AN UNPOPULAR WEDDING.
The marriage of Innocent took place on one of the first days of
February, a day of the “seasonable” kind, with black skies, a dark gray
atmosphere, and occasional downpours of steady rain. The raw cold
penetrated to one’s bones and one’s heart, and even the show of costly
flowers which had been procured for the occasion failed to make the
rooms look cheerful. Innocent herself, in her white bridal dress and
veil, was like the snowdrops. Her head drooped a little, her cheeks were
not much less pale than her dress. She was not a blushing, or a smiling,
or a weeping bride. Her eyes were full of a certain awe, sometimes
varied by alarm, when the prospect of leaving home came uppermost; but
she was passive in all things, gentle and grateful, as calm in her new
position as she had been in the former. The only one thing she had been
anxious about, the one trouble and mystery in her life, had been set
right (as she thought) by her bridegroom’s exertions. He had taken upon
him to arrange all that: to explain it, to make everything clear; and
Innocent, trustful and ignorant, had not doubted his power to do so.
Mrs. Eastwood’s anxious assurances that she was mistaken, that her
belief about Amanda was a delusion, had never made any impression on the
girl. But when Sir Alexis accepted her story as true, and pledged
himself to set everything right, the practical part of her mind, which
was in reality the only intellectual part of her which had any power,
accepted his assurances, and trusted in them. Why should any one bid her
believe that it was a delusion? Innocent knew that it was no delusion;
but at the same time she was quite simple enough and foolish to believe
that Sir Alexis could set it all to rights, without inquiring how. He
would give her a caressing answer when she asked him about it, and tell
her that all was being settled; and in her ignorance she believed him,
and was lightened of her burden. The wedding was to be a very quiet one,
partly (as it was announced) because of Innocent’s health--partly
because of the mourning of the family. John Vane, who had been summoned
for the occasion, was to give her away as the representative of her
father’s family--for Frederick, morose and melancholy (feeling the death
of his wife, poor fellow--for she was very beautiful, though it was
quite a _mésalliance_), would have nothing to do with it. And a few of
Mrs. Eastwood’s friends and counsellors were in attendance, and two or
three friends of Sir Alexis; but it was not a gay ceremonial. The
Molyneuxes were present, for Ernest had not intimated to his family any
doubt as to eventual union with Nelly, nor had he accepted her virtual
dismissal of him; but they, like many other people, after having
received the announcement of the marriage with enthusiasm, had come
prepared at the last moment to criticize.
“How could she allow that poor child to marry such a man?” whispered
Miss Molyneux to her mother.
“Hush, child!” said the mother; “the Eastwoods are people who will do
anything for money.”
“How pale she is; do you think they can have used force?” the same young
lady asked of Ernest.
“No more force than that of wealth and finery--a force women are always
glad to yield to,” said Ernest, almost in Nelly’s hearing.
She heard the last words, and divined the first. They had “made up”
their quarrel, as people say, but Nelly’s heart was very sore, quivering
with pain present and pain past. Even the marriage itself was nothing to
be happy about. How would poor Innocent bear it, when she was gone, away
from all who cared for her, with her old-new husband? How selfish it was
of him, Nelly thought, to insist upon marrying Innocent because in her
trouble she had committed herself to him!--but all men were now selfish;
they were not to be judged as women are. It came natural to them to
consider themselves, their own will, their own gratification before
everything else. This conviction was the bitter product of Nelly’s own
experience, which she endeavoured to soften by generalization, as men
and women do invariably on both sides. All men were like that, she said
to herself; it took off something of the sharp edge of self-seeking from
the man whom she had herself chosen from all the world--or rather, who
had chosen her, as he himself would have preferred to have said.
John Vane did not come to her until the weary morning was nearly over,
till after the bride and bridegroom had departed, and the other guests
were dropping away. The guests in general had not been cheerful in their
comments; most of them had expressed themselves warmly delighted at the
prospect of so good a match for Innocent--but the compliments they paid
to the mistress of the house now were not so agreeable.
“I am afraid poor little Lady Longueville is very delicate,” said one,
shaking her head.
“Everything has gone off very nicely,” said another; “but I wish, poor
thing, she had looked a little happier.”
