HOME.
The vehicle stopped before the portals of that home, and was welcomed by
such a perfect Babel of barking dogs that it seemed as if the entire
place were inhabited by them alone. The old hall echoed to their loud
alarum, and every dreary corridor, interminable staircase, tenantless
apartment, and wandering passage, in the house, sent back a hollow
sullen reply, which struck such a chill to Mina’s heart that, had escape
then been possible, she would have flown to the loneliest isle of the
ocean, and thankfully taken up her abode in that desert spot, sooner
than have sought a permanent abiding place where unhappily she had found
it—there.
She cast one hurried wistful glance over the long line of windows, false
and real, ranged in two dreary rows along the front of the uninviting
mansion: not a light glimmered in one of them; not a solitary gleam of
fire glanced forth into the gathering darkness without, to dispel, by
even a momentary ray of hope and cheerfulness, the deeper darkness
dwelling in a woman’s breast.
“It even would have looked like a friend,” she thought; but there was no
retreat: she had chosen—reluctantly and sorrowfully it might be, but
still she had chosen—to go so far, and she was perfectly well aware she
had no choice now but to proceed still further. So, making a strong
effort to conquer her feelings of repugnance, she ascended the broken
flight of steps; and, as she did so, the heavy door swung suddenly open,
and forth rushed a whole troop of half-starved noisy dogs, that sprang
out growling and barking and yelping as if with the fixed intention of
tearing the intruder to pieces ere help of any kind could reach her.
“Ernest!” she cried, shrinking back in terror as hounds and terriers and
bulldogs closed around her; but the sound of his well known voice,
crying, “Down, Satan! silence, Danger! be quiet, Lion!” speedily
produced a sort of comparative calm, and brought the animals, fawning
and whining and crouching, about him.
“Where is Sir Ernest?” asked Mr. Ivraine of the decrepid old man whom
the baying of the dogs had first attracted to the spot.
“In the dining room, sir,” was the response.
“Have you no candle?” Ernest demanded, drawing his wife closer to him
and feeling how, spite of all her efforts at composure, she shivered and
trembled.
“I brought one, sir,” he said, “but the draught as I opened the door put
it out; I will get you a light, sir, immediately,” and he shuffled away
across the hall as if to do so.
“No, never mind,” interposed Mr. Ivraine hastily. “Help the driver off
with those boxes, and put them in the paneled room—tell your wife to
light a fire there—and let her be ready to attend Mrs. Ivraine—and——come
on Mina.”
There was nothing unkind in his tone; on the contrary, considering his
usual manner and the abrupt sternness of his character, it was almost
tender: yet with what a terrified sickening heart she heard his mandate,
and obeyed the same, she herself felt—he perhaps imagined.
He led her through the dreary desolate hall, then down a gloomy
corridor, which had, so it seemed to Mina, a cold, damp, chill smell
like that of a family vault; but at length he paused by a door near the
further end, and waited for a moment ere turning the handle, as if he
were irresolute whether to enter or not.
“Yes,” he murmured after a second’s consideration, “she may as well come
in now and get it over.”
Though the words were uttered in so low a tone as to be almost
inaudible, his wife’s quick ear heard, and her quicker thought applied,
them.
“Get it over:” this, then, was her welcome—an interview to be dreaded, a
foe to be faced, an enemy to be overcome. Well, no matter; she had
nerved herself for the worst, and, let that worst be bad as it might, it
could scarcely be more appalling than her fancy pictured it.
Mina felt as if she had become hardened within the last few minutes, and
truly it was high time she should; for Ernest, having flung open the
door of the apartment, was now striding hastily across the carpetless
floor, and his wife felt him clutch her hand almost convulsively as he
dragged, rather than led her along, to the fireplace, at one side of
which an old man was crouching, flanked on the other by a woman whose
face, as well as Mina could discern it, was pinched and worn and
wrinkled to an extreme.
Both turned their heads as the new comers advanced towards them; and Sir
Ernest, after he had shot one glance back into the gloom, fairly twisted
himself round in his chair to gain a nearer view of the pair, who came
forth out of the darkness and stood within the shadowy circle, rescued
from total obscurity by the faint flickering of the only apology for
firelight the baronet ever permitted to be enjoyed in his mansion.
“You have stayed away long enough this time,” began Sir Ernest; “I
thought, perhaps, you were going to remain from home altogether.”
“No, sir, I am here,” replied his son.
“So I see,” was the brief rejoinder; “and I see more than that.”
“My wife, father.”
