"ONLY PITY."
A cold frosty air in the streets that night--a chilling welcome to
Harriet Wesden as she emerged from the hot room into Tenchester Street.
Sidney was waiting for her, staid, silent, and statuesque; he offered
her his arm, which she took, and together they proceeded along the
narrow street into the Southwark Bridge Road--thence past the old house
in Great Suffolk Street towards the Borough.
Harriet Wesden felt that she would have given worlds, had she possessed
them, to have broken the silence, and ventured on some topic which might
have tested the truth or the folly of her fears; but all thought seemed
to have deserted her.
These sudden vacuums are difficult things to account for--most of us
suffer from them more or less at some period or other of our lives. Who
cannot remember the sudden hiatus with the friend--male or female--whom
we intended particularly to impress with the force of our eloquence; or
the collapse in the grand speech with which we wished to return thanks
for the handsome manner in which our health had been drunk at that
dinner party, or the vote of confidence placed in us at that
extraordinary general meeting?
Harriet Wesden was dumb; there was not one thought at which she could
clutch, even the coldness of that night did not suggest itself till it
was too late to speak, and the idea began to impress her that it would
be more unnatural to say a few commonplace words than to keep silence.
She guessed that Sidney knew her secret, or the greater part of her
secret, the instant that she had emerged into the street; and to attempt
a commonplace discourse with a great sorrow overshadowing him would,
after all, have been a mockery, unworthy of herself and him.
But if he would only speak!--not proceed onwards so firmly, steadily
saying, never a word to relieve the embarrassment of her position.
Sidney Hinchford maintained a rigid silence for almost a similar reason
to Harriet's; he was at loss how to begin, and break the spell which had
enchained him since his engagement. He was walking in darkness, and
there was no light ahead of him. All was vanity and vexation of spirit.
At last the silence was broken. They had left behind them the long rows
of lighted shops, and come to private houses, and long dreary front
gardens, with interminable rows of iron railings; there were a few late
office-clerks--a shadowy woman or two--hastening homewards; the roar of
London was growing fainter in the distance.
"Harriet," he began, in a deep voice, wherein all excitement was pent up
and constrained, "I have heard a strange story to-night from that man
claiming to be Mattie's father--is it true?"
"Yes."
She did not ask what he had heard, or attempt any defence; the sound of
his voice, deep and resonant after the long silence, had set her heart
beating, and rendered her answer a matter of difficulty.
"It is a strange story, and I have been hoping it might have been
explained away by some means not only unnatural--I can almost believe
that it is all a dream, and no cruel waking is to follow it. Harriet,
may I ask if your father is aware of this?"
"He is not yet."
"You were travelling alone with a gentleman--I will call him a gentleman
for the sake of argument--in the middle of the night by the Dover mail
train; at Ashford you leave the carriage abruptly, and demand protection
from him--speak of a trap into which he had led you, and seek counsel of
that man we met at Mattie's house to-night?"
"But----"
"But do not misunderstand me, Harriet--I can read the story for myself;
I can see that you were deceived in this man, and had no consciousness
of the snare prepared for you, until the hour was too late. I can
believe that your sense of right was outraged, and the _gentleman_
merited all the scorn which he received--but who was this man to whom
you could trust yourself at that hour, and by what right were you, under
any circumstances, his companion?"
"He was a man I met at Mrs. Eveleigh's--he offered to escort me to the
railway station."
"A stranger?"
"No--I had met him at Brighton, before then, when I was a school-girl.
He--he paid me attentions there which flattered my girlish vanity;
and--and then I met him again at Mrs. Eveleigh's."
"What is his name?"
"Darcy."
"You have not seen him since?"
"No--I hope that he and I will never meet again."
"Harriet, you loved this man!"
"No," was the fearless answer; "I cannot believe that now. I might have
fancied so at the time--for oh! I was bewildered by many thoughts, and
my heart was troubled, Sid--but I never loved him, on my honour!"
"It is easy to think that now," said Sidney in reply; "the idol has
fallen from the pedestal, never to be replaced again--a ruin, in which
no interest remains. But you loved him, or believed you loved him at
that time--it is a nice distinction--and there was no thought of me and
my hopes."
"Sidney, I wrote--I--"
"Harriet, there is no need for us to say one word in anger about this,"
he interrupted; "I will ask no further explanation--I do not wish it. I
can see now where I have been wrong, and whither my folly was leading
me--and there's an end of it," he added.
"An end of--what?"
"Of the one hope that I have had. I see, now, how much better it is for
you and me, and what a foolish couple we have been."
There was a long silence; they had walked on some distance before
Harriet said, suddenly and sharply--
"What do you mean--what am I to understand?"
"That our engagement is at an end, and that it is better for us both to
forget the romantic nonsense which we talked of lately. I will not ask
you to forget me; I will not try for a single moment to forget _you_. I
will prefer, if you will allow me, Harriet, to remain your
friend--something of the old boy-friend I was to you, before the dream
came."
"Unjust--unkind!" she murmured.
"No, you will not think that presently," he answered; "you will judge me
more fairly, and see for yourself how it could not have ended otherwise
for either of us. You have been more than kind to me--you have offered
me the sacrifice of your best wishes, even your brightest prospects, out
of pity, and I cannot have it."
"Pity!" she repeated.
