Edwards_Ought_We_to_Visit_Her.txt topic ['13', '324', '378', '393']
CHAPTER I
A QUESTION OF FINANCE.
A sitting-boom in one of the best hotels in Spa ; the hour,
four in the afternoon ; husband and wife alone together.
" Forty and eighty are certainly one hundred and twenty,"
says Mr. Theobald, resting his forehead on his hand, and applying
himself resolutely to a sheet of paper covered with figures that
lies before him. " From this subtract fifty ; add ten ; divide by
six. Jenny, my clear," after a minute or more of intense men-
tal difficulty, " I don't know where the balance can be, but on
paper, and according to all the four rules of arithmetic, we are
exactly fifty pounds better off than I thought."
' " Then you have forgotten to put down something," answers
Jane. "The only kind of arithmetic I believe in is counting
one's cash. How much money have you got in your pocket V
Jane's husband takes out a penknife, a book of cigarette-
paper, and four napoleons. He is an exceedingly near sighted-
man, and has to put up his eye-glass in order to survey his pro-
perty as he spreads it, in a neat row, upon the table. " Ridi-
culous to think" the eye-glass falls with a clink against his
watch-chain "ridiculous to think, in the face of all these
rows of figures, that we are reduced to four napoleons, Jane !"
" I remember the days when I thought four napoleons riches.
Why, only last Christmas I made a winter-dress for myself,
and a whole suit for Blossy, with less than four napoleons. Oh,
Theobald/' looking suddenly up from her work, a diaphanous
little blue cloud that shall presently be a bonnet, " what a
1
OUGHT WE TO VISIT HERf
queer sensation it is to think we are rich people at last ! that it
doesn't matter really whether we happen to have four napoleons
or forty in our pockets !"
" I don't think any sensation on the subject of money ought
to be queer to us," says Mr. Theobald ; " and as to feeling
rich why, I never felt in my life before that I was a pauper
till now. As long as we lived well, on nothing particular,
Jenny, the dregs of capital, ill-luck of friends, and other
eccentricities of fortune poverty was too undefined to weigh
upon me. To morrow was a scoundrel with whom we had no
personal acquaintance. To-day a jovial good fellow with whom
we were glad to share our bottle of champagne while it lasted.
Now "
"Now .your cousin is dead, bless him ! and we shall live in
a home of our own in our own dear country, ,, interrupts Jane,
with visible pride.
" I hope we shall like our own dear country when we get
there," remarks Mr. Theobald. " Our home, too. We have
done very well without a home hitherto ; I mean we have
carried it about the Continent very conveniently a meershaum
pipe, a work-box, and Blossy's doll ! How could we be more at
home than we are at this minute here, and how, my dear Jenny,
how, in the name of fortune, do you suppose we are going to
keep up a place like Theobald's on our pittance of an income V
" Pittance ! You call six hundred a-year (and we shall have
every farthing of that the lawyer's letter says so) you call six hun-
dred a-year a pittance ! "
" Six hundred a-year is enough for any man when it is not an
income," replies Mr. Theobald. " Given, no capital, no position,
the habits of vagrants, and the principles of well, well, Jenny,
let bygones be bygones. But, given certain conditions, and six
hundred a-year, got no one knows how, and spent after the same
fashion in the course of a year, is sufficient for any man, parti-
cularly if he has a wife who can make her bonnets and dresses,
and sufficient sense in his own head to keep clear of England.*
A QUESTION OF FINANCE.
" The dream of my life is England," says Jane, with a certain
wistfulness of tone. "Not London I know London too well
to dream about that but the country, a jolly homelike old
country-place such as Theobalds must be "
"And with the society of English people, all better off than
ourselves, both as regards this world and the next, for excite-
ment ? Ah, I hope the reality will come within a hundred miles
of the dream. We have been very contented as Pariahs, my
dear Jenny ; I hope we shall be equally so when we set up as
Brahmins.' 1
And Mr. Theobald, again having recourse to his eyeglass,
takes a meerschaum from his pocket, nils it, strikes a vesuvian,
and composedly begins to smoke.
" A whole batch of our nearest Chalkshire neighbours are now
in Spa, Jane/' he resumes after a time, "arrived here from
Germany last night. The Crosbies, pere et mtre ; the young
hopeful, Eawdon ; and the red-haired heiress, Af iss Marsland,
whom Kawdon's mamma destines him to marry. I ran against
them all this morning, thought I remembered old Crosbies face,
and, assisted by the visitor's book, found out who they were.
Jenny, my dear, what will life be like when you begin your little
battle for social existence with women like Mrs. Crosbie ? She
is clothed in an olive-green silk of the same awful and uncom-
promising texture that I remember about my own sisters years
ago. Virtue sits throned upon her forehead, exclusiveness in
her eye "
" And what does all this matter to us 1 and why should there
be a battle between me and anybody)" interrupts Jane. "I
want these Chalkshire people to like me well, to tolerate me,
because I'm your wife ; and for Blossy to grow up '*
"Into a Miss Marsland f finishes Theobald, as his wife
hesitates. " Quite impossible, Jane. Blossy is your daughter."
" Blossy hasn't got red hair," cries Jane, warming. " Blossy
mayn't be a lady any more than me, but she will be a pretty
12
OUGHT WE TO VISIT HER t
woman some day, whether your fine country people notice her
mother or not And a pretty woman "
But the sentence remains for ever incomplete. Jane gives a
significant nod at the reflection of her own bright face in an
opposite looking-glass, then bends it down again over her work,
and at the end of another five minutes the bonnet is finished.
Minute classifications of the human race are, as a rule, failures
when we try to reduce them to practice. But it may be said
broadly, perhaps, that women can be divided into two sections
those who know how to make a bonnet, and those who do not.
Jane knows how to make a bonnet right well, and never has she
felt the consciousness of triumphant art stronger in her soul
than at this minute.
" I don't say anything about black lace," she bursts forth ener-
getically, and apropos of nothing, as is her habit ; Mr. Theobald,
his feet perched on the window-sill at a higher elevation than
his head, a cloud of tobacco-smoke floating upward from his
lips, turns his head a good half -inch to listen ; " any one not
absolutely a fool can make a bonnet out of black lace. But
gauze ! blue gauze ! I should like to know whether there's a
lady yes, and what's more, a milliner in Chalkshire that
could make a bonnet like this V
"Not one of them could look as you will look in it, my dear
Jenny," says Theobald, in his pleasant lazy voice.
Jane turns away with just visible impatience from the com-
pliment, and walking across to one of the many mirrors with
which the room is lined, begins the process (a process beset with
misgivings even to the fairest and youngest woman living) of
"trying on" her bonnet.
To say that it is not absolute perfection, needing no after-
touch, no subtle inspiration of mature genius, would be only to
say that the artist is mortal. It must be pinched back off the
temples ; must be raised the third of an inch in diadem ; the
effect must be hazarded of knotting the gauzy strings around the
throat, then of letting them stream unbound upon the shoulders ;
A QUESTION OF FINANCE.
finally, one must see oneself aided by an opposite mirror in
different angles : profile ; three-quarters ; in perspective 1
" It is perfect," cries Jane, at last " I never looked better in
a bonnet in my life I" And saying this she advances and stands
before her husband ; stands before him, no longer with an air
of questioning or doubt, but rather with the calm consciousness
of assured artistic success written on her face.
What a fresh face it is ! Mrs. Theobald has been married
* close upon four years, but her cheeks are just as blooming, her
blue eyes as limpid, her smile as delightfully frank, as on the
day when Theobald, after a fortnight's acquaintance, made her,
an unfledged ballet-girl of sixteen, his wife.
She is, but scarcely looks, above the middle height of English
women, has large well-balanced shoulders, an exquisite waist
if judged by a sculptor's, not a corset-maker's standard and
decidedly more of undulating, flowing ease in her movements
than women of the world are prone to display.
"Till I was sixteen till the time you raised me above my
station, sir I was trained to move my limbs well," says Jane,
when Theobald occasionally hints to her how vividly some trick
of gait or manner brings old theatrical associations before his
mind. " And although I am in the position of a lady now, I
can't remember always to be awkward."
Whalebone and steel have as little share in her lithe sym-
metry as have Kalydor or pearl-powders with the honest car-
nation and white of her complexion. Everything about Jane is
real ; terribly real, impostors of all classes are made to feel
when they come too nigh her. She is somewhat untidy at
times ; being her own milliner, a dress or bonnet, wanted for
such an hour, has occasionally to be finished imperfectly as
regards the length of stitches ; but clean clean, her husband
affirms with gravity, to a vice. The smell of primroses, th(
, sweetness of April fields, all things wholesome, out-of-door,
vernal are irresistibly summoned before your vision when you
look at Jane. Her face is the delight of artists, the despair of
OUGHT WE TO "VISIT HER t
photographers. It has not a perfect feature, and yet, with its
changeful expressions and brilliant colouring, and absolute
naturalness, it is so perfect 1 "The good looks of youth and
robust health/' say her detractors, who are, without exception,
of her own sex. " Her mouth is too wide, her eyes are common-
place. She has two distinct marks of smallpox on her forehead,
and you have only to look at her in a mirror to see that her nose
is not set straight on her f ace/
Poor Jane ! And she continues charming still.
On this particular afternoon an afternoon destined, in more
ways than one, to prove a landmark in her life she is dressed
in a little striped blue-and-white muslin of twenty-five francs,
with a black-lace cape round her shoulders. A pair of cream-
coloured gloves, a white parasol, a fresh-gathered rose for her
waist-belt, lie in readiness on her work-table.
" You are coming with me, Theobald V For a long minute
Mr. Theobald's eyes and pipe have been literally sending forth
incense at the shrine of Jane's vanity. " Do now, like a good
old soul ! It isn't much trouble to walk as far as the avenue,
and then, if these Chalkshire people are about "
" Oh ! you are afraid of the Chalkshire Mrs. Grundy, already,
are you, Jenny? Well, 111 come and do a little respectability,
for her edification, by-and-by, if I can remember not to fall
asleep meanwhile. As a precautionary measure, hadn't you
better take Blossy for your chaperon now V
" Blossy went out with Elize after her dinner. Young monkey,
see what she has been doing here !" Jane picks up a hideously-
battered doll, into whose dropsical body shreds of blue crape,
ribbon, and other odds and ends of finery, are thickly pinned.
" Isn't tliat taste ? What, not for a baby only three years old !
And see, she's actually cut Nancy's hair short on the forehead,
to be in the fashion, bless her heart !"
"Bless her bless her I" says Theobald, stretching out his
hand theatrically over Nancy's battered head.
The colour rises into Jane's cheeks. " Oh, you always turr
A QUESTION OF FINANCE.
things into ridicule ; you never see any cleverness in what the
child does but I do. Very likely she won't be accomplished,
book-clever, as your fine county ladies are, but she'll be able to
work at her needle, to use her hands, to be useful, Mr. Theo-
bald ! and, as far as I can see, those are the first accomplishments
men require from their wives."
Mrs. Theobald puts Nancy tenderly aside, takes up her gloves
and parasol, and moves towards the door.
" If Blossy can use her hands (and her tongue) as her dear
mother does, Jenny, shell be a treasure, an inestimable treasure,
to the man who is fortunate enough to win her."
" Yes you mean so much of that I I know so well what your
compliments are worth I*
But she turns, half mollified. A word can thaw, as a word
can chill the girl, so long as the word be spoken by Theobald's
lips.
Mr. Theobald raises himself from his reclining position, and
takes his pipe from between his lips. " I mean it always when
I say flattering things of you, my love. If Blossy only inherits
half of her mother's admirable qualities, she will be ''
" Make haste, please. I don't want to lose more than I can
help of the band. If poor little Blossy inherits my gifts ? "
" She will be an exceedingly charming woman, Jane. A good
milliner ; on occasion, a good cook ; a perfect dancer ; a
thorough adept in the art of making any young fool who is
taken by her pretty face miserable ; and to her husband at all
times the most excellent company in the world."
The blood is not in Jane's cheeks alone now. It stains her
forehead, her throat ; an angry tremble comes round her
lips.
"A cook a milliner a dancer. Oh, I understand you,
Theobald a dancer ! And this, after four years, is the highest
praise you can find to give me 1 ?"
Theobald by now is thoroughly amused. No sarcasm, how-
ever bitter, can scathe his well-oiled spirit. How shall he guess
3 OUGHT WE TO VISIT HERt
that a jest, lightly spoken, lightly meant, may have power to
wound Jane's jealous heart to the quick !
"I dare say I could find much more if you would give me
time to think. You have faults, Jenny, of course, who has not]
But experience will cure these experience and the salutary
advice of judicious female friends, to which our altered position
in life will now enable you to have access. There are my sis-
ters a little crooked-tempered, a little straight-laced, certainly,
but an epitome of all female wisdom and propriety in them-
selves, Charlotte especially. Then, if you behave very well, you
may get to know our neighbour, Mrs. Crosbie ; perhaps, in time,
the archdeacon's wife, and "
u And you think sermons preached to me by any of these
women will do me, Jane Theobald, good % "Where is their right
to preach % They are better born ; they have never worked for
their bread ; have never toiled at a rehearsal, or grilled up
among the gas battens in a transformation scene 1 Does this
entitle them to mount the pulpit
" Morally, no ; socially, yes V*
" Then I hate such socialism." Theobald successfully represses
a smile ; " and I despise such morality. And if any of them
were to preach to me, and I was to listen which I shouldn't
it would demoralise yes, demoralise me !*
"Don't use strong language, my dear. It is a question
exclusively of finance. If we had come into six thousand a year,
instead of six hundred, we should be the nicest people in Chalk-
shire, Jenny, and want sermons from no man."
"I've read in the papers," goes on Jane, her tone waxing
hotter and hotter ; " I've read in the papers lately about the
grand model markets set up in Bethnal Green, and such places
set up for the poor. Bishops and lords at the opening cere-
mony, no selling on Sundays, cleanliness, ventilation, marble
slabs every advantage ! And the poor won't go to them, and
will sooner get worse things, and pay dearer to their old friends
the costermongers in the gutter."
A QUESTION OF FINANCE.
u The poor are proverbially an ungrateful set of devils/' is Mr
Theobald's cheerful generalisation.
"They are human beings, and I feel as they do," says Jane.
"Perhaps because I belong to the vagrant classes myself I don't
know about that but I feel as they do. I hate advantages
that have a do-me-good flavour in them "
" Certainly, my dear, but "
"I was born among people, among ideas that no man or
woman of your class of life can understand. You raised me
from them, Theobald, and if I've become, as you say sometimes,
' an imitation better than the reality of a lady/ it has been by
living with you, and getting hold of your outward manners
simply, but at heart n
" Jennie !"
"At heart Fve never given up my old associates, or my love
for them, or my belief that their lives are as good as other lives,
and I never wilL No, not if all the ladies from all the counties
in England were to preach to me at once. I'd be like the un-
grateful, heathen poor. I'd keep to the costermongers still."
After this there is silence for a minute. Mr. Theobald is the
first to speak. "Come here, Jenny, child/' holding out his
hand to her, kindly.
"No, thank you. I can hear quite as well where I am."
"Do you know the meaning of the word 'logic']"
" Of course I do. I wasn't pretending to talk logic. I was
talking common sense ; yes, and I was speaking from my heart,
straight out, as you as you, Theobald, never do !"
"Do you know, in the very least, how all this animated dis-
cussion began?"
" I know how it will end." She has moved across the room,
and looks at him, her fingers on the handle of the door. " You
said something just now about my having to do battle with fine
ladies like this Mrs. Crosbie, the fine ladies of your class, sir, in
Chalkshire. A few minutes afterwards you tell me of the good
I may get if I choose to listen, humbly and gratefully, to their
io OUGHT WE TO VISIT HER t
advice. Very well Now, 111 tell you the truth plainly. If
our going to England, and our living at Theobalds is to make
me a hypocrite I mean if I am to choose between becoming a
hypocrite, and declaring war to the knife with every fine lady
in Chalkshire, I have made my choice already. War to the
knife!"
Having uttered which trenchant declaration, Jane, like a
whirlwind (in blue and white muslin,) sweeps away from the
room and down the staircase of the hotel, and Mr. Theobald is
left alone to enjoy his pipe and cull the honey of his own
reflections.
CHAPTER IL
A QUESTION OP DUTY.
All is bright, sunshiny, cheerful, in the out-of-door world.
The season is crude as yet, for it is scarcely past the middle of
June ; but there are visitors enough to give an air of quasi-
occupation to the streets and avenues of the little mountain
town. And to those whose tastes affect sweet sunshine and
verdant country, rather than princesses and archdukes, early
summer is assuredly the time when Spa has most charms.
It is now the gayest hour of the afternoon, and down in the
Avenue of the Four Hours a band is playing. How pleasant it
is to catch the distant notes, prolonged, hushed, heightened at
intervals by the arena of wooded hills which form the walls of
the al fresco concert-room ! How gloriously the sun streams
through the linden boughs, turning the courtyard pavement of
the Hotel Bellevue into a mosaic work of ever-shifting gold !
What an altogether palatable thing mere existence is 1 What
an excellent place is this best of all possible worlds to live in !
"Each one of us," says Gothe, "must be drunk once."
Emma Marsland, yonder plain-looking English girl, who is
eating cakes and drinking afternoon coffee under the shadow of
the lindens, is drunk to-day i She shows, I must admit, few
A QUESTION OF DUTY. n
outward signs by which you could guess at her condition.
Emma has been brought up in a school that holds betrayal of
feeling as a forfeiture of the sex's dignity. Hers, too, is a face
not destined by nature to be the index of the soul. But still,
for all her calm exterior, the wine of life runs warm and tingling
through her veins ; the joyfullest cup we any of us taste, from
our birth to our burying, is at her lips. Emma Marsland loves,
and believes herself to be loved in return. For one day as
likely as not, one only, out of a perfectly sober, common-place
life every beat of the little heiress's heart, every breath she
draws, is intoxication.
" How good the coffee always is abroad, mamma." Not very
poetic ; but this is what she says, not what she thinks. " And
the kuchen" (Emma has learnt German for seven years in
Chalkshire, and pronounces the word coo-ken,) " so crisp and
short, better even than we got on the Rhine. I wonder whether
they put much butter in them V
" I should hope not, for your sake, Emmy," remarks a mascu-
line voice at her side. " The dish was brought out, full, a minute
ago, and you and mother have pretty nearly emptied it
already."
" Oh, Rawdon, what a shame ! Mamma, do you hear what
Rawdon accuses us of V y And poor Emma laughs and laughs
again, a rather tittering little school-girl laugh, at Rawdon's
exquisite stroke of humour. "You are glad enough to
get your own sherry-and-bitters of an afternoon, you know
you are, Rawdon, and you ought to be content, and not envy
mamma and me our coffee and coo-ken. Don't you know they
take the place of five o'clock tea to us now we are abroad V 1
"Do they !* returns Rawdon, in the absent tone of a man
who does not know a word he is saying. "La, la, la, la,
lira . . ." He follows, half aloud, the opening bars of the
distant waltz music, then is seized with a mighty yawn, which
he strives gallantly, but in vain, to stifle in its birth ; and then
he crosses his arms, pulls his hat a little over his eyes, gazes up
12 OUGHT WE TO VISIT HER t
at as much blue sky as the lindens leave visible, and begins to
whistle.
He is bored, poor young fellow, but unconsciously ; takes no
livelier interest in Emmy and the dead level of Emmy's small
talk than he has done any time during his twenty-two years of
life, but is unaware of his lack of interest. If his mother would
allow him to smoke he would be happier than he is, doubtless ;
and if his mother and Emma would retire to their own apart-
ments in the hotel, and leave him and his father to their
newspapers and their pipes, he would be happier still.
Other anarchy is there none in Rawdon Crosbie's spirit And
yet all the combustible materials wanted for rebellion are ready
stored there, waiting only the chance spark that shall kindle
them into a flame. Does not every day's experience show us
that this slumbering, negative, acquiescent kind of discontent
is the very symptom of all others that tells surest when men's
hearts are ripe f qr revolt ]
I have spoken at length of Jane Theobald ; let me give a few
words to the group of English people who are drinking their
coffee beneath her window ; the Chalkshire neighbours, who are
to be Jane's enemies, or friends, her monitors or her execu-
tioners, as fate may elect.
Mrs. Crosbie was a noted beauty in her youth. She is fifty
years old now, but has not forgotten the trick of smile, the turn
of head, the downcast bend of the eyelids, which were her
strong points when she was the " beautiful Juliana Hervey."
The beautiful Juliana Hervey who, after a dozen seasons'
fruitless title-hunting, bestowed herself at eight-and-twentyupon
Mr. Crosbie, a country gentleman of small means, smaller
pretensions, and without a connection in the world worth
mentioning. She is dressed always by the first milliner of her
part of Chalkshire, adopts with unflinching courage whatever
she believes to be the latest fashion of the day, and at the
present moment wears a dress, bonnet, and shawl, each unde-
niable of its kind, but the sum total of whose effect absolutely
A QUESTION OF DUTY. 13
sets your teeth on edge with its cruel discordancy. Were you
to talk to Mrs. Crosbie of dress as of a thing relative rather
than final, hint to her of subtle combinations of colour, of
artistic license, of subduing fashion to the age and complexion
of each particular votary, I think she would at once have doubts
as to the correctness of your moral character. All the best
people about Lidlington employ the same milliner, as they con-
sult the same doctor, attend the same church, and talk the same
scandal. And as long as the best people of the neighbourhood
supply the cue, either to her thoughts, words, or actions, Mrs.
Crosbie's conscience is at rest. She is a woman who never
moves out of the safe and narrow groove of class prejudice.
She knows, and wants to know, nothing about the abstract
truth of things. She wants only to dress and dine, calumniate
and pray, die and be buried as a woman belonging by birth to
the Landed Gentry of her country should, and is content to
debit Providence with the results.
Young Rawdon Crosbie, aged twenty-two years, and a
lieutenant in Her Majesty's regiment of artillery, is a fair
average specimen of his nation and class. Across his broad
forehead is the genuine "gunner sunmark," or insignia of his
craft ; his limbs, displayed by one of those knickerbocker cos-
tumes which our countrymen love to wear upon their travels,
bear witness to the beneficial results of seven years' classical
training on the heights of Harrow. His face is an honest red-
and-brown Englishman's face, by no means handsome in its
present unfledged condition, but giving you an impression that
it may become even strikingly so a few years later on. The
head, with its close shorn black hair, is compact and solid, not
precisely an intellectual- looking head, and yet a head that looks
u full of brains," fuller of them indeed than Master Rawdon's
speech and actions up to the present time would seem to betoken.
He stands a little under six feet in his shooting boots ; ha&
never had a heart-ache or a finger-ache since he was born ;
from his earliest infancy has been trained with the extra scrupu-
i 4 OUGHT WE TO VISIT HER?
loudness usually bestowed upon only sons, and is now destined
to marry an heiress ! In all respects, one may say, he is a
young fellow with whom the world goes well, and to whom
more than his share of the world's goods have fallen.
Mr. Crosbie, a middle-aged gentleman with square, grey
whiskers, a resigned, fresh-coniplexioned face, and no very par-
ticular features to speak of, sits dutifully guiding his opinions
by the Times, at his wife's side ; and between him and Rawdon,
and immediately opposite the dish of kuchen is Emma Marsland.
I have already broken to the reader that Emma is plain.
