Oh Lord, what is thys worldys blysse,
That changeth as the mone!
My somer's day in lusty May
Is derked before the none.
_The Not-Browne Mayd_.
There was no letter the next morning. "Gerald must have been too late,"
thought Eugenia, trying to think she did not feel anxious. But the
morning after that there was none either--none, at least, that she
caught sight of at first. There was one with the Wareborough postmark,
but it had a black seal and was addressed to her husband, and he
prevented her seeing it till he knew its contents. Then he had to tell
her. It was from Frank. Eugenia never knew or remembered distinctly
anything more of that day, nor of several others that succeeded it. And
Captain Chancellor never cared to repeat to any one the wild words of
reproach which, in the first moment of agony, had escaped her. But,
satisfied though he was that he had acted for the best, there were
moments during those days when Beauchamp was thankful to recall the
assurance which Sydney's husband had had the generous thoughtfulness to
give in this letter. "Even if Eugenia had returned with my brother it
would have been too late;" an assurance which Eugenia's stunned senses
had failed to convey to her brain.
This was the history of that day at Wareborough--the day, that is to
say, of Gerald's unsuccessful errand.
As soon as he was satisfied that Eugenia had been sent for, Mr Laurence
became calmer. He slept at intervals during the day, and when awake
seemed so much better that Sydney almost regretted the precipitancy with
which she had acted on what was, perhaps, after all, only an invalid's
passing fancy. But by evening she came to think differently. The
nervous restlessness returned in an aggravated form. Every few minutes
he asked her what o'clock it was, and she, understanding the real motive
of the question, replied each time with a little addition of volunteered
information.
"Seven o'clock, dear papa; they _may_ be here by nine, you know;" or, "a
quarter to eight; they will be about half-way if they started by the
later train."
Between eight and nine, to Sydney's great relief, her father fell asleep
again. She dared not leave him, but sat beside him, watching his
restless slumber; wearied herself, she had all but fallen asleep; too,
when she was startled by his suddenly addressing her.
"Sydney," he said, "tell me--Eugenia?" His voice was clear, and
stronger than it had been of late, yet he seemed to find difficulty in
expressing himself. A strange fear seized Sydney.
"Not yet, dear father," she said, consolingly. "She has not come yet.
But very soon she must be here."
He looked at her earnestly, as if striving to take in the sense of her
words. "No," he said, at last, "no, it will be too late." Then a smile
broke over his face. "Good-bye, dear Sydney, dear child. Tell Eugenia
not to grieve. It is not for long."
Sydney had seen death, but never a death-bed. Death, when all the
life-like surroundings are removed, when the last tender offices have
been performed, and the soulless form lies before us in solemn calm; in
this guise death is easier to believe in--to realise. But _dying_, the
actual embrace of the grim phantom--a phantom only, thank God--she had
never seen, and it came upon her with an awful shock. For some
minutes--how many she never knew--she stood there beside the bed, in
agonised bewilderment, almost amounting to unconsciousness. The first
thing that brought her to herself was the sound of wheels rapidly
driving along the street, suddenly stopping at their door.
"Eugenia!" cried Sydney, "oh, poor Eugenia! She has come, and it is too
late." Then a mocking hope sprang up in her heart. "Perhaps he has
only fainted," it whispered. She knew it was not so, yet somehow the
idea gave her momentary strength. She rang the bell violently. In
another moment her husband and the servants were beside her. But in an
instant they saw how it was--the good, kind father, the gentle-spirited
scholar, the earnest philanthropist had passed through the awful
doorway--had entered into "the better country." And Eugenia had not
come!
Sydney did not see her brother-in-law that night, but the next day he
told her all--not quite all, but enough to prevent her blaming Eugenia--
to fill her with unspeakable pity for her sister. To Frank, Gerald was
somewhat less communicative.
"Fine lady airs and nonsense," exclaimed the curate. "Not well enough,
indeed! Think how Sydney has been travelling about with her father and
wearing herself out, poor child. Still I am very sorry for Eugenia. It
will be an awful blow to her."
And the letter he wrote to Beauchamp, deputing him, as was natural, to
"break the sad tidings" to his wife, was kind and considerate in the
extreme.
Return of post brought no answer, considerably to their surprise, for
Frank's letter had contained particulars of the arrangements they
proposed, among which Captain Chancellor's presence at the funeral had
of course been mentioned. Sydney felt anxious and uneasy; her husband
tried to reassure her by reminding her that her nerves had been shaken,
and she was inclined to be fanciful in consequence.
