SUSPENSE.
George Wainwright was by no means unconscious that he had done anything
but a friendly act towards the Derinzys, by making himself accessory
to the reconciliation which he foresaw as the inevitable result of the
meeting between Paul and Daisy. He quite understood that he should
be regarded in the light of an enemy by Paul's father and mother;
and that, should circumstances turn out so happily as to lead to an
avowal of his feelings towards Annette, he would have laid himself
open to the imputation of the meanest of motives, in encouraging his
friend to a step which should at once remove him from rivalry for
the lady's hand and competition for her fortune. The attainment of
Annette's majority would set her free from the guardianship of her
uncle; but if her infirmity of mind continued--and it would then be her
relatives' interest to prove the fact which it had been their interest
to conceal--it would be a curious question how Captain Derinzy would
act. George held a very decided opinion of Annette's uncle, and he felt
very little doubt that the "old scoundrel," as he designated him in
his meditations, would take measures to prove the girl's insanity in
order to bar her from marriage or the testamentary disposition of her
property. If anyone else had been her legal heir, George felt that,
if the hope of her restoration failed, it would have been possible to
make terms, at least to secure secrecy; but not in the case of Captain
Derinzy, especially under the circumstances which he felt were now
shaping themselves into form. Greed, spite, revenge, and exasperation
would all combine to inspire the Captain with a determination, in which
George had no doubt he would be warmly supported by Mrs. Derinzy, to do
his worst with the least possible delay.
But George, beyond feeling that they required consideration and
cautious handling, cared little for these things. If the experiment
undertaken by Dr. Hildebrand should happily prove successful, he would
do his best to make Annette love him and become his wife; and then
they might dispute her fortune as they liked--he should have enough
for both. If the experiment were destined to fail, he could not see
that the Derinzys would have much to complain of. They would not like
their son's marrying a milliner, of course; but as it was quite clear
they could not make him marry Annette, it did not materially affect the
chief object of their amiable and conscientious scheme. At all events,
no pondering over it on George's part, no resolution he could come to,
would avail to shorten the period of suspense, to alter the fact that
the crisis of his life must shortly be encountered.
George had contented himself with a written communication to Mrs.
Derinzy, in which he informed her of Paul's illness, and expressed
his conviction that his life depended upon the judicious action of
all around him at the present crisis. He did not overestimate Mrs.
Derinzy's tenderness towards her son; but he was not prepared, when
he went to Paul's rooms on the following day, to find that she had
contented herself with inquiring for him, ascertaining that proper
arrangements had been made for his being carefully nursed, and
announcing her intention of calling upon the doctor.
Paul was not in a condition to know anything about her proceedings.
When he appeared to be conscious, he named only Daisy and George, and
these intervals were rare and brief. They alternated with long periods
of stupor; and then it would not have been difficult, looking at the
sick man's face, to believe that all care and concern of his with life
were over for ever.
It was from Daisy George learned that Mrs. Derinzy had been at her
son's lodgings, and he allowed her to perceive how much her account of
the incident surprised and displeased him.
On arriving at Paul's rooms, George found Daisy sitting quietly beside
the bed, the sick man's hand in one of hers, while the fingers of the
other, freshly dipped in a fragrant cooling essence, lay lightly on
his hot wan forehead, on whose sunken temples pain had set its mark.
Her dress, of a soft material incapable of whisking or rustling, her
hair smoothly packed away, her ringless hands, her noiseless movements,
her composed, steady, alert face, formed a business-like realisation
of the ideal of a sick-nurse, which impressed the practised eye of
George reassuringly, and at the same time conveyed to him a sense of
association which he did not at the moment clearly trace out. When he
thought of it afterwards, he put it down to a general resemblance to
the women employed at his father's asylum.
Daisy's beauty was not in a style which George Wainwright particularly
admired, and the girl had never attracted him much. He had regarded
her with pity and consideration at first, when he had feared that
Paul was behaving so badly to her. He had regarded her with anger
and dislike when he discovered that she was behaving badly to Paul.
Both these phases of feeling had passed away now, and Daisy presented
herself to George's mind in a different and far more attractive light.
