INFATUATION.
Perdita was dressed in a more modest and, to speak truly, in a more
delicate manner than on either of the former occasions when Charles
had seen her. A plain morning gown, made with a high corsage, set off
her fine figure, without affording even a glimpse of the charms the
full proportions of which its shape developed. Her hair was arranged
in plain bands; and there was altogether an appearance of so much
innocence, candour, and maiden reserve in her demeanour, that it seemed
to Charles as if he now beheld in her some new phasis of her wondrous
beauty.
Hastening forward to meet her, he caught her in his arms and covered
her lips, her cheeks, and her brow with kisses: for--whether it were
imagination or reality we know not--but she appeared to be far more
lovely than ever in his eyes.
“Dearest--dearest Perdita!” he exclaimed,forgetting at that moment all
and every thing in the world save the object of his adoration.
“Charles--my lord--how am I to call you henceforth?” she murmured, in
that soft, musical tone which flowed like the harmony of the spheres in
unto the very soul.
“Am I not _Charles_ to you, dear girl?” he demanded, looking at her
tenderly and half reproachfully: then, conducting her to a seat, and
placing himself near her, he added, “I have had a long interview with
your mother, Perdita; and from all that I could gather, she has no
opposition to offer to our love.”
“I know it,” responded the girl, casting down her eyes with a modesty
so admirably assumed that it would have deceived the most experienced
individual. “And are you well satisfied that she has thus proved
favourable to our hopes?”
“Will you always seem to doubt my affection?” demanded the young man,
in an impassioned tone: “will you ever appear to believe that I am so
volatile--so fickle--so inconstant, as to regret to-day a step that I
took yesterday?”
“Pardon me, Charles--pardon me,” said Perdita, looking up into his face
with an expression of the most charming _naiveté_: “but my mother heard
a rumour--and yet it might be unfounded----”
“Speak--speak, Perdita!” cried the young man, impatiently.
“A rumour to the effect that you were looked upon as the future husband
of Lady Frances Ellingham,” added Perdita, in a tremulous tone, as if
scarcely daring to give utterance to the jealous suspicion that the
words implied.
Charles Hatfield became suddenly red as scarlet; and Perdita burst into
tears.
“Oh! then the rumour is true--and you are deceiving me, my lord!”
she exclaimed, affecting a passionate outburst of grief: but, in a
few moments, she seemed to exercise an abrupt and powerful controul
over her feelings, and rising from her seat, drew herself up into a
demeanour of desperate calmness, saying, “Viscount Marston, I will show
you that my affection is of no selfish nature. If you love this young
lady, who must be your cousin, from all I have heard and know through
my mother,--if you prefer the beauteous Frances--for beautiful I am
aware she is,--Oh! then I release you from your vows to me--I restore
your plight--and I, the obscure and neglected Perdita, will pray in
secret for your welfare,--yes, and for the welfare of her who will have
robbed me of your affections!”
“No, Perdita--no!” cried Charles, profoundly touched by this
well-enacted piece of apparently generous self-denial: “I do _not_ love
my cousin Frances--and it was only this very morning that I disputed
with my parents because I refused to form an alliance on which their
hearts are set. Perdita--my beloved Perdita, I thank thee--Oh! heaven
alone knows how sincerely I thank thee for this manifestation of
generosity,--a generosity that, if possible, has rivetted my affections
more indissolubly on thee!”
“And you will pardon me, Charles--if in a moment of jealousy----”
murmured the designing young woman, hanging down her head in a charming
kind of confusion and bashfulness.
“Pardon thee!” repeated her dupe, catching her in his arms, and
straining her passionately to his breast: “what have I to pardon?
Must I pardon thee for loving me so well, my Perdita?--for only those
who love well, can know what jealousy is! And, did I think that I had
cause, should I not be jealous of thee, sweet Perdita? Oh! yes--and my
jealousy would be very fierce and terrible in its consequences. But on
neither side shall there be cause for jealousy----”
“At least not on mine, Charles,” returned the young woman, gently
extricating herself from his arms, and resuming her seat upon the
sofa. “And now, my lord,” she added playfully, “when do you intend to
take some charming suburban villa--fit it up in a chaste, elegant,
and beautiful style--and bear thither your bride,--for your bride
am I prepared to become on the conditions which have already been
established between us?”