"It must be some accidental delay," he said. "Letters seldom go wrong,
but when they do, it is sure to happen awkwardly. Besides, I think it
just possible Chancellor may be bringing Eugenia over. She will
probably wish it."
As he spoke there came a loud ringing at the bell. Sydney started. In
the sad days of death's actual presence in a house such sounds are rare.
There were grounds for her apprehension. In another moment a telegram
was in Frank's hands.
"From Captain Chancellor to Rev F. Thurston.
"Is it possible for Sydney to come at once? E---is very ill."
The husband and wife looked at each other.
"My poor Sydney," said Frank, "it is very hard upon you."
Within an hour, Sydney was on her way to Halswood. It was a strange,
melancholy journey. Arrived at Chilworth, she found the Halswood
carriage in waiting, on the chance of her early arrival, and drove off
at once. How pretty and fresh, how mockingly bright, the country
looked, in its as yet unsullied spring dress! How beautiful the park
was, when the carriage turned in at the lodge, and there stretched out
before her view, on each side, the broad, undulating sweep of grassy
land, fringed round with noble trees! Sydney was town-bred; she loved
the country with the yearning, enthusiastic, half-reverent love of one
who seldom breathes the fresh, pure air, to whom the country sights and
sounds are fascinatingly unfamiliar. In a moment's forgetfulness she
glanced at the baby by her side, asleep in the nurse's arms: "How
fortunate Eugenia is," she thought, "to have her home here--to be able
to look forward to bringing up her children in this lovely place." Then
she remembered all, leant back in her seat, and was conscious of no
other feeling save the gnawing anxiety that had accompanied her all the
way.
When she reached the house, she learnt, somewhat to her surprise, that
her brother-in-law was not in. He had only gone out for a stroll in the
park, by the doctor's advice, having been up for two nights and being
much fatigued--of course, not thinking it would be possible for Mrs
Thurston to arrive so early--was what Blinkhorn informed her, adding, in
answer to her eager inquiry, as he condescendingly showed her into the
morning-room, that his mistress was "Better--decidedly better. Good
hopes were now entertained of her recovery."
Then Sydney had an interview with Mrs Grier, in her element of
lugubrious excitement. In somewhat less sanguine terms, she confirmed
the favourable report. "But the baby," she went on to say, "was in a
very sad way, poor lamb!--only just alive, and no more."
"The baby!" repeated Sydney, in amazement. "I had no idea--I had no
thought of a baby for a long time to come."
"I or any one else, ma'am. It is very hard upon it, poor innocent! to
have been hurried into this sad world, this valley of tears, so long
before it should have been. But it cannot live, ma'am--they say it is
quite impossible; and I am sure there are many of us--myself for one--
that will feel it is to be envied."
"Has my sister seen it? A boy, is it?" asked Sydney.
"No, ma'am--a girl, fortunately," replied Mrs Grier, with a curious
mingling of conventional sentiment with her unworldly aspirations. "My
mistress has seen it, for a moment,--this morning early, when for the
first time she seemed quite conscious. It was then she asked for you,
and my master sent at once. Poor dear lady! how pleased we were, to be
sure."
Real tears shone in the housekeeper's eyes, and Sydney began to like her
better.
"I wonder how soon I may see my sister?" she was just saying, when a
step in the hall caught her ear. It was Beauchamp. The door opened and
he came in--came in, looking well and fresh and handsome--offensively
well, thought Sydney; heartlessly cool and comfortable.
"This _is_ kind, truly kind," he exclaimed, really meaning what he said,
but unable to throw off the "amiable" manner and sweet tone habitual to
him when addressing any woman, especially a young one. "I had no idea
you could have come so quickly. You have heard, I hope, how much better
Eugenia is. All will now, I trust, go on well. She must have had a
narrow escape, though," and his voice grew graver.
"Yes," said Sydney; "I am inexpressibly thankful. But," she added, "the
poor little baby?"