Let me soften that worst indictment that can be brought
against any young woman in the position of a heroine, by
adding that she has thirty thousand pounds. A girl with
thirty thousand pounds can surely afford to do without the
foolish carnation hues and sparkling eyes, which, to penniless
maidens, are the all-in-all of existence. Her hair well, I wish
to speak tenderly of everything belonging to poor Emmy, so we
will call her hair auburn. Her skin is of the peculiar dead
waxen whiteness that goes with the auburn type of colouring ;
and it is a skin that freckles. Her eyes are dark sienna brown ;
the brows and eyelashes so much fairer than her hair as to be
all but invisible. Were you to analyze her other features, you
would, I think, find them correct (correcter, certainly, than
Jane Theobald's). But what man analyzes when he has to pass
his verdict upon a girl's face] Emma generally gets a suf-
ficiency of partners at the Chalkshire balls ; but no man,
Rawdon included, dances more than his one or two set duty
dances with her. Everyone likes Emma. Everyone has a
favourable word to say for her. She is unaffected, amiable to
excess, dances fairly well considering her low stature and her
plumpness. But no man asks her for more than his duty
dances, and no man, despite the thirty thousand pounds, has
ever envied Bawdon his future lot as her husband.
like her adopted mother, Emma is dressed by the first mil-
liner in Chalkshire, and with not dissimilar results. Deep,
A QUESTION OF DUTY.
reddish-pink ribbons, for instance, predominate in her attire
to-day. Well, Rawdon, of course, has not much practical
knowledge of aught pertaining to women's dress, still some
glimmering, some intuitive sense of artistic propriety is in his
soul, and every time he glances at Emma this sense is disturbed.
Sunshine is good, and rose-coloured ribbons are good, and so, in
a mediaeval picture, is flame-coloured hair. _ But the three in
juxta-position a tri-coloured glory round the face of a young
person who has just devoured a plate of buttery cakes in five
minutes !
Poor Eawdon ! Whenever he is away from Emma he believes,
vaguely, that he is very much indeed in love. And whenever
he is at her side he knows definitely that he is not in love at all !
This is a contradictory, but by no means uncommon condition
of the human heart ; and one well worth the study of those
curious in such matters.
" Juliana, my dear/' says Mr. Crosbie, looking at his wife
across his newspaper, "who do you think that Englishman we
saw this morning turns out to be 9 Our scapegrace neighbour,
Francis Theobald. I was sure something about his face was
familiar to me. He is here in this very hotel"
Mrs. Crosbie gives a rebellious fold of her silken skirts a
furtive little admonition with one shapely finger ; " Mr. Francis
Theobald in this hotel ? Dear, dear, how inopportune ! Is he,"
lowering her voice, as if she had just in time remembered
Emma's presence " is he alone V
" I'm sure I don't know. No, I suppose his wife is with him.
I saw him on the stairs afterwards, and he had a little girl in
his arms."
" A little girl ! Ah, I think I do recollect hearing ... It
makes it additionally painful."
Mrs. Crosbie looks unutterable things, and Eawdon asks for
an explanation. Does "it" mean Theobald, or the hotel, or
meeting Theobald in the hotel, and who is especially to be pained
by the malapropos existence of a little girl 9
16 OUGHT WE TO VISIT HER t
*
"Rawdon, you know how much I dislike this sort of idle
joking," answers Mrs. Crosbie, gravely. " Mr. Francis Theobald,
as you are aware, will before long be our nearest neighbour in
Chalkshire. ,,
"Yes, mother."
" Well, if you force me to speak of such things in Emma's
presence, you must -know any one with proper feeling must
know that our position as regards him and his household
will be most delicate* Emma, my dear, what is that splendid
scarlet creeper, yonder, round the trellis-work? It would be
just the sort of grower we want for the corner of the poultry-
house."
"Scarlet runners," says Rawdon, decisively. "Don't move,
Emmy/' laying his brown hand on Emma Marsland's white
one. " You are only to be sent out of the way because we
happen to be talking of improper subjects. Mother, by the
bye/' turning round with an air of suddenly-awakened interest
to Mrs. Crosbie, " why are the Theobalds an improper subject,
and why is our position with regard to them delicate ? In spite
of Emma's presence we may surely discuss this V 9
Rawdon is argumentative by nature. By the time he was five
years old he was wont to fold his small arms when opposed, and
calmly dispute first principles with poor Mrs. Crosbie.
" It is not a question for discussion at all, Rawdon. It is a
question of what everybody in the neighbourhood will do. A
question of duty."
"Duty. Well, now, I can't see that. The Theobalds are as
old a family as there is in Chalkshirev and Theobald, from what
men say of him, is not at all a bad sort of fellow, bar gambling.
As for his wife, if she had not been a pretty woman and a nice
woman, you may depend upon it he wouldn't have married her.
And a pretty woman and a nice woman must be an acquisition
to Lidlington society."
"But all that has nothing to do with our duty. However
much we may pity the position of Mr. Theobald's sisters, how-
A QUESTION OF DUTY. 17
vec much we may wish well to his . . wife," the word comes
laggingly, as under protest, from Mrs. Orosbie's lips, " the ques-
tion for us all will be, 'Ought we to visit hatV"
" Of course in olden days these little social difficulties were
settled more comfortably,'' says Eawdon. " Within this century
French actors were not even allowed Christian buriaL But
now, when every one goes everywhere ! Why, mother, don't
you know the houses of some of our first-rate actors are allowed
to be the pleasantest in London 1 houses everybody tries to get
invited to, and "
"I know nothing of the kind, Eawdon. Mrs. Coventry
Brown told me (for, alas ! the subject had to be discussed as soon
as we all heard who was coming among us), Mrs. Coventry
Brown told me that this Mrs. Theobald's sister is at the present
time a very poor actress at one of the minor theatres, and that
her uncle plays the trombone yes, the trombone, Eawdon, in
the orchestra of the Theatre EoyaL Is this, can this be a person
with whom you would desire Emma to associate V*
Before Eawdon can answer, Mr. Crosbie unexpectedly looks
up again from his Times, and speaks. After being the husband
for three-and-twenty years of a woman whom he acknowledges,
and whom the world acknowledges, to be his superior, Mr.
Crosbie has naturally become a man of few words. What he
says when he does speak, however, is pretty nearly always to the
point
" Do we know anything against this Mrs. Francis Theobald's
moral character, Juliana, either before or since her marriage?"
% " Moral character ? Eeally, Mr. Crosbie, I must ask you not
to make use of such strong expressions before Emma."
"Because, if we do not and as we do visit Lady Eose
Golightly, my dear I think we might express ourselves with a
little more charity. Francis Theobald's father poor old
George ! and I were schoolboys together," goes on Mr. Crosbie
stoutly, " and whatever you ladies may do, I shall certainly not
2
i8 OUGHT WE TO VISIT HERf
turn the cold shoulder on George's son, spendthrift and game
though they say the man has become.' 7
" Ah, gentlemen, happily for themselves, can act with inde-
pendence in these matters," says Mrs. Crosbie, again rebuking
i contumacious fold of her dress. ( * Mr, Francis Theobald, I
have no doubt, in the hunting field and all other places where
gentlemen see each other, will never meet with anything to
remind him of his painful domestic position-"
" And Mrs- Theobald is to be reminded of it alone % " cries
Emmy, who has at last finished her cakes and coffee, " Mamma,
is this justice ) Mr, Theobald is not to be punished for being
the husband of au actress, and Mrs. Theobald is to be punished
for being the wife of a gentleman."
u And it must be remembered that Mrs. Theobald never was
an actress at all," puts in Rawdon, looking approvingly at
Emma. " She was in training, or so they say, for a dancer, and
Theobald ran off with her before she ever appeared in public.
If we are to be punished for what we might have been, heaven
help us all!"
" It is a question, simply and wholly, of duty, of what society
owes to itself," says Mrs. Crosbie, going back, as is her invari-
able custom when Bawdon argues with her, to her original
starting point. " This young person, coming from a different
station to our own, and being accidentally transplanted into our
neighbourhood, ought we, remembering what is due to ourselves
and others, to visit her ? This is the question society will have
to decide, and until it is decided, we as individuals must take
the greatest care not to form an opinion, or an acquaintance that
may hereafter be compromising. Emma, love, we really must
ascertain the name of that creeper before we leave Spa."
Now, oddly enough, all this kindly chat as to Mrs. Theobald's:
impending ostracism has been taking place, in the hotel court-
yard, at the very time when Mrs. Theobald and her husband are
holding their little domestic discussion within doors. When
Mrs. Crosbie began, " It is a question, simply and wholly, of
A QUESTION OF DUTY. 19
duty," Jane had reached the trenchant declaration of, " War to
the knife!" While Mrs. Crosbie was proceeding with her
exordium, Jane was flying, two steps at a time, down the hotel
staircase. Finally, just at the moment Mrs. Crosbie finished
speaking, Jane, in all the dazzling freshness of her summer
dress, and wearing the celebrated blue bonnet, emerged from
the hotel door, not half-a-dozen paces from the spot where the
party of her future neighbours were sitting.
"ItmustbetheFrmcess^whispersEmma, eagerly. "Mamma
Rawdon, look ! It must be the Princess."
The great Russian Princess Gzartoriska {nee nobody knows
of what people, or of what clime) happens to be now staying in
the Hotel Bellevue, and Mrs. Crosbie and Emma are already
well posted as to the number of her Highness's estates, the mag-
nificence of her diamonds, the profound impression produced
by her toilettes, her prodigality and her reckless play where-
soever she travels. For Mrs. Crosbie's Chalkshire maid is a
pretty girl, and the Princess has a good-looking courier, speaking
all languages. And on a fine June evening what more natural,
when the families are at dinner, than that pretty girls and
good-looking couriers should exchange a word in the court-yard
or on the staircase of the hotel ? Emma and Mrs. Crosbie, I
say, know these things already. They are not fonder of gossip,
perhaps, than most country ladies of respectable position and
perfectly unemployed minds ; but they are fond, very fond of
it And must not the smallest details, virtuous or the reverse,
of a princely life be as nectar always to a well-regulated English
mind ? So when Emma, misled by the elegance of Jane's dress,
whispers the word " Princess," visions of all her Highness's
jewels and toilettes visions, even, as to the possibility of
becoming acquainted with their owner, rise at once before Mrs.
Crosbie' s souL
"Your hat remove your hat, Charles," she whispers, in a
quick aside to her husband.
Mr. Crosbie looks up, his finger still marking his place on a
22
to OUGHT WE TO VISIT HER?
leading article, and, seeing a pretty young woman stand before
him, encircled by bine and white muslin, does as he is bidden
without hesitation, Kawdon following suit Jane, never sus-
pecting the presence of the enemy, gives a smile that shows her
white teeth to perfection, accompanying it with a little profes-
sional salutation learnt long ago from poor old Adolphe Dido,
the ballet-master of the Theatre Koyal, and floats on.
" And bonnets are worn small, after all," says Emma. " And
what a different shape to ours ! "
"My dear Emma," returns Mrs. Crosbie, "our bonnets were
the fashion six weeks ago, Miss Fletcher assured me so, and I
have never had cause to doubt Fletcher's integrity. But in the
position, with the wealth of the Princess, every new caprice from
head-quarters can be adopted, as a matter of course."
"And she wears shoes ! and buckles ! I wish I had a foot
that looked well in shoes."
" She is an uncommonly pretty woman,* says Mr. Crosbie, in
his admiration of Jane actually forgetting to go back to his
paper. " Looks remarkably young, too ; and yet the Princess
Czartoriska why, if it's the same woman who was over in
London in '65, she must be forty if she's a day ! *
" I wonder if it is the Princess at all T 1 suggested Kawdon.
"Before we go into any more raptures, let us be sure the
lovely being is not her Highnesses lady's-maid."
But neither Mrs. Crosbie nor Emma will entertain a doubt
on this point Especially is Mrs. Crosbie sure that they have
received a friendly bow and smile from son Altesse, and no
other. The grace, the distinction, the mien! Mrs. Crosbie
might mistake in some things ; she is not likelythe instincts
of a Hervey are not likely to err as regards these attributes of
breeding and high birth.
" Then, suppose, Emmy, you and I go after her Highness, in
the hope of getting another bow % n says Kawdon, jumping up,
and with his eyes still following Jane. " We'll come back for
you, by-and-by, mother ; and, mind, if we get acquainted with
A QUESTION OF DUTY. 21
the wrong person, if our gracious friend turns out to be the
lady's-maid, not the mistress, you will be to blame."
And, so speaking, away Master Rawdon strolls from the
courtyard into the street, Emma Marsland trotting, obedient as
a little spaniel, at his heels.
" How well everything has turned out !" Mrs. Crosbie remarks,
in a thanksgiving tone, as she looks after them.
" I beg your pardon, my dear. Who did you say had turned
out well r
" The plans, the hopes of my life, Mr. Crosbie. Emma is
twenty-one, her own mistress, to-day, and see see the terms on
which she and our Rawdon stand !"
A motion of Mrs. Crosbie's hand points in the direction
which the two young people have taken. . A moment ago they
were side by side, but, exactly as she speaks, the airy blue-and-
white figure of "the Princess," who has been stopping behind
to look into a shop window, chances to divide them an omen
Mrs. Crosbie may, perhaps, remember later on. "I do hope
Charles, we shall make that sweet Princess's acquaintance," she
remarks, almost with fervour.
" I hope it will profit us if we do make it, Juliana. A foreign
princess reminds me more than I like of a foreign archduke, and
the only time I ever knew an archduke was at Boulogne "
" And he borrowed twenty pounds of us, and turned out not
to be an archduke at all," interrupts Mrs. Crosbie, reddening.
"I pretend to no superhuman sagacity, Mr. Crosbie. I confess
that I have been deceived by an impostor once in my life.
What has that got to do with the Princess Czartoriska V 9
"Nothing, nothing, my love. I was foolish to mention it,
perhaps; only, as you seemed so squeamish about taking
Francis Theobald's wife on trust, I thought you might like to
make a few enquiries as to this Russian woman's antecedents
too."
" The Princess Czartoriska is received by every crowned head
in Europe, Charles. I have seen her name repeatedly among
the distinguished guests at different foreign Courts, and she has
been presented in London. Would any reasonable being talk
about antecedents after that?"
Mr, Crosbie goes on with Ms leading article
CHAPTER ItL
ONLY DQHEEm
The lovers that are to be saunter slowly, meanwhile, along the
High Street of Spa, Emma's heart as full of sunshine as the sky
above her lie ad, Rawdon in as little lover-like a frame of mind
as can well be imagined* He knows perfectly well that before
the day is over it is incumbent upon him to make a proposal of
marriage to poor expectant Emma. He hopes that, somehow or
another, he will be able to pull through it. But he is not elated.
Of course he will get accustomed in time to being engaged, and
even married. But the proposal what is he to say, what can
he say that Emmy does not very well know already ? Why is
it not the custom for people to become engaged off-hand without
going through any ridiculous preliminary form of proposal and
acceptance at all 1
When Emma Marsland, an orphan at seven years of age, was
first left to Mr. Crosbie's guardianship, nothing could be more
admirable, more disinterested, than the sentiments given forth
to the world by Mrs. Crosbie. She might, indeed, have wished
that this additional responsibility, this sacred charge, had been
spared her. She might have wished, for her Rawdon's sake,
that the unexpected addition to her cares had been a boy, in
which case the children could have pursued their studies
together. Still, a trust was a trust a duty a duty. Under
heaven's blessing, Mrs. Crosbie would bring up poor little Emmy
with as much care, as much love, as though she were indeed her
Rawdon's sister. And faithfully, it must be added, was the
promise carried out Few girls in Chalkshire had had a better
education than Emma Marsland. None had been more dili-
gently counselled by maternal wisdom as to the paths wherein
they should tread.
That the auburn-haired heiress and her thirty thousand
pounds were destined, in Mrs. Crosbie's mind, for Rawdon
from the earliest days when the children lived together under
the same roof, is, perhaps, only to say that Mrs. Crosbie was
mortal But on this point, as on all others, she behaved in
strictest accordance with the ruling principles of her life. " I
do not say that you will never make Emma your wife," she used
to tell young Rawdon, while he was still at school. " If, when
the tastes of both are matured, your boy-and-girl attachment
should remain unchanged, I do not even deny that my fondest
hopes would be realized by such a union. Meanwhile, never
forget that you must act with the utmost delicacy in the matter.
To extract, nay, to permit, a promise from a young girl placed
as our dear Emma is placed, would expose you and all of us to
an imputation of mercenary motives in the eyes of the world.
On the day when Emma is twenty-one, and if she has mad?
no other choice in the meantime, you may speak. Until then,
remember she is not only our daughter that she will always be,
whatever happens but your sister."
And Rawdon, rigidly virtuous, poor fellow, in the absence of
temptation, had obeyed his mother's injunctions to the letter.
He had never hinted, and never wished to hint, one word of
love to Emma Marsland. Love! why even the boy-and-girl
attachment at which Mrs. Crosbie hinted was, Rawdon knew
in his heart, a myth. He liked her, of course, poor little patient
jog-trot Emma, as he must have liked any young creature that
had lived under the same roof with him, and made itself his
slave. She was invincibly stupid with her fingers ; could never
learn to splice a line, or make a fly, as some girls could ; was a
muff at everything to do with horses ; too stout of limb and
snort of breath to fag out even, as some fellows' sisters could,
at cricket Still, she was so perseveringly affectionate, so im-
24 OUGHT WE TO VISIT HERt
placably sweet tempered under bullying or neglect, that Bawdon
could not but like her. "Who in the world could dislike
Emma?" he would say, as the strongest encomium that could
be passed upon her. And probably in his own words could be
found the most exact exposition of his feelings. He found it
impossible to dislike her.
Not a very near approach this to the sentiment of love. But
Bawdon, up to the hour of which I write, knew no more than
the majority of lads of his age of sentiment of any kind. A
pair of keen young eyes were in his head ; young blood was in
his veins ; every pretty girl he met yes, if he met a dozen in
the same walk, occasioned him a quickening of the pulse very
pleasant to experience. This was all. He was rather shy with
ladies if the truth must be told ; held aloof in ball-rooms
although he loved dancing with a passion had never, as far as
Chalkshire knew, had an affair of the heart in his Ufa And,
then, on the day on which she was twenty-one he was to
propose to Emma Marsland ! Every one, Emma included,
knew this perfectly, and the result was, that Bawdon, like
all men engaged or married too young, was just a little
crushed.
He had young eyes in his head, young blood in his veins ; and
there were plenty of pretty women, there was plenty of pleasure,
of love-making, of delight in the world. And he stood apart
from it all. He was to marry Emma Marsland. The uncer-
tainty, the aroma, the sparkling taste of life were wanting to the
lad before he, in reality, knew what life was. His household
duties were set and sealed for him as are those of royalty.
Bomance, the possibility of romance as connected with himself,
existed not He was to marry Emma Marsland.
Such had been Bawdon Crosbie's frame of mind for the last
two years. It was his frame of mind on this, Emma's twenty-
first birth-day the day on which they were to become formally
betrothed lovers the day on which fate had appointed him to
make the acquaintance of Jane Theobald.
ONLY DONKEYS. 25
They walk side by side along the street, the blue and white
draperies of " the Princess" fluttering about three yards ahead
of them.
"Her dress is stylishly made, but cheap, very cheap, when
one comes to look at it near," thinks Emma.
" She has a perfect figure," thinks Bawdon. " And her ankle
by Jove, if that woman is forty, or within fifteen years of forty,
III
His meditations are cut short by Emma's voice, a high-pitched
piping voice, such as not unfrequently belongs to people of her
complexion. " What a dear little path up to the right, Bawdon 1
I should like so much to go up that little path to the right 1"
44 Why not go, then?" is Bawdon's inevitable answer.
And in another minute he and Emma, out of sight of man,
are climbing up one of those steep over-arched pathways by
which, at every turn, you can escape out of the village of Spa,
into the cool, still greenness of the wooded hillside.
Of Bawdon, as of Malcolm Graeme, a poet might sing :
" Straight up Ben Lomond could he press,
Yet not a sob his toil confess ! "
But mountaineering is not an exercise for which nature has
fitted Emma Marsland. Before they have scrambled a hundred
yards, tjie poor little thing is breathless, panting, clutching at
her companion's stout arm, and warmer oh, warmer far, than
any heroine of a love scene should ever be 1
Things being so, Bawdon considerately suggests that they
shall rest awhile, and down on the mossy sward Emma sinks,
recovering her breath and her complexion as best she can.
Bawdon sits down too.
The birds are singing among the boughs, the spot is lonely ;
the sweet wild scent of lusty woodland spring is in the air.
Now, thinks Bawdon, is the time to propose.
He gazes stedfastly away down a sun-tinted vista among the
trees, listens to the birds, listens to the far-off music in the
26 OUGHT WE TO VISIT HER t
avenue, drinks in the June air, a love-philter of itself, and the
thing seems easy to da He turns, full of courage, looks straight
into Emma's face and begins to whistle.
"How funny it seems to be so far from home on my birth-
day/' she remarks, placidly. " I hope the school children are
enjoying their treat. I hope the buns aren't as heavy as they
were last year."
The Sunday-school at Lidlington is, next to Eawdon, Emma's
object in existence, and always on her birth-day, a great affair
of bun-cake, prizes, and tea goes on in the village. Eawdon, poor
fellow ! entertains towards tea-feasts and Sunday-schools gene-
rally the natural instincts of his sex and age, but the speech
reminds him of Emmy's kind heart, charitable dispositions,
admirable suitability to the country and domestic life. And
with a kind of rush he comes to the point thus :
"Emma, my dear *
"Yes, Eawdon?"
"I hope you don't wish yourself back in Lidlington already,
Emma?"
"Not for good. I wouldn't miss Brussels for anything.
Mamma and I are going to get a dress each, and a bonnet (I
shall get a blue one like the Princess's) in Brussels. But I
should like to be back just for ten minutes to give the prizes,
and see the children properly set to their tea. Miss Fuich is all
very well in school-time, but I don't know how she'll get on
alone at a treat ; besides, I should like to be sure that the buns
aren't heavy."
"Emma" but his voice trembles oh, it is, it is difficult
" I think sometimes your whole heart and soul are centred in
Lidlington 1"
She looks at him, she knows what is coming, and turns
crimson from forehead to chin. An emotion she cannot master
holds her dumb. It is the supreme, enraptured moment of
ner life this terribly difficult, emotionless moment to Eawdon
Crosbie.
ONL Y DONKE VS. 27
u How would you like to live" an involuntary sigh escapes
him "to live always in Lidlington! I mean, when we are
elderly people, like my father and mother ?"
" Why Rawdon what a question ! You know I should like
it Tou know I always mean to remain with mamma. 1 '
"Dear Emma !" This last remark he feels has smoothed
matters beautifully. " Remaining with mamma seems," after
all, to involve so very slight a change in their present position
towards each other. " My dear Emma "
And then Rawdon's eloquence comes to an abrupt full stop,
and rather spasmodically he puts his arm round Emmy's waist,
and kisses her.
He has been in the habit of doing so, fraternally, every morn-
ing and night since the day when they first lived together as
little children. There is, therefore, no reason why this particu-
lar kiss should form any new standing-point in their existence.
Yet each feels that it has done so.
" It is over," thinks Rawdon. " Thank God ! It is over."
What Emma thinks could not be put into words so easily.
She is as commonplace a woman as ever lived ; but she is a
woman, and she loves Rawdon from the depths of her heart,
and these first moments, doubtless, to her are as ecstatic as
though she were a beauty and a genius. Dandelions and potato-
flowers are probably as glad of the spring as are violets and
primroses, if we knew the truth.
The lowering sun warms all the woodland vistas with richer
yellow ; the gnats pursue each other, amatively circling over-
head ; the small birds sing in the boughs. Love is abroad,
quickening the pulse of all creation, this June afternoon.
Rawdon Crosbie, a lover of a minute old, wonders what the
mischief he shall say next ?
Love-making, in the common acceptation of the word, would be
simply ridiculous between him and Emmy. He has too much deli-
cate sympathy for the earnestness of her feelings to begin talking
on indifferent subjects. Fortunately she solves the difficulty
for him.
