|I CANNOT, for my own part, at all agree with the depreciatory
expressions used by Mistress Forest with respect to Miss Rose Aynton's
personal appearance. “What Master Walter could have seen in her,” &c.,
it was easy enough for anybody else to see who was not of her own sex.
A magnificent figure, masses of silken hair that, when unbound, would
ripple almost to her dainty feet, and a countenance “bright as light,
and clear as wind;” and indeed this latter was too keen and sharply cut
for my taste. The sort of expression which one likes to see in one's
lawyer, does not so well become the object of our heart's affections.
Of course, there was nothing of steel about Miss Rose, except what might
have been in her crinoline; but I never saw man or woman who gave me so
much the idea of being armed _cap-à-pied_; she seemed to be equipped in
a complete Milan suit of proof, impregnable, invulnerable. Like _Le Noir
Fainéant_ in _Ivanhoe_, she never attacked anybody, although my Lady
fancied she had recently detected signs of aggression about her; and
those who knew her best avoided putting the temptation in her way.
But when she entered her hostess's boudoir by invitation, upon that
particular morning, she looked not only, as usual, on her guard; there
was also a certain slumbrous fire in her dark eyes, which betokened
onslaught--the initiative of battle. My Lady herself remarked it, not
without pity. “How little is this poor lost creature aware,” thought
she, “that I know all.”
But she was quite wrong in this. Miss Rose had almost gathered the truth
from the trembling fingers and frightened manner of her tiring-maid that
morning; and the thing had been quite confirmed to her by the malicious
triumph with which Mary Forest had delivered her mistress's request to
see her in the boudoir upon very particular business.
“Will you please to sit down, Miss Aynton?”
Yes, it was so. The secret was out. Not even a morning salutation from
her friend and hostess; and the hand only outstretched to point her out
a chair at the other extremity of the room. “Before proceeding with what
I have to say,” began my Lady, “I wish to know whether your aunt is in
town.”
“I believe so, Lady Lisgard; I think she has come back from
Leamington--although I have not heard from her for the last two days.”
“That is well. When I hinted, yesterday morning, that it would be better
for you to return to London, I was unaware of the _necessity_ for your
departure from this roof at once--_immediately_--and for ever.”
“Indeed!” Not a muscle moved: confident in the goodness, if not of her
cause, at least of her Milan suit; conscious, too, of the possession
of a Damascus poniard, undreamed of by the foe, and admirable for close
encounters, her right hand nervously opened and shut as though to clutch
the handle--that was all.
“You have disgraced this house and me: yourself and your sex.”
“You lie, insolent woman,” returned the other; “_and judge others by
yourself_.”
Each started to her feet, and looked her enemy in the face as she slung
these words of flame.
“It is worse than useless, girl, thus to brazen it out,” continued my
Lady, attaching no importance to the emphasis the other laid upon
her last words. “Outraging not only moral laws, but even the rites of
hospitality, you have intrigued with my own son under my own roof.”
“You dare to say so, Lady Lisgard, do you? It is only for his sake, I
swear, that I do not brand _you_ Wanton, for that calumny. I _could_
do it; you know I could, although you wear that look of wonder. Was
not that man Derrick once your lover? Ah! you wince at that. Sir
Robert--good, easy man--he knew nothing, of course”----
Here she stopped, for my Lady's face was terrible to look upon.
“Be silent, bad, bold girl! You shoot your poisoned arrows at a venture,
and aim nothing home. You know not what a wife should be--how should
you? You!”
It is not true that the swan is “born to be the only graceful shape
of Scorn.” A fair woman unjustly slandered is its rival therein. Rose
Aynton cowered before that keen contempt--beneath the dropping of those
bitter words---as though they were sword and fire.
“I will never forgive you this, Lady Lisgard,” muttered she--“never,
never!”
“_You! you_ forgive! To such as you, it would be idle to protest my
soul is spotless. The man whose name you have soiled by uttering it--my
husband--he, in high heaven, knows right well that never so much as
thought of mine has wronged him. Vile, evil-minded girl, as false as
frail!”
“That is sufficient, madam; almost enough, even if I were indeed the
thing you take me for.” Here the girl paused to moisten her dry lips,
and catch her breath, of which passion had almost deprived her. “Now,
look you, I was wrong. I thought my Lady was not so lily-pure as the
world took her to be, and I was wrong. I have seen things with my own
eyes, and through the eyes of others, that might well entitle me to say:
'I still believe it,' I tell you, Lady Lisgard, I have _proofs_--or what
seemed to me to be so, a few minutes back--of the charge that has so
moved you, such as would amply justify my disbelief in your denial. But
I honestly avow that I was wrong.”
“I thank you, Miss Rose Aynton, for your charity.”
“Spare your scorn, madam. It is no charity that moves me; nay, far
from it. Convinced almost against my will, I own, by your unsupported
assertion--your mère 'No,' I have withdrawn an accusation for which I
have been patiently preparing evidence this long time--not, indeed, for
your hurt, but for my own safety and convenience, and hereby confess it
baseless and unjust. Now, on your part, I do beseech you, make amends to
_me_. You, too, have had your seeming proofs of my disgrace; you, too,
have heard and seen yourself, or through the eyes and ears of others,
certain”----
“Add not, lost, wretched girl,” interposed my Lady, “deceit to sin!
All that is left you is to pray to Heaven for pardon, and to leave that
hospitable roof which you have disgraced.”
