THE QUARREL.
“A something light as air,—a look,
A word unkind, or wrongly taken,
Oh! love that tempests never shook
A breath, a touch like this hath shaken!
And ruder words will soon rush in
To spread the breach that words begin,
And eyes forget the gentle ray
They wore in courtship’s smiling day,
And voices lose the tone that shed
A tenderness o’er all they said;—
Till fast declining, one by one
The sweetnesses of love are gone,
And hearts, so lately mingled, seem
Like broken clouds, or like the stream
That smiling leaves the mountain’s brow,
As though its waters ne’er could sever,
Yet, ere it reach the plain below,
Breaks into floods, that part for ever!”
MOORE.
The Earl and Countess of Dashleigh now found less enjoyment in the mutual
converse which had once made their days flow so pleasantly and swiftly,
and which had been especially appreciated by Dashleigh, whose reserve or
pride made him avoid much general society. When Annabella’s wit sparkled
before him, he had needed no other amusement, and in the first part of
her wedded life, she had required no other auditor than him who listened
with so partial an ear. But each now felt that a change had come, as
water penetrating the crevices of a rock, and then freezing, sometimes
by its sudden expansion bursts asunder the solid stone, and severs it
as effectually by silent power as a gunpowder blast could have done, so
secret pride in both hearts was gradually, fatally dividing those bound
to each other by the closest of earthly ties! There was yet, however,
no open quarrel; the world was not called in as a spectator of domestic
disunion. There was no appearance of want of harmony as, on the occasion
which I am about to relate, the husband and the wife sat together in
the countess’s luxurious boudoir, Annabella on a damask sofa, engaged
in German work, the earl at a writing-table, looking over a copy of the
_Times_.
There had been a long silence between them. It was broken by a question
from Dashleigh.
“Did you know, Annabella, that Augustine Aumerle was soon going to leave
the vicarage and return to Aspendale?”
“I know little of what goes on at the vicarage,” replied Annabella, after
pausing to count stitches in her pattern; “I think that Ida must have cut
me, she so seldom comes to the hall.”
“There are to be great doings at Aspendale,” resumed Dashleigh; “I saw
Augustine this morning during my ride, and he told me of his novel
arrangements. He expects soon a visit from Verdon, the well-known
æronaut; I wonder that he keeps up acquaintance with one who may be
regarded as a public exhibitor; but that is his business, not mine; it
seems that they were school-fellows together, and it is not easy to break
off old friendships.”
“If there be such a thing as a _lofty_ profession it is Mr. Verdon’s,
without doubt,” said Annabella; “the aspirations of an æronaut must mount
higher than even those of a peer!”
“It appears,” continued Dashleigh, without seeming to take notice of the
observation, “that Mr. Verdon is to give his new grand balloon a trial
trip from Augustine’s grounds.”
“Oh, how I should like to be there!” cried the countess.
“Augustine has invited us both,”—Annabella clapped her hands like a
child,—“but the difficulty is that he will not be able himself to do the
honours of his house, as he is to accompany Verdon in his upward flight.”
“Is he?” exclaimed the young countess; “that will be charming! Such a
genius will mount up so high, that the silken ball will have no need of
hydrogen gas! He will but inflate it with poetical ideas, and it will
never stop short of the stars!”
The earl smiled at the idea. “I should be well pleased to see the
ascent,” he observed; “but yet I am doubtful about accepting the
invitation. It would, you see, be awkward for those in our position of
life to be guests at the table of a man who was at the moment up in the
clouds.”
[Illustration: Tearing the Manuscript.
_Page 107._]
Annabella burst into a girlish laugh. “You are afraid that he might look
down even upon us,” she cried.
“I doubt whether etiquette would allow—”
“Throw etiquette to the dogs!” exclaimed Annabella, heedless of her
husband’s look of disgust at such an audacious parody on Shakspeare. “I
must, will go to Aspendale! It will be such fun! I have half a mind to
ascend in the balloon myself!”
“It would be very unsuitable for a lady,” began the earl,—
“Unless her lord would accompany her,” said Annabella, archly; “we might
obtain as fine a view as from Mont Blanc, without all the trouble of
climbing.”
The earl always winced under any allusion to his mountain adventure.
“But then,” continued Annabella maliciously, “it would never do to get
giddy,—suspended between earth and sky,—there would be no hope of the
friendly intervention of a lady’s boa!”
“I should not have the slightest objection, not the slightest,” repeated
the irritated earl, “to go in a balloon to-morrow; indeed, I think it
very probable that I shall make one of Augustine’s party.”
Annabella was diverted to see that she had succeeded in putting her
haughty lord on his mettle. It seems an instinct with some natures to
delight in showing a power to tease, and it had become stronger with
the countess since her disappointment regarding her romance. She was
like a child playing with fire-arms, ignorant of their dangerous nature.
Annabella knew the weakness of her husband’s nerves, but not the full
strength of his pride.
“I was reading yesterday a curious account of a balloon ascent,”
continued the earl, in a quieter tone; “and, by-the-bye, I have not quite
finished it. It is in the —— Magazine; have you seen the last number,
Annabella?”
