A LAST LOOK.
At about eleven o'clock next morning, mamma came to my bedside, having
thrown her dressing-gown on, and holding a note in her hand. I was
awakened by her calling me by my name; and the extraordinary exertion of
getting out of her bed at such an hour, the morning after a ball, even
if there had not been consternation in her looks, would have satisfied
me that something unusual had happened. I sat up staring at her.
"Oh, dear Ethel, here's a note from Doctor Droqville; I'm so
shocked--poor, dear Aunt Lorrimer is dead." And mamma burst into tears,
and, sobbing, told me to read the note, which, so soon as I had a little
collected myself, I did. It said:
"Dear Mrs. Ware,--I could not, of course, last night tell you the
sad news about Lady Lorrimer. She arrived, it seems, on Tuesday
last, to die in England. On leaving Lady Mardykes's last night, I
went to her house to make inquiries; she was good enough to wish to
see me. I found her in a most alarming state, and quite conscious
of her danger. She was sinking rapidly. I was, therefore, by no
means surprised, on calling about half an hour ago, to learn that
she was no more. I lose no time in communicating the sad
intelligence. It will be consolatory to you to learn that the
nurses, who were present during her last moments, tell me that she
died without any pain or struggle. I shall call to morrow, as near
twelve as I can, to learn whether there is anything in which you
think my poor services can be made available.--I remain, dear Mrs.
Ware, Ever yours sincerely,
P. Droqville."
I was very sorry. I even shed some tears, a thing oftener written about
than done.
Mamma cried for a long time. She had now no near kinswoman left. When we
are "pretty well on," and the thinned ranks of one generation only stand
between us and death, the disappearance of the old over the verge is a
serious matter. Between mamma and Lady Lorrimer, too, there were early
recollections and sympathies in common, and the chasm was not so wide.
But for the young, and I was then young, the old seem at best a sort of
benevolent ghosts, whose presence, more or less, chills and awes, and
whose home is not properly with the younger generation. Their memories
are busy with a phantom world that passed away before we were born. They
are puckered masks and glassy eyes, peeping from behind the door of the
sepulchre that stands ajar, closing little by little to shut them in for
ever. I am now but little past forty, yet I feel this isolation stealing
upon me. I acquiesce in the law of nature, though it seems a cynical
one. I know I am no longer of the young; I grow shy of them; there is a
real separation between us.
The world is for the young--it belongs to them, and time makes us ugly,
and despised, and solitary, and prepares for our unregretted removal,
for nature has ordained that death shall trouble the pleasure and
economy of the vigorous, high-spirited world as little as may be.
Mamma was more grieved, a great deal, than I at all expected. I am
writing now in solitude, and from my interior convictions, under a sort
of obligation to tell, not only nothing but the truth, but the whole
truth also; and I confess that mamma was selfish, and, in a degree,
exacting. The education of her whole married life had tended to form
those habits; but she was also affectionate, and her grief was vehement,
and did not subside, as I thought it would, after its first outburst.
The only practical result of her grief was a determination to visit the
house, and see the remains of the poor lady.
I never could understand the comfort that some people seem to derive
from contemplating such a spectacle! To me the sight is simply shocking.
Mamma made it a point, however, that I should accompany her. She could
not make up her mind to go that day. The next day Doctor Droqville
called. Mamma saw him. After they had talked for a little, mamma
declared her intention of seeing poor Lady Lorrimer as she lay in her
bed.
"Allow me to advise you, as a physician, to do no such thing," said
Droqville. "You'll inflict a great deal of pain on yourself, and do
nobody any good."
"But unless I see her once more I shall be miserable," pleaded mamma.
"You have not nerve for such scenes," he replied; "you'd not be yourself
again for a month after."
I joined my entreaties to Doctor Droqville's representations, and I
thought we had finally prevailed over mamma's facile will.
He gave us a brief account of Lady Lorrimer's illness and last moments,
and then talked on other subjects; finally he said, "You told me you
wished me to return a bracelet that does not answer, to St. Aumand, when
I pass again through Paris. I find I shall be there in a few days--can
you let me have it now?"
