ACTING FOR HERSELF.
But it is not to be supposed that Lydia, her whole being ablaze with
excitement and eagerness, was likely to assent to this masculine view of
what was best for her. Before Lionel had got downstairs into the hall,
where he waited so long to intercept any rash enterprise she might be
bound on, she had stolen out, tremulous yet brave, and was speeding
along the morning streets, where the passers-by, who gazed at her with
that frank admiration which Italians feel, without any impertinence of
meaning, to be the due of every pretty woman--excused, yet wondered at
her solitary progress, on the score that everything was to be pardoned
to an Englishwoman. Lydia herself was confused by the looks she met on
every side, but her mind was so entirely preoccupied that they made less
impression upon her than they would have done had it been at freedom,
and it did not occur to her that she was being guilty of any breach of
decorum. What troubled her more was that she was uncertain of the way,
having paid but little attention to it last night, and she was shy of
asking which turning to take. But by right of the inspiration that was
in her, and of that good fortune which attends daring, she at last found
herself in a street which she recognised, and saw with a beating heart
the well-known shield over the doorway. It was not to the official
entrance she was bound. She saw with a smile, even in the midst of all
the ferment of her agitation, the little Italian, her admirer of the
previous night, in light clothes and a cigar, making his way towards it;
and, lingering a moment till he disappeared within the doorway, she
hurried after him till she got safely within the shelter of the
courtyard and to the door of the Vice-Consul’s house.
The Vice-Consul that morning had been early astir. He had been painfully
affected by the half-revelation of last night. All these years, since
the beginning of their intercourse when he had framed his theory about
Harry’s parentage so easily, and satisfied himself so entirely that he
must be right, nothing had occurred to put this theory to the test. The
marriage had taken place while he was still ill, and in a state of some
danger, and perhaps at the bottom of his heart he was glad and relieved
to be in a condition which made all inquiries impossible, and which
forced him to throw himself upon Harry’s honour. He had never had any
occasion to be shaken in his faith as to that honour personally, and use
and wont had made everything natural. For years he had not thought on
the question. Nothing had occurred to bring it up. The serene domestic
life had flowed along, and notwithstanding the drawbacks on Mr. Bonamy’s
part which have been already noted, they had been happy together. He was
aware that, though he might sometimes grudge Harry the position he had
acquired in Rita’s affection, yet that he himself would have been the
first to miss him had any accident taken Harry away. But at the first
whisper of a real discovery of his son-in-law’s antecedents, Mr. Bonamy
was roused out of the quiescence of years. The very suggestion of some
one bearing Harry’s name roused him, and something about Harry, an
awakened attention in his eyes, a strain of watchfulness quite unusual
with his simple, easy-going nature had aided the impression. He had
already heard something from Miss Joscelyn, and was on his way to learn
more when Harry had interrupted the conversation, calling him away for a
matter of business to which strictly speaking it was necessary that he
should give his attention, but which in other circumstances his
son-in-law, he felt sure, would have managed himself rather than disturb
him among his guests. And what he had heard had roused him still more.
It was evident that the person, whoever he was, who bore the same name
was not a relation to be proud of, and the Vice-Consul too was impressed
by the fact, dimly apparent, that Harry had shown no surprise and asked
no questions when this namesake was spoken of. There had been that look
in his eyes, _eveillé_, on the watch, on his guard; but no
curiosity--and he had not said a word about it when the guests were
gone. Neither had Rita said anything about it, which would have seemed
so natural. She had not asked who Miss Joscelyn was speaking of, or what
she was speaking of; but had maintained a complete silence on the
subject. All this awakened the Vice-Consul’s anxious curiosity. He was
on the watch at breakfast next morning, hoping that something might be
said, that Harry might laugh at the suggestion made to him, or take some
notice of it. But nothing occurred to throw the least light upon the
subject. Harry was still watchful, still on his guard, but chiefly
occupied with little Madge and the baby, whom he brought in to breakfast
seated high upon his shoulder, and who occupied him completely in a way
which filled the elder man, though he had usually all the indulgence of
a grandfather for his descendants, with impatience. He was glad to get
away from this scene, rising somewhat abruptly, and going out without
any explanation. Had Lydia come the direct way she would have met Mr.
