Miss Susan entered the drawing-room in the same dim light in which
Everard had left it. She was irritable and impatient in her misery. She
would have liked to turn up all the lamps, and throw a flood of light
upon the stranger whose attitude was indolent and indecorous. Why was
she there at all? what right had she to extend herself at full length,
to make herself so comfortable? That Giovanna should be comfortable did
not do Miss Susan any further harm; but she felt as if it did, and a
fountain of hot wrath surged up in her heart. This, however, she felt
was not the way in which she could do any good, so she made an effort to
restrain herself. She sat down in Everard’s seat which he had left. She
was not quite sure whether he himself were not lingering in the shadows
at the door of the room, and this made her difficulty the greater in
what she had to say.
“Do you like this darkness?” she asked. “It is oppressive; we cannot see
to do anything.”
“Me, I don’t want to do anything,” said Giovanna. “I sleep and I dream.
This is most pleasant to me. Madame Suzanne likes occupation. Me, I do
not.”
“Yes,” said Miss Susan with suppressed impatience, “that is one of the
differences between us. But I have something to say to you; you wanted
me to make an allowance for the child, and I refused. Indeed, it is not
my business, for Whiteladies is not mine. But now that I have thought of
it, I will consent. It would be so much better for you to travel with
your father-in-law than alone.”
Giovanna turned her face toward her companion with again that laughing
devil in her eye. “Madame Suzanne mistakes. The bon papa spoke of his
rente that he loves, not me. If ces dames will give me money to dress
myself, to be more like them, that will be well; but it was the
bon-papa, not me.”
“Never mind who it was,” said Miss Susan, on the verge of losing her
temper. “One or the other, I suppose it is all the same. I will give you
your allowance.”
“To dress myself? thanks, that will be well. Then I can follow the mode
Anglaise, and have something to wear in the evening, like Madame Suzanne
herself.”
“For the child!” cried the suffering woman, in a voice which to Everard,
behind backs, sounded like low and muffled thunder. “To support him and
you, to keep you independent, to make you comfortable at home among your
own people--”
“Merci!” cried Giovanna, shrugging her shoulders. “That is the
bon-papa’s idea, as I tell madame, not mine. Comfortable! with my
belle-mère! Listen, Madame Suzanne--I too, I have been thinking. If you
will accept me with bounty, you shall not be sorry. I can make myself
good; I can be useful, though it is not what I like best. I stay--I make
myself your child--”
“I do not want you,” cried Miss Susan, stung beyond her strength of
self-control, “I do not want you. I will pay you anything to get you
away.”
Giovanna’s eyes gave forth a gleam. “Très bien,” she said, calmly. “Then
I shall stay, if madame pleases or not. It is what I have intended from
the beginning; and I do not change my mind, me.”
“But if I say you shall not stay!” said Miss Susan, wrought to fury, and
pushing back her chair from the table.
Giovanna raised herself on her elbow, and leaned across the table,
fixing the other with her great eyes.
“Once more, très bien,” she said, in a significant tone, too low for
Everard to hear, but not a whisper. “Très bien! Madame then wishes me to
tell not only M. Herbert, but the bonne sœur, madame’s sister, and ce
petit monsieur-là?”
Miss Susan sat and listened like a figure of stone. Her color changed
out of the flush of anger which had lighted it up, and grew again ashy
pale. From her laboring breast there came a great gasp, half groan, half
sob. She looked at the remorseless creature opposite with a piteous
prayer coming into her eyes. First rage, which was useless; then
entreaty, more useless still. “Have pity on me! have pity on me,” she
said.
“But certainly!” said Giovanna, sinking back upon her cushions with a
soft laugh. “Certainly! I am not cruel, me; but I am comfortable, and I
stay.”
“She will not hear of it,” said Miss Susan, meeting Everard’s anxious
looks as she passed him, hurrying upstairs. “Never mind me. Everard,
never mind! we shall do well enough. Do not say any more about it. Never
mind! never mind! It is time we were all in bed.”
“But, Aunt Susan, tell me--”
“No, no, there is nothing to tell,” she said, hurrying from him. “Do not
let us say any more about it. It is time we were all in bed.”
