On reaching home that night, Arabella surprised herself thinking, in the
midst of her anguish: “Whatever is said of us, it cannot be said that
there is a house where the servants have been better cared for.” And
this reflection continued to burn with an astounding brilliancy through
all the revolutions of a mind contemplating the dread of a fallen
fortune, the fact of a public exposure, and what was to her an ambition
destroyed. Adela had no such thoughts. “I have been walking on a plank,”
she gasped from time to time, as she gave startled glances into the
abyss of poverty, and hurried to her bedchamber--a faint whisper of
self-condemnation in her ears at the 'I' being foremost. The sisters
were too proud to touch upon one another's misery in complaints, or to
be common by holding debate on it. They had not once let their eyes meet
at Besworth, as the Tinleys wonderingly noticed. They said good night
to their papa, who was well enough to reply, adding peremptorily,
“Downstairs at half-past eight,”--an intimation that he would be at the
break-fast table and read prayers as usual. Inexperienced in nervous
disease, they were now filled with the idea that he was possibly
acting--a notion that had never been kindled in them before; or,
otherwise, how came these rapid, almost instantaneous, recoveries?
Cornelia alone sounded near the keynote. Since the night that she had
met him in the passage, and the next morning when Mrs. Chump had raised
the hubbub about her loss, Cornelia's thoughts had been troubled by some
haunting spectral relationship with money. It had helped to make her
reckless in granting interviews to Purcell Barrett. “If we are poor, I
am free;” and that she might then give herself to whomever she pleased,
was her logical deduction. The exposure at Besworth, and the partial
confirmation of her suspicions, were not without their secret comfort
to her. In the carriage, coming home, Wilfrid had touched her hand
by chance, and pressed it with good heart. She went to the library,
imagining that if he wished to see her he would appear, and by exposing
his own weakness learn to excuse hers. She was right in her guess;
Wilfrid came. He came sauntering into the room with “Ah! you here?”
Cornelia consented to play into his hypocrisy. “Yes, I generally think
better here,” she replied.
“And what has this pretty head got to do with thinking?”
“Not much, I suppose, my lord,” she replied, affecting nobly to
acknowledge the weakness of the female creature.
Wilfrid kissed her with an unaccustomed fervour. This delicate mumming
was to his taste. It was yet more so when she spoke playfully to him of
his going soon to be a married man. He could answer to that in a smiling
negative, playing round the question, until she perceived that he really
desired to have his feeling for the odd dark girl who had recently shot
across their horizon touched, if only it were led to by the muffled ways
of innuendo.
As a dog, that cannot ask you verbally to scratch his head, but wishes
it, will again and again thrust his head into your hand, petitioning
mutely that affection may divine him, so:--but we deal with a
sentimentalist, and the simile is too gross to be exact. For no
sooner was Wilfrid's head scratched, than the operation stuck him as
humiliating; in other words, the moment he felt his sisters fingers
in the ticklish part, he flew to another theme, then returned, and so
backward and forward--mystifying her not slightly, and making her think,
“Then he has no heart.” She by no means intended to encourage love for
Emilia, but she hoped for his sake, that the sentiment he had indulged
was sincere. By-and-by he said, that though he had no particular
affection for Lady Charlotte, he should probably marry her.
“Without loving her, Wilfrid? It is unfair to her; it is unfair to
yourself.”
Wilfrid understood perfectly who it was for whom she pleaded thus
vehemently. He let her continue: and when she had dwelt on the horrors
of marriages without love, and the supreme duty of espousing one who has
our 'heart's loyalty,' he said, “You may be right. A man must not play
with a girl. He must consider that he owes a duty to one who is more
dependent;”--implying that a woman s duty was distinct and different in
such a case.
Cornelia could not rise and plead for her sex. Had she pushed forth the
'woman,' she must have stood for her.
This is the game of Fine Shades and Nice Feelings, under whose empire
you see this family, and from which they are to emerge considerably
shorn, but purified--examples of One present passage of our
civilization.
“At least, dear, if” (Cornelia desperately breathed the name) “--if
Emilia were forced to give her hand...loving...you...we should be right
in pitying her?”