"Ah, yes," replied Beauchamp, indifferently, "poor little thing! It's a
good thing it's a girl, is it not? You would like to see Eugenia soon,
would you not? The doctor said there would be no objection; she wishes
it so much. I can't tell you," he added, as he led the way upstairs, "I
can't tell you how thankful I have felt that I prevented her going to
Wareborough that day. The shock of finding it too late on getting there
would have been even worse, and after a fatiguing journey too. Yes, I
am very thankful I put a stop to that." Sydney said nothing. She did
not wish to yield to prejudice or dislike, but half a dozen times in the
course of this five minutes' conversation, her brother-in-law had grated
on her feelings. It was very inconsiderate of him to speak so of the
journey to Wareborough, which he must know had been her dear dead
father's proposal. She almost wished Frank had not told him Eugenia
would have been "too late." She had expected to find Beauchamp full of
sympathy, and possibly of self-reproach; here he was, on the contrary,
priding himself on what he had done! At least he might have had the
grace to refrain from any allusion to so painful a subject. But she
said nothing. And soon, very soon, she forgot all about it for the
time, in the sorrowful delight of seeing Eugenia again, of listening to
her murmured words of intense, unaltered affection, of gratitude and
piteous grief.
"It was not the shock that did me harm," she whispered to Sydney, later
in the day; "it was _remorse_. Oh, to think of what he must have
thought of me! My kind, good father!"
Then Sydney, who had hitherto dreaded the subject, saw that the time had
come for delivering her father's message. She did so, word for word as
it had been given to her.
"And so you see, dear Eugenia," she added, in conclusion, "you need have
no remorseful feeling. _He_ never thought you indifferent; and had you
come, it would have been too late. Frank said so in his letter."
"Thank God!" whispered Eugenia; "and thank you, Sydney. I think now a
faint remembrance recurs to me of Beauchamp saying my going would have
been no use. But I took it as merely a vague consolation of his own.
Had I understood it properly, I might have controlled myself better, and
then perhaps I would not have been ill. I don't mind for myself, but
the little baby. Oh, Sydney, my poor little baby! They say she cannot
live!"
She turned her great sorrowful eyes to her sister, as if praying for a
more hopeful verdict; but Sydney dared not give it. She had seen the
poor little piteous atom of humanity. The only wonder to her was that
it lived at all.
"And it would have been such a pretty baby!" she murmured. Then another
thought struck her. "Has it been baptised?" she asked.
"Not yet. We sent to the Rectory, but Mr Dawes is away from home.
Then I sent to Stebbing, and Mr Mervyn is coming--he will soon be here.
That reminds me--let it be called `Sydney'--my mother's name and
yours."
"Will Captain Chancellor like it?" suggested Sydney, not without
hesitation.
"He need not be asked," answered Eugenia, quickly. "He cares nothing
about it--it is not a _boy_!" with bitter emphasis. "No, it is all my
own--living it is mine--dying, doubly mine. You will do as I ask,
Sydney dear?" she added, the almost fierceness of her tone melting again
into gentleness.
The little creature's name never became a source of discussion. The
feeble life flickered out that very night, leaving, short as had been
its span, one sore, desolate heart behind it.
Yet, physically, Eugenia made satisfactory progress towards recovery.
Sydney began to think of returning home, where her presence was much
needed. She did not feel that after the first she was of much comfort
to her sister; for as she grew stronger, a cloud of reserve seemed to
envelope Eugenia--she to whom it used to be impossible to conceal the
most passing fancy. To Sydney she was most loving and affectionate,
never wearied of talking over old days, full of interest in the
Thurstons' home-life and prospects. But of her own life and feelings
she said hardly a word. It might be right and wise to say nothing,
where there was nothing satisfactory to say, thought Sydney; but all the
same, it made her very unhappy. Knowing of old Eugenia's inclination to
extremes, she doubted if her grounds for disappointment and
dissatisfaction were altogether real and unexaggerated. But she could
not urge an unwilling confidence--especially on a subject of which she
felt she knew too little to be a wise adviser. For her brother-in-law
was almost a complete stranger to her. He was very civil and attentive
to her the few times they saw each other during this week, and more than
once repeated his thanks for her prompt, response to his summons; but
when she said she must fix the day of her return home, he did not press
her to stay.
"You must come again before long," he said, "and by that time Eugenia
will be all right again. I expect my sister here in a week or two,
which will cheer us up a little. It will never do for Eugenia to yield
to depression. The doctors assure me she will be all right if she will
keep up her spirits, and Mrs Eyrecourt is just the person to discourage
that sort of thing--low spirits and hypochondria."
Sydney sighed. She knew very little of Mrs Eyrecourt, but she felt an
instinctive doubt of her sister's "grief being med'cinable" by such
doctoring.
The day before she left, a little incident occurred which broke down
temporarily one side of the barrier of reserve with which Eugenia had
surrounded herself. Sydney was sitting by her sister's bedside; the
invalid lying so quietly, that the watcher thought she must be asleep.