In this pale quiet woman there was nothing meretricious, nothing
flaunting; not the least touch of vulgarity marred the calm propriety
of her demeanour. George felt assured that he was seeing her in a
light which promised for the future, should the marriage which he was
forced to hope for, for his friend's sake, be the result of the present
complication.
She did not rise when he entered the room, she did not alter her
attitude, and there was not a shade of embarrassment in her manner. In
reply to his salutation she merely bent her head, and spoke in the low
distinct tone, as soothing to an invalid as a whisper is distracting.
"There is not much change," she said; "it is not yet to be expected."
George looked at Paul closely and silently.
"I expected to have found his mother here," he said. "I wrote and told
her of his illness."
"But you did not tell her I was here?"
"No," said George in surprise, "I did not think it necessary. I
concluded she would see you here, and learn from your own lips, and
your presence, the service you are doing Paul."
The sick man moaned slightly, and she dexterously shifted his head upon
the pillow before she answered, with a dim dubious smile:
"I believe Mrs. Derinzy is a very well-bred person, quite a woman of
the world. She would hardly commit herself to an interview with me."
The girl's proud eyes fixed themselves upon George's face, as she said
these few words, without any embarrassment.
"I--I beg your pardon," stammered George; "I ought to have seen Mrs.
Derinzy, and prepared her--I mean told her. I shrank from seeing her,
from a personal motive, and--and I fear thoughtlessly sacrificed you,
in some measure, to this reluctance. I wonder she could go away without
seeing her son."
"Do you? I do not. The standard of the actions of a woman of the world
may not be comprehensible to you, Mr. Wainwright; but we outsiders, yet
on-lookers, understand it well enough."
She glanced at the clock on the mantelshelf, softly withdrew her
hand from Paul's, and administered medicine to him, he, seemingly
unconscious, moaning heavily the while.
"I shall see Mrs. Derinzy," said George, "and explain to her. Forgive
me, Miss Stafford, pray forgive me, if I express myself awkwardly; I
really feel quite astray and at a loss. Things have changed so much
since I last talked with you, though that was only yesterday. I shall
have to give Mrs. Derinzy not only an explanation of the past and the
present, but some notion of what is to be expected in the future. Do
not think me impertinent, do not think me unfeeling, but I must, for
your own sake, in order to place you in the position it is right, it
is due to you, that you should occupy in the estimation of Paul's
mother--I must ask you, what do you purpose--what do you intend the
future shall mean for you and him?"
Daisy did not reply, until George began to feel impatient of her
silence. Her hand again lay on Paul's forehead, her brow was overcast
and knitted; she was thinking deeply. At length she said:
"Explain the past as you please, Mr. Wainwright--as Paul has told it
to you, I make no doubt--truly, honestly, as a gentleman, as a man of
honour should; relate the present as you know it to be--the story of
our interview, and of the step I have taken in consequence of it; but
of the future, say nothing."
"Nothing!" repeated George, in a tone of remonstrance--"nothing! Will
that suffice for her, for you, or for _him?_" He pointed to Paul. "Do
you not know the hope, the confidence, to which your presence here, the
noble act you have done in coming to him in this terrible extremity,
must give rise? Do you not feel that this is decisive, that henceforth
every consideration must be abandoned by each of you, for the life
which must be lived together?"
It passed swiftly through Daisy's mind that if ever Paul had so
pleaded his own cause, with so much conviction, so much force, so much
earnestness--if ever he had made her understand the worth of true love,
the false _allures_ of all beside--she would not have listened to
prudence and the narrow suggestions of her worldly wisdom, but would
have listened to him. It passed through her mind that this was a strong
man, one who would love well and worthily, and whose wife would be
honoured among women, whatever her origin. But she answered him coldly,
though his words were utterly persuasive.
"I cannot tell you to answer for the future, Mr. Wainwright. That
question cannot be answered until it has been asked by Paul. If he
lives, he will ask it; if he dies, Mrs. Derinzy will not require to
know anything about me."
"Be it so," said George emphatically. "I shall go there at once, and
see you again this evening. Goodbye, Miss Stafford, and God bless you!
