THE ABSOLUTE AND THE COMPARATIVE.
This secret incident in the family history left a great deal of
agitation in the house. Mrs. Mountford had not been informed in any
detail what her husband’s mission to Hunston was. She knew that he had
gone to ‘tamper with his will,’ as she said, but what were the exact
changes he meant to make in that will she did not know. They were
certainly to the advantage of Rose and to the detriment of Anne: so much
she was aware of, but scarcely anything more. And she herself was
frightened and excited, afraid of all the odium to which she would
infallibly be exposed if the positions of the sisters were changed, and
more or less affected by a shrinking from palpable injustice; but yet
very much excited about Rose’s possible good fortune, and not feeling it
possible to banish hopes and imaginations on this point out of her mind.
If Rose was put in the first place it would not be just--not exactly
just, she said to herself, with involuntary softening of the expression.
Rose’s mother (though she would be blamed) knew that of herself she
never would have done anything to deprive Anne of her birthright. But
still, if papa thought Anne had behaved badly, and that Rose deserved
more at his hands, he was far better--no doubt _far better_, able to
judge than she was; and who could say a word against his decision? But
it was very irritating, very wearing, not to know. She tried a great
many ways of finding out, but she did not succeed. Mr. Mountford was on
his guard, and kept his own counsel. He told her of Heathcote’s
proposal, but he did not tell her what he himself meant to do. And how
it was that her husband was so indifferent to Heathcote’s proposal Mrs.
Mountford could not understand. She herself, though not a Mountford
born, felt her heart beat at the suggestion. ‘Of course you will jump at
it?’ she said.
‘I do not feel in the least disposed to jump at it. If there had been a
boy, it might have been different.’ Mrs. Mountford always felt that in
this there was an inferred censure upon herself--how unjust a censure it
is unnecessary to say: of course she would have had a boy if she
could--of that there could be no question.
‘A boy is not everything,’ she said. ‘It would be just the same thing if
Anne’s husband took the name.’
‘Don’t speak to me of Anne’s husband,’ he cried, almost with passion. ‘I
forbid you to say a word to me of Anne’s affairs.’
‘St. John! what can you mean? It would be barbarous of me, it would be
unchristian,’ cried the much-exercised mother, trying hard to do her
duty, ‘not to speak of Anne’s affairs. Probably the man you object to
will never be her husband; probably----’
‘That is enough, Letitia. I want to hear nothing more upon the subject.
Talk of anything else you like, but I will have nothing said about
Anne.’
‘Then you are doing wrong,’ she cried, with a little real indignation.
After this her tone changed in a moment: something like bitterness stole
into it. ‘It shows how much more you are thinking of Anne than of anyone
else. You are rejecting Mount because you don’t choose that she should
be the heir. You forget you have got another child.’
‘Forget I have got another child! It is the first subject of my
thoughts.’
‘Ah, yes, perhaps so far as the money is concerned. Of course if Anne
does not have it, there is nobody but Rose who could have any right to
it. But you don’t think your youngest daughter good enough to have
anything to do with Mount. I see very well how it is, though you don’t
choose to explain.’
‘If that is how you prefer to look at it,’ he said; but at this moment a
budget of papers arrived from Hunston by a special messenger, and Mrs.
Mountford withdrew perforce. She was in a very irritable condition, as
all the house knew, ready to find fault with everything. Perhaps it was
rather an advantage to her to have a grievance, and to be able to
reproach her husband with preferring in his heart the elder to the
younger, even when he was preferring the younger to the elder in this
new will. ‘There will never be any question of _my_ child’s husband
taking the name, that is very clear,’ she said to herself, with much
vehemence, nursing her wrath to keep it warm, and thus escaping from the
question of injustice to Anne. And again it occurred to her, but with
more force than before, that to announce to her husband that Rose was
going to marry Heathcote Mountford would be a delightful triumph. She
would thus be Mrs. Mountford of Mount in spite of him, and the victory
would be sweet. But even this did not seem to progress as it appeared to
do at first. Heathcote, too, seemed to be becoming interested in Anne:
as if that could advantage him! when it was clear that Anne was ready to
lose everything, and was risking everything, every day, for that other!
Altogether Mrs. Mountford’s position was not a comfortable one. To know
so much and yet to know so little was very hard to bear.