Suddenly an unexpected sound broke the stillness--an infant's cry, once
or twice repeated, then the sort of sobbing "refrain" with which a very
sleepy little baby soothes itself to peace again.
Much annoyed, Sydney rose quickly but softly from her seat, and was
hastening across the room, when Eugenia's voice recalled her.
"What was that, Sydney?" she inquired. "I was not asleep."
"I am so sorry, dear," said Sydney, looking very guilty, the colour
mounting to her forehead, "I am afraid it is my little boy. You know I
was obliged to bring him; but I hoped this would not have happened.
Mrs Grier gave us rooms at the other end of the house on purpose; but I
suppose nurse, thinking him safely asleep, ventured along the passage."
For a minute Eugenia did not speak. Then she said, gently, "Never mind,
Sydney. Perhaps it is best. Kiss me, Sydney." And when her sister's
face was closely pressed to her own, she whispered, "Even to you, dear,
I can hardly tell _how_ terrible is my feeling of loss--loss of what I
never had, you might almost say. But oh, if you knew how I looked
forward to what that little life would be to me! Sydney, if you are
ever inclined to blame me, pity me too. I need it sorely."
The sisters seemed almost to have changed places. Sydney could hardly
answer for the tears that choked her. Eugenia was perfectly calm.
"Poor Eugenia, dear Eugenia!" said Sydney at last; "I do know a little
at least of what you must be feeling. There have even been times in the
last few days when I have not wanted to see my baby--when I have felt
almost angry with him for looking _so_ strong and healthy. Oh, poor
Eugenia!" Eugenia drew her sister's face down and kissed her again.
"Do you remember, Sydney," she said, suddenly, "a day, long ago, when we
were putting camelias in our hair? Mine fell off the stalk, and you
said you would not wear yours either, because I had none."
"Yes," said Sydney, "I remember." Then they were both silent.
"I should like to see your boy," said Eugenia, in a little--"not to-day,
perhaps, but before you go. Bring him to me the last thing, that I may
kiss him."
Sydney did so, "the last thing" before leaving the next morning. And
thus the sisters parted again.
Three more weeks found Eugenia, comparatively speaking, almost well
again, and beginning to resume her usual habits. It was the end of May
by now; surely the loveliest season of the year, when the colours are
brilliant yet tender with the dewy freshness wanting to them later in
the year; when there is sunshine without glare, life in abundance with
no attendant shadow of already encroaching decay. A season when happy
people feel doubly so from nature's apparent sympathy with their
rejoicing, but a season of increased suffering to the sorrowful. Oh,
but the sunshine can mock cruelly sometimes! And oh, the agony in the
carols of the soulless little birds! And the flowers, even! How
heartless the daffodils are, and the primroses, and worst of all,
perhaps, the violets! How can you show your heads again, you terrible
little blossoms, and in the self-same spots too, where last year my
darling's voice cried out in rapture that she had found you, hidden in
the very lane where, day by day, in childish faith, she unweariedly
sought you? Does she gather spring flowers now? Are there primroses
and violets in the better land? There is "no need of the sun, neither
of the moon" in that country, we are told; "there is no night there,"
"neither death, nor sorrow, nor crying." Should not this satisfy us?
But it does not. We long, ah! how we long sometimes to know a little,
however little more, to see if but for an instant the faces of the
children playing in the golden street, by the banks of the crystal
river.
Eugenia's little baby's death had been a bitter disappointment, but in
its momentary life there had been no time for the gathering of hereafter
bitter associations. Yet the bright spring days added to her sadness
and exaggerated her tendency to dwell upon her losses. They had been
many and severe, she said to herself: the father whose affection had
been tried and true; the infant in whose existence she had bound up many
hopes for the future--and besides these, what more had she not lost?
"Trust, hope, heart, and energy," she sadly answered.
One day, nearly a month after Sydney's visit, Beauchamp told her with
evident satisfaction, that he had heard from his sister; "she hopes to
be here to-morrow," he added.
"To-morrow," repeated Eugenia, aghast. She had heard something of an
impending visit from Mrs Eyrecourt, but she had heard it vaguely.
Absorbed in her own thoughts, it had never occurred to her that it was
likely to take place so soon, or that the actual date would be fixed
without her being further consulted.
"Yes, certainly, to-morrow. Why not?" said Beauchamp, coolly. "And I
am exceedingly glad she is coming. It is quite time you tried to rouse
yourself a little, my dear Eugenia, and some fresh society will do you
good."
