Warrender met his mother and sister with a face somewhat cloudy, which,
however, he did his best to clear as he came in, in response to their
pleasure at the sight of him. It did not become him in his position to
look otherwise than blessed: but a man has less power of recognising
and adapting himself to this necessity than a woman. He did his best,
however, to take an interest in the house, to have all its conveniencies
pointed out to him, and the beauty of the view over the garden, and the
coolness of the drawing-room in which they sat. What pleased him still
more, however, or at least called forth a warmer response, was the
discovery of some inconveniencies which had already been remarked. "I am
very glad you told me," he said. "I must have everything put right for
you, mother. A thing that can be put right by bricks and mortar is so
easy a matter."
"It is the easiest way, perhaps, of setting things right," she said, not
without an anxious glance; "but even bricks and mortar are apt to lead
you further than you think. You remember Mr. Briggs, in _Punch_?"
"They will not lead me too far," said Theo. "I am all in the way of
renovation and restoration. You should see--or rather, you should not
see, for I am afraid you would be shocked--our own house----"
"What are you doing? No, I should not be shocked. I never was a devotee
of the Warren. I always thought there were a great many improvements I
could make."
"Oh, mamma!"
"You must remember, Chatty, I was not born to it, like you. What are you
doing? Are you building? Your letters are not very explicit, my dear."
"You shall see. I cannot describe. I have not the gift." Here the cloud
came again over Theo's face, the cloud which he had pushed back on his
entrance as if it had been a veil. "We have let in a little light at
all events," he said, "that will always be something to the good. Now,
mother, let me have some lunch; for I cannot stay above an hour or so.
I have to see Longstaffe. There has been a great deal to do."
"Mr. Longstaffe, I am sure, will not give you any trouble that he can
help."
"He is giving me a great deal of trouble," said the young man, with
lowering brows. Then he cleared up again with an effort. "You have not
told me anything about your doings in town."
"Oh, we did a great deal in town." Here Mrs. Warrender paused for a
moment, feeling that neither did the auditor care to hear, nor the
person concerned in those doings care to have them told. Between these
two, her words were arrested. Chatty's head was more than ever bent over
her muslin, and Theo had walked to the window, and was looking out with
the air of a man whose thoughts were miles away. No one said anything
more for a full minute, when he suddenly came back, so to speak, and
said, with a sort of smile:--
"So you were very gay?" as if in the meantime she had been pouring forth
an account of many gaieties into his ear. So far as Theo was concerned,
it was evidently quite unnecessary to say any more, but there was now
the other silent listener to think of, who desired that not a word should
be said, yet would be equally keen to note and put a meaning to the
absence of remark. Between the two, the part of Mrs. Warrender was a
hard one. She said, which, perhaps, was the last thing she ought to have
said: "We saw a great deal of your friend Mr. Cavendish."
"Ah, Dick! yes, he's about town I suppose--pretending to do law, and
doing society. Mother, if you want me to stay to luncheon----"
"I will go and see after it," said Chatty. She gave her mother a look,
as she put down her work. A look--what did it mean, a reproach for having
mentioned him? an entreaty to ask more about him? Mrs. Warrender could
not tell. When they were left alone, her son's restlessness increased.
He felt, it was evident, the dangers of being left with her _tete-a-tete_.
"I hope you didn't see too much of him," he said hastily, as if picking
up something to defend himself. "Cavendish is a fellow with a story, and
no one knows exactly what it is."
"I am sure he is honourable and good," said Mrs. Warrender, and then she
cried, "Theo! don't keep me in this suspense--there is something amiss."
He came at once, and sat down opposite to her, gazing at her across the
little table. "Yes," he said with defiance, "you have made up your mind
to that beforehand. I could see it in your eyes. What should be amiss?"
"Theo, you do me wrong. I had made up my mind to nothing beforehand--but
I am very anxious. I know there must be difficulties. What are your
negotiations with Mr. Longstaffe? Is it about settlements?--is it----"
"Longstaffe is an old fool, mother: that is about what it is."
