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(Library of the University of Illinois)
A RIGHTED WRONG.
A RIGHTED WRONG.
A Novel.
BY
EDMUND YATES,
AUTHOR OF
"BLACK SHEEP," "THE FORLORN HOPE," "BROKEN TO HARNESS," ETC.
IN THREE VOLUMES.
VOL. II.
LONDON:
TINSLEY BROTHERS, 18 CATHERINE ST., STRAND.
1870.
[_All rights reserved_.]
LONDON:
ROBSON AND SONS, PRINTERS, PANCRAS ROAD, N.W.
CONTENTS OF VOL. II.
CHAP.
I. Day.
II. Full Compensation.
III. Three Letters.
IV. Hayes Meredith's Revelation.
V. Consultation.
VI. The Return.
VII. The Marriage.
VIII. Shadows.
IX. Family Affairs.
X. Margaret's Presentiment.
XI. After a Year.
A RIGHTED WRONG.
CHAPTER I.
DAY.
It will probably be entirely unnecessary to inform the intelligent
reader what was the nature of the contents of the letter which James
Dugdale had handed to Mrs. Hungerford. Retrospect, present knowledge,
or anticipation will convey a sufficiently accurate perception of it
to all the readers of this story.
The writing of that letter was the result of a long and entirely
unreserved conversation which had taken place between Lady Davyntry
and her brother, after the last-recorded interview between the former
and Margaret.
So entirely confident was Eleanor of Mr. Baldwin's feelings and
intentions, that she no longer hesitated to speak to him on the matter
nearest her heart from any apprehension of defeating her own purpose
by precipitation.
In the doubts and fears, in the passionate and painful burst of
reminiscence which had given her added insight into Margaret's nature.
Lady Davyntry had seen, far more plainly than Margaret,--or at least
than ever she had confessed to herself,--that a new love, a fresh
hope, had come to her. The very strife of feeling which she confessed
and described betrayed her to the older woman, whose wisdom, though
rather of the heart than of the understanding, was true in this case.
"It will never do to let her brood over this sort of thing," said Lady
Davyntry to herself with decision. "The more time she has to think
over it, the more danger there is of her working herself up into a
morbid state of mind, persuading herself that she ought to sacrifice
her own happiness, and make Fitz wretched, because she had the
misfortune to be married to a villain, and associated, through him,
with some very bad people--the more she will tax her memory and
torture her feelings, by trying to recall and realise all the past. I
can see that nature and her youth are helping her to forget it all,
and would do so, no doubt, if Fitz never existed; but she is trying to
resist the influence of nature, and to train herself to a state of
mind which is simply ruinous and absurd."
So Lady Davyntry spoke to her brother that evening, and had the
satisfaction of finding that she had acted wisely in so doing. '"Don't
speak to her, Fitz," she said, towards the conclusion of their
conversation; "don't give her the chance of being impelled by such
feelings as she has acknowledged to me, to say no,--let her have time
to think about it."
It was a position in which few men would have failed to look silly,
that of talking over a love affair, in the ante-proposal stage, with a
sister. But Mr. Baldwin was one of those men who never can be made to
look silly, who have about them an inborn dignity and entire
singleness of purpose which are effectual preservatives against the
faintest touch of the ridiculous in their words or actions.
He had spoken frankly of his hopes, and of his grounds for
entertaining them, but the account his sister gave of Margaret's state
of mind troubled him sorely. Here Lady Davyntry again proved her
possession of sounder sense than many who knew her only slightly would
have believed she possessed.
"It won't last," she assured her brother; "it is a false, phantasmal
state of feeling, and though it might grow more and more strong if
nothing were opposed to it, it will disappear before a true and
powerful feeling--rely upon it she will wonder at herself some day,
and be hardly able to realise that she ever gave way to this sort of
thing."
Mr. Baldwin wrote the letter, the answer to which was to mean so much
to him; and Lady Davyntry enclosed it in a cover directed by herself.