The next day M. Guillaume left Whiteladies, after a very melancholy
parting with his little grandchild. The old man sobbed, and the child
sobbed for sympathy. “Thou wilt be good to him, Giovanna!” he said,
weeping. Giovanna stood, and looked on with a smile on her face. “Bon
papa, it is easy to cry,” she said; “but you do not want him without a
rente; weep then for the rente, not for the child.” “Heartless!” cried
the old shopkeeper, turning from her; and her laugh, though it was quite
low, did sound heartless to the bystanders; yet there was some truth in
what she said. M. Guillaume went away in the morning, and Everard in the
afternoon. The young man was deeply perplexed and disturbed. He had been
a witness of the conclusive interview on the previous night without
hearing all that was said; yet he had heard enough to show him that
something lay behind of which he was not cognizant--something which made
Miss Susan unwillingly submit to an encumbrance which she hated, and
which made her more deeply, tragically unhappy than a woman of her
spotless life and tranquil age had any right to be. To throw such a
woman into passionate distress, and make her, so strong in her good
sense, so reasonable and thoroughly acquainted with the world, bow her
head under an irritating and unnecessary yoke, there must be some cause
more potent than anything Everard could divine. He made an attempt to
gain her confidence before he went away; but it was still more fruitless
than before. The only thing she would say was, that she could speak no
more on the subject. “There is nothing to say. She is here now for good
or for evil, and we must make the best of it. Probably we shall get on
better than we think,” said Miss Susan; and that was all he could
extract from her. He went away more disturbed than he could tell; his
curiosity was excited as well as his sympathy, and though, after awhile,
his natural reluctance to dwell on painful subjects made him attempt to
turn his mind from this, yet the evident mystery to be found out made
that attempt much harder than usual. Everard was altogether in a
somewhat uncertain and wavering state of mind at the time. He had
returned from his compulsory episode of active life rather better in
fortune, and with a perception of his own unoccupied state, which had
never disturbed him before. He had not got to love work, which is a
thing which requires either genius or training. He honestly believed,
indeed, that he hated work, as was natural to a young man of his
education; but having been driven to it, and discovered in himself, to
his great surprise, some faculty for it, his return to what he thought
his natural state had a somewhat strange effect upon him. To do nothing
was, no doubt, his natural state. It was freedom; it was happiness
(passive); it was the most desirable condition of existence. All this he
felt to be true. He was his own master, free to go where he would, do
what he would, amuse himself as he liked; and yet the conclusion of the
time when he had not been his own master--when he had been obliged to do
this and that, to move here and there not by his own will, but as
necessity demanded--had left a sense of vacancy in this life. He was
dissatisfied with his leisure and his freedom; they were not so good,
not so pleasant, as they had once been. He had known storm and tempest,
and all the expedients by which men triumph over these commotions, and
the calm of his inland existence wearied him, though he had not yet gone
so far as to confess it to himself.
This made him think more of the mystery of Whiteladies than perhaps he
would have done otherwise, and moved him so far as to indite a letter to
Reine, in which perhaps more motives than that of interest in Miss
Susan’s troubles were involved. He had left them when the sudden storm
which he had now surmounted had appeared on the horizon, at a very
critical moment of his intercourse with Reine; and then they had been
cast altogether apart, driven into totally different channels for two
years. Two years is a long time or a short time, according to the
constitution of the mind, and the nature of circumstances. It had been
about a century to Everard, and he had developed into a different being.
And now this different being, brought back to the old life, did not well
know what to do with himself. Should he go and join his cousins again,
amuse himself, see the world, and perhaps renew some things that were
past, and reunite a link half broken, half unmade? Anyhow, he wrote to
Reine, setting forth that Aunt Susan was ill and very queer--that there
was a visitor at Whiteladies of a very novel and unusual character--that
the dear old house threatened to be turned upside down--fourthly, and
accidentally, that he had a great mind to spend the next six months on
the Continent. Where were they going for the Winter? Only ladies, they
say, put their chief subject in a postscript. Everard put his under care
of a “By-the-bye” in the last two lines of his letter. The difference
between the two modes is not very great.
And thus, while the young man meditated change, which is natural to his
age, in which renovation and revolution are always possible, the older
people at Whiteladies settled down to make the best of it, which is the
philosophy of their age. To say the older people is incorrect, for it
was Miss Susan only who had anything novel or heavy to endure. Miss
Augustine liked the new guest, who for some time went regularly to the
Almshouse services with her, and knelt devoutly, and chanted forth the
hymns with a full rich voice, which indeed silenced the quavering tones
of the old folks, but filled the chapel with such a flood of melody as
had never been heard there before. Giovanna enjoyed singing. She had a
fine natural voice, but little instruction, and no opportunity at the
moment of getting at anything better in the way of music; so that she
was glad of the hymns which gave her pleasure at once in the exercise of
her voice, and in the agreeable knowledge that she was making a
sensation. As much of a crowd as was possible in St. Austin’s began to
gather in the Almshouse garden when she was known to be there; and
though Mrs. Richard instinctively disapproved of her, the Doctor was
somewhat proud of this addition to his service. Giovanna went regularly
with her patroness, and gained Augustine’s heart, as much as that
abstracted heart could be gained, and made herself not unpopular with
the poor people, to whom she would speak in her imperfect English with
more familiarity than the ladies ever indulged in, and from whom, in
lieu of better, she was quite ready to receive compliments about her
singing and her beauty. Once, indeed, she sang songs to them in their
garden, to the great entertainment of the old Almshouse folks. She was
caught in the act by Mrs. Richard, who rushed to the rescue of her
gentility with feelings which I will not attempt to describe. The old
lady ran out breathless at the termination of a song, with a flush upon
her pretty old cheeks, and caught the innovator by the arm.
