrased to myself
what I had detected.
Then, recalling her white face, and the deeper, stranger expression
of her beautiful eyes, I entertained myself with the idea that she was
under the influence of “suppressed exaltation.” The more I thought of
her the more she appeared to me not natural; wound up, as it were, to
a calmness beneath which there was a deal of agitation. This would have
been nonsense if I had not, two days afterwards, received a note
from her which struck me as an absolutely “exalted” production. Not
superficially, of course; to the casual eye it would have been perfectly
commonplace. But this was precisely its peculiarity, that Lady Vandeleur
should have written me a note which had no apparent point save that
she should like to see me again, a desire for which she did succeed in
assigning a reason. She reminded me that she was paying no calls, and
she hoped I wouldn’t stand on ceremony, but come in very soon again, she
had enjoyed my visit so much. We had not been on note-writing terms, and
there was nothing in that visit to alter our relations; moreover, six
months before, she would not have dreamed of addressing me in that
way. I was doubly convinced, therefore, that she was passing through a
crisis, that she was not in her normal state of nerves. Mr. Tester had
not reappeared since the occasion I have described at length, and I
thought it possible he had been capable of the bravery of leaving town.
I had, however, no fear of meeting him in Upper Brook Street; for,
according to my theory of his relations with Lady Vaudeleur, he
regularly spent his evenings with her, it being clear to me that they
must dine together. I could answer her note only by going to see her
the next day, when I found abundant confirmation of that idea about
the crisis. I must confess to you in advance that I have never really
understood her behavior,--never understood why she should have taken
me so suddenly--with whatever reserves, and however much by implication
merely--into her confidence. All I can say is that this is an accident
to which one is exposed with English people, who, in my opinion,
and contrary to common report, are the most demonstrative, the most
expansive, the most gushing in the world. I think she felt rather
isolated at this moment, and she had never had many intimates of her own
sex. That sex, as a general thing, disapproved of her proceedings during
the last few months, held that she was making Joscelind Bernardstone
suffer too cruelly. She possibly felt the weight of this censure, and at
all events was not above wishing some one to know that whatever injury
had fallen upon the girl to whom Mr. Tester had so stupidly engaged
himself, had not, so far as she was concerned, been wantonly inflicted.
I was there, I was more or less aware of her situation, and I would do
as well as any one else.
She seemed really glad to see me, but she was very nervous.
Nevertheless, nearly half an hour elapsed, and I was still wondering
whether she had sent for me only to discuss the question of how a London
house whose appointments had the stamp of a debased period (it had been
thought very handsome in 1850) could be “done up” without being made
æsthetic. I forget what satisfaction I gave her on this point; I
was asking myself how I could work round in the manner prescribed by
Joscelind’s intended. At the last, however, to my extreme surprise, Lady
Vandeleur herself relieved me of this effort.
“I think you know Mr. Tester rather well,” she remarked, abruptly,
irrelevantly, and with a face’ more conscious of the bearings of
things than any I had ever seen her wear. On my confessing to such an
acquaintance, she mentioned that Mr. Tester (who had been in London a
few days--perhaps I had seen him) had left town and would n’t come back
for several weeks. This, for the moment, seemed to be all she had to
communicate; but she sat looking at me from the corner of her sofa as if
she wished me to profit in some way by the opportunity she had given me.
Did she want help from outside, this proud, inscrutable woman, and was
she reduced to throwing out signals of distress? Did she wish to be
protected against herself,--applauded for such efforts as she had
already made? I didn’t rush forward, I was not precipitate, for I felt
that now, surely, I should be able at my convenience to execute my
commission. What concerned me was not to prevent Lady Vandeleur’s
marrying Mr. Tester, but to prevent Mr. Tester’s marrying her. In a few
moments--with the same irrelevance--she announced to me that he wished
to, and asked whether I didn’t know it I saw that this was my chance,
and instantly, with extreme energy, I exclaimed,--
“Ah, for Heaven’s sake don’t listen to him! It would kill Miss
Bernardstone!”
The tone of my voice made her color a little, and she repeated, “Miss
Bernardstone?”
“The girl he is engaged to,--or has been,--don’t you know? Excuse me, I
thought every one knew.”
“Of course I know he is dreadfully entangled. He was fairly hunted
down.” Lady Vandeleur was silent a moment, and then she added, with a
strange smile, “Fancy, in such a situation, his wanting to marry me!”
“Fancy!” I replied. I was so struck with the oddity of her telling
me her secrets that for the moment my indignation did not come to a
head,--my indignation, I mean, at her accusing poor Lady Emily (and even
the girl herself) of having “trapped” our friend. Later I said to myself
that I supposed she was within her literal right in abusing her rival,
if she was trying sincerely to give him up. “I don’t know anything
about his having been hunted down,” I said; “but this I do know, Lady
Vandeleur, I assure you, that if he should throw Joscelind over she
would simply go out like that!” And I snapped my fingers.