"I don't think my darling Margaret can have much doubt about how I
should regard this affair," she said, as she sealed the envelope with
such a lavish use of sealing wax in the enthusiasm of the moment, that
it swelled up all round the seal like liliputian pie-crust; "but
whatever she may have teased herself with fancying, she will know it
is all right when she sees that I enclose your letter. Some women
might take it into their heads to be annoyed because you had spoken to
another person of your feelings; but Margaret is too high-minded for
anything of that sort, and, rely upon it, she will be none the less
happy, if she promises to become your wife, that she will make me as
happy in proportion as yourself by the promise."
At this stage, the impulsive Eleanor gave vent to her emotion by
hugging her brother heartily, and accompanying the embrace with a
shower of tears.
Margaret remained where James Dugdale had left her standing with Mr.
Baldwin's letter in her hand. She did not break the seal, she did not
move, for several minutes,--then she picked up Lady Davyntry's
envelope, which had fluttered to the ground, and went into the house.
Any one not so innocently absentminded as Mr. Carteret, or so
cheerfully full of harmless self-content of youth, health, and
unaccustomed leisure as Haldane Carteret, could hardly have failed to
notice that there was something strange in the looks and manner of two
of the little party who sat down that day to the dinner table at
Chayleigh, shorn of much of its formality since Mrs. Carteret had
ceased to preside over it.
Margaret was paler than usual, but not with the pallor of
ill-health--the clear skin had no sallowness in its tint.
To one accustomed to read the countenance which had acquired of late
so much new expression, and such a softening of the old one, the
indication of strong emotion would have been plain, in the pale cheek,
the lustrous, downcast eye, the occasional trembling of the small
lips, the absent, preoccupied gaze, the sudden recall of her attention
to the present scene, the forced smile when her father spoke to her,
and the unusual absence of interest and pleasure in Haldane's jokes,
which were sometimes good, but always numerous.
James Dugdale sat at the table, quite silent, and did not even make
any attempt to eat. Margaret, with the superior powers of hypocrisy
observable in the female, affected, unnecessarily, to have a very good
appetite. The meal was a painful probation for them.
It was so far from unusual for James to be ill and depressed, that
when Haldane had commented upon his silence and his want of appetite
in his usual off-hand fashion, and Mr. Carteret had lamented those
misfortunes, and digressed into speculation whether James had not
better have his dinner just before going to bed, because wild
beasts gorge themselves with food, and go to sleep immediately
afterwards,--no further notice was taken.
It never occurred to Mr. Carteret or to Haldane that anything except
illness could ail James. Neither did it occur to one or the other to
notice that Margaret, usually so observant of James, so kind in her
attention to him, so sympathetic, who understood his "good days" and
his "bad days" so well, did not make the slightest remark herself, and
suffered theirs to pass without comment.
She never once addressed James during dinner, nor did her glance
encounter his. Why?
It had been Margaret's custom of late to sit with her father in his
study during the evening. Mr. Carteret and she would adjourn thither
immediately after dinner, and James and Haldane usually joined them
after a while.
Margaret did not depart from her usual practice on this particular
evening, but she was not inclined to talk to her father. She settled
him into his particular chair, in his inevitable corner, and began to
read aloud to him, with more than her usual promptness.
But somehow the reading was not successful, her voice was husky and
uncertain, and her inattention so obvious that it soon became
infectious, and Mr. Carteret found the effort of listening beyond him.
An unusually prolonged and unmistakable yawn, for which he hastened to
apologise, made the fact evident to Margaret.
"I think we are both disinclined for reading to-night, papa," she said
as she laid aside her book, and took a low seat by her father's side.
"We will talk now for a while."
"Very well, my dear," said the acquiescent Mr. Carteret. But Margaret
did not seem inclined to follow up her own proposition actively. She
sat still, dreamily silent, and her fingers played idly with the
fringe which bordered the chintz cover of her father's chair. At
length she said:
"Papa, what do you think of Mr. Baldwin?"
