The days of the last week hurried along like the grains of sand out of
an hour-glass when they are nearly gone. It is true that almost
everything was done--a few little bits of stitching, a few things still
to be "got up" alone remaining, a handkerchief to mark with Elinor's
name, a bit of lace to arrange, just enough to keep up a possibility
of something to do for Mrs. Dennistoun in the blank of all other
possibilities--for to interest herself or to occupy herself about
anything that should be wanted beyond that awful limit of the
wedding-day was of course out of the question. Life seemed to stop there
for the mother, as it was virtually to begin for the child; though
indeed to Elinor also, notwithstanding her love, it was visible more in
the light of a point at which all the known and certain ended, and where
the unknown and almost inconceivable began. The curious thing was that
this barrier which was placed across life for them both, got somehow
between them in those last days which should have been the most tender
climax of their intercourse. They had a thousand things to say to each
other, but they said very little. In the evening after dinner, whether
they went out into the garden together to watch the setting of the young
moon, or whether they sat together in that room which had witnessed all
Elinor's commencements of life, free to talk as no one else in the world
could ever talk to either of them, they said very little to each other,
and what they said was of the most commonplace kind. "It is a lovely
night; how clear one can see the road on the other side of the combe!"
"And what a bright star that is close to the moon! I wish I knew a
little more about the stars." "They are just as beautiful," Mrs.
Dennistoun would say, "as if you knew everything about them, Elinor."
"Are you cold, mamma? I am sure I can see you shiver. Shall I run and
get you a shawl?" "It is a little chilly: but perhaps it will be as well
to go in now," the mother said. And then indoors: "Do you think you will
like this lace made up as a jabot, Elinor?" "You are giving me all your
pretty things, though you know you understand lace much better than I
do." "Oh, that doesn't matter," Mrs. Dennistoun said hurriedly; "that is
a taste which comes with time. You will like it as well as I do when you
are as old as I am." "You are not so dreadfully old, mamma." "No, that's
the worst of it," Mrs. Dennistoun would say, and then break out into a
laugh. "Look at the shadow that handkerchief makes--how fantastic it
is!" she cried. She neither cared for the moon, nor for the quaintness
of the shadows, nor for the lace which she was pulling into dainty folds
to show its delicate pattern--for none of all these things, but for her
only child, who was going from her, and to whom she had a hundred, and
yet a hundred, things to say: but none of them ever came from her lips.
"Mary Dale has not seen your things, Elinor: she asked if she might come
to-morrow."
"I think we might have had to-morrow to ourselves, mamma--the last day
all by ourselves before those people begin to arrive."
"Yes, I think so too; but it is difficult to say no, and as she was not
here when the others came---- She is the greatest critic in the parish.
She will have so much to say."
"I daresay it may be fun," said Elinor, brightening up a little, "and
of course anyhow Alice must have come to talk about her dress. I am
tired of those bride's-maids' dresses; they are really of so little
consequence." Elinor was not vain, to speak of, but she thought it
improbable that when she was there any one would look much at the
bride's-maids' dresses. For one thing, to be sure, the bride is always
the central figure, and there were but two bride's-maids, which
diminished the interest; and then--well, it had to be allowed at the end
of all, that, though her closest friends, neither Alice Hudson nor Mary
Tatham were, to look at, very interesting girls.
"They are of great consequence to them," said Mrs. Dennistoun, with the
faintest smile.
"I didn't mean that, of course," said Elinor, with a blush; "only I
never should have worried about my own dress, which after all is the
most important, as Alice does about hers."
"Which nobody will look at," Mrs. Dennistoun said.
"I did not say that: but to tell the truth, it is a pity for the girls
that the men will not quite be, just of their world, you know. Oh,
mamma, you know it is not that I think anything of that, but I am sorry
for Alice and Mary. Mr. Bolsover and the other gentlemen will not take
that trouble which country neighbours, or--or John's friends from the
Temple might have done."
"Why do you speak of John's friends from the Temple, Elinor?"
"Mamma! for no reason at all. Why should I? They were the only other men
I could think of."
"Elinor, did John ever give you any reason to think----"
"Mamma," cried Elinor again, with double vehemence, her countenance all
ablaze, "of course he never did! how could you think such foolish
things?"
"Well, my dear," said her mother, "I am very glad he did not; it will
prevent any embarrassment between him and you--for I must always
believe----"
"Don't, please, oh, don't! it would make me miserable; it would take all
my happiness away."
Mrs. Dennistoun said nothing, but she sighed--a very small, infinitesimal
sigh--and there was a moment's silence, during which perhaps that sigh
pervaded the atmosphere with a sort of breath of what might have been.
After a moment she spoke again:
"I hope you have not packed up your ornaments yet, Elinor. You must
leave them to the very last, for Mary would like to see that beautiful
necklace. What do you think you shall wear on the day?"
"Nothing," said Elinor, promptly. She was about to add, "I have nothing
good enough," but paused in time.