“Without a day’s--without an hour’s unnecessary delay, my beloved
Perdita,” answered Charles, his cheeks flushing and his eyes sparkling
with the hopes and voluptuous thoughts inspired by the question thus
put to him; and throwing his arms around her, he drew the bewitching
syren towards him.
“Charles--Charles,” she murmured, as he glued his lips to her warm,
glowing cheek; “you are adorably handsome--and I love you as woman
never loved before. But I implore you to release me now--for--my mother
might return to the room--and--and--Oh! Charles--you clasp me too
violently----”
And she succeeded in disengaging herself from his arms, having maddened
him as it were by the contact of her fine, voluptuous form, and the
caresses she had allowed him to lavish upon her.
“Perdita, you are more reserved with me than you were yesterday,” said
Charles, half reproachfully.
“Or rather say that yesterday I was so hurried away by the rapturous
thoughts--the delightful emotions--the elysian feelings which were
excited within me by the certainty of possessing your love,” murmured
the young woman, “that I had no controul over myself.”
“And now that you are assured of my love, you have grown comparatively
cold and reserved,” said Charles, with the least degree of humour.
“Should you think the better of me if I were without the least particle
of maiden reserve?” she asked, in a reproachful tone. “Listen, my
beloved Charles--and look not angrily on your Perdita!”
“No--not for worlds!” he exclaimed, pressing her hand to his lips, and
feeling in the renewed infatuation of his soul that he was prompt to do
her bidding and yield to her will in all things.
“Now you are kind and good--and I love you, dear Charles,” said
Perdita, in a tone of captivating artlessness. “Although we shall have
no bridal ceremony as performed at a church,” she resumed, “yet must
our wedding-day--if I may so call it--be duly fixed and celebrated.
When, therefore, you have provided for me and my mother such a home as
you would wish me and my parent to possess--then shall you bear me
thither, my dearest Charles, as your bride--and--and--I will be unto
thee as a wife in all respects,” she added, bending her beauteous head
down upon his bosom, and concealing her blushing countenance there.
“Be it as you say, my sweet Perdita!” he exclaimed. “And in all things
will I do your bidding--for I love and adore you. You are an angel of
beauty;--your manners are irresistibly winning;--your voice has the
charm of the sweetest melody;--and your looks would kindle love in the
breast of an anchorite.”
“Ah! flatterer,” she cried, raising her head, and tapping him gently
upon the face. “Will you always think thus well of me?”
“Yes--always, always!” he exclaimed--so completely infatuated was he
with the syren. “And now tell me, my charmer--in which part of London
should you wish me to fix upon a beautiful villa for your reception?”
“The more secluded the spot--the better,” said Perdita. “I do not wish
to form the acquaintance of prying and curious neighbours, nor shall
I court the presence of visitors. When you are with me, I shall have
no thought but for you: when you are absent, to think of you will
be sufficient occupation. I have heard that in the neighbourhood of
Holloway there are some delightful villas, newly built----”
“Holloway! It is there--in that neighbourhood--that Markham Place, the
mansion where the Prince of Montoni is staying, is situated.”
“And you are acquainted with that Prince?” said Perdita. “Yes--for in
this morning’s newspaper I read, amongst the Fashionable Intelligence,
that his Royal Highness had yesterday partaken of a banquet at the
mansion of the Earl of Ellingham in Pall Mall.”
“Oh! he is a great and illustrious Prince, Perdita!” cried Charles, his
cheeks suddenly glowing with animation.
“But he is not so handsome as you, Charles?” said Perdita, half
enquiringly--half playfully.
“He is very handsome, dearest,” was the reply: “but his heroic
deeds--his noble disposition--his boundless philanthropy--and his
staunch support of the Rights of Man, constitute attractions which,
were he ugly as Satan, would render him adorable as an angel.”
“And have you none of those qualities, my Charles?” demanded Perdita.