There was a something absolutely appealing in the way the younger man
pronounced the last word. It sounded as if he had used that expression,
hoping to win some word of gentleness for the being he had the
misfortune—for so he truly felt it—to call his. It was a brief setting
forth of the relations in which they all stood,—his wife—his father; but
the sense of the expression was only just so far heeded by Sir Ernest,
as to cause him to sneer while he responded,
“Your wife! you turned benedict! you married! and so you have been good
enough to provide a daughter-in-law for your father, without first
asking his consent; wedded without my knowledge, and brought her home
here without my permission. _Your_ wife! the lady who won a smile from
you must surely be matchless amongst women: this is she, you say,—let me
see.”
And the baronet, stretching forth a long bony arm, caught Mina with his
vulture-like fingers and pulled her towards him, whilst his widowed
sister, forgetting for once her economy in her curiosity, flung a few
dry twigs and branches on the fire, which, igniting instantly, threw for
a moment a strong bright glare of light on the haggard, pallid face of
the young wife, whom thus they greeted.
“Humph! nothing remarkable for beauty, at any rate,” was the old man’s
complimentary observation, after completing a scrutiny, under which
Mina’s eyes had sought the ground, blinded with tears of wounded pride
and vain regret. “And now tell me, child,” he added, seizing her slender
wrist so tightly that she felt she might as well strive to free herself
from some powerful vice as from that rude iron grasp, “and now tell me,
child, have you any money?”
The question was put so suddenly—it was so completely unlike anything
she had prepared herself for, that Mina, thrown altogether out of her
usual line of thought—half stupified and wholly bewildered—misunderstood
the object of his sentence, and almost involuntarily put her disengaged
hand into her pocket to draw forth the scanty sum she could still call
hers: but, ere she had time to accomplish this intention, or her husband
could collect sufficient presence of mind to frame what he considered a
suitable reply, the baronet interposed with,
“Pshaw! I did not mean that: I want to know the amount of your dower,
your fortune—you understand.”
Ernest made a rapid attempt to intercept an answer, but in vain; for,
before she was aware of his wish, before she gave herself a second to
reflect, the straightforward confession, “I have none,” passed her lips,
and then Mina, trembling and guilty, stood mute, awaiting and dreading
the next speech her father-in-law might choose to address to her.
“It is over, at any rate,” thought the happy husband, “she can say
nothing worse than that, and he can hear nothing worse;” but Ernest was
mistaken.
“None!” slowly repeated the old man, griping the delicate wrist in a
still firmer manner, as if he really desired to hurt her, “none, nor any
expectations?”
He paused and listened eagerly for her reply; but none came; she did not
even sob: she had arrived at a state of such agony, that she was past
seeming agitated; she was so fascinated by the cold steady gaze of those
keen, cruel, vindictive eyes, that the tears became frozen in her own
soft melancholy orbs, and she could do nothing but look fearfully at him
and return that reply which is frequently so much more expressive than
any words—silence.
But Sir Ernest Ivraine was not the man to be put off with any such
womanly stratagem, and therefore, after waiting an instant in vain for
an explicit reply, he said, in an imperious tone,
“Come, answer me directly; have you any expectations?”
“No,” murmured his victim.
“Well, there can be no disappointment there, at all events,” remarked
the baronet in a withering tone; “and now, as I wish clearly to
understand this matter, may I ask who you are?”
There had been a time, and that not so very long past, when Mina Ivraine
would boldly have answered, “The wife of your son, and as such entitled
to consideration and respect in the house of his father;” but sorrow, if
it had not broken her spirit, had crushed it, and with a suffocating
feeling at her heart and a wild sorrow in her soul,—she responded,
“I am an orphan.”
If he had possessed the slightest touch of human feeling, the words
might have moved him; but Sir Ernest saw only in the drooping form and
slender figure of the young creature who uttered them the visible
outlines of a something to be hated, wherefore he harshly proceeded:
“Don’t pretend to misunderstand me; for though you may be an orphan now,
it is to be presumed you had parents once,—who were they?”
“My father was an officer, sir,” replied Mina, the warm Highland blood
tingling through her veins as anger, for a moment, mastered grief,
“Captain Allan Frazer, of the —th Regiment, formerly owner of Glenfiord,
near Loch Lomond, and nephew to Mr. Frazer, the head of our clan, who
lived at Craigmaver in ——shire.”
“Humph!” ejaculated the baronet, _sotto voce_; “and your mother?”
“Was an English lady, daughter to Mr. Merapie, at one time a merchant in
London.”