"Not my little star? It would look very well, my darling, to fix your
veil on. The diamonds are very good, though perhaps a little
old-fashioned; you might get them reset. But--your father gave it me
like that."
"I would not change it a bit, mamma, for anything in the world."
"Thanks, my dearest. I thought that was how you would feel about it. It
is not very big, of course, but it really is very good."
"Then I will wear it, mamma, if it will please you, but nothing else."
"It would please me: it would be like having something from your father.
I think we had less idea of ornaments in my day. I cannot tell you how
proud I was of my diamond star. I should like to put it in for you
myself, Elinor."
"Oh, mamma!" This was the nearest point they had come to that outburst
of two full hearts which both of them would have called breaking down.
Mrs. Dennistoun saw it and was frightened. She thought it would be
betraying to Elinor what she wished her never to know, the unspeakable
desolation to which she was looking forward when her child was taken
from her. Elinor's exclamation, too, was a protest against the imminent
breaking down. They both came back with a hurry, with a panting breath,
to safer ground.
"Yes, that's what I regret," she said. "Mr. Bolsover and Harry Compton
will laugh a little at the Rectory. They will not be so--nice as young
men of their own kind."
"The Rectory people are just as well born as any of us, Elinor."
"Oh, precisely, mamma: I know that; but we too---- It is what they call
a different _monde_. I don't think it is half so nice a _monde_," said
the girl, feeling that she had gone further than she intended to do;
"but you know, mamma----"
"I know, Elinor: but I scarcely expected from you----"
"Oh," cried Elinor again, in exasperation, "if you think that I share
that feeling! I think it odious, I think their _monde_ is vulgar, nasty,
miserable! I think----"
"Don't go too far the other way, Elinor. Your husband will be of it, and
you must learn to like it. You think, perhaps, all that is new to me?"
"No," said Elinor, her bright eyes, all the brighter for tears, falling
before her mother's look. "I know, of course, that you have seen--all
kinds----"
But she faltered a little, for she did not believe that her mother was
acquainted with Phil's circle and their wonderful ways.
"They will be civil enough," she went on, hurriedly, "and as everybody
chaffs so much nowadays they will, perhaps, never be found out. But I
don't like it for my friends."
"They will chaff me also, no doubt," Mrs. Dennistoun said.
"Oh, _you_, mamma! they are not such fools as that," cried poor Elinor;
but in her own mind she did not feel confident that there was any such
limitation to their folly. Mrs. Dennistoun laughed a little to herself,
which was, perhaps, more alarming than that other moment when she was
almost ready to cry.
"You had better wear Lord St. Serf's ring," she said, after a moment,
with a tone of faint derision which Elinor knew.
"You might as well tell me," cried the bride, "to wear Lady Mariamne's
revolving dishes. No, I will wear nothing, nothing but your star."
"You have got nothing half so nice," said the mother. Oh yes, it was a
little revenge upon those people who were taking her daughter from her,
and who thought themselves at liberty to jeer at all her friends: but as
was perhaps inevitable it touched Elinor a little too. She restrained
herself from some retort with a sense of extreme and almost indignant
self-control: though what retort Elinor could have made I cannot tell.
It was much "nicer" than anything else she had. None of Phil Compton's
great friends, who were not of the same _monde_ as the people at
Windyhill, had offered his bride anything to compare with the diamonds
which her father had given to her mother before she was born. And Elinor
was quite aware of the truth of what her mother said. But she would have
liked to make a retort--to say something smart and piquant and witty in
return.
And thus the evening was lost, the evening in which there was so much to
say, one of the three only, no more, that were left.
Miss Dale came next day to see "the things," and was very amiable: but
the only thing in this visit which affected Elinor's mind was a curious
little unexpected assault this lady made upon her when she was going
away. Elinor had gone out with her to the porch, according to the
courteous usage of the house. But when they had reached that shady
place, from which the green combe and the blue distance were visible,
stretching far into the soft autumnal mists of the evening, Mary Dale
turned upon her and asked her suddenly, "What night was it that Mr.
Compton came here?"
Elinor was much startled, but she did not lose her self-possession. All
the trouble about that date had disappeared out of her mind in the
stress and urgency of other things. She cast back her mind with an
effort and asked herself what the conflict and uncertainty of which she
was dimly conscious, had been? It came back to her dimly without any of
the pain that had been in it. "It was on the sixth," she said quietly,
without excitement. She could scarcely recall to her mind what it was
that had moved her so much in respect to this date only a little time
ago.
"Oh, you must be mistaken, Elinor, I saw him coming up from the station.
It was later than that. It was, if I were to give my life for it,
Thursday night."
This was four or five nights before and a haze of uncertainty had
fallen on all things so remote. But Elinor cast her eyes upon the
calendar in the hall and calm possessed her breast. "It was the sixth,"
she said with composed tones, as certain as of anything she had ever
known in the course of her life.
"Well, I suppose you must know," said Mary Dale.