“The doctor is at home, and I am just going to give him a cup of tea,”
she said; “won’t you come and have some with us?”
Mrs. Richard’s tidy little bosom heaved under her black silk gown with
consternation and dismay.
Giovanna was not at all willing to give up her al fresco entertainment.
“But I will return, I will return,” she said.
“Do, madame, do,” cried the old people, who were vaguely pleased by her
music, and more keenly delighted by having a new event to talk about,
and the power of wondering what Miss Augustine (poor thing!) would
think; and Mrs. Richard led Giovanna in, with her hand upon her arm,
fearful lest her prisoner should escape.
“It is very good of you to sing to them; but it is not a thing that is
done in England,” said the little old lady.
“I love to sing,” said Giovanna, “and I shall come often. They have not
any one to amuse them; and neither have I,” she added with a sigh.
“My dear, you must speak to the Doctor about it,” said Mrs. Richard.
Giovanna was glad of any change, even of little Dr. Richard and the cup
of tea, so she was submissive enough for the moment; and to see her
between these two excellent and orderly little people was an edifying
sight.
“No, it is not usual,” said Dr. Richard, “my wife is right; but it is
very kind-hearted of madame, my dear, to wish to amuse the poor people.
There is nothing to be said against that.”
“Very kind-hearted,” said Mrs. Richard, though with less enthusiasm. “It
is all from those foreigners’ love of display,” she said in her heart.
“But perhaps it would be wise to consult Miss Augustine, or--any other
friend you may have confidence in,” said the Doctor. “People are so very
censorious, and we must not give any occasion for evil-speaking.”
“I think exactly with Dr. Richard, my dear,” said the old lady. “I am
sure that would be the best.”
“But I have nothing done to consult about,” cried the culprit surprised.
She sipped her tea, and ate a large piece of the good people’s cake,
however, and let them talk. When she was not crossed, Giovanna was
perfectly good-humored. “I will sing for you, if you please,” she said
when she had finished.
The Doctor and his wife looked at each other, and professed their
delight in the proposal. “But we have no piano,” they said in chorus
with embarrassed looks.
“What does that do to me, when I can sing without it,” said Giovanna.
And she lifted up her powerful voice, “almost too much for a
drawing-room,” Mrs. Richard said afterward, and sang them one of those
gay peasant songs that abound in Italy, where every village has its own
_canzone_. She sang seated where she had been taking her tea, and
without seeming to miss an accompaniment, they remarked to each other,
as if she had been a ballad-singer. It was pretty enough, but so very
unusual! “Of course foreigners cannot be expected to know what is
according to the rules of society in England,” Mrs. Richard said with
conscious indulgence; but she put on her bonnet and walked with “Madame”
part of the way to Whiteladies, that she might not continue her
performance in the garden. “Miss Augustine might think, or Miss Susan
might think, that we countenanced it; and in the Doctor’s position that
would never do,” said the old lady, breathing her troubles into the ear
of a confidential friend whom she met on her way home. And Dr. Richard
himself felt the danger not less strongly than she.
Other changes, however, happened to Giovanna, as she settled down at
Whiteladies. She was without any fixed principles of morality, and had
no code of any kind which interfered with her free action. To give up
doing anything she wanted to do because it involved lying, or any kind
of spiritual dishonesty, would never have occurred to her, nor was she
capable of perceiving that there was anything wrong in securing her own
advantage as she had done. But she was by no means all bad, any more
than truthful and honorable persons are all good. Her own advantage, or
what she thought her own advantage, and her own way, were paramount
considerations with her; but having obtained these, Giovanna had no wish
to hurt anybody, or to be unkind. She was indolent and loved ease, but
still she was capable of taking trouble now and then to do some one else
a service. She had had no moral training, and all her faculties were
obtuse; and she had seen no prevailing rule but that of selfishness.