"No, my dear. I am sure he is a kind friend, who has your interests at
heart."
"Whose interests?" he said, with a harsh laugh. "You must remember there
are two sides to the question. I should say that the interests of a
husband and wife were identical, but that is not the view taken by those
wretched little pettifogging country lawyers."
"Dear Theo, it is never, I believe, the view taken by the law. They have
to provide against the possibility of everything that is bad--they must
suppose that it is possible for every man to turn out a domestic
tyrant."
"Every man!" he said, with a smile of scorn: "do you think I should be
careful about that? They may bind me down as much as they please. I have
held out my hands to them ready for the fetters. What I do grudge," he
went on, as if, the floodgates once opened, the stream could not be
restrained, "is all that they are trying to impose upon her, giving her
the appearance of feelings entirely contrary to her nature--making her
out to be under the sway of---- That's what I can't tolerate. If I knew
her less, I might imagine--but thank God, I am sure on that point," he
added, with a sharpness in his voice which did not breathe conviction to
his mother's ear.
She laid her hand upon his arm, soothing him. "You must remember, that
in the circumstances a woman is not her own mistress. Oh, Theo, that was
always the difficulty I feared. You are so sensitive, so ready to start
aside like a restive horse, so intolerant of anything that seems less
than perfect."
"Am I so, mother?" He gathered her hand into his, and laid down his head
upon it, kissing it tremulously. "God bless you for saying so. My own
mother says it--a fastidious fool, always looking out for faults, putting
meanings to everything--starting at a touch, like a restive horse."
How it was that she understood him, and perceived that to put his faults
in the clearest light was the best thing she could do for him, it would
be hard to tell. She laid her other hand upon his bent head. "Yes, my
dear, yes, my dear! that was always your fault. If your taste was
offended, if anything jarred--though it might be no more than was
absolutely essential, no more than common necessity required."
"Mother, you do me more good than words can say. Yes, I know, I know--I
never have friends for that cause. I have always wanted more, more----"
"More than any one could give," she said softly. "Those whom you love
should be above humanity, Theo: their feet should not tread the ground
at all. I have always been afraid, not knowing how you would take it
when necessary commonplaces came in."
"I wonder," he said, raising his head, "whether mothers are always as
perfect comforters as you are. That was what I wanted: but nobody in the
world could have said it but you."
"Because," she said, carrying out her role unhesitatingly, though to
her own surprise and without knowing why, "only your mother could know
your faults, without there being the smallest possibility that any fault
could ever stand between you and me."
His eyes had the look of being strained and hot, yet there seemed a
little moisture in the corners, a moisture which corresponded with the
slight quiver in his lip, rather than with the light in his eyes. He
held her hand still in his and caressed it almost unconsciously. "I am
not like you in that," he said. Alas no! he was not like her in that:
though the accusation of being fastidious, fantastic, intolerant of the
usual conditions of humanity, was, for the moment, the happiest thing
that could be said to him, yet a fault! a fault would stand between him
and whosoever was guilty of it, mother even--love still more. A fault:
he was determined that she should be perfect, the woman whom he had
chosen. To keep her perfect he was glad to seize at that suggestion of
personal blame, to acknowledge that he himself was impatient of every
condition, intolerant even of the bonds of humanity. But if there ever
should arise the time when the goddess should be taken from her pedestal,
when the woman should be found fallible like all women, heaven preserve
poor Theo then. The thought went through Mrs. Warrender's mind like a
knife. What would become of him? He had given himself up so unreservedly
to his love, he had sacrificed his own fastidious temper in the first
place, had borne the remarks of the county, had supported Geoff, had
allowed himself to be laughed at and blamed. But now if he should chance
to discover that the woman for whom he had done all this was not in
herself a piece of perfection----His mother felt her very heart sink
at the thought. No one was perfect enough to satisfy Theo; no one was
perfect at all so far as her own experience went. And when he made this
terrible discovery, what would he do?
