MOLLY'S SECOND APPEARANCE
Molly's first appearance was at the assembly of Tuesday; her second on
that of Friday. Between these two days, as you have seen, a good many
things happened, not the least important of which was Lady Anastasia's
"adoption," so to speak, of Molly.
On Tuesday she came with the captain, whose appearance betrayed the
old sailor, followed by the young sailor, transformed, for one night
only, into a fine gentleman. On that occasion she was dressed with an
extravagant display of jewels which might have suited an aged duchess
at court, but was entirely unfitting to a young girl in the assembly
of a watering place; she then danced as if every step had been
recently taught her (which was indeed the case) and as if every
posture was fresh from the hands of the dancing-master.
This evening she came in the company and under the protection of the
Lady Anastasia herself, whose acceptance of her right to appear could
not be questioned, save in whispers and behind the fan. The former
partner in the minuet, he who sprawled and trod the boards like an
elephant; the sailor who would pass for a gentleman--in a word, her
old friend, Jack Pentecrosse (myself)--was not present.
I had proposed to accompany her, but in the morning I received a
message from Lady Anastasia, "Would Mr. Pentecrosse be so very good as
to call upon her immediately?"
I went. I found her the most charming lady, with the most gracious
manner, that I had ever seen. She was, indeed, the only lady of
quality with whom I have ever conversed. It seemed as if she
understood perfectly my mind as regards Molly, because while she
humiliated me, at the same time she made me feel that the humiliation
was necessary in the interests of Molly herself. In a word, she asked
me not to accompany Molly again to the assembly, nor to present myself
there; and, therefore, not to remind the company that Molly's friends
were young men who were not gentlemen. "You have the face and the
heart, Mr. Pentecrosse," she said, laying her white hand on my arm,
"of a man of honour. With such a man as yourself, one does not ask for
a shield and a pedigree. But where women are concerned some things are
necessary. You love our Molly"--she said "our" Molly, and yet she was
in league with the arch villain, the earl among lost souls. "You love
her. I read it in your betraying blush and in your humid eyes.
Therefore you will consent to this sacrifice with a cheerful heart.
And, Mr. Pentecrosse--I would willingly call you Jack, after Molly's
sisterly fashion--come to see me again. It does me good--a woman of
fashion, which too often means of hollow hearts--to converse with a
young man so honest and so simple. Come again, Jack. I am here nearly
every morning after prayers."
I obeyed, of course. Who could resist such a woman? Well, Molly
appeared under her protection. She was now dressed with the simplicity
that belongs to youth, yet with a simplicity only apparent and not
real. For the cloth of gold and the embroidery had vanished; the
bracelets, heavy with rubies and emeralds, had disappeared; the golden
cestus, the diamonds, the gold chains, all were gone. But the pink
silk gown and the white silk petticoat which she wore were costly; the
neck and the sleeves were edged and adorned with lace such as no other
lady in the room could show; round her neck lay a necklace of pearls
as big as cobnuts; on her wrists hung a fan whose handle was set with
sapphires; and in her hair, such was the simplicity of the maiden, was
placed a white rose. Her head was not built after the former manner,
but was covered now with natural curls, only kept in place by the art
of the friseur. In a word, it was Molly herself, not an artificial
Molly; Molly herself, just adorned with the feminine taste which
raised the Lady Anastasia above the blind laws of mere fashion who now
entered the room. She proclaimed herself once more as the heiress with
a more certain note and with less ostentation.
"With her ladyship! With the Lady Anastasia!" they whispered behind
their fans. "What next? Are there no ladies in the room but she must
pick up this girl out of the gutter?" But they did not say these
things aloud; on the contrary they pressed around her ladyship, gazing
rudely and curiously upon the intruder.
"Ladies," said Lady Anastasia, "let me present my young friend, Miss
Molly, the heiress of Lynn. I entreat your favour towards Miss Molly,
who deserves all the favours you can afford, being at once modest, as
yet little acquainted with the world of fashion, and endowed by
fortune with gifts which are indeed precious."