The snare was almost too palpable. Wilfrid fell into it, from the
simple passion that the name inspired; and now his hand tightened. “Poor
child!” he moaned.
She praised his kind heart: “You cannot be unjust and harsh, I know
that. You could not see her--me--any of us miserable. Women feel, dear.
Ah! I need not tell you that. Their tears are not the witnesses. When
they do not weep, but the hot drops stream inwardly:--and, oh! Wilfrid,
let this never happen to me. I shall not disgrace you, because I intend
to see you happy with...with her, whoever she is; and I would leave
you happy. But I should not survive it. I can look on Death. A marriage
without love is dishonour.”
Sentiment enjoys its splendid moods. Wilfrid having had the figure of
his beloved given to him under nuptial benediction, cloaked, even as
he wished it to be, could afford now to commiserate his sister, and
he admired her at the same time. “I'll take care you are not made a
sacrifice of when the event is fixed,” he said--as if it had never been
in contemplation.
“Oh! I have not known happiness for years, till this hour,” Cornelia
whispered to him bashfully; and set him wondering why she should be
happy when she had nothing but his sanction to reject a man.
On the other hand, her problem was to gain lost ground by letting him
know that, of the pair, it was not she who would marry beneath her
station. She tried it mentally in various ways. In the end she thought
it best to give him this positive assurance. “No,” he rejoined, “a woman
never should.” There was no admission of equality to be got out of him,
so she kissed him. Of their father's health a few words were said--of
Emilia nothing further. She saw that Wilfrid's mind was resolved upon
some part to play, but shrank from asking his confidence, lest facts
should be laid bare.
At the breakfast-table Mr. Pole was a little late. He wore some of his
false air of briskness on a hazy face, and read prayers--drawing breath
between each sentence and rubbing his forehead; but the work was done by
a man in ordinary health, if you chose to think so, as Mrs. Chump did.
She made favourable remarks on his appearance, begging the ladies to
corroborate her. They were silent.
“Now take a chop, Pole, and show your appetite,” she said. “'A
Chump-chop, my love?' my little man used to invite me of a mornin'; and
that was the onnly joke he had, so it's worth rememberin'.”
A chop was placed before Mr. Pole. He turned it in his plate, and
wonderingly called to mind that he had once enjoyed chops. At a loss to
account for the distressing change, he exclaimed to himself, “Chump! I
wish the woman wouldn't thrust her husband between one's teeth. An egg!”
The chop was displaced for an egg, which he tapped until Mrs. Chump
cried out, “Oh! if ye're not like a postman, Pole; and d'ye think ye've
got a letter for a chick inside there?”
This allusion scared Mr. Pole from the egg. He quitted the table,
muttering, “Business! business!” and went to the library.
When he was gone Mrs. Chump gave a cry to know where Braintop was,
but, forgetting him immediately, turned to the ladies and ejaculated,
“Broth'm. It's just brothin' he wants. Broth, I say, for anny man that
won't eat his chop or his egg. And, my dears, now, what do ye say to
me for bringing him home to ye? I expect to be thanked, I do; and then
we'll broth Pole together, till he's lusty as a prize-ox, and capers
like a monkey.”
Wretched woman! that could not see the ruin she had inflicted--that
could not imagine how her bitter breath cut against those sensitive
skins! During a short pause little Mrs. Lupin trotted to the door, and
shot through it, in a paroxysm.
Then Wilfrid's voice was heard. He leaned against a corner of the
window, and spoke without directly looking at Mrs. Chump; so that she
was some time in getting to understand the preliminary, “Madam, you
must leave this house.” But presently her chin dropped; and after feeble
efforts to interpose an exclamation, she sat quiet--overcome by the
deliberate gravity of his manner, and motioning despairingly with her
head, to relieve the swarm of unborn figure-less ideas suggested by his
passing speech. The ladies were ranged like tribunal shapes. It could
not be said of souls so afflicted that they felt pleasure in the scene;
but to assist in the administration of a rigorous justice is sweet to
them that are smarting. They scarcely approved his naked statement
of things when he came to Mrs. Chump's particular aspiration in the
household--viz., to take a station and the dignity of their name. The
effect he produced satisfied them that the measure was correct. Her back
gave a sharp bend, as if an eternal support had snapped. “Oh! ye hit
hard,” she moaned.