“I don’t understand a bride looking very happy on her wedding day,”
said a more benevolent critic; “and she is so young and
so--inexperienced----”
“He has plenty of experience for both,” said a fourth.
“I should like to see that girl safe back from her wedding tour,” said
Mrs. Everard, who was privileged to speak her mind. “She looks to me a
great deal too like a Lucia di Lammermoor, my dear. She wanted nothing
but her hair down, and a confidant in white muslin. I hope he will take
care of her.”
“There can be no doubt that he will take every care of her,” said Mrs.
Eastwood, who was tired and irritated. “That was my great comfort in
giving my consent.”
“Well, at all events, the responsibility is off your hands,” said Mrs.
Everard, nodding her head half in congratulation, half in pity.
Thus the marriage was set down on all hands as a mercenary match made by
Mrs. Eastwood, of which poor Innocent was the victim. Her very sons
thought so; and with better reason John Vane thought so, whom she had
thought of as her counsellor, and whose moral support would have done
her good. But how was he to judge, except as other people did, from the
surface? and Mrs. Eastwood felt that she must bear it all, and dared
not say anything in her own defence. John Vane was cold and grave even
to Nelly. He seemed to intend to go away without speaking to anyone
beyond the ordinary civilities; but something in Nelly’s face seemed to
bring him back from the door, when he had all but taken his leave. He
approached her reluctantly, she thought, and his manner was not as of
old. He told her he was sorry he had not known of this sooner--that it
must all have been arranged very suddenly--and that he would have been
glad to have been consulted about a matter so important to his poor
little cousin’s happiness.
“We should have liked more time, too,” said Nelly, in her turn
indignant; “but Innocent settled it all by herself, and Sir Alexis
insisted that there should be no delay.”
“Innocent settled it all by herself?”
“Yes, Mr. Vane; it looks very strange, but it is true. I see you blame
poor mamma, who never was a matchmaker in her life; but it was Innocent
who settled everything. I hate it,” said Nelly, with warmth; “and when
she sees what she has done--poor Innocent! But he is a kind man,” she
added, more calmly, “and he will be very good to her, as mamma says.”
“I do not understand Innocent,” said Vane. “They told me a very strange
story at Sterborne----”
“A story--about what?” said Nelly, growing breathless with excitement
and terror.
“She seems to have gone home in so strange a way, so suddenly, so oddly
altogether,” he said, with an uneasy look. “And yet she is not _really_
an idiot--only odd. I am very sorry for my sister’s sake--it has
disturbed her so much. Indeed, I often regret deeply that I took
Innocent to the High Lodge.”
“Oh, if you had not done so!” cried Nelly, with that horrible perception
of how a whole world of trouble might have been avoided, which comes so
often after the event. “Oh, if you had not done it!” Then she restrained
herself, as he could see, with a sudden movement of alarm.
“There is something behind that I do not know,” said Vane, looking at
her.
“Oh, no, no, pray don’t think so! She was frightened and nervous: that
was all,” cried Nelly.
How she longed to tell him, to set him right in his injurious opinion,
to vindicate her mother and herself! Few of the only denials of life are
equal to this, when men or women are compelled by honour to abandon
their honour to public comment, and to accept blame which is not justly
theirs. Vane looked at her curiously, even with something like anxiety;
but he remained silent. He was confounded by all that had happened, and
offended by the complete want of confidence shown by them. And what
could he say beyond what had been said?--that Innocent had been
permitted, or perhaps induced--forced, the bolder spirits said--into a
mercenary match which she did not wish; which she was passive in, if not
less than passive? Vane stood silently by Nelly’s side, for some time,
wondering, trying to think what the secret could be--what extenuating
circumstances might exist. At least, he concluded to himself, Nelly
could not be to blame. She could have nothing to do with the matter; one
young girl would not help to force another on that painful road. Nelly,
at the worst, must have been herself passive--perhaps she was herself
fated to be the next victim. Vane watched curiously the greetings
between her and the Molyneuxes, as this thought passed through his mind.