You are doing the right thing now, at all events."
Again she simply bent her head without speaking, and without turning
her eyes from the sick man's face. George left the room with a
noiseless step. When he had reached the stair-foot, Daisy covered her
face with her hands, and rocked herself upon her chair, in an agony of
self-upbraiding.
"If he lives, he will ask me," she murmured in her torturing thoughts.
"Yes, he will ask me; and I--I who a little while ago was unfit to be
his wife only because of the difference in our rank--what shall I say?
Far other my unfitness now--the unfitness of one who has deliberately
entertained the project of degradation. Am I, who have chaffered with
that vile old man about the terms on which I might be induced to become
his mistress, fit to be that trusting boy's wife? Oh mother, mother!
this is the result of your calculation, your worldly instructions! Yet
no; why should I blame _her?_ It is the outcome of my life, of the sort
of thing I have seen and known since my childhood. Oh, my God! my God!
how foolish, how mad, how wicked I have been!"
Mrs. Derinzy was at home. George was ushered into the back
drawing-room, and permitted to indulge himself in solitude with the
contemplation of Annette's unoccupied place, her piano, her work-box,
and her own especial book of photographs, for some time. He looked at
these things with pangs of mingled hope and fear, and their influence
was to do away with the embarrassment and uneasiness he had felt on
entering the house. After all, what did anything really matter to him
which did not concern Annette and his relations with her?
When at length Mrs. Derinzy appeared, George saw that she was alarmed
and angry. The former sentiment he was enabled to allay, the latter he
was prepared to meet--prepared by courage on his friend's account, and
indifference on his own.
"I am happy to tell you," he began at once, "that there is satisfactory
progress in Paul's case. He is going on safely. I have little doubt he
will soon be out of danger; indeed, the doctor has said plainly that,
unless in the case of increase of symptoms, he is confident of the
result. You need not be alarmed, Mrs. Derinzy; I assure you the case is
favourable."
"I have heard the doctor's opinion of the case, Mr. Wainwright,"
replied Mrs. Derinzy with cold displeasure, "and I am not unduly
alarmed. But I am not unnaturally astonished to find myself excluded
from my son in his illness, and by you, the son of one of the oldest
and best friends I have in the world. I cannot believe you have any
explanation to offer which I can listen to, for your conduct in
bringing a--a person whom I cannot meet to take my place at my son's
side."
"I am not surprised at your tone, Mrs. Derinzy," replied George,
"though I might be pardoned for wondering how you contrive to hold me
guilty in the matter of Paul's supposed offence."
"_Supposed_ offence, Mr. Wainwright! You adopt the flippant and
unbecoming fashion in these matters! I hold it more than a _supposed_
offence that I should find a person installed in my son's lodgings,
with the knowledge of my son's friend, whose presence renders mine
impossible."
"We will let the phrase pass, Mrs. Derinzy, and come to the facts. Are
you sure you are really acquainted with the character and position of
the lady in question?"
"_Character_ and _position_ of the _lady_ in question!" echoed Mrs.
Derinzy, in an accent of spiteful contempt. "I should think there
was little doubt about _them_; the facts speak pretty plainly for
themselves."
"I assure you, nevertheless, and in spite of appearances, the
facts do not speak the truth if they impugn the respectability of
Miss Stafford--that is the young lady's name." Mrs. Derinzy bowed
scornfully. "I can give you an ample and trustworthy assurance on this
point, for I am acquainted--I was made acquainted by Paul himself--with
every particular of their intimacy, until within a few weeks of the
event which led to his illness; and the remainder I have learned partly
from inquiries elsewhere, but chiefly from Miss Stafford herself. If
you will listen to me, Mrs. Derinzy, I will tell you Miss Stafford's
history, so far as I know it, and the whole truth respecting her
position with regard to your son. And in order that what I have to say
may be more convincing, may have more weight with you, let me tell
you in the first place that I never spoke a word to Miss Stafford
until yesterday, when I went to her in my fear and trouble about Paul,
feeling convinced that from _her_ only could any real assistance be
procured."