“A pauper Scotchman, and a bankrupt London trader,” was Sir Ernest’s
sneering summary of poor Mina’s genealogical confessions, relaxing at
the same time his hold sufficiently to permit of her shrinking back
terrified to her former position by Ernest’s side. “And so, sir,” he
continued, addressing his son in a tone of concentrated fury, “this is
the final result of your frequent absences from home; no wonder you were
ashamed, in the full light of day, to return with your beggar bride to
your father’s house,—that house which you have so disgraced; no wonder
you skulk back in the dusk to announce your having bound yourself for
life to a person, of whose advent you were afraid to inform me
beforehand, lest I should have given orders to close the doors on both
of you, and told the servants to turn you indignantly from the gates;
but your silence shall not avail you, sir: you thought if you once got
in, it was all right; that, having gained an entrance, you had little to
fear. But I tell you, no! Sir Ernest Ivraine is not to be browbeaten by
living mortal; he is not to be defeated by any stratagem; he is not to
be deluded by any scheme, no matter how artfully concocted; he will not
be trapped or coerced into receiving a creature like this into his
abode, into recognizing her as a relative of his, into lending his
sanction to a _mésalliance_. As you have chosen to marry and bring your
wife here to please yourself, I command you to leave this house and take
her with you to please me. No remonstrances, no arguments, sir; take her
out of my sight, remove her instantly, and go yourself.”
Ernest stood irresolute. Heaven knew how gladly at that moment he would
have obeyed the command; but where was he to remove her to? He could not
speak; he remained like one spell-bound; but Mina spoke for him, wildly,
passionately, imploringly.
“Don’t blame him,” she cried, flinging herself before the old man,
bending in supplication to the hardest and stingiest and meanest of
mortals, forgetting everything at the instant, save that she had sown
enmity between father and son, brought sorrow to her husband, misery to
herself, “don’t blame him, don’t be angry, sir, with him; it was my
fault, mine alone: I will go; I, not he, am the intruder: I am so sorry;
but I never dreamt of this, I never dreamt of wrong; only do not be
angry with your son, and I will go, I will do anything you require.”
“Can you _unmarry_ him?” growled out the baronet; “if you can do that,
you are talking to some purpose; if not, you may keep silence. You have
wrought mischief enough: you thought, no doubt, you were making a great
match, marrying a rich man, stepping into a comfortable establishment;
but you were mistaken: he is a beggar; he has not a shilling, and I will
never leave him one, never! I cut him off, I renounce him, I disown him
as my son: away! away! You trapped him into it, then, you acknowledge
that. ‘All your fault;’ I do not doubt it: take him away and see how you
can live on dark looks and few words; it is all the food he will give
you. Don’t kneel there; I hate to see you: take her away, sir, and go
immediately yourself.”
As he might have raised a child, Ernest lifted her from the floor; but
she suddenly broke from him and turned to the fourth person in the room,
who had, during this period, maintained a profound silence.
“Lady,” she said calmly, for she was calm now, “to you I appeal, not for
myself, but for him; listen to me and I will tell you how it came to
pass, and then, I know, you will mediate between them. I was not born to
penury; I had once a happy home, a kind father, the right to expect
wealth, almost the certainty of fortune; but death and adversity entered
our dwelling when I was a little child, swept home and competence and
happiness from us, carried my father to a better world, and left us
beggared. My mother had a brother, however, living in London; he was
very rich and kind and good; he took us home to his house, educated us,
gave us reason to believe he would never leave us badly off; he acted a
father’s part towards all; and when I first met Mr. Ivraine, no one
could have imagined I should ever come to know absolute want,—no one.
One night my uncle came home, sat down to write a will, intending to
leave us a suitable provision, but death interposed——”
“We have had enough,” interrupted Sir Ernest savagely; but his sister
laid her skeleton hand on Mina’s arm and bade her proceed.
“I found him next morning,” resumed Mina, getting out the words she
scarcely knew how, “with the unfinished document beside him, quite dead,
quite; and we! within twenty-four hours, we were all turned out of the
house by a stranger woman, who came representing herself to be his wife,
and who was his wife, and whose son stepped into our place, leaving us,
for the second time, paupers.”
“Cease that!” exclaimed Sir Ernest; “I want to hear no more of your
family details, false or true: you are wasting time to no purpose;
cease, I tell you.”
“Go on,” said the miser’s sister, keeping her glittering eyes fixed on
Mina’s face, “go on.”