"What do I think of Mr. Baldwin, my dear?" repeated Mr. Carteret
slowly. "I think very highly of him indeed: a most accomplished young
man I consider him, and excessively obliging, I'm sure. I don't
flatter myself, you know, Margaret, with any notion that I am a
particularly delightful companion for any one; indeed, since our great
loss, I am best alone I think, or with you--with you, my dear," and
her father patted Margaret's head just as he had been used to pat it
when she was a little child; "and still, he seems to like being with
me, and takes the greatest interest in my collection. Excessively
liberal he is, too, and I can assure you very few collectors, however
rich they may be, are _that_. He has shared his magnificent specimens
of lepidoptera with me, and I have not another friend in the world who
would do that. Think of him?" said Mr. Carteret again, returning to
Margaret's question. "I think most highly of him. But why do you ask
me? Don't you think well of him yourself?"
Margaret looked up hastily, dropped her eyes again, and said:
"O yes, papa; I--I do, indeed; but I wanted to ask you, because----"
A quick tapping at the window interrupted her. Haldane stood outside,
and his sister left her seat and went to him.
"Come out for a walk, Madge," he said. "James is queer this evening,
and says he will just give the governor half-an-hour, and then go to
bed. You don't want them both, do you, sir?" Haldane asked the
question with his head inside, and his body outside the window. "I
thought not. Here's James now." At that moment Mr. Dugdale entered the
room. "Come on; you can get your bonnet and shawl; the door is open."
Margaret had not turned her face from the window, and she now stepped
out into the verandah. She had not seen the expression on James
Dugdale's face. Instinct caused her to avoid him. She had not yet
faced the subject in her own mind, she had not yet reckoned with
herself about it.
"Has she written to him? Is he coming here? How is it?"
These were the questions which repeated themselves in James's brain,
as he tried to talk to Mr. Carteret, and tried _not_ to follow the
footsteps of the woman whose way was daily deviating more and more
widely from his.
The brother and sister walked down the terrace, and into the
pleasaunce together.
Haldane had been exposed to the fascinations of the eldest Miss
Crofton for the last ten days or so, and, being rather defenceless
under such circumstances, though not, as he said of himself, "lady's
man," he was very likely to capitulate, unless some providential
occurrence furnished him with a change of occupation, and thus
diverted his mind.
At present the eldest Miss Crofton--her papa, her mamma, her little
brother, a wonderfully clever child, and particularly fond of being
"taken round the lawn" on Haldane's horse, with only Haldane on one
side and his sister on the other to hold him on--her housekeeping
science, and her equestrian feats, afforded Haldane topics of
conversation of which Margaret showed no weariness. Her attention
certainly did wander a little, but Haldane did not perceive it.
They had passed through the gate into the fields which bordered on
Davyntry, and Haldane had just pleaded for a little more time out, the
evening was so beautiful--adding his conviction that every woman in
the world was greedy about her tea, and that Margaret would not be
half so pale if she drank less of that pernicious decoction--when she
started so violently that he could not fail to perceive it.
"What's the matter? he asked, in surprise.
"Nothing," said Margaret. "There's--there's some one coming."
"So there is," said Haldane, looking at a figure advancing quickly
towards them from the direction of Davyntry; "and it is Baldwin."
The blood rushed violently into Margaret's cheeks, her feet were
rooted to the ground for a moment, as she felt the whole scene around
her grow indistinct; the next, she was meeting Mr. Baldwin with
composure which far surpassed his own, and in the first glance of her
candid eyes, which looked up at him shyly, but entirely with their
owner's will, he read the answer to his letter.
"If you will take Margaret home to this important and ever-recurring
tea, Baldwin," said Haldane Carteret, "I will go on a little farther,
and smoke my cigar."
He went away from them quickly, and saying to himself, "It is to be, I
think."