They began with awkwardness and some constraint to express cold words
of welcome; but they could not conceal their chagrin, and two or three
of them withdrew from the throng and abstained altogether after that
evening from the society of her ladyship, and, as they were but plain
wives of country gentlemen, this abstention cost them many pangs. For
my own part, now that I know more about the opinions of gentlefolk, I
confess that I think they were right. If there is an impassable gulf,
as they pretend, between the gentleman and the mere citizen or the
clown, then they stood up for their principles and their order. Why
there should be this impassable gulf I know not; nor do I know who dug
it out and set one class on one side and one on the other; whereas it
is most true that there are many noble families whose ancestors were
either merchants or were enriched by marriages with the daughters of
merchants. Of such there are many witnesses. If, on the other hand, a
girl can be received and welcomed among the Quality simply because she
has a great fortune, there can be no such gulf, and the passage from
one class to the other is matter of worldly goods only. There are also
cases in which the sons of noble and gentle houses have entered into
the service of merchants, and have themselves either succeeded and
made themselves rich, or have sunk down to the levels of retail trade
and of the crafts.
Another humiliation was in store for these ladies. When Lord
Fylingdale entered the assembly he walked across the room, saluted
Lady Anastasia, and bowed low to Molly, who blushed and was greatly
confused at this public honour.
"Miss Molly," he said, "permit me to salute the town of Lynn itself in
your fair person. The town of Lynn is our hostess; you are the queen
of Lynn; let me invite your Majesty to open the ball with me."
So saying, he took her hand and led her out to the middle of the room,
while the music struck up and the company formed a ring.
As for me, you have seen that I made a promise. I kept it in the
spirit but not in the letter. That is to say, I went in my ordinary
Sunday clothes, and stood at the door with the crowd and looked in at
the gay scene. Molly danced with his lordship. My heart sank when I
saw the ease and dignity of his steps, and the corresponding grace of
hers. There was neither sliding nor sprawling. Then after the dance I
saw her standing beside the Lady Anastasia, her eyes sparkling, her
cheek flushed, smiling and laughing, while a whole troop of gentlemen
surrounded her with compliments. She seemed quite happy with them. As
for me, I felt that I was no longer of any use to her; she was flying
far above me; my place was at the door with those who had no right to
enter. So I stole away out of the gardens and into the silent streets,
while the music followed me, seeming to laugh and to mock me as I
crept along with unwilling feet and sinking heart. "Go home! Go home!"
it said. "Go home to your cabin and your bunk! This place is not for
you. Go home to your tarpaulin and your salt junk and your rum!"
I did not obey immediately. I went to the captain's. Molly's mother
was sitting there alone. Nigra was at the assembly to look after her
mistress; the captain was there also, looking on from a corner;
Molly's mother was alone in the parlour, her work in her hands,
stitching by the light of a single tallow candle; and while she
stitched her lips moved.
She looked up. "Jack," she cried, "where is Molly?"
"She is enjoying herself with her new friends. I am no longer wanted.
So I came away."
"My poor Jack!" She laid down her needlework and looked at me. "You
can't make up your mind to lose her. What do you think I feel about
it, then? Sure, a mother feels more than a lover. If she goes, Jack,
she will never come back again. We shall lose her altogether. She will
never come back." With this the tears rolled down her cheek.
"We ought not to grumble and to grutch," she went on. "Why, it is for
her own good. The captain has told us all along that she was too great
a catch for any of the folk about here. There is never a day but he
tells me this, again and again. Not a man, he says, is worthy of such
a fortune! Jack, when I think of the days when my man and me were
married; he never wanted me to know how rich he was. What did I want
with the money? I wanted the man, not his fortune. The jewels and the
chains lay in the cupboard--the foolish glittering things! He followed
simple ways, and lived like his neighbours. And as for Molly, I've
brought her up as her poor father would have had it; there is no
better housewife anywhere than Molly; no lighter hand with the crust;
no surer hand with the home-brewed; no safer hand with the poultry.
And all to be thrown away because she's got such a fortune as would be
wasted on an honest lad like you, Jack, or some good gentleman from
the country side."
"We can do nothing, mother--except to wish her happiness."