“Are you not gloriously handsome?--have you not a proud title,
which you can claim when you will--aye, and which you will claim
shortly?--and will you not some day be a Peer of the Realm, and able
to electrify the senate with your eloquence? For that you would be
eloquent, Charles, I am convinced;--and, oh! what pleasure--what
unfeigned, heart-felt pleasure would it give your devoted Perdita to
occupy even the humblest, most secluded nook in the place where you
were delivering yourself of the burning thoughts and splendid ideas----”
“Oh! Perdita--do you too hope that I shall yet create for myself a
great and a glorious reputation?” demanded the young man, surveying his
beauteous companion with joy and surprise.
“Yes, Charles: for do I not love thee?” she asked, in her dulcet,
silvery tone.
“Now--oh! now can I understand how the image of the Princess Isabella
might cheer and hearten on the once obscure Richard Markham to the
accomplishment of those great deeds which have placed him on so
proud an eminence! Now,” continued the enthusiastic, infatuated
Charles,--“now can I comprehend how gallant knights, in the days of
chivalry, would dare every peril--encounter every danger, at the behest
or command of their ladye-loves! And you, my Perdita,--you shall be
as a Princess Isabella in my eyes--you shall be my ladye-love;--and
animated by thy smiles, will I yet carve out for myself a glorious
career in the world.”
“I long to see thee in possession of thy titles, Charles--to behold
thee, too, occupying thy place in the House of Peers,” said Perdita.
“But, hark--the clock strikes two; and now I am compelled to accompany
my mother into the City----”
“To her attorney’s?” asked Charles, a sudden fear seizing upon him.
“Yes--to her solicitor’s office,” responded Perdita: then, after
suffering him to manifest a sentiment of pique and annoyance for a few
moments, she threw her arms around his neck, exclaiming, “And so you
are very jealous, sir--are you?--and you thought perhaps that I was
about to call upon this lawyer to signify to him my readiness to accept
the hand of the old nobleman who is my mother’s relentless opponent
in the suit? But I can assure you that the object of my visit in that
quarter is one which you will no doubt highly approve. It is to inform
the legal gentleman, with my own lips, that I utterly and totally
decline the honour of the proposed union----”
“Charming--dearest Perdita!” ejaculated Charles, straining her in
rapture to his breast.
“Inasmuch,” she added, with playful artlessness--or rather with an
affectation of that delightful _naiveté_,--“inasmuch as the solicitor
will not believe that I can possibly resist so splendid an offer; and
he is determined to hear the truth from me--and from me only.”
“And were he to over-persuade you, Perdita--to impress you with the
necessity of yielding in this instance----” began Charles, still
labouring under the vague apprehension with which the artful creature
sought to inspire him in order to attach him the more completely to her.
“Have you so much to fear on the part of an old nobleman whom I have
never seen, as I have on the part of that beautiful Lady Frances who
dwells beneath the same roof with you?” enquired Perdita, in the most
melting tones of her flute-like voice.
“Pardon me--pardon me, dearest girl!” cried Charles, embracing her
fondly.
“I have no more to pardon in you at present, than you had to forgive
in me ere now,” murmured the guileful woman, placing her warm cheek
against his own and allowing their hair to mingle.
For a few moments she remained with him in this position,--a position
that enchanted, thrilled, and intoxicated him: then suddenly
withdrawing herself from his arms, she said, archly, but impressively,
“It now remains with you, Charles, when our wedding-day is to be
celebrated.”
“Ah! if you were only as impatient as I!” he exclaimed.
They parted--the young man hastening, as was his wont after these
visits, to the park to feast his imagination with a delicious reverie
the whole and sole subject of which should be Perdita!
A few minutes after he had taken his departure, Mrs. Fitzhardinge
sought her daughter in the drawing-room; and the ensuing dialogue took
place.
“Every thing tends to forward our designs with respect to this young
man,” observed the old woman, seating herself in a chair opposite to
her daughter, who was reclining upon the sofa.
“And yet I cannot _now_ altogether comprehend your policy, mother,”
returned Perdita.
“In which particular point, my child?” demanded the vile parent.
“Respecting the nature of the connexion which is to subsist between
myself and Charles,” said Perdita. “It was all very well for me to
calculate upon being his mistress before we were aware that he is in
reality a Viscount, and must be an Earl: but since you succeeded so
nicely in extracting those revelations from him this morning, why
should we not secure so glorious a prize by a means more durable and
powerful than mere sophistry and the love which he bears me? Consider,
mother, how instantaneously he took a fancy to me; and believe me when
I assure you that coolness will follow as rapidly, after full satiety,
on his part.”