"Society, Beauchamp?" answered Eugenia, reproachfully, "You cannot
expect me to go into society _yet_!"
"I wasn't speaking of going out, or anything of that kind. I dare say
you are hardly up to that; but Dr Benyon says you would be ever so much
better if you had some variety. When Gertrude comes, I want to arrange
for going away somewhere."
"I did not mean with regard to my health," said Eugenia. "I am well
enough. I meant, considering other things; how recently--" she broke
off, abruptly. "I would rather have been left alone a little longer;
but, of course, a visit from your sister is different from any strangers
coming."
Captain Chancellor looked slightly uneasy; an intuitive feeling had
warned Eugenia that something more was to come. "Gertrude is coming
alone," he said; "but she asks me if we can have the Chancellor girls
here a fortnight hence. They are going to stay with her at Winsley, and
she would like them to be here part of the time. And of course, there
is no possible objection to it? They know we are not going out just
now. One or two small dinner-parties and a little croquet, or that sort
of thing, will be all they will expect."
Eugenia made no reply. Beauchamp began to get vexed. "You surely are
not going to make a new trouble out of such a simple thing as this?" he
exclaimed.
"I don't want to make any trouble," she answered, drearily. "I must do
what you tell me; but I do think it cruel of you to put this upon me. I
don't expect you to sympathise in my greatest loss, but I _cannot_
understand your not caring about our poor little baby."
Captain Chancellor gave vent to a muttered exclamation of impatience.
"You are infatuated, Eugenia!" he exclaimed. "Do you never look at home
as the cause of half the things you complain of? It is not true that I
did not care about the poor little thing. I cared as much as was
natural considering the circumstances, and that it was not a boy. But I
detest exaggerated sentiment. And really, you have no right to reproach
me. You must know you have no one to thank for this particular trouble
but yourself; your own want of self-control and wild behaviour because I
had prevented your going off to Wareborough in that insane way, were the
cause of it all. I did not intend ever to have alluded to it; but you
provoke me, I do believe, intentionally. I cannot express the least
wish of late but you set yourself against it. It never seems to occur
to you that I have my share of disagreeables to put up with. Do you
think the sort of life I have had the last few months was what I looked
forward to, or that any man would envy me a wife everlastingly in low
spirits like you?"
He left the room as he spoke, having, as usual, when he lost his temper,
said more than he meant or really felt, regretting already that he had
said so much, and at the same time mortified by the consciousness of his
rudeness and unkindness. Eugenia remained where he had left her, some
degrees more miserable than she had been before this conversation,
though such painful scenes were not, unfortunately, so rare as to give
any fresh direction to the current of her unhappiness. "Yes," she
thought to herself, "it is all true--it has been a wretched mistake for
him too. It is all true, but ah! how terrible for him to be the one to
say it."
The next day brought Mrs Eyrecourt--Mrs Eyrecourt, in brilliant
spirits and beautiful attire. For the correct number of months of
mourning for her cousins having expired some time ago, she had deserted
the trailing crape in which her sister-in-law had last seen her, for
less lugubrious plumage. And on Eugenia's present mood, unfortunately,
the bright though well assorted colours struck as discordantly as last
year's sable on the feelings of the bride. But there was an unexpected
pleasure in store for Beauchamp's wife. Out of the fly containing the
luggage and the maids a small figure appeared. It was Floss--Floss,
smaller, queerer, greener-eyed, and more defiant than ever; but
internally, nevertheless, in a state of intense excitement and delight
at the thought of seeing Aunty 'Genia again, hearing more dolls'
stories, possibly--who could say?--seeing those venerable ladies
themselves.
"Floss wouldn't come in the carriage with her uncle and me," said
Gertrude, turning to Eugenia. "She is more of a little savage than
ever, I fear."
"Poor Floss!" thought her aunt, as she kissed her.
Gertrude was in a very amiable mood. She congratulated Eugenia on
looking so well--"Ever so much better than she had expected to see her,"
while wondering in her secret heart at the sad change in her
sister-in-law's looks. "It must be partly her clothes," she decided,
and marvelled more that her brother allowed her to wear such
"atrociously made mourning." She sighed as she reflected what a
different wife she would have liked to see at the head of her brother's
table, and sighed again as she remembered her own short-sightedness in
another direction. But her sighs were upstairs in her own room.
