It was late one fine evening toward the end of August, when, though the
rooms at the Granby had been brilliantly lighted, several windows were
open to admit the soft radiance of moonlight, and the whole
miscellaneous party of ladies and gentlemen resident at the great hotel
had assembled, full of gay excitement, in the public saloon, where the
buzz and laughter of merry voices might be heard on every side. Various
agreeable excursions had taken place throughout the morning. Pic-nics
had flourished at Studley, Ripon, Bolton Abbey, and Harewood House,
while even Plumpton rocks, very little higher than the cut for a
railway, had not been without admirers who called them sublime, and the
petrifying well at Knaresborough had petrified many with admiration.
A day of amusement seemed likely now to end, as such days too commonly
do, in weariness and ennui. Several very old gentlemen sat down to
cards,--those who still made any attempts at being juvenile, flirted
with the more elderly misses, and Agnes, seated between Lord Doncaster
and the Abbe, seemed industriously exerting herself to fascinate them
both, while, though generally careful of her smiles, she now lavished
them on each side with apparently heedless profusion.
The scarcity of _beaux_, so often remarked and lamented in most
societies, could hardly be a legitimate cause of complaint on this
occasion, but, as Sir Patrick remarked to Marion, "in every family
there is but one eldest son, while there are at least three-and-twenty
daughters, each educated and prepared to take her place at the head of
a brilliant establishment; therefore, seeing in this room sixty-five
young ladies, every one of whom expects to marry on at least £2000
a-year, it would require £130,000 per annum to satisfy them and their
expectant mammas!"
Lord Wigton's fortune alone might have been sufficient, if divided into
suitable portions, for at least ten such happy couples; but his whole
heart seemed bent on bestowing it, with himself, on Marion, who found
that she was pursued with assiduity so persevering, not only by him,
but also by Captain De Crespigny, who had now openly abandoned Agnes
for her, that, annoyed and perplexed how to act, rather than become
repulsive and forbidding, which was always repulsive to her nature, she
silently retreated with Sir Arthur to the quiet domestic fireside of
the Granvilles, where she enjoyed the peaceful reality of happiness,
instead of that noisy and glittering imitation of it which she had so
gladly forsaken.
In the public saloon, Mrs. O'Donoghoe, a superannuated _jeune femme_ of
about thirty, more or less, in a dress as bright and red as a
blacksmith's forge, hammered on a decayed piano-forte a sort of tune,
which might be an Irish jig or a Scotch strathspey, while several
mournful-looking gentlemen had been persuaded to dance with three or
four very affected, over-dressed partners, giggling young ladies, most
of whom were on the shady side of five-and-twenty, dressed in stiff
muslin frocks _a l'enfant_, bare shoulders, rouge, and very pink
stockings.
Mrs. O'Donoghoe's marriage, ten years before, had been a true
Harrowgate match--a mutual take-in--the lady being a reputed heiress,
without a shilling, and the gentleman endowed with an imaginary estate,
which turned out to be situated in the moon. Since her widowhood, she
had affected extreme youth, excessive wealth, and extraordinary
vivacity, being of opinion that liveliness is the most universally
popular of all qualities in the gay world, and that those who are not
gifted by nature with light and joyous spirits, should assume them,
though, if the exact degree of any person's happiness were distinctly
marked by a thermometer on their foreheads, the reality might seldom
coincide with the external appearance, and the pre-eminence would
seldom be awarded to those who are blazing the brightest in a crowd.
The most malevolent persons could scarcely wish their worst enemy to
lead that life of anxiety, mortification, and misery, the inevitable
doom of ladies who will not consent with a good grace to grow old--who
desire to seem what they are not, and never can be again--who, instead
of cheerfully advancing to meet advancing years, attempt to _rajeunir
leur beaute passee_, and who, vainly endeavoring to stem the tide of
time, catch at every straw which affords a hope of impeding their
career into oblivion. If it be indeed true, as all who have experienced
it acknowledge, that a worldly career, decked with all the glare and
glitter of success, is yet a weariness to the spirit, what must such a
life be to those for whom it does not even assume the tinsel of deceit.