“We had some money,” she continued; “but, not having been then much
accustomed to economy, it rapidly diminished, and a long journey to
Scotland reduced our resources to very little. There, our surviving
parent died; trouble tracked every step we took; ill success attended
our efforts to make an independence for ourselves. Our relatives wanted
us to stay with them, but we were proud: we came to London to try if
there were anything we could do; but, alas! we had not been educated to
earn our daily bread, for we were proud, self-willed, ignorant of the
world and of the difficulties of getting on in it. My brother was about
to leave me: I had no home to which I had any right; I had one good
friend, some wealthy relatives; but still I stood, so far as any claim
to sympathy, any title to assistance went, utterly desolate in the
world. Then he married me; in his great kindness, in my great distress,
he asked me to become his wife: he was so generous as never to speak of
my want of fortune. I ought to have considered that, myself, but I did
not; it was my place to have refused to bring sorrow on him, but I knew
nothing of him further than his goodness; I did wrong,—I see it now. All
the fault was mine: he has erred through unselfishness, I from never
thinking of him at all. Will you, at the request of an orphan, plead to
his father, not for me, but for him?”
“Peace!” thundered Sir Ernest, in a tone which brought Mina’s speech to
a rapid conclusion; “take her away,” he continued, turning to his son,
“take her out of my sight, I command you!”
Without answering a word, Ernest laid a hand on his wife and drew her
out of the room. His aunt’s eyes followed her to the door, and then
sought the flickering firelight. It is hard to say what she saw in the
embers, what chord had been touched by Mina’s appeal to her woman’s
feelings, what memory had been awakened by the sound of that soft young
voice recounting her sorrows; but something in the scene had affected
her, for she abruptly stopped Sir Ernest’s vehement expressions of rage,
by remarking, without withdrawing her eyes from the smouldering logs,
“If I were you, I would not send her away.”
“Not send her away, not send her away!” he almost screamed; “and, pray,
why not?”
“Because she won’t cost much, and can be made useful; I can manage her.”
“Do you really mean what you say?” he asked, half incredulously.
“I do.”
“And why should she stay?” he demanded for the second time.
“Because I choose her to remain,” the lady replied dogmatically; having
delivered herself of which astounding announcement, she rose and walked
out of the room.
“Do not go,” she said to Ernest in the corridor, “do not go to-night.”
“Believe me, I have no intention,” he sullenly answered, as she flitted
by him and disappeared in the darkness beyond, like some spectre
haunting that dreary abode.
She and Sir Ernest, for days previously, had been, not actually
“quarrelling,” but indulging in that species of warfare popularly known
as “sparring;” she had, therefore, resolved from the first moment of her
nephew’s arrival, not to side with his father against him. If there were
anybody in the world for whom she entertained a shadow of attachment, it
was Ernest. Henry, upon his marriage, had offended her grievously; for
the young man, who perfectly detested his aunt, had not merely virtually
ignored her very existence, but had induced his wealthy high-born bride
to do the same: the spirit of opposition and the spirit of revenge had
both induced her to take Ernest’s part; and when Mina turned and
confidently asked her to plead their cause,—when, through the flickering
light, she saw an almost child-like figure standing imploringly before
her, and heard her repeat, in a voice subdued by sorrow, yet rendered
steady by a good purpose, the brief story of her sufferings, her
desolation, his kindness, his disinterested affection, some strange
feeling was aroused. Perhaps there floated before the eyes of the
miser’s sister a shadowy memory of her own girlhood, of a time when
money was not everything; perhaps the soft tones of Mina’s voice came on
her soul like something better and sweeter than aught which had swept
over it for years; perhaps, whatever of woman’s nature long habits of
hoarding and saving had left in her bosom was touched at sight of the
young wife’s utter helplessness; perhaps she really did think that, as
Sir Ernest, not she, would have to maintain the new comer, it might not
be altogether unpleasant for her to have a meek docile slave always at
hand to order about and watch and domineer over and employ in all sorts
of domestic drudgery.
At any rate, it is certain she wished Ernest to remain, for she felt as
if he kept all other connections miles and miles away from Paradise: she
dreaded their advent and Henry’s return; for, oh! how, in former days,
the latter had insulted and reproached her with parsimony, and accused
her of dishonesty, and expressed his contempt for her, even in her own
house, when he was merely a beardless lad, she angrily remembered; and
she felt that, now he was wealthy and independent, he and his wife could
soon render Paradise no abiding place for her.
