[Illustration: ‘BUT NOTHING SHALL STAND BETWEEN US ANY MORE.’]
CARITÀ
BY MRS. OLIPHANT
AUTHOR OF “WITHIN THE PRECINCTS,” ETC.
CHEAP EDITION
LONDON
JOHN MURRAY, ALBEMARLE STREET, W.
1885
_All Rights Reserved_
CONTENTS.
CHAPTER PAGE
I. THE BERESFORDS 1
II. A FRIGHT 10
III. HONEYMOONING 18
IV. THE THREE CHARITIES 26
V. COMING HOME 35
VI. THE CONSULTATION 44
VII. THE CATASTROPHE 53
VIII. CONSOLATION 62
IX. THE HILL 71
X. THE SQUARE 80
XI. MRS. MEREDITH 88
XII. THE HOUSE NEXT DOOR 98
XIII. THE YOUNG PEOPLE 107
XIV. THE OLD PEOPLE 117
XV. ROGER 126
XVI. SUNDAY EVENING 135
XVII. EDWARD 145
XVIII. TELLING TALES 155
XIX. THE HOLY INQUISITION 164
XX. THE PERUGINO 173
XXI. A CONFIDENCE 183
XXII. MYSTIFIED 193
XXIII. A REMONSTRANCE 202
XXIV. ON THE OTHER SIDE OF THE WALL 212
XXV. AN IDEALIST 222
XXVI. IN THE ‘HOUSE’ 231
XXVII. THE WOLF IN SHEEP’S CLOTHING 241
XXVIII. THE FIRESIDE 251
XXIX. THE OLD FOLK AND THE YOUNG 261
XXX. A REBELLIOUS HEART 269
XXXI. THE HOUSE OF MOURNING 279
XXXII. TAKING UP DROPT STITCHES 288
XXXIII. LITTLE EMMY’S VISITORS 297
XXXIV. THE WIDOW 308
XXXV. ROGER’S FATE 317
XXXVI. BETWEEN THE TWO 326
XXXVII. THE CRISIS APPROACHING 336
XXXVIII. THE SUPREME MOMENT 346
XXXIX. THE HAND OF FATE 355
XL. TWO--PARTED 364
XLI. TWO--TO BE ONE? 373
XLII. A GREAT REVOLUTION 382
XLIII. THE WORST SCRAPE OF ALL 393
XLIV. CLEARING UP 402
XLV. CONCLUSION 412
CARITÀ.
CHAPTER I.
THE BERESFORDS.
James Beresford and Annie his wife had been married for more than a
dozen years--their only child, indeed, had nearly attained the age of
twelve at the time when this history begins. They had both got footing
on that plateau of middle age which, if it comes to something like level
ground at thirty, need not think of a descending step for twenty
years--the time of the greatest enjoyments and most solid progress of
life. He was at one end and she at the other of the first decade; the
one approaching the forties, the other scarcely well out of the
twenties; both ready to laugh at the advance of years, which was as yet
but a joke to them, and neither having thought of bidding any grave
farewell to youth. She was impulsive, enthusiastic and nervous; he
philosophical and speculative, a man ready to discuss any theory in
earth or heaven, and without any prejudices such as might make one
subject of discussion appear less legitimate than another. They were not
very rich, but neither were they poor in any sense of the word. He had
been called to the Bar, but had never gone any further in that career.
They had enough between them to live on without show, but without
pinching, as so many people of quietly social, semi-literary tastes do
in London. They knew a number of people. They saw all the pictures, read
all the books, and heard all the music that was going; not absorbed in
any art, but with just enough devotion to all to make their life full
and pleasant. And there could scarcely be a pleasanter life. The
fantasies of youth, but not the sentiment of youth, had ended for both.