Mrs. O'Donoghoe had appeared during nine successive seasons at
Harrowgate, where she shone like a moving rainbow, dressing of course
younger as she became older, and being considered now quite a part and
parcel of the Granby establishment. Though it had been remarked that
she always appeared about the same day as Lord Doncaster, yet her usual
place of habitation and means of existence were perfectly unknown; but
as, on her arrival, she generally entered the public room about the
same hour as the post bag, it became shrewdly conjectured that she
might perhaps condescend to travel per mail, while, nevertheless, she
boasted long and loudly of her enormous jointure.
Sir Patrick alleged, that on a former occasion, when the house was
crowded, Mrs. O'Donoghoe ordered a bed to be made up for her on the
billiard table, and that now she had bespoken one, after the dancing
was over, in the orchestra, while she gladly dispensed with a
sitting-room, as the deficiency formed an adequate pretext for
constantly frequenting the public room, which she greatly preferred,
alleging at the same time, in the most emphatic terms, that saving six
shillings a-day for the hire of a parlor was not of the slightest
consequence to her, money being "no object," as poor Mr. O'Donoghoe had
left her more than she could ever hope to spend.
Mrs. O'Donoghoe's name appeared regularly in the weekly printed list of
company at Harrowgate, and she was certainly by no means a dead letter
in the brilliant circle. She sang a little, played a little, and talked
a great deal, while no topic of conversation ever came amiss to her.
The gay widow floundered through anything or everything, making a
thousand blunders, and adapting herself to each individual who
conversed with her in succession, being ready and anxious for the
admiration of all. She seemed willing to compensate for the want of
silver in her purse, by having plenty on her tongue, and apparently
thought, if she thought at all, that conversation resembled a game at
whist, where each individual should implicitly follow his partner's
lead.
In every carriage going to races, balls, pigeon matches, or steeple
chases, Mrs. O'Donoghoe generally manoeuvred to get herself a place,
either inside or outside, she seemed by no means particular which; and
whenever the master of the ceremonies became perplexed at balls, by an
application for a partner from some heavy elderly gentleman in yellow
gloves, who desired to risk his tendon of Achilles by dancing, he was
sure to be rapturously welcomed by Mrs. O'Donoghoe. She had been always
hitherto the favorite flirt of Lord Doncaster; and her bold bravura
manner amused Captain De Crespigny, who called her "Fountain's Abbey,"
on account of her being so picturesque a ruin on so very large a scale.
Though not quite so "wither'd, auld, and droll," as he and some
refractory officers had alleged, when entreated by the master of the
ceremonies to dance with her, yet Mrs. O'Donoghoe's best friends
allowed she was thirty--her enemies protested she was forty--and the
truth lay, as usual, between both extremes. Forced almost to
acknowledge at last that she had arrived on the debatable ground
between youth and that uninteresting period, middle age, too old for
dancing, too young for cards, and not quite beyond the excitement of
love-hunting, she still eagerly hoped to forget, in a brilliant
establishment, the blighted hopes of former years. No unmarried man was
too elderly or too juvenile for Mrs. O'Donoghoe to try her
well-practised fascinations on; and whether they were majors or minor,
Lord Wigton, Captain De Crespigny, Sir Patrick, or the Marquis, she yet
continued to hope for their admiration. Still she retained a firm
conviction that every gentleman arrived at Harrowgate with the full
intention of marrying within a month or two--that happy couples, at the
end of every season, were to be paired off like pairs of gloves or
shoes--and that every gentleman among her numerous assortment of
intimate acquaintances, would at last make his own selection; but the
most sanguine hope of her sanguine mind was, that the attentions shown
to her during many a successive season by Lord Doncaster, which had
gone so far as even to excite some scandal, might at last ripen into an
offer of his coronet; in which very ardent expectation she had recently
suspended her dancing propensities, and diligently exercised on the
Marquis her talents for listening, when his society could be had, or in
his absence, she even tolerated his shadow, the Abbe.