She and Sir Ernest had so frequently quarrelled since Henry’s marriage:
the baronet seemed so uplifted about the match his youngest born had
made; he had grown so overbearing at times, that she felt vindictively
glad another son had humbled his pride by making a dowerless girl his
wife, one whom she could obtain immediate mastery over; who would treat
her respectfully, as her husband did; who would be thankful for a word,
a look—who had pleaded so humbly to her,—humbly as Mina Ivraine had
never pleaded before to mortal.
There is no saying what induced her to take Ernest’s part; but, contrary
to all his expectations, she did do so. She was not all bad; she was a
more genuine miser than Sir Ernest; she had more of the magpie nature in
her than even he; she pinched and starved and economized more than her
brother: she had a bitter, domineering temper, a sour, dissatisfied
heart; but still she was not as bad as he, not quite.
“You are to cease crying and to come to supper,” were the words she
addressed to Mina upon opening the door of the room where, crouching in
an old arm chair, the “happy bride” was weeping; “you need not mind
lighting that fire,” she added, speaking to an aged woman who was
engaged in trying to get some damp wood to burn in a long disused grate;
“Mrs. Ivraine can warm herself in the dining-room, and the night is not
very cold.”
Such a look of pity as the female turned towards the drooping figure of
the young wife! it contained a sort of prophesy of years of hopeless
suffering, of a lifetime of misery, of a dull dreary eternity of sorrow!
There was scarce a thing in the chronicles of misfortune that glance did
not predict for the frail bark launched upon such an ocean of turmoil
and care; but, without uttering a syllable, she quitted the apartment
and descended to the kitchens.
“There’s a young heart come here to be broken, Roger,” she said, “a
slight delicate creature to be crushed and tortured and killed, for they
will kill her one way or another; there never was a woman lived here
long.”
“God’s will be done!” devoutly responded her husband. He could say those
words, but Mina found it impossible: sitting, shrinking back in that
huge chair, as if she desired to bury herself from observation,
listening to the dry, short exhortations of her husband’s aunt, who told
her she should remain in Paradise, as if that assurance contained a sort
of concentrated essence of the balm of happiness; as if, after she had
said it, Mina ought to dry her eyes and become contented in heart, as if
there was no sorrow in life to be compared to that of being ordered out
of that wretched den, and sent forth into the world penniless and free.
At length Mina did repress her tears and raise her head and stand up
before the miser’s sister; at length she opened her lips and answered
the lady’s many sentences, with one brief one.
“Madam, I see it is better I should go; I ought never to have come here,
but I have a friend whose door stands always open to receive me. I will
relieve Sir Ernest Ivraine of my presence; I will never intrude on him,
or his, more; if he will only forgive his son and forget everything
about me,—it is all I ask.”
“Sir Ernest Ivraine asked if you could _unmarry_ his son,—give him back
the freedom he once possessed, loosen the tie, snap the bond, make
yourself no wife, my nephew no husband. If you can do so, go; if not, I
advise you to stay.”
“I cannot give him freedom from that tie,” cried Mina half wildly, “but
I can relieve you all from my presence, render myself almost as though I
had never been; I am not likely to live very long; death in a little
time will accomplish all you can desire; and, if I go away now, surely
the baronet would forgive his son and wait for that event, which will
end my sorrows for ever: I have done your nephew a great injury; I did
not see it before, but I know it now.”
“You have injured him,” said Mrs. Close, laying a hand on her auditor’s
wrist,—so cold, so death-like, so little resembling the touch of mortal
fingers, that it froze up Mina’s feelings in her breast and caused the
blood to stagnate around her heart; “you have injured him more than you
know, more than you can imagine; but, as you cannot recal the past, be
advised as to the future: going will not mend matters; it can only make
them worse: my nephew would not remain behind, and he ought not to leave
this place. You must stay and compel him to stay; there is wealth,
money, gold at stake,—gold, girl,” the woman repeated, and her eyes
gleamed so as she pronounced that magic word, that Mina felt as though
it were a something appalling to be standing in that remote apartment in
that hobgoblin house all alone with such a weird, unearthly being, who
seemed merely to be linked to humanity by a few bones and muscles, who
was scarcely human, even in outward appearance, who was neither flesh
nor spirit, but a horrible distortion of both.
