THE FACULTY OF CLOSE OBSERVATION
One night, during the winter which followed the conversation between
Otho and Gilbert, a large ball was given at a well-known house in the
neighbourhood of Bradstane, and present at it were both the Langstroth
brothers, Magdalen Wynter, and even Otho Askam, little as he loved such
entertainments. Perhaps Gilbert had persuaded him to go.
Magdalen was chaperoned by a good-natured matron, who had married off
all her own girls with credit and renown, and could therefore afford to
witness with complacent amusement the gaspings and stugglings of those
who were still, as Otho might elegantly have put it, ‘in the running.’
She had not that dislike to Magdalen which animated more interested
persons; she admired her beauty, and considered her ‘good form.’
Magdalen herself had never looked better than she did that night, or
more haughtily and superbly independent of all outside support. She was
richly attired, for Miss Strangforth liked her niece to dress
splendidly. She danced very seldom; it had never been her habit to do so
often; and as not even her rivals, while in possession of their senses,
would have dreamed of saying that this was because she could not get
partners, and as her sitting out usually involved also the sitting out
of some man who would otherwise have been free to dance with another
girl, and as the said men always looked perfectly happy and satisfied in
their inactivity at such times,—her habit did not in any way make her
more popular.
To-night it was observed that she danced twice with her betrothed, twice
with Otho Askam, and once with Gilbert. Perhaps that might have been
endured without much adverse criticism, but it was noticed also, and
bitterly noticed, that Otho danced with no one else, though both Michael
and Gilbert did.
On the following afternoon, Gilbert, returning from a solitary,
meditative ride, far into the country—such a ride as he loved to take,
and did take, almost every day—found himself outside the palings at one
side of the Balder Hall Park. Looking over them, he saw within the
figure of Magdalen Wynter. She was pacing quickly up and down a sort of
woodland path, which in summer must have been almost concealed, but
which was now plainly visible between the trunks of the naked
trees—visible, at any rate, to Gilbert as he sat on horseback. There was
a broad belt of rough grass, in which grew ferns, and from which also
rose the leafless trees just spoken of. Then came the path on which Miss
Wynter was walking, and beyond that a glade, sloping steeply down to
where Tees flowed by in one of his many curves.
Gilbert saw a dark, close cap of velvet, and a pale face which drooped
somewhat beneath it, a long, fur-bordered mantle tightly clipped around
the wearer’s form, the bottom of a crimson kilting peeped beneath it,
and a pair of small, well-shod feet. Her back was turned to him, and he
stopped and looked over the palings till she turned, lifted her head,
and saw him. She gave a little start.
‘Oh, Gilbert, how quietly you must have come!’
‘Not so very. The ground is hard and frosty, and my horse’s hoofs rang.
It is your deep thoughts, Magdalen, which render you deaf to outside
things.’
She had walked across the grass, which was dry and hard, and crunched
frostily under her feet, up to the paling, and held up her hand to him.
Gilbert rarely met his future sister-in-law, and it has been seen that
in speaking of her to his friend, Otho Askam, he did not employ terms
exactly of enthusiasm; but if ever they did encounter each other,
whether by chance or design, he was always scrupulously amiable and
polite to her. Whether this meeting had come about by chance—whether he
had intended that it should come about—this is a thing known only to
himself. As he looked down now, into the marble paleness and wonderful
beauty of the girl’s face, he gave no sign, and she said to him—
‘Are you riding alone?’
‘Yes, just as you see me. I have been a long way—nearly to
Middleton-in-Teesdale.’
‘I have been walking for an hour, up and down this path. I am beginning
to find it rather monotonous, and am going in for some tea. Will you
come and have some, too?’
‘With pleasure, if you can put up with such a feeble substitute for my
brother. I think the North Lodge is just round here, isn’t it?’
‘Yes. I will meet you there. Then we can walk to the house together.’
They did so, Gilbert dismounting at the lodge, and leading his horse.
The short winter day was closing in, gray and cold, as they went up the
avenue.
‘How did you enjoy the dance?’ he asked.
‘Not much. I never do. Did you?’
