"Love is made a vague regret."
Virginia, when she parted from Jack, walked slowly homewards through the
mist and the falling leaves, and thought of the bloom and the brightness
of that fair Seville which she had so often pictured to herself. How
happy the two brothers would be there together, among all the
surroundings which she had heard described so often! Alvar would never
think of her. "At least, I should have had letters from him if I had
not sent him away," she thought; and though she did not regret the
parting in the sense of blaming herself for it, she felt in her utter
desolation as if she had rather have had her lover cold and indifferent
than not have him at all.
For life was so dreary, home so wretched, and Virginia could not mend
it. Indeed in many ways a less high-minded girl with stronger spirits
and more tact might have been far more useful there. Virginia held her
tongue resolutely; but she could not shut her eyes. She had lost her
bearings, and could not possibly understand the proportion of things.
Thus even in her inmost soul she never blamed her father for his
life-long extravagance, for the vague stories of his dissipated youth--
these things were not for her to judge; but the conversation, which he
intended to be perfectly fit for her ears, was full of small prejudices,
small injustices, and trifles taken for granted that grated on her every
hour. She tried very hard to be gentle and pleasant to her aunt; but
she could not bring herself, as Ruth could, to laugh at scandalous
stories, old or new, or even to think herself right in listening to
them. And though her father and aunt _so far as they knew how_,
respected her innocence, the latter only laughed at the ignorance that
thought one thing as bad as another. For there _were_ virtues, or at
least self-denials in their lives, for which, with all her love and with
all her charity, she could not possibly credit them. It was something
that Mr Seyton had pulled through without utterly succumbing to debt
and difficulty, it was something that when writhing under an injury
which she never forgot or forgave, his sister stuck to him and kept
things as straight as they were. It was a godless, idle, aimless
household, above stairs and below; but it was not a scandalous one, and,
with all the antecedents, it easily might have been. But the obvious
outcome of this hard narrow life was a deadness to all outer or higher
interests, an ignorance of the ordinary views of society, and of modern
forms of thought never attained save by selfish people, an absence of
restraint of temper, a delight in utter littleness, which were intensely
wearying. Higher principles would have made life more interesting if
nothing more. The narrowest form of belief in religion and goodness
would have given a wider outlook. Virginia was sick to death of tales
of little local incidents spiced with ill-nature, or incessant
complaints of someone's ill-behaviour about a fence or a cow. If she
had lived at Oakby she would have heard a good deal of the same sort of
thing; but there there would have been something else to fall back on,
and she would not have heard small triumphs over small overreaching,
which Mr Seyton did not mix enough with his kind to hear commented on.
Virginia used to wonder if she would grow like her aunt, her life was so
empty. All her young-lady interests, the essay and drawing clubs, the
correspondence and the art needlework, with which like other girls she
had amused herself, had languished entirely during her engagement, and
she did not care to resume them. She would have liked to be a resource
to Dick; but she was not used to boys, and had not much faculty for
amusing them, and Dick did not care for her. Her Sunday class tired
her, and were naughty because her teaching was languid; the children by
no means offering the consolations to her depression which they are
sometimes represented as doing in fiction. The Ellesmeres, who were
always kind to her, were away for their annual holiday, and the library
books for which she subscribed, and which might have amused her, could
never, by any chance be fetched from the station when she wanted them.
Her uncle showed his sympathy by scolding her roundly for fretting for a
black-eyed foreigner, till she was almost too angry to speak to him.
Under all these circumstances Ruth's urgent invitation had been welcome,
and as she received others from her friends at Littleton, she resolved
to go and try to pick up the threads that Alvar had broken. Soon after
she parted with Jack she met the Parson, and told him what she knew
would be welcome news, that Cherry was better.
"Ay," said Mr Seyton, "Jack brought me a message from him that he would
write me an account of a bull-fight. Wonder he's not ashamed to go near
one. Cruel, unmanly sport--disgraceful!"
"Well, uncle," said Virginia, "I think you ought to be pleased that
Cherry is well enough to go."