28 OUGHT WE TO VISIT HER t
. " I wonder what mamma will say when when we tell her all
about our walk 1"
The remark is so comprehensive, and at the same time so
vague, that Rawdon " blesses her unaware." He has spoken,
has spoken definitely, as it was always intended he should speak,
on Emmy's twenty-first birth-day, and she understands him,
and is happy. Surely things may remain in this comfortable
but unacknowledged position for the present.
"Is it necessary always to tell mamma, verbatim, where you
have been and what you have said, Emma) Couldn't you and
I keep a secret for one month, well, for one week, then, to
ourselves V
She hesitates, not quite knowing whether a clandestine en-
gagement would be wrong, but very certain indeed that it would
be pleasant.
" Do just as you like," says Rawdon, watching her face.
U I like what you like," is Emma's answer, as she* glances back
at him affectionately. "You must decide everything for me
now."
" My dear little Emmy ! You have always been the best, the
kindest "
But just as things have reached this tender point, just as
Rawdon Crosbie, carried away by feeling that he feels nothing,
is on the brink of becoming loverlike in earnest, a cavalcade of
donkeys, ridden by foreign ladies and gentlemen in picturesque
equestrian dress, and with a great flourishing of whips, breaks
in abruptly upon the scene. The cavalcade passes on in due
time, but not until Emma has sustained a dreadful fright from
the whole herd of donkeys " trying to run over her," as she calls
it ; while Rawdon, hot and indignant, has had to shoulder a
parasol and stand between his beloved and danger.
"You do make yourself so confoundedly ridiculous, Emma,"
he remarks, the amenities of sentiment rapidly merging
back into fraternal straightforwardness when they are again
alone.
ONL y DONKE YS. 29
u Yes, but, Rawdon, why should they all begin I know it
was down hill but why should the nasty things all begin run
ning just when they came near me 1 Oh, ' only donkeys ! ' It s
very fine for you to say 'only donkeys,' * and Emma is vrry
near crying, "but I say I don't want to be killed by a runaway
horrid donkey, any more than by a horse."
What man after such an episode could revert to love-making 1
Not Rawdon Crosbie. He recovers his temper, of course, and
begins to " chaff" Emma, just as he used in the old schoolboy
days, about her cowardice ; and, as long as they are in the
woods, she hangs betrothed-fashion upon his arm in one
steepest part of the descent, even transfers her hand for a
single, thrilling, delightful instant to his shoulder. But love-
making ! Rawdon feels that all the love-making his fate can
possibly entail upon him is finished and done with. He has
proposed well, has made himself understood and Emmy is
contented, and nothing more remains to be said on the subject.
As far as he is concerned, love-making is a thing over and done
with for ever in this life.
A pretty numerous crowd has gathered round the military
band by the time they get back to the village : seeing which
Rawdon proposes that Miss Marsland shall stroll slowly on in
the direction of the promenade while he runs back to the Hotel
Bellevue for his mother.
" Don't be long, Rawdon," cries Emma, before he has got a
couple of paces away. " And be sure you return, too." Expe-
rience has taught her what risk there is of losing Rawdon
altogether when once she trusts him out of her sight. " Now,
promise that you^will return too % n *
"Don't make me promise too much, Emmy," says Rawdon,
looking back. " If I meet the Princess, and she gives me another
bow, I won't undertake to answer for what will become of me."
"Take care what you say, sir ! If you think so much about
the Princess Czartoriska, I shall be jea "
But Rawdon is out of hearing ; and Emma, with a sensation
Mt^m
y OUGHT WE TO VISIT HER1
of treading on air rather than on solid ground, pursues her way
alone down the pleasant shaded road towards the avenue.
CHAPTER IV.
THE PRINCESS CZARTORISKA.
Scarcely has she reached the outskirts of the crowd, when
a succession of infantine shrieks disturbs the decorum of the
promenade : another minute, and Miss Marsland finds herself
" assisting" at a combat of the most determined, albeit unequal
nature. On one side a stalwart Belgian nurse, her hair and
cap disordered, her face inflamed with passion ; on the other a
bright-cheeked, furious little morsel of an English baby some
two or three years of age.
The original cause of dispute, as in the case of most wars,
seems to be forgotten by both belligerents in the present heat
and fervour of the fray. Brandishing her charge aloft, and
conscious at least of superior physical force, the nurse is bodily
bearing the enemy back in the direction of the village, while a
shower of blows, neither weak nor ill-directed, fall upon her
broad, red face, and a volley of such abuse as the infant tongue
is capable of half German, half English, half Belgian patois is
brought to bear upon her moral sense.
Emma Marsland pauses, half amused, half sorry for this poor
little plucky British rebel held in durance by the foreigner ; and
the child, instinctively scenting an ally, stretches forth its arms
in her direction.
" Mamsey me want mein Mamsey !" is its piteous entreaty.
And upon this, Emma stops outright, and going up to the nurse
asks, in as good French as she can command, what ails the little
one?
The reply, to English ears at least, is unintelligible ; but a
rent that the nurse points out in the child's elaborately em-
broidered frock, and recent gravel marks on the palms of its
little rosy hands, tell their own story of the nature of its crime.
THE PRINCESS CZARTORISKA. 31
While the "brave Beige * amused herself by gazing at some
good-looking bandsman, the child had fallen down, and was
now being carried home in grief and disgrace for punishment.
" Poor little thing ! I don't suppose she could help it," says
Emma, good-naturedly.
"No, no," the child repeats, in its broken accents. "Me
touldn't help it. Bossy touldn't help it."
And. then, with one swift rush, she frees herself from the
nurse's arms, and seeks the side of her new ally, from which
position, clutching Emma's skirts tight, she looks back, with all
the flush of victory upon her small face, at the foe.
A rose-bud bit of mischief of three is Blossy Theobald a bit
of mischief delightfully redolent of soap-and-water, fresh air,
and health ; long eye-lashed, with teeth like tiny pearls, dimpled
hands that she has a pretty trick of clasping, the fingers out-
spread, like one of Vandyck's portrait children, upon her chest ;
heaven-blue eyes, that look you through and through with the
conscious superiority of her age, and assurance ah ! Blossy's
assurance, like other of her moral qualities, is a thing to be ex-
perienced, not written about.
Mistress in a moment of the situation, she briefly remarks,
" Bossy go back," and forthwith, still holding Miss Marsland's
dress, turns her small steps again in the direction of the music,
the nurse following. Here, then, is Emma Marsland, Mrs.
Crosbie's daughter of adoption, trepanned into an intimate ac-
quaintance with Jane Theobald's child ! Before three minutes
are over Blossy has unfolded all the domestic joys and sorrows
of her life. She loves Mamsey, and Dada, and her doll Nancy.
And which best? All best. Well, if that cannot be, Nancy.
Only Nancy has a broken nose, and her paint is off.
" Then I . suppose Nancy is about as pretty as I am V asks
Emma, who, like most very plain people, is sensitive, overmuch
on the subject of her own personal appearance.
Blossy looks up, showing her white teeth and wrinkling her
nose as she scrutinises Emma's features, but makes no direct
OUGHT WE TO VISIT HER f
mswer. '* Madame got pitty zings," she remarks at last, point-
ing to a little bunch of charms golden, substantial charms
that hangs from Emma's watch-chain, "And me like pitty
zings me do. 1 '
If the compliment savours of mercenariness, it also displays
a ready tact, a fertility of resource, which many an older person
might not, on the moment, have found to their hand Miss
Marsland stoops and kisses the small speaker on the lips. Just
then Bourn, bourn, begins the drum -beat which is to herald in
a lively set of military quadrilles. Blossy listens to the first
three bars, then, finding the music of a quality that pleases her,
lifts her embroidered frock between her two pink thumbs and
fore-fingers, poises her right toe aloft* in true professional fashion,
and begins to dance,
A prettier picture it would be hard to imagine than Blossy,
dancing improvised ballets of her own beneath green trees, her
gipsy-hat falling upon her shoulders, her yellow curls bare in
the sun. She smiles, coquettes, raises one dimpled arm above
her head ; she pirouettes, she fantasias. Emma, already ena-
moured of the whole world that Kawdon's declaration has dyed
rose-coloured, grows more and more fascinated by the little
creature as she stands and watches her. When, but not until
the band has ceased playing, does Blossy cease to dance. Then,
after kissing the tips of her fingers to some imaginary audience,
she returns gravely to the examination of Miss Marsland's
trinkets.
" And who taught you to dance so well V 1 asks Emma, lead-
ing the child apart and sitting down with her upon a bench.
" No one taughted me," says Miss Theobald, in her dialect
" Mamsey dance, and Auntie Min, and Bossy dance too."
" And what is your name ] Bossy Teaball /oh, but that's
nonsense. I mean your real name."
" Bossy Teaball, and Auntie Min, and Mamsey, and Dada,"
repeats the child, evidently determined to go through the family
nomenclature exhaustively. "And Bossy like pitty zings! 7
THE PRINCESS CZARTORISKA. 33
This with great pathos and sincerity, and clasping the whole
bunch of Miss Marsland's trinkets between her two small hands.
To pleading like this there can be but one result. When is
the combination of a sweet tongue, a fair face, and a mercenary
heart aught but successful % Among Emma's toys is a silver
fish, with emerald eyes, ruby gills and flexible tail, that Blossy
singles out, by unmistakable signs of admiration, from among
its fellows ; and before another minute has passed, the fish is
detached from Emma's chain and in Blossy's possession. The
child jumps, dances, sings with delight, kisses her new treasure,
hugs it, as little children do, with rapture to her breast.
" Mamsey, mamsey 1" she cries out at last, " mamsey see !"
and away flies Blossy, the nurse in pursuit, towards a lady who
at this moment approaches by a side-walk, immediately in face
of the bench where Miss Marsland is sitting.
It is the Princess Czartoriska ! Emma Marsland recognises
the blue and white dress, the affable smile, the aristocratic tread,
at a glance ; and her heart beats pleasurably. Her Highness
draws near ought she to sit still or stand up ? Emma feels it
must be best to err on the side of over-deference, so stands up.
And thus standing, and colouring almost as red as her own hair,
waits, while Blossy, volubly explaining her adventure, drags her
mother along by the skirts to introduce her to the owner of the
"pitty zings."
" I am afraid my little girl has been giving you a great deal
of trouble." What singularly good English the Princess speaks !
But then, remembers Emma, the Russians are notably the best
linguists extant. And how entirely without state are her man-
ners ! But simplicity, Emma has always heard, is a special
attribute of real greatness. " Bloss, what do you say to this
lady for being so kind to you 1"
** She got pitty zings," answers Bloss, looking up wickedly
from beneath her eye-lashes.
" Wherever that child goes, she makes friends," proceeds her
Highness, Emma remaining silent from pure humility. "I
3
34 OUGHT WE TO VISIT HERt
never saw anything like it And she picks all their pockets.
Yesterday she came home with a little box of bonbons that some
old gentleman or other had given her."
What an absence, what a marvellous absence of pride in all
this ; Emma stammers out something about her fondness for
children, and this particular child's wit and beauty. Such grace,
such elegance of movement, too! Emma hopes before many
minutes to have the delight of watching her dance again.
"Ah, not much wonder she can dance," says the Princess.
M Are you sitting here thanks," accepting, as a little diffident
gesture of Emma's invites her to do, the vacant place on the
bench. "Not much wonder she can dance; that's an heir-
loom."
"Yes, I believe all foreign nations dance better than we Eng-
lish do," remarks Emma, meaning the speech to be a delicately
flavoured compliment
" If s the fashion to say so," answers her Highness, not with-
out warmth. " For my part I think the reverse. Just look at
the meagre, dark-skinned French women the managers bring
over sometimes ! They are agile, certainly, so are monkeys ;
but put them beside a troupe mix them, as I've often seen
done, in the same piece with a troupe of ordinary English ballet-
girls and see where they are, as far as beauty goes, and in these
days beauty, for the ballet, is everything."
" I don't know much about theatres," says Emma, feeling duly
ashamed of her ignorance, " and I've seen very little of the Con-
tinent This is only the second time I've been out of England,
and we lead a very quiet life when we are at home, in Chalk-
shire."
" Chalkshire !" The Princess Czartoriska gives a quick, com-
prehensive glance at the dress, the face, the roseate locks of her
new acquaintance. " And how do you like the Continent when
you compare it to Chalkshire V she asks, quietly.
" Oh, very much for a change. We have been abroad a fort-
night, and I have enjoyed all the sight-seeing immensely ; but
THE PRINCESS CZARTORISKA. 35
I shouldn't like to live anywhere out of England. I am not
sufficient of a linguist to feel at home when Pm abroad. What
wonderfully good English your little girl speaks 1" Emma goes
on, hazarding compliment number two.
"Do you think so) We think she talks all languages equally
badly. We roam from one country to another, seeking a resting
place and finding none, and the child, poor morsel, gets a new
nurse-girl and a new tongue in each. Last winter we spent in
Hombourg, and all she talked was German ; now it is Belgian
patois. Come here, Bloss." Blossy obeys with the peculiar
dancing movement that seems to be her natural way of walking.
" Say * Good-morning* to this lady directly, in French, in Ger-
man, and in English."
The child goes through this bit of show-off, with perfect ease
and confidence in her own powers, and Emma's enthusiasm re-
doubles. .... Ah, how she would like to show the dear little
gifted darling to mamma !
"We are staying in the Hotel Bellevue," she finally volun-
teers ; diffident, but hopeful
" So are we, M remarks her Highness.
" And if it would not be too great too great a liberty
We shall remain in Spa for a day or two longer, and if I might
take your sweet little girl in to see mamma V
"Thank you, you're very good," says Blossy's mother, the
colour deepening in her fresh cheeks. " Of course I'm always
glad when anyone takes a liking to Bloss."
"I asked her to tell me her name just now," goes on Emma,
growing bolder ; " but the answer was enigmatical Some pet
name, I suppose V
" Her name is Blossom, a foolish one, isn't it 1 It was a whim
of Theo of her father's. She was born in spring, and
nothing would do but the baby must be called Blossom. I say
it's like a cow. Pm sure the country-people in the after-pieces
always call their cows Daisy, and Blossom, and all names like
that However, there's no changing it now, and I don't know
3*
36 OUGHT WE TO VTSIT HERt
that I want it changed. It doesn't seem to me anything would
suit the child Igit Blossy."
Emma, secretly wondering, perhaps, at the eccentricities of
the great, declares the name of Blossy to be charming. And
then the second one? She is too well-bred to ask a direct
question, but confesses that Blossy's pronunciation of the second
name had been somewhat difficult for her English ear to catch.
" And yet we always think she says her name so welL You
must remember her age, only three the second of last April.
Bloss, come here, child, and tell your name directly."
Blossy, busy on the ground constructing a sand-lake for the
fish to live in, turns round her dimpled pink face, and shows
her little milk-white teeth. "Bossy Teaball," she cries, but
without offering to move.
"There, I don't know for a baby of three what could be
plainer than that/' says the mother, proudly. "Of course
little children never can pronounce the Th."
" rpk j fjjters Emma, across whose mind an intuition of the
horrible truth is breaking. " But her nameyour name does
not \*
"Our name begins with Th," says Jane, with admirable
calmness, and looking full into Emma Marsland's face. " Our
name is Theobald."
CHAPTER V.
FORTUNATELY, THERE ARE RULES.
After the first smart of disappointment has passed, Emma
Marsland, I must say, behaves herself as well as the burning,
the intolerable humiliation of her position permits. She crim-
sons with very shame, she moves away as far as she can move
from the contagion of Jane's blue-and- white-muslin, she looks
as though she would fain sink into the earth and be hidden
from the sight of men. But she is decently civil
"I have heard . . . I mean I know Mr. Francis Theobald's
FORTUNATELY, THERE ARE RULES. 37
name welL We shall soon be near neighbours, I hope that is
to say, the Miss Theobalds are old acquaintances of mamma's. 1 '
Jane interprets aright every stammering word, every shifting
expression of Miss Marsland's face; and smiles maliciously, not
offering to help her by a syllable.
" It must be getting late, almost time for me to be going,"
says Emma, after a minute's uncomfortable silence.
" Oh, won't you stay to hear the next tune V Jane asks this
in the most innocent voice imaginable. " I thought you wanted
to see another of Blossy's dances?*'
Even as she speaks the band begins to play again, unconscious
Blossy to dance. What must Emma do 1 After extolling at
one minute the ravishing graces of the infant Czartoriska, how,
under what possible pretext, can she turn her back upon the
infant Theobald and her mother at the next ! She stays on.
By the help of carefully-chosen monosyllables, of ambiguous
generalities, even keeps up a show of conversation with her
newly-made friend. The band plays mercifully loud ; the
crowd is thick ; and Emma is just beginning to hope that she
may slip away with no worse mischief established than a bowing
acquaintance, which may, or may not, be kept up hereafter in
Ohalkshire, when lo ! not a dozen paces away, appears the sheen
of an olive-green dress that Emma recognises but too quickly,
and Mrs. Crosbie and Bawdon draw near.
It would be hard to describe Mrs. Crosbie's face on seeing
Miss Marsland thus familiarly seated at the Princess's side. No
mere vulgar satisfaction, but a tempered, awe-struck serenity
overspreads her comely features, an expression that seems to
say, " / recognised your Highness's birth and breeding at a
glance. Your Highness, guided by a like beautiful reciprocity
of sentiment, has been drawn towards me and mine." Though
it is as proud a moment as she has ever experienced in her life,
Mrs. Crosbie does not forget no, not even in approaching a
Princess with nineteen quarterings to her shield that she is a
Hervey ! one of that race who, while other families boast of
a. mat me lady in olive-green is Mrs. Crosbi
n she is not alone though !" And obeying ins
reason, Jane's April-blue eyes direct a aha:
on that does its work but too quickly and too
e spot.
ma looks more and more foolish, Mrs. Crosbie
s ; Rawdon, taking off his hat very low, look
whatever she may feel, maintains a quiet coi
? goes on with her pirouetting ; the sun who t a
republican trick of shining on visited and i
q alike, slants down his golden benisons upon t
ma is the first to speak. "Mamma,* rising, an
ig herself so much nearer the means of flight,
ee a little child dance so well 1 And she's only '
ilk I don't know how many languages alread
ie's face bespeaks an almost venerating apprei
r's surprising talents. "Her mamma has been t
her." Without daring to mention names, Ei
li rough a misty pantomime of introduction, up
Crosbie bows very low, and Jane, not rising, b
Hawdon in the back-ground, meanwhile, stanc
it between his hands, in an attitude of attentioi
na has been telling me about her. She is onW +}
FORTUNATELY, THERE ARE RULEh. 39
nearly allied with royalty as the Princess Czartoriska herself,
can feel that she is but addressing a fellow creature and a peer !
"Your Highness is, I trust, like ourselves, visiting this
charming retreat for pleasure, not because your Highness's
state of health requires the renovating agency of the springs) 9
This with eyes downcast, and a reverential air of interest as
to the reply delightful to witness.
Crimson with shame, Emma would fain interfere, but the
words die on her lips. A look of blankest amazement, followed,
an instant later, by one of dawning intelligence, crosses Jane's
face.
" I am perfectly well thanks," she answers coolly ; " and
I'm thankful to say never tasted a mouthful of any of their
atrocious mineral waters in my life."
The perfect English vernacular, a certain comical expression
in the Princess's blue eyes, bring Bawdon Crosbie by a rapid
intuition to the truth, or to so much of the truth as that this
blooming English girl of nineteen is not the Princess Czartoriska.
But Mrs. Crosbie remains in outer darkness still, and having
now abundance of rope at her command, further entangles
herself and multiply the horrors of the situation in this wise :
"We had the pleasure of seeing your Highness this after-
noon." Some gesture, fancied surely, on the part of Jane, here
seems to invite Mrs. Crosbie to fill the place vacated by Emma,
and down Mrs. Crosbie sits. " We were in the courtyard of the
Hotel Bellevue
Janegives another glance at Bawdon, which says " I remember."
"In the courtyard of the hotel, when your Highness passed
out. As my daughter and your charming baby have made
acquaintance might we, might we be permitted, living under
the same roof, to pay our respects %"
"You are extremely good, I'm sure," says Jane, as Mrs.
Crosbie pauses.
"And I shall have the honour of bringing my husband.
Bawdon" (Mrs. Crosbie waves her hand to Bawdon to approach).
40 OUGHT WE TO VISIT HER t
"let me have the honour of presenting my son, an officer in our
English artillery, to the Princess Czartoriska/'
" The Princess Czartoriska ! " cries Jane, the key to the rid-
die, the motive to the whole farce laid bare by that one word.
" The Princess Czartoriska i " And then such a burst of laughter
as rings forth from her lips i Well-bred women, I am sure,
never laugh like Jane Theobald- But Jane is not well-bred ;
and to laugh when she is amused comes just as naturally to her
healthy spirit as to eat when she is hungered, or to drink when
she is at hirst
*' I, a princess ? 1 1 Oh, I see it all now. And the Princess
Czartoriska ] Why, she a forty, and she paints, and she's got
the gout ! '' Each fresh announcement accompanied by such
renewed peals of laughter as cause not a few of the nearer
spectators to turn round and gaze, open-eyed, at the manners
of " these English women."
" And and I am to understand " stammers Mrs. Crosbie.
" Mamma, it's all my stupidity ! " Emma exclaims, trying
hard to steady her voice. " I suppose I could not have said
the name distinctly. This lady is is " oh, with a wrench she
has to bring it out, " is Mrs. Francis Theobald."
For once in her life Mrs. Crosbie forgets her own dignity
the dignity of the Hervey blood everything. She turns green ;
she jumps up to her feet, speechless.
Rawdon comes forward with a vast deal more eagerness than
he displayed towards " her Highness" a minute since. " Mis-
take or not, mother," he says, with emphasis, " the accident is
a fortunate one, inasmuch as it brings us acquainted with Mrs.
Theobald." And as he speaks, the obstinate expression his
mother knows only too well comes round his lips.
" Yes, I was saying I was remarking to Mrs. Theobald that
we shall be near neighbours soon," begins Emma, faintly.
But now Mrs. Crosbie, the momentary weakness of panic
over, proves herself at once equal to the occasion, and true to
f he principles upon which every action of her life is based
FORTUNATELY, THERE ARE RULES. 41
u Emma, my dear," she interrupts, in the silkiest, best-contained
tone, " you really should be more careful in these foreign places.
A mistake of the kind has often entailed the most embar-
rassing results. To this lady," icily regarding not Jane's eyes
but the exact centre of her forehead, " to this lady we owe, I
am sure, every apology for our inadvertence."
And quietly passing her hand within Emma's arm, Mrs.
Crosbie bows condescendingly towards Jane, as much as to say
she will overlook that young person's impertinence in having
been mistaken for a princess, and prepares to move away.
Up flushes the hot blood over Rawdon Crosbie's face. Before
he can collect his temper enough to speak, however, Blossy,
seeing that the owner of the "pitty zings" is going, has compli-
cated the position by rushing to Emma, throwing her little arms
round the heiress's knees, and holding up her face to be kissed.
And now Jane feels that the time has arrived for her to throw
down the gauntlet of defiance, too, and enter the lists. " Blossy,
my pet," and she rises, and, though her limbs tremble under her
with indignation, walks, very calm and self-possessed, towards
the child, " give back the little fish this lady lent you to play
with."
" Oh no oh, please !" stammers Emma, her own not ungene-
rous heart, and Bawdon's face, and Blo&y's uplifted arms, all
pleading on one side ; the warning pressure of Mrs. Crosbie's
fingers on the other. "I I meant the little girl to keep it as
her own if you don't mind."
"Give it back at once, child," repeats Jane, sternly.
