THE FIRST INTERVIEW.
For some days after the intimation of her mother's purpose, Lady Anna
kept her bed. She begged that she might not see a doctor. She had a
headache,--nothing but a headache. But it was quite impossible that
she should ever marry Earl Lovel. This she said whenever her mother
would revert to that subject,--"I have not seen him, mamma; I do not
know him. I am sure it would be impossible." Then, when at last she
was induced to dress herself, she was still unwilling to be forced to
undergo the interview to which she had acknowledged that she must be
subjected. At last she consented to spend a day in Bedford Square; to
dine there, and to be brought home in the evening. The Countess was
at this time not very full of trust in the Serjeant, having learned
that he was opposed to the marriage scheme, but she was glad that her
daughter should be induced to go out, even to the Serjeant's house,
as after that visit the girl could have no ground on which to oppose
the meeting which was to be arranged. She could hardly plead that she
was too ill to see her cousin when she had dined with Mrs. Bluestone.
During this time many plans had been proposed for the meeting. The
Solicitor-General, discussing the matter with the young lord, had
thought it best that Lady Anna should at once be asked down to
Yoxham,--as the Lady Anna; and the young lord would have been quite
satisfied with such an arrangement. He could have gone about his
obligatory wooing among his own friends, in the house to which he had
been accustomed, with much more ease than in a London lodging. But
his uncle, who had corresponded on the subject with Mr. Hardy, still
objected. "We should be giving up everything," he said, "if we were
once to call her Lady Anna. Where should we be then if they didn't
hit it off together? I don't believe, and I never shall believe, that
she is really Lady Anna Lovel." The Solicitor-General, when he heard
of this objection, shook his head, finding himself almost provoked to
anger. What asses were these people not to understand that he could
see further into the matter than they could do, and that their best
way out of their difficulty would be frankly to open their arms to
the heiress! Should they continue to be pig-headed and prejudiced,
everything would soon be gone.
Then he had a scheme for inviting the girl to his own house, and to
that scheme he obtained his wife's consent. But here his courage
failed him; or, it might be fairer to say, that his prudence
prevailed. He was very anxious, intensely eager, so to arrange this
great family dispute that all should be benefited,--believing, nay
feeling positively certain that all concerned in the matter were
honest; but he must not go so far as to do himself an absolute and
grievous damage, should it at last turn out that he was wrong in any
of his surmises. So that plan was abandoned.
There was nothing left for it but that the young Earl should himself
face the difficulty, and be introduced to the girl at the lodging in
Wyndham Street. But, as a prelude to this, a meeting was arranged
at Mr. Flick's chambers between the Countess and her proposed
son-in-law. That the Earl should go to his own attorney's chambers
was all in rule. While he was there the Countess came,--which was not
in rule, and almost induced the Serjeant to declare, when he heard
it, that he would have nothing more to do with the case. "My lord,"
said the Countess, "I am glad to meet you, and I hope that we may be
friends." The young man was less collected, and stammered out a few
words that were intended to be civil.
"It is a pity that you should have conflicting interests," said the
attorney.
"I hope it need not continue to be so," said the Countess. "My heart,
Lord Lovel, is all in the welfare of our joint family. We will
begrudge you nothing if you will not begrudge us the names which
are our own, and without which we cannot live honourably before
the world." Then some other few words were muttered, and the Earl
promised to come to Wyndham Street at a certain hour. Not a word
was then said about the marriage. Even the Countess, with all her
resolution and all her courage, did not find herself able in set
terms to ask the young man to marry her daughter.
"She is a very handsome woman," said the lord to the attorney, when
the Countess had left them.
"Yes, indeed."
"And like a lady."
"Quite like a lady. She herself was of a good family."
"I suppose she certainly was the late Earl's wife, Mr. Flick?"
"Who can say, my lord? That is just the question. The
Solicitor-General thinks that she would prove her right, and I do
not know that I have ever found him to be wrong when he has had a
steadfast opinion."
"Why should we not give it up to her at once?"
"I couldn't recommend that, my lord. Why should we give it up? The
interests at stake are very great. I couldn't for a moment think of
suggesting to you to give it up."
"I want nothing, Mr. Flick, that does not belong to me."