The _aigre-doux_ of their salutations was unchanged; they were not
warmer than before, nor more familiar; it was evident that no change had
taken place, there, in the position of affairs. He thought it was
evident (looking again at Nelly herself) that she was not more happy
than she had been. Why had not Mrs. Eastwood exerted herself to further
her daughter’s prospects, instead of thus fatally deciding poor
Innocent’s? He went away at last with his mind in a very uncomfortable
state; grieved for Innocent, troubled about Nelly, wondering and
confused altogether. The only thing he was sure of was another
generalization, such as in all similar cases men find it safe to take
refuge in--that it must be the mother’s fault. She it was who must have
“managed” and schemed for the one gilded unhappiness, and who must be
permitting, for her own ends, the other. Poor Mrs. Eastwood! this was
all the reward she got for her much anxiety and motherly care.
Another incident had occurred a few days before, which she had confided
to no one but Nelly, and which had seriously disturbed her. Jane the
housemaid, whose quiet demeanour had lulled all her fears to rest, had
come to her suddenly, and demanded to be promoted to the post of lady’s
maid to the future Lady Longueville.
“Lady’s maid! you, Jane? but you don’t understand the duties,” Mrs.
Eastwood had said in consternation.
“Oh, ma’am, I know a deal as no one thinks of,” said Jane,
significantly, with a look that froze the blood in her mistress’s veins.
“That may be, perhaps,” Mrs. Eastwood said, trying to cover her
confusion with a nervous laugh; “but you do not know how to make
dresses, or how to do hair--or any of a maid’s special duties. Household
work is a different sort of thing.”
“My friends has told me to apply for the place,” said Jane, “and them as
knows thinks me well qualified. They say as how I have the best right. I
knows a deal more than any one thinks for,” the woman repeated doggedly,
like a lesson she had learned by rote.
A swift calculation passed through Mrs. Eastwood’s mind--was it better
to keep this dangerous knowledge within her own reach, where she could
prevent its evil use, or try to prevent it? or, on the other hand, would
Jane be safer within the steady grasp of Sir Alexis, who would stand
between Innocent and harm? It was a difficult question to settle in a
moment. Mrs. Eastwood leaped at the more generous decision; she took the
burden on herself.
“I have no wish to part with you,” she said, diplomatically; “but if you
want to better yourself, to try another kind of place, I shall be glad
to let you try how you can get on with Miss Ellinor at home. For Lady
Longueville, I should like a person of more experience to begin with.
You can speak to my daughter about it, if you please.”
“But, ma’am,” Jane was beginning, pertinaciously.
“No more just now--I am busy. After the wedding I shall have more time,”
said Mrs. Eastwood. But this interview gave her another ache in her
heart.
All these things concurred to make the wedding day a painful one. As the
family were in mourning, and as the wedding had been so quiet, they had
excused themselves from any further festivities in the evening: and who
does not know how dismal is the languid close of the day, when all is
over, after the excitement of the morning, and of the busy days
preceding, when there was so much to do? Dick sauntered about the garden
with his wedding favour still on his coat, shedding bits of wedding-cake
all over his path, which Winks, following at his heels, condescended to
pick up, though Winks had not approved of the wedding any more than the
rest of the family. Winks had never had any opinion of Sir Alexis. A
connoisseur, fond of art, of dainty furniture, and fine gardens, has
seldom much sympathy with the four-footed visitor, whose appreciation of
the finest collection is generally somewhat contemptuous, to say the
least. Winks retired to a corner when Sir Alexis visited The Elms. He
declined to take any notice of him. “He is not in my style,” the little
cynic said very plainly; and he retired from his usual leading part in
the family life while this objectionable visitor remained. Other events
that day had combined to derange Winks’s temper, and wound him in his
tenderest feelings. Mr. Justice Molyneux (for the Q.C. was now a Judge)
had attempted to give him a kick in the hall, where Winks was
contemplating the arrival of the guests with much dignity; Mrs. Everard
had trodden on the flowing fringes of his tail; he had been hustled out
of his favourite chair, and interfered with in all his usual habits.
Winks was very tolerant when this sort of thing happened in the evening.