"Nothing; not even to find out the kind of man she is to marry. The
captain is all for taking this Lord Fylingdale's advice. Why his
lordship should take to the captain I cannot understand. Sammy Semple
was here to-day--a worm, a wriggling worm--saying how soft and
virtuous his lordship is. Well, Jack, I thought--if he has no
masterfulness in him he isn't any kind of man to advise about a woman.
Now, Molly's father had a fine quick temper of his own, and Molly
needs a master. Then this lady Anastasia, who seems kindly, offers to
take her to town, where she will learn cards and wickedness. But I
doubt, Jack--I doubt. My mind is full of trouble. It is a dreadful
thing to have a rich daughter."
"Would to God," I said, "she had nothing."
"For the men they will come around her; and the women they will hate
her--and she will be too good for her own folk, and too low for the
folks above, and they will all want her money, and they will all scorn
her."
"Nay," I said, "she is too beautiful."
"Beauty! Much women care about beauty! I have dreams at night, and I
wake up terrified and the dreams remain with me still in the waste of
the night like ghosts. Oh, Jack, Jack, I am a miserable woman!"
I left her. I rowed off to the ship and sought my cabin.
After dancing with his lordship, who then offered his hand to a lady
of the county, Molly stood up with the young man called Tom Rising,
who was by this time as sober as could be expected after such a night.
He, in the hearing of everybody, loaded her with compliments of the
common kind, such as would suit a milkmaid, but were not proper for a
modest woman to hear. To these, however, Molly returned no reply, and
danced as if she heard them not. She then rejoined Lady Anastasia,
and, with her, retired to the card room, whither many of the young men
followed her. She stood beside her ladyship, and obliged the young men
by choosing cards for them, which they lost or won. Tom Rising
followed her, and stood beside her with flushed face and trembling
hands. It was remarked afterwards that he seemed to assume the care of
her. He kept gazing upon Molly with fierce and ravenous looks, like a
wolf who hungers after his prey and lives to wait for it. He played
the while, however, and lost during the evening, I believe, some
hundreds of pounds; but, for reasons which you will presently hear, he
never paid that money.
When the country dances began Lord Fylingdale led out Molly once more,
and placed her at the head.
It was too much. Some of the ladies refused to dance at all. Those who
did were constrained and cold. But Molly was triumphant. She was not
an angel. One could not blame her for resenting the flouts and scorn
with which she had been treated. Now, however, she was the first lady
of the company next to Lady Anastasia, because she had been taken out
both for the minuet and the country dance by the first gentleman
present.
I do not think that his lordship paid her any compliments. He danced
as he moved, and spoke with a cold dignity which stiffened his joints.
Now, in a country dance, Molly, for her part, danced all over, her
feet and her body moving together, her hands and arms dancing, her
eyes dancing, her hair dancing. They danced quite down the lines until
every couple had had their turn.
"Miss Molly," said her partner, "you dance with the animation of a
wood nymph, or, perhaps, a nymph of the ocean. I would that the ladies
of London possessed half the vivacity of the Lady of Lynn."
He offered her the refreshment of wine or chocolate, but she declined,
saying that the captain now would be wishing her to go home, and that
her chair would be waiting.
So his lordship led her to the door, where, indeed, her chair was
waiting but no captain, and, bowing low, he handed her in and shut the
door, and he returned to the assembly, and Molly's chair was
immediately lifted up and borne rapidly away, she sitting alone,
thinking of the evening and of her great triumph, suspecting no evil
and thinking of no danger.
A minute later the captain came to the door. There he saw Molly's
chairmen, waiting with her chair. He looked about him. Where was
Molly? He returned to the assembly. The girl was not there. He looked
into the card room. His lordship was standing at the table looking on.
"My lord," said the captain, in confusion, "where is my ward?"
"Miss Molly? Why, captain, I put her into her chair five minutes ago.
She is gone."
"Her chair?" The captain turned pale. "Her chair is now at the door
with her chairmen."
"What devilry is forward?" cried Lord Fylingdale. "Come with me,
captain. Come with me!"