“I glanced over it,” replied the lady, carelessly; “I suppose that it is
lying on one of the tables.”
The earl rose and looked around for the magazine. His wife was too busy
in arranging the shades for a withered rose-leaf to give him the least
assistance. She was too busy to notice that he at length extended his
search for the missing periodical to the drawer of her writing-table.
Into that drawer, with habitual carelessness, the countess had thrust a
little manuscript, to which, after hastily writing it, she had scarcely
given a thought.
“What’s this?” exclaimed Dashleigh half aloud, as his gaze unwittingly
fell upon the title—“The Precipice and the Peer.” The first glance had
been purely accidental, for the earl was above petty curiosity, and
would never have touched either paper or drawer had he supposed them to
contain anything secret. But now an ungovernable impulse made him open
the leaves, and hastily run his eye over the contents. Annabella had just
succeeded in finding a missing shade of russet, when she was startled by
a sudden sound resembling a stamp; and looking up, she saw the earl with
his very temples crimsoned by rage, and her unfortunate burlesque in his
hand.
“Lord Dashleigh!” exclaimed the countess, “that was never intended—”
“Never intended for my eye!” thundered the earl, who was in a violent
passion; and tearing the manuscript into a hundred pieces, he trampled it
under his foot!
“That is the action of a pettish child!” exclaimed Annabella, almost as
much irritated as her husband, her eyes flashing indignant fire.
“Leave the room, insolent girl!” cried the earl; and turning round as he
spoke, he perceived to his surprise and inexpressible annoyance that he
had two unexpected auditors—his servant having a moment before opened the
door, to announce the Duke of Montleroy, who was following close behind!
Dashleigh was so much confused—overwhelmed at being discovered by such
a person in such a position—that of a husband quarrelling with his own
wife, and giving way to a burst of passion degrading to any man, but most
of all to one of his exalted station—that he remained for some minutes
transfixed, totally unable to speak. Annabella, on the contrary, lost
none of her self-possession. She swept past the bewildered duke, with a
passing reverence which might have beseemed an empress, and proceeded
at once to her own chamber, without uttering a word. As soon as she had
reached it, she violently rang her bell.
The maid who obeyed the summons found her mistress sitting at her
toilette table, calm, tearless, but pale with suppressed emotion. She was
selecting various articles of jewellery from a large mahogany box.
“Bates, bid the coachman put the horses to directly, and do you prepare
to accompany me in the carriage,” was the countess’s brief command.
The lady had, not an hour before, returned from a lengthened drive, and
the order surprised the maid. She ventured to say something about the
late hour and the appearance of coming rain.
“Let it rain torrents—what matters it?” cried Annabella. “Bear my message
to Mullins, and return without delay to pack up the things which I shall
require. I shall sleep at the vicarage to-night.”
The lady’s-maid hurried away to the servant’s hall, which she found in
a state of considerable excitement, for the news had already spread
like wild-fire through the house that my lord had quarrelled with my
lady, torn up her writings, ordered her out of the room—nay, as it was
rumoured, had actually struck her on the face.
“Take my word for it,” cried the butler, with the air of one who can see
much further through a millstone than others,—“take my word for it this
has something to do with the odd couple as came here the other day,—the
fine lady, and the fierce old man with black brows and long white hair.”
“Yes,” replied another servant, with a nod, “I’ve noticed that nothing
has gone right up stairs since them two drove off in the donkey-chaise,
and my lady shut herself up in her room, as if she’d had a down-right
set-down from my lord.”
“Oh, for the matter of that,” laughed Bates, “she’d give as good as she
gets, any day. The earl has ordered her out of the room; but she’s going
a little further than may be he wished or expected. She has a spirit of
her own, has my lady!”
In the meantime, Annabella was pacing up and down her apartment with a
heart full almost to bursting. “I will not stay here, no, not an hour!”
she exclaimed; “he shall find that he has no weak girl to deal with—no
slave to submit to his pride and caprice! I have borne much, but this I
will not bear. I will not endure to be trampled upon by a tyrant, even
though that tyrant be a husband. I will go to the vicarage at once. Mr.
Aumerle will not forget that my mother was the sister of the wife whom he
loved. He will not deny the shelter of his roof to an orphan, so cruelly
driven from her own. I will impose no burden upon my friends. I ask,
I need nothing from any one but the sympathy which my griefs, and the
justice which my wrongs demand.”
Thus, asking counsel only of her own angry passions, casting aside all
higher considerations, and seeking but the gratification of her bitter
pride and resentment, the young Countess of Dashleigh prepared to take a
step which scarcely any circumstances could justify. Intoxicated as she
was with anger, the voice of reason and of conscience were alike unheard
or unheeded. Indignant at the errors of her husband, Annabella was
blinded to her own; and when she found her domestic happiness wrecked,
her youthful hopes scattered like leaves in a storm, she recognised not
the cause of the evil—she traced not in the desolation around her the
work of the demon Pride.