Lady Vandeleur listened to this serenely enough; she tried at least to
take the air of a woman who has no need of new arguments. “Do you know
her very well?” she asked, as if she had been struck by my calling Miss
Bernardstone by her Christian name.
“Well enough to like her very much.” I was going to say “to pity her;”
but I thought better of it.
“She must be a person of very little spirit. If a man were to jilt me, I
don’t think I should go out!” cried her ladyship with a laugh.
“Nothing is more probable than that she has not your courage or your
wisdom. She may be weak, but she is passionately in love with him.”
I looked straight into Lady Vandeleur’s eyes as I said this, and I was
conscious that it was a tolerably good description of my hostess.
“Do you think she would really die?” she asked in a moment.
“Die as if one should stab her with a knife. Some people don’t believe
in broken hearts,” I continued. “I did n’t till I knew Joscelind
Bernardstone; then I felt that she had one that would n’t be proof.”
“One ought to live,--one ought always to live,” said Lady Yandeleur;
“and always to hold up one’s head.”
“Ah, I suppose that one ought n’t to feel at all, if one wishes to be a
great success.”
“What do you call a great success?” she asked.
“Never having occasion to be pitied.”
“Being pitied? That must be odious!” she said; and I saw that though she
might wish for admiration, she would never wish for sympathy. Then, in
a moment, she added that men, in her opinion, were very base,--a remark
that was deep, but not, I think, very honest; that is, in so far as the
purpose of it had been to give me the idea that Ambrose Tester had done
nothing but press her, and she had done nothing but resist. They were
very odd, the discrepancies in the statements of each of this pair; but
it must be said for Lady Vandeleur that now that she had made up her
mind (as I believed she had) to sacrifice herself, she really persuaded
herself that she had not had a moment of weakness. She quite unbosomed
herself, and I fairly assisted at her crisis. It appears that she had
a conscience,--very much so, and even a high ideal of duty. She
represented herself as moving heaven and earth to keep Ambrose Tester up
to the mark, and you would never have guessed from what she told me that
she had entertained ever so faintly the idea of marrying him. I am sure
this was a dreadful perversion, but I forgave it on the score of that
exaltation of which I have spoken. The things she said, and the way she
said them, come back to me, and I thought that if she looked as handsome
as that when she preached virtue to Mr. Tester, it was no wonder he
liked the sermon to be going on perpetually.
“I dare say you know what old friends we are; but that does n’t make any
difference, does it? Nothing would induce me to marry him,--I have n’t
the smallest intention of marrying again. It is not a time for me to
think of marrying, before his lordship has been dead six months. The
girl is nothing to me; I know nothing about her, and I don’t wish to
know; but I should be very, very sorry if she were unhappy. He is the
best friend I ever had, but I don’t see that that’s any reason I should
marry him, do you?” Lady Vaudeleur appealed to me, but without waiting
for my answers, asking advice in spite of herself, and then remembering
it was beneath her dignity to appear to be in need of it. “I have told
him that if he does n’t act properly I shall never speak to him again.
She’s a charming girl, every one says, and I have no doubt she will make
him perfectly happy. Men don’t feel things like women, I think, and if
they are coddled and flattered they forget the rest. I have no doubt she
is very sufficient for all that. For me, at any rate, once I see a
thing in a certain way, I must abide by that I think people are so
dreadful,--they do such horrible things. They don’t seem to think what
one’s duty may be. I don’t know whether you think much about that, but
really one must at times, don’t you think so? Every one is so selfish,
and then, when they have never made an effort or a sacrifice themselves,
they come to you and talk such a lot of hypocrisy. I know so much
better than any one else whether I should marry or not. But I don’t
mind telling you that I don’t see why I should. I am not in such a bad
position,--with my liberty and a decent maintenance.”
In this manner she rambled on, gravely and communicatively,
contradicting herself at times; not talking fast (she never did), but
dropping one simple sentence, with an interval, after the other, with
a certain richness of voice which always was part of the charm of her
presence. She wished to be convinced against herself, and it was a
comfort to her to hear herself argue. I was quite willing to be part
of the audience, though I had to confine myself to very superficial
remarks; for when I had said the event I feared would kill Miss
Bernardstone I had said everything that was open to me. I had nothing
to do with Lady Vandeleur’s marrying, apart from that I probably
disappointed her. She had caught a glimpse of the moral beauty of
self-sacrifice, of a certain ideal of conduct (I imagine it was rather
new to her), and would have been glad to elicit from me, as a person
of some experience of life, an assurance that such joys are not
insubstantial. I had no wish to wind her up to a spiritual ecstasy from
which she would inevitably descend again, and I let her deliver herself
according to her humor, without attempting to answer for it that she
would find renunciation the road to bliss. I believed that if she should
give up Mr. Tester she would suffer accordingly; but I did n’t think
that a reason for not giving him up. Before I left her she said to me
that nothing would induce her to do anything that she did n’t think
right. “It would be no pleasure to me, don’t you see? I should be always
thinking that another way would have been better. Nothing would induce
me,--nothing, nothing!”