Bonamy and saved him a great deal of annoyance and trouble. But, as she
took two or three wrong turnings, the Vice-Consul reached the inn and
was shown up to the sitting-room to wait for Lady Brotherton about the
same time that Lydia reached his house; and Lionel, by no means so sure
what to do as either of these straightforward and one-idead persons, had
gone to the English bankers, the best-informed persons he could think
of, to see what information about Mr. Isaac Oliver he could pick up
there.
Lady Brotherton was still busy about Sir John’s breakfast, endeavouring
to beguile him to the simple luxury of an egg instead of the something
much less safe on which he had set his fancy. “You must not forget that
we start to-night; that we have a sea voyage before us,” she was saying.
“Morsh-a reason for deshunt breakfast now,” said the invalid, and
chuckled and laughed at his own cleverness. His wife was not at all
disposed to go downstairs and hear what Mr. Bonamy might have to say.
“Let’sh have old Bonamy up here--show him up here,” Sir John said; but
that was so much worse that Lady Brotherton left him to his ortolan, and
went off to answer her untimely visitor. She thought it was no doubt a
mere visit of goodwill, to inquire “if he could be of any use.” “As if
we wanted anybody to be of use! As if we were not experienced enough to
know what we want, and how to get it,” she said to herself, as she went
to the unwelcome guest. Her mind was a little perturbed besides; the
servant had declared that he could not find either Mr. Brotherton or
Miss Joscelyn. They had both gone out. Where had they gone, had they
gone together? she asked, but nobody could tell. Now Lady Brotherton had
bidden them to go out together, had said they were cousins, and had no
need of a chaperon, but she did not like this adoption of her advice so
suddenly. The last morning, just when Sir John wanted special managing,
that he might commit no imprudence before the evening, and when they
might have known Mr. Bonamy would be sure to call!
But when Lady Brotherton heard that it was not civility, nor for her
sake at all, but a visit full of self-interest upon his own business,
this interruption in the midst of all her cares threw her out of temper.
“No, indeed, I cannot tell you much,” she said; “I heard them talking of
it, but I did not pay much attention. The man is an old servant, I
believe, belonging to Miss Joscelyn’s family, a sort of old factotum at
a farm. My son lodged in some rooms in the old Manor-house (I think),
and this old Isaac and his wife ‘did for him,’ as people say. Yes, I am
sure that was the story. They all know this old man, quite respectable,
I feel sure, a sort of good class of family retainer; servants of this
kind still flourish, you know, in some out of the way places. Mr.
Bonamy, I am afraid you are ill.”
“No, no,” he said, waving his hand, “nothing, it’s nothing, a kind of
faintness I have sometimes since my illness, which goes off directly. I
see--I see--an old servant. Well, of course, it was a very odd
coincidence, very odd. But I thought at first the young lady
supposed--that this old man of hers was somehow connected with my
son-in-law. Thank you! thank you! I see how absurd I was.”
“Oh, I don’t think Lydia could be so ridiculous as to think that,” said
Lady Brotherton, “only my son and she were both struck by the name; it
is such an uncommon name. At least, the two together were struck by it;
they both cried out, ‘Isaac Oliver!’ My son is rather fond of telling
absurd stories about this poor old man. He is a kind of a wit in his
way, it seems, but a little of that goes a long way in the country. I
don’t think I have seen much humour in what they tell of him--”
“A thing that is quite commonplace often seems original from the lips
of a clown,” said the Vice-Consul, with solemnity. “Perhaps you have
heard something about the family, or children, or other relatives of
this--old man?” Mr. Bonamy felt disposed to call him a confounded old
man, but, after all, it was not the old man’s fault.
“Nothing at all, nothing whatever, I assure you. You must not think, Mr.
