During the early weeks of their marriage Lord Hurdly, while changing
his attitude from the solicitude of the pursuer to the masterfulness
of the possessor, had certainly made some effort to win Bettina,
while she, on her part, had tried to oblige him by responding to his
professions for her. Both were aware that this effort had been made
on both sides, and that it had quite failed. By the time the
honey-moon was over, Lord Hurdly had, to all appearance, ceased to
care. The consciousness of this was an immense relief to Bettina, and
she had felt ever since that in doing him credit in the eyes of the
world she would satisfy his first object in having her for a wife. In
this she had not failed. There was a distinct estrangement between
them, but it had never been necessary to define it. Whatever
disagreements there had been, only themselves were aware of. Lord
Hurdly would have felt his authority over her incomplete indeed if
he had ever had to assert it in public.
As for Bettina, a singular change of feeling was going on within her.
She had made her test of the world, and found that she had overrated
its power to please. It was almost appalling to reflect that there
was no more for her to do than to repeat what she had already done.
Another London season, another autumn in receiving and making visits,
another winter abroad. What then? Was there nothing but material
pleasure for her in the world? She wanted something more, something
different from all this.
One morning she went out into the park, where spring was just
beginning to put forth its greenery. Leaping footsteps sounded behind
her. It was Comrade, bounding to her side and nestling up against
her. She put her arm around his neck and drew him close. He responded
with an affectionateness that was almost human.
Almost human! At this thought she began to ask herself how much human
affection there was for her in the world. As much, no doubt, she told
herself, as she had to bestow. But why was this?
The birds were going wild with song in the branches above her head.
The grass, the trees, the clouds, the sky, seemed all to have been
made to be part of a world for love to dwell in. A great hunger
possessed her--a hunger not to be loved, but to love. For the first
time she found herself longing for this boon, entirely apart from any
idea of her mother. Oh, to have some one with a human, comprehending,
ardent heart, to put her arms around as she was now clasping
Comrade--some one to whom to offer up the wealth of love which she
had once thought she could never give except to her dear mother; some
one who might make that mother's words come true, that a love far
greater than any she had known might be in store for her; some one,
handsome, charming, ardent, loving, sympathetic, kind; some one to be
friend and brother and lover all in one; above all, some one with
thoughts and feelings akin to her own--some one impulsive and
natural--some one young!
When at last she said good-bye to Comrade and returned to her rooms,
she felt in some strange way that a new era had dawned for her. But
a mood like this was new in her experience, and she fought resolutely
against its recurrence. As an aid to this end she threw herself
more eagerly into the external interests which were so great in
such a position as hers, and became more noted for her splendid
entertainments and rich dressing than she had been the season before.
As she got a deeper insight into the conditions of the life about
her, she saw opportunities for influence and power, even to a woman,
which attracted her. But she was very ignorant. She knew little of
the world and English affairs, and she found the women about her so
well informed on these subjects that she began to feel herself at a
certain disadvantage. This roused her pride, and she set to work to
inform herself on many subjects of which she had hitherto been
ignorant.
One means to this end was the reading of newspapers, and this
occupation now absorbed a part of every morning. In this way she
occasionally came upon Horace Spotswood's name, and when she did, a
strange agitation would possess her. She could not quite shake off an
influence which this man's life seemed to exert upon hers. Lord
Hurdly would have had her believe that she had bestowed a great
benefit upon Horace, as it was through her that he was in the
possession of his present independent fortune, but there was no voice
so strong as the one in her own heart which told her that she had
wronged him. Here and there she had picked up the impressions of
many different people concerning this young diplomatist, and
unquestionably the aggregated effect was one of admiration. The brief
notices of him which she read in the papers confirmed this impression
of him. He was doing well, for a man of his years, in diplomacy, and
he was doing more than well in the work he had undertaken for the
relief of the famine-stricken population near him.
It was Horace's interest in this cause which had given rise to
Bettina's interest in it, and she began to read eagerly all that she
could find on the subject. As a result her heart was, for the first
time in her life, awakened to an intense perception of the suffering
of the world at large. It was a new emotion to her, and one which
throbbed through all her consciousness with a power which changed her
individuality even to herself. She began to think for the first time
of the utter recklessness with which she had been spending the large
sums of money which Lord Hurdly placed at her disposal. Her
expenditure of these sums heretofore had met with his entire
approval, as she could never have too rich a wardrobe to please him.