"Mrs. O'Donoghoe," exclaimed Captain De Crespigny, throwing himself
into a seat beside the piano during the interval of a quadrille, "only
look at your old superannuated admirer and Miss Dunbar. People laugh at
the susceptibility of seventeen, but that is nothing to the
susceptibility of seventy. Your ears have generally been the best of
listeners to Lord Doncaster's prosing, but you are fairly outdone
to-night. How all you young ladies must be tormented by that old
fellow's button-holding propensities."
"Quite the contrary! His conversation, though not always perfectly
correct, is, it must be confessed, very amusing. Men in general are a
queer set, but I like Lord Doncaster's old-fashioned compliments--quite
of the _vieille cour_--one might fancy he had lived some centuries
ago!"
"I heartily wish he had! I could back old Doncaster against the world,
for being the dullest proser in the United Kingdoms of Great Britain
and Ireland, with the Colonies besides. He will die talking, for he
talks everybody else to death! The Abbe, too, has no more mind than a
sparrow. His conversation should be filtered every evening to purify it
from bad taste of every kind. He picks up half a dozen stories every
morning at the ordinary, and retails them to any wearied victim who can
be forced to listen at night; when these are done so is he--his barrel
organ has run down--and you may know when the Abbe has come to an end,
by observing the hurry he is in to be off."
"You are an habitual hater, Captain De Crespigny, and have put on your
black cap to condemn us all this evening; but I will not have our good
Abbe hissed off the stage in this way."
"Good! Look out that word, Mrs. O'Donoghoe, in the dictionary
to-morrow, for you cannot know its real meaning!"
"Your criticisms on his conversation are like a shower of sleet this
cold night, but I assure you the Abbe started a perfected new story
yesterday, and I have sometimes heard him say very good things!"
"Then you have the advantage of everybody else, for I have known him
since the time of William the Conqueror, and who ever heard of his
saying or doing a single good thing? He cannot even understand one. The
whole pattern of his conversation is egotism in all its branches, and
you must positively permit me to enjoy my detestation of the Abbe in
peace."
"I allow that he is in bad taste occasionally," whispered Mrs.
O'Donoghoe, confidentially. "The Abbe can say very shocking things
without causing one to feel shocked. If he has any hypocrisy, it is in
trying to appear worse than he is."
"Could any one be worse? That seems to me impossible. No human being
would think of calling me strict, but of all the odious, revolting
sights I know, none can go beyond an irreligious clergy-man. The Abbe
always looks to me like a person who had something very heavy upon his
conscience--a guilty, suspicious expression of countenance. I have
occasionally wondered, Mrs. O'Donoghoe, to see you out-laugh him at
some of his own abortive attempts to be witty; but you can do many
things that no other person can, and that is one of them."
"Captain De Crespigny, we must now and then laugh at other people's
jokes besides our own!"
"I never laugh! I am the gravest man in Europe. I do sometimes give a
bewitching smile, but never more."
"Did you ever try an ineffable look?"
"Perhaps I may some evening, when anxious to cut out old Doncaster!
Miss Dunbar must find her two hours' conversation with him a serious
grievance; but what would a life-time be! The ideas which proceed from
the inside of my uncle's wig are certainly not of the most original and
amusing. Fancy him day after day _toujours_ Doncaster! Dunbar says he
would dismiss the best servant he ever had, if the fellow so much as
admitted him to a morning visit. If I had an ill-will at you, Mrs.
O'Donoghoe, which is luckily not the case, I should certainly wish you
were married to my uncle! Ladies and gentlemen may laugh; but I can
assure them it would be no laughing matter!"
"Well, say what you will; but I may perhaps think my rose-colored satin
has done its duty if I have an offer from the Marquis of Doncaster, old
as he is!"