"Eh? I'll ask him if he'll come and see a cock-fight when he comes
home. Plenty of 'em here--round the corner. So you're going to London
to get a little colour in your cheeks, I think it's time."
"Yes, uncle; Mrs Clement will teach the children while I'm away."
"Very well, and tell Miss Ruth she was blind of one eye when she made
her choice, but _I_ can see out of both."
"Uncle, I shouldn't think of telling her such a thing. What do you
mean?"
"Never mind, she'll understand me. Good-bye, my dear, and never mind
the Frenchman."
Virginia smiled, but she could not turn her thoughts away, not merely
from Alvar, but from her life without him. Fain would she have refused
the invitation which soon arrived to a solemn dinner-party at Oakby; but
it had been accompanied by a hint from Mr Lester to her aunt which
caused the latter to insist on accepting it, and they went accordingly
to meet Sir John and Lady Hubbard, and one or two other neighbours. Mr
Lester was markedly polite to Virginia. Mrs Lester wore her best black
velvet, and a certain diamond brooch, only produced on occasions of
state. Jack looked proper, silent, and bored. Every one wished to ask
after the universally popular Cheriton, but felt that Alvar was an
awkward subject of conversation, so that the adventures of the
travellers could not be used to enliven the dulness. Nettie did not of
course appear at dinner, and afterwards sat in a corner of the
drawing-room in her white muslin, apparently determined not to open her
mouth. Dick strolled up to her when the gentlemen came in, and was
instantly followed by Jack, who stood by her silent and frowning.
Nettie looked up under her eyebrows, and said, "Dick, I am going to
London."
"So I hear," said Dick, with a smile and a slight shrug.
"I hate it, but I can't help it. _You go on_."
Dick smiled again and nodded, and then looked at Jack with an air of
secret amusement, indescribably provoking. "All right," he said, but he
turned away and made no further demonstration; and Mrs Lester desired
Nettie to show Miss Hubbard "Views on the Rhine," a very handsome book
reserved for occasions of unusual dulness.
Altogether the evening did not raise Virginia's spirits, and she was
half inclined to resent the special kindness shown to her by Mr Lester,
as implying blame to his absent son.
It was a wonderful change of scene and circumstance, when she found
herself, some few days later, sitting in Lady Charlton's pleasant London
drawing-room, full of books, work, plants, and pretty things, with Ruth,
bright-eyed and blooming, sitting on the rug at her feet, ready for a
confidential chatter.
She was to be married directly after Christmas, she told Virginia.
Rupert did not mean to sell out of the army; she did not at all dislike
the notion of moving about for a few years, and now the regiment was at
Aldershot she could see Rupert often while she remained in London to get
her things.
"And, Queenie, you must choose the dresses for the bridesmaids.
Grandmamma will have a gay wedding. _I_ think it will be a great bore."
"Your bridesmaids ought to wear something warm and gay and bright, like
yourself, Ruthie. Are you going to ask Nettie Lester?"
"Oh, no!" said Ruth hurriedly. "Why should I?"
"She is Rupert's cousin, and she is so handsome."
"I never thought of her! I am angry with them all since Don Alvar has
made you miserable. My darling Queenie, I should like to stamp on him!
Now, don't be angry; but tell me how it all came about?"
"I don't think I could ever make you understand it, Ruth. He did
nothing wrong. It was only that--that I did not suit him, and I found
it out," said Virginia, with a sort of ache in her voice, as she turned
her head away.
"The more--well, I won't finish the sentence. Any way, he has spoiled
your life for you; for I am afraid he is _your_ love if you are not
his," said Ruth, scanning her sad face curiously. "Queenie, weren't you
ready to kill him and Cherry, too, when they went off comfortably
together?"
"No," said Virginia, "he could not help going--_that_ was not it. And
as for Cherry, he was the only person who understood anything about it--
he was so kind! Oh, I hope he is really better!"
"I dare say he is, by this time," said Ruth, rather oddly; "but they are
all so easily frightened about him--they spoil him. I wonder what they
would all say if _he_ fell in love with a naughty, wicked siren--a
female villain, who broke his heart for him--just for fun."