"Just so. But then perhaps it does belong to you. We can never
be sure. No doubt the safest way will be for you to contract an
alliance with this lady. Of course we should give it up then, but the
settlements would make the property all right." The young Earl did
not quite like it. He would rather have commenced his wooing after
the girl had been established in her own right, and when she would
have had no obligation on her to accept him. But he had consented,
and it was too late for him now to recede. It had been already
arranged that he should call in Wyndham Street at noon on the
following day, in order that he might be introduced to his cousin.
On that evening the Countess sat late with her daughter, purposing
that on the morrow nothing should be said before the interview
calculated to disturb the girl's mind. But as they sat together
through the twilight and into the darkness of night, close by the
open window, through which the heavily laden air of the metropolis
came to them, hot with all the heat of a London July day, very many
words were spoken by the Countess. "It will be for you, to-morrow, to
make or to mar all that I have been doing since the day on which you
were born."
"Oh! mamma, that is so terrible a thing to say!"
"But terrible things must be said if they are true. It is so. It is
for you to decide whether we shall triumph, or be utterly and for
ever crushed."
"I cannot understand it. Why should we be crushed? He would not wish
to marry me if this fortune were not mine. He is not coming, mamma,
because he loves me."
"You say that because you do not understand. Do you suppose that my
name will be allowed to me if you should refuse your cousin's suit?
If so, you are very much mistaken. The fight will go on, and as we
have not money, we shall certainly go to the wall at last. Why should
you not love him? There is no one else that you care for."
"No, mamma," she said slowly.
"Then, what more can you want?"
"I do not know him, mamma."
"But you will know him. According to that, no girl would ever get
married. Is it not a great thing that you should be asked to assume
and to enjoy the rank which has belonged to your mother, but which
she has never been able to enjoy?"
"I do not think, mamma, that I care much about rank."
"Anna!" The mother's mind as she heard this flew off to the young
tailor. Had misery so great as this overtaken her after all?
"I mean that I don't care so much about it. It has never done us any
good."
"But if it is a thing that is your own, that you are born to, you
must bear it, whether it be in sorrow or in joy; whether it be a
blessing or a curse. If it be yours, you cannot fling it away from
you. You may disgrace it, but you must still have it. Though you were
to throw yourself away upon a chimney-sweeper, you must still be Lady
Anna, the daughter of Earl Lovel."
"I needn't call myself so."
"Others must call you so. It is your name, and you cannot be rid of
it. It is yours of right, as my name has been mine of right; and not
to assert it, not to live up to it, not to be proud of it, would
argue incredible baseness. 'Noblesse oblige.' You have heard that
motto, and know what it means. And then would you throw away from you
in some childish phantasy all that I have been struggling to win for
you during my whole life? Have you ever thought of what my life has
been, Anna?"
"Yes, mamma."
"Would you have the heart to disappoint me, now that the victory is
won;--now that it may be made our own by your help? And what is it
that I am asking you to do? If this man were bad,--if he were such a
one as your father, if he were drunken, cruel, ill-conditioned, or
even heavy, foolish, or deformed; had you been told stories to set
you against him, as that he had been false with other women, I could
understand it. In that case we would at any rate find out the truth
before we went on. But of this man we hear that he is good, and
pleasant; an excellent young man, who has endeared himself to all who
know him. Such a one that all the girls of his own standing in the
world would give their eyes to win him."
"Let some girl win him then who cares for him."
"But he wishes to win you, dearest."
"Not because he loves me. How can he love me when he never saw me?
How can I love him when I never saw him?"
"He wishes to win you because he has heard what you are, and because
he knows that by doing so he can set things right which for many
years have been wrong."
"It is because he would get all this money."
"You would both get it. He desires nothing unfair. Whatever he
takes from you, so much he will give. And it is not only for this
generation. Is it nothing to you that the chiefs of your own family
who shall come after you shall be able to hold their heads up among
other British peers? Would you not wish that your own son should come
to be Earl Lovel, with wealth sufficient to support the dignity?"
"I don't think it would make him happy, mamma."
"There is something more in this, Anna, than I can understand. You
used not to be so. When we talked of these things in past years you
used not to be indifferent."
"I was not asked then to--to--marry a man I did not care for."
"There is something else, Anna."
"No, mamma."