It was all a part of his own glory and importance, and he never asked
a question as to how the money went.
But now the tide within Bettina's heart had turned. As she read of
the sufferings of these starving people, the thought of her own
excess of luxuriousness sickened her. The more she felt within her
soul that nameless sadness which no outside help could relieve, the
more she felt it urgent upon her to relieve the wants of others when
this assuagement lay within her actual power.
It may seem strange that, with a mother who had a large-hearted
sympathy with all sorrow, Bettina should have kept her own heart so
closed to the suffering outside it; but no seed can sprout until the
soil is prepared for it, and up to this period of her life the ground
of Bettina's heart had been unprepared.
Now, however, all was changed. She went to balls and dinners, as her
position as Lord Hurdly's wife demanded, but her heart was elsewhere.
She began to economize strictly in her personal expenditure, and
collected all the ready money she could lay her hands on, both from
her husband's allowance and from her own small private fortune, and
sent it anonymously to the Indian famine fund.
This contribution was sent in with no other identification than "From
B.," written on the card which accompanied it. How could Bettina
have dreamed that any living soul would connect her with it?
She was not unaware, however, that she was constantly watched by her
husband. Since she had become interested in her new pursuits he
observed her more closely than ever, and on the morning of the
publication in the papers of the special additions to the famine fund
which contained her own subscription Lord Hurdly, with apparently no
reason at all, read the list aloud to her across the breakfast table.
When he came to the item "From B.," he paused and looked at her
searchingly.
Bettina felt her face turn red.
[Illustration: "'THE MONEY WAS PARTLY MY OWN'"]
"I thought so," said her husband, with a strange mixture of
satisfaction and anger in his hard tones. "I have been expecting some
such foolery as this for some time, and I am not blinded to the
motive behind it. What do you care about those devils of Indian
savages? What does Horace Spotswood care about them? Just as little!
Enough, and too much, of my money has gone already to the prolonging
of their worthless lives. If that graceless cub chooses to go on
wasting money on them he can do it, but I take this occasion to
inform you, Lady Hurdly--and I'd advise you to remember what I
say--that I do not choose that any more of my money shall go in that
direction. Do you understand?"
There was an insolence in his tone which he had never used to her
before. She resented it keenly. Rising to her feet, with an instinct
which forbade her to preside over the table at the other end of which
he was seated as master, she said, with a tinge of anger in her quiet
tones:
"The money was partly my own--from my mother's little fortune; and
she would have held, with me, that I could put it to no more holy
use. As to the rest, I understood that that also was my own. I did
not know that you required of me an account of how I used it."
"How you used it? You may light your fire with it, for all I care!
But there is one thing for which I do care, and which I mean to see
nipped in the bud; and that is this ridiculous sentimentality which
you are indulging in over Horace Spotswood. If you are regretting
your young lover, that is your own affair, but when you come to
flaunt this regret before the eyes of the public it becomes my
affair, and as such I propose to put a stop to it."
Bettina trembled with the rage of resentment that possessed her. She
recollected herself enough, however, not to speak until she had
paused long enough to be sure that she could control herself. Then
she said:
"You are forgetting yourself, Lord Hurdly, when you presume to speak
to me as you have just done. I have given you no occasion to do so,
and you know it. If there are certain regrets in my marriage to you,
your present conduct justifies them. But permit me to say, on my
side, that I can imagine no explanation of your behavior, except to
suppose that it proceeds from a consciousness in your own mind of
having wronged this man."
She was looking at him narrowly. His features did not flush, nor did
his cold eyes falter. And yet, in spite of the long habit of
guardedness which now stood him in such good stead, there was a
consciousness about him, like an atmosphere, which told her that her
thrust had drawn blood.
"I thought so!" she said, using the very words which he had used to
her. "I have for a long time been struggling in my mind against a
doubt which sometimes would arise, that I might have been deceived.
Everywhere, in public and in private, that I hear that young man
spoken of, it is with words of confidence, admiration, and
affection."
Still her penetrating gaze was on him, and still he bore it without
flinching.
