MRS. MADDEN'S BALL.
Two days after the dinner, George Bertram called in Eaton Square and
saw Lady Harcourt; but, as it happened, she was not alone. Their
interview on this occasion was not in any great degree embarrassing
to either of them. He did not stay long; and as strangers were
present, he was able to talk freely on indifferent subjects. Lady
Harcourt probably did not talk much, but she looked as though she
did.
And then Adela Gauntlet came up to town for a month; and George,
though he was on three or four occasions in Eaton Square, never saw
Caroline alone; but he became used to seeing her and being with her.
The strangeness of their meeting wore itself away: he could speak to
her without reserve on the common matters of life, and found that he
had intense delight in doing so.
Adela Gauntlet was present at all these interviews, and in her heart
of hearts condemned them bitterly; but she could say nothing to
Caroline. They had been friends--real friends; but Caroline was now
almost like stone to her. This visit of Adela's had been a long
promise--yes, very long; for the visit, when first promised, was to
have been made to Mrs. Bertram. One knows how these promises still
live on. Caroline had pressed it even when she felt that Adela's
presence could no longer be of comfort to her; and Adela would not
now refuse, lest in doing so she might seem to condemn. But she felt
that Caroline Harcourt could never be to her what Caroline Bertram
would have been.
Lady Harcourt did whatever in her lay to amuse her guest; but Adela
was one who did not require much amusing. Had there been friendship
between her and her friend, the month would have run by all too
quickly; but, as it was, before it was over she wished herself again
even at Littlebath.
Bertram dined there twice, and once went with them to some concert.
He met them in the Park, and called; and then there was a great
evening gathering in Eaton Square, and he was there. Caroline was
careful on all occasions to let her husband know when she met
Bertram, and he as often, in some shape, expressed his satisfaction.
"He'll marry Adela Gauntlet; you'll see if he does not," he said to
her, after one of their dinners in Eaton Square. "She is very pretty,
very; and it will be all very nice; only I wish that one of them had
a little money to go on with."
Caroline answered nothing to this: she never did make him any
answers; but she felt quite sure in her own heart that he would not
marry Adela Gauntlet. And had she confessed the truth to herself,
would she have wished him to do so?
Adela saw and disapproved; she saw much and could not but disapprove
of all. She saw that there was very little sympathy between the
husband and wife, and that that little was not on the increase.--Very
little! nay, but was there any? Caroline did not say much of her lot
in life; but the few words that did fall from her seemed to be full
of scorn for all that she had around her, and for him who had given
it all. She seemed to say, "There--this is that for which I have
striven--these ashes on which I now step, and sleep, and feed, which
are gritty between my teeth, and foul to my touch! See, here is my
reward! Do you not honour me for having won it?"
And then it appeared that Sir Henry Harcourt had already learned how
to assume the cross brow of a captious husband; that the sharp word
was already spoken on light occasions--spoken without cause and
listened to with apparent indifference. Even before Adela such words
were spoken, and then Caroline would smile bitterly, and turn her
face towards her friend, as though she would say, "See, see what it
is to be the wife of so fine a man, so great a man! What a grand
match have I not made for myself!" But though her looks spoke thus,
no word of complaint fell from her lips--and no word of confidence.
We have said that Sir Henry seemed to encourage these visits which
Bertram made to Eaton Square; and for a time he did so--up to the
time of that large evening-party which was given just before Adela's
return to Littlebath. But on that evening, Adela thought she saw a
deeper frown than usual on the brows of the solicitor-general, as he
turned his eyes to a couch on which his lovely wife was sitting, and
behind which George Bertram was standing, but so standing that he
could speak and she could hear.
And then Adela bethought herself, that though she could say nothing
to Caroline, it might not be equally impossible to say something to
Bertram. There had been between them a sort of confidence, and if
there was any one to whom Adela could now speak freely, it was to
him. They each knew something of each other's secrets, and each of
them, at least, trusted the other.