In the meantime they went to luncheon, and there was talk of the repairs
wanted in the house, and of what Theo was doing "at home." He was very
unwilling, however, to speak of "home," or of what he had begun to do
there. He told them indeed of the trees that had been cut down, over
which Chatty made many exclamations, mourning for them; but even Chatty
was not vigorous in her lamentations. They sat and talked, not interested
in anything they were saying, the mother seated between them, watching
each, herself scarcely able to keep up the thread of coherent conversation,
making now and then incursions on either side from which she was obliged
to retreat hurriedly; referring now to some London experience which
Chatty's extreme dignity and silence showed she did not want to be
mentioned, or to something on the other side from which Theo withdrew
with still more distinct reluctance to be put under discussion. It was
not till this uncomfortable meal was over that Theo made any further
communication about his own affairs. He was on his way to the door,
whither his mother had followed him, when he turned round as if
accidentally. "By the bye," he said, "I forgot to tell you. _She_ will
be here presently, mother. She wanted to lose no time in seeing you."
"Lady Markland!" said Mrs. Warrender, with a little start.
He fixed his eyes upon her severely. "Who else? She is coming about
three. I shall come back, and go home with her."
"Theo, before I meet your future wife---- You have never given me any
details. Oh, tell me what has happened and what is going to happen.
Don't leave me to meet her in ignorance of everything."
"What is it you want to know?" he said, with his sombre air, setting his
back against the wall. "You know all that I know."
"Which is no more than that she has accepted you, Theo."
"Well, what more would you have? That is how it stands now, and may for
months for anything I can tell."
"I should have thought it would have been better to get everything
settled quickly. Why should there be any delay?"
"Ah, why? You must ask that of Mr. Longstaffe," he said, and turned
away.
Mrs. Warrender was much fluttered by the announcement of this visit.
She had expected no doubt to meet Lady Markland very soon, to pay her
perhaps a solemn visit, to receive her so to speak as a member of the
family, which had been an alarming thought. For Lady Markland, though
always grateful to her, and on one or two occasions offering something
that looked like a close, confidential friendship, had been always a
great lady in the opinion of the squire's wife, a more important person
than herself, intimacy with whom would carry embarrassments with it.
She had not been even, like other people in her position, familiarly
known in the society of the county. Her seclusion during her husband's
lifetime, the almost hermit life she led, the pity she had called forth,
the position as of one apart from the world which she had maintained,
all united to place Lady Markland out of the common circle on a little
eminence of her own. She had been very cordial especially on the last
evening they had spent together, the summer night when she had come to
fetch Geoff. But still they had never been altogether at their ease
with Lady Markland. Mrs. Warrender went back into the drawing-room, and
looked round upon it with eyes more critical than when she had regarded
it in relation to herself, wondering if Lady Markland would think it a
homely place, a residence unworthy her future husband's mother. She made
some little changes in it instinctively, put away the work on which
she had been engaged, and looked at Chatty's little workbox with an
inclination to put that too out of the way. The rooms at Markland were
not so fine as to make such precautions necessary; yet there was a faded
splendour about them very different from the limitation and comfortable
prim neatness of this. When she had done all that it was possible to do,
she sat down to wait for her visitor, trying to read though she could
not give much attention to what she read. "Lady Markland is to be here
at three," she said to Chatty, who was slightly startled for a moment,
but much less than her mother, taking a strip of muslin out of her box,
and beginning to work at it as if this was the business of life and
nothing else could excite her more. The blinds were all drawn down for
the sunshine, and the light came in green and cool though everything was
blazing out-of-doors. These lowered blinds made it impossible to see
the arrival though Mrs. Warrender heard it acutely--every prance of the
horses, every word Lady Markland said. It seemed a long time before,
through the many passages of the old-fashioned house, the visitor
appeared. She made a slight pause on the threshold, apparently waiting
for an invitation, for a special reception. Mrs. Warrender, with her
heart beating, had risen, and stood with her hands clasped in tremulous
expectation. They looked at each other for a moment across the parlour
maid, who did not know how to get out of the room from between the two
ladies, neither of whom advanced towards the other. Then Mrs. Warrender
went hurriedly forward with extended hands.