"She would break something worth having," said Virginia indignantly.
"But, do you know anything about Cherry, Ruth?"
"I? I don't believe in sirens who break hearts just for fun and vanity.
And as for Cherry, if he did meet with a little trouble, he'd mend up
again, heart and lungs and all. There's something happy-go-lucky about
him--don't you think so?"
"I think Cherry is too many-sided to be left without an object in life,
if that is what you mean," said Virginia. "Besides, it is so different
for a man, they can always do something."
Then Ruth put aside the little uneasy feeling of self-reproach and doubt
that had prompted her to talk about Cherry, and put her arms round
Virginia, kissing her tenderly.
"My darling Queenie! You have been fretting all by yourself at
Elderthwaite till things seem worse than they are."
"No," said Virginia; "but my life has all gone wrong. When I found that
he did not love me everything seemed over for me."
Ruth interposed a question, and at last acquired a clearer knowledge of
the circumstances under which Alvar and her cousin had parted. She had
a good deal of knowledge of the world, and some judgment, though she did
not always use it for her own benefit, and she did not think that the
case sounded hopeless. She tried an experiment.
"If you gave him up, Queenie, because you discovered that he did not
come up to your notions of what he ought to be, why there's an end of
it, for he never will; but it looks to me much more like a very
commonplace lovers' quarrel aggravated by circumstances. He isn't a bad
sort of fellow in his own way; but it's not the way that you think
perfection."
"I did not quarrel with him, and I think the failure was in myself. Why
should he love me?--it does not seem as if I was very lovable."
There crossed Virginia's young gentle face a look that was like a
foretaste of the bitterness and self-weariness that had seized on so
many of her race--a sort of self-scorn that was not wholesome.
"Why should you think so?" said Ruth.
"I think I should have got on better at home if I had been."
She spoke humbly enough, but there was utter discouragement in every
line of her face and figure.
"Nonsense!" said Ruth briskly. "Nobody would get on, in your sense, at
Elderthwaite. I don't think you ought to stay there. You know it is
quite in your power to arrange differently. You might make them long
visits and--come fresh to every one."
"I'll never have it said that I could not live there," said Virginia,
colouring deeply. "And if I was away--I could not.--I would not--"
"Go back into the neighbourhood? Well, at any rate you are going to
have a holiday now, and see something besides moors and mud."
The change of scene could not fail to do Virginia good, though there
might be something in the courtship of Ruth and Rupert to remind her,
with a difference, of her own. It was sometimes breezy, for Rupert
loved to tease his betrothed, and having got his will, was a
free-and-easy and contented lover, not much liking to be put out of his
way, and not quite coming up to Ruth's requirements.
Ruth, though very kind to her cousin, believed that she had lost her
lover in great measure through a feminine scrupulosity and desire to
bring him up to her own standard. Ruth would never be so narrow and
unsympathetic, _she_ would be prepared to understand _all_ the story of
her hero's life; and being young, and much more simple than she believed
herself to be, thought that her indiscriminate reading of somewhat
free-spoken novels, gave her the necessary experience. But Rupert took
quite another view. He was not aware of having any particular story to
tell, and had no intention whatever of telling it. He did not in the
least desire Ruth's sympathy with his past, which was quite commonplace.
He was not in a state of repentance, desirous of making a confession;
nor had his heart ever been withered up by any frightful experiences.
No doubt he could remember much that was not particularly creditable,
and which he rightly thought unfit for discussion with his betrothed.
Moreover, he did not care at all for poetry, and very little for novels,
and at last actually told her that one she mentioned was unfit for her
to read.
Ruth was very angry, and had a sense of being put aside. Had Rupert--
like herself--a secret, or was she going to be "only a little dearer
than his horse?" as she expressed it to herself, and with tears to him.
Rupert laughed, and then grew a little angry, and then they made it up
again; but he teased her for her romance, laughed at her most muscular
and strong-souled heroes, and never would put himself in a heroic
attitude. Ruth quarrelled with him, made it up with him, was vexed by
him, and sometimes was vexatious; but all the while she never told him
about Cheriton.