Mr. Beresford had some mildly scientific pursuits, was a member of some
learned societies, and of one or two new and advanced clubs where clever
men were supposed to abound. Occasionally in his comfortable library he
wrote an article for a review or magazine, which was very much talked
about by his friends, to the great edification and amusement of people
who live by writing articles and say nothing about them. This gave him
an agreeable sense of duty to add seriousness to his life; and he was
never without occupation--meetings of committees, scraps of semi-public
business, educational and other projects, which, for the moment at
least, seemed full of interest to the world, made him feel himself a not
unimportant, certainly not a useless, man. Mrs. Beresford, on her side,
had the natural occupation of her housekeeping, and her child, whose
education gave her much thought--so much thought that many people with
full nurseries listened with a certain awe to her ideas of all that was
necessary for her little girl, and sighed to think how much less was
possible when there were six or seven little girls to think of.
The child, however, was not so over-educated and over-cared for as might
have been fancied; for the parents were young, as has been said, very
fond of each other, and fond of their own way; which likings did not
consist with the burden of dragging a small child with them wherever
they went. The Beresfords liked to go about ‘honeymooning,’ as their
friends called it, and as they themselves were not displeased to call
it, by themselves, over the world. They would start sometimes quite
suddenly, to the Riviera in the middle of winter, to escape London fogs
and wintry chills; to Paris at Easter; to Scotland in the autumn; even
to Norway sometimes, or such difficult places; and it stood to reason
that they could not take the child with them when they started at a
day’s notice on these delightful journeys. For their journeys were
delightful. They were well enough off not to require to count the cost;
they went lightly, with little luggage and no servants, and they went
everywhere together. But it would have been bad for the little girl;
therefore she stayed at home, under the care of the best of nurses, who
had been Mrs. Beresford’s nurse before the child’s; and the father and
mother, like two lovers, roamed lightly about the world. But when they
were at home, Mrs. Beresford talked a great deal about education, and
had plans enough to have educated six princesses, let alone one little
girl of undistinguished lineage. It was a very lucky thing for all
parties, their friends said, that they had but this one child. Had they
been hampered by half-a-dozen, what could they have done? It would have
changed their life completely. And one of their many felicities was,
that whereas they were preserved from the old-maidishness of childless
married persons by having a child, their freedom of action was preserved
by the fact that they had but one.
And they were wonderfully free of other relations who might have
hampered them. Mrs. Beresford had been an orphan from her childhood,
brought up by her grandmother, who in the course of nature was dead too;
and Mr. Beresford’s only two relations were a wealthy aunt, Charity
Beresford, who lived in a pretty house in the country, within driving
distance of London, and with whom lived his elder sister, Cherry
Beresford, named after her aunt, and living in considerable subjection
to that energetic woman. Miss Beresford was the richest member of the
family, and her nephew had expectations from her; and Charity was the
favourite female name of this branch of the race. But the idea of
calling her child Charity did not at all smile upon young Mrs. Beresford
when her baby was born. She was beguiled, however, by the unusual look
of it, which charmed her, into calling the little girl by the more
melodious name of Carità, contracted prettily into Cara in the
drawing-room, and Carry in the nursery. Aunt Charity growled when she
heard of this, but did not otherwise complain, and gentle Aunt Cherry
declared herself unfeignedly glad that her little niece had thus escaped
the worse consequences of a symbolical name. When the young couple went
away pleasuring, little Cara very often would be sent to Sunninghill, to
pass the quiet days there under the charge of the aunts; and so all
responsibility was removed from the minds of the parents. They had a
letter sent to them every day to assure them of their welfare, however
far off they might go--an extravagance which Aunt Charity condemned
loudly, but which Aunt Cherry was proud of, as showing the devotion of
the parents to little Cara. The child herself was very happy at
Sunninghill, and was a much more prominent person there than at home,
where very often she was in the way, and interrupted conversation. For a
father and mother who are very fond of each other, and have a great deal
to talk of, often, it must be allowed, are hampered by the presence of
one curious child, with quick ears and an inconveniently good memory. In
this particular the half-dozen would have been more easily managed than
the one.
Thus the Beresfords led a very pleasant life. They had the prettiest
house; naturally, travelling so much as they did, they had been able to
‘pick up’ a great many charming things. You could scarcely see their
walls for pictures; some very good, one or two wonderful windfalls, and
the rest pretty enough; nothing strikingly bad, or next to nothing.