"Theo told me you were coming. I am very glad to see you." They took
each other's hands, and Mrs. Warrender bent forward to give the kiss
of welcome. They were two equal powers, meeting on debatable ground,
fulfilling all the necessary courtesies. Not like this should Theo's
mother have met his wife. It should have been a young creature whom she
could have taken into her arms, who would have flung herself upon the
breast of his mother, or at her knees, like a child of her own. Instead
of this, they were two equal powers, if, indeed, Lady Markland were not
the principal, the one to give and not receive. Mrs. Warrender felt
herself almost younger, less imposing altogether than the new member
of the family, to whom it should have been her part to extend a tender
patronage, to draw close to her, and set at her ease. Things were better
when this difficult first moment was over. It was suitable and natural
that Lady Markland should give to Chatty that kiss of peace--and then
they all seated themselves in a little circle. "You have just arrived,"
Lady Markland said.
"Yesterday. We have scarcely settled down."
"And you enjoyed your stay in town? Chatty at least --Chatty must have
enjoyed it." Lady Markland turned to her with a soft smile.
"Oh yes, very much," said Chatty, almost under her breath.
And then there was a brief pause, after which, "I hope Geoff is quite
well," Mrs. Warrender said.
"Quite well, and I was to bring you his love." Lady Markland hesitated
a little, and said, "I should like if I might--to consult you about
Geoff."
"Surely," Mrs. Warrender replied, and again there was a pause.
In former times, Chatty would not have perceived the embarrassment of
her two companions: but she had learned to divine since her three weeks'
experience. She rose up quietly. "I think, mamma, you will be able to
talk better if I go away."
"I don't know, my dear," said Mrs. Warrender, with a slight tremulousness.
Lady Markland did not say anything. She retained the advantage of
the position, not denying that she wished it, and Chatty accordingly,
putting down her work, went away. Mrs. Warrender felt the solemnity of
the interview more and more; but she did not know what to say.
Presently Lady Markland took the initiative. She rose and approached
nearer to Mrs. Warrender's side. "I want you to tell me," she said,
herself growing for the first time a little tremulous, "if you dislike
this very much--for Theo."
"Dislike it! oh, how can you think so? His happiness is all I desire,
and if you----"
"If I can make him happy? that is a dreadful question, Mrs. Warrender.
How can any one tell that? I hope so; but if I should deceive
myself----"
"That was not what I meant: there is no happiness for him, but that
which you can give: if you think him good enough--that was what I was
going to say."
"Good enough! Theo? Oh then, you do not know what he is, though he is
your son; and so far I am better than you are."
"Lady Markland, you are better in a great many ways. It is this that
frightens me. In some things you are so much above any pretensions of
his. He has so little experience, he is not rich, nor even is he clever
(though he is very clever) according to the ways of the world. I seem to
be disparaging my boy. It is not that, Lady Markland."
"No; do you think I don't understand? I am too old for him; I am not the
kind of woman you would have chosen, or even that he would have chosen,
had he been in his right senses."
"It is folly to say that you are old. You are not old; you are a woman
that any man might be proud to love. And his love--has been a wonder to
me to see," said his mother, her voice faltering, her eyes filling. "I
have never known such adoration as that."
"Ah, has it not!" cried the woman who was the object of it, a sudden
melting and ineffable change coming over her face. "That was what gave
me the courage," she said, after a moment's pause. "How could I refuse?
It is not often, is it, that a man--that a woman"--here her voice died
away in a confusion and agitation which melted all Mrs. Warrender's
reluctance. She found herself with her arms round the great lady,
comforting her, holding her head against her own breast. They shed some
tears together, and kissed each other, and for a moment came so close
that all secondary matters that could divide them seemed to fade away.
"But now," said Lady Markland, after this little interval, "he is
worried and disturbed again, by all the lawyers think it right to do. I
should like to spare him all that, but I am helpless in their hands. Oh,
dear Mrs. Warrender, you will understand. There are so many things that
make it more difficult. There is--Geoff."