"If there be nothing else you will learn to care for him. You will
see him to-morrow, and will be left alone with him. I will sit with
you for a time, and then I will leave you. All that I ask of you is
to receive him to-morrow without any prejudice against him. You must
remember how much depends on you, and that you are not as other girls
are." After that Lady Anna was allowed to go to her bed, and to weep
in solitude over the wretchedness of her condition. It was not only
that she loved Daniel Thwaite with all her heart,--loved him with
a love that had grown with every year of her growth;--but that she
feared him also. The man had become her master; and even could she
have brought herself to be false, she would have lacked the courage
to declare her falsehood to the man to whom she had vowed her love.
On the following morning Lady Anna did not come down to breakfast,
and the Countess began to fear that she would be unable to induce her
girl to rise in time to receive their visitor. But the poor child had
resolved to receive the man's visit, and contemplated no such escape
as that. At eleven o'clock she slowly dressed herself, and before
twelve crept down into the one sitting-room which they occupied. The
Countess glanced round at her, anxious to see that she was looking
her best. Certain instructions had been given as to her dress, and
the garniture of her hair, and the disposal of her ribbons. All
these had been fairly well obeyed; but there was a fixed, determined
hardness in her face which made her mother fear that the Earl might
be dismayed. The mother knew that her child had never looked like
that before.
Punctually at twelve the Earl was announced. The Countess received
him very pleasantly, and with great composure. She shook hands with
him as though they had known each other all their lives, and then
introduced him to her daughter with a sweet smile. "I hope you will
acknowledge her as your far-away cousin, my lord. Blood, they say, is
thicker than water; and, if so, you two ought to be friends."
"I am sure I hope we may be," said the Earl.
"I hope so too,--my lord," said the girl, as she left her hand quite
motionless in his.
"We heard of you down in Cumberland," said the Countess. "It is
long since I have seen the old place, but I shall never forget it.
There is not a bush among the mountains there that I shall not
remember,--ay, into the next world, if aught of our memories are left
to us."
"I love the mountains; but the house is very gloomy."
"Gloomy indeed. If you found it sad, what must it have been to me? I
hope that I may tell you some day of all that I suffered there. There
are things to tell of which I have never yet spoken to human being.
She, poor child, has been too young and too tender to be troubled
by such a tale. I sometimes think that no tragedy ever written, no
story of horrors ever told, can have exceeded in description the
things which I endured in that one year of my married life." Then
she went on at length, not telling the details of that terrible year,
but speaking generally of the hardships of her life. "I have never
wondered, Lord Lovel, that you and your nearest relations should have
questioned my position. A bad man had surrounded me with such art in
his wickedness, that it has been almost beyond my strength to rid
myself of his toils." All this she had planned beforehand, having
resolved that she would rush into the midst of things at once, and if
possible enlist his sympathies on her side.
"I hope it may be over now," he said.
"Yes," she replied, rising slowly from her seat, "I hope it may be
over now." The moment had come in which she had to play the most
difficult stroke of her whole game, and much might depend on the way
in which she played it. She could not leave them together, walking
abruptly out of the room, without giving some excuse for so unusual
a proceeding. "Indeed, I hope it may be over now, both for us and
for you, Lord Lovel. That wicked man, in leaving behind such cause
of quarrel, has injured you almost as deeply as us. I pray God that
you and that dear girl there may so look into each other's hearts
and trust each other's purposes, that you may be able to set right
the ill which your predecessor did. If so, the family of Lovel for
centuries to come may be able to bless your names." Then with slow
steps she left the room.
Lady Anna had spoken one word, and that was all. It certainly was not
for her now to speak. She sat leaning on the table, with her eyes
fixed upon the ground, not daring to look at the man who had been
brought to her as her future husband. A single glance she had taken
as he entered the room, and she had seen at once that he was fair
and handsome, that he still had that sweet winsome boyishness of
face which makes a girl feel that she need not fear a man,--that the
man has something of her own weakness, and need not be treated as
one who is wise, grand, or heroic. And she saw too in one glance
how different he was from Daniel Thwaite, the man to whom she had
absolutely given herself;--and she understood at the moment something
of the charm of luxurious softness and aristocratic luxury. Daniel
Thwaite was swarthy, hard-handed, blackbearded,--with a noble fire
in his eyes, but with an innate coarseness about his mouth which
betokened roughness as well as strength. Had it been otherwise with
her than it was, she might, she thought, have found it easy enough to
love this young earl. As it was, there was nothing for her to do but
to wait and answer him as best she might.