“I tell you kindly that we (who, you will acknowledge, must count for
something here) do not sanction any change that revolutionizes our
domestic relations,” said Wilfrid; while Mrs. Chump heaved and rolled
on the swell of the big words like an overladen boat. “You have only to
understand so much, and this--that if we resist it, as we do, you,
by continuing to contemplate it, are provoking a contest which will
probably injure neither you nor me, but will be death to ham in his
present condition.”
Mrs. Chump was heard to mumble that she alone knew the secret of
restoring him to health, and that he was rendered peaky and poky only by
people supposing him so.
“An astonishin' thing!” she burst out. “If I kiss 'm and say 'Poor
Pole!' he's poor Pole on the spot. And, if onnly I--”
But Wilfrid's stern voice flowed over her. “Listen, madam, and let this
be finished between us. You know well that when a man has children, he
may wish to call another woman wife--a woman not their mother; but the
main question is, will his children consent to let her take that place?
We are of one mind, and will allow no one--no one--to assume that
position. And now, there's an end. We'll talk like friends. I have only
spoken in that tone that you might clearly comprehend me on an important
point. I know you entertain a true regard for my father, and it is that
belief which makes me--”
“Friends!” cried Mrs. Chump, getting courage from the savour of cajolery
in these words. “Friends! Oh, ye fox! ye fox!”
And now commenced a curious duett. Wilfrid merely wished to terminate
his sentence; Mrs. Chump wantonly sought to prevent him. Each was
burdened with serious matter; but they might have struck hands here,
had not this petty accidental opposition interposed. --“Makes me feel
confident...” Wilfrid resumed.
“And Pole's promos, Mr. Wilfrud; ye're forgettin' that.”
“Confident, ma'am.”
“He was the first to be soft.”
“I say, ma'am, for his sake--”
“An' it's for his sake. And weak as he is on 's legs, poor fells; which
marr'ge 'll cure, bein' a certain rem'dy.”
“Mrs. Chump! I beg you to listen.”
“Mr. Wilfrud! and I can see too, and it's three weeks and ye kissed
little Belloni in the passage, outside this vary door, and out in the
garden.”
The blow was entirely unexpected, and took Wilfrid's breath, so that he
was not ready for his turn in this singular piece of harmony.
“Ye did!” Mrs. Chump rejoiced to behold how her chance spark kindled
flame in his cheeks. “It's pos'tuv ye did. And ye're the best blusher
of the two, my dear; and no shame to ye, though it is a garl's business.
That little Belloni takes to 't like milk; but you--”
Wilfrid strode up to her, saying imperiously, “I tell you to listen!”
She succumbed at once to a show of physical ascendency, murmuring,
“It's sure he was seen kissin' of her twice, and mayhap more; and hearty
smacks of the lips, too--likin' it.”
The ladies rewarded Wilfrid for his service to their cause by absolutely
hearing nothing--a feat women can be capable of.
Wilfrid, however, was angered by the absurdity of the charge and the
scene, and also by the profane touch on Emilia's name.
“I must tell you, ma'am, that for my father's sake I must desire you to
quit this--you will see the advisability of quitting this house for a
time.”
“Pole's promus! Pole's promus!” Mrs. Chump wailed again.
“Will you give me your assurance now that you will go, to be our guest
again subsequently?”
“In writin' and in words, Mr. Wilfrud!”
“Answer me, ma'am.”
“I will, Mr. Wilfrud; and Mr. Braintop's a witness, knowin' the nature
of an oath. There naver was a more sacrud promus. Says Pole, 'Martha--'”
Wilfrid changed his tactics. Sitting down by her side, he said: “I am
sure you have an affection for my father.”
“I'm the most lovin' woman, my dear! If it wasn't for my vartue I don't
know what'd become o' me. Ye could ask Chump, if he wasn't in his grave,
poor fella! I'll be cryin' like a squeezed orr'nge presently. What with
Chump and Pole, two's too many for a melanch'ly woman.”