Bonamy, for a moment--it was only _pour rire_; they never supposed, I am
sure you will believe me when I say it, of connecting old Isaac
with--any gentleman; it was a mere joke. They thought the coincidence so
amusing, and Lydia, I suppose, as girls do, thought it was fun to tease
Mr. Oliver a little; that was all. I have never heard a word more about
it. It was only at the moment. I hope you will forgive my silly
youngsters. They are both out. I cannot think where they are gone, or
they would make their apologies themselves.”
“No apologies are necessary,” the Vice-Consul said. He was very grave,
his countenance had changed even since he came in, much more since
yesterday, when his handsome head had been full of serene content. There
was a deeply marked wrinkle in his forehead, and the lines at the
corners of his mouth drooped heavily. He seemed to have aged
half-a-dozen years. “There is no harm done; and where there is no
offence there need be no excuse.” He said this with a sort of formality,
such as he was in the habit of employing to troublesome British
subjects, who got into many scrapes and gave much occupation to the
representative of their country in pulling them out. It was a style that
told (for the moment) upon such persons, and it came to his hand readily
on an emergency. “I am glad to hear there is so little in it,” he added,
rising. “Unfortunately my son-in-law is estranged from his family, and
we know but little about them; so that I thought it just possible this
might be some one--in whose well-being he was interested. It is I who
should apologise for troubling you. I hope Sir John is none the worse
for last night?”
“He is not at all strong,” said Lady Brotherton. “It begins to be
anxious work when we have long journeys to take. But he bears them
better than anyone would think,” she added. “Oh, no, he is none the
worse; I left him making a very good breakfast. He would have liked to
see you, but I could not think to trouble you coming into a sick-room.”
“No trouble at all,” Mr. Bonamy said, but he did not make any motion to
go, neither did she wish him to do so, and they parted with mutual
politenesses and professions of regret to have given each other trouble,
and repeated protestations that it was no trouble at all. But when the
Vice-Consul got out of doors, he went along slowly with a dejected
tread, his head drooping, his eyes dim, and little in him of the
dignified tranquillity becoming the representative of H.B.M. He was
wounded in his pride, in his self-confidence, in the serenity of his
judgment, in the force of his instincts. He was not going to give up
Harry; Harry was Harry, whatever happened. But to think, after all, that
he was _not a gentleman_, that the family which Mr. Bonamy had taken for
granted was a family of laborious peasants, not of gentlefolks, that his
relations were such as would not help him, but burden him in every
particular of life--in short, that he himself had been entirely
mistaken, and that he had given his daughter to a nobody, went to his
very heart. He had the generosity to reflect that Harry had said
little, that it was he who had jumped at conclusions and given him
credit for connections which he had never directly claimed. It was he,
rather than Harry, who was the fallen personage, fallen from all
certainty, from all faith in the future, in himself. He would say
nothing about it, he thought, to anyone. Why disturb poor Rita, who need
never know that her husband’s father, or uncle, or near relation was a
farm-servant? Why even bring poor Harry to book, and force him to
confess, and convict him, if not of falsehood, yet of sanctioning a
false impression? Mr. Bonamy with true magnanimity decided that he would
not humiliate, as he might do, even the chief culprit, if culprit he
could be said to be. It was no use to make all suffer. He thought it
best on the whole to make an effort to keep the trouble to himself.
Meanwhile Lydia had knocked with some timidity and trembling at the door
of the Vice-Consul’s house. She asked for Mrs. Oliver with a hesitation
that was very unusual to her. Now that the moment had come her heart
beat so loudly, her breath came so quick, that she did not feel able to
face it. She was led soberly up to the large, cool, shadowed
drawing-room, in which with so much agitation she had spent the
previous night. There was no trace of agitation or disturbance of any
kind about the tranquil place, all closed up and semidark, according to
the Italian wont, against the fierceness of the sun. The old graceful
furniture, the dim pictures on the walls, the signs of long established
living everywhere, made it almost impossible to think of any change or
revolution that could happen in such a settled place. Lydia sat down in
a corner, feeling herself more than an intruder--a traitor and
introducer of strife and trouble into the stillness. She had asked
instinctively for the wife, lest after all she might be making a
mistake; and only after she had done so, had it occurred to her that to
have her husband thus discovered and identified, though he had done no
wrong, might not be an agreeable incident in Rita’s life. This, however,
was but a momentary thought. To feel that she was herself within a few
minutes of the truth was an excitement which occupied all her being. Her
mind had room for little more.