Her husband had a still harder life as being a free agent, and having
the whole weight of the decision upon his shoulders. It was not to be
supposed that he could free himself entirely from all sense of guilt
towards the child whom in his heart he loved most. He had resolved to
punish her and he clung to his resolution with all the determination of
a narrow mind. He had said that she should never marry the man who was
nobody, that if she held by him he would give her fortune to Rose. And
she did hold by him, with an obstinacy equal to his own. Was it possible
that he should bear this and give her reason to laugh at his words as
mere sound and fury signifying nothing? No, whatever he might have to
suffer for it, no! Perhaps, however, the great secret of Mr. Mountford’s
obstinate adherence to a determination which he could not but know to be
unjust and cruel--and of many more of the cruelties and eccentricities
that people perpetrate by their wills--lay in the fact that, after all,
though he took so much trouble to make his will, he had not the
slightest intention of dying. If a man does not die, a monstrous will is
no more than an angry letter--a thing which wounds and vexes, perhaps,
and certainly is intended to wound and vex, and which suffices to blow
off a great deal of the steam of family quarrels; but which does no real
harm to anybody, in that there is plenty of time to change it, and to
make all right again some time or other. Another thing which assisted
him in getting over his own doubts and disquietudes was the strenuous,
almost violent, opposition of Mr. Loseby, who did not indeed refuse at
last to carry out his wishes, but did so with so many protests and
remonstrances that Mr. Mountford’s spirit was roused, and he forgot the
questionings of his own conscience in the determination to defend
himself against those of this other man who had, he declared to himself,
nothing whatever to do with it, and no right to interfere. Could not a
man do what he would with his own? The money was his own, the land his
own, and his children too were his own. Who else had anything to do with
the arrangements he chose to make for them? It was of his grace and
favour if he gave them his money at all. He was not bound to do so. It
was all his: he was not responsible to any mortal; it was a pretty
piece of impudence that Loseby should venture to take so much upon him.
This opposition of Loseby’s did him all the good in the world. It set
him right with himself. But still those packets of papers, always
accompanied by a letter, were annoying to him. ‘I send you the draft of
the new codicil, but you must allow me to observe----’ ‘I return draft
with the corrections you have made, but I must once more entreat you to
pause and reconsider----’ What did the old fellow mean? Did he think he
had any right to speak--a country attorney, a mere man of business? To
be sure he was an old friend--nobody said he was not an old friend; but
the oldest friend in the world should know his own place, and should not
presume too far. If Loseby thought that now, when matters had gone this
length, _his_ representations would have any effect, he was indeed
making a mistake. Before pen had been put to paper Mr. Mountford might
perhaps have reconsidered the matter; but now, and in apparent deference
to _Loseby_! this was a complaisance which was impossible.
The whole house was agitated by these proceedings, though publicly not a
word was said nor an allusion made to them. Anne even, absolutely
disinterested as she was, and full of a fine, but alas! quite
unreasonable contempt for fortune--the contempt of one who had no
understanding of the want of it--felt it affect her in, as she thought,
the most extraordinary and unworthy way. She was astonished at herself.
After all, she reflected, with a sense of humiliation, how much power
must those external circumstances have on the mind, when she, whose
principles and sentiments were all so opposed to their influence, could
be thus moved by the possible loss of a little land or a little money!
It was pitiful: but she could not help it, and she felt herself humbled
to the very dust. In the fulness of her heart she wrote an account of
all that was happening to Cosmo, reproaching herself, yet trying to
account for her weakness. ‘It cannot be the mere loss of the wealth that
affects me,’ Anne wrote. ‘I cannot believe so badly of myself, and I
hope--I hope--you will not think so badly of me. It must be (don’t you
think?) the pain of feeling that my father thinks so little of me as to
put upon me this public mark of his displeasure. I say to myself, dear
Cosmo, that this must be the cause of the very unquestionable pain I
feel; and I hope you will think so too, and not, that it is the actual
money I care for. And, then, there is the humiliation of being put
second--I who have always been first. I never thought there was so much
in seniority, in all those little superiorities which I suppose we plume
ourselves upon without knowing it. I can’t bear the idea of being
second, I suppose. And then there is the uncertainty, the sense of
something that is going on, in which one is so closely concerned, but
which one does not know, and the feeling that others are better
informed, and that one is being talked of, and the question discussed
how one will bear it. As if it mattered! but I acknowledge with
humiliation that it does matter, that I care a great deal more than I
ever thought I cared--that I am a much poorer creature than I believed I
was. I scorn myself, but I hope my Cosmo will not scorn me. You know the
world better, and the heart which is pettier than one likes to think.