But this, if it be done at all, must be done on that evening. There
was no probability that they would meet again before her departure.
This was the only house in which they did meet, and here Adela had no
wish to see him more.
"I am come to say good-bye to you," she said, the first moment she
was able to speak to him alone.
"To say good-bye! Is your visit over so soon?"
"I go on Thursday."
"Well, I shall see you again, for I shall come on purpose to make my
adieux."
"No, Mr. Bertram; do not do that."
"But I certainly shall."
"No;" and she put out her little hand, and gently--oh! so
gently--touched his arm.
"And why not? Why should I not come to see you? I have not so many
friends that I can afford to lose you."
"You shall not lose me, nor would I willingly lose you. But, Mr.
Bertram--"
"Well, Miss Gauntlet?"
"Are you right to be here at all?"
The whole tone, and temper, and character of his face altered as he
answered her quickly and sharply--"If not, the fault lies with Sir
Henry Harcourt, who, with some pertinacity, induced me to come here.
But why is it wrong that I should be here?--foolish it may be."
"That is what I mean. I did not say wrong; did I? Do not think that I
imagine evil."
"It may be foolish," continued Bertram, as though he had not heard
her last words. "But if so, the folly has been his."
"If he is foolish, is that reason why you should not be wise?"
"And what is it you fear, Adela? What is the injury that will come?
Will it be to me, or to her, or to Harcourt?"
"No injury, no real injury--I am sure of that. But may not
unhappiness come of it? Does it seem to you that she is happy?"
"Happy! Which of us is happy? Which of us is not utterly wretched?
She is as happy as you are? and Sir Henry, I have no doubt, is as
happy as I am."
"In what you say, Mr. Bertram, you do me injustice; I am not
unhappy."
"Are you not? then I congratulate you on getting over the troubles
consequent on a true heart."
"I did not mean in any way to speak of myself; I have cares, regrets,
and sorrows, as have most of us; but I have no cause of misery which
I cannot assuage."
"Well, you are fortunate; that is all I can say."
"But Caroline I can see is not happy; and, Mr. Bertram, I fear that
your coming here will not make her more so."
She had said her little word, meaning it so well. But perhaps she had
done more harm than good. He did not come again to Eaton Square till
after she was gone; but very shortly after that he did so.
Adela had seen that short, whispered conversation between Lady
Harcourt and Bertram--that moment, as it were, of confidence; and so,
also, had Sir Henry; and yet it had been but for a moment.
"Lady Harcourt," Bertram had said, "how well you do this sort of
thing!"
"Do I?" she answered. "Well, one ought to do something well."
"Do you mean to say that your excellence is restricted to this?"
"Pretty nearly; such excellence as there is."
"I should have thought--" and then he paused.
"You are not coming to reproach me, I hope," she said.
"Reproach you, Lady Harcourt! No; my reproaches, silent or expressed,
never fall on your head."
"Then you must be much altered;" and as she said these last words, in
what was hardly more than a whisper, she saw some lady in a distant
part of the room to whom some attention might be considered to be
due, and rising from her seat she walked away across the room. It was
very shortly after that Adela had spoken to him.
For many a long and bitter day, Bertram had persuaded himself that
she had not really loved him. He had doubted it when she had first
told him so calmly that it was necessary that their marriage should
be postponed for years; he had doubted it much when he found her,
if not happy, at least contented under that postponement; doubt had
become almost certainty when he learnt that she discussed his merits
with such a one as Henry Harcourt; but on that day, at Richmond, when
he discovered that the very secrets of his heart were made subject of
confidential conversation with this man, he had doubted it no longer.
Then he had gone to her, and his reception proved to him that his
doubts had been too well founded--his certainty only too sure. And so
he had parted with her--as we all know.