" Me not !" cries Blossy, hugging what she feels to be her own
legitimate possession to her breast, and setting her teeth tight
" Me dot mine fiss."
Upon this Jane, stooping, lays her hand over the resolute
tiny fingers with force, and straightway rises to heaven such a
shriek as I trust few small children save Blossy Theobald have
the power to send forth. A shriek not of terror, not of weak-
ness, but defiance ; the veritablest war-cry that ever issued from
42 OUGHT WE TO VISIT HER 1
a pair of coral baby lips. Forward rushes the Belgian nurse,
ready for battle, then comes another cry, and another, and then
down falls Blossy prone, the fish beneath her in the dust, a
passionate-tossed heap of white embroidery, vigorously kicking
legs, and dishevelled golden curls.
People begin to turn round more and more ; they stare at
Jane, at Bawdon, at every member of the group.
" Fray do not let this painful scene be prolonged," remarks
Mrs. Crosbie, who it must be confessed stands now on vantage
ground ; " Emma, my dear, I really must request of you to ac-
* company me." And with victorious dignity radiating from
every fold of her olive-green dress, away Mrs. Crosbie walks,
Emma Marsland at her side.
So Bawdon is left alone with Mrs. Theobald. The blood runs
tingling through his veins with shame ; shame for his mother,
for himself, for the very name of Crosbie and all belonging to
it. He glances at Mrs. Theobald, and sees that the colour has
died down on her cheeks ; something not very unlike tears are
in her eyes as she stands and looks after the retreating forms of
the enemy. Poor Jane ! The heat, the excitement of the fray
are over now, and she is feeling, keenly, scorchingly (as even
Bohemian women can feel some things), this slight that has
been newly offered to her by the hands of her " sisters."
He advances, more humbly than he would have done had
Jane been an empress, and falters out some lame and impotent
excuse for his mother's conduct "The stiffness of English
manners living a good deal out of the world the pleasure his
father and he will feel in welcoming Mr. and Mrs. Theobald
as neighbours." These words, and others like unto them, fall
indistinctly on Jane's ear, and she knows that one friend, at
least, will await her in Chalkshire if she choose. Shall she
accept the proffered olive branch, or stand upon her own dignity 1
She hesitates, and Bawdon Crosbie speaks again. " If you
are going back towards the Bellevue, perhaps you will let me
walk with you, Mrs. Theobald 1 Please do !"
.-.lu
FORTUNATELY, THERE ARE RULES. 43
And Jane's determination is taken ; the more quickly in that
she can discern how Mrs. Crosbie and Emma, under pretence of
sitting down, are watching her movements from a distance. If
war is to be waged against her, on a grand and aggressive scale,
by the ladies of Chalkshire, why should she not enrol every
husband, brother, and son, willing to enter the lists, for her own
poor little guerilla system of defence !
"But what will your mamma say, Mr. Crosbie? In these
foreign places, you know, one can't be too caref uL What will
your mamma and Miss Marsland say to this fresh inadvertence V
"Miss Marsland is excessively kind-hearted," says Eawdon,
quickly. u You must not judge of Emma by any of the old-
fashioned opinions my mother imposes upon her. Emmy never,
voluntarily, committed an unamiable action in her life."
" * Emmy' talked to me for five whole minutes," says Jane,
demurely. " And after knowing, too, that I wasn't the Princess
Czartoriska ! She also presented a silver fish with green eyes
to my daughter. I have every reason to be grateful to Miss
Marsland."
At the word " fish" Blossy uplifts her head, and seeing that
her mother smiles, and that the ladies are gone, jumps to her
feet, the nurse indiscriminately dusting hair, face, legs, arms,
and embroidery with a corner of her apron.
" Me dot mine fiss !" she remarks, with triumph to Jane, the
moment the process is over.
u Yes, miss, as you've always ' dot* your own way in every-
thing," answers Jane. Then taking her little daughter in her
arms, as mammas of the upper classes are never seen to take their
children in public, walks back towards the Bellevue ; young
Rawdon (thinking the faces of mother and child the fairest his
eyes have ever rested upon) in attendance.
u You see, my dear Emma f Mrs. Crosbie remarks, in the
dim perspective of the avenue. u You see V
** Yes, I do see, and Pm very sorry I ever spoke to her," says
Emma, with perfect sincerity. M I dare say, mamma," but her
..-
I
44 OUGHT WE TO VISIT HERt
voice trembles somewhat, " I dare say Eawdon is trying to be
civil to make up for the slight we showed her/
Mrs. Crosbie laughs, a quiet, lady-like little laugh, and yet it
falls like lead on Emma's heart. " You are always amiable and
unselfish, but you are very unversed in the world's ways,
Emma, very. What can a person like Mrs. Theobald expect*
what can she ever have met with, from ladies, but slights t"
"Oh, mamma !"
u Your ignorance of evil does j*u jaredit, my dear child, still
Emma and remember I speak to you exactly as though you
were my own daughter nothing could be more ill-advised, as
matters stand now, than for me to permit any intercourse what-
ever between our house and the house of Francis Theobald.
For you, my dear girl, I do not dread ; your own high feminine
standard of right and decorum would, I know, under all cir-
cumstances be your safeguard, but . . there is Eawdon ! If
feel warmly if I seem to have acted a little harshly towards
this very-painfully-placed young person, remember my respon-
sibilities. There is Eawdon !"
A choking sensation comes into Emma Marsland's throat. Is
not Eawdon her own especial property 1 Half an hour ago did
not she and Eawdon kiss as only lovers kiss who one day will
be man and wife 1 And now, to hear his mother speak of him
as at the mercy of Mrs. Theobald of the first pretty but doubt-
ful woman who chooses to look at him with encouraging eyes !
"Eawdon is not made of barley-sugar, mamma" this she
says with a sorrowful little failure of a laugh " I don't suppose
he will quite melt away, because he happens to walk the length
of the street with Mrs. Theobald ! Charming though she may
be, you know she is married. Don't let us forget the (Existence
of Mr. Theobald and Blossy."
" If she were not married the case would be very different.
If, with all her want of birth, yes, and with her antecedents on
the stage and her dreadful existing relations, this young woman
were Francis Theobald's sister instead of Francis Theobald's
FORTUNATELY, THERE ARE RULES. 45
wife, I might feel my duty less plainly marked out before me.
With all his faults, I do not consider Rawdon a boy to be guilty
of the crime of making a low marriage. 11
" Then what are you afraid of, mamma V 9 exclaims Miss Mars-
land, hastily. " Really I can't help thinking that you a little
overrate Rawdon's susceptibility ; or do you consider Mrs.
Theobald's beauty so transcendent that no man, not even Raw-
don, can look at her and survive V
" I don't think Mrs. Theobald beautiful at all," answers Mrs.
Crosbie. "She possesses the transient attractions of youth,
and of a certain meretricious style "
Oh, Mrs. Crosbie, Mrs. Crosbie ! What of the graceful mien,
the elegance, the distinction you perceived in Jane as she passed
out from the hotel 1
" But she belongs, by birth and association alike, to a class of
persons whom society rightly considers dangerous, and puts be-
yond its barriers. A class who we know, and regret, must exist
Society will have its opera, and opera necessitates the ballet
but with whom no right-minded mother would, voluntarily,
allow her young son to be thrown. Your own delicacy of feel-
ing, my dear Emma, will, I am sure, make you sensible that I
have said enough/'
But Emma is not to be silenced yet. " I shall do just as you
choose, mamma dear, about my own acquaintance with Mrs.
Theobald ; and I'm sorry, very sorry, that the acquaintance
ever began. But I must say I consider Rawdon perfectly safe
in her society ; yes, or in the society of the most beautiful and
witty and fascinating actress in London. No doubt young men
talk to these sorts of people differently to how they do to us,
and and, perhaps, find what they say more amusing !" Emma
gives a sigh as she speaks. Far away she can see Rawdon and
Jane slowly strolling in the direction of the Bellevue. " Aa
long as we know we hold the first place in their affections, what
does it matter?"
M In these levelling days it is sometimes difficult to know who
46 OUGHT WE TO VISIT HERt
does hold the first place anywhere," is Mrs. Grosbie's answer,
u and, indeed, guided by our own wisdom, it would frequently
be embarrassing to decide who should, and who should not, be
admitted to our intimacy. Fortunately, my dear Emma, there
are Rules, and, fortunately also, there is the conduct of those
above us in station to be our guide."
"Those above us sometimes number very queer members
among their ranks," says Emma ; thinking, perhaps, of some
of the ultra well-born, ultra fast people, even in virtuous Chalk-
shire.
"Never ballet-girls," says Mrs. Crosbie, calmly. "Never
ballet-girls, and never persons who play the trombone in orches-
tras ! Of private misconduct, my Emma, we, erring creatures
of the hour, are not the appointed judges. Sufficient for you
and me, and every one of us, to regulate our own conscience,
and leave that of persons above us in station in peace."
And with the enunciation of this admirable Christian senti-
ment the conversation closes.
CHAPTER VL
YOUNG RAWDON GAINS HIS FREEDOM.
" I shall expect to see you at the ball to-night then," cries
Jane, looking back over her shoulder with a friendly farewell
nod to Rawdon ; " and I promise you two round dances that
is, if the powers that be give you leave to come."
And away she trips with her child, through the courtyard of
the hotel, Rawdon Crosbie his heart, his eyes, full of sunlight
watching the airy flutter of her blue and white muslin dress
till it is out of sight
The courtyard is empty now. Even Mr. Crosbie has finished
his Times, and betaken himself elsewhere to wile away the
interminable hours and get up an appetite for his dinner.
Rawdon lights his cigar, takes one of the vacant chairs under
the lindens, puts his legs across another chair, folds his arms,
YOUNG RA WDON GAINS HIS FREEDOM. 47
and begins to muse, with the delicious sense, for a quarter-of-
an-hour at least, of being his own master.
What a pretty woman Mrs. Theobald is i He has not the
faintest notion whether her nose is classical or celestial, whether
her mouth is geometrically straight, or the reverse ; he remem-
bers only generalities, the exquisite frank allurement of all that
health and youth and freshness ; remembers only that, if he can
get leave, she has promised to dance with him at the Casino
ball to-night
If he can get leave 1 Ridiculous doubt Who should hinder
him % His mother Emma 1 Certainly not poor Emma ; in-
deed, more than likely, Emmy at the last moment may take a
fancy to go to the ball herself. At this possibility Rawdon falls
with a rush, suddenly, blankly, as one falls from airy heights of
nothingness after inhaling the fumes of nitrogen gas or chloro-
form. He takes his cigar from his lips, examines its tip of burnt
ash gravely, looks up at the sky, and remarks the circles that
the swallows are making far away over head. Vaguely it occurs
to him that the swallows are enviable. They are free agents,
at least ; never consult parents in the matter of their affections;
never commit themselves, as animals endowed with the doubt-
ful advantages of speech do, beforehand.
Has he committed himself? The cigar burns dead, and he
re-kindles it by a moment's application to his lips, then holds it
idly again between his fingers. Is Emma Marsland his affianced
wife or not) He tries honestly to remember what was said
before the donkeys came, and his heart answers joyously, " No-
thing." And then he remembers Emma's tell-tale face of happi-
ness, and the kiss that was exchanged between them, and honour
and conscience cry heavily, " Everything." Of course, of course
he is engaged, absolutely now, as he has been, virtually, from
the time he left off jackets, and Emma is the best-hearted
little girl living, and he the luckiest of fellows.
He returns his cigar to his mouth, smokes away steadily, and
once more looks up at the sky. It is blue blue like some
women s eyes.
t&e iindena, ifids
tt y onng. and Be is
And because & man is
reMOn, when one
the b^t of every
h*a reach.
It ia the Erst time Rawdon Crosbie has vw snereefad
reconciling inclination perfectly sod amicably with facte.
more danger lurks hidden, perhaps, under the optiiwiut philo-
sophy than lie himself knows oC
The hours wear away, every minute of which brinp those
two promised waltzes nearer; the family-party meet at dinner
fit 13 a formula of Mrs* Crosbie that the m best people,* abroad,
never dine at tables-dnflte), ^n* Bawdon does not muster
courage to announce that he intends going to the public ball in
t be evening. Xo one seems in particularly lively spirits, and the
conversation at table flags. Mr. Crosbie, duly informed in
connubial solitude of the fiasco about the Princess, and warned
by a certain expression in his wife's eye, touches on no subject
nearer home than the present position of New Zealand finance.
Rawdon gives answers that betray either culpable indifference
to our colonial interests, or entire absence of mind, or both :
Emma, embarrassed, naturally, by her consciousness as a newly
affianced bride, eats her food in silence, Mrs. Crosbie is calm
and self-contained as ever, but cold as the ice on the centre of
the table ; addresses her remarks pointedly to her husband or
to Miss Maryland, never goes within a yard of meeting Raw-
don's eye. It is her invariable way of manifesting displeasure
towards her son ; a way, I may add, that, from the time Rawdon
was a baby, has never failed in putting him upon the defensive,
whatever the cause of dispute of the moment might chance to
be.
After dinner they all betake themselves to the pleasant flower-
garden at the back of the hoteL Mr. Crosbie walks up and
YOUNG RA WD ON GAINS HIS FREEDOM. 49
down the paths, wondering how it is that with this Continental
cooking one always feels lighter after dinner than before, and
wishing himself back again in Chalkshire. Mrs. Crosbie, a
black lace shawl over her head, stands in an attitude, her chin
resting on her shapely jewelled fingers, and watches the rising
moon. Emma Marsland creeps up to Rawdon, who is smoking
again when does Rawdon not smoke ? under a shady trellised
archway at the farther corner of the garden.
How handsome he is, thinks the heiress, gazing up at her
lover's most unclassical sunburnt face. And what a fine broad-
. shouldered fellow ! And hers hers ! stealing her fingers under
his arm and feeling, even with its attendant cares and jealousies,
what a thrilling intoxicating thing love is. Emma is not
romantic at ordinary times, but certainly at this moment she
would fain be wafted off to some fairy isle in seas unknown
with Rawdon Crosbie; no Mrs. Theobald, or any other ob-
noxiously pretty woman of the unVisited classes, to interrupt
their bliss ; nightingales to lull the hours ; a good cook to dress
their four meals a day, and' a pretty little rustic church to attend
English service in on Sundays.
" Oh, Rawdon," she whispers, and unconsciously her fingers
rest closer on his arm, " Isn't it delightful V
" Very," answers Rawdon, promptly. The question chimes
in so aptly with the subject he is thinking of just now !
M Do you think, by-and-by, if mamma doesn't mind, we might
have another walk V 1
"What, to-night r
" I I thought so. One of those little shady paths among the
woods, only not so up-hilL"
To a man in love, what music would such a proposal sound 1
But Rawdon is not in love, and he shirks it with an adroitness
that, were Emma more experienced in such matters, might lead
her somewhat inconveniently near the truth :
u My mother would be sure to mind, my dear Emma. My
mother is not in too amicable a mood, it seems, already. Be*
4
50 OUGHT WE TO VISIT HERt
sides, aren't we very jolly as we are V Pressing her hand to
his side with a lover-like warmth that raises Emma to the third
heaven of happiness.
"Very jolly," she whispers, leaning her cheek against his
shoulder. It is dusk, Reader, and the spot where they stand is
isolated. " Oh dear ! in spite of all that dreadful mistake about
Mrs. Theobald, what a day of days this has been !"
The tone of her voice makes Bawdon Crosbie realise lis
position to the f uIL They are lovers, formally affianced lovers ;
and in the friendly, flower-scented dusk, and in this close
proximity (and with the prospect of the ball before him) the
young fellow's own heart almost begins to feel tender.
"If it wasn't that my mother is watching us, Emma, I
should
" Oh, Eawdon, please ! Oh, don't !" If it is possible, she
clings a little closer to his side. " Oh, what do you mean V*
" Do you want me to tell you more plainly 1"
After this there is a long silence. Eawdon gives stealthy
glances at a certain brilliantly-lighted row of windows on the
first floor of the hotel, across whose blinds flits, ever and anon,
a shadow he recognises ; Emma, entranced, listens to the beat-
ings of her own heart.
" Only that I don't want to begin by scolding," she remarks
at last, in her falsetto little voice, " I should certainly scold
you, sir, for what you did this afternoon."
Bawdon is all contrition before he knows the nature of his
offence. He wants sincerety to propitiate every one. He wants
sincerely to get his leave of absence, and hurry away to dress.
" Scold me, my dearest Emma 1 Why, what have I done, now V 9
" Not flirted with Mrs. Theobald, in the least," says Emma,
with playful emphasis.
" It was with the Princess Czartoriska, my dear Emmy. My
mother introduced me. How could I do less than accompany
her Highness home '
" Do you think her pretty \ I don't in the least."
YOUNG RA WDON GAINS HIS FREEDOM. 5 1
" Pretty 1" repeats Rawdon, innocently. "Think whom
pretty r
" Oh, don't pretend Mrs. Theobald, of course. / don't care
for her face a bit." And in saying this, Emma speaks with
thorough sincerity. Jane is a style seldom appreciated save by
the other sex. What women extol in each other are regular fea-
tures, charms that can be catalogued ; men are all for charms
that can be felt. Thus, a man's beauty, is apt to have fine shoul-
ders, bright complexion, a sunny smile ; while a woman admired
by women can boast of an accurate nose an,d mouth, coldish
eyes, and a thin waist. Rarely will you find this rule at fault.
" She hasn't one good feature, her nose is not straight, I think,
and when you look close there are two marks of small-pox on
her forehead. Still, taking her altogether, I suppose she is a
woman that most people would call nice-looking)"
Pressed thus into a corner, Rawdon confesses that he should
probably go with the many. Mrs. Theobald yes, he supposed
Mrs. Theobald is a woman nineteen persons out of twenty would
call nice-looking.
"Without being in the least handsome, really V persists
Emma Marsland.
"Very likely. The truth is," says Rawdon, carelessly, "I
was thinking much more of my mother's queer behaviour than
of anything else."
"I'm afraid mamma did seem harsh," says Emmaf, "but it
was necessary to get out of the scrape some way or another. I
took quite a fancy to the child, and I don't see why I should
dislike Mrs. Theobald, if she were not such bad style, poor
thing ! Still, until we are sure whether she will be noticed in
the country or not "
Emma pauses, and her lover does not attempt to help her out
The twilight deepens, the great white stars come out upon the
violet night, and Rawdon is again in a fever of impatience,
and Emma in Paradise, or as near an approach to Paradise as
her constitution allows of. " I wonder whether mamma would
4-2
5* OUGHT WE TO VISIT HER f
mind our taking another walk!" she suggests after a time, her
It and still resting affectionately on Pawdon's arm. " We should
have an hour still before ten o'clock n
" Ten o'clock by George, that reminds jne!" cries Pawdon,
with ;iu in gen 11 nu 9 little start; M I ought to be dressing already, 1 *
" Dressi ngP
" Dressing ! White choker, lavender gloves ; all the prelimi*
nary process of torture."
* f Kawdon, you are going out somewhere !"
" Only to the ball at the Casino. Didn't X tell you this
morning I meant to gn1 Stupid kind of affair, I believe, never
kept up after midnight ; still, when one is at Pome "
" And you can care for such things, you can take any pleasure
in wing to halls and parties, and me left behind F
Five minutes before, Pawdon Crosbie was brought seriously
to realise his position as a lover. Miss Marsland's tone, now,
makes him feel like a lawfully-wedded husband ! And the first
foretaste of the dual state, the first prospective beat of the wings
against the prison bars is, I must confess, not overmuch to his
taste.
" Pleasure is a strong word, Emma. If I am not inordinately
bored I may be thankful. At all events," throwing away the
end of his cigar, "if I am to go at all, it is time for me to dress."
" Is Mrs. Theobald to be there : because, if she is " But
here a beetle, or heavy-winged insect of some kind, blunders
opportunely into Miss Marsland's face, and the threat remains
unspoken. She screams, fights, begins to run, Pawdon, with
the valour of a soldier, and the ardour of a lover, rushing to the
rescue.
" Why, Emmy, you silly little muff, what's the matter now ?
This is worse than the donkeys "
" It's somewhere about me, I know it is; it's somewhere about
me ! Oh, there's another, the air's full of them. I'm sure they're
cockchafers I should die if I got a cockchafer into my hair !"
Cockchafers they prove of the large and aggressive kind
THE "GRANDE DUCHESSE* WALTZES. 53
peculiar to certain wooded districts of the Ehineland and Bel
gium and suddenly, as at some preconcerted signal, they seem
to be let loose in myriads upon the face of the earth.
Mrs. Crosbie, by the light of the moon, makes dignified passes
at them with the corner of her lace shawl*; Mr. Crosbie is duck-
ing his bald head and napping them away with his handkerchief ;
they strike Eawdon on the nose; they whizz, like musket-shot,
past Emma's affrighted ears. They are here, there, everywhere.
" I can never stand it. Til go in. Oh, mamma, mamma,
dear, did you ever see anything like these disgusting horrid
things % I know they sting !"
And the heiress clasps her fat little hands above her head,
and, followed by Mrs. Crosbie, flies away the ball, Mrs. Theo-
bald, jealousy itself forgotten to the shelter of the hotel
By which means young Rawdon gains his freedom, and makes
the most of it Blessed for ever be the Belgian cockchafer 1
CHAPTER VII.
THE "GRANDE DUCHESSE" WALTZES,
The rooms occupied by Mr. and Mrs. Theobald are absolutely
the best the Hotel Bellevue possesses ; rooms not unfrequently
assigned to emperors,4rings, and all other kinds of royalties in
the height of the Spa season.
For Francis Theobald is one of those happy-go-lucky "Rip
Van Winkle" sort of men, who take the world equally easily
whether the road leads uphill or down, and just eat white bread
or black according as their gods think fit for the moment to
provide. Only, when it is white, Mr. Theobald will have it of
the very whitest !
"Always go to the best hotel in the place, and take the best
rooms the hotel can give you," is one of his maxims. " It's the
cheapest in the end." Everything pleasant is sure to be the
cheapest in the end, according to Francis Theobald's theory cf
OUGHT WE TO VISIT HER t
life. "You put up at a second-rate inn, order an economical din-
ner, get disgusted with everything, move nothing so expensive
as moving go to the hotel you should have gone to at first, and
are fleeced by two scoundrels instead of one for your pains."
- So at the present moment (while Mrs. Crosbie and Emma are
shutting out the cockchafers from a gloomy little sitting-room
on the second etage) luxury surrounds the Theobalds paupers
till yesterday on every side. Mirrors from ceiling to floor,
embroidered curtains, laced pillow-cases, Sevres and Dresden
services, clusters of wax-lights in silver sconces on their respec-
tive toilet-tables And exactly four napoleons, ready
money, in their pockets.
Jane, on one side of the room, has just fastened the last button
of her white silk ball dress, and stands for a moment in grave,
but satisfied abstraction before the looking-glass. Plain white
silk, before a flower, or necklace, or bracelet has been added, is
one of the severest tests to which a woman's complexion can be
put. Jane's comes out triumphant from the ordeal ; she knows
it, th knowledge softens her heart, and crossing the room noise-
lessly in her satin slippers, she surprises her husband, to whom
she has scarcely spoken since the tornado of the afternoon, by
giving him a sudden and conciliatory hug with both white arms
round his neck.
Mr. Theobald has arrived at that point of the toilette when
the best men's tempers are apt to be precarious. A couple of
ties, failures, lie as they have been impatiently tossed on the
floor, and he has just reached the mystic crowning turn of the
third when Jane at once jerks his hand and takes Jiis breath
away by her sudden caress.
" Kiss me, Theobald. I'm sorry I was in a rage. Don't let
us be bad friends any longer."