Where other people had ordinary china, they had genuine old faïence, and
one or two plaques which Raphael himself might have seen perhaps--Urbino
ware, with Messer Giorgio’s name upon it. Not to speak of the Venice
point which Mrs. Beresford wore, there were brackets in the drawing-room
hung with scraps of old _point coupé_ which many a lady would have been
glad to trim her dress with; and, instead of common _portières_, they
had two pieces of old tapestry from an Italian convent which devotees
went down on their knees before. But I have not space to tell you how
many pretty things they had. It was one of the pleasures of their life
whenever they saw anything that pleased them to bring it home for the
decoration of that pretty drawing-room, or the library, which Mr.
Beresford had filled with old vellum-bound volumes of curious editions,
and pretty books in Russian leather which kept the room always fragrant.
What was wanting to this pleasant, warm, full, delightful living?
Nothing but continuance; and it had not struck either of them that there
was any doubt of this for long, long years at least. What a long way off
threescore years and ten look when you are not yet forty! and death
looked further off still. Neither of them thought of dying. Why should
they? For, to be sure, though we know very well that must happen to us
some time, in our hearts we are incredulous, and do not believe that
_we_ ever can die. The Beresfords never dreamt of anything so frightful.
They were well, they were happy, they were young; and as it had been, so
it would be; and a world so bright they felt must mean to go on for
ever.
When Cara was about ten, however, the mother began to feel less well
than usual. There was nothing much the matter with her, it was thought:
want of ‘tone,’--a little irritability of disposition--a nervous
temperament. What she wanted was change of air and scene. And she got
that, and got better, as was thought; but then became ill again. No, not
ill--unwell, indisposed, _mal à son aise_, nothing more. There was
nothing the matter with her really, the doctors thought. Her lungs and
her heart, and all vital organs, were perfectly sound; but there was a
little local irritation which, acting upon a nervous temperament---- The
nervous temperament was perpetually kept in the front, and all sorts of
evils imputed to its agency. At Sunninghill, it must be confessed, they
did not believe in the illness at all.
‘Fudge,’ said Aunt Charity, who had always been strong, and had no faith
in nerves, ‘don’t talk to me of your nervous temperaments. I know what
it means. It means that Annie has fallen sick of always having her own
way. She has everything she can desire, and she is ill of having nothing
more to wish for. A case of Alexander over again in a London
drawing-room--that’s what it is, and nothing else, my word upon it; and
I know my niece.’
‘Yes, Mr. Maxwell; perhaps there is some truth in what Aunt Charity
says,’ said Miss Cherry. ‘I think you know I don’t judge harshly----’
‘That means that _I_ judge harshly,’ said Miss Charity, bursting in;
‘thank you, my dear. Well, you may call me uncharitable if you please;
but there’s where it is; let James lose the half of his fortune, or all
his china get broken, and she’d come round in no time--that’s what ails
Annie. But as she belongs to a very refined society, and has a silly
husband, it’s called nerves. Bless me, Cherry, I hope I knew what nerves
were, and all about it, before you were born.’
‘You could not know Annie before I was born,’ said Miss Cherry, who was
devoid of imagination. ‘I hope you will give her your best attention,
Mr. Maxwell. My brother James is a very fond husband, poor fellow! If
anything happened to Annie, he would never get the better of it. As for
marrying again, or anything of that sort----’
‘Good heavens!’ said the doctor; ‘I hope there is no need to take such
an idea into consideration. We must not go so fast.’
Miss Charity laughed. She was a great deal older than her niece, but
much more sensible. ‘There’s the seventh commandment to be thought of,’
she said; for her remarks were sometimes more free than they ought to
be, and put Miss Cherry to the blush: and this was all the worse because
she immediately walked out into the garden through the open window and
left the younger lady alone with the doctor, who was an old friend of
the family, and contemporary of the second Charity Beresford. Very old
friends they were; even it was supposed that in their youth there had
been or might have been passages of sentiment between these two now
sitting so calmly opposite each other. Mr. Maxwell, however, by this
time was a widower, and not at all sentimental. He laughed, too, as Miss
Beresford made her exit by the window. He was very well used to the
family, and all its ways.