“You have an affection for my father I know, ma'am. Now, see! he's ill.
If you press him to do what we certainly resist, you endanger his life.”
Mrs. Chump started back from the man who bewildered her brain without
stifling her sense of justice. She knew that there was another way of
putting the case, whereby she was not stuck in the criminal box; but the
knowledge groped about blindly, and finding herself there, Mrs. Chump
lost all idea of a counter-accusation, and resorted to wriggling and
cajolery. “Ah! ye look sweeter when ye're kissin' us, Mr. Wilfrud; and I
wonder where the little Belloni has got to!”
“Tell me, that there maybe no misunderstanding.” Wilfrid again tried to
fix her.
“A rosy rosy fresh bit of a mouth she's got! and pouts ut!”
Wilfrid took her hand. “Answer me.”
“'Deed, and I'm modust, Mr. Wilfrud.”
“You do him the honour to be very fond of him. I am to believe that?
Then you must consent to leave us at the end of a week. You abandon
any idea of an impossible ceremony, and of us you make friends and not
enemies.”
At the concluding word, Mrs. Chump was no longer sustained by her
excursive fancy. She broke down, and wrung her hands, crying, “En'mies!
Pole's children my en'mies! Oh, Lord! that I should live to hear ut! and
Pole, that knew me a bride first blushin'!”
She wailed and wept so that the ladies exchanged compassionate looks,
and Arabella rose to press her hand and diminish her distress. Wilfrid
saw that his work would be undone in a moment, and waved her to her
seat. The action was perceived by Mrs. Chump.
“Oh, Mr. Wilfrud! my dear! and a soldier! and you that was my favourut!
If half my 'ffection for Pole wasn't the seein' of you so big and
handsome! And all my ideas to get ye marrud, avery one so snug in a
corner, with a neat little lawful ring on your fingers! And you that go
to keep me a lone woman, frightened of the darrk! I'm an awful coward,
that's the truth. And ye know that marr'ge is a holy thing! and it's
such a beaut'ful cer'mony! Oh, Mr. Wilfrud!--Lieuten't y' are! and I'd
have bought ye a captain, and made the hearts o' your sisters jump with
bonnuts and gowns and jools. Oh, Pole! Pole! why did you keep me so
short o' cash? It's been the roon of me! What did I care for your
brooches and your gifts? I wanted the good will of your daughters,
sir--your son, Pole!”
Mrs. Chump stopped her flow of tears. “Dear hearts!” she addressed
her silent judges, in mysterious guttural tones, “is it becas ye think
there's a bit of a fear of...?”
The ladies repressed a violent inclination to huddle together, like
cattle from the blowing East.
“I assure ye, 'taint poss'ble,” pursued Mrs. Chump. “Why do I 'gree
to marry Pole? Just this, now. We sit chirpin' and chatterin' of times
that's gone, and live twice over, Pole and myself; and I'm used to 'm;
and I was soft to 'm when he was a merry buck, and you cradle lumber
in ideas, mind! for my vartue was always un'mpeach'ble. That's just the
reason. So, come, and let's all be friends, with money in our pockuts;
yell find me as much of a garl as army of ye. And, there! my weak time's
after my Porrt, my dears. So, now ye know when I can't be refusin' a
thing to ye. Are we friends?--say! are we?”
Even if the ladies had been disposed to pardon her vulgarity, they could
not by any effort summon a charitable sentiment toward one of their sex
who degraded it by a public petition for a husband. This was not to be
excused; and, moreover, they entertained the sentimentalist's abhorrence
of the second marriage of a woman; regarding the act as simply
execrable; being treason to the ideal of the sex--treason to Woman's
purity--treason to the mysterious sentiment which places Woman so high,
that when a woman slips there is no help for it but she must be smashed.
Seeing that each looked as implacable as the other, Mrs. Chump called
plaintively, “Arr'bella!”
The lady spoke:--
“We are willing to be your friends, Mrs. Chump, and we request that you
will consider us in that light. We simply do not consent to give you a
name....”
“But, we'll do without the name, my dear,” interposed Mrs. Chump. “Ye'll
call me plain Martha, which is almost mother, and not a bit of 't.
