LADY CLARA QUARRELS WITH HER STEPMOTHER.
Lady Hope had fainted, but with such deathly stillness that neither
Hepworth Closs nor Clara had been aware of it. She remained, after they
left the box, drooping sideways from her cushioned seat, with the cold
pallor of her face hid in the crimson shadows, and kept from falling by
the sides of the box, against which she leaned heavily.
No one observed this, for the whole audience was intensely occupied by
what was passing on the stage; and the pang of self-consciousness
returned to Rachael Closs in the utter solitude of a great crowd. She
opened her eyes wearily, as if the effort were a pain. Then a wild light
broke through their darkness. She cast a quick glance upon the stage and
over the crowd. Then turning to look for her companions, she found that
they were gone. A sense of relief came to the woman from a certainty
that she was alone. She leaned back against the side of the box in utter
depression. Her lips moved, her hands were tightly clasped--she seemed
in absolute terror.
What had Rachael Closs heard or seen to agitate her thus? That no one
could tell. The cause of those faint shudders that shook her from time
to time was known only to herself and her God.
When Hepworth and Lady Clara came back, Lady Hope rose, and gathering
her ermine cloak close to her throat, said that she was tired of the
confusion, and would go home, unless they very much wished to stay and
see Olympia.
They consented to go at once. The pallor of that beautiful face, as it
turned so imploringly upon them, was appeal enough.
On their way home Lady Clara told her stepmother of her visit behind the
scenes.
Rachael listened, and neither rebuked her for going nor asked questions;
but when Clara broke forth, in her impetuous way, exclaiming, "Oh, mamma
Rachael, you will help us! You will get this poor girl out of her
mother's power! You will let me ask her down to Oakhurst!" Rachael
almost sprang to her feet in the force of her sudden passion.
"What! I--I, Lady Hope of Oakhust, invite that girl to be your
companion, my guest! Clara, are you mad? or am I?"
The girl was struck dumb with amazement. Never in her existence had she
been so addressed before--for, with her, Rachael had been always kind
and delicately tender. Why had she broken forth now, when she asked the
first serious favor of her life?
"Mamma! mamma Rachael!" she cried. "What is the matter? What have I done
that you are so cross with me?"
"Nothing," said Rachael, sighing heavily, "only you ask an unreasonable
thing, and one your father would never forgive me for granting."
"But she is so lovely! papa would like her, I know. She is so unhappy,
too! I could feel her shudder when the stage was mentioned. Oh, mamma
Rachael, we might save her from that!"
"I cannot! Do not ask me; I cannot!"
"But I promised that you would be her friend."
"Make no promises for me, Clara, for I will redeem none. Drive this girl
from your thoughts. To-morrow morning we go back to Oakhurst."
"To-morrow morning! And I promised to see her again."
"It is impossible. Let this subject drop. In my wish to give you
pleasure, I have risked the anger of Lord Hope. He would never forgive
me if I permitted this entanglement."
Lady Clara turned to Hepworth Closs.
"Plead for me--plead for that poor girl!" she cried, with the
unreasoning persistence of a child; but, to her astonishment, Hepworth
answered even more resolutely than his sister.
"I cannot, Clara. There should be nothing in common between the daughter
of Olympia and Lord Hope's only child."
"Oh, how cruel! What is the use of having rank and power if one is not
to use it for the good of others?"
"We will not argue the matter, dear child."
"But I will argue it, and if I cannot convince, I will hate you,
Hepworth Closs, just as long as I live."
"Not quite so bad as that, I trust," answered Hepworth, sadly. "To own
the truth, Clara, I fear your mother will have enough to do in
reconciling Lord Hope to the position another person has assumed in his
household. Do not let us add new difficulties to her position."
Clara began to cry.
"I'm sure I never thought of troubling her or offending my father. It is
so natural for them to be good and kind, why should I doubt them now,
when the grandest, sweetest, most beautiful girl in the whole world
wants help--just the help they can give, too? Well, well, when papa
comes home, I will lay the whole case before him."
"Not for the world!" cried Rachael, suddenly. "I tell you, cast this
subject from your mind. I will not have my lord annoyed by it. For once,
Clara, I must and will be obeyed."