He accepted the fact of a ball with a certain benevolent interest, and
wagged his tail condescendingly at the young people, bidding them enjoy
themselves, before he went off on three feet, like the philosopher he
was, to enjoy tranquillity in the one comfortable chair in the library,
congratulating himself that dogs do not dance. But a ball, or something
like a ball, in the morning was a mystery to Winks. He thought he had
got rid of all that crowd of unnecessary people when they went off to
the church; but to see them come back in full daylight, not twelve
o’clock, and fill the room once more, was beyond the endurance even of a
philosopher. He was so far disturbed out of his ordinary calm as to
bark indignantly when the bride and bridegroom went away, and a few of
the livelier spirits in the party, headed by Dick, threw old shoes after
them. Winks read Dick a lecture on the subject afterwards. He looked at
him with a mixture of reproach and contempt, as he stood in the hall,
with his hands full of old slippers. He was too much disgusted even to
follow his young master back into the house when the carriage drove
away, but shook his head and marched off round the side walk into the
garden, feeling that such absurdity was not to be borne. I cannot quite
explain how it was that he condescended to pick up the bits of
wedding-cake; perhaps with a thrifty idea that it was best they should
not be lost; or perhaps he was satisfied that Dick was ashamed of
himself, and saw the familiar book in his pocket which was Dick’s
signal-flag and intimation to all concerned that he had returned to the
duties of ordinary life.
“It was fun, though, by Jove, to see that old slipper with the high heel
hit Longueville on his old nose,” Dick said with a laugh, as he held up
a larger bit of cake than usual; and Winks, mollified, grinned in
acknowledgment of the joke. He made one round of the garden after the
cake was finished, to show that he was not mercenary, and then trotted
indoors, where, providentially, all was now quiet. The family were
assembled in the drawing-room, where, though the chairs and tables had
been put in their usual places, there was still an air of excitement,
and a sentiment of disorder. Winks came in and set himself down in front
of the fire, and looked at them all. “What do you think of your
handiwork now it is finished?” he seemed to say, severely, looking at
his mistress, curling up one black lip over his white teeth; he would
not condescend to wag his tail.
“Oh, Winks, don’t look so diabolical,” said Nelly, trying to laugh;
perhaps it was as good a way of relieving her feelings as crying would
have been.
“Don’t sneer, you brute!” cried Jenny, indignant. Winks fixed upon them
all a look of contemptuous disapproval, and then trotted off to a chair
at the window. They were not even amusing in their exhaustion--he
preferred his own company to theirs.
After a while Jenny followed Winks’s example.
“What a bore a wedding is,” he said, stretching himself, “in the
morning, leaving one’s afternoon on one’s hands. I shall go out for a
walk till dinner.”
“Don’t go out in the rain with your cold, dear,” said Mrs. Eastwood.
“Pshaw! what’s a cold?” said Jenny. The rain was nothing to the chill
discouragement and inarticulate vague misery which seemed to fill the
house from garret to basement. A sense of unhappiness, which he did not
know how to struggle against, was in Jenny’s own mind. Nothing
uncomfortable had happened to him in his personal career. He had
pleasant rooms, was in a good set, and fortune smiled upon him.
Nevertheless he too was dully miserable, as the house was; he did not
know why. He was too young for sentiment, or, at least, too boyish and
defiant of sentiment, to take himself to task in the matter, or
ascertain what ailed him. Perhaps even the boy was wise enough not to
wish to come to any clear conclusion in the matter; but he was dull,
dull as ditchwater, according to his own simile.
They were all going to a dance at Mrs. Barclay’s that night, which was
some relief. She was full of triumph and exultation in the event which
had brought so little comfort to the Eastwoods. She had asked
everybody--the Molyneuxes, who were to be “connexions,” through Nelly,
and John Vane, who was already her “connexion,” through Innocent--and
all the _habitués_ of the Elms. Jenny spent the time till dinner in a
wretched walk, and came in drenched, with his cold considerably
increased, which, on the whole, he was rather glad of; and Mrs.
Eastwood, yielding to the general misery of the circumstances at last,
went “to lie down”--an indulgence unknown to her on ordinary occcasions.
Dick went to his own room, where Winks, on being whistled for five
times, condescended to follow him; and they two, I think, had the best
of it. Frederick had sole possession of the library, where he sat over
the fire with his feet on the grate, and a countenance which was dark as
the sky. And Nelly went to poor Innocent’s room and put things tidy with
her own hands, and cried over the little empty white bed, as if Innocent
had died. A wretched day, rain outside, cold, dulness, and misery
within; but if people will marry in February, what else can be looked
for? for the home of the bride is seldom a very cheerful habitation on
the evening of the wedding day.