"Lady Anna," he said.
"My lord!"
"Will it not be well that we should be friends?"
"Oh,--friends;--yes, my lord."
"I will tell you all and everything;--that is, about myself. I was
brought up to believe that you and your mother were just--impostors."
"My lord, we are not impostors."
"No;--I believe it. I am sure you are not. Mistakes have been made,
but it has not been of my doing. As a boy, what could I believe but
what I was told? I know now that you are and always have been as you
have called yourself. If nothing else comes of it, I will at any rate
say so much. The estate which your father left is no doubt yours. If
I could hinder it, there should be no more law."
"Thank you, my lord."
"Your mother says that she has suffered much. I am sure she has
suffered. I trust that all that is over now. I have come here to-day
more to say that on my own behalf than anything else." A shadow of a
shade of disappointment, the slightest semblance of a cloud, passed
across her heart as she heard this. But it was well. She could not
have married him, even if he had wished it, and now, as it seemed,
that difficulty was over. Her mother and those lawyers had been
mistaken, and it was well that he should tell her so at once.
"It is very good of you, my lord."
"I would not have you think of me that I could come to you hoping
that you would promise me your love before I had shown you whether I
had loved you or not."
"No, my lord." She hardly understood him now,--whether he intended to
propose himself as a suitor for her hand or not.
"You, Lady Anna, are your father's heir. I am your cousin, Earl
Lovel, as poor a peer as there is in England. They tell me that we
should marry because you are rich and I am an earl."
"So they tell me;--but that will not make it right."
"I would not have it so, even if I dared to think that you would
agree to it."
"Oh, no, my lord; nor would I."
"But if you could learn to love me--"
"No, my lord;--no."
"Do not answer me yet, my cousin. If I swore that I loved you,--loved
you so soon after seeing you,--and loved you, too, knowing you to be
so wealthy an heiress--"
"Ah, do not talk of that."
"Well;--not of that. But if I said that I loved you, you would not
believe me."
"It would not be true, my lord."
"But I know that I shall love you. You will let me try? You are very
lovely, and they tell me you are sweet-humoured. I can believe well
that you are sweet and pleasant. You will let me try to love you,
Anna?"
"No, my lord."
"Must it be so, so soon?"
"Yes, my lord."
"Why that? Is it because we are strangers to each other? That may
be cured;--if not quickly, as I would have it cured, slowly and by
degrees; slowly as you can wish, if only I may come where you shall
be. You have said that we may be friends."
"Oh yes,--friends, I hope."
"Friends at least. We are born cousins."
"Yes, my lord."
"Cannot you call me by my name? Cousins, you know, do so. And
remember this, you will have and can have no nearer cousin than I am.
I am bound at least to be a brother to you."
"Oh, be my brother!"
"That,--or more than that. I would fain be more than that. But I will
be that, at least. As I came to you, before I saw you, I felt that
whenever we knew each other I could not be less to you than that. If
I am your friend, I must be your best friend,--as being, though poor,
the head of your family. The Lovels should at least love each other;
and cousins may love, even though they should not love enough to be
man and wife."
"I will love you so always."
"Enough to be my wife?"
"Enough to be your dear cousin,--your loving sister."
"So it shall be,--unless it can be more. I would not ask you for more
now. I would not wish you to give more now. But think of me, and ask
yourself whether you can dare to give yourself to me altogether."
"I cannot dare, my lord."
"You would not call your brother, lord. My name is Frederic. But
Anna, dear Anna,"--and then he took her unresisting hand,--"you shall
not be asked for more now. But cousins, new-found cousins, who love
each other, and will stand by each other for help and aid against
the world, may surely kiss,--as would a brother and a sister. You
will not grudge me a kiss." Then she put up her cheek innocently,
and he kissed it gently,--hardly with a lover's kiss. "I will leave
you now," he said, still holding her hand. "But tell your mother
thus:--that she shall no longer be troubled by lawyers at the suit of
her cousin Frederic. She is to me the Countess Lovel, and she shall
be treated by me with the honour suited to her rank." And so he left
the house without seeing the Countess again.