‘_She_ wears very well,’ he said, reflectively. ‘I don’t think she has
aged to speak of for these twenty years. When I used to be coming here
in my early days, when I was beginning practice----’
‘The rest of us have changed very much since then.’
‘Yes,’ said Mr. Maxwell, thinking most of himself; ‘but she not at all.
I could think when I look at her that I was still, as I say, a young
fellow beginning practice----’
Miss Cherry sighed--very softly, but still she did sigh: over forty, but
still in the position and with many of the sentiments of a girl. People
laugh at the combination, but it is a touching one on the whole. What
ages of lingering monotonous life had passed over her since her present
companion began his practice, since her Aunt Charity had begun to be an
old woman! Dr. Maxwell had married, had lost his wife, had gone through
perhaps sharper troubles than Miss Cherry had known. He was now
middle-aged and stoutish and weather-beaten--weather-beaten in aspect
and in soul--while she was slim and soft and maidenly still. The sigh
was half for those uneventful years, and half for the undevelopment
which she was conscious of--the unchangedness of herself, underneath the
outer guise, which was changed; but this was not safe ground, nor could
it be talked of. So she brushed away the sigh with a little cough, and
added quickly:
‘I know perhaps what nerves are better than my aunt does, and I know
Annie better. Tell me seriously, Mr. Maxwell, now we are alone. You
don’t apprehend anything serious? Should she go on travelling and
running about as they do if there is really anything the matter? No one
can be so much interested as I am. You would be quite frank with me?’
‘It is the best thing for her,’ said the doctor. ‘You now--I should not
say the same for you. You are a tranquil person and patient; but for
her, the more she runs about the better. It distracts her and keeps her
from thinking. If she worries, it’s all over with a woman like that.’
‘She has so little to worry about.’
‘Just so; and the less one has to bear the less one is fit for; that is
to say,’ said the doctor, getting up and going to the window, ‘the less
some people are fit for. There’s that old aunt of yours to prove me a
fool. She has never had anything to bear, that I know of; and she is
strong enough to bear anything. Sixty-eight, and just look at her.
There’s a _physique_ for you--that is the kind of woman,’ Mr. Maxwell
said, with a little outburst of professional enthusiasm, ‘that I
admire--as straight as a rod still, and every faculty in good order.
That a woman like that should never have married is a loss to the
world.’
Miss Cherry, who had gone to the window too, and stood by his side,
looked out somewhat wistfully at her old aunt. Cherry was not like her,
but took after the other side of the family, her own mother, who had
died young, and had not possessed any _physique_ to speak of. ‘It is
very sweet to-day in the garden,’ she said, inconsequently, and stepped
out into the world of flowers and sunshine. Sunninghill was an ideal
house for two ladies, a place which people who were shut out from such
delights considered quite enough for happiness. Indeed, Miss Cherry
Beresford’s friends in general resented deeply the little plaintive air
she sometimes took upon her. ‘What could she wish for more?’ they said,
indignantly; ‘a place that was just too good to be wasted on two single
women. There should be a family in it.’ This was especially the
sentiment of the rector’s wife, who was a friend of Cherry’s, and who
felt it a personal slight to herself, who had a large family and many
cares, when Cherry Beresford, with not a thing in the world to trouble
her, presumed to look as if she was not quite happy. The house stood
upon a hill, fringed round with small but delightful woods. These woods
were on a level with the highest turrets of the great beautiful royal
Castle of St. George, which lay full within sight in the afternoon
sunshine. So you may imagine what a view it was that was visible from
the old smooth velvet lawn round the house, which formed the apex to
these woods. The quiet plain all around lay basking in the light
underneath, and the Castle upon its hill dominated, with a broad and
placid grandeur, that majestic sweep of country, with all its lights and
shadows. The royal flag fluttered on the breeze, the great tower rose
grey and solid against the sky. Green branches framed in this picture on
every side; the cuttings in the trees made a picture-gallery indeed of
different views for different hours, according to the lights. ‘What a
lovely place it is!’ Mr. Maxwell said, with sudden enthusiasm; ‘I always
forget how lovely it is till I come back.’