"Go on," said Mrs. Derinzy, with sullen resignation. "This is a
pleasant hearing for a mother; but it is our fate, I suppose. Tell me
what you have to tell."
George obeyed her. He recapitulated all that had passed between
himself and Paul on the subject of Daisy, from the time when he had
accidentally witnessed their meeting in Kensington Gardens, to the
last conversation he had held with Paul before he went to Germany. She
listened, still sullen, but with interest, until he told her what was
Daisy's position in life; and then she interrupted him with the comment
for which he had been prepared.
"A milliner's girl! Truly Paul has a gentlemanly taste! And I am to
believe _she_ had scruples and _made_ difficulties?"
"You are," returned George, gravely; "for it is true. I do not
sympathise with your notions of caste, Mrs. Derinzy--I think I have
known more bad men and unscrupulous women of gentle than of plebeian
blood--but I understand them. Miss Stafford _had_ scruples, scruples
which Paul failed to vanquish--more shame to him for trying--and
she made difficulties which he could not surmount. The last and
gravest--that which threw him into the fever in which he is now
striving and battling for life--was her refusal, her point-blank,
uncompromising, positive refusal, to marry him!"
"To marry him!" exclaimed Mrs. Derinzy, starting up from her chair
in very undignified surprise and anger. "My son propose to _marry_ a
milliner's girl! I won't believe it!"
"You had no difficulty in believing, on no evidence at all, that he
had seduced her," continued George, quietly. "Now I can assume the
latter is utterly false; the former is distinctly true. You had better
be careful how you act towards this young lady, Mrs. Derinzy, for your
son loves her--loves her well enough to have been unworldly, and manly
enough to implore her to become his wife, and to be stricken well-nigh
to death by her refusal, and the sentence of final separation between
them pronounced by her. When your son fell down at his club in the fit
from which it seemed at first probable he would never rally, he was
struck down by a letter from Miss Stafford, in which she told him he
should see her no more."
"What was her reason? Did she not care for him?" asked Mrs. Derinzy,
almost in a whisper. She was subdued by the earnestness of George's
manner, and some womanly feelings, which, though tepid, still had a
place in her worldly scheming nature, were touched.
It was fortunate for the zeal and sincerity of George's advocacy of the
cause of the loves of Paul and Daisy, that he was entirely ignorant of
the Orpington episode. He had no actual acquaintance with the other
motives which had influenced Miss Stafford to reject Paul's proposal of
marriage, or the arguments with which she enforced them.
He had a general idea of the ground she had taken up throughout--the
ground of their social inequality, the inadequacy of means, and the
inevitable grief to which a marriage contracted under those grave
disadvantages must come; and he had, on the whole, approved her
views, until he had beheld their practical effect. He detailed to
Mrs. Derinzy his conviction concerning Miss Stafford's reasons, and
stoutly maintained that those reasons were quite consistent with a
disinterested attachment to Paul, and with a sound and elevated sense
of self-respect. To this view of the subject Paul's mother was entirely
indifferent. When it was made plain to her--as it was with irresistible
clearness, which not even the obstinacy of an illiberal woman sitting
in judgment on a social inferior could resist--that Miss Stafford's
character was unblemished, in the ordinary sense of the phrase, she
was obliged to shift her ground; and thenceforth her anxiety was to
be convinced that Daisy had really refused to marry her son, and to
be assured that she was likely to maintain her resolution. In her
solicitude on this point, Mrs. Derinzy was even ready to praise Miss
Stafford.
It was most wise of her; it showed an unusual degree of sense and
judgment in one so young, and necessarily so ignorant of the world; and
really it was impossible to praise such good taste too highly. Mrs.
Derinzy could assure Miss Stafford, from her own observation, which she
had had many opportunities of confirming, that these unequal marriages
never "did." They always resulted in misery to the wife. When the
husband outlived the first infatuation, and began to find society and
old habits essential to his comfort, society would not have the wife,
and she could not fit in with the old habits; and then came impatience
and disgust, and all the rest of it. Oh no, such marriages never "did;"
and Mrs. Derinzy was delighted to learn--delighted for the girl's
own sake; for Mr. Wainwright's narrative had inspired her with quite
an interest in this deserving young person--that she had acted with
so much judgment and discretion. She really deserved to prosper, and
Mrs. Derinzy was quite ready to wish her, after the most disinterested
fashion, the utmost amount of good fortune which should not involve her
marriage with Paul.