"You saw the letter," he said, with a sneer. "If that was not enough
for you--" He broke off with a harsh, unpleasant laugh.
"It was enough," she said. "Surely it has sufficed to fix my fate in
life. But it is possible that that letter gave an exaggerated
account. Still, if the half of it was so, I was more than justified
in cutting loose from him. No one could possibly blame me."
"No one does, so far as I can see," was the malicious answer. "I hear
of no complaints from others, and certainly I have uttered none. You
make a very satisfactory Lady Hurdly, and I suppose you get enough
out of the position to repay you for anything you may have lost--at
least, from the world's point of view, you should have done so."
Bettina did not answer at once. A sickness of soul was creeping over
her that made all life look suddenly loathsome. The one feeble ray
that penetrated the darkness in which she felt herself enveloped was
the help that came from a certain ideal which she had recently
enthroned in her own heart. As the world's need, the wider issues
affecting the myriad lives beyond her own, had recently been brought
before her consciousness, she had felt her way, as simply and weakly
as a child might have done, to one plain principle of life--that it
was worth while to try to be good. Never had she felt so keenly as in
this minute the utter futility of hoping to be happy. Yet in this
minute she felt more than ever, also, that happiness was not all.
It was only rarely that she had any personal talk with her husband.
The wall of separation between them seemed to be thickening by silent
accretion all the time. It was very difficult to scale this wall, and
she felt that any effort to do so irked him no less than it did her.
So, with an instinct not to let go the present opportunity, she said,
rather eagerly, as he was rising to go away:
"Sit down a moment. We do not often speak together. I have something
on my mind to say to you."
He resumed his seat and lighted a cigar--an action which discouraged
her by its nonchalance. Still, she was determined to go on. By a
great effort she made her voice very gentle, as she said:
"I know I have disappointed you in what you had hoped from this
marriage between us, and I want to tell you I am very sorry. If I
have not been able to give you the feeling which you desired--"
He interrupted her.
"Feeling?" he said. "Who wants feeling nowadays in a wife? No one
expects it. I wanted some one to make a handsome figure as Lady
Hurdly. I expected that you would do that, and you have not
disappointed me."
"If this is true, I'm glad to know it," she said; "but, at any rate,
you could not blame me for not giving you the love another woman
might have given you. I never deceived you as to that. I told
you I had not that love to give; not--as you have so unjustly
hinted--because I had given it to another man, but because I was then
incapable of love. I had no thought of any one beyond myself. I was
miserably ignorant and egoistic. It was in ignorance and egoism that
I took the position of your wife, but I think from the first that I
have tried, as I could, to fulfil its obligations. I have tried to be
and to appear what you would wish. And I am not unmindful of the
honor and distinction which my marriage to you has conferred upon
me."
"Gad! I should hope not! One of the biggest positions in England!" he
exclaimed, in a tone of scornful irritation. With these words he rose
and left the room.
Bettina's pride was deeply wounded. It had been that new assertion of
the control of duty which had led her to say these things to her
husband. She had conquered much in herself before speaking, and she
felt that she had a right to resent the almost brutal insensibility
with which he had received her words.
As she turned from the breakfast-room and mounted to her own
apartments she felt conscious of a new humiliation in her life. Up to
this time she had believed that Lord Hurdly would have been incapable
of such speech as he had used to her that morning. She had done a
good deal--more than was required of her, she told herself--in
speaking to him as she had done after his words in the early part of
their conversation, and now it seemed plain to her that she had
fulfilled her whole duty toward him, and that if it had done no good,
the fault was on his side and not on hers.
Once in her own rooms, she gave herself up to profoundly sorrowful
thoughts. She was only twenty-two. How long the path of her future
life looked, and whither would it lead? She had attained all that
any woman could desire in the way of the world's bestowment. She did
not underrate the value of this. On the contrary, it was as essential
to one part of her nature as something far different in the way of
human possibility was to another part. She did not lose her hold upon
the actual because she was striving after the unattained. All this
power and admiration was very important to her, though she felt the
insufficiency of mere worldly prosperity. "Pleasure to have it, none;
to lose it, pain," were words that very nearly fitted her state of
mind. At the thought of going back to the obscurity she had come out
of she shrank.