Clara sank back in her seat, aghast with surprise.
"Oh, mamma Rachael, you are getting to be awfully cruel."
"Cruel? No! In this I am acting kindly. It is you who are cruel in
pressing a distasteful and impossible thing upon me."
"I don't understand it; I can't believe it. You are always so free, so
generous, to those who need help. It is just because this poor girl is
my friend. Oh! I only wish old Lady Carset would just die, and leave me
everything! I would let the world see a specimen of independence--I
would! Don't speak to me, don't attempt to touch my hand, Mr. Closs! You
haven't a spark of human nature in you. I have a good mind to leave you
all, and go on the stage myself."
Again Lady Hope broke into a storm of impatience so unlike her usual
self-restraint, that Clara was really terrified.
"Hush, girl! Not another word of this. I will not endure it."
This severe reprimand took away Clara's breath for an instant; then she
burst into a passion of sobs and tears, huddling herself up into a
corner of the carriage, and utterly refused all consolation from
Hepworth, who was generously disturbed by her grief.
Lady Hope did nothing, but sat in silence, lost in thought, or perhaps
striving to subdue the tumult of feelings that had so suddenly broke
forth from her usual firm control.
Thus they drove home in distrust and excitement. A few low murmurs from
Hepworth, bursts of grief from Lady Clara, and dead silence on the part
of Rachael Closs, attended the first disagreement that had ever set the
stepmother and daughter in opposition.
When they reached home, Clara, her face all bathed in tears, and her
bosom heaving with sobs, ran up to her room, without the usual kiss or
"Good-night."
She was bitterly offended, and expressed the feeling in her own childish
fashion.
Rachael sat down in the hall, and watched the girl as she glided up the
broad staircase, perhaps hoping that she would look back, or, it may be,
regretting the course she had taken, for her face was unutterably sad,
and her attitude one of great despondency.
At last, when Clara was out of sight, she turned a wistful look on her
brother.
"She will hate me now."
Her voice was more plaintive than the words. The confidence of that
young girl was all the world to her; for, independent of everything
else, it was the one human link that bound her to the man she loved with
such passionate idolatry. Her kindness to his child was the silver cord
which even his strong will could not sunder, even if he should wish it.
Hepworth saw her anguish, and pitied it.
"Let her go," he said, stooping down and kissing his sister on the
forehead, which, with her neck and arms, was cold as marble. "She is
disappointed, vexed, and really indignant with us both; but a good
night's sleep will set her heart right again. I wish we had never
chanced to come here."
"Oh, Heavens! so do I."
"Rachael," said Hepworth, "what is it troubles you so?"
"What? Is it not enough that the child I have made a part of my own life
should quarrel with me and with you, because of me, for a stranger?"
"No; because her own generous nature assures us that the evil will die
of itself before morning. This is not enough to account for the fact
that you quiver as if with cold, and the very touch of your forehead
chills me."
"Do I?" questioned Rachael. "I did not know it. My cloak has fallen
off--that is all."
"Mamma Rachael!"
They both started, for leaning over the banisters was the sweet, tearful
face of Lady Clara.
"My own darling!" cried Rachael, lifting her arms.
Down the staircase sprang that generous young creature, her feet
scarcely touching the polished oak, her hair all unbound and rolling in
waves down her back. Struck with sweet compunctions, she had broken from
the hands of her maid, and left her with the blue ribbon fluttering in
her hand, while she ran back to make peace with the woman who was almost
dearer to her than a mother.
She fell upon her knees by Rachael, and shook the hair from her face,
which was glowing with sweet penitence.
"Kiss me, mamma Rachael, not on this saucy mouth of mine, but here upon
my forehead. I cannot sleep till you have kissed me good night."
Rachael laid one hand on that bright young head, but it was quivering
like a shot bird. She bent the face back a little, and pored over the
features with yearning scrutiny, as if she longed to engrave every line
on her heart.
Something in those black eyes disturbed the girl afresh. She reached up
her arms, and cried out:
"Don't be angry with me, mamma Rachael, but kiss me good night, and ask
God to make me a better girl."
Instead of kissing her, Rachael Closs fell upon her neck and broke into
a passion of tears such as Clara had never seen her shed before.