But this was precisely the contingency towards which it was George's
object to direct her thoughts. Notwithstanding the ambiguity with which
Daisy had spoken, he believed that she would be ready to sacrifice
all her pride, and to lay aside all her misgivings, when, the great
relief of Paul's being out of immediate danger realised, she should be
convinced that his health and his peace must alike depend on her; and
when that time should have come, much would depend upon his mother.
Happily, George had judgment as well as zeal, and contented himself on
this occasion with convincing Mrs. Derinzy, not only that there was no
contamination to be dreaded in the presence of the "young person" under
whose watchful care her son was struggling back to life, but that she
owed it to Daisy to show, by immediately visiting Paul, and recognising
her properly, that she was willing to undo the compromising impression
which her refusal to enter Paul's room had produced. Those were two
great points to gain in one interview; and when he had gained them,
with the addition of having his offer to escort Mrs. Derinzy to Paul's
lodgings accepted, he bethought himself, for positively the first time,
of the Captain.
Was he at home? was he much alarmed? George asked.
The Captain was not at home; was out of town for a couple of days, in
fact; had gone to some races, Mrs. Derinzy did not remember where; she
knew so little about things of that kind, all the racing places were
pretty much alike to her.
George politely suggested that the Captain's absence was fortunate; he
would not have much suspense to suffer; there was every reason to hope
all danger would be at an end before his return.
To which Mrs. Derinzy replied with some sharpness that Captain Derinzy
was not endowed with susceptible nerves, and that he was not easily
alarmed by any illness except his own.
They went out together, and George took leave of Mrs. Derinzy at
the door of Paul's lodgings, having ascertained that the doctor had
again seen the patient, and pronounced that there was no change to be
expected in his condition for some time. He lingered for a moment until
Mrs. Derinzy had begun to ascend the stairs under convoy of a maid, and
then he turned away, hoping for favourable results from this strange
and momentous meeting between Daisy and Paul's mother; and glad on his
own account that a rupture between himself and the Derinzys, which his
interference had appeared to render imminent, was at least postponed.
There was no characteristic of Daisy's more pronounced than her
self-control. When the maid gently opened the door of the sick-room,
and whispered the words "Mrs. Derinzy," she understood all that had
taken place, and was equal to the emergency. She disengaged her hand
from Paul's unconscious clasp, and rose. Standing in an attitude of
simple easy dignity by her son's bedside, Paul's mother saw her first,
and felt, though she was not a bright woman in general, an instant
conviction that George's story was perfectly true, and that there was
nothing about this remarkable-looking "young person," whose handsome
face was absolutely strange to her, and yet suggested, as it had done
in George's case, an inexpressible association.
Their respective salutations were polite but formal. Daisy spoke first.
"Will you take this chair?" she said, indicating her own. "You will be
able to see him better from that side. I am happy to say he is going on
favourably."
"Thank you, thank you," returned Mrs. Derinzy, in a fidgety whisper;
and she took the proposed place.
Then came a silence, interrupted only by an occasional faint moan
from Paul. The presence of Mrs. Derinzy did not deter Daisy from
the punctual fulfilment of her self-imposed duties; and as the
mother watched her diligent ministering to the invalid, watched
it helplessly--for Mrs. Derinzy was a perfectly useless person in
a sick-room--she could maintain this reserve no longer, and broke
through it by anxious questions, to which the other replied with ready
respectful self-possession.
If poor Paul could only have known that, in the first interview between
his mother and his love--an interview on which he had often nervously
speculated--Daisy had appeared to greater advantage, had looked
handsomer, softer, more charming, more graceful, more ladylike than she
had ever appeared in her life before! But many days were to pass away
before Paul was to know anything of surrounding things or persons; his
mind was away in a mysterious region of semi-consciousness, of pain,
of unreality. He was assiduously cared for by Daisy and George, by the
doctor and the nurse. Even Dr. Wainwright himself superintended the
case, and indorsed the mode of treatment of the humbler practitioner.