Harriet was unnerved at his earnestness, at the deep sorrow which
betrayed itself in every word, and which he thought that he disguised so
well; but her pride was wounded also at his resignation of her, and she
could see that there was no defence to urge which, by the laws of
probability, had power to affect him. Between her and him that cruel
past, which she had hidden from him; that proof of love or fancy for
another, when he was building on her lore for him; that evidence against
her, which for ever robbed him of his confidence and trust. No, there
was no defence, and the scornful echo of his last words were more like
defiance than regret.
"Yes, pity!" he reiterated--"only pity! Harriet," he said, for an
instant pressing her hand upon his arm with the old affection, "it was
kind and noble of you, but it was not love. It was a sacrifice; I was a
poor man; there was a great affliction in store for me, and you felt
that you alone could lighten it in the present--and in the future, when
it faced me and shut me in with it. You saw that you were my one hope,
and you took pity on me. It was a mistake--I see the gigantic error that
it was now!"
"You will see the truth--you will judge me fairer yet, Sidney."
"This past engagement between us, Harriet, has been a trouble to me
lately," he continued; "my selfishness has scared me before this, and I
have felt that I had no right to bind you to me for a term of years,
ending in calamity at the last. I was wrong--I retract--I am very sorry
for the error--I am glad of this excuse to rectify it."
"You say that!" cried Harriet; "you are glad to break with me--to
believe that I did not love you, Sidney?"
"Yes, I am glad. I can see that it was all for the best; and though I
could have wished that there had been a different reason for the
parting, still it takes a weight from my conscience--it is a relief!"
It was a struggle to say so, but he said it without bitterness, and in
good faith. By some ingenious method of word-twisting, which Harriet
could not follow, he had stopped all effort to explain more fully, and
turned the blame of the engagement on himself. There was no answering;
she saw that his heart was wrung with the agony of the dissolution, but
she read upon that pale, stern face, to which she glanced but once, an
inflexible resolve, that nothing could alter. He upbraided her not; he
uttered not one sarcasm upon the folly of her past passion for Mr.
Darcy, or the mistakes to which it had led; he expressed a wish to be
her friend still, but he gave her up, and with all her love for him--and
she knew how truly it was love then--she could not ask him to reconsider
his verdict and spare her a parting as bitter for her as him. She read
in that hasty glance at his face, _incredulity_ of her affection for
him; and no protestation on her part could have altered that. Yes, it
was ended between them--perhaps for the best, God knew; she could not
think of it then--she was ashamed, miserable, utterly cast down!
"Let me get home," she murmured; "what a long way it is to home."
"I will say no more, Harriet--I have been unkind to say so much," he
said, in answer to that cry, in which he might have read the truth, had
not his heart been for ever closed to it from that night.
So, in the same silent way as they had begun that inauspicious walk, the
two concluded it, reaching the little house of Mr. Wesden shortly
afterwards. Colder and more grim the night there; beyond the lighted
London streets, in melancholy suburban districts like to this, there
seemed to lurk a greater desolation.
"Good night," he said; "don't think that we part in anger, or that I am
hurt in any way at what has happened--or that I am less your friend than
ever, Harriet."
"Good night," was all her answer.
He lingered still, as though he had more to say, or was endeavouring to
think of something more to render the disruption less abrupt and harsh;
but he relinquished the attempt, and left her, walking away rapidly as
though at the last--the very last--he feared to trust himself.
He did not go straight home, but walked for awhile up and down the
street wherein his home was, at the same rapid pace, with his breath
held somewhat, and his hands clenched.
He had acted for the best--it _was_ for the best, he thought!--but the
result was not satisfactory, and the future beyond was the grey density
at which he had recoiled, when crossing the Channel on the day he came
to man's estate.
If he had died on that day, or the ship had gone down with him, how much
better he thought then; better for her, for him--even for his father,
perhaps, he could not tell at that time!
He went indoors at last, feigned for awhile the old demeanour, and
failed at a task beyond his strength for once. He gave it up, and,
looking vacantly at his amazed father, said,
"I'm not well to-night. I think I'll go to my room."
"Not well!--you not well, Sid?" exclaimed the father, as though the
assertion were the most improbable to make in the world.
"Not very well--a head-ache."
"Ah! too much book-work. Be careful, Sid, don't overtask yourself."
"I shall be well enough to-morrow. Good night."
He left the room abruptly, and turned the key in his own apartment a few
minutes afterwards. In his own room, he hunted for a few letters which
she had written to him during their brief engagement, and proceeded to
burn them in the empty fire-grate.
"So much the best," he muttered, "so much the best!" as though they were
charmed words, that kept him strong.
He missed something else, and was uneasy about it. He went to the
looking-glass drawer, and turned out the whole contents upon the
toilet-table--staring at a letter soiled, crumpled and torn, but still
_sealed_, which rewarded his search, and lay at the bottom.
"What's this?" he muttered.
He drew a chair nearer the drawers on which the light was placed,
examined the post-mark, the superscription, the seal, then opened the
letter, dated on the day he went away on special service.
A long, confused epistle, written with difficulty and under much
agitation, but telling one truth, at which he had guessed--which he had
spoken of that night.
"I knew it before!" he cried; but the news daunted him, and unmanned him
notwithstanding.
It was the climax, and he gave way utterly.