MARRIAGE.
The die was cast now. For weal or for woe, for better or worse, Sir
Ronald and Lady Clarice were to spend the remainder of their lives
together.
They went abroad! They made the usual Continental tour, and then
returned to Aldenmere. Lady Clarice was happy as the day was long. No
bird singing in the shade of summer trees was half so blithe or gay.
On one occasion he was speaking of the grand ball they must give on
their return, and she said, half doubtingly:
“Shall you invite the Lorristons, Ronald?”
“Certainly. Why not? Lord Lorriston and I were always good friends.”
“I fancied, perhaps, you would not like to meet his daughter.”
“She will, in all probability, be Lady Eyrle then, and what can Kenelm
Eyrle’s wife matter to me?”
“I hear nothing now of their engagement,” she said, thoughtfully.
He turned to her quickly.
“It was you who told me about it--surely you remember?”
“Oh, yes, perfectly; but I fancy it must be broken off, as I hear
nothing of it.”
He only said bitterly to himself that she had played with another
heart and broken it; but for the remainder of all that day no smile or
cheerful word came from him.
Yet she did not notice it. She knew the power of her own beauty, and
she would have deemed it simply impossible that the man upon whom she
lavished all her love could give one thought to another.
She was blind and deaf to the fierce contest going on in the heart and
soul of her husband--to the war that never ended, between right and
wrong.
He would go to her at times with a wearied look on his face that never
came from physical fatigue. He would lay his head down like a tired
child, and say:
“Clarice, sing to me.”
She never said to herself that she was needed to drive away the demon
of discontent; she only thought he preferred her singing to any other,
and was flattered accordingly.
Then the time came for them to return to Aldenmere, and great were
the preparations. The little town of Leeholme was in a perfect fever
of excitement. Triumphal arches were erected, flags were flying, the
beautiful bells of Leeholme church pealed merrily, the tenants were all
assembled to do honor to their lord.
“Welcome Home!” “Long Life to Lord and Lady Alden!” “A Bridal Welcome!”
and hundreds of other mottoes decorated the flags and the arches.
Through long lines of happy faces, through the music of cheering
voices, bride and bridegroom drove to their ancient home.
People might have wondered why the bridegroom’s face grew sterner and
paler as the thunder of a mighty welcome greeted him. Lady Clarice
looked at him with tears in her eyes.
“Oh, Ronald, how pleased they are to see us! What can we do for them?”
“There will be plenty of home-brewed ale, and as many oxen roasted
as can be eaten,” he said, and the words jarred upon her. She looked
in the pale, impassive face, and would fain have seen some lingering
softness there.
He was thinking, Heaven help him! how different it would have been had
the face he loved been near him on this day, when he saw how popular
and well-loved he was. Then he took himself fiercely to task for the
thoughts.
“Let me remember I have a wife who loves me dearly,” he said to
himself, “and let me not forget the woman who ruined my life for her
own amusement will soon have, or perhaps has, a husband of her own.”
So he went through the duties of the day with ease and dignity. He
made a most cordial and genial speech to his tenants, inviting them
all to partake of the lavish hospitality prepared for them. He took
his beautiful young wife by the hand, and spoke a few words in her
praise that caused cheers to rise to the very heavens. He spoke of the
work he hoped to do among them--of the life he hoped to spend--of the
brightness of his future, and in his heart he hated the sun for shining
to mock him, and the flowers for blooming so fair.
Had any one present said that that man’s heart was broken by an unhappy
love, who would have believed it? Did ever lot seem so fair?
And as the well-satisfied tenants left they declared one and all
that Sir Ronald must be perfectly happy. Those who had troubles
of their own--the sorrowful and unhappy, whom many privations had
crushed--wondered that lots in life were so unequal, and envied this
man, young, rich, handsome, and beloved, while he would have changed
places with the poorest, lowliest there to have known only for one hour
such peace of mind as the happy enjoy.
There was but a few hours of respite, then the hall table was covered
with letters of welcome and cards. The same evening Mrs. Severn drove
over. It seemed to her years since she had parted with her beloved
child.
“You will not see Mr. Eyrle among your friends,” she said, as they sat
at dinner; “he went away three weeks ago.”
“Then he is not married?” said Sir Ronald, hastily.
“No,” she replied, with some little surprise, “I never heard even a
rumor of his marriage.”
“You forget,” said Lady Clarice, hastily. “It was not publicly known.”
So, then, Lady Hermione was still free--no adoring husband or jealous
lover was there. He would rather ten thousand times over been told that
she was married and was most passionately attached to her husband; that
would have been better news for him; the barrier between them would
have been doubled. He did not like to think that any time he went out
he should meet her, perhaps more beautiful than ever, to renew all
his misery. He had all the respect of a true, pure-hearted Englishman
for the sanctity of the marriage tie, and he wished that the barrier
between himself and the woman he loved were as great and strong on her
side as on his.
“Clarice,” he said to his wife, “I have altered my mind. Nay, you are
going to tell me that I am claiming a woman’s privilege; let it be so.
I am not much stronger than a woman in some things. I shall not invite
the Lorristons to Aldenmere.”
She looked up at him with a sudden cloud of anxiety on her face.
“Why, Ronald?”
“It would not be pleasant. After all, they did not behave well to me.
We had better, I think, keep that distance that seems to have grown
between us.”
Lady Clarice was perfectly willing, nothing could have pleased her
better, for there was no time of her life during which she had not been
more or less jealous of Lady Hermione.