Mamma's maid was out, so she went to get it herself, and, while she was
away, Doctor Droqville said to me, with rather a stern look:
"Don't you allow her to go; your mamma has a form of the same affection
of the heart. We can't tell her that; but quiet nerves are essential to
her. She touches the spring of the mischief, and puts it in action at
any moment by agitating herself."
"I think she has given up that intention," I answered; "but for Heaven's
sake, Doctor Droqville, tell me, is mamma in any danger?"
"No, if she will only keep quiet. She may live for many years to come;
but every woman, of course, who has a weakness of the kind, may kill
herself easily and quickly; but--I hear her--don't allow her to go."
Mamma returned, and Doctor Droqville soon took his departure, leaving me
very miserable, and very much alarmed. She now talked only of postponing
her last look at poor Lady Lorrimer until to-morrow. Her vacillations
were truly those of weakness, but they were sometimes violent; and when
her emotions overcame her indolence, she was not easily managed.
The dark countenance of Doctor Droqville, as he urged his prohibition,
excited vague suspicions. It was by no means benevolent--it was grim,
and even angry. It struck me instinctively that he might have some
motive, other than the kind one which he professed, in wishing to scare
away mamma from the house of death.
Doctor Droqville was, I believe, a very clever physician; but his visits
to England, being desultory, he could not, of course, take the position
of any but an occasional adviser. He had acquired an influence over
mamma, and I think if he had been a resident in London, she would have
consulted no other. As matters were, however, Sir Jacob Lake was her
"physician in ordinary." To him I wrote the moment I had an opportunity,
stating what had occurred, enclosing his fee, and begging of him to look
in about two next day, on any pretext he could think of, to determine
the question.
Next day came, and with two o'clock, just as we were sitting down to
lunch, Sir Jacob arrived. I ran up instantly to the drawing-room,
leaving mamma to follow, for sages of his kind have not many minutes to
throw away. He relieved my mind a little about mamma, but not quite, and
before he had spoken half-a-dozen sentences she came in. He made an
excuse of poor Lady Lorrimer's death, and had brought with him two or
three letters of hers, describing her case, which he thought might be
valuable should any discussion arise respecting the nature of her
disease.
The conversation thus directed, I was enabled to put the question on
which Doctor Droqville had been so peremptory. Sir Jacob said there was
nothing to prevent mamma's going, and that she was a great deal more
likely to be agitated by a dogged opposition to a thing she had so set
her heart on.
Now that mamma found herself quite at liberty to go, I think she grew a
little frightened. She was looking ill; she had eaten nearly nothing for
the last two days, seen nobody but Doctor Droqville and the doctor who
had just now called, and her head was full of her mourning and mine.
Her grief was very real. Through Lady Lorrimer's eyes she had been
accustomed to look back into her own early life. They had both seen the
same scenes and people that she remembered, and now there was no one
left with whom she could talk over old times. Mamma was irresolute till
late in the afternoon, and then at last she made up her mind.
We drove through half-a-dozen streets. I did not know in what street my
poor aunt Lorrimer's house was. We suddenly pulled up, and the footman
came to the door to say that there was a chain across the street at each
end. We had nothing for it but to get out and to walk past the paviors
who had taken possession of it. The sun was, I suppose, at this time
about setting. The sunlight fell faintly on the red brick chimneys
above, but all beneath was dark and cold. In its present state it was a
melancholy and silent street. It was, I instantly saw, the very same
street in which Lady Lorrimer had chosen to pass me by.
"Is that the house, the one with the tan before it?" I asked.
It was. I was now clear upon the point. Into that house I had seen her
go. The woman in the odd costume who had walked beside her, Mr. Carmel's
thin figure and melancholy ascetic face, and the silence in which they
moved, were all remembered, and recalled the sense of curious mystery
with which I had observed the parting, more than two years ago, and
mingled an unpleasant ingredient in the gloom that deepened about me as
I now approached the door.