Perhaps it is women only that are the victims of these unworthy
sentiments. I cannot think of you as being moved by them; perhaps what
is said of us is true, and we are only “like moonlight unto sunlight,
and like water unto wine.” But these are far too pretty comparisons if I
am right. However, heaven be praised, there is the happiness of feeling
that, if I am but after all a mean and interested creature, there is you
to fall back upon, who are so different. O Cosmo mio, what would the
world be now if I had not you to fall back upon (I like these words!),
and lean against and feel myself doubled, or so much more than doubled,
and propped up by you. I feel already a little better for getting this
off my mind and telling you what I have found out in myself, and how
ashamed I am by my discoveries. You have “larger, other eyes” than mine,
and you will understand me, and excuse me, and put me right.’
Cosmo Douglas received this letter in his chambers, to which he had now
gone back. He read it with a sort of consternation. First, the news it
convened was terrible, making an end of all his hopes; and second, this
most ill-timed and unnecessary self-accusation was more than his common
sense could put up with. It was not that the glamour of love was wearing
off, for he still loved Anne truly; but that anyone in her senses could
write so about money was inconceivable to him. Could there be a more
serious predicament? and yet here was she apologising to him for feeling
it, making believe that he would not feel it. Is she a fool? he said to
himself--he was exasperated, though he loved her. And in his reply he
could not but in some degree betray this feeling.
‘My dearest,’ he said, ‘I don’t understand how you can blame yourself.
The feelings you express are most natural. It is very serious, very
painful--infinitely painful to me, that it is my love and the tie which
binds us which has brought this upon you. What am I to say to my dear
love? Give me up, throw me over? I will bear anything rather than that
you should suffer; but I know your generous heart too well to imagine
that you will do this. If you were “petty,” as you call yourself (heaven
forgive you for such blasphemy!) I could almost be tempted to advise you
to have recourse to--what shall I call it?--strategy--one of the
fictions that are said to be all fair in love and war. I could do this
myself, I am afraid, so little is there in me of the higher sentiment
you give me credit for. Rather than that you should lose your
birthright, if it were only my happiness that was concerned, I would
take myself out of the way, I would give up the sweet intercourse which
is life to me, and hope for better days to come. And if you should
decide to do this, I will accept whatever you decide, my darling, with
full trust in you that you will not forget me, that the sun may shine
for me again. Will you do this, my Anne? Obey your father, and let me
take my chance: it will be better that than to be the cause of so much
suffering to you. But even in saying this I feel that I will wound your
tender heart, your fine sense of honour: what can I say? Sacrifice me,
my dearest, if you can steel your heart to the possibility of being
unkind. I would be a poor wretch, indeed, unworthy the honour you have
done me, if I could not trust you and bide my time.’