Still, let her be fiend, or woman, or phantom, or whatever else she
liked, her sentence decided Mina’s unsteady purpose. Ernest, in answer
to her entreaties to permit her to go alone, had announced his fixed
intention of their remaining in the house together and braving the
severest outburst of his father’s displeasure. He told her it would not
last long, and that then matters would be better; but Mina could not
credit the latter statement: she saw he was trying to persuade her into
believing what he did not believe himself. He bade her never to speak of
departure again, assured her all would soon be well, and left her
sullenly determined to “face the matter silently out,” and never to
leave the house, unless compelled by actual force to obey his father’s
mandate; and, as Mrs. Close echoed all his words, Mina submitted to her
doom and prepared to settle herself down in that house, amongst her new
relatives, with such an appearance of resignation as excessive
excitement and intense dread permitted her to assume.
“Give me your money to keep,” whispered Mrs. Close, as though the walls
of the room had ears; “money is not safe in this house; but I know a
place,—I can hide it for you: give it to me; I will take care of it.”
Like one fascinated, Mina produced her purse, upon which the skeleton
hand closed with incredible speed, whilst her eyes glistened at finding
the prize at length within her grasp. She had determined to secure that
purse from the moment she noticed Mina’s involuntary movement towards
her pocket. It contained a few sovereigns, some silver, an old coin; but
Ernest Ivraine’s wife never saw one shilling of the amount again: her
aunt bore it off to the hiding-place she said she knew of, and kept it
there truly safe, though not for the benefit of its legitimate owner.
Mrs. Close marshalled the girl back into the dining-room, as if she
dared the baronet to meddle with any one whom she chose to take under
her protection; and, though he greeted her with a withering scowl, he
addressed no word to his son’s wife upon her entrance, for Mrs. Close
was too rich to come to open war with: she had gained the field that
time; he meant to conquer by other means.
“You don’t seem to like our fare, Mrs. Ivraine,” he said at length in a
withering tone; and she started at the remark as if guilty of some
crime. Heaven knew it was not the coarse bread which was choking her,
but a sort of suffocating despair. “You don’t seem to like our fare,” he
repeated, “fastening” her with one of his keen serpent glances.
“I—I think it very nice,” began Mina, who scarcely knew either what the
viands actually were or what she was saying, “very nice; I can eat
anything.”
“Well, that’s a comfort, at all events,” remarked the baronet; “as you
have, no doubt, been accustomed to a much better style of living than we
can afford. There is no virtue equal to that of being able to bend to
circumstances, eh?” and the baronet swore in his heart it was one he
would teach her before very long.
Mina bowed her head over her plate; no answer greeted his ear; but
Ernest, addressing his aunt, observed, “She always eats little, I am
sorry to say,” which, he knew, would at once establish a sort of claim
on his relative’s affections; for, by half starving himself in her
presence, he had induced her to believe him perfect amongst men. What a
home that was for Mina Ivraine, where even the bare necessaries of
existence were grudged her; where every morsel she carried to her lips
was watched and commented on; where the inability to eat, the lack of
natural appetite—that delicacy which, after a time, made her turn from
their unpalatable food, and prefer going without food almost altogether
to swallowing that—were matters for congratulation; where Mrs. Close
exultingly noticed upon how very little nourishment she contrived to
support life, and the baronet observed her increasing pallor and
weakness with joy, hoping this abstinence would soon lead to death;
where, when Malcolm, against express desire, came to visit his sister
before his departure for India, she dared not ask him to stay for
dinner, scarcely to sit down.
“Oh! Miss Caldera,” cried the young man, on his return to London, when
he went to tell the governess how it fared with Mina, “the sight of her
and that house has broken my heart; I would have brought her away if I
could. You can’t conceive what a place it is: and that was the home she
married for; one in a workhouse would have been preferable: but it was
for me she did it, all for me, and I wished her. God forgive me!”
He was weeping: it was the first time Miss Caldera ever felt pity for
him; but pity came too late to rescue Mina, who remained on at Paradise
whilst her brother worked his passage out to India, with a letter in his
portmanteau directed to Major Henry Ivraine. And this was the marriage,
upon the occasion of which Allan Frazer thought proper to write and
congratulate his cousin, and Cecilia indited her an epistle full of
loves and darlings, wishing her all sorts of happiness, and trusting
they should sometime have the pleasure of meeting once more. To have
read the letters, one would have thought there had never been any
coolness at Craigmaver, any variation of affection, any lack of
friendship; but Mina was not to be imposed upon now: she was so
engrossed by the difficulties of her position, that it is true she very
seldom turned her memory’s eyes back to the Highlands; but, whenever she
did so, she still remained perfectly convinced that Cecilia was a very
unfeeling, dangerous woman, a bitter enemy, a relentless foe, who hated
her for some vague reason, and whom she cordially disliked and dreaded
in return.