Rita was busy with her housekeeping, arranging the affairs of the day.
Her husband was in the office at his work; her father gone out, no
doubt about business; her little children enjoying the morning air in
the garden. All had begun pleasantly as usual in the well-ordered,
calmly constituted life. She had been a little disturbed, a very little,
last night by her visitors, with the slightest possible jealousy in her
mind of the new-comer, who seemed to have some sort of connection with
her husband’s early life, that portion of it with which she was
completely unacquainted. It was a mere superficial sentiment, not strong
enough to be called jealousy, yet veering that way; for she did not like
to think that anybody anywhere could know more about her Harry than his
wife, a feeling which even in its most unreasonable phases is not
uncommon among wives--or husbands either, for that matter. But _that_
Miss Joscelyn was going away, was gone away so far as the Vice-Consul’s
household was concerned, and Rita thought no more of her--She was
interrupted in the very midst of her discussion of the _spese_, and
examination of the contents of the cook’s basket, which old Benedetta
was helping to turn over, and making sharp remarks upon, to the damage
of the cook’s temper, as so much dearer and not nearly so good as in her
time--by a message that a lady wanted to see her. She was predisposed
to be annoyed by it. “A lady! how often must I tell you to bring me the
name! It can be nobody for me; it must be some one for your master,” she
said. The man was very humble and apologetic; he represented that the
English names were very hard to pronounce; that it was the young lady
who had been there last evening--the young lady who resembled the
bambino so much. “Resembled the bambino? What bambino?” cried Rita. And
then old Benedetta burst in and explained that all the servants had
remarked it--that the English young lady was the very image of nostro
bambino, our own blessed baby whom everybody admired.
“Resemblances are very strange,” Benedetta said; “they will come without
rhyme or reason--for of course our darling can have nothing to do with a
stranger--a young Signorina Inglese whom no one ever saw before.”
“I wonder you can allow yourself to talk such nonsense, Benedetta. There
is not the slightest resemblance,” Rita said. The other servants bowed
and deprecated, and agreed that the Signora must know best; but
Benedetta stood like a rock, and completely ruffled the impatient,
fanciful temper of her mistress. Rita delayed consequently as long as
she could find something to occupy her in her kitchen, wilfully keeping
her untimely visitor waiting. “What can she want with me? She had better
ask for Harry if she has anything to say. Like my baby indeed! I wonder
what next?” Rita said to herself. But at last, when there was no further
excuse, she mounted reluctantly the stairs, and walked slowly towards
the drawing-room, Lydia within counting her deliberate steps with a
beating heart that went a great deal faster. It was a duel that was
about to take place between the two.
“Good morning,” Rita said, coldly; “Italian servants never can manage
English names. I was told it was a young lady, and that is vague. Pray
sit down. I hope there is nothing amiss with Lady Brotherton or Sir
John.”
“I come--entirely on business of my own,” said Lydia, with a little
timidity. She was taller and altogether a more imposing person by nature
than this small, little, half Italian matron; but Rita had always a
certain grandeur about her, and she was the invaded châtelaine, the
defender of her house against an intruder. Lydia felt almost afraid of
her, and a little compunctious too.
“My husband would probably be of more use than I can be. But pray sit
down, and if there is anything I can do----” Rita said, with a majestic
wave of her hand towards a chair.
But Lydia did not sit down. Her hands sought each other in that same
clasp of agitation which was habitual to her mother. “I must beg you to
pardon me. It is about your husband that I want to ask.”
“My husband!” Rita said, and no more.
They stood and looked at each other for a moment, Lydia, appealing,
agitated, as if (she felt) there was something wrong in her interest in
Harry, the little wife towering over her in offended dignity, something
like a Queen Eleanor, though without any cause.