This letter was very carefully composed and with much thought. If Anne
could but have been made a convert to the code that all is fair in love,
what a relief it would have been; or if she could have divined the
embarrassment that a portionless bride, however much he loved her, would
be to Cosmo! But, on the other hand, there was no certainty that, even
if the worst came to the worst, she would be a portionless bride; and
the chances of alarming her, and bringing about a revulsion of feeling,
were almost more dreadful than the chances of losing her fortune. It
wanted very delicate steering to hit exactly the right passage between
those dangers, and Cosmo was far from confident that he had hit it. A
man with a practical mind and a real knowledge of the world has a great
deal to go through when he has to deal with the absolute in the person
of a young inexperienced and high-flown girl, altogether ignorant of the
world. And, as a matter of fact, the letter did not please Anne. It gave
her that uneasy sense of coming in contact with new agencies, powers
unknown, not to be judged by her previous canons, which is one of the
first disenchantments of life. How to lie and yet not be guilty of lying
was a new science to her. She did not understand that casuistry of love,
which makes it a light offence to deceive. She understood the art of
taking her own way, but that of giving up her own way, and yet resolving
to have it all the same, was beyond her power. What they wanted her to
do was to deceive her father, to wait--surely the most terrible of all
meanness--till he should be dead and then break her promise to him. This
was what Heathcote had advised, and now Cosmo--Cosmo himself replied to
her when she threw herself upon him for support, in the same sense. A
chill of disappointment, discouragement, came over her. If this was the
best thing to be done, it seemed to Anne that her own folly was better
than their wisdom. Had she been told that love and a stout heart and two
against the world were better than lands or wealth, she would have felt
herself strong enough for any heroism. But this dash of cold water in
her face confounded her. What did they mean by telling her to obey her
father? he had not asked for obedience. He had said, ‘If you do not give
up this man, I will take your fortune from you,’ and she had proudly
accepted the alternative. That was all; and was she to go back to him
now, to tell him a lie, and with a mental reservation say, ‘I prefer my
fortune; I have changed my mind; I will give him up?’ Anne knew that she
could not have survived the utter scorn of herself which would have been
her portion had she done this. Were it necessary to do it, the proud
girl would have waited till the other sacrifice was completed, till her
father had fulfilled his threat. Cosmo’s letter gave her a chill in the
very warmth of her unbounded faith in him. She would not allow to
herself that he did not understand her, that he had failed of what she
expected from him. This was honour, no doubt, from his point of view;
but she felt a chill sense of loneliness, a loss of that power of
falling back upon an unfailing support which she had so fondly and
proudly insisted on. She was subdued in her courage and pride and
confidence. And yet this was not all that Anne had to go through.
It was Mr. Loseby who was the next operator upon her disturbed and
awakening thoughts. One wintry afternoon when November had begun, he
drove over to Mount in his little phaeton with a blue bag on the seat
beside him. ‘Don’t say anything to your master yet, Saymore,’ he said,
when he got down, being familiar with all the servants, and the habits
of the house, as if it had been his own. ‘Do you think you could manage
to get me a few words privately with Miss Anne?’
‘If I might make bold to ask, sir,’ said Saymore, ‘is it true as there
is something up about Miss Anne? Things is said and things is ‘inted,
and we’re interested, and we don’t know what to think. Is it along of
_that_ gentleman, Mr. Loseby? Master is set against the match, I know as
much as that.’
‘I dare say you’re right,’ said the lawyer. ‘An old family servant like
you, Saymore, sees many things that the rest of the world never guess
at. Hold your tongue about it, old fellow, that’s all I’ve got to say.
And try whether you can bring me to speech of Miss Anne. Don’t let
anyone else know. You can manage it, I feel sure.’
‘I’ll try, sir,’ Saymore said, and he went through the house on tiptoe
from room to room, looking for his young mistress, with the air of a
conspirator in an opera, doing everything he could to betray himself.
When he found her, he stole behind a large screen, and made mysterious
gestures which everybody saw. ‘What is it, Saymore?’ asked Anne. Then
Saymore pointed downstairs, with jerks over his shoulder, and much
movement of his eyebrows. ‘There’s somebody, Miss Anne, as wants a word
with you,’ he said, with the deepest meaning. Anne’s heart began to
beat. Could it be Cosmo come boldly, in person, to comfort her? She was
in the billiard-room with Rose and Heathcote. She put down the cue which
she had been using with very little energy or interest, and followed the
old man to the hall. ‘Who is it, Saymore?’ she asked tremulously. ‘It’s
some one that’s come for your good. I hope you’ll listen to him, Miss
Anne, I hope you’ll listen to him.’ Anne’s heart was in her mouth. If he
should have come so far to see her, to support her, to make up for the
deficiency of his letter! She seemed to tread on air as she went down
the long passages. And it was only Mr. Loseby after all!
The disappointment made her heart sink. She could scarcely speak to him.
It was like falling down to earth from the skies. But Mr. Loseby did not
notice this. He put his arm into hers as the rector did, with a fatherly
familiarity, and drew her to the large window full of the greyness of
the pale and misty November sky. ‘I have something to say to you, my
dear Miss Anne--something that is of consequence. My dear, do you know
anything about the business that brings me here?’
‘I know--that my father is making some alteration in his will, Mr.
Loseby. I don’t know any more--why should I?--I do not see why I should
believe that it has anything to do with me.’
