“My dear Alice, what has changed you so completely? You have lost
your spirits, and appear to take a dark, morbid view of life. You find
a thousand faults with things and people you used to be perfectly
satisfied with; and you look thin and ill. Are you unwell?” inquired
Mrs. Hazlehurst of her daughter, after Alice had been staying some days
at the Grange. They were sitting together in Mrs. Hazlehurst’s morning
room, which commanded an extensive view across the park. Alice’s eyes
had been for some minutes fixed upon one particular spot, and as she
gazed they filled with tears--it was the stile leading to the shady walk
wherein Harry had first told his love, and the sight of it called up
a host of tender recollections. How different was the bright, sunny,
trusting affection which she then felt for him, from her present
perturbed state of mind!--in which jealousy of Arabella Crofton and
estrangement from her husband (springing originally from his neglect and
injustice, and kept alive by the untoward events of their London
season) contended with a love, the strength of which was proved by the
wretchedness all these doubts and misunderstandings caused her. Scarcely
hearing her mother’s question, she replied, mechanically, “No, that
she was not ill,” and relapsed into her train of gloomy musing. Mrs.
Hazlehurst regarded her in anxious silence for a few moments, then
observed abruptly--
“Alice, you never speak of your husband now; yet, when you were first
married, your letters were full of his praises, and you could neither
talk nor write of anything but Harry’s perfections. How is this?”
“Oh! one cannot be always a baby,” was the reply. “While I was a new
plaything, Mr. Coverdale spoiled me, and made much of me; and I was
child enough to be delighted with his attentions--to fancy they would
always continue the same, and that life would prove a path of roses, so
I rhapsodised about it accordingly. I have now found out my mistake, and
indulge in raptures no longer--that is all!” She strove to speak lightly
and carelessly, but her tearful eyes and quivering lips belied the sense
of her words. Her mother saw it, and could abstain no longer.
“Alice, my child, you are unhappy,” she said; “it is useless to attempt
to conceal it. Come, tell me what it is. You know of old that I am to be
trusted, and who so fit as your mother to confide in?--who so well
able to sympathise with--and perhaps to counsel you?” As she spoke, she
passed her arm caressingly round Alice’s slender waist, and drew
her towards her. For a minute or so Alice submitted passively to her
embrace, then, with an hysterical sob, she flung her arms round her and
burst into a passion of tears. Mrs. Hazlehurst allowed her to weep in
silence, until the violence of her grief had in some measure subsided,
then, by degrees, drew from her an account, at first broken and
disjointed, but becoming fuller and more coherent as she proceeded,
of all her woes, real and imaginary, with which the reader is already
acquainted.
“And now, mamma dearest, how can I ever again be happy, knowing as I do
that Harry is still attached to that dreadful woman, and that he regrets
his marriage with me more because it places a bar between them, than
because I have disappointed him by not proving the spiritless, tender,
and affectionate doll he fancied me when I first married? I--I almost
wish I was, for then perhaps I could make him happy, and I’m sure I
don’t now!” She paused, then resting her head against her mother’s
shoulder, added, “Mamma--you will tell me honestly--do you think I have
behaved very ill?”
“I certainly cannot exonerate you from blame, my poor child; there have
been, as it seems to me, serious faults on both sides. Mr. Coverdale’s
appear to me to have proceeded more from thoughtlessness than from
intention; while yours, I am both sorry and surprised to find, seem
chiefly to have arisen from warmth of temper.”
“Yes, I see it now; and yet you know, mamma, I am not really
ill-tempered--at least, I never used to be; but you know I loved, or,”
she added with a sigh, “I may say I _love_ Harry so very dearly, that
the slightest neglect or unkindness on his part appears such a cruel
return for my affection that I cannot bear it quietly; if I were not
to lose my temper and get angry about it, I should pine away and die--I
know I should!”
“Did you ever tell him this?” inquired Mrs. Hazlehurst.
Alice shook her head. “One does not tell such things,” she said; “if
Harry cared for my affection he would soon perceive how entirely I love
him; if, as I fear, he is indifferent to it, all the telling in the
world would make no difference; besides, I have heard from his own lips
that he loves another.”
“I do not make out that affair at all,” observed Mrs. Hazlehurst,
reflectively; “it is so completely unlike Mr. Coverdale’s
straightforward, honest character, to marry one woman when he cared for
another, that I cannot but think there must be some mistake about it.”
“How can there be any mistake, dear mamma?” was the rejoinder. “I have
long felt certain that Miss Crofton was attached to Harry; and I myself
heard him say to her that he was most unfortunate, because love which
he could not return was lavished upon him (meaning mine), while he had
alienated by his own act (his marriage of course) the only affection he
cared to possess (that is Arabella Crofton’s): I do not know what could
be clearer.”
“Did you not say that Mr. Coverdale appeared aware that he had neglected
you for his sporting, and blamed himself for so doing?”
“Yes; I think he knows it, and is sorry for it--and--and he does not
leave me nearly so much alone as he used; only I fancied--that is, I was
afraid he did so from a sense of duty, and not because it was a pleasure
to him to stay with me. Harry has a very strict sense of duty.”
“You say he seems to doubt your affection,” continued Mrs. Hazlehurst,
“and you own you conceal it from him, treating him to bursts of
pettishness and ill-humour, of which you refuse to explain the cause.