His mother came to see him every day, and a good understanding existed
between her and Daisy, though no direct reference to Daisy's relations
with Paul had been made.
The Captain had shown a decent solicitude about his son; but it is to
be feared he rather enjoyed the state of affairs than otherwise as soon
as positive danger to Paul's life was no longer to be apprehended. It
implied so much of the freedom he loved, no surveillance, no domestic
restraints, no regular hours; it was a delicious renewal of the liberty
of his bachelor days.
There is no need to dwell farther on this portion of the story. After
many weeks Paul was pronounced convalescent; and then, by the advice
of Dr. Wainwright, whose interest had been gradually awakened in the
case, and who had come to like Paul, Daisy abandoned her post. It was
determined that the invalid should travel for awhile, and arranged that
George should accompany him. Dr. Wainwright undertook to induce him to
acquiesce, and to reconcile him to the absence of Daisy.
He was too weak to resist, he felt an inner consciousness of his
unfitness to bear emotion, which rendered him passively obedient, and
he was too happy to be exacting or rebellious. He trusted the future;
he felt, in a vague way, that things would go well with him. And on the
day fixed for the departure of himself and George on their excursion,
he received a little note from Daisy, which sent him on his way
rejoicing. It contained only these words:
"DEAREST PAUL,--George would have brought me to say goodbye to you;
but I could not bear it. You know I hate showing my feelings to anyone
but you, and we could not have been alone. Come home soon--no, don't;
stay away until you are quite well and strong; and don't forget, for
one minute of all the time,
"DAISY."
"I think you are a humbug," said George Wainwright to Paul as they
landed at Calais, and Paul declared his inclination to have everything
that could be procured to eat immediately; "you don't look a bit like a
sick man."
"I'm sure I don't feel like one," returned Paul; "and it's great
nonsense your father sending me away like this. But I am not going to
complain or rebel; I mean implicitly to obey him----"
"And Daisy," interrupted George.
"And Daisy, of course."
The two young men enjoyed their tour, Paul very much more than George,
as was natural. Paul's affairs were promising, though he did not see
his way very clearly to the fulfilment of the promise. But he was full
of hope and the gladsome spirits of returning health. There was as yet
no rift in the cloud which overhung George's prospects, and he wearied
sometimes of the monotony of anxiety and deferred hope.
Dr. Wainwright communicated punctually to his son such information as
reached him from Mayence. He had not expected regular intelligence
from Dr. Hildebrand, and had told George he must not expect any such
concessions from the scientific old oddity, who had already done him
exceptional grace. A formal report from Mrs. Stothard of the general
health and spirits of Annette reached the Doctor at the appointed
periods, but conveyed little real information. Such as they were,
George hailed the arrival of these documents with eagerness, and Paul
had the grace to assume a deeper interest in them than he really felt.
"By-the-bye," he said to George one evening, as they were resting after
a day of laborious mountain-walking, "I don't think I ever told you
about Mrs. Stothard, did I?"
"You never told me anything particular about Mrs. Stothard," replied
George. "What is it?"
"Why, she's Daisy's mother!"
"Daisy's mother!" repeated George in astonishment. "Now I know what
the likeness was that struck me; of course, it was just the steady
business-like look I have seen Mrs. Stothard give at Annette."
Before the companions had started on the expedition arranged for the
following day, the English mail arrived. George got his letters at the
inn-door. One was from his father. He glanced over it, and ran up to
Paul's room, breathless, and with a very pale face.
"Paul," he said, "there's a letter from my father. Such wonderful news!
He says he will not tell me any particulars till we meet; but Dr.
Hildebrand is sending Annette home at once, and--and she is perfectly
well! Hildebrand says he has never had a more complete, a more thorough
success."
Paul shook his friend's hand warmly, and eagerly congratulated him,
adding with great promptitude:
"I'm all right also, you know; and so, old fellow, we'll start for
England to-night."