There--Cornelia, my love! what do ye say?”
“I can only reiterate my sister's words, which demand no elucidation,”
replied Cornelia.
The forlorn woman turned her lap towards the youngest.
“Ad'la! ye sweet little cajoler! And don't use great cartwheels o' words
that leave a body crushed.”
Adela was suffering from a tendency to levity, which she knew to be
unbefitting the occasion, and likely to defeat its significance. She
said: “I am sure, Mrs. Chump, we are very much attached to you as Mrs.
Chump; but after a certain period of life, marriage does make people
ridiculous, and, as much for your sake as our own, we would advise
you to discard a notion that cannot benefit anybody. Believe in our
attachment; and we shall see you here now and then, and correspond with
you when you are away. And....”
“Oh, ye puss! such an eel as y' are!” Mrs. Chump cried out. “What are
ye doin' but sugarin' the same dose, miss! Be qu't! It's a traitor that
makes what's nasty taste agree'ble. D'ye think my stomach's a fool? Ye
may wheedle the mouth, but not the stomach.”
At this offence there fell a dead silence. Wilfrid gazed on them all
indifferently, waiting for the moment to strike a final blow.
When she had grasped the fact that Pity did not sit in the assembly,
Mrs. Chump rose.
“Oh! if I haven't been sitting among three owls and a raven,” she
exclaimed. Then she fussed at her gown. “I wish ye good day, young
ladus, and mayhap ye'd like to be interduced to No. 2 yourselves, some
fine mornin'? Prov'dence can wait. There's a patient hen on the eggs
of all of ye! I wouldn't marry Pole now--not if he was to fall flat and
howl for me. Mr. Wilfrud, I wish ye good-bye. Ye've done your work. I'll
be out of this house in half-an-hour.”
This was not quite what Wilfrid had meant to effect. He proposed to her
that she should come to the yacht, and indeed leave Brookfield to go on
board. But Mrs. Chump was in that frame of mind when, shamefully wounded
by others, we find our comfort in wilfully wounding ourselves. “No,” she
said (betraying a meagre mollification at every offer), “I'll not stop.
I won't go to the yacht--unless I think better of ut. But I won't
stop. Ye've hurrt me, and I'll say good-bye. I hope ye'll none of ye be
widows. It's a crool thing. And when ye've got no children of your own,
and feel, all your inside risin' to another person's, and they hate
ye--hate ye! Oh! Oh!--There, Mr. Wilfrud, ye needn't touch me elbow. Oh,
dear! look at me in the glass! and my hair! Annybody'd swear I'd been
drinkin'. I won't let Pole look at me. That'd cure 'm. And he must let
me have money, because I don't care for 'cumulations. Not now, when
there's no young--no garls and a precious boy, who'd say, when I'm gone,
'Bless her' Oh! 'Poor thing! Bless--' Oh! Augh!” A note of Sorrow's
own was fetched; and the next instant, with a figure of dignity, the
afflicted woman observed: “There's seven bottles of my Porrt, and
there's eleven of champagne, and some comut clar't I shall write where
ut's to be sent. And, if you please, look to the packing; for bits o'
glass and a red stain's not like your precious hope when you're undoin
a hamper. And that's just myself now, and I'm a broken woman; but naver
mind, nobody!”
A very formal and stiff “Good-bye,” succeeding a wheezy lamentation,
concluded the speech. Casting a look at the glass, Mrs. Chump retired,
with her fingers on the ornamental piece of hair.
The door having closed on her, Wilfrid said to his sisters: “I want one
of you to come with me to town immediately. Decide which will go.”
His eyes questioned Cornelia. Hers were dropped.
“I have work to do,” pleaded Adela.
“An appointment? You will break it.”
“No, dear, not--”
“Not exactly an appointment. Then there's nothing to break. Put on your
bonnet.”
Adela slipped from the room in a spirit of miserable obedience.
“I could not possibly leave papa,” said Arabella, and Wilfrid nodded
his head. His sisters knew quite well what was his business in town,
but they felt that they were at his mercy, and dared not remonstrate.