You also tell me that this Miss Crofton appears to have been attached to
Mr. Coverdale; now, from what you have told me of the way in which you
behaved at Lady Trottemout’s party--which I confess I think was both
foolish and wrong--I can easily conceive your husband to have been
greatly annoyed with you; and it seems to me that nothing would be more
natural than for him to have told, or in some way to have allowed Miss
Crofton to perceive his annoyance; in which case, as I fear she must
be a designing, unprincipled woman, she might avail herself of the
opportunity to contrast her own affection with your disobedience and
petulance. Thus your husband’s speech, on which you have built up all
this alarming fabric of future unhappiness, may be interpreted much more
satisfactorily: as, for instance, the affection lavished on him, which
he could not return, might be Miss Crofton’s, and the love he coveted,
yours, which he by his own neglect had alienated. Do you perceive?”
“Oh yes, mamma!” exclaimed Alice, eagerly, her face lighting up with the
ray of hope thus given her; “I see it really might mean that! Oh, if I
dare but believe it was so!”
She paused to reflect, and as the recollection of Harry’s frank, earnest
face, and simple, truthful manner came across her, when in their last
discussion he had told her there was not, and never had been, anything
between himself and Miss Crofton which need give her uneasiness, she,
for the first time since Lady Tattersall Trottemout’s _soirée_, allowed
herself to hope that she had mistaken the meaning of the words she had
overheard; that her husband still loved her; that she had only to show
him how these troubles and estrangements had served but to prove to her
the depth and reality of their mutual affection; and that, warned by
past experience to bear and forbear, a life of happiness still awaited
them.
“No one could be more averse than I am to raise false hopes,” resumed
Mrs. Hazlehurst; “but I really believe, from my previous knowledge of
Mr. Coverdale’s character, as well as from all you have told me to-day,
that my interpretation of the enigmatical speech is the true one.”
“If it is, dearest mamma, I shall owe the whole happiness of my life to
you,” exclaimed Alice, enthusiastically; “already I feel as if a load
which had been crushing me to the earth was taken off my shoulders: the
thought that Harry preferred that woman to me haunted me continually,
and embittered my existence. Even now,” she continued, sorrowfully, “as
long as the fact of Harry’s refusal to tell me what has passed between
them remains unaccounted for, I cannot feel quite satisfied.”
“Do you know, Alice, I think you are evincing extreme narrow-mindedness
in these unworthy suspicions; if you do not take yourself seriously to
task, and strive to overcome this very grave fault in your character,
I am afraid the evil you so much dread--the loss of your husband’s
affection, may come upon you after all; but it will be solely to your
own ungenerous mistrust that you will owe it. I do not wish to distress
you,” she continued, as Alice burst into tears at this the most severe
rebuke she had ever received from her mother’s lips; “but if I did not
tell you what I believe to be the truth, I should fail in my duty to
you.”
Alice wept for some moments in silence, then drying her tears, she
said in a submissive, child-like manner, “I have done very, very wrong;
advise me, mamma, and I will try and act according to your wishes.”
Mrs. Hazlehurst drew Alice towards her, and kissing her pale cheek
affectionately, replied:
“My advice is this, love; when you return home, do not enter upon any of
these matters which have been subjects of dissension between you and Mr.
Coverdale; and should he do so, take care to reply gently and without
irritation, remembering that ‘a meek and quiet spirit is a woman’s
chiefest ornament;’ for the rest, try and make yourself as pleasant
and agreeable as you can to him. Let him perceive your affection in the
thousand constantly-recurring trifles of which a loving woman can avail
herself for such a purpose, but be careful not to bore him with it at
unsuitable times; above all, do not be _exigeante_, and expect or desire
him to give up his sporting tastes, or his love of farming, or even the
society of his gentlemen friends for your sake: you could not do it if
you would, and you would only deteriorate his frank, manly character if
you were to succeed. At the same time you may, by your influence, lead
him to cultivate some of his more refined pursuits, into which you
can enter with him. He sings charmingly; get him to keep up his music,
procure the cleverest and best-written books, and persuade him to read
and discuss them with you. His clear intellect and strong good sense
will be of the greatest use in expanding and forming your mind, and
supplying the deficiencies which my ill-health has occasioned in your
education. I see I need not go farther into detail--you understand me.”
“Oh yes, mamma! and if I were but able to realize the picture you have
drawn of our domestic life, how happy we might yet be! but I will try my
very best, only I feel so weak, and sometimes so wicked; if I were but
as wise and good as you--but I will try. Ah! if I had done so at first,
I should have had so much easier a task--however, they say it is never
too late to mend.” She paused, sighed deeply, then continued: “Emily
comes home to-morrow; I will write to Harry to send for me the next day,
and then--and then--Mamma, do you think I shall succeed?”
At the very moment Alice was thus repenting the past, and forming good
resolutions for the future, Harry, with gloomy brow and clenched teeth,
was striding impatiently up and down his library, holding in his hand
a sealed letter--it was addressed to his wife, and the writing was Lord
Alfred Courtland’s. “So,” he muttered, “so, not content with amusing
(that’s the phrase now-a-day) himself during his London season by
dangling after my wife, he must try to keep up the thing now she is
away--foolish young idiot!--but I feel sure that scoundrel D’Almayne is
at the bottom of it, setting him on for some purpose of his own. Well,
I’ve borne it patiently--more patiently than one man in fifty would have
done--nobody can say I’ve been rash or hasty in this matter; but it’s
time to act, and when I do begin, I’ll astonish them. I’ll take Alfred
Courtland off to his father, and tell him the boy’s not fit to be
trusted alone. If he won’t go, I’ll horsewhip him; and as to D’Almayne,
by the Heaven above me, I’ll shoot him like a dog! such a scoundrel is
not fit to live! it would be a benefit to society to rid it of such a
fellow. But I may be wrong; I said I would do nothing hastily in this
business, and I’ll be true to my word. I’ll wait till Alice comes
home, give her the letter myself, and ask her to show it to me. If she
refuses, or if it contains such matter as I expect, I shall then know
how to act.”