Rose Aynton's gipsy face grew drawn and pale. She had aimed her blow,
and missed; the weapon in which she had put so much trust had proved
utterly good for nothing. All her schemes of the last few months were
rendered fruitless, and the discoveries to which she had attached such
vast importance, and which she had attained to by such mean arts, shewn
to be vain and futile. And now that she had humiliated herself by owning
this, and thrown herself at this woman's feet, she would not extend so
much as a finger-tip to help her.
“Lady Lisgard, as I hope for heaven,” cried she in anguish, “I am
innocent of that with which you charge me; I am honest as yourself, or
Letty. Alas, you shudder, because I dare to compare myself with your
pure daughter; you think that I soil that name, too, by uttering it.
What shall I say--by what shall I swear, in order to make you believe
me?”
“I would to Heaven I _could_ believe you, Rose,” returned my Lady sadly,
touched in spite of herself by the girl's yearning appeal. “If you could
erase this damning blot upon my son's fair name, and give me back my
Walter--as I deemed him but an hour ago--I would be so grateful, girl,
that you should almost think I loved you.”
“You _would!_” cried Rose with eagerness; then added bitterly: “But no;
you mean if I could say: 'Your son has never pressed his lips to these,
has never sworn to be mine, and mine alone.' But you would not thank
me for merely proving that in this, although he did it, he was not to
blame.”
“What! Not to blame?”
“No, madam--for even for _his_ sake, I cannot longer bear this burden of
undeserved shame. _Walter Lisgard is my husband_. We were married weeks
ago, when I went to London in the spring.”
“Married, married!” gasped my Lady.
“Thank God for that! Far better to deceive _me_, boy, than this poor
girl. I never thought to say: 'I am glad you are my daughter-in-law,
Rose Aynton;' but I do say so now.” She took both her hands in hers, and
gazed upon her downcast face, now overspread with blushes, and tinged
for once with genuine tenderness. “It moves you, does it, that I am
thankful to see the honour of my son preserved at some sacrifice of his
prospects. How little do you know me, girl! yet I am glad to move you
anyway. Rose, be a kind wife to him. I will not blame you for what has
happened, although I have much cause. I must blame _him_ rather. Who can
wonder that you yielded when he said: 'Be mine.' So gentle and so loving
as he can be! Now, too, I see it all. When you refused Sir Richard in
the library, you were actually his brother's wife. Ah, Heaven, you must
not remain here longer--not a day. I shall write to Walter”----
“Nay, madam--_mother_,” exclaimed Rose beseechingly, “I pray you let
_me_ write. I have broken my plighted word, and disobeyed my husband's
bidding in revealing this. To please him, I had resolved to defend
myself this morning as I best might, by returning thrust for thrust,
without using this shield--my innocence--at all. But your bitter
words--a shower of barbed darts--drove me behind it. He will be very
wrath with me indeed, madam; but far worse if the news comes from you.
He has much just now to make him anxious too.”
“Indeed,” replied my Lady hastily. “How is it, then, that I have heard
nothing of it? But I forgot; it is _you_ who have his secrets now. Yes,
you shall write, not I. Tell him that I am sorry--sorry that he should
have deceived me above all; but that I forgive him freely. He knows
that, however, right well. He must not come back to Mirk until he hears
from me; and you, Rose, you must join him without delay. Every member
of this household must learn at once that you are Walter's wife; but not
till you have gone--for Richard's sake.” My Lady's thoughts, as always,
were for others; even when this great blow had well-nigh stunned her,
she did not permit herself the luxury of selfish grief. She was already
busy with schemes for the benefit of her erring boy; how to contrive and
where to save without prejudice to Sir Richard's interests (for _that_
must be now avoided above everything) so that a respectable allowance
might be meted out to the young couple. She could not respect, and far
less love the girl who had become her Walter's wife in so clandestine
a manner; but still she _was_ his wife, and therefore, in her eyes, a
something precious. Then, bad as matters were, they might have been far
worse; she had fully expected that they were so; and she felt in some
sort grateful to accept this product of rashness and deceit in place
of downright shame. Moreover, she foresaw in her own mind, for ever
dwelling on such contingencies, that out of this evil a certain good
might come, in case of that terrible misfortune befalling her, compared
with which this present sorrow was as the prick of a pin's point.
Rose, upon her part, had certainly cause for congratulation upon the
result of this interview. Although her weapon of offence had failed
her--and she was genuinely convinced of the groundlessness of her late
suspicions concerning Lady Lisgard--she had found in her mother-in-law
a most generous adversary, and one certainly far more forgiving than she
deserved. Even the worst of us, I conclude, are not bad at all times,
and when my Lady, as they parted, touched her brow with her pale lips,
and murmured once more: “Be a kind wife to him, Rose,” that young woman
mustered an honest tear or two--of which articles, to do her justice,
she did not keep, like some women, a constant supply on hand for social
emergencies.
Not until she regained her own room did she begin to think that she had
been unnecessarily humble, and had weakly suffered herself to be moved
by the show of forgiveness and good-will which my Lady had doubtless put
on for her own purposes. However, the confession had been made, and
upon the whole, most satisfactorily got over, the thought of which had
oppressed her of late more than she cared to own, and made her bitter
against her mother-in-law, as people generally feel towards those whom
they are conscious of having wronged. And now there was that letter to
write to Walter, which we have seen him peruse with such disfavour at
his hotel in Town, acquainting him with her premature avowal of their
common secret; and many a line of dexterous excuse she wove, and many a
line of affectionate pleading, only to be torn up and recomposed again
and again; for there was one person in the world beside herself whom
Rose loved dearly, and yet of whom she stood in deepest awe; and he whom
she both loved and feared with all the strength of her energetic nature,
was her husband--Walter Lisgard.