“Silly girl! thou art thyself in love with him!” cried Mrs.
Fitzhardinge, in a tone of vexation.
“Yes--more than half: I acknowledge it,” returned Perdita, coolly.
“And yet--but a few days ago you assured me that you could not
chain yourself to one individual with any hope of being faithful to
him,--that love was a passion which would never obtain over you that
influence which it so often exercised over the weak, the simple-minded,
and the infatuated.”
“It is perfectly true, mother, that I said all which your memory has
so faithfully treasured up, and your lips so accurately repeated,”
said Perdita, still speaking without excitement. “But _then_, my dear
mother,” she added, almost satirically--no, almost jeeringly, as if
diverting herself with her parent’s evident vexation,--“_then_, you
know, I had not seen Charles Hatfield.”
“And I told you not to be too confident on that point to which we are
alluding,” cried Mrs. Fitzhardinge. “My dear Perdita, renounce all
ideas of marriage with this young man: indeed, you have compromised
yourself too deeply in your denunciations of the marriage-tie to be
able to recall your sentiments on that head.”
“Not at all,” said Perdita, authoritatively. “In the same way that
I induced Charles to accede to my proposals, and even fall into
my views--so can I, in a very short space, and by means of other
sophistry, convince him that I had merely been playing a part to test
the value of his affection----”
“No--no, Perdita: you must not attempt such a perilous proceeding,”
said Mrs. Fitzhardinge, evidently listening with great uneasiness to
the words that fell from her daughter’s lips.
“I dare and will attempt all I choose or fancy with that young man!”
cried the head-strong Perdita, in an imperious tone.
“Will you not follow my counsel?” demanded Mrs. Fitzhardinge. “Have I
not fulfilled all my promises to you?--did I not declare that in London
you should find luxury, plenty, and ease?--did I not pledge myself that
the young man should sue at your feet and implore your love?--and could
you have brought about all these results for yourself?”
“I do not pretend that I could, mother,” returned Perdita. “But am I to
be your tool--your instrument--an automaton in your hands?--am I not
to have an opinion in our councils?--or am I to pay blind obedience to
you, even though I have reasons for questioning the prudence of your
proceedings?”
“And do you now question the prudence of my proceedings?” demanded Mrs.
Fitzhardinge, growing every moment more and more irritable.
“Yes--I do!” answered Perdita, firmly and resolutely--at the same
time fixing her brilliant eyes rebelliously upon her mother. “I
admit that if we had only ensnared in our toils a simple commoner--a
plain Charles Hatfield--with limited resources within his reach, it
would have been advisable to form no lasting connexion with him. But
now--_now_ that we are assured, beyond all possibility of doubt, that
he is himself a nobleman and the heir to enormous wealth, it would
be madness--it would be folly not to bind him to us by irrefragable
chains. Why--here is a position to be obtained and ensured at once,--a
position which will render us rich for the remainder of our days! And
think you, mother, that I have not a little feeling of ambition in my
soul? Would it not be a proud thing for you to be enabled to call the
Vicountess Marston--and in due time the Countess of Ellingham--your
daughter? All these considerations never flashed to my mind until
immediately after Charles had quitted the room ere now: or I should
have assuredly commenced the undoing of all that stupid work which, by
your persuasion and so well tutored by you, I achieved in respect to
the conditions whereon our connexion was to be based. What!” she cried,
her eyes absolutely flashing fire: “have a coronet within my reach--and
refuse it!--have a wealthy noble--or one who will be enormously
wealthy--sighing at my feet, and not wed him! Mother,” she cried,
actually exciting herself into a passion, “you must think me to be a
fool--an idiot--a mad woman!”
“I shall think you to be a fool--an idiot--and a mad woman if you
persist in thwarting my plans or proceeding contrary to my advice,”
said Mrs. Fitzhardinge, her tanned, weather-beaten countenance becoming
absolutely livid with rage.