Cornelia ventured to say, “I think she should not come back to us till
papa is in a better state.”
“Perhaps not,” replied Wilfrid, careless how much he betrayed by his
apprehension of the person indicated.
The two returned late that night, and were met by Arabella at the gate.
“Papa has been--don't be alarmed,” she began. “He is better now. But
when he heard that she was not in the house, the blood left his hands
and feet. I have had to use a falsehood. I said, 'She left word that she
was coming back to-night or to-morrow.' Then he became simply angry. Who
could have believed that the sight of him so would ever have rejoiced
me!”
Adela, worn with fatigue, sobbed, “Oh! Oh!”
“By the way, Sir Twickenham called, and wished to see you,” said
Arabella curiously.
“Oh! so weary!” the fair girl ejaculated, half-dreaming that she saw
herself as she threw back her head and gazed at stars and clouds. “We
met Captain Gambier in town.” Here she pinched Arabella's arm.
The latter said, “Where?”
“In a miserable street, where he looked like a peacock in a quagmire.”
Arabella entreated Wilfrid to be careful in his management of their
father. “Pray, do not thwart him. He has been anxious to know where you
have gone. He--he thinks you have conducted Mrs. Chump, and will bring
her back. I did not say it--I merely let him think so.”
She added presently, “He has spoken of money.”
“Yes?” went Adela, in a low breath.
“Cornelia imagines that--that we--he is perhaps in--in want of it.
Merchants are, sometimes.”
“Did Sir Twickenham say he would call to-morrow?” asked Adela.
“He said that most probably he would.”
Wilfrid had been silent. As he entered the house, Mr. Pole's
bedroom-bell rang, and word came that he was to go to his father. As
soon as the sisters were alone, Adela groaned: “We have been hunting
that girl all day in vile neighbourhoods. Wilfrid has not spoken more
than a dozen sentences. I have had to dine on buns and hideous soup. I
am half-dead with the smell of cabs. Oh! if ever I am poor it will kill
me. That damp hay and close musty life are too intolerable! Yes! You see
I care for what I eat. I seem to be growing an animal. And Wilfrid is
going to drag me over the same course to-morrow, if you don't prevent
him. I would not mind, only it is absolutely necessary that I should see
Sir Twickenham.”
She gave a reason why, which appeared to Arabella so cogent that she
said at once: “If Cornelia does not take your place I will.”
The kiss of thanks given by Adela was accompanied by a request for tea.
Arabella regretted that she had sent the servants to bed.
“To bed!” cried her sister. “But they are the masters, not we! Really,
if life were a round of sensual pleasure, I think our servants might
congratulate themselves.”
Arabella affected to show that they had their troubles; but her
statement made it clear that the servants of Brookfield were peculiarly
favoured servants, as it was their mistress's pride to make them.
Eventually Adela consented to drink some sparkling light wine; and being
thirsty she drank eagerly, and her tongue was loosed, insomuch that she
talked of things as one who had never been a blessed inhabitant of the
kingdom of Fine Shades. She spoke of 'Cornelia's chances;' of 'Wilfrid's
headstrong infatuation--or worse;' and of 'Papa's position,' remarking
that she could both laugh and cry.
Arabella, glad to see her refreshed, was pained by her rampant tone; and
when Adela, who had fallen into one of her reflective 'long-shot' moods,
chanced to say, “What a number of different beings there are in the
world!” her reply was, “I was just then thinking we are all less unlike
than we suppose.”
“Oh, my goodness!” cried Adela. “What! am I at all--at all--in the
remotest degree--like that creature we have got rid of?”
The negative was not decisively enunciated or immediate; that is, it did
not come with the vehemence and volume that could alone have satisfied
Adela's expectation.
The “We are all of one family” was an offensive truism, of which Adela
might justly complain.
That night the ladies received their orders from Wilfrid--they were to
express no alarm before their father as to the state of his health, or
to treat him ostensibly as an invalid; they were to marvel publicly at
Mrs. Chump's continued absence, and a letter requesting her to return
was to be written. At the sign of an expostulation, Wilfrid smote them
down by saying that the old man's life hung on a thread, and it was for
them to cut it or not.