But now he began to doubt his doubts--to be less certain of his
certainty. That she did not much love Sir Henry, that was very
apparent; that she could not listen to his slightest word without
emotion--that, too, he could perceive; that Adela conceived that
she still loved him, and that his presence there was therefore
dangerous--that also had been told to him. Was it then possible that
he, loving this woman as he did--having never ceased in his love for
one moment, having still loved her with his whole heart, his whole
strength--that he had flung her from him while her heart was still
his own? Could it be that she, during their courtship, should have
seemed so cold and yet had loved him?
A thousand times he had reproached her in his heart for being
worldly; but now the world seemed to have no charms for her. A
thousand times he had declared that she cared only for the outward
show of things, but these outward shows were now wholly indifferent
to her. That they in no degree contributed to her happiness, or even
to her contentment, that was made manifest enough to him.
And then these thoughts drove him wild, and he began to ask himself
whether there could be yet any comfort in the fact that she had
loved him, and perhaps loved him still. The motives by which men are
actuated in their conduct are not only various, but mixed. As Bertram
thought in this way concerning Lady Harcourt--the Caroline Waddington
that had once belonged to himself--he proposed to himself no scheme
of infamy, no indulgence of a disastrous love, no ruin for her whom
the world now called so fortunate; but he did think that, if she
still loved him, it would be pleasant to sit and talk with her;
pleasant to feel some warmth in her hand; pleasant that there should
be some confidence in her voice. And so he resolved--but, no, there
was no resolve; but he allowed it to come to pass that his intimacy
in Eaton Square should not be dropped.
And then he bethought himself of the part which his friend Harcourt
had played in this matter, and speculated as to how that pleasant
fellow had cheated him out of his wife. What Adela had said might be
very true, but why should he regard Sir Henry's happiness? why regard
any man's happiness, or any woman's? Who had regarded him? So he
hired a horse, and rode in the Park when he knew Lady Harcourt would
be there, dined with Baron Brawl because Lady Harcourt was to dine
there, and went to a ball at Mrs. Madden's for the same reason. All
which the solicitor-general now saw, and did not press his friend to
take a part at any more of his little dinners.
What may have passed on the subject between Sir Henry and his wife
cannot be said. A man does not willingly accuse his wife of even the
first germ of infidelity; does not willingly suggest to her that
any one is of more moment to her than himself. It is probable that
his brow became blacker than it had been, that his words were less
courteous, and his manner less kind; but of Bertram himself, it may
be presumed that he said nothing. It might, however, have been easy
for Caroline to perceive that he no longer wished to have his old
friend at his house.
At Mrs. Madden's ball, Bertram asked her to dance with him, and
she did stand up for a quadrille. Mr. Madden was a rich young man,
in Parliament, and an intimate friend both of Sir Henry's and of
Bertram's. Caroline had danced with him--being her first performance
of that nature since her marriage; and having done so, she could not,
as she said to herself, refuse Mr. Bertram. So they stood up; and the
busy solicitor-general, who showed himself for five minutes in the
room, saw them moving, hand-in-hand together, in the figure of the
dance. And as he so moved, Bertram himself could hardly believe in
the reality of his position. What if any one had prophesied to him
three months since that he would be dancing with Caroline Harcourt!
"Adela did not stay with you long," said he, as they were standing
still.
"No, not very long. I do not think she is fond of London;" and then
they were again silent till their turn for dancing was over.
"No; I don't think she is," said Bertram, "nor am I. I should not
care if I were to leave it for ever. Do you like London, Lady
Harcourt?"
"Oh, yes; as well as any other place. I don't think it much
signifies--London, or Littlebath, or New Zealand."
They were then both silent for a moment, till Bertram again spoke,
with an effort that was evident in his voice.
"You used not to be so indifferent in such matters."
"Used!"
"Has all the world so changed that nothing is any longer of any
interest?"
"The world has changed, certainly--with me."
"And with me also, Lady Harcourt. The world has changed with both of
us. But Fortune, while she has been crushing me, has been very kind
to you."
"Has she? Well, perhaps she has--as kind, at any rate, as I deserve.
But you may be sure of this--I do not complain of her." And then they
were again silent.