“Ah! you have some sinister purpose to serve, mother!” cried Perdita,
a sudden idea striking her: “else never would you oppose yourself so
completely to the dictates of common sense. What were your words to me
when I spoke to you--and spoke as rashly--about the inaccessibility
of my soul to the passion of love? You advised me not to count only
on the chance of making a good match: you declared it to be far more
probable that I might ensnare some young gentleman of birth, family,
and fortune--or some old voluptuary of immense wealth;--and you added
that there was more to be gained as the mistress of one of those, than
as a wife. In fine, your advice was that I should remain unmarried and
independent, so that the moment I had ruined one lover, I might take
another.”
“Yes--and that counsel was the wisest I could proffer you,” said her
mother, actually speaking in a savage tone, and looking as if she could
have leapt, tigress-like, upon her daughter and torn her with her nails
as if they were claws.
“Oh! the advice was good enough under certain circumstances,” exclaimed
Perdita. “It was good in so far as it related to the probability of my
securing a succession of lovers, each with only a comparatively small
fortune, and each individual, therefore, to be soon set aside. But now
that, at the very outset, chance has thrown in my way a young noble,
who must sooner or later inherit a vast fortune which no extravagance
can completely dissipate,--a fortune, indeed, which will minister to
all extravagances, and yet remain unimpaired,--should I not be the
veriest fool that ever tossed gold into a river or hurled diamonds
into an abyss, were I not to secure the brilliant advantage thus placed
within my reach?”
[Illustration]
“Daughter,” exclaimed the old woman, with difficulty preventing a
complete outburst of her fury, “I tell you that this may not be! Secure
Charles Hatfield--or rather Viscount Marston--as your paramour: _I_
will undertake to raise as much money, as you can persuade him to
lavish upon you;--and then--_then_, my child,” she added, adopting a
tone of fawning conciliation, “you can choose a new lover and make
inroads into another’s fortune.”
“I am determined to pursue and follow out the plan which my own
convictions indicate as the most rational--the most sensible--the most
advisable!” exclaimed Perdita; “and, therefore, the present dispute is
useless and absurd.”
“Dispute!” repeated Mrs. Fitzhardinge, her countenance again becoming
absolutely livid, and her whole form trembling with rage: “I do not
choose to dispute with you, insolent girl that you are! Now listen to
me, Perdita--and know once for all that I _will_ be obeyed in this, as
in all things--or I will abandon you to your own resources--I will hurl
you back into rags, want, and poverty----”
“Not while I possess this beauty of which a queen might be proud!” said
Perdita, in a quiet manner, as she glanced with self complacency at her
own handsome countenance as it was reflected in a mirror opposite.
“Oh! think not that beauty is the only element of fortune!” cried
the old woman, surveying her daughter with almost an expression of
fiend-like hate: “for, if you dare to thwart me, Perdita, I will
become your bitterest and most malignant enemy, though you are my own
child:--I will pursue thee with my vengeance;--wherever you may be,
I will spoil all your machinations and ruin all your schemes;--nay,
more--I will compel your very lovers to thrust you ignominiously
forth from them! For I will boldly proclaim how that Perdita who
has enthralled them, was accursed from her very birth--born in
Newgate--thence taken by her mother to a penal colony, where she became
lost and abandoned at the early age of thirteen--and how every handsome
young officer in garrison at Sydney could boast of the favours of this
profligate young creature!”
A mocking laugh came from the lips of Perdita,--a laugh that rang more
horribly in the ears of her mother than an explosion of maledictions,
recriminations, and insults would have done,--a laugh that seemed to
say, “Wretched--drivelling old woman, I despise thee!”