“I want you to tell me if you know anything of his family, or where he
came from; and when he came here? and if he has ever spoken to you of
any of----, and why he has never taken any notice? It must seem very
strange to you,” Lydia sat pausing, trying a smile of anxious
deprecation, “that I should ask such questions as these.”
“It is very strange indeed. I cannot understand them, or what right you
can have to put them. A stranger must have a very good reason indeed for
interfering at all between a man and his wife.”
“I do not want to interfere,” cried Lydia; “oh, believe me, it is not
that! I want only to know; and it may be very important for you and the
family, as well as for us. I am only surmising, groping; and I am
not--very old,” the girl said, with that instinctive appeal to personal
feeling with which women invariably back up all arguments, “nor
experienced. I don’t know how to go about it. But it is of so much
importance, if I only could tell you right, to my mother, and all of us,
and may be to you too.”
“Your mother, and all of you! What do you mean? What have you to do with
my husband?” Rita cried.
The wonder, and even the indignation, were natural enough. To be
confronted all at once by a stranger demanding news of your husband,
declaring that what she wishes to find out will be very important to
her mother--what could be more bewildering, more irritating to a woman?
Her nostrils began to expand, and her eyes to flash. “There is evidently
some mystery here which I am unable to fathom,” she said.
“It is a very innocent mystery,” said Lydia; “there is nothing in it
that will do him any harm, or you. If you will not tell me, will you
take him a message from me? It must be cleared up one way or another,
for we are going away to-day.”
“Mr. Oliver is in the office,” said Rita coldly, walking to the bell.
“He can be sent for at once.”
“Will you wait a little, please?” Lydia said, faintly; “though I feel so
sure, yet I may be wrong. Will you take a message for me? It will be
better if you will do it than seeing him myself.”
“I would rather not be mixed up with any mystery.” Rita had her hand on
the bell. She was drawn up to twice her usual height, her small foot
planted firmly on the ground, her head thrown back, her whole person
instinct with resistance, defiance, and indignation. And Lydia before
her, flushed and excited, was not at all unlike a suppliant handmaiden,
whom the wife had a right to reject and cast forth out of her house.
“Oh, do not be so hard upon me,” she cried. “Listen to what I want you
to say to him. Would I send any message that could hurt him by his
wife?”
“Hurt--him--” Rita began to be confused, and took her hand from the
bell. “But it might hurt me.”
“It will not hurt you. Don’t delay, don’t delay!” cried Lydia; “if you
knew what a thing it is to wait. And think how my poor mother has been
waiting all these ten years--and I said when I left her that I should
find him. Mrs. ---- no, no, I cannot call you by that name--it is
unworthy! Mrs. Harry--will you go and say this to him from me? Listen,
listen; you must not make any mistake. Uncle Henry is dead. He has left
all his money to his nephew who went away. If he does not come home it
will be divided, and wrong will be done. Will you say that to your
husband for me?”
“Uncle Henry--and his money--and his nephew. What is the meaning of all
this? What do we know about all this--and who are you?” It was Rita now
who was losing command of herself.
“If _he_ understands,” said Lydia, dropping down in a chair in the
mingled exhaustion and relief of having at last had her say, “I will
tell you who I am. You don’t know the meaning, but I am sure he will
know. Oh, Mrs. Harry, it is so simple a test! Will you not try it? If he
does not understand no harm will be done, and you can judge of it for
yourself. If he knows what it means you will soon know all about me.”
She began to cry, with little tremulous laughs between, in her
agitation. She was entirely overcome by the excitement of the crisis--so
near finding out, so sure, and yet still a little cloud of suspense and
uncertainty between. Rita stood and looked at her--her rival was it? who
was it?--with a tremor of wonder and rising excitement, and even a
sympathy which nature exacted, which she was most unwilling to bestow.
Then reluctantly she went out of the room, slowly and carefully closing
the door behind her, and walking along the corridor as if counting every
step she took. It was the last struggle of her instinctive opposition
with awakened interest, excitement, curiosity, and alarm. She ran along
the passage to the office as soon as she was out of hearing of the
other. In a moment more she would know.