Downstairs, she was amiability and liveliness itself. She talked, and
laughed, and asked questions about the neighbours and neighbourhood, to
which nearly all the answers came from Beauchamp--for in most instances
Eugenia's information was at fault, her interest palpably languid. Yet
when Gertrude turned from her with a patronising "Oh, no, of course, you
have not met them--it was when you were ill;" or "Ah, yes, I remember
you were not there," Eugenia felt unreasonably indignant. Altogether,
this first evening left her with a mortifying sensation of being an
outsider in her own home; she felt again the same sensation of
loneliness and isolation, of being in no wise essential to her husband's
well-being, which had so depressed her the first evening at Winsley.
And more bitterly than ever her thoughts went back over and over again
to the irreparable past.
"Aunty," inquired Floss, a day or two after this, when she was alone
with Eugenia, "are you as pwetty as you used to be?"
The stare of the blue-green eyes was rather disconcerting.
"I don't know, Moss," said Eugenia. "I daresay not, but it doesn't
matter. What makes you ask?"
"What does `failed off' mean?" continued Floss, pursuing her own train
of thought.
"I won't answer silly questions, Floss," replied her aunt, her face
flushing, nevertheless.
"'Tisn't silly," said Floss, indignantly. "Big people said it. Mamma
said you had failed off _tewibly_, and Uncle Beachey looked cross and
said it was your own fault. I don't think Uncle Beachey is nice at all.
He spoke so cwoss. I thought falling off meant tumbling and hurting
yourself, but it doesn't. It's something about being pwetty and ugly.
And mamma said she wished she hadn't interfered once, and then somebody
else who wouldn't have failed off would have been here. Does it mean
about widing? Everybody says Aunty Woma looks pwetty widing, and I
_know_ mamma meant her."
So far, in a sort of stupor of bewildered amazement, Eugenia had
listened in silence to the child's curiously jumbled revelation.
Suddenly she recollected herself.
"Floss," she said, sternly, "you must not repeat what you were not meant
to hear, and I will not listen to you."
"It wasn't not meant for me not to hear. I was just playing with my new
doll. I never listened behind the curtains. I never did," said Floss,
"not since the day I cut the worm up, and Uncle Beachey scolded me. The
day Aunty Woma said she'd go away, and Uncle Beachey was angwy. And I
never told that mamma scolded Aunty Woma till she cwied. Aunty Woma
didn't go away, but Uncle Beachey did, and when he comed back he bwought
you, Aunty 'Genia, and I wish you wouldn't look so gwave. Please don't
be angwy with me." There was an "et tu, Brute," inflection in the
child's tone which, through all her tumultuous feelings, touched
Eugenia. She stooped to kiss Floss, promising her not to be angry if
she would never again talk about what she heard big people say. Then
she sent her away to her dolls, and sat by herself trying to think over
what she had heard, calmly; trying to persuade herself the inference to
be drawn from Floss's garbled communication was not what her first
instinct had told her it was; trying to believe it _could_ not be true
that her husband had never really cared for her--that he had married her
merely in a fit of mortified vanity, "out of pique."
Beauchamp was away that day. He had left home on a two days' visit in
the neighbourhood, in which, greatly to her disgust, Mrs Eyrecourt had
not been invited to accompany him. Had he been at home, doubtless
Eugenia, in her first impetuous excitement, would have rushed to him for
confirmation or refutation of what her morbid imagination had already
worked up into a plausible history of deception and concealment on his
part--of cruel advantage taken of her inexperience and confiding trust--
an explanation, she told herself, of his having so quickly grown weary
of her, to which it now seemed to her innumerable, little-considered
trifles pointed as the true one.
"Not that I blame him for loving Roma," she thought. "Oh no--not that.
But he knew I was giving him my all, and he took it, sought it, knowing
he had nothing to give me in return. Ah, it was cruel!"
She pressed her hands to her throbbing temples and burning eyes. It was
too late in the day for any relief by tears; she felt as if she could
never cry again. For a long time she sat there motionless. Then a
sudden thought struck her. "I will hear the whole truth," she said,
with a sudden fierce determination. "I will make his sister tell it
all. There is nothing dishonourable in forcing her to tell me what he
has wilfully concealed, if, as the child says, they talk together of the
past, and wish now--now that I am his wife, the mother of his child,"
(this thought, alas! bringing no softening influence with it) "that it
could be undone. Yes, I will make her tell it all, and she shall see
what she has done--ruined two lives, if not three."
But through her tremendous excitement she remembered one trifling
consideration. She would not betray poor baby Floss. Mrs Eyrecourt
should never know how she had learnt the truth.