Selfishness takes different aspects, according to the manner in which
you look at it. When you have to maintain hardly, by a constant
struggle, your own self against the encroachments and still more rampant
selfishness of others, the struggle confers a certain beauty upon the
object of it. Giovanna had wanted to have her own way, like the others
of the family, but had been usually thrust into a corner, and prevented
from having it. What wonder, then, that when she had a chance, she
seized it, and emancipated herself, and secured her own comfort with the
same total disregard to others which she had been used to see? But now,
having got this--having for the moment all she wanted--an entire
exemption from work, an existence full of external comfort, and
circumstances around her which flattered her with a sense of an elevated
position--she began to think a little. Nothing was exacted of her. If
Miss Susan was not kind to her, she was not at least unkind, only
withdrawing from her as much as possible, a thing which Giovanna felt to
be quite natural, and in the quiet and silence the young woman’s mind
began to work. I do not say her conscience, for that was not in the
least awakened, nor was she conscious of any penitential regret in
thinking of the past, or religious resolution for the future; it was her
mind only that was concerned. She thought it might be as well to make
certain changes in her habits. In her new existence, certain
modifications of the old use and wont seemed reasonable. And then there
gradually developed in her--an invaluable possession which sometimes
does more for the character than high principle or good intention--a
sense of the ludicrous. This was what Everard meant when he said there
was fun in her. She had a sense of humor, a sense of the incongruities
which affect some minds so much more powerfully by the fact of being
absurd, than by the fact of being wrong. Giovanna, without any actual
good motive, thus felt the necessity of amending herself, and making
various changes in her life.
This, it may be supposed, took some time to develop; and in the meantime
the household in which she had become so very distinct a part, had to
make up its mind to her, and resume as best it could its natural habits
and use and wont, with the addition of this stranger in the midst. As
for the servants, their instinctive repugnance to a foreigner and a new
inmate was lessened from the very first by the introduction of the
child, who conciliated the maids, and thus made them forgive his mother
the extra rooms they had to arrange, and the extra work necessary. The
child was fortunately an engaging and merry child, and as he got used to
the strange faces round him, became the delight and pride and amusement
of the house. Cook was still head nurse, and derived an increased
importance and satisfaction from her supremacy. I doubt if she had ever
before felt the dignity and happiness of her position as a married woman
half so much as now, when that fact alone (as the others felt) gave her
a mysterious capacity for the management of the child. The maids
overlooked the fact that the child’s mother, though equally a married
woman, was absolutely destitute of this power; but accuracy of reasoning
is not necessary in such an argument, and the entire household bowed to
the superior endowments of Cook. The child’s pattering, sturdy little
feet, and crowings of baby laughter became the music of Whiteladies, the
pleasant accompaniment to which the lives at least of the little
community in the kitchen were set. Miss Susan, being miserable, resisted
the fascination, and Augustine was too abstracted to be sensible of it;
but the servants yielded as one woman, and even Stevens succumbed after
the feeblest show of resistance. Now and then even, a bell would ring
ineffectually in that well-ordered house, and the whole group of
attendants be found clustered together worshipping before the baby, who
had produced some new word, or made some manifestation of supernatural
cleverness; and the sound of the child pervaded all that part of the
house in which the servants were supreme. They forgave his mother for
being there because she had brought him, and if at the same time they
hated her for her neglect of him, the hatred was kept passive by a
perception that, but for this insensibility on her part, the child could
not have been allowed thus fully and pleasantly to minister to them.
As for Miss Susan, who had felt as though nothing could make her endure
the presence of Giovanna, she too was affected unwittingly by the soft
effects of time. It was true that no sentiment, no principle in
existence was strong enough to make her accept cheerfully this unwelcome
guest. Had she been bidden to do it in order to make atonement for her
own guilt, or as penance for that guilt, earning its forgiveness, or out
of pity or Christian feeling, she would have pronounced the effort
impossible; and impossible she had still thought it when she watched
with despair the old shopkeeper’s departure, and reflected with a sense
of suffering intolerable and not to be borne that he had left behind him
this terrible witness against her, this instrument of her punishment.
Miss Susan had paced about her room in restless anguish, saying to
herself under her breath that her punishment was greater than she could
bear. She had felt with a sickening sense of helplessness and
hopelessness that she could never go downstairs again, never take her
place at that table, never eat or drink in the company of this new
inmate whom she could not free herself from. And for a few days, indeed,
Miss Susan kept on inventing little ailments which kept her in her own
room. But this could not last. She had a hundred things to look after
which made it necessary for her to be about, to be visible; and
gradually there grew upon her a stirring of curiosity to see how things
went on, with _that_ woman always there. And then she resumed her
ordinary habits, came downstairs, sat down at the familiar table, and by
degrees found herself getting accustomed to the new-comer. Strangest
effect of those calm, monotonous days! Nothing would have made her do it
knowingly; but soft pressure of time made her do it. Things quieted
down; the alien was there, and there was no possibility of casting her
out; and, most wonderful of all, Miss Susan got used to her, in spite of
herself.
And Giovanna, for her part, began to think.