‘I always enjoy watching other people’s little games.’
She gave a short laugh. ‘Do you mean mine?’
‘Yours—nay. How can you have any?’
‘Just what I was going to say. I mean, if you were looking for what you
call “games” with me, your trouble must have been wasted, that’s all.’
‘Of course. No; I meant all the other girls, and their mothers, and the
men, too, for that matter.’
She laughed again, shortly and contemptuously.
‘And Otho Askam,’ he pursued tranquilly.
Magdalen looked up. ‘What? Has he got plans, or “games,” as you call
them?’
‘I was amused to see his devotion to you last night, and what a rage
those women were in about it. His game is to avoid all the girls whom he
might possibly be supposed to be desirous of marrying. He told me so. He
is mortally afraid of being trapped. And of course, he is even more
afraid of the mothers than of the girls. You are quite harmless, you
see. You are promised to Michael. He feels so safe and happy with you.’
‘Poor, innocent lamb!’
‘Isn’t he? It shows how blindly he trusts in your probity, and in your
devotion to Michael. He comes to Balder Hall sometimes, doesn’t he?’
‘Yes.’
‘He never asks me to go with him.’
‘No?’
‘It is so amusing, I think. What does Michael say to it?’
‘Michael—oh, he laughs, and says it is very good of me to let him come,
and that it is a good sign for Mr. Askam’s future career that he
frequents any decent society at all,’ she said, with a short, dry laugh,
of which Gilbert’s answering one seemed an echo, so much were they alike
in tone.
‘How beautiful of him! When you are married to him, Magdalen,’ he added,
speaking very slowly, and openly watching her face—‘when you are married
to Michael, and fairly established as Mrs. Langstroth, for which
consummation you have waited so faithfully and so patiently,’—he dwelt
upon all his words—‘I should say that then Michael would find it rather
a bore to have Otho Askam coming in, and you would, too. Don’t you think
so?’
‘How can I tell? I should say that Otho Askam would find it a bore
himself, when I am married to Michael, if ever I should be. As you say,
I have waited a long time, and I may have a longer one yet to wait,
before I am Michael’s wife.’
She spoke with a dead monotony of tone, and a no less monotonous
expression in her face. They stood now in front of the house. Magdalen
beckoned to a gardener’s boy, and told him to send a groom for Gilbert’s
horse, after which they went into the house, into Magdalen’s
sitting-room, and she cast off her fur cloak, and began to make tea,
with the firelight shining on her crimson gown. Gilbert sat in a low
chair and watched her, but said nothing. Only when she handed him his
cup of tea, he said softly—
‘Magdalen, I do wish you and Michael could be married to-morrow.’
‘Thank you.’
‘Then your life would be brighter.’
‘Who told you it was dull?’
‘All your actions and words tell me so.’
‘You and I are what they call quiet people,’ she remarked. ‘Not
impressionable, and all that kind of thing.’
‘I believe that is the general opinion of our characters.’
‘Well, and people also seem to think that such creatures—pachydermatous,
don’t they call animals with thick skins——’
‘Has Michael been lending you some science primers to while away the
time in the winter evenings? What a happy thought of his!’
‘You haven’t answered my question.’
‘They do—pachydermatous is the word.’
‘They seem to think that, because we are not all on fire, and jerking
about, for nothing, we can do without any excitement at all.’
‘I have observed the existence of the delusion you speak of. Yes, thank
you, I will have some more cake.’
‘I don’t know what you think, but I feel to want more excitement than
most people, and I get less. Last night, if I could have been sure that
Michael would not have misunderstood me, I would have danced every dance
with Otho Askam, if the result had been that not a woman would have
spoken to me at the end of the evening. That’s the kind of feeling I
have.’
‘I can quite understand it. I wish you would have tried the
experiment—say with me.’
‘That would not have been at all the same thing. You are a very good
young man, and Otho Askam is considered rather a bad one.’
‘Michael is the best of us all.’
‘It is not that I like bad people, but I like to sing in a different key
from that used by all the rest. I should like to see them all looking as
if the world were coming to an end.... By the way, Gilbert, are you such
a very good young man? They say you are too great a friend of that timid
creature we have been talking about, who only dances with engaged girls,
to be very good.’