‘Anne, my dear, I can’t betray your father’s secrets; but I am afraid it
has something to do with you. Now look here, my dear girl--why it is
not so long since you used to sit on my knee! Tell me what this is,
which has made you quarrel with papa----’
‘Mr. Loseby!--I--do not know that I have quarrelled with my father----’
‘Don’t be so stern, my dear child. Call him papa. After all he is your
papa, Anne. Who was so fond of you when you were a tiny creature? I
remember you a baby in his arms, poor man! when he lost his first wife,
before he married again. Your mother died so young, and broke his life
in two. That is terribly hard upon a man. Think of him in that light, my
dear. He was wrapped up in you when you were a baby. Come! let me go to
him, an old friend, your very oldest friend, and say you are ready to
make it up.’
‘To make it up?--but it is not a quarrel--not anything like a quarrel.’
‘Yes, yes, it is--I know better. Only say that you will do nothing
without his consent; that you will form no engagement; that you will
give up corresponding and all that. You ought to, my dear; it is your
duty. And when it will save you from what would inconvenience you all
your life! What, Anne, you are not going to be offended with what I say,
your oldest friend?’
‘Mr. Loseby, you do not understand,’ she said. She had attempted, in her
impatience, to withdraw her arm from his. ‘He said “Give up”--I do not
wish to conceal who it is--“give up Mr. Douglas, or I will take away
your portion and give it to your sister.” What could I say? Could I show
so little faith in the choice I had made--so little--so little--regard
for the gentleman I am going to marry, as to say, “I prefer my fortune?”
I will not do it; it would be falsehood and baseness. This is all the
alternative I have ever had. It is like saying, “Your money or your
life”----’
‘In that case one gives the money, Anne, to save the life.’
‘And so I have done,’ she said, proudly. ‘Dear Mr. Loseby, I don’t want
to vex you. I don’t want to quarrel with anyone. Can I say, when it is
not true--“I have changed my mind, I like the money best?” Don’t you see
that I could not do that? then what can I do?’
‘You can give in, my dear, you can give in,’ repeated the lawyer. ‘No
use for entering into particulars. So long as you authorise me to say
you give in--that is all, I am sure, that is needful. Don’t turn me off,
Anne--give me the pleasure of reconciling you, my dear.’
Mr. Loseby had always given himself out as one of Anne’s adorers. His
eyes glistened with the moisture in them. He pressed her arm within his.
‘Come, my dear! I never was a father myself, which I have always
regretted; but I have known you all your life. Let me do you a good
turn--let me put a stop to all this nonsense, and tell him you will make
it up.’
Anne’s heart had sunk very low; with one assault of this kind after
another she was altogether discouraged. She did not seem to care what
she said, or what interpretation was put upon her words. ‘You may say
what you please,’ she said. ‘I will make it up, if you please: but what
does that mean, Mr. Loseby? I will give up writing, if he wishes it--but
how can I give up the--gentleman I am engaged to? Do you think I want to
quarrel? Oh, no, no--but what can I do? Give up!--I have no right. He
has my promise and I have his. Can I sell that for money?’ cried Anne,
indignantly. ‘I will do whatever papa pleases--except that.’
‘You are making him do a dreadful injustice, Anne. Come, what does this
young fellow say? Does he not want to release you, to save you from
suffering? does he hold you to your promise in the face of such a loss?
An honourable young man would tell you: never mind me----’
Anne detached her arm with a little energy from his. ‘Why should you
torment me?’ she cried. ‘An honourable man?--is it honour, then, to
prefer, as you said yourself, one’s money to one’s life?’
‘My dear child, money is always there, it is always to be relied upon;
it is a strong back, whatever happens--whereas this, that you call
life----!’ cried Mr. Loseby, spreading out his hands and lifting up his
eyebrows; he had chosen the very image she had herself used when writing
to her lover. Was this then what they all thought, that wealth was the
best thing to fall back upon? She smiled, but it was a smile of pain.
‘If I thought so, I should not care either for the life or the money,’
she said.
Mr. Loseby held up his hands once more. He shook his shining little bald
head, and took up his blue bag from the table. ‘You are as obstinate, as
pig-headed, the whole family of you--one worse than another,’ he said.