'Dark is the world to thee? Thyself art the reason why.'
TENNYSON.
Convalescence is often accompanied by a depression of spirits rarely
experienced during the illness itself. A weak nature seeks for a cause
for this depression in its surroundings, and when it finds one, as it
invariably does, it hugs it. These causes, thanks to the assiduity of
one whom we are given to understand has seen better days, are seldom far
to seek; and it requires a very strong will to hold fast the conviction
that these paroxysms of depression arise from physical weakness, and
not from some secret woe. Sibyl had not a very strong will. After the
first novelty of convalescence was past, and she had been installed in
her sitting-room in a cascade of lace and ribbons, which her dressmaker
called a _saut du lit_, and after Mr. Loftus had gravitated back towards
the library on the ground-floor and his article for the _Millennium_,
Sibyl began to experience that vague weariness and distaste of life
which all know who know ill health.
It is at this stage that the unprincipled invalid becomes 'the terror of
the household and its shame.' It is at this stage that lengths of felt
are laid down in passages by tender and injudicious parents, because no
sound can be borne by sensitive ears, that the children are 'hushed,'
the blinds are drawn down, and doctors who encourage exercise and light
are speedily discovered to have misunderstood the delicate constitution
with which they have to deal.
If Sibyl had not had a cause for depression, she would most certainly
have manufactured one. But unfortunately she had a real one. The
incident of the masked ball rankled. Doll had lied. He had done his poor
best, but he had not lied well. His eyes had not quite looked her in the
face when he told her that Mr. Loftus had married her for love. His
voice had not that emphatic ring which the crude mind ever recognises as
the ring of truth, and which in consequence the progressive one applies
itself to acquire.
Her mind, dulled by illness and narcotics, had half forgotten that she
had been momentarily distressed. But now the remembrance came back like
a nightmare. The grain of sand, blown by chance into her eye, pricked,
and she sedulously rubbed it into an inflammation.
She remembered now that there had been an earlier incident in his
courtship which had not been satisfactorily explained, _when he proposed
to her the second time_. Sibyl always regarded his offer under the
mountain-ash as _the second time_. She had a vague feeling that he had
proposed before. She had said as much to one or two friends in
confidence. But now that she came to think of it, she remembered that it
was she who had proposed _the first time_, and had been refused. This
minor detail of an uncomfortable incident had until now almost slipped
out of her memory, which, like that of many women whose buoyancy
depends on the conviction of the admiration of others, seldom harboured
anything likely to prove a worm in that bud.
But now she applied to the whole subject that mental friction which
morbid minds believe to be reflection, until it became, so to speak,
inflamed.
Why had he sworn before the altar and the Bishop to love her, if he did
not love her? She became tearful, listless, apathetic. She sat for hours
looking into the fire, unemployed, uninterested. The evil spirit which
ever lurks in sofas and couches whispered in her ear, when it pressed
the cushions, that she was indeed miserable, that her husband avoided
her, that she was an unloved martyr, that no one felt for her or
sympathized with her. It did not tell her that she had been married for
her money, simply because no sane person could look at Mr. Loftus and
believe that. But she changed in manner towards him. She was cold,
formal. She turned away her head when he came into the room, and then
when he had left it wept in secret because she had been married out of
pity.
And yet in her heart of hearts, if she had such a thing, had she not
partly guessed that fact long ago, and wilfully shut her eyes to it? The
chance words she had overheard were only the confirmation of a latent
misgiving. Does any woman ever really remain in ignorance if she is not
loved, or if she has been married for other reasons than love? What
constant props and supports she had given to Mr. Loftus's love for her!
It had never been allowed to stand alone. Why had she from the first
always bolstered it up by continually saying to herself and others,
until she almost believed it: 'My husband is so devoted to me. My love
is such a little thing beside his. What have I done to deserve such a
great devotion?' How often she had said all these things that
tepidly-loved women say!
Seeming to observe nothing, Mr. Loftus saw all, and pondered over the
reason of her altered appearance, and her visibly changed feeling
towards himself since the night of the masked ball. If it were that her
health was threatened as it had been before her marriage, why should her
affection towards himself have undergone this change? Could it be
anything to do with Doll? And in these days Sibyl was more frequently in
his thoughts than in the early days of his marriage with her. The
thought of her came between him and the political article which the
editor of the _Millennium_ had asked for.
'Time will show,' he would say to himself, with a sigh, taking up his
pen again.
One afternoon soon afterwards he came into her sitting-room, and found
her in tears.
'Has Crack said anything unkind?' he asked gently, while Crack beat his
tail in the depths of the fur rug in courteous recognition of his own
name.
'No,' she said, turning her head away.
'Have I, then?' sitting down by her.
'No.'
'Then, my child, what is it?'
'Nothing,' she said faintly.
There was a pause.
'Is it the same nothing that troubled you the night of the ball?'
He saw her start and shrink away from him.
'Oh! did Doll tell you?' she gasped, turning crimson.
'My dear, he told me nothing,' said Mr. Loftus gently, moving slightly
away from her, and looking at her with grave attention. He greatly
feared that unhappiness was before her in some form or other. He waited
in the hope that she would speak to him of her own accord. But she only
began to cry again. She was still weak. Was it possible that she was
afraid of him? What could be troubling her that she, who did not know
what reticence meant, could fear to tell him, which yet Doll knew? Doll
was in love with her. Had he lost his head on the night of the ball?
Had she discovered that she and Doll were young?
'Crack,' said Mr. Loftus, 'I have a very neglectful wife. I come to ask
for something for my headache, and she pays no attention to me at all.'
In earlier days Sibyl would have been on the alert in a moment if Mr.
Loftus's sacred head confessed an ache. Now she moved slowly to the
writing-table and produced certain innocuous remedies which he had
brought to her and asked her to apply for him after that terrible time
when he had had an attack of the heart and had repulsed her.
Presently the headache was better, and Mr. Loftus went back to the
library and lit his pipe, which was remarkable, because he was as a rule
unable to smoke after a headache.
He sat motionless a long time, his eyes fixed.
'I hope,' he said at last, knocking the ashes out of his pipe, 'that I
shall not live to become Sibyl's natural enemy, for I think I am about
the only real friend she has in the world.'
And the small seed that would have quickened in another man's heart into
a deep-rooted jealousy remained upon the surface of his mind as a
misgiving, which took the form of anxiety for her.