“You will repent this conduct, vile girl--you will repent it!” muttered
Mrs. Fitzhardinge, approaching Perdita, and gazing on her with eyes
that seemed to glare savagely. “Whatever be the risk--even though I
involve myself in the downfall of our splendid prospects--I will ruin
thee, if thou darest to oppose and thwart me! Abandon thy scheme of
marrying the young nobleman--and we will be friends again: persist
in it--and we separate, as mortal enemies. Yes--and the first step
which I shall take will be to repair to Charles Hatfield--implore his
forgiveness for having been a party to the scheme plotted against him
and his--and give such a character of thee, Perdita, that his blood
shall run cold in his veins at the mere thought of ever having been
placed in contact with thee! And, oh! the picture which a mother
will draw of her daughter in such a case,--that picture will be
terrible--very terrible! Pause, then--reflect----”
“One word, mother,” said Perdita, who had maintained an extraordinary
degree of composure throughout this scene--doubtless because she knew
that she must triumph in the long run. “You threaten bravely: let us
look calmly and deliberately at what must be the inevitable results of
a fearful quarrel between you and me:--let us see who would get the
better of it! On one side would be you--old--ugly--disgustingly ugly,
I may say--so that to become anything save a beggar, grovelling in
the kennel would be impossible. On the other side would be myself--at
all events handsome enough to gain the favour of some soft fool: and,
spoil my character as you will, you cannot prevent me from finding a
paramour amongst those who care nothing for the reputation, but every
thing for the beauty, of their mistresses. Bread to me is certain: rags
and starvation to you are equally well assured. My life of pleasure,
gaiety, and dissipation is to come: yours has passed--and naught
remains for you save to die in a workhouse or on a dunghill! Pardon
me, my dear mother, for speaking thus openly--thus plainly,” added the
young woman, now throwing a spice of irony into her tone: “but you
did not spare me when you summed up my characteristics just now. And
before I quit the subject, I may as well observe that you yourself are
not the most immaculate woman upon the face of the earth. Heaven only
knows how prolific were the debaucheries of your youth: but you veiled
them all beneath the aspect of a _saint_! Oh! that was excellent, dear
mother--excellent, indeed!” cried Perdita, her merry, musical laugh
echoing through the apartment: “only conceive you once to have been a
_saint_! In good truth, you have not much of the appearance of a saint
now, mother: neither had you when living with the free-settler as his
mistress!”
“Perdita--Perdita!” gasped the wretched Mrs. Fitzhardinge, writhing
like a snake at these bitter words, and shaking convulsively from head
to foot: “you--you will drive me mad!”
“Ah! what--do you possess _feelings_, then, my dear mother?” demanded
the young woman, assuming an air of profound astonishment. “And yet
you must have imagined that your daughter was totally without those
same little feelings which it is so easy to wound, and so difficult to
heal. Well--I will forbear: otherwise, I was about to have reminded
you of those glorious times--before I was born, indeed--when you were
the paramour of Sir Henry Courtenay, whose name you so pleasantly and
quietly forged to a slip of paper one day----”
“Silence--Perdita--silence!” said Mrs. Fitzhardinge, in a hoarse and
hollow tone--clasping her hands convulsively at the same time. “I was
wrong to provoke you thus: you are very hard upon me--you have the best
of it, Perdita--and I--I----”
Here the old wretch burst into tears,--not an assumed grief--no
crocodile weeping,--but a flood of genuine tears, wrung from her
by the cutting, biting, bitter sarcasms which her daughter had so
mercilessly--so slaughterously levelled against her.
Perdita suffered her to weep without offering the least consolation:
for the young woman was hurt and wounded on her side as well as the old
harridan was hurt and wounded on the other.
The recriminations of those two females--that mother and daughter--had
been terrible in their implacability, and appalling in their unnatural
malignity.
There was a long pause--during which Mrs. Fitzhardinge sate
sobbing--being absolutely hideous in her grief,--while Perdita--with
flashing eyes dilating nostrils, flushing cheeks, and palpitating
bosom, lay half reclined upon the sofa--tapping the carpet petulantly
with the tip of her long, narrow, exquisitely shaped shoe.
“My dear child,” at length said the old woman, “are we to be friends or
enemies?”
“That depends entirely upon yourself, mother,” was the answer: “I
am not to be tyrannised over by you--nor menaced in the fearful way
in which you have threatened me to-day, without showing resentment
in return. Really, one would have supposed that you were addressing
yourself to the bitterest enemy you had in the world--rather than to
your daughter who has done all she could to place you in a comfortable
position for the remainder of your days.”
“Well--well--let us be friends, Perdita!” exclaimed Mrs. Fitzhardinge.
“Yes--we will be friends,” responded the daughter. “But remember
that my views in respect to Charles Hatfield--or rather, Viscount
Marston--are to be carried into effect.”
“Without again quarrelling,” interrupted her mother, “let me assure
you that I cannot--cannot possibly consent to this deviation from our
original arrangements. It was an express understanding between us that
_marriage_ was, in every case, to be out of the question----”
“And may not circumstances transpire to change original plans?”
demanded Perdita, beginning to divine the reasons of her mother’s
uncompromising opposition to her matrimonial scheme.