"Ah, Mrs. O'Donoghoe! If you had worn that red satin when we were first
acquainted, there is no saying what might have happened. Another day of
it now, and I should be perfectly done for! With a train, you would be
fit to appear at St. James's! You alone, in the whole world, never
alter! You must have been born a century old, and become younger every
day!"
Though Mr. Granville and Marion, with the good-humored connivance of
Sir Arthur, now spent many delightful hours in rational and animated
intercourse, their happiness became gradually clouded with anxiety
respecting the lovely but fragile Clara, who evidently drooped and
faded. Her mind was stronger than her body; while resigned and gentle,
she never caused a moment's distress to others that could be avoided,
though the bright eye, and brighter cheek, which might have been
mistaken for the glow of health, were but too evidently caused by
fever; and her brother's heart occasionally misgave him, on observing
that a vivid flush, and a deadly paleness, chased each other on her
countenance when she spoke. There was a nervous tremor in her manner,
and a deep sensibility in her smile, which saddened the eye that looked
on that form of almost ethereal delicacy, while she tried, but tried in
vain, to conquer the wasting sorrow with which she thought the vices
and follies of Sir Patrick had forever divided them.
Several transient rencontres with the young Baronet, accidental on her
part, but preconcerted on his, had renewed the conflict of her
feelings, and unable to sustain the nearly frantic reproaches of one
whom she loved only too well, Clara became now almost entirely a
prisoner in her own apartments. It was the power of principle over
feeling which caused her to reject, with gentle sorrow, the expression
of attachment once so precious, and the fascination of Sir Patrick's
manner to her was such, that his very errors she could not utterly
hate, though day after day, she schooled her heart afresh with the
remembrance how unjustifiably her own best hopes of lasting peace would
be endangered by trusting her affections to the keeping of one who had
betrayed others, and who would have but too baneful an influence over
her own mind were they united, as he could so little sympathize in the
emotions, occupations, and duties of the Christian life. While she
might have said, like the poet, "I but know that I love thee whatever
thou art," Clara felt that if her life were to be the sacrifice, he
must be rejected; therefore, day after day, with pious resignation and
fortitude, she endured the slow but agonizing martyrdom of
extinguishing from her memory one whom she had so deeply loved. Sir
Patrick contrived to testify by a thousand indescribable assiduities,
only too gratifying to her nature, how constantly she was the object of
his solicitude. Every morning Clara's sitting room was adorned with
flowers from an unknown hand, which she felt and knew must be sent by
Sir Patrick, though it was an attention he had never shown to any
other; and the rarest fruit was frequently produced at her solitary
dinner, though the waiter neither could nor would give any clear
account of whence it came, while not a day passed that Clara did not
see Sir Patrick's graceful figure lounging beneath her windows,
conversing in an animated tone, with everybody except herself, or
throwing himself on horseback, and galloping almost madly out of sight.
Every evening Mr. Granville urged upon his sister the importance of her
being speedily conveyed to the continent; but every morning Clara
postponed their preparations, feeling too much enfeebled for the
journey, and unwilling to lose the delightful fascination of Marion's
society, who sat beside her couch all day, and every day, making hours
seem like moments while they conversed together. Clara knew nothing of
ennui, and never had occasion to kill time, for she valued it as time
ought to be valued, at an inestimable price. She had no weariness to
dissipate, as every hour was occupied in improving her own mind and
heart, while she exerted herself for the happiness of others, and never
laid her head on the pillow at night without an anxious examination
whether she had done all in her power for the real advantage of herself
and others. It was the opinion of Mr. Granville, frequently expressed,
that the very essence of earthly happiness is found in exertion,--that
"while a right discharge of religious duty is in itself the greatest of
all exertions, even the trifles or the essentials of life must all be
gained by making existence one great struggle against nature. Study,
integrity, good-humor, benevolence, early rising, and moderation are
all exertions that must be made upon principle,--a principle of
Christian obedience; and, as difficulty is the condition of success,
our frame is strengthened by exertion, our skill by practice, our
reasoning powers by opposition, and he who wrestles most will wrestle
best."