It was all to be cleared up soon. The door was instantly opened by a man
in black placed in the hall. A man also in black, thin, very
perpendicular, with a long neck, sallow face, and black eyes, very
stern, passed us by in silence with a glance. He turned about before he
reached the hall door, and in a low tone, a little grimly, inquired our
business. I told him, and also who we were.
We were standing at the foot of the stairs. On hearing our names he took
off his hat, and, more courteously, requested us to wait for a moment
where we were, till he should procure a person to conduct us to the
room. This man was dressed something in the style of our own
High-Church divines, except that his black coat was longer, I think. He
had hardly left us when there was a ring at the bell, and a poor woman,
holding a little girl by the hand, came in, whispered to the man in the
hall, and then, passing us by, went up the stairs in silence and
disappeared. They were met by a second clergyman coming down, rather
corpulent, with a tallowy countenance and spectacles, who looked at us
suspiciously, and went out just as a party of three came into the hall,
and passed us by like the former.
Almost immediately the clergyman we had first met returned, and
conducted us up the stairs as far as the first landing, where we were
met by a lady in a strange brown habit, with a rosary, and a hood over
her head, whom I instantly knew to be a nun. We followed her up the
stairs. There was a strange air of mystery and of publicity in the
proceedings; the house seemed pretty well open to all comers; no one who
whispered a few words satisfactorily to the porter in the hall failed to
obtain immediate access to the upper floor of the house. Everything was
carried on in whispers, and there was a perpetual tramping of feet
slowly going up and down stairs.
It was much more silent as we reached the level of the drawing-rooms.
The nun opened the back drawing-room, and without more ceremony than a
quiet movement of her hand, signed to us to go in. I think mamma's heart
half failed her; I almost hoped she would change her mind, for she
hesitated, and sighed two or three times heavily, with her hand pressed
to her heart, and looked very faint.
The light that escaped through the half-opened door was not that of day,
but the light of candles. Mamma took my arm, and in silence hurried me
into the room.
Now I will tell you what I saw. The room was hung with black, which
probably enhanced the effect of its size, for it appeared very large.
The windows were concealed by the hangings of black cloth, which were
continued without interruption round all the walls of the room. A great
many large wax candles were burning in it, and the black background,
reflecting no light, gave to all the objects standing in the room an odd
sharpness and relief.
At the far end of the apartment stood a sort of platform, about as wide
as a narrow bed, covered with a deep velvet cushion, with a drapery of
the same material descending to the floor. On this lay the body of Lady
Lorrimer, habited in the robes and hood of the order, I think, of the
Carmelites; her hands were placed together on her breast, and her rosary
was twined through her fingers. The hood was drawn quite up about the
head and cheeks of the corpse. Her dress, the cushion on which she lay,
the pillow creased by the pressure of her cold head, were strewn with
flowers. I had resolved not to look at it--such sights haunt me
afterwards; but an irresistible curiosity overcame me. It was just one
momentary glance, but the picture has remained on my inner sight ever
since, as if I had gazed for an hour.
There was at the foot of this catafalque an altar, on which was placed a
large crucifix; huge candlesticks with tall tapers stood on the floor
beside it. Many of the strangers who came in kneeled before the crucifix
and prayed, no doubt for the departed spirit. Many smaller crucifixes
were hung upon the walls, and before these also others of the visitors
from time to time said a prayer. Two nuns stood one at each side of the
body, like effigies of contemplation and prayer, telling their beads. It
seemed to me that there was a profusion of wax-lights. The transition
from the grey evening light, darker in the house, into this illumination
of tapers, had a strange influence upon my imagination. The reality of
the devotion, and the more awful reality of death, quite overpowered the
theatrical character of the effect.
I saw the folly of mamma's irrepressible desire to come here. I thought
she was going to faint; I dare say she would have done so, she looked so
very ill, but that tears relieved her. They were tears in which grief
had but a subordinate share; they were nervous tears, the thunder-shower
of the hysteria which had been brewing ever since she had entered the
room. I don't know whether she was sorry that she had come. I am sure
she would have been better if she had never wished it.