Mrs. Warrender pressed her hands and gave her a look full of sympathy;
but she said nothing. She did not make a cheerful protest that all these
things were without importance, and that Geoff was no drawback, as
perhaps it was hoped she might do. Lady Markland drew back a little,
discouraged--waiting for some word of cheer which did not come.
"You know," she said, her voice trembling, "what my boy has been to me:
everything! until this new light that I never dreamed of, that I never
had hoped for, or thought of. You know how we lived together, he and I.
He was my companion, more than a child, sharing every thought. You
know----"
"Lady Markland, you have had a great deal of trouble, but how much with
it--a child like that, and then----"
"And then--Theo! Was there ever a woman so blessed--or so---- Oh, help
me to know what I am to do between them! You can understand better than
any of the young ones. Don't you see," said Lady Markland, with a smile
in which there was a kind of despair, "that though I am not old, as you
say, I am on your level rather than on his, that _you_ can understand
better than he?"
If it were possible that a woman who is a mother could cease to be that
in the first place and become a friend, first of all a sympathiser in the
very difficulties that overwhelm her son, that miracle was accomplished
then. The woman whom she had with difficulty accepted as Theo's future
wife became, for a moment, nearer to her in this flood of sympathy
than Theo himself. The woman's pangs and hindrances were closer to
her experience than the man's. To him, in the heat of his young
passion, nothing was worth considering that interfered with the perfect
accomplishment of his love. But to her--the young woman, who had to
piece on the present to the past, who though she might have abandoned
father and mother could never abandon her child--the other woman's heart
went out with a pang of fellow-feeling. Mrs. Warrender, like most women,
had an instinctive repugnance to the idea of a second marriage at all,
but that being determined and beyond the reach of change, her heart
ached for the dilemma which was more painful than any which enters into
the possibilities of younger life. As Lady Markland leant towards her,
claiming her sympathy, her face full of sentiments so conflicting, the
joy of love and yet the anguish of it, and all the contrariety of a
heart torn in two, the youthfulness, when all was said, of this expressive
countenance, the recollection that, after all, this woman who claimed to
be on her own level was not too old to be her child, seized upon Mrs.
Warrender. Nothing that is direct and simple can be so poignant as those
complications in which right and wrong and all the duties of human life
are so confused that no sharply cut division is possible. What was she
to do? She would owe all her heart to her husband, and what was to
remain for her child? Geoff had upon her the first claim of nature; her
love, her care, were his right--but then Theo? The old mother took the
young one into her arms, with an ache of sympathy. "Oh, my dear, what
can I say to you? We must leave it to Providence. Things come round when
we do not think too much of them, but do our best."
How poor a panacea, how slight a support! and yet in how many cases all
that one human creature can say to another! To do our best and to think
as little as possible, and things will come round! The absolute mind
scorns the mild consolation. To Theo it would have been an irritation,
a wrong, but Theo's betrothed received it with humbler consciousness.
The sympathy calmed her, and that so moderate, so humble, voucher of
experience that things come round. Was it really so? was nothing so bad
as it appeared? was it true that the way opened before you little by
little in treading it, as she who had gone on so much farther on the
path went on to say? Lady Markland regained her composure as she
listened.
"You are speaking to me like a true mother," she said. "I have never
known what that was. Help me, only help me! even to know that you
understand me is so much--and do not blame me."
"Dear Lady Markland----"
"I have a name," she said, with a smile which was full of pain, as if
marking another subject of trouble, "which is my own, which cannot be
made any question of. Will you call me Frances? It would please him.
They say it would be unusual, unreasonable, a thing which is never
done--to give up---- Is that Theo? Dear Mrs. Warrender, I shall be far
happier, now that I know I have a friend in you."
She grasped his mother's hands with a hurried gesture, and an anxious,
imploring look. Then gave a hasty glance into the glass, and recovered
in a moment her air of gentle dignity, her smile. It was this that met
Theo when he came in eager, yet doubtful, his eyes finding her out, with
a rapid question, the instant that he entered. Whatever her troubles
might be, none of them were made apparent to him.