"Or if they sing, 'tis with so dull a cheer,
That leaves look pale, thinking the winter's near."
The visit to the Court being decided on, Miss Kavanagh undertakes life
afresh, with a joyous heart. Lord and Lady Baltimore are the best host
and hostess in the world, and a visit to them means unmixed pleasure
while it lasts. The Court is, indeed, the pleasantest house in the
county, the most desirable in all respects, and the gayest. Yet, strange
and sad to add, happiness has found no bed within its walls.
This is the more remarkable in that the marriage of Lord and Lady
Baltimore had been an almost idealistic one. They had been very much in
love with each other. All the hosts of friends and relations that
belonged to either side had been delighted with the engagement. So many
imprudent marriages were made, so many disastrous ones; but _here_ was a
marriage where birth and money went together, and left no guardians or
parents lamenting. All Belgravia stood still and stared at the young
couple with genuine admiration. It wasn't often that love, pure and
simple, fell into their midst, and such a _satisfactory_ love too! None
of your erratic darts that struck the wrong breasts, and created
confusion for miles round, but a thoroughly proper, respectable winged
arrow that pierced the bosoms of those who might safely be congratulated
on the reception of it.
They had, indeed, been very much in love with each other. Few people
have known such extreme happiness as fell to their lot for two whole
years. They were wrapt up in each other, and when the little son came at
the end of that time, _nothing_ seemed wanted. They grew so strong in
their belief in the immutability of their own relations, one to the
other, that when the blow fell that separated them, it proved a very
lightning-stroke, dividing soul from body.
Lady Baltimore could be at no time called a beautiful woman. But there
is always a charm in her face, a strength, an attractiveness that might
well defy the more material charms of a lovelier woman than herself.
With a soul as pure as her face, and a mind entirely innocent of the
world's evil ways--and the sad and foolish secrets she is compelled to
bear upon her tired bosom from century to century--she took with a
bitter hardness the revelations of her husband's former life before he
married her, related to her by--of course--a devoted friend.
Unfortunately the authority was an undeniable one. It was impossible for
Lady Baltimore to refuse to believe. The past, too, she might have
condoned; though, believing in her husband as she did, it would always
have been bitter to her, but the devoted friend--may all such meet their
just reward!--had not stopped there; she had gone a step further, a
fatal step; she had told her something that had _not_ occurred since
their marriage.
Perhaps the devoted friend believed in her lie, perhaps she did not.
Anyway, the mischief was done. Indeed, from the beginning seeds of
distrust had been laid, and, buried in so young and unlearned a bosom,
had taken a fatal grip.
The more fatal in that there was truth in them. As a fact, Lord
Baltimore had been the hero of several ugly passages in his life. His
early life, certainly; but a young wife who has begun by thinking him
immaculate, would hardly be the one to lay stress upon _that_. And when
her friend, who had tried unsuccessfully to marry Lord Baltimore and had
failed, had in the kindliest spirit, _of course_, opened her eyes to his
misdoings, she had at first passionately refused to listen, then _had_
listened, and after that was ready to listen to anything.
One episode in his past history had been made much of. The sorry heroine
of it had been an actress. This was bad enough, but when the
disinterested friend went on to say that Lord Baltimore had been seen in
her company only so long ago as last week, matters came to a climax.
That was a long time ago from to-day, but the shock when it came
shattered all the sacred feelings in Lady Baltimore's heart. She grew
cold, callous, indifferent. Her mouth, a really beautiful feature, that
used to be a picture of serenity and charity personified, hardened. She
became austere, cold. Not difficult, so much as unsympathetic. She was
still a good hostess, and those who had known her _before_ her
misfortune still loved her. But she made no new friends, and she sat
down within herself, as it were, and gave herself up to her fate, and
would probably have died or grown reckless but for her little son.
And it was _after_ the birth of this beloved child that she had been
told that _her_ husband had again been seen in company with Madame
Istray; _that_ seemed to add fuel to the fire already kindled. She could
not forgive that. It was proof positive of his baseness.
To the young wife it was all a revelation, a horrible one. She had been
so stunned by it, that she, accepted it as it stood, and learning that
the stories of his life _before_ marriage were true, had decided that
the stories told of his life _after_ marriage were true also. She was
young, and youth is always hard.
To her no doubt remained of his infidelity. She had come of a brave old
stock, who, if they could not fight, could at least endure in silence,
and knew well the necessity of keeping her name out of the public mouth.
She kept herself well in hand, therefore, and betrayed nothing of all
she had been feeling. She dismissed her friend with a gentle air,
dignified, yet of sufficient haughtiness to let that astute and now
decidedly repentant lady know that never again would she enter the doors
of the Court, or any other of Lady Baltimore's houses; yet she
restrained herself all through so well that, even until the very end
came, her own husband never knew how horribly she suffered through her
disbelief in him.
He thought her heartless. There was no scandal, no public separation.
She said a word or two to him that told him what she had heard, and when
he tried to explain the truths of that last libel that had declared him
unfaithful to her since her marriage, she had silenced him with so cold,
so scornful, so contemptuous a glance and word, that, chilled and
angered in his turn, he had left her.
Twice afterwards he had sought to explain matters, but it was useless.
She would not listen; the treacherous friend, whom she never betrayed,
had done her work well. Lady Baltimore, though she never forgave _her_,
would not forgive her husband either; she would make no formal attempt
at a separation. Before the world she and he lived together, seemingly
on the best terms; at all events on quite as good terms as most of their
acquaintances; yet all the world knew how it was with them. So long as
there are servants, so long will it be impossible to effectually conceal
our most sacred secrets.
Her friends, when the Baltimores went to visit them, made arrangements
to suit them. It was a pity, everybody said, that such complications
should have arisen, and one would not have expected it from Isabel, but
then she seemed so cold, that probably a climax like that did not affect
her as much as it might another. She was so entirely wrapped up in her
boy--some women were like that--a child sufficed them. And as for Lord
Baltimore--Cyril--why----Judgment was divided here; the women taking his
part, the men hers. The latter finding an attraction hardly to be
defined in her pure, calm, rather impenetrable face, that had yet a
smile so lovely that it could warm the seemingly cold face into a
something that was more effective than mere beauty. It was a wonderful
smile, and, in spite of all her troubles, was by no means rare. Lady
Baltimore, they all acknowledged, was a delightful guest and hostess.
As for Lord Baltimore, he--well, he would know how to console himself.
Society, the crudest organization on earth, laughed to itself about him.
He had known how to live before his marriage; now that the marriage had
proved a failure, he would still know how to make life bearable.
In this they wronged him.