"I wonder whether you ever think of old days?" he said, after a
pause.
"At any rate, I never talk of them, Mr. Bertram."
"No; I suppose not. One should not talk of them. But out of a full
heart the mouth will speak. Constant thoughts will break forth in
words. There is nothing else left to me of which I can think."
Any one looking at her face as she answered him would have little
dreamed how much was passing through her mind, how much was weighing
on her heart. She commanded not only her features, but even her
colour, and the motion of her eyes. No anger flashed from them; there
was no blush of indignation as she answered him in that crowded room.
And yet her words were indignant enough, and there was anger, too, in
that low tone which reached his ear so plainly, but which reached no
further.
"And whose doing has this been? Why is it that I may not think of
past times? Why is it that all thought, all memories are denied to
me? Who was it that broke the cup at the very fountain?"
"Was it I?"
"Did you ever think of your prayers? 'Forgive us our trespasses.' But
you, in your pride--you could forgive nothing. And now you dare to
twit me with my fortune!"
"Lady Harcourt!"
"I will sit down, if you please, now. I do not know why I speak
thus." And then, without further words, she caused herself to be
led away, and sitting down between two old dowagers, debarred him
absolutely from the power of another word.
Immediately after this he left the house; but she remained for
another hour--remained and danced with young Lord Echo, who was a
Whig lordling; and with Mr. Twisleton, whose father was a Treasury
secretary. They both talked to her about Harcourt, and the great
speech he was making at that moment; and she smiled and looked
so beautiful, that when they got together at one end of the
supper-table, they declared that Harcourt was out-and-out the
luckiest dog of his day; and questioned his right to monopolize such
a treasure.
And had he been cruel? had he been unforgiving? had he denied to her
that pardon which it behoved him so often to ask for himself? This
was the question which Bertram was now forced to put to himself. And
that other question, which he could now answer but in one way. Had he
then been the cause of his own shipwreck? Had he driven his own bark
on the rocks while the open channel was there clear before him? Had
she not now assured him of her love, though no word of tenderness had
passed her lips? And whose doing had it been? Yes, certainly; it had
been his own doing.
The conviction which thus came upon him did not add much to his
comfort. There was but little consolation to him now in the assurance
that she had loved, and did love him. He had hitherto felt himself
to be an injured man; but now he had to feel that he himself had
committed the injury. "Whose doing has it been? You--you in your
pride, could forgive nothing!" These words rang in his ears; his
memory repeated to him hourly the tone in which they had been spoken.
She had accused him of destroying all her hopes for this world--and
he had answered not a word to the accusation.
On the morning after that ball at Mrs. Madden's, Sir Henry came into
his wife's room while she was still dressing. "By-the-by," said he,
"I saw you at Mrs. Madden's last night."
"Yes; I perceived that you were there for a moment," Caroline
answered.
"You were dancing. I don't know that I ever saw you dancing before."
"I have not done so since I was married. In former days I used to be
fond of it."
"Ah, yes; when you were at Littlebath. It did not much matter then
what you did in that way; but--"
"Does it matter more now, Sir Henry?"
"Well, if it would entail no great regret, I would rather that you
did not dance. It is all very nice for girls."
"You do not mean to say that married women--"
"I do not mean to say anything of the kind. One man has one idea, and
another another. Some women also are not placed in so conspicuous a
position as you are."
"Why did you not tell me your wishes before?"
"It did not occur to me. I did not think it probable that you would
dance. May I understand that you will give it up?"
"As you direct me to do so, of course I shall."
"Direct! I do not direct, I only request."
"It is the same thing, exactly. I will not dance again. I should have
felt the prohibition less had I been aware of your wishes before I
had offended."
"Well, if you choose to take it in that light, I cannot help it.
Good-morning. I shall not dine at home to-day."
And so the solicitor-general went his way, and his wife remained
sitting motionless at her dressing-table. They had both of them
already become aware that the bargain they had made was not a wise
one.