“A truce to these arguments!” cried Mrs. Fitzhardinge, again growing
irritable. “Remember that this evening your love-sick swain will
deposit in my hands all the papers containing the evidence of his
father’s right to the earldom and estates of Ellingham----”
“And you will use your power to coerce me?” said Perdita, in her quiet
way, which nevertheless seemed to breathe defiance.
“I do not affirm _that_, my child,” cried the old woman, smothering her
rage. “But I would ask you of what use those papers would be without my
assistance to raise money on them?”
“Of no more utility than our acquaintance with Charles would be to
_you_, were it not for _me_,” returned Perdita. “And now, mother, I may
as well inform you at once that I can penetrate into all the motives
which prompt you thus to oppose my marriage views with respect to
Charles. You imagine that if I become his mistress only, I shall be so
completely in your power that I must still continue your slave,--that a
word from you relative to my past life would send away Charles Hatfield
in disgust,--and that in order to prevent you from speaking that word,
I shall obey you blindly. In fine, you hope to exercise a despotism
alike over him and me,--dispose of the purse--and control the household
with sovereign sway. On the other hand, you imagine,--nay, do not
look so black, my dear mother--we are only telling each other a few
agreeable truths----”
“Go on, vile girl!” gasped Mrs. Fitzhardinge, trembling--suffocating
with rage.
“On the other hand, then,” pursued the young woman, in a placid,
unexcited manner,--“on the other hand you suppose that if once I become
the wife of Charles Hatfield--if once he shall have taken me for better
or worse--if once the indissoluble knot be tied, your power over me
would cease. For were you to avenge any slight by making revelations
respecting me, I might lose my husband’s esteem and love, but should
not the less remain his wife. You therefore dread lest you should
become a cypher--dependant upon us for your daily bread--unable to
control the purse and the domestic economy----”
“And what will you do to guarantee that all you are now saying is not
a predictive sketch of what you know must happen in case I permit
your marriage?” demanded Mrs. Fitzhardinge, dismayed by this accurate
reading of her heart’s secrets on the part of her daughter.
“I can only assure you this much, mother,” was the answer,--“that
if you conduct yourself well towards me, I shall act well towards
you,--that you shall have your own way in every thing where my will is
not violently thwarted,--and that I will co-operate with you cheerfully
for our mutual interests, so long as you do not attempt to drive me as
a slave.”
“And all this you faithfully promise, Perdita?” demanded her mother,
eagerly; for she was now glad to effect any compromise rather than come
to an open rupture with her daughter, who, she saw, had in reality so
much the better of her.
“Be assured, mother,” replied Perdita, “that I am not for war;--and if
we quarrel any more, it will be your fault.”
“We will _not_ quarrel, Perdita,” said Mrs. Fitzhardinge: “you shall
marry Charles Hatfield--or Viscount Marston, as we ought to call
him;--and here let our dispute finish.”
“With all my heart. And now tell me, mother, how--where--and with whom
you intend to raise the money upon these papers which Charles is to
send or bring in the evening?”
“A few evenings ago, when I was lurking about Pall Mall waiting for
that young gentleman, I suddenly encountered a person whom I had known
years and years since, and who played me a vile--a very vile trick. He
was much altered,” continued Mrs. Fitzhardinge; “but I knew him--knew
him the moment the light of the lamp flashed upon his features. I
accosted him--told him who I was--and upbraided him for his villainy
of former times. He spoke softly and in a conciliatory manner--and
we fell into a more amicable train of conversation than at first. We
soon understood each other; and giving me his address--for, by-the
bye, he has taken a new name--he invited me to call upon him--and we
parted. Since then I have made enquiries in the neighbourhood where he
dwells; and I learn that he is reputed to be immensely rich--a miser
and money-lender. He is therefore the man whom I require;--and we may
reckon confidently upon his aid in the business of raising funds on the
documents. This very evening I will call upon him----”
“You will permit me to accompany you, mother,” said Perdita, rather in
a tone of command than of interrogatory.
“Yes--if such be your pleasure,” was the reply: for the old woman saw
that it was useless and totally adverse to her own interests to thwart
her daughter in any single respect.