" I haven't been bad friends at all, Jenny," says Theobald, in
his soft calm voice. Tie number three is hopelessly crushed,
but he keeps his temper admirably. He has a miraculous temper
this oft-tried husband of Jane's, a temper poor Jane would be
Li.
THE GXANDE DUCHESSE" WALTZES. 5$
better satisfied sometimes to see ruffled. "Indeed, I don't know
yet what we quarrelled for. Something about a model-market
and a bishop, was it % No. What the deuce could model-markets
and bishops have to do with us V
" It was my fault, every bit of it. You told me I should have
to let the Chalkshire ladies sermonise me, and I and I felt
iealous. I couldn't help it Kiss me. I hate to think you
want me different to what 1 am. I hate to think how all these
people will remind you of what I should have been I"
Mr. Theobald kisses the lips so eagerly upheld to his and
submits, rather than responds, to the pressure of his wife's white
arms. Mechanically he searches for his eye-glass his usual
resource when Jane begins to hold him captive in this impetu-
ous fashion but his eye-glass is still lying on the dressing-
table, so he must resign himself to imprisonment without the
consolation even of seeing six inches beyond his own nose.
"I met them all, Theobald, I've been dying to tell you all
the Crosbie family, minus papa, and we have crossed swords
already. You remember when I went out?"
" Yes, Jane, I remember."
"Well, and I saw these people in the court-yard. Of course
I didn't know who they were ; but I thought they were cads by
the women's dress. Every colour of the rainbow, purple, pink,
green, like a beetroot salad. Well, they saluted me, wonder-
fully civilly ; and away I went to the town to do some shopping,
and by-and-by down to the avenue, and "
"Is the narrative long]"
" Long or short, I mean you to hear it. Yes, I mean you to
hear this sample of your well-born Chalkshire ladies' breeding !"
And then the story is told in Jane's fashion. No euphem-
isms does she make use of, no calling a spade by any other
name ; but fine nervous English vernacular. A slight shade of
colour has risen into Mr. Theobald's face by the time she finishes.
"And so for once in your life you were taken for a princess)
Poor Jenny ! n
$6 OUGHT WE TO VISIT HERt
"Taken for a princess, and cut the moment the mistake was
discovered. Oh, Theobald, the way the old lady walked off was
delicious. ' Emma, my dear, I think we have had enough of
this painful scene. In these foreign places one can't be too
careful.' And with a withering glance at Vice poor me
Virtue puts her hand under the arm of innocence, and exits."
And now Jane quits her husband, and struts in her training
white silk to the other end of the room, Mr. Theobald, who has
regained the use of his eye-glass, watching her. She is an
actress by birth, early training, natural proclivities alike, and
her rendering of Mrs. Crosbie is perfect. The conscious rec-
titude ; the British matron walk ; the very expression of the
eye is lifelike.
"And the young fellow, Kawdon what of him, Jenny ?"
asks Theobald, taking up a fourth tie when the performance is
over. "Am I to call Rawdon Crosbie out, or "
" You are to be as nice as you can to Rawdon Crosbie when
I introduce you to him to-night at the ball, ,, answers Jane, as
she returns to her own looking-glass. " He is a very good kind
of little boy ; not handsome, to be sure, and, I think, rather a
prig, but worth a world of the others ; I intend the young
fellow Eawdon to be my friend."
"Ah!"
" Oh, I understand. I know what you mean by that 'Ah !'
Pray, if the ladies of the family are determined to be against
us, isn't it better to have some one on our side V
" Very much better," says Mr. Theobald, amiably.
"Besides, Pm sorry for Bawdon Crosbie. Such a mother,
such a wife, for I suppose some day or other Miss Marsland
will be his wife. Theobald/' energetically, "how glad I am
Pm good-looking! For every estate in Chalkshire would I
exchange faces with Miss Marsland)"
"And yet, you see, Miss Marsland has got a lover, my dear."
"Got! . . . Will she be able to keep him?"
" You know more about that than I do, Jenny."
THE "GRANDE DUCHESSE* WALTZES. 57
Jane gives a nod at her own fresh image in the glass ; a nod,
we may fear, fuller of meaning than it should be for Emma
Marsland's peace. " I shan't look bad to-night when I'm fully
got up," she remarks, opening her trinket-case. "Do have tha
first waltz with me, Theobald for a treat 1"
" Not if Theobald knows it. De Lansac is as tall as I am
and has no vertigos."
"De Lansac!"
" Well, doesn't one man of a certain height show off a woman's
dress as well as another 1"
"Will you come here and pin in my flowers for me?" A
heap of fresh-cut roses from the hotel garden lie among the
laces and ribbons on Jane's untidy dressing-table. " You can
do that, at least, without being sarcastic."
" Certainly, Jane, certainly. Only let me put on my coat first."
It is a childish whim of Jane's that her husband shall always
arrange her flowers for her before she starts for a ball He
himself it was who set the practice going ah ! with what fond
hands when she was a bride of sixteen, and Jane clings with
a sort of superstition to keeping up this one custom (so many
are dead and gone now !) of those first foolish, honied days of
marriage. Mr. Theobald, who has fallen into the habit, since
his mis-alliance, of affecting theatrical parlance, calls himself
her " dresser," and obeys at all times with perfect good temper,
but without any marked degree of sentiment He is accus-
tomed, glancing up through his eye-glass from remote cart6
corners,- to see his wife's graceful flower-decked head gyrating,
at any number of miles an hour, round ball-rooms over the
shoulders of successive partners. He knows that Jenny, poor
girl, keeps no lady's-maid, so wants someone to give the finish-
ing touches to her dress, as she wants someone to play audience
to her preparations for conquest. And this " someone " is neces-
sarily himself. Mr. Theobald is, you see, a man without an
ounce of poetry in his composition.
"Lovely roses, aren't they, and so sweet % Madame was oat
.**.&* -^-..o
58 OUGHT WE TO VISIT HER1
of the way, and I actually got them for nothing out of old Papa
Benezit. Now, which shall I wear? I like the yellow ones
best, bat yellow is not my colour, and then they don't go with
pearls. It must be pink or white as usual"
Mrs. Theobald selects a drooping spray half -blossom, half-
foliage of exquisitely fragrant tea-rose, and Theobald, really
with no inartistic hands, fastens it among the natural ripples
never a morsel of false puff or chignon will Jane use of her
brown hair. Then she clasps on her pearls, Theobald's gift
when they married, her one "real" set, takes a long last linger-
ing draught of the delightful homage the looking-glass offers
her, and announces herself ready. Blossy, rosy and dimpled in
her cot by her Another's bed, has to be kissed, covered upj and
generally put straight; the Belgian nurse receives stringent
orders not to leave Miss Bdbe's side, on pain of instant dis-
missal, till her mistress's return. And then away Mr. and
Mrs. Theobald start on foot, as people do to these summer balls
abroad, for the Casino.
Mrs. Crosbie s Chalkshire maid, Lucy, happens, as does the*
Princess's courier, to be loitering somewhere in the vestibule as
they go out, and forthwith carries up detailed accounts to poor
Emma of Mrs. Theobald's appearance. Lucy knows all about
the misadventure of the afternoon, and how her people have
decided that Mrs. Theobald, who was only an actress, shall not
be visited when she comes into our neighbourhood ; and how
Mr. Eawdon walked back with her to the hotel, and has gone
to the ball, in spite of his mamma and poor Miss Emma, to meet
her now. She scents from afar, with the instinct of her kind,
a scandal, an imbroglio of some sort, and puts in her little
word in due season, thus :
M An English lady, I hear, ma'am, by the name of Theobald.
They say the gentlemen are all wild about her beauty ; and her
skirt was most elegant ; a train longer than Miss Fletcher ever
makes for you, ma'am, but not cut in a point, and with seven
bias flounces so deep and pearls on her neck and arms, and
THE " GRANDE DUCHESSE" WALTZES. 59
natural pink roses worn careless in her hair. Mr. Rawdon will
see her at the ball, no doubt, ma'am."
"No doubt, answers Emma, with a dignified assumption of
indifference that deceives neither her maid nor herself ; then,
when she is left alone, on this her first evening of gratified hope
of legitimate bliss, waters her pillow plentifully with salt tears
ere she sleeps*
Notwithstanding the tardy hour at which the cockchafers
effected Rawdon's enfranchisement, he manages to reach the
ball-room some minutes before Mr. and Mrs. Theobald arrive.
Jane is out-and-out the best-looking woman present. Rawdon
discovers this much, from a corner by the orchestra in which he
has ensconced himself, almost before she has crossed the door-
way. He discovers, too, with a very different order of attendant
sensation, that Theobald is out-and-out the best-looking man.
He had pictured Jane's husband basing the picture on heaven
knows what recollections of Theobald's spinster sisters in Chalk-
shire as swarthy, middle-aged, forbidding ; the typical husband
that the mind at once assigns to as young and charming a
woman as Mrs. Theobald. He sees a fair, handsome man
of two or three and thirty, somewhat worn-looking, perhaps,
somewhat prematurely sunken about the eyes and temples, but
possessing all the easy grace of a man of the world, the " clothes-
wearing faculty" which he, Rawdon Crosbie, will never attain
while he lives, and with his wife hanging proudly on his arm,
and, glancing up smiling, as though they were lovers of yester-
day, into his face.
And the sight is distasteful to him. So distasteful, silly boy
that he is, that had Jane danced the first waltz, as she wished,
with her own husband, Rawdon Crosbie likelier than not would
have marched straight away back to the hotel, and Emma, and
his mamma ; and my story at this early date have reached
its last chapter. Instead of Theobald, however, a certain good-
looking Frenchman, with whom Jane is evidently on terms of
complete familiarity, becomes her partner (Theobald, after three
60 OUGHT WE TO VISIT HERt
bars of the waltz, betaking himself through the red-baize door
into the adjoining salle de jeu\ and Rawdon's ridiculous jea-
lousy is transferred and modified at the same time.
He advances into the light of the chandeliers from his hiding
place beside the fiddlers, gets a nod of friendly recognition from
Mrs. Theobald, and the moment the waltz is over, stalks her
down, British fashion, as she is walking about on her partner's
arm, and asks her the Frenchman's eyes dissecting him, he
feels, into small pieces as he standsfor the honour of the next
dance.
" It's a quadrille," says Jane, stretching out her hand to Mrs.
Crosbie's son as if she had known him a dozen years ; " but you
can have it if you like."
" I think the agreement was that I should have two round
dances V Rawdon remarks, with tolerable audacity.
" I know it was, but you can have the quadrille all the same.
It will give us time to get better acquainted."
She passes away from him as she says this. Some other
foreigner comes up and asks her for a dance, and then another,
a and another. Her card must be filling fast Rawdon feels,
blankly. Not a chance for him beyond the two promised dances
which lured him here, if indeed she is quite sure to remember
these. Why, on earth, if he has come to the ball to enjoy him-
self does he not put Mrs. Theobald away out of his mind, and,
taking a leaf from her book, secure to himself other partners'?
He looks round the room, and sees pretty girls of all nations,
pretty girls in pink, white, and blue, some already appropriated,
some standing by their chaperons meekly biding their time. A
slim little raven-haired child of sixteen, in white and scarlet,
arrests his fancy. She has great dark eyes ; they meet Raw-
don's, and say, as plainly as eyes can say anything, " Dance
with me !" He wonders what is the etiquette about introduc-
tions in these foreign ball-rooms ) pulls on his gloves a little,
gets a few steps nearer the raven hair, finds the owner prettier
even than he thought, forgets Mrs. Theobald, wants only one
THE " GRANDE DUCHESSE* WALTZES. 61
more grain of courage, one more glance from the dark eyes to
walk boldly up and take his chance, when Jane's hearty English
voice sounds close beside him.
" Our quadrille, Mr. Crosbie, if we mean to dance it."
Rawdon turns and sees the Frenchman gracefully bowing
himself, as Frenchmen only can, into the background, and Mrs.
Theobald waiting for him. Since the days of his school-boy
rapture on finding himself first in a race or in a competition,
Rawdon's heart has, perhaps, not beat with such quick pleasure
as at this moment.
" You were so engrossed with the young person in scarlet and
white I scarcely knew whether I had better interrupt you," Jane
remarks, as they are taking their places. " Really, Mr. Crosbie,
I am surprised that you, an engaged man, should show such
levity ! In these foreign resorts, you know, one can't be too
careful. The most embarrassing results may arise from a single
inadvertence."
" But one may lessen danger by dividing it, Mrs. Theobald.
Black eyes may possibly be a safeguard against blue ones, may
they not r
" Don't ask me. I finished with all those follies a century
ago. Besides, I've been in so much danger all my life that I
don't know now what danger is. For a poor little boy of your
age, it's very different."
" A boy of my age ! What have I done to deserve these
names 1 I was an engaged man just now."
" But a poor little boy may be engaged, may he not V Jane
retorts, with gravely compassionating lips.
As she speaks the figure of the quadrille begins ; and, slow
dance though it is, with every bar that is played, with every
lightest touch of his partner's hand Rawdon Crosbie's pulse
beats quicker. That Mrs. Theobald is not of the same class as
Emma Marsland and his mother he knows, better even than he
knew it this afternoon. The familiarity with which she treats
him, jokes him, patronises him, after half a day's acquaintance ;
1
62 OUGHT WE TO VISIT HER t
her freedom from the set vapidities of conventional small-talk,
the very excellence of her movements in dancing all divide
her from women of his own world in Rawdon's sight : divide
her from them, yet by no means lessen her own charm ! Few
men of two-and-twenty but are socialistic in these matters,
above all when a pretty woman shows her lack of patrician
breeding by too facile intimacy with themselves.
After the quadrille comes a waltz.
" I have kept it for you," says Jane ; " this, and galop number
nine, and if you deserve it, waltz ten, the last of the evening.
I hope you are a good dancer? If you are not, mind, if you
make the least exhibition of me I stop after the first turn."
Now, Rawdon is by no means sure whether, critically judged,
he is a good dancer or no, and Jane's point-blank question makes
him hot.
" I don't fall down, Mrs. Theobald, generally, and I don't
know that I tread upon my partner's toes. I suppose I get on
as well as most other fellows."
" Ah," Jane shakes her head, resignedly, " if the other fellows
are English, I know what that means. However, we can but
make a break-down of it."
And thus hopefully encouraged, Rawdon puts his arm round
her shapely non-whaleboned waist, and they start Rawdon
Crosbie has gone to a good many Chalkshire balls in his life :
he feels that he has never danced till now. Light as a feather,
firm as a rock, his partner at once buoys him up, steadies him,
steers. In a sort of dream he hears the music of those Grande
Duchesse waltzes, and breathes the fragrance of the roses Jane
wears in her hair. What is Emma Marsland, or his engagement
to her) What is anything in the world beside the rhythm
and the movement, the sweetness and the light of this incom-
parable present moment !
I said that Rawdon Crosbie has never danced : I might almost
say he has never lived till now.
They stop after making two turns round the ball-room. Alas
THE " GRANDE DUCHESSE WALTZES. 63
for sentiment ! Rawdon has to take out his handkerchief and
wipe his forehead. Jane looks in better breathing condition
than when they started.
" We . . . didn't fall down, Mrs. Theobald, after all ?"
" No, we did'nt fall down," Jane answers, laconically.
" Or make an exhibition of ourselves in any way ?"
" I hope not."
Her tone cools Rawdon more effectually than do all the floods
of night air which are streaming in on them liberally through
every open window.
"Hope? I'm afraid yon think me an outrageously bad dancer ?"
"Oh no, I don't Your style is bad atrocious! and you
don't know how to hold your partner, and your feet seem to get
in your own way. You've been spoilt utterly spoilt by bad
teaching and bad partners, still I see no reason why you shouldn't
dance in time."
" Thank you," says Rawdon Crosbie, very red.
" You noticed my last partner ? His name is De Lansac, the
best friend Theobald and I have. Well, now, you couldn't do
better than take him as a model. His style is perfect."
"Is it indeed?"
"Perfect. And of course, Fm a judge from having been
brought up to the profession." Nothing can be more unabashed
than Mrs. Theobald's manner of making this confession. " I
tell Theobald, sometimes, that when everything else fails I can
earn my bread by giving dancing-lessons. Will you attend my
classes, Mr. Crosbie? Ill take you on moderate terms as an
old friend/
" You do look upon me as a friend already, then f whispers
Rawdon, forgetting his own smarting vanity in a moment.
" Not only a friend, but a neighbour. Hasn't some one told
me our estates in Chalkshire join? Well, if you like, you
may consider this evening as the first of the course. You won't
be offended," looking up at him with her blue eyes, " if I tell
you of your faults 1"
1
64 OUGHT WE TO VISIT HER?
" Offended !" echoes Rawdon ; "I should think not *Why *
Why, he would like the whole of life to be one long dancing-
lesson ; the same musicians playing the same waltz ; the same
sweet-smelling roses lulling his senses ; and Jane for ever find-
ing fault with him ! He pulls up in time, however. Ignorant
of the world though he may be, some instinct of discretion
warns him that Mrs. Theobald is the kind of woman to ridicule
pretty speeches mercilessly. And after another minute's breath-
ing space, away they waltz again.
" Better, much better. Don't be afraid of yourself. Don't
think whether you have feet or not. Lighter, more on the toes
no, don't jump about in the air. So." With admonitions
and encouragements like these, Rawdon's lesson draws to a close
(a lesson in which he has, perhaps, gained something besides
Terpsichorean experience) and he has to resign his monitress to
others.
He has forgotten all about the little girl in white and scarlet.
He does not want to dance with her, or with anyone. He wants
nothing but to hear the fiddlers begin the first bar of number
nine. Oh ! the interminable galop and waltz, and quadrille,
and galop and quadrille, and waltz that intervene ! Mrs. Theo-
bald lightens the misery of waiting by giving him a smile or
nod, or friendly word whenever, circulating alone about the
rooms, he crosses her path ; he attempts to shorten it once by
going into the salle de jeu, where he is just in time to see a
croupier pushing a cheerful pile of gold across the trente-et-
quarante table to Jane's husband ; and once he retires for some
minutes into one of the embrasured windows of the ball-room
where he observes the stars, and thinks a little of Emma, and
a great deal of Mrs. Theobald ! And then, in the middle of
dance number six, he returns abruptly to his first place of con-
cealment beside the orchestra, and watches Jane, steadily and
without interruption, until the moment arrives at which he may
legitimately claim her.
" Why in the world are yua looking so miserable, and where
THE "GRANDE DUCHESSE* WALTZES. 65
have you been hiding yourself?" are her first words. "If at
your juvenile age you don't go to a ball to dance, what do you
go for?"
"I came here to dance, and remained to learn," answers
Kawdon, gravely. "lam thinking of edification, not amuse-
ment, Mrs. Theobald."
" I saw you go into the card-room, two or three dances ago.
Did you notice what Theobald was about? Winning money?
Oh ! take me in there !" putting her hand quickly within his
arm. " Yes, I remember the galop, but we have quite time to
go and have a look at the tables before it begins."
They find Mr. Theobald no longer playing trente-et-quarante
himself, but forming one of a knot of spectators, an extempo-
rised gallery that has assembled round the roulette table to
watch an extraordinary run of ill-luck which, during the last
quarter-of-an-hour, has set in against the Princess Czartoriska.
" The illustrious personage I ought to have been !" whispers
Jane, calling Bawdon's attention to her Highness's Calmuck
high-cheek-boned face ; the sallow forehead covered with big
drops of agitation, the black oval eyes bloodshot and horribly
fixed of expression. "And to think this is all the pleasure
great people can buy with their money ! They say she was a
gipsy girl when the Prince Czartoriska married her. She must
have been a vast deal happier in those days, I should think.
Why you and I, dancing our poor little waltz just now, were
richer in reality than she is.*
" Only our riches were too soon spent, Mrs. Theobald !"
"Too soon spent? How so? Why, every time I dance
with you, or De Lansac, or A, or B, or C and hear good music,
and feel that I am young and strong, and have a polished floor
under my feet (and provided, of course, I've a decent partner),
I say I'm richer than her poor old painted gouty haggard
Highness. It will take a good many years yet, Mr. Crosbie.
before my riches are spent."
A, B, or C. Banked generally among " decent" partners, and
5
I
66 OUGHT WE TO VISIT HER t
told to his face how he is ranked ! Ah, there can be no doubt
about it, Mrs. Theobald's want of breeding is a desperate draw-
back to her pretty face. A pleasant companion at a theatre or
in a ball-room she may be ; but imagine being married to such
a woman, seeing her at the head of your table, watching the
effects of her terrible honesty upon the faces of your guests.
And then her grammar ! Twice, if not of tener, Rawdon has
detected something radically wrong about her nominatives ;
and she speaks of her husband as "Theobald!" Rawdon
Crosbie is afraid curiously, abruptly the fear has fallen upon
him that his mother's precautions are reasonable, that Mrs.
Theobald is . . . vulgar.
She leads him within a step or two of where her husband is
standing. Theobald, however, who at no time sees six inches
beyond his own nose, is too engrossed in the Princess's duel for
a duel it has now become to notice them.
" Rien ne va plus. Messieurs, le jeu est fait," sounds the
monotonous parrot call of the croupier through the silent room.
The Princess Czartoriska stakes once more ; this time stakes
the maximum amount allowed by the direction ; and every one
bends forward, breathless, to watch the result The wheel is
set in motion, the ball burrs round with lightning quickness,
revolves slower, slower, and falls with a click, into its destination.
" Vingt-huit. Rouge pair et passe," cries the same machine-
like voice. Then, impressive as fate itself, one croupier begins
raking up the crisp notes and shining heaps of gold of the
Princess, while another pushes across the sums, not very heavy
any of these, due to the players who happened to stake upon
the right side.
Pale under her rouge, with livid brow and lips, with palsy-
stricken hands, the Czartoriska rises. A lady companion, who
has been patiently dozing in the background during the repe-
tition of this often-enacted scene, advances to support her from
the room to her carriage. Her Highness has had her two hours'
pleasure; has bestowed upon the Spa management about as
THE "GRANDE DUCHESSE" WALTZES. 67
many thousand francs a* would support half-a-dozen honest
men's families for a year.
It is now half-past eleven, and after the departure of the
great star of the evening, most of the other smaller players pre
pare to leave the rooms, Theobald among the rest " I hope
you have not quite ruined us?" says Jane, touching his arm.
"From the expression of your face I know you have been losing. "
"I am glad my face has any expression left, Jenny," Mr.
Theobald answers ; " but, as it happens, I am a couple of
napoleons or so to the good. Ah," adjusting his eye-glass and
taking a good-natured look at young Rawdon, "Bawdon Cros-
bie, is it not ? I thought so by the family likeness. Curious
run on red, that, was it not ? You were looking on at the poor
old Princess's ill-fortune 1"
Jane's husband extends a friendly hand, and all Rawdon's
prejudice against him vanishes, as if by magic. Francis Theo-
bald is not a very wise man ; certainly he does not answer to
the popular notion of a very virtuous one. He neither feels,
expresses, nor acts up to any exalted views whatever of human ,
nature ; never deliberately takes the trouble to harm his fellow-
creatures seldom, deliberately, takes the trouble to do them
good. If rule or principle of any kind can be said to govern
his erratic life, it would seem to be to attain the ease, moral and
physical, of the moment, and to shut one's eyes resolutely against
the morrow. And still, thanks to the influence of voice, looks,
and manner, few men, no woman can come into personal contact
with Francis Theobald, and not like him. Barring his very
near relations, he has literally never had an enemy on the earth
save himself ; and as to friends well, notwithstanding his abso-
lute selfishness, his nomadic habits, that he is often bankrupt,
and always readier to borrow than to lend, I really believe
Francis Theobald has met with as much friendship as befalls
the average of better principled, less selfish, and more solvent
men.