‘Yes, it is beautiful,’ said Cherry, who was used to it. ‘If you are
going to send them away, I suppose Cara may come to us for the
summer?--that makes such a difference.’ Cherry was very well used to the
different lights. She acknowledged the beauty of her home, and yet I can
fancy circumstances under which she would have liked a little house in a
street better. Man or woman either cannot live by beauty alone any more
than by bread.
‘Here’s a pretty business,’ said Miss Beresford, briskly; ‘half of my
roses, I believe, spoiled for this year; no second show this time. Jones
is the greatest idiot; he pretends to know everything, and he knows
nothing. Your _protégé_, Cherry, of course. All the incapables hang on
by you.’
‘I can’t see any signs of deficiency,’ said the doctor, looking round.
‘Not at this moment; if there were, he should have his dismissal on the
spot. If those two go off again, as you are always sending them off,
tell James I insist on the child coming here. Ah! that’s what your women
of nervous temperament do--leave their children at home in a poky London
square, while they go wandering over the world. Tell them I wish it,’
said Miss Beresford, with a laugh; ‘they never go against me.’
‘They know how kind you always are.’
‘They know I’m old and will have something to leave behind me, that’s
the plain English of it--as if I was going to accept poor Cherry’s
subjection, poor soul, without rewarding her for it! It is she who will
have everything when I’m gone. I’ve told them that, but still they think
there’s a chance that Cara might cut her old aunt out. I can see
through them. I see through most people,’ she added, with a laugh,
looking at him full. How could she know the thought passing through his
mind at the moment, which was the abrupt reflection, uncalled for
perhaps, that for a professional man, who had made no extraordinary name
in his profession, Cherry Beresford, though an old maiden, would make
not such a bad wife? Could the old witch see through broadcloth, and the
comfortable coating of middle-aged flesh and blood, straight into a
man’s heart? He grew red foolishly, as if that were possible, and
stammered a little in his reply:
‘I can believe everything that is clever of you as well as everything
that is kind; though why you ladies should make such a point of having a
little chit like that, who can only disturb your quiet in this paradise
of a place----’
‘Oh, how can you say so!’ said Cherry. ‘The child’s voice and the
child’s face make all the difference--they are better than sunshine.
They make the place beautiful. I would give it all, twenty times over,
to have the child.’
‘Whom her mother is very glad to leave behind her.’
‘Hold your tongue, Cherry,’ said the elder lady; ‘you mild little old
maids, you are always in a way about children. I never took up that
line. A child in the abstract is a nuisance. Now, a man--there are
advantages about a man. Sometimes he’s a nuisance too, but sometimes
he’s a help. Believe them, and they’ll tell you that marriage was always
far from their thoughts, but that children are their delight. That’s not
my way of thinking. But I happen to like little Cara because she is
Cara, not because she is a child. So she may come and take her chance
with the rest.’
Cherry had turned away along the garden path, and was looking through
one of the openings at one of the views. She knew it by heart--exactly
how the light fell, and where were the shadows, and the name of every
tower, and almost the shape of every cloud. Was it wonderful that this
was not so delightful to her as to the strangers who could not see that
view every day in their lives? To some people, indeed, the atmospheric
changes, the effects of wind and colour, the waverings and dispersions
of those clouds, would have made poetry enough to fill up all that was
wanting; but poor Miss Cherry was not poetical in this big way, though
she was very fond of pretty verses, and even wrote some occasionally;
but how she longed for the child’s innocent looks--the child’s
ceaseless prattle! Her gentle delicacy was hurt at that unnecessary gibe
about the old-maidishness, and her supposed sham rejection of the
husband who had never come her way. ‘Why should she talk of
men--especially before _him_? What do I want with men?’ said poor Miss
Cherry to herself; ‘but my own niece--my brother’s child--surely I may
wish for her.’ And surely there could not have been a more innocent
wish.