Gilbert started—within himself, not outwardly, stirred his tea, and said
carelessly—
‘Perhaps I cultivate him for reasons like your own—because I am dull,
and it makes people vexed.’
‘Perhaps. He is very rich, of course. Gilbert, you have wished me such
good wishes about Michael, it is only fair that I should wish you well
in return. I wish Otho Askam would relieve you of those factories that I
have heard you speak of. Then there would be more money in your coffers,
and perhaps more chance of that marriage coming off, of which you have
been speaking so kindly.’
‘You are very good,’ said Gilbert, laying down his empty cup; ‘but
gentlemen are not in the habit of twisting their friends’ pockets inside
out, for their own advantage.’
‘Oh no! But if the friend had a leaning towards commercial enterprise—a
speculative spirit. It would be an amusement for him.’
‘_If_ he had. But you know as well as I do that his tastes are not of
that kind, but of the turf, turfy.’
Magdalen smiled, and said, ‘I know that his tastes are for anything
exciting, anything highly flavoured. What will you wager that he is
tired of the turf in a year from now?’
‘Nothing at all. If I did wager on that subject, I would wager to the
contrary.’
‘Well, I think his superfluous cash would be more respectably employed
in setting your factories going.’
Here a loud ring sounded through the house.
‘I should not wonder if that were Michael calling,’ said Magdalen, and
she spoke in hurried tones. ‘Remember, Gilbert, not a word of this. I
feel better for speaking to you; and Michael is good, oh, so much better
than any of us! And he has cares of his own. And you will be my brother,
some day. Do you understand?’
‘My dear Magdalen, of course! Do not distress yourself, pray. There is
no need,’ he assured her, as Michael entered.
‘Why, Gilbert, that is well,’ said he, with a look of great pleasure. ‘I
have often wished that you could spare time to ride out and have a chat
with Magdalen now and then. Where did you meet?’
Michael sat half an hour, and then the brothers rode home in company.
Magdalen, when the two young men had left her, sat for a long time over
the fire, gazing into its glow, her elbows propped on her knees.
‘Gilbert is very observant—remarkably observant,’ she thought to
herself. ‘Who would have thought that he would see so quickly, and
Michael be so blind? And yet again, Gilbert sees, but sees only to
dissect—without any feeling, unless it be a feeling of pleasure in
showing one his power. Michael does not see, but if he did he would
sympathise. He is grand—at least, he would be if he were awake. With all
his love for me, I have not been able to awaken him. His time is yet to
come. Sympathise—yes; but what is sympathy? He can’t give me what I
want. Here am I, beautiful, yes, very beautiful, and very strong, and
with some brains in my head, though they all think I have none. And I
have to live, to vegetate, that is, as if I were some worn-out old
woman, as if I were my own great-aunt. It is horrible, horrible, and I
do not know how long I shall be able to bear it.’
A dreary blank seemed to open before her mind’s eye, and still she sat
motionless, staring into the fire.
‘Michael is my lover—he does love me, too. He is the only friend I have,
for no one is fond of me. If they were kind to me, and really cared for
me, I would not take their Otho Askam away from them. I wonder if they
know what he is, this creature that they make such a fuss about! Perhaps
there would be no fuss if he were dancing attendance on any one but
me—fuss, of course there would be no fuss. Gilbert and I know what he
is. He has not been able to conceal his miserableness from us. And we
know that he himself—the man—is not worth fighting for. But I do not
mean to let them have him, all the same. It amuses me to keep him, and
to enrage them. And I shall go on amusing myself in that way. Michael is
very good, but he is not—amusing. If I were married to him, I wonder if
I should find it as dull as I do being engaged to him. Surely not.
But——’
Here Miss Strangforth’s maid came in, and said her mistress was awake,
and was going to have a cup of tea, and would be glad if Miss Wynter
would go to her. Magdalen went instantly, and whatever the state of her
own heart, she did not let her great-aunt feel dull while she sat with
her.