" I don't want to hurry you, Mr. Crosbie," Jane remarks when
5-2
68 OUGHT WE TO VISIT HER?
three or four minutes have passed, Theobald having at onco
befun initiating Bawdon into some of the finer chances and
mysteries of roulette. "I don't want to hurry you when you
are engaged on such a delightful subject as gambling, still, this
is our galop, and if we have any intention of dancing it "
"I beg a thousand pardons," cries Bawdon. "But is it not
through your wish of looking on at the tables, Mrs. Theobald,
that so much of the galop has been wasted already?"
"Better make up for lost time now, at all events," says Mr.
Theobald, turning towards the ball-room, " and 111 look on. I
haven't seen you dance to-night, Jenny."
He "looks on" by getting into a corner and talking with
de Lansac and one or two other men until the music ceases
playing ; then comes across the shining well- waxed floor of the
ball-room, his opera hat under his arm, to meet Jane and her
partner.
" One more dance, Jenny ? and you are going to dance it
with Crosbie ? I thought so. Well, then, De Lansac and I
will walk on. De Lansac is coming round to our rooms for an
hour, and we shall just have time to finish our cigars before you
arrive. Crosbie will bring you."
" So like your way of answering for people," cries Jane ; but
perfectly acquiescent, perfectly ignorant that there is any want
of decorum or dignity in the proposal. "Suppose I am not
going to dance with Mr. Crosbie, and suppose, too, Mr. Crosbie
doesn't want to see me hornet"
"Why suppose impossibilities?" remarks Bawdon, and the
remark seems to settle the question at once. Theobald and De
Lansac leave the Casino, arm-in-arm, and Mrs. Theobald is left
to hb undivided charge for the remainder of the balL
They dance number ten, waltz ; they dance an extra waltz
afterwards and, following the law of every unpremeditated
pleasure, is not that one extra dance at the end of an evening
i leasanter than all the bespoken, labelled lawful
ave gone before 1 And then, best of all, comes
THE "GRANDE Dl/CHESSE" WALTZES. 69
the walk, in the sweetness and silence of the night, back to the
Hotel Bellevue.
It is just past twelve, and the moon (dazzlingly white she
shines in this clear climate) rides high in heaven; every
jalousied window along the principal street of the village is
close shut, the silver-tipped amphitheatre of surrounding wood-
land seems drowzing in delicious sleep. How doubly pretty
a woman looks by moonlight ! With one hand Mrs. Theobald
gathers up her silken train out of the dust, the other rests
lightly on Rawdon's arm, and close, too close, to Rawdon's
foolish heart ! The white satin hood of her opera cloak half-
drawn, half thrown back, forms a soft and fairy-like setting to
her blooming girlish face. Oh, if the Rue Haute were only
longer, or if human feet, moving onward at all, could but be
brought to move slower !
Alas, the walk is already over. They pause ; by a side-door
enter the gardens of the Bellevue. The air is weighted with
the damp rich odours of the seringas and acacias ; everything
in the world seems fresh, fragrant, in tune. A throb of life-
enjoyment, so new, so keen, as to be almost a throb of pain,
rises in Rawdon Crosbie's breast !
They go up the broad moonlit staircase of the hotel, Jane
stops at a door on the first floor; the sound of laughter, of men's
voices is heard within, and Rawdon, brought rudely back from
the land of dreams to reality, prepares to wish his companion
good-night.
" Good night why, what do you mean V says Jane. " The
evening is just beginning. You are coming in to smoke a cigar
with Theobald, of course V
Rawdon hesitates, thinks of Emma ; how if poor Emmy should
be sitting up awaiting his return ?
" Now, come in at once," Jane repeats, laying her hand on
his shoulder as if he were a schoolboy. " How much pressing
some people do want !"
She opens the door, and Rawdon follows her. Where, at that
moment, would he not follow if she chose to lead ?
r*jj--** jur%--.-J
70 OUGHT WE TO VISIT HER?
CHAPTER VIII. *
THE BOOK OP MARTYRS.
There has not been time, it seems, for Theobald and De Lansac
to finish their cigars ; the room, at all events, is decidedly fuller
of tobacco-smoke than a lady's sitting-room should be when
Rawdon and Jane arrive ; wine, brandy, and seltzer-water are
on a table at Mr. Theobald's side. De Lansac, removing his
cigar from his lips and approaching Jane, says, " Madame, you
permit r
To which Jane answers gravely, " Yes, monsieur, I permit
one cigar after midnight."
But Rawdon can detect that this is a little bit of comedy, got
up, doubtless, in compliment to himself as a stranger. It is
the rule of the house I use the phrase figuratively ; the Theo-
balds never have a house that men shall smoke in Jane's pre-
sence and Jane take no umbrage.
She moves across the room to Theobald's side and coolly drinks
about a third of his brandy and seltzer at a draught, then look-
ing back at Rawdon (gracefully always : Jane has a trick of
looking back to you across her shoulder which is simply irre-
sistible) asks him what he will have ?
" Oh, thank you, you are very kind," says Rawdon, following
her and speaking in his stiff young British manner, " I don't
think I want anything at all at present."
" Rubbish ! After the pace of those two last dances, and no-
thing but a glass of sugar- water for support ! Take some brandy
and seltzer like a rational being, and do drop all those absurd
airs of superiority."
Saying this, she prepares him a glass of the mixture, with a
hand accustomed to minister to Francis Theobald, and therefore
less sparing of the alcohol than of the diluent, and Rawdon
receives it obediently.
a You may smoke if you like. What, ' no, thank you' again !
j-ri.v**-jk-'.^A .'\ -
THE BOOK OF MARTYRS. 71
Do you always say ' no thank you/ to everything, Mr. Crosbie *
Well, then, make yourself at home in any way you prefer.
Theobald," looking through the open window near which she
stands, " here is little Molenos coming up the street Oh, I
know what that means : 6carte\ I shall go to Blossy."
" Madame Theobald, do you think we can want carte* when
you are here V asks De Lansac. He speaks English with tho-
rough fluency, scarcely more than the invincible stumbling-block
of the tk 9 indeed, marking him as a Frenchman at alL " Do you
think, in your presence "
" We could presume to smoke our cigars, and drink our brandy
and water, and play our ecarte and forget Madame Theobald's
existence F Jane interrupts him. " No, Monsieur de Lansac,
I know you too well to suspect you of such infamous conduct."
" But if we play, you will promise not to forsake us alto-
gether V De Lansac asks, laying his hand on her wrist.
" Yes, 111 promise not to forsake you because Mr. Crosbie
is here and will talk to me ; for nothing else."
Thus speaking she takes a light from a side table and dis-
appears into the adjoining room. Jane disappears, and almost
at the same moment the outer door opens, and unannounced,
unceremoniously, like everything else that has to do with the
Theobalds' life, another person enters.
"Ah, Molenos, old fellow, here you are?" cries Theobald,
cordially, but without stirring from a sofa on which he has
thrown himself full-length. " Crosbie, let me introduce you to
my friend Molenos. He doesn't understand a word of English,
and no one in Spa can find out what language he does under-
stand ; but he is one of the best fellows living. Have some
brandy and seltzer, Molenos 1 Cognac and zelsare. De Lansac,
convey to our friend, if you can, that my intentions are hospit-
able."
Molenos is a rich young Mexican merchant, speaking not one
syllable of English, and only about a dozen words of French,
but with whom, through the universal language of ecarte, Theo*
72 OUGHT WE tO VISIT HER t
bald and De Lansac have succeeded in becoming intimate. He
bows, with an instinct of having been introduced to Rawdon,
and looking round the room exhausts a quarter of his vocabu-
lary by remarking, " Madame pas ici V
" Madame will be ici directly, tout de suite" says Theobald.
" Curious run of luck that against the Czartoriska, was it not,
MolenosT
" Oui, Oui," says the Mexican, " Czartoriska, perdue."
He has just six words of French now unspent,imt with these,
Theobald speaking English, De Lansac French, he manages to
sustain the conversation ; drinks some sherry and seltzer, that
is to say, shows his white teeth and answers, " Oui, Oui," to
everything, and looks intelligent.
"I don't know that it is too late for a little e'carte," Theobald
suggests after a time. " De Lansac, I think there are cards in
that drawer by you. You play ecart, Crosbie V
Before Rawdon can answer, the door communicating with
the bedroom opens and Jane reappears. She has exchanged her
opera cloak for a white lace shawl, which falls in soft clouds
over her neck and arms. The roses, half -faded, are in her hair :
she holds a little bunch of fresh ones, crimson, yellow, and
white, in her hand.
" You play ecarte*, of course, Crosbie V Theobald has to repeat,
Rawdon's eyes and ears and whole attention having become
suddenly absorbed elsewhere.
" I beg your pardon thank you, yes, sometimes."
' " Not to-night, though," says Jane, peremptorily. " Oh, good
T evening to you, Mr. Molenos." Judging from the nod she ac-
cor Js him, the young Mexican is not one of Mrs. Theobald's
I favourites. u Mr. Crosbie is going to talk to me, and not play
' ecarte* to-night, Theobald, and all nights, too, if he takes my
Y advice."
A quick look, not exactly of displeasure, but of something
very different to their usual lazy expression, passes from Mr.
Theobald's handsome grey eyes. " You may depend upon it,
u .
THE BOOK OF MARTYRS. 73
my dear Jane, Crosbie is too gallant a man to refuse such an
alternative," he remarks, good-humouredly, but with emphasis.
Jane bites her lip, colours, and hangs her head. The remark
evidently has told.
"And Mees B^beT asks De Lansac, promptly. It enters
Rawdon Crosbie's head that the Frenchman is sufficiently a
friend of the house not only to understand domestic storm
signals, but to throw himself boldly between man and wife.
" There are two days that I have not seen Mees B4b& How is
she looking V
" You had better judge for yourself," says Jane, returning
towards the half -open bedroom door. " Come in ; 111 light
you." And taking up the candle she had just set down, she
goes with De Lansac into the other room, while Mr. Theobald,
assisted by the young Mexican, sets ready the card-table.
Rawdon Crosbie looks on, open-eyed, at this new specimen of
Jane's thoroughly free-and-easy style of manners. To De Lan-
sac, a foreigner, to Mrs. Theobald and her husband, professed
Bohemians, the situation is one of the simplest matter-of-course.
Blossy asleep on her pillow, or Blossy playing on the floor in
the daytime what is the difference) As often as not, when
funds run low, during their wanderings, the Theobalds do not
possess the luxury of a sitting-room at all. But Rawdon has
never been out of her British Majesty's dominions for more
than a consecutive fortnight since he was born. On all points
connected with the received canons of artificial decorum he is
British unconsciously, very likely, but British to the core.
And the coolness with which Mrs. Theobald conducts De Lansac
to the side of Blossy's small bed, the way they talk there in
whispers, the final tableau of De Lansac stooping to kiss one of
Mees B6b6's pink hands, Jane shading the candle at his side
I say the utter, the flagrant disregard of insular prejudice evinced
by the whole scene, takes him positively and ludicrously aback.
" Now then, Jenny," cries Theobald, looking round from the
card-table to which he has drawn up the easiest chair in the
74 OUGHT WE TO VISIT HER t
room for his own special use. "When you have quite done
Be*be^worship and can spare De Lansac, we are waiting for him ;
but don't hurry." His tone is unruffled as ever ; the sweetest
voice in the world has Francis Theobald ; all his transient ill-
humour fled.
" In a minute," cries out Jane, " I just want to show him my
new dress."
And upon this shade of Mrs. Crosbie, couldst thou witness
it ! she runs across to a bureau, the Frenchman following ;
a grand silk dress with lace flounces is produced, held up, en-
larged upon by Jane, while De Lansac, whose turn it is now to
hold the candle, gravely criticises its " points."
" I never had such a swell dress before," Rawdon overhears
her say. " But the moment we heard of our fortune, nothing
would do for Theobald but he must order me tnisfrom the most
expensive milliner in Brussels. The colour is prettier by day-
light, just my mauve, you know, and the white lace makes it so
becoming. Now, which do you say is correct, a mauve or a
white bonnet to go with it V
De Lansac holds one opinion. Jane another. They argue
the momentous question, inch by inch, and Jane at last slowly
gives way. Then, after carefully rearranging the dress in its
place, they return to the sitting-room. De Lansac rolls himself
a cigarette as he joins the other two men at the card-table, Jane,
her face wearing the same frank open smile which is its dis-
tinguishing charm, comes up to Rawdon.
" You and I must entertain each other if we want to be en-
tertained at all," she tells him. " I hope you feel in an amusing
veinT
" Not in the very least," says Rawdon, stiff and glum. Then
he adds, with the pleasant consciousness that he is striking a
side-blow at foreign frivolity, "indeed I trust, yes, I am thank-
ful to say I trust, Mrs. Theobald, that I am never amusing."
" Oh, you don't mean that ! You are only modest, as you were
about your dancing, and see how well I got you through it after
HWJ.,i ?*_--
THE BOOK OF MARTYRS. 75
all ! Now come with me," extending her hand to him as one
would do to a child of six, "and 111 show you my photographs
You must give me yours, by the way. I'm sure you make a
good one."
Crossing the room, she takes an album from one of the tables,
and moves away with it to an ottoman in the corner farthest
from the card-players. " I don't know whether we shall have
light enough/' and she opens her book and signs to Kawdon to
take his place beside her. Good heavens, my poor boy !" look-
ing hard in his face, " what is the matter with you 1 If you
can't be amusing, at least be good-tempered, for my sake. See,
here's a flower for you, if you'll condescend to accept it V
She selects the freshest rosebud from the bunch she has in
her hand and gives it to him. It is one of the same kind, it
has the same odour, as those she wore at the ball, and Eawdon
forgets Monsieur de Lansac and the little scene of B6b6-worship
as quickly as an hour before he forgot poor Emmy, and the
warnings of his own conscience. " Pm a fearful bear, I know,
Mrs. Theobald." The admission is made in too low a tone to
be heard by any ear but Jane's. " I wonder you takft the trouble
to talk to me at all."
Jane bends her face and examines the silver and velvet bind-
ing of her album. " To tell you the truth, I wonder at it too,"
she remarks, after a short silence, and in the same undertone as
Eawdon's. " I was never nearer anything in my life than I was
to bidding you go about your business in the avenue to-day, I
can tell you."
" Mrs. Theobald ! Why, what had I donef
"You were your mamma's son," says Jane, quickly. "Oh,
don't defend yourself," she adds, as Eawdon is about to speak ;
"don't defend yourself, and don't think I mean to say bad
things of anybody belonging to you. We all act according to
our lights, and I tell you when your mother and Miss Marsland
walked away, the crime of my not being a princess discovered,
I was within an ace yes, within an ace," her lips quiver, " of
insulting you, sir, as you stood there !"
%
76 OUGHT WE TO VISIT HERt
" You couldn't hare insulted me," sayB Rawdon, with a hu-
mility that touches her in his voice. M However harshly you
had treated me, I should have felt that I, that all of us, had de-
served it If you had told me to go about my business "
"Welir
"Well, I dont think I should have gone, Mrs. Theobald,
that's alL"
"Wouldn't yout Ah, you don't know how I can look, how I
can speak, when I'm in a rage ! If I had said what for a mo-
ment it was in my heart to say 111 undertake to answer for
your obeying me."
" But you didn't say it," Rawdon pleads. "You were gene-
rous "
44 1 acted according to my lights. We needn't use grand
words. I did not quarrel with you, I dont mean to quarrel
with you, no, not never no more, as Blossy says. Now, let me
show you my photographs. First, what do you think of my
book! It was De Lansac's present on my last birthday. See,
here's my name. 9 She points to some Lilliputian French hand-
writing on the title-page. M Cant you read it t ' Jane Theobald,
on her nineteenth birthday. From B. D.L.' (that means Ber-
nard de Lansac), and the date. He didn't want to put my Age ;
so like a Frenchman ! but I would have it What does age
matter V
"Not very much at nineteen," Rawdon Crosbie assents,
"No, nor at thirty-nine either. I know I would never tell
an untruth about mine. By-the-by, how old are you t"
Rather shamefacedly, Rawdon Crosbie acknowledges that he
will not be twenty-three till next November.
" Twenty-three ! What, you, twenty-three more than three
years oMer than me t What a ridiculous idea !"
tf Yoa took me for fifteen, no doubt, Mrs. Theobald. That
accounts for your good-nature in advising me not to play ecarte."
"I should have said the same if I had taken you for fifty. I
detest gambling in every form, and I detest people who gamble.
THE BOOK OF MARTYRS. 77
On the day that I first see you play cards I say good-bye to you.
Mind that"
"Then I shall never touch another card. I can make the
promise with a very easy conscience. Still," and he glances at
the cart table and its occupants, " I can scarcely believe you
carry out such extreme opinions always V
u Well, I don't detest Theobald, certainly, or ... or De Lan-
sac" The colour comes again to Jane's face, her eyes sink.
* You do not detest Mr. Theobald or Monsieur de Lansac,
but you do detest the men who play with them?" Rawdon
hazards.
" Precisely. You have described my sentiments to a nicety.
And now, please, let us talk of something else. Oh, the photo-
graphs. You promised me, didn't you, that you would give me
yours r The little flurry of her manner does not escape Raw-
don's notice, neither does he forget that De Lansac's was the
last name mentioned. " Please don't let me hear ' No, thank
you,' again. You'll send it, bring it in to-morrow morning, if
you have one with you. Now let us begin."
She gives Rawdon the book to support, and leans over its
pages with him, close ; so close that her breath is on the lad's
cheek, the folds of her lace drapery touch his sunburnt hand.
M Pll tell you who the people are as we go along. They are a
motley collection, as you will see."
A motley collection they prove. Frenchmen, Englishmen,
Germans, men of every nation under the sun ; the slenderest
sprinkling of ladies, and these bearing all the irrepressible
" artiste" stamp. Jane never adds to her picture-gallery by
purchase : with scarcely an exception, her photographs are por-
traits of people she has known, and the book tells the story, in
some sort, of her eventful vagrant life.
" Pve put them, as near as I could, by date. The people you
see here, and for the next three pages, are vagabonds, the pro-
fessional people I knew before I married Theobald. This old
fellow is my uncle Dick. You must have heard him often.
%
78 OUGHT WE TO VISIT HER*
He playB in the orchestra of the Theatre Royal dear, jolly old
face that he has, bless his heart ! And this is my sister Miii.
You have seen her, of course V
Turning his eyes upon the very characteristic portrait of Uncle
Dick, Rawdon Crosbie turns to the equally characteristic one
of " Min," and answers that he is not, at the present moment,
aware whether he has had that pleasure.
" Minnie Arundel is her professional name. If you are in
the habit of going to the London theatres at all, you must have
seen her, particularly about Christmas time. During the sum-
mer, Min is generally in the provinces ; and, I can tell you,
never plays anything under leading lady, even in Liverpool.
She is like me, rather, isn't she V
44 Rather," answers Rawdon, hesitatingly. Miss Minnie Arun-
del's showy stage face, with its professional smile, big eyes, and
hair cut short across the forehead, is undeniably like Jane's ;
but, somehow, the likeness pains him. M Your sister is a good
deal older than you are, Mrs. Theobald I*
"A year or two, yes ; but when she's dressed and lit up, poor
Min doesn't look more than eighteen, not an hour more. The
girl you are looking at now is Rose Lascelles, and this is Kate
Aubrey as they were, both of them, in my days. We were
all taught in one class. And now look at this. I suppose you
would never guess who this is?"
She points to a gauze-winged sylphide of the ballet, half-
child, half- woman ; a sylphide dressed in the airiest of butterfly
dresses, and leaning, with grace and buoyancy wonderful for a
photograph to reproduce, against a broken column.
u I have never seen you wear wings," says Rawdon, raising
his eyes from the photograph to her face, "but the likeness is
excellent''
" It was like me," Jane answers, a little regretfully ; "it was
like me, then, in my beauty days. You say you never saw me
wear wings. I never did wear them, or any dress belonging to
the ballet, except in this photograph. You know I was just
THE BOOK OF MARTYRS. 79
coming out, had my engagement signed, and my dress ready
and everything, when . . . when I married Mr. Theobald."
" And the photograph was taken as a memento of what might
have been?" Rawdon suggests, as she hesitates.
"I suppose so. I was disappointed just a little not at
getting married" ("getting" married ! Rawdon's critical spirit
groans), "but at having to throw up my engagement, and so
Theobald let me be photographed in my dress, although I wasn't
fated to wear it. Well, well, all that's past and done with \*
turning over the leaf of the album with a half sigh. " From
this point onward you'll find yourself in different company
better company, I suppose I ought to say. Doesn't Theobald
photograph well!" Rawdon is examining a cabinet-size vignette
of Jane's handsome husband u I put him on this page, you see,
by himself ; a land mark between the old life and the new."
"And Monsieur de Lansac?" Rawdon asks. "Why does he
come next Is Monsieur de Lansac a landmark also ? "
" De Lansac comes next because he was my first and best
friend after I married," Jane answers coolly. " You will see
him a dozen times or more through the book. De Lansac and
Blossy appear perpetually, like a chorus. Now you come to the
common crowd all the men I have known during the past four
years. The 'army of martyrs/ Theobald calls them."
" And of whom I am to be one 1 " Rawdon Crosbie asks, in a
whisper.
" Of course," she answers, in that hearty voice of hers which
is such an antidote to sentiment. "Who are you, that you
should escape more than your betters ?"
Alas, for Rawdon's vanity ! He has not gone far before he
discovers that to enter the ranks of Jane's martyrs is no very
signal compliment, as far, at least, as social distinction goes.
Not only all nations, but all classes, are to be found there.
Thus, on one page, " Who' is this man ? " he asks. "lam sure
I know his face well in London % n
"That? Let me see : that is the young Marquis of Waste-
k
80 OUGHT WE TO VISIT HER 1
lands/' answers Jane, carelessly ; " and this queer little mortal
by him is Lord Paget Vaurien. Theobald picked them both
up in Paris, one winter, and they would present me with their
photographs."
"And this?"
"This lachrymose-looking gentleman is a Moldavian prince,
with a name a foot long, an ecart^ friend of De Lansac's."
"And this?*
" Oh, that is dear old Carl Hofman. He keeps the ' Golden
Eagle* in Frankfort. ,,
"And you really honour Mister . . . ah Carl Hofman, by
giving him a place in your book ? " asks Rawdon, with a certain
Brahminical emphasis that is not lost upon Jane.
"Yes, indeed I do. I consider Carl's about the handsomest
and nicest face my book contains ; as I consider Carl himself
one of the handsomest. and nicest fellows living. Theobald
was ill, very ill, in his house once, and I shall never forget
Carl's kindness. He sat up with him at night, he was like a
brother to us."
"Ah, that makes all the difference. You may be grateful to
a man of that kind, without - "
" Without looking upon him as an associate? But, you see,
we did look upon Carl as an associate. He was such excellent
company ! could play, sing, do everything. I never spent bet-
ter evenings than we used to have at the ' Golden Eagle,' when
Theobald was recovering. However," she adds, maliciously,
"I shouldn't presume to put you in such company, Mr. Crosbie.
I've got a bishop somewhere oh, indeed I have ! Min gave
him to me when she was weeding her book I don't remember
his name, but he is someone very celebrated, who went wrong
about the deluge, and 111 put you beside him. Yes, you and a
bishop, all by yourselves, on one page."
It was past midnight when Eawdon and Jane danced their
last waltz. By the time the book of martyrs is finished they
discover, on looking up at the open window, that night is over.
THE BOOK OF MARTYRS. Si
A few pale stars still twinkle in the sky, but the sky is already
rose-flushed. The blackbirds and thrushes are calling to each
other among the distant woods. All at once it occurs to Rawdon,
with a shiver, that his mother and Emma may be sitting up for
him. He hints that it is time to go.
