I called that day on Mrs. Poyntz, and communicated to her the purport of
the glad news I had received.
She was still at work on the everlasting knitting, her firm fingers
linking mesh into mesh as she listened; and when I had done, she laid
her skein deliberately down, and said, in her favourite characteristic
formula,--
“So at last?--that is settled!”
She rose and paced the room as men are apt to do in reflection, women
rarely need such movement to aid their thoughts; her eyes were fixed
on the floor, and one hand was lightly pressed on the palm of the
other,--the gesture of a musing reasoner who is approaching the close of
a difficult calculation.
At length she paused, fronting me, and said dryly,--
“Accept my congratulations. Life smiles on you now; guard that smile,
and when we meet next, may we be even firmer friends than we are now!”
“When we meet next,--that will be to-night--you surely go to the mayor’s
great ball? All the Hill descends to Low Town to-night.”
“No; we are obliged to leave L---- this afternoon; in less than two
hours we shall be gone,--a family engagement. We may be weeks away; you
will excuse me, then, if I take leave of you so unceremoniously. Stay,
a motherly word of caution. That friend of yours, Mr. Margrave! Moderate
your intimacy with him; and especially after you are married. There is
in that stranger, of whom so little is known, a something which I cannot
comprehend,--a something that captivates and yet revolts. I find
him disturbing my thoughts, perplexing my conjectures, haunting my
fancies,--I, plain woman of the world! Lilian is imaginative; beware of
her imagination, even when sure of her heart. Beware of Margrave. The
sooner he quits L---- the better, believe me, for your peace of mind.
Adieu! I must prepare for our journey.”
“That woman,” muttered I, on quitting her house, “seems to have some
strange spite against my poor Lilian, ever seeking to rouse my own
distrust of that exquisite nature which has just given me such proof of
its truth. And yet--and yet--is that woman so wrong here? True! Margrave
with his wild notions, his strange beauty!--true--true--he might
dangerously encourage that turn for the mystic and visionary which
distresses me in Lilian. Lilian should not know him. How induce him to
leave L----? Ah, those experiments on which he asks my assistance! I
might commence them when he comes again, and then invent some excuse to
send him for completer tests to the famous chemists of Paris or Berlin.”