"Directly," says Jane. "You must have something to eat
iirst. Now, please let us have no more ' No, thank yous f this
is the hungriest hour of the twenty-four, just as midnight is
the thirstiest"
She crosses the room, and opening the door of a gilt and
mirrored armoire in a corner, takes out a half -cut pate and a
Madeira cake ; holding one of which in either hand she returns
towards Rawdon. " None of you want anything so common-place
as food, I suppose V she asks, as she passes by the card-players.
Mr. Theobald is too engrossed to answer. He is waiting, his
cards on the table, for Molenos to propose, and the game is four
all. De Lansac looks round at Mrs. Theobald, and lays his
finger silently on his lips.
" Oh, then we will have our supper, as we have spent our
evening alone," she remarks, addressing Rawdon. " Come to
the window, Mr. Crosbie. It's cooler there, and farther from
that horrible card-table."
Nothing loth, Rawdon obeys. H his mother and Emma are
waiting up for him, he reflects, the case is so bad that an- hour,
more or less, matters not. Jane runs back for wine and glasses
from the table beside the carte" players, and the tete-a-tSte
supper begins. It is the pleasantest meal Rawdon Crosbie has
ever eaten in his life : he is extremely hungry in the first place ;
the pat, the cake, the wine are good ; and he has Jane for his
hostess and companion !
" Don't tell any one we had no plates, or that we eat with our
fingers. By ' any one* I mean your mamma and Miss Marsland.
They think badly enough of me as it is ! By-the-by, do you
think you'll muster moral courage enough to tell them where
you have been?"
6
i/ 82 OUGHT WE TO VISIT HEM
Rawdon is by no means certain whether he will or not, so
demands, warmly, how it is possible Mrs. Theobald can even
ask such a question )
" I didn't know. You must remember, Mr. Crosbie, I know
very little indeed about you. We are intimate friends, are n't
we well, very nearly intimate, at all events, but still we seem to
stand on air. Who are you, really 1 What are your pleasures t
What are your ideas of life? How do you spend your time?
Now come and go through your catechism at once, like a good
little boy."
Supper is over, and Jane, in her shining silk and laces, is
leaning beside the wide-open window. Her face is pale, and a
little wearied, but, though the searching light of dawn rests on
it full, the perfect complexion shows without a flaw. In Raw-
don's sight she looks fairer than she did when she was flushed
with spirits, and surrounded by admiration in the ball-room.
"Do you hear? You are to give a full and particular account of
yourself; I mean when you have, quite done gazing at the stars."
" There are no stars left, Mrs. Theobald, and I don't suppose
I should see them if there were."
}) " Well, when you have quite done gazing at me, then. What
is your name 1 where do you live % et cetera"
" My name is Rawdon Hervey Crosbie. I am a gunner by
profession, and have been stationed at Woolwich, Alderney,
Plymouth, Portsmouth chiefly at Portsmouth. I have less
duty in some places than in others, and always more time than
I know what to do with. Whenever Pm near enough I run up
to town as often as I can. Somewhere, Alderney, I think it
must have been, I got through Napier's ' History of the Pen-
insular War.' As a general rule I read a three-volume novel a
day. I have no particular ideas about life that I can recollect
It makes a great difference to an artilleryman if he happens to
be at a station where he can join a good mess."
Jane opens her blue eyes, and looks at him pityingly. She
is, as the reader must have remarked, matter-of-fact to the last
m
THE BOOK OF MARTYRS\ 83
degree, and takes the confession without a grain of salt. " And
is this all ? Good heavens ! and have you no enjoyment in your
life ? When you go down to Chalkshire, when you are at home,
with your people, with Miss Marsland, how is it then V\
" Well, we take our food at ten in the morning and at seven
in the evening that is to say, my father and I do ; my mother
and Emma get in a solid lunch and a five o'clock tea between.
And in due season we shoot and hunt, and all the year round
we farm a little. We go to whatever parties we are invited to,
and twice to church on Sundays. At the present moment I
can't remember that we have any other particular enjoyment,
unless it is croquet in summer and whist in winter."
" And when you go to London V
" Oh, I knock about, as most people do then."
" But those are the best times you ever have, surely !*
After reflection, Rawdon answers, Yes ; he has probably got
more out of his life in London than elsewhere. Still, even in
London, it is difficult for a man at all times to know what to
do with himself.
" Difficult !" exclaims Jane. " Difficult to know what to do
with oneself in London ? What a pity you have never met me
there I We live, as I've told you, abroad, but twice a year regu-
larly, sometimes oftener, we wake up without intending it,
Theobald says and find ourselves in London. You ought to
be with us (with me and Min, I mean) if you don't know what
to do^with your time ! Perhaps we might manage to meet there
before long. When are you going to leave this for England V
" Not for a day or two, I hope," answers Rawdon ; "to-morrow,
I fear." He has growing forebodings that his mother and Emma
will bear him bodily away, as soon as possible, from the enemy's
camp. "We only ran over to Bonn for a fortnight's change, and
returned this way to show Emma the outside of a foreign spa."
" And have seen wickedness enough already to be frightened
awayf
" Not exactly that. The truth is, I think, the Crosbie family
6-2
always to hear of me is at the Theatre R03
We shall only be able to stay a few hours
she adds. " We are going down straight
take possession of our property. This dayi
it sounds ! we shall be Mr. and Mrs. The
Chalkshire."
"And our next-door neighbours. I ho
grand to admit me if I GalL"
** If 1 You are wise to put in the previa
It is past three o'clock when Raw don le
rooms The ecarte pi ay era are still shuffl
dealing, cutting, shuffling, with the same f n
began at midnight, and likelier than not,
tin ne to do so until breakfast time. She
to the door and stands a minute or two th
in whispers he carries away an ineffaceabh
the flush of morning resting upon her soft 1
upon the half-dead roses in her hair
the staircase from whence the Theobald's dot
and Jane, before she vanishes, sends him a i
her fingers. Then, with mmih tlig same fee
THE BOOK OF MARTYRS. 85
it, he holds himself safe, when the door opens, sudden and
wide, and a figure appears before him ; a figure in a loose chintz
wrapper, but with a head dignified and erect a head from
which the black lace, the chignon of yesterday, have not been
unpinned a head that has unmistakably " sat Up " all night :
Mrs. Crosbie.
She takes a step forward, and Eawdon has no choice but to
stop short. And so they confront each other : Mrs. Crosbie in
the hybrid attire aforesaid, her eyes and cheek haggard from
watching ; young Eawdon in his evening dress, his opera-hat
under his arm, the rose (Jane's gift) in his button-hole, a quite
unwonted glow of brightness, the reflection probably of all the
happy hours he has been spending, upon his face.
"What, mother, up already?"
" You have been in those peoples' rooms, Rawdon. Don't
deny it ! don't stoop to deny it ! You have stayed till this dis-
graceful hour with Mrs. Theobald, and Emma and myself under
the same roof 1"
Well, I can't precisely say how it is, but either the tone of the
accusation, or the general effect of his mother's figure, or both,
take a fatal effect on Eawdon's fancy, and he bursts into a
laugh. It is indefensible, undutiful, but for the life of him he
cannot help it ; nay, when he tries to choke the ill-timed levity
back it does but redouble. At three in the morning you will
often see this hysterical kind of affection in persons solemn as
judges at all other times.
" I've spent the evening with the Theobalds, and a very jolly
evening too," he remarks as soon as he can speak at alL
Mrs. Crosbie looks at him with growing horror and disgust
" I will not address you further now, sir. You are not in a fit state
to be addressed." And although he knows that he has in reality
only partaken of a slice of pate, of some madeira cake, of two
glasses of light Ehenish wine, the awful emphasis of Mrs. Cros-
bie's voice makes Eawdon almost ask himself whether he is or
is not sober. " To-morrow I should say to-day, for it is broad
j.iu n uuu ;
" I'm not a schoolboy any longer, you ki
am old enough to be master of my own tin
" And our position ? The position in
places us "
"Juliana, my dear/' cries out the sleepy
from within ; " don't you think you had b
and leave the boy alone % This isn't the t
ment." ,
h JSot fa Hawdon in a state to listen to it.
wih another withering look at her eon. H
dom enough to follow her husband's adv:
shutting the door, with all the righteous si
parental authority, full in the delinquent's
Rawdon runs, two steps at a time, up to
his rosebud tenderly in water, and long bi
head has reached its pillow, falls asleep
Grande Duchesse waltzes, and of Jane.
CHAPTER IX,
BLOSSY*S DEPLORABLE PASS!
BLOSSY'S DEPLORABLE PASSIONS. 87
breakfast hour, and he. remembers that Jane is the wife of
Francis Theobald (and the intimate associate of Monsieur de
Lansac) and that he is nothing to her ! The ball and those three
hours in the Theobalds' rooms, and the dreams that followed,
are all unrealities, things gone by, and done with for ever. And
he must get up and dress, and join the people who belong to
him, and face his destiny : must go on with life.
When he comes downstairs he finds the breakfast equipage
still upon the table, and Emma Marsland dilligently looking over
" Bradshaw," while she writes down labyrinthine rows of figures
on a slip of paper. A bundle of wraps, strapped, and his
father's hat-box, are in one corner of the room ; Mrs. Crosbie's
travelling-bag is on a chair beside the window.
" Kawdon ! down at last ! Do you know what time it is, sirl"
Miss Marsland runs to meet him, her kind little plump hands
outstretched, and Eawdon stoops and kisses her. She is not
beautiful ; she is not Jane ; but her smiling face of welcome
picks up his spirits somewhat. Anything to a lad of Bawdon's
age is better than a lecture. After anticipating a family con-
clave, to find himself alone with Emma, and to find Emma
good-tempered and forgiving, comes to him in the nature of a
reprieve.
" Mamma thought the tea would keep warm enough, but I
know how you hate half-cold things, so I rang for fresh as soon
as Lucy told me you were getting up. If you hadn't stirred by
eleven, we decided we must call you ; for I hope you won't
mind it, Eawdon, but we are going away to-day."
" Oh, are we, indeed?" says Rawdon, trying not to look as
blank as he feels. "And pray, what is the reason of this sudden
exodus T
" Well, mamma seems to think it will be best ; and you know,
Rawdon, how anxious your father is about the hay."
u But that is no reason why we should go, Emmy. We are
not anxious about the hay. Let them do as they like, and you
and I will stop in Spa and enjoy ourselves."
88 OUGHT WE TO VISIT HERt
Before Emma can recover herself from the shock of this hor-
rible, this delightful proposal sufficiently to answer, Rawdon's
breakfast is brought in. She crosses to the table, pours out his
tea, helps him to the liberal cream and sugar that his soul loves,
then stands, with her eyes downcast, and more colour than usual
in her face, tracing little imaginary patterns on the tablecloth
with her finger.
" You have got something disagreeable to say, Emmy. Oh,
but I know you have ! Whenever people make fortresses of
bread-crumbs, it shows their minds are not at rest. Now, out
with it ! You'll be better afterwards."
" I oh, Rawdon, I'm so afraid you'll be cross ; but mamma
got it out of me, and you know we never could have kept it a
secret long*
" Kept what a secret f
"Rawdon!"
Miss Mainland's lips quiver, and with a pang of self-reproach,
Rawdon remembers the love-scene in the woods. He remem-
bers everything !
" You are not, say you are not angry with me," she pleads,
watching his face. " I couldn't help it. Mamma has such a
way of searching one's very thoughts, and it all came on, some-
how, about Mrs. Theobald. She looked so dreadfully annoyed,
poor mamma, at breakfast, and and I didn't know how to defend
you, Rawdon, and then* I told them that It seems a very vain
speech, but I knew it was the one way to please mamma, and it
has pleased her oh, so much, and your father, too."
Rawdon Crosbie drinks half a cup of tea and butters himself
a roll. " And when are we to be married, Emmy ? Angry, my
dear, why should I be angry V 1 He holds out his hand, and she
takes and clings to it " You had a perfect right to do as you
liked, and, as you say, nothing that two people know can be a
secret long. When is it to be, Emmy? Of course my mother
has decided everything."
a Of course nothing of the kind, sir. It will be only an
BIOSSVS DEPLORABLE PASSIONS. 89
engagement for I don't know how long yet." In her heart
Emma has fixed upon the second week of August. "Papa
says my other guardian's consent must be asked ; my cousin,
Mr. Mason, you know, in Jamaica. But that can only be a
matter of form, I'm sure. And then there will be the trousseau
and bridesmaids, and everything else to think of. Oh, Rawdon,
won't it be funny, you and me going back engaged 1 I wonder
what all the Chalkshire people will say V 9
Rawdon, failing it would seem to grasp the humour of the
situation, does not offer any guesses on the subject, but, gradu-
ally freeing his hand from that of his betrothed, goes on with
his breakfast. He feels in the very flattest of spirits he has
experienced during his whole not too-highly pitched life ;
reaction after the ball, perhaps, to start with, superadded to
this the weight of his avowed, legitimate, to-be-congratulated
engagement, and now, crowning all, the conviction that he is
defeated ! The conviction that Jane and his short, sweet,
opening friendship for her are nowhere, and his mother and
Emmy, and all the whole hum-drum responsibilities and bless-
ings of his lot, in fullest possession of the field.
" Yes, it was certainly apropos of Mrs. Theobald that it began,"
says Emma, presently. " I don't think I ever saw mamma so
thoroughly cut up before ; and really and truly, Rawdon, I must
say mamma was right. Now was it, was it nice of you, to be at
an uproarious party, and us on the floor above, till three in the
morning?"
Miss Marsland lays due emphasis on the word " uproarious/'
Rawdon remembers the Theobalds' room, with its silent hearts'
players, and Jane and himself whispering in the moonlight over
their supper. " Uproarious ! I came home with the Theobalds
from the ball, and stopped to have a glass of wine in their
rooms. Emmy, by the way, whatever you may do hereafter as
to the rest, don't take one leaf out of my mother's book. Don't
sit up for me ! I think I could be driven into any crime," says
Rawdon, looking ferociously miserable, "by a wife who sat up
for me."
, *w ivtwi, iciuzu-Kb nawdon, g.
" But as it is not proper for me to know a
Theobald, why "
" Go on, my love."
" Why, I don't think, now we are engaged,
for you. I'm sure I don't want to say anythi
her moral character, I mean ; but she is not
sher
" Really, Emma, I am no judge. She is a vei
woman, and has more to say for herself tbanm*
is all I know."
'* And you would like me now, or hereaf tei
with her % n
11 You are echoing my mother in all this, ]
Rawdon, shifting his position. "What ques
your being intimate with Mrs, Theobald t She
anxious, that I know of, for the distinction
patronage."
"Well, no," remarks Miss Maryland, drawii
from her pocket *' Mrs. Theobald has taken j
to ehow us, me and mamma, I mean, the value
good opinion I You remember my giving th
meat off my guard yesterday, and it was thai
Mr. Mason sent me otiw. wirt* t-i u-
BLOSSVS DEPLORABLE PASSIONS. 91
a common-place school-girl hand, reader ; but Rawdon sees a
new revelation of character in every upstroke. "To Miss
Marsland. Number fourteen." He reads aloud, in an absent
sort of way.
" Yes, 'To Miss Marsland, number fourteen,' and not a word
of explanation/' repeats Emma. "As mamma says, after I had
been good-natured enough to give it to the child, Mrs. Theobald
might at least have apologised for sending it back."
" Certainly," Kawdon acquiesces gravely. " After having been
mistaken for the Princess Czartoriska, and cut as soon as the
mistake was discovered, the very least Mrs. Theobald could
have offered us would have been an apology. But some people
have no delicacy of feeling."
" I'm glad you see it, as we see it," cries Emma, upon whom
Rawdon's small irony is lost. "But perhaps, charitably, we
ought to set her conduct down to ignorance ? It would have
been difficult for her to say 'with compliments/ or 'kind
regards.' "
" After having her acquaintance declined, only the day be-
fore," adds Rawdon. " So it would, Emmy, rather."
He laughs aloud ; Emma, not knowing how to take him in
his present mood, laughs too ; and just at this moment in comes
Mr. Crosbie. Ah ! the spirits, the happiness of these poor chil-
dren, he thinks, looking pityingly at the faces of the two young
lovers. Will they laugh as loud when they have been married
a dozen years ? Mr. Crosbie gives his bald head a shake full
of mournful premonition, and crossing the room lays his hand
kindly on his son's shoulder.
And Rawdon knows that he has received his father's con-
gratulations. In situations where a father and son of any other
nation would find room, for a score of pretty little dramatic
effects, six commonplace words, a shake of the hand, a clasp of
the shoulder, are sufficiently expansive demonstrations for two
phlegmatic Britons. Rawdon Crosbie knows that he is con-
gratulated, his engagement paternally ratified. He can see
complete, a mischievous fair face, a pair of mod
perhaps watching the ceremony with amusemenl
"I have been giving Rawdon a good lectui
Emma, prettily, " trying my best to make him p
better boy for the future."
"Ah, never lecture, my dear Emma," answers
bie, almost solemnly- " Never lecture any ni,
make any man promise anything. A woman's ;
is sub ; ahem, yes," the entrance of Mrs. Crc
travelling, abruptly cutting him short "Sum
inevitable is the iirst duty of us all," he adds, '
betakes himself to strapping together wraps, and t
nor speaks again out of monosyllables tiH he ant
smoking the pipe of retrospection together that nig
Mrs. Croshie's congratulations are offered afti
ferent fashion to her husband's. She advances
effusion, to llawdon's side, puts an arm round his
well*chosen words " forgives" him bis last night's
that he will prove himself worthy of one who ah
a daughter's place in his parents 1 hearts 1 Tear
dignity, in Mrs. CrosmVs eyes ; they well over in
cries, "Oh. mamma, mnmina krvnr **fl you?*'
obli _ _***i *--*
BLOSSVS DEPLORABLE PASSIONS. 93
quarter of an hour the Pepinster char-a-banc will be at the
door.
" And unless I and my things are to be left behind, I must
go and pack them at once," says Rawdon, devoutly wishing such
a consummation may arrive. He rims off to his room, rapidly
turning over the possibilities of escape as he runs, and finds
that fate and Mrs. Crosbie's maid have been too much for him.
His dressing-case is packed ; the evening suit he wore last night
neatly folded in his portmanteau waiting only for him to turn
the key. All that remains now is to submit, bid a hurried good-
bye to Mrs. Theobald, and be carried off at once to his lawful
happiness, and the village wedding, and the shining rector and
curates in Lidlington church ! He descends the stairs swiftly^- .'-
(may not his mother be again in wait for him ?), gets safely past
the second floor, and knocks at the Theobald door. A step is
heard crossing the room how Rawdon's heart beats the lock
turns, and instead of Jane's slim figure he sees the yard-wide
waist of the Belgian nurse.
Her French is pretty much on a par with Rawdon's who has
enjoyed the usual linguistic teaching of a thorough English
education during ten years or so of his youth. But when does
bad news fail to convey itself intelligibly % Mr. and Mrs. Theo-
bald have gone away to breakfast in the woods. They may be
back at two, three who knows ? The French gentleman, their
friend is with them, and will Monsieur like to leave any message?
Monsieur feels his heart is in his mouth, so ridiculously
poignant is his disappointment. Gone away to breakfast in
the woods ! And with De Lansac ! He detests Mrs. Theobald
and everything belonging to her ; he despises himself for having
wished to see her again. The door stands wide open, and he
looks drearily round the pretty sunlit room. He sees the cornei
where Jane showed him her book of martyrs, the window where
they ate madeira cake, and were happy in the moonlight A
work-box, and some scraps of lace and ribbon, are on a table
near at hand. Her presence is everywhere.
94 OUGHT WE TO VISIT HER f
"Will Monsieur leave a message, a card?" repeats the Bel-
gian, looking up with stolid scrutiny at the young Englishman's
face.
" Je laisse mm carte," says Rawdon. Then, taking out his
card-case, he discovers he has no pencil wherewith to write his
P. P. C. The Belgian, however, divining what he wants, signs
to him to come in, and pointing to her mistress's open work*
box, says the word " crayon." Just then a vigorous shout makes
itself heard from the interior of the bedroom ; Mees Bebe*
awakening from her noontide sleep. The nurse runs away,
prompt to whip or comfort, as the case may demand, and Baw-
don is left alone.
After some search he finds a pencil, duly writes the con-
ventional absurdity upon a couple of cards for Mr. and Mrs.
Theobald ; then, instead of wisely escaping from the room and
its recollections at once, falls to examining all the different little
trinkets and bits of feminine rubbish Jane's box contains. Here
is a morsel of blue ribbon, the same ribbon, he could swear, that
she wore when he first saw her yesterday ; and here is an old-
fashioned silver amulet, heart-shaped, and scented by a Vanilla
bean inside ; and here, carefully stored in a corner by them-
selves, are a dozen or so dead rose leaves. Rawdon thinks it
would be no great crime to possess himself of these, keep them,
wear them yes, in the pocket of that very embroidered waist-
coat that shall face the rector and both curates in Lidlington
church ; then, with sudden chill, he remembers that they may,
nay, that they must be, a memento of some hour in which he
had no part. Does not their colour tell they died longer ago
than yesterday? Well, but that desire of steabng something
that once belonged to Jane has entered his heart, and he has
not the moral courage necessary to put it away. A patter of
bare feet, a loud " I sail ! I sail !" is heard from the inner room.
If he means to commit the deed at all, it behoves him to lose
no time about it. He hesitates, and the temptation grows
stronger ; another instant, and the little silver heart (Jane's
BLOSSfS DEPLORABLE PASSIONS. 9$
dearest possession : if he only knew how dear a one !) is feloni-
ously transferred to Eawdon Crosbie's waistcoat pocket Open
flies the bedroom door, and in rushes Blossy, in the lightest of
baby deshabille, her feet, her'neck bare, her yellow curls disor-
dered, a nightcap, of the ridiculous shape that children wear
abroad, on one side of her head ; the most delicious little figure
for a baby Greuze imaginable.
She flies to Kawdon ; the nurse, who follows, vainly striving
to throw a frock, lasso-fashion, over her head, and takes refuge
in his arms. He knows nothing whatever about children of her
age ; indeed, connecting them always in his mind with school-
rooms and village treats, dislikes them, on principle. But who
could feel Blossy Theobald's lips upon his cheek and not fall in
love with her? Eawdon does on the spot he has, it must be
confessed, pretty wide capabilities of this kind ! And when,
two minutes later, he goes back dutifully to his betrothed, such
improvement in spirits and temper is visible in him as at once
gives the poor little heiress's heart food for suspicion.
" You have been saying good-bye to Mrs. Theobald, Rawdon?"
" I have been leaving my P. P. C. on Mr. and Mrs. Theobald,
Emmy. They were out, and the only person I saw was youi
friend, the small child."
He puts his arm round her, guiltily conscious of his latest
infidelity, and the heiress reposes her face affectionately on his -
waistcoat Mr. and Mrs. Crosbie have gone to dispute the bill,
and it is the lovers' last moment together before starting.
" Oh, Rawdon, what a dandy you are getting !" Her nose is
within an inch and a half of Jane's amulet " What is this
new scent you wear ? and what put it into your head to buy it % n
" I never bought a bottle of scent in my life, Emmy. It must
be these foreign fusees. I believe I have a box of them about
me, somewhere."
"Oh, indeed. Fusees! I never knew any fusees smell so
sweet before. I remember the time when you used to say you
despised men who wore scents."
new keen taste of life he has experienced th
of the past to Rawdon Crosbie. He glan
windows of the first-floor, to wish a mental
one who stood there last night, and sees a sn
its hand to him vehemently.
"Dood-bye, dood-bye," shouts Blossy, w
nurse holds aloft in her arms upon the balcor.
Emma on this looks up, and then Mrs. C
little near-sighted not blind, like Francis Tl
ciently so, on occasion, to warrant that aid an
dignity, a double eyeglass. She draws forth
double eyeglass now.
11 A nice-looking child, positively a nice-loot
is she not 1* This little Christian concession
n ess Mrs. Crosbie thinks it right, under th
circumstances, to make, " Dood-bye, my dea
voice, playfully, " dood-hyQ. w And, carried a\
able impulses of the moment* Mrs. Crosbie actu
herself as to wait a kiss, from the extreme ti
fingers, to Jane Theobald's child.
And now occurs a really remarkable phenoim
Blossy Theobald's age and circumstances, At
sight of these two ladies, Emma smiling, Mr;
BLOSSY 9 S DEPLORABLE PASSIONS. 97
and receives instant punishment on her face and ears in
return.
" Mein Fiss, mein Fiss !" shrieks Blossy, as though she would
invoke heaven and earth to come to the rescue.
Put yourself in her place, mature reader. She went to sleep
last night, the ravished possessor of a real gold fish, with emerald
eyes, with movable tail She awoke this morning with a paper
of sweets, paltry substitute, miserable bribe, beneath her pillow ;
her fish gone, her mother telling her that he had swum away in
the night, because the ladies wanted him back again. And
now she sees them these brigands, these destroyers of her
happiness smiling and kissing their hands, as though to give
a fish one day and lure him away the next, were quite a trivial
thing. Why, if Blossy's strength but matched her childish
rage, her maddened sense of injustice, she would willingly tear
both of them to pieces with those small hands of hers on the spot.
"What deplorable passions, or rather what a deplorable
bringing up," says Mrs. Crosbie, with her slow soft smile, as she
doubles up her eyeglass. " Kawdon used to fly into just those
sorts of senseless rages till I cured him of them."
" I doubt if Miss Theobald could be cured easily," remarks
Emma, giving a last look at the little blue-eyed fury overhead.
" My dear Emma, education can cure anything. In six months
T would undertake to eradicate the evil even of that child's
natural heart. Education, system, strictness "
The char-a-banc moves on with a jerk, and Blossy continues
to bestow gestures of bitterest anathema upon its occupants till
they are out of sight.
"And so, adieu to Spa V whispers Miss Marsland, sentimen-
tally, to her lover, as they turn from the last street of the village
into the open country road. " Dear little Spa ! I shall always
look back to our stay here as an oasis in life, shan't you Jlawdon T
Eawdon is silent. He is in one of those impressionable moods
when we are apt to regard the lightest accident as a portent, a
M delicate omen traced in air" either for good or evil ; and the
7
98 OUGHT WE TO VISIT HER t
child's parting mele diet ions seem to him child that he is him-
selfto be fraught with untoward augury of all kinds for the
future.
CHAPTER X.
FADED DAFFODILS.
The future!
" Yes," says Miss Charlotte Theobald, with spiteful pre-
science, "there's the rub. The present will all go smooth enough,
as long as they have poor James's money to make ducks and
brakes of but the future ! What future, what hopes, either
for his child or himself, can a man have who has made such a
marriage as our brother Francis V
" Especially if he doesn't keep his health," rejoins the elder
sister mournfully. " Francis always had a poor digestion. The
same feeble action of the liver as n
" Feeble action of the fiddle-strings, Annie ! Francis has got
his share of the Theobald laziness, or he would never have been
cajoled into marrying the woman he did. But don't talk to me of
bad health. A man leading the life of dissipation his has been
and living still !*
" Ah, it takes a great deal to kill people, however delicate
they are," remarks the eldest Miss Theobald, thinking, perhaps,
of herself, and of all the years she has survived her sister Char-
lotte's bitter tongue. " Look at our cousin James. He never
really digested a meal for twenty years "
"And then died in a minute, with his old will torn up,
the new one not signed, and leaving his property to the man he
most wished in the world to disinherit our brother Francis !
So much for your invalids !" Miss Charlotte's tone of disgust
expresses more, even, than her words. " Catch a man in honest
health, a man with a digestion, making such a muddle at the
last as that!*
FADED DAFFODILS. . 99
" But ought we to call it a muddle, Charlotte? It might be
more comfortable, certainly, if we didn't live in the immediate
neighbourhood ; still, as it has pleased Providence to remove
poor James to a better sphere, is it not better our brother should
come into the property than a stranger % There's more chance
of their settling down respectably now that Francis has a house
and position of his own than there was before.' 9
"Ah! You think so." I represent by full stops certain
curious interjectional sniffs on the part of Miss Charlotte Theo-
bald. " Then let me tell you, Annie, your remark only betrays
your usual gross ignorance of human nature. Position, to a
woman like Mrs. Francis Theobald, will be ... a thing to laugh
at and degrade an opportunity of dragging us deeper into the
mire than she has dragged us already. As long as they were too
poor to live in England we might pretend to forget, might flatter
ourselves that our friends forget, the connection. For the future
we shall have it in daily, hourly evidence before our eyes. You
should have heard Mrs. Pippin's voL-e to-day as she congratu-
lated me on my brother's return. ' So very agreeable, would it
not be, for us to have him as a neighbour V And now it appears
the Crosbies met them met them, and of course wouldn't know
her abroad."
" Dear, dear, you don't mean to say that, Charlotte ! Well,
now, T call it very- unkind of the Crosbies. I'm sure, for our #
sainted mother's sake, the hospitality they have met with from
our family, they might "
" Annie !" interrupts the younger sister sternly. " Once and
for all, let me tell you that that sort of sentimental talk is bosh!"
It is Charlotte Theobald's habit to flavour her discourse with
somewhat masculine and nervous turns of expression. "As long
as our mother lived and gave dinners the world was civil to her.
And when she died, and could give dinners no longer, the world
forgot her the Crosbies with the rest. Men and women are
judged on their own merits, not by the kind of dinners their
fathers and mothers gave before them. Francis Theobald will
72
,.. ~..~ uan vuauuil, 10 lneoDalds.
Theobalds. Yes, this is Jane's land of p
country house in which Blossy is to grow up,
for the first time since their marriage, Franc
wife are to taste the sweets of a settled hab:
Hummer is now at her prime, (Ten days hav
u.i lUvdon met at Spa.) The weather is
til* fairest one of the twenty- four. But Theol
like a tomb. When could Theobalds look or
two Atom**) gray stone house, built on the
hill, trees overshadowing it, back and front
the cawjng of a rookery ; for prospect, a swe
carriage-road and a pond, or imitation lake,
weed* . . , Such is Francis Theobald's inhe
jolly homelike old place" to which Jane, a
life to the colour, and stir, and variety of stn
way.
To the Miss Theobalds, whose best, becaus
tiny* were spent here, the house is a very mom
dignified and to be desired, Could not Th
twenty bods if it had visitors, which it nevi
visitors wore indifferent on the score of amok
not the? drawiinr-rnnm twum* ~ - the fin
FADED DAFFODILS. 101
dry-rot, and neither cat nor trap subdue the legions of rats
these are facts, certainly, at which strangers may take umbrage,
but which to the Miss Theobalds are merely like the plain,
never-to-be-changed features of a face we love ; facts disagree-
able in themselves, perhaps, but unalterable, and against which
no Christian and no Theobald would rebel
As with the house, so with the furniture. The room in which
the sisters now await Francis and his wife is the drawing-room
with the carved ceiling. A long narrow room, dark even on a
summer noonday, and at all times a perfect epitome of bad taste
and ugliness ; the paper a dingy chocolate ; dingy chocolate cur-
tains, draped in the ponderous mode of a bygone generation,
across the windows ; one solitary looking-glass hung high above
the hideous clock upon the mantelpiece; a "centre table," drear
relic of antiquity, placed with mathematical correctness in the
middle of the room ; high-backed chairs ranged stiffly along the
walls. But the Miss Theobalds no more dispute it all than they
would dispute the Pentateuch. They are aware, they confess,
that the furniture is not modern : cousin James was a bachelor,
and did not trouble himself as to the date of his upholstery.
But at least there is no veneer about it. It is good ; it is a part
of Theobalds ; part, that is to say, of their own old-fashioned
flesh and blood prejudices ! Not without a secret satisfaction
do they look forward to the moment when Jane, poor creature,
accustomed as she must be to the discomforts of carpetless
foreign inns, shall enter her husband's early home and view the
solid mahogany and rosewood, the Kidderminster and damask,
that await her in a life of respectability. She will be taken
aback, naturally, until she gets used to her position, and Miss
Anne, who, as far as dyspepsia and laziness allow, is really not
unamiable, has already prepared in her own mind a little patron-
ising speech by which she will endeavour to set the humbly-
born, roughly-nurtured sister-in-law at her ease.
44 1 dare say we shall see a good deal of change in our brother,
Charlotte." Five more minutes have been ticked into their grave
id OUGHT WE TO VISIT HERt
by the hideous clock on the mantelpiece, and still no sound of
carriage-wheels breaks the silence. " It is six years since we
saw him last, and six years make a difference at his age. Let
me see," Miss Theobaljl folds her hands and calculates blandly;
" Francis is just twelve years younger than you, Charlotte ! for
poor mamma had given away all her baby-clothes, never think-
ing there would be any more of us. Francis will be thirty-two
years old the tenth of next January."
"I do wish," remarks Miss Charlotte, tartly, "I do wish,
Anne, you would keep your chronologies to yourself. Because
you happen to be as indifferent to your age as you are to every-
thing else, is no reason younger people are to have their bap-
tismal registry thrust in their faces a dozen times a day. Re-
member Francis's birthday by your own, please, or by any other
date you choose, so long as it is unconnected with me."
The elder Miss Theobald is a stout, dusty-complexioned woman
of about fifty. When she is not in crape and bombazine, as at
present, she passes her harmless existence in dust-coloured silks,
and, for more years than she can remember, has taken dust-
coloured, or canvas-side-ofrthe-carpet views of all mortal hopes
and happiness. A woman occupied, primarily, with globules,
and little books on indigestion ; secondly, with supporting the
tempers and bullying of her sister Charlotte. Not a bad sort
of human soul in the main. A human soul undecided, after
fifty years, as to the effect of potash and bismuth on the coats
of the stomach, and humbly speculative (on Sunday afternoons)
as to what the kingdom of heaven will be like if poor dear
Charlotte should happen to get tb"*e as well as herself.
Miss Charlotte, her sister's junior by several years, is still
young enough and will remain young enough till she dies to
care for dress : so far I would incline towards rating her as a
better woman than Miss Theobald. She is plain, exceedingly, as
you will often remark of the sisters of handsome men ; but dresses
with such choice care, such perfection of trim neatness, as ren-
der her slight figure and smooth dark hair not unpleasing to the
FADED DAFFODILS. 103
eye. In her youth, it is said, some one loved Charlotte Theobald ;
certainly no one loves her now ; and equally certainly she loves
no one. Above all do young and attractive married women
rouse her indignation. " Flaunting their faces before men, when
they should be at home, darning socks, in their nursery. As if
girls did not do mischief enough in the world without their
example I" She dislikes men, women, babies : dislikes herself !
Knows, by experience, that life is inherently disagreeable, and
does her best, on principle, to keep up its character. Charlotte
Theobald frequently expresses her belief that she has " a moral
back-bone." She prides herself on her honesty ; her capacity
of saying, to every man's face, what she would say in his ab-
sence. Ruin yourself, and Charlotte, if you belong to the family,
will stand by you, but in such an attitude as almost to make
you prefer ruin to salvation. Prosper, and a quarter of an hour
of her society will cause prosperity to taste bitter as Dead Sea
fruit in your mouth. You feel that she must be of use ; that
so many pungent, fermenting properties must fulfil some end in
the great economy of nature. But what is it % Well, when you
were five years old, you used to ask the same question about
wasps and earwigs, and were told that there were certain facts
that must be accepted, not reasoned about Charlotte Theobald
is one of these facts.
" Ten minutes and a half past eight,'' she remarks, turning,
after another pause, and looking at the clock. u You may do
as you choose, Anne. Keep the brougham until whatever hour
suits you. At the quarter I walk home. Railway accidents %
Stuff ! People like Francis Theobald and his wife never come
to bodily harm."
And the generalisation proves correct Scarcely have the
words left Miss Charlotte's lips, when the sound of wheels is
heard. Another minute, and a carriage containing Theobald,
his wife, and child, all in perfect health and spirits, approaches,
at a rapid pace, towards the house.
" The gravel 1" sighs Anne Theobald, as she moves slowly
io4 OUGHT WE TO VISIT HER I
across to the window. " I must speak to Francis about the
gravel. Cousin James never allowed any furious driving along
the avenue."
"And another carriage with luggage behind!" adds Miss
Charlotte, peering sourly round the window-curtain. " What
reckless extravagance ! when Smith could have brought it, at
a quarter the price, in his cart to-morrow ! If this is the way
Francis is beginning ! n
Francis is beginning in the same delightfully confident and
placid spirit with which he inaugurates every fresh start in his
perpetually-starting life. The first thing, on reaching the station
at Lidlington, was, naturally, to hire the best conveyance the
town possessed ; the next to drive to the principal hotel and
order the best bottle of champagne it could furnish. After this
came the drive through the pleasant country lanes, the sunset
turning the land, and flowery hedges, and Blossy's face to gold.
And Jane sang aloud as they drove, and Theobald smoked, and
the driver, who also had had his glass of champagne, kept his
horses up to their best pace, and all the world seemed fair to
them, and full of movement and cheerfulness and hope ! Now
they have reached home ; and the two daffodil sisters, who ate
their solitary dinner at two, and have drunk no champagne, and
felt no sunshine, watch them, chill and critical, from behind the
window-curtains.
" What what a set they look V exclaims Miss Charlotte,
below her breath, as the carriage stops. She is unacquainted
with the word "rowdy," or, I am certain, would have employed
it here. " If anyone we know should have met them ! ,;
Jane, in an airy summer-dress, is sitting without her hat, and
has a hand clasped upon her husband's shoulder, as she looks
up, with her bright young face, at the sombre house that is to
be her home. A pipe is between Mr. Theobald's lips. Blossy,
in wild excitement, cries " Huzza ! huzza !" waving up and down
a great branch of honeysuckle which some country children
flung into the carriage as they came along.
&
JANE'S TASTE OF RESPECTABILITY. 105
"A pipe !" says the elder sister, with faint horror, and raising
her handkerchief before her nose. " Oh ! if our dear mother
could have seen this ! A pipe in daylight P
"And as I live," cries Charlotte, starting forth from her lair
behind the curtains, as the disgraceful truth breaks full upon
her "as I live coming into our own parish, and with our cousin
James scarce cold in his grave they. are not in mourning l n
CHAPTER XL '
jane's first taste of respectability.
The travellers enter the gloomy sitting-room, bringing in with
them the freshness and sunshine of the outer world, and hap-
pily unconscious that a family reunion awaits them. Jane's
hand is upon her husband's arm ; she is laughing merrily and
loud. Blossy, brandishing aloft her honeysuckle, with shouts
of purposeless glee, knocks down a valuable Chinese mandarin
from his bracket before she has taken half a dozen steps. Two
sable-clad figures advance, at a funereal pace, to meet them ;
and Mr. Theobald, admonished by the pressure of Jane's fingers,
puts up his eye-glass, and recognises his sisters.
"Anne Charlotte, how good of you to come over 1 I didn't
see you for the moment getting blinder than ever, I'm sorry to
say, in my old age. How are you both V
They fold him in a stony embrace, and Miss Theobald remarks
that it is six years since they met last. Then there is silence.
Miss Charlotte is looking steadily at Jane ; Jane, illogical, but
right as usual, is deciding that she will have fewer friends by
two than she had counted on in Chalkshire. Blossy, with open
eyes and mouth, is recovering from the downfall of the man-
darin, and taking such general stock as her limited powers per-
mit of everything.
" And here are my wife and child, 9 says Mr. Theobald, neither
of the ladies offering to speak or move. " Jenny," putting hia
io6 OUGHT WE TO VISIT HERt
arm around his wife's waist, and so drawing her forward, " these
are my sisters."
The introduction thus formally gone through, the Miss Theo-
balds perform their duty, by successively taking Jane's hand
and touching her cheek with their lips. Cold, lifeless, void of
flesh and blood are the salutes ; but Jane wants, for the child's
sake rather than her own, .to conciliate her husband's people,
and receives them graciously.
" It is very kind of you to be here to meet us," she remarks,
for safety following Mr. Theobald's lead.
"It is not likely we should leave the house in the hands of
new servants," observes Charlotte, pointedly addressing Theo-
bald, not his wife. " You said nothing about servants in your
letter, Francis, but we concluded that you would want them,
and have engaged you two respectable country girls as cook
and housemaid. I presume that is as many as you will keep T
" Eh ? Well, I'm sure I don't know. I hope the cook can
cook," answers Mr. Theobald. " By the way, Charlotte, have
you ordered dinner? We are all of us ready for it."
" We concluded you would have dined early, Francis. But
there are some chops. You can have chops and tea when you
like."
Mr. Theobald puts up his glass, and looks from one of his
sisters to the other with unaffected surprise. " Chops and tea !
Good heaven, what a dreadful combination ! Tea alone or
chops alone but together ! Jenny, my dear, why didn't you
remind me to dine on the road V
Jane answers, diplomatically, that, for her part, she would
sooner have a cup of tea than anything else, still a chop will be
just the thing for Blossy. And then Blossy, hearing her own
name mentioned, comes a step or two forward, evidently de-
sirous of notice.
" Kiss your aunts, Bloss," says Mr. Theobald, taking posses-
sion of the only easy-chair the room contains. " Go up and
xive each of those ladies one of your best kisses. 1 '
JANE'S TASTE OF RESPECTABILITY. 107
" Yes, Blossy, go," says Jane, pushing her daughter on, a little
nervously, towards her relatives.
But Miss Charlotte's eyes happen, unfortunately, to be riveted
full upon the child's blooming upturned face ; and Blossy stops
short
" Come here, my dear," says the elder sister, amicably, but in
the stiff tone of a person unaccustomed to children*
" No, me not," says Blossy, grasping her mother's dress tight
with both her small hands.
"Go this moment and kiss those nice ladies,* says Jane,
sternly.
" No me not," cries Blossy, driven by desperation to violent
language. " Dey not nice. Dey narsy, narsy ladies !"
The Miss Theobalds, it is to be hoped, do not understand
these infantine accents.
" She looks rather hectic," remarks the elder sister, scanning
the brilliant carnations and snows of Blossy's complexion. " If
that child were mine, Francis, I should try her with a little tar-
axacum."
" She seems to like her own way, and to get it/* adds Miss
Charlotte. " A hundred to one the ornament wasn't smashed
to pieces. If I had anything to do with the child, Francis, I
should make her obey."
Up rises all Jane's blood at the two speeches. " Blossy has
never had a day's sickness since she was born, and never takes
physic. Blossy has perfect health." This she addresses to the
elder Miss Theobald. "And as to her disobedience," looking
full into Charlotte's crabbed face, "why, little children are sin-
cere, and won't go to strangers as they will to their own people;
why should they 1"
"Oh, of course not Of course my brother's child looks
upon us as strangers !" says Miss Charlotte. " Francis," turn-
ing sharply to Theobald, who is smiling under his blonde mou-
stache at the little comedy the ladies are
ment, " I trust, as long as you live in this :
108 OUGHT WE TO VISIT HER t
shall never have cause for painful discussions on any subject
whatever."
" Amen," responds Theobald promptly. u Let us pray that
we all go on in the same friendly spirit as we have begun to-
night !"
" But one thing I feel called upon, yes, called upon, to ob-
serve." The sisters are no;w seated; Jane is seated likewise; and
Miss Charlotte casts a wicked eye round upon the family circle;
" You have lived a great deal abroad, and I am ready to admit
that the customs of foreigners may not be our customs ; but
decency Decency, I suppose, is recognised all over the world,
Francis."
"Well, yes ; more or less, I suppose it is," Theobald assents
cheerfully.
" Our cousin James is dead."
" So is Queen Anne, my dear Charlotte. If our cousin James
were not dead, I, and my wife and child, would certainly not be
at Theobalds."
" He died exactly a month ago."
" On the 28th of May, at three in the afternoon, half an hour
after he had eaten a hearty dinner of lamb and gooseberry tart,"
puts in Miss Theobald, who always feels it her duty in questions
of sickness or death to be minute as to details.
" And you, Francis, and those belonging to you, are in colours !"
Charlotte Theobald gives a malignant glance at a knot of cherry-
coloured ribbon on Blossy's hat. f You come into this neigh-
bourhood into the very house where he died in colours !"
Jane crimsons with shame. " It is my fault," she cries. " Yes,
Theobald, it is my fault. I forgot all about it. I will make up
some mourning at once."
" Not if I know it, Jenny," says Mr. Theobald, becoming sud-
denly animated. " Not a stitch of black shall you or anyone in
this house put on for James Theobald."
44 Your own first cousin, Francis," expostulates the elder Miss
Theobald. '
JANE'S TASTE OF RESPECTABILITY. 109
" My own first cousin, Annie. I became his heir by accident,
and I feel exceedingly grateful to him for his sudden death ;
but I am not going to wear mourning for him. Jenny, my dear,
you have never heard the story of our good fortune 1 You shall
hear it in a dozen words. Once upon a time, long ago, our cousin
James made a will, leaving all the worldly goods he possessed
to me. Since then, certain actions of mine having displeased
him, he made up his mind to cut me off with a shilling, had a
new will drawn out to that effect, and died before he had signed
it, leaving me, whether he liked it or not, his heir-at-law. Wei],
I say I am extremely grateful to him on many accounts, but I
am not going to wear sackcloth and ashes because he is dead.
Black does not become me, Jane, nor you either. 1 '
" Become ! you can view a duty in such a light as that !* ex-
claims Charlotte, with fierce contempt. " What do you suppose
the neighbourhood what do you suppose our friends will think
when they see you flaunting about in every colour of the rain-
bow 1"
Mr. Theobald is habited in a black morning-coat, the rest of
his dress is of soberest neutral tints. " Every colour of the
rainbow 1 Why, Charlotte, you must be getting blind like me.
What flaunting colours have I got about me ? I who pride my-
self upon my chaste severity of style !"
" You can turn what I say into ridicule, Francis. I am in no
humour for joking." A sniff for every full stop. "For you and
your wife to appear in Chalkshire out of mourning is n
"To set Mrs. Grundy openly and deliberately at defiance,
Charlotte/' interrupts Theobald, putting up his glass again, and
looking across good-humouredly at his younger sister's face.
"Precisely. Well, I have set Mrs. Grundy at defiance all my
life "
" You have indeed," says Charlotte, with- a glance at Jane.
" I shall probably do so till I die. I am too old to change my
ways, and Mrs. Grundy, once set at naught, is not a lady to be
& o buc wiutn or J ane's flounces, then, in the
s made a discovery, remarks that, " It is li,
to read ; yet/' qualifying the proposition, k
that " June is a month in which one must
Jane, who has not the faintest notion of
tation of this kind, answers bluntly, " Why, y t
at," * h en k silent. Miss Charlotte, her fad
n the twilight, her smooth snake-shaped heac
resting, in a somewhat masculine mode pecu
either knee, sits evidently collecting her forces
i won't find many friends in the neighbourhooi
ancie," she asks, or more correctly speaking, as
friends 1 Not a soul," answers Theobald, wh
h suppressed laughter over some whispered fai
f Blossy's. " At ieast^ I don't know yet whetl
What sort of regiment have you got at Lidhugl
illy I cannot inform you. We live in extren
amie and I, as befits our income. We do not,"
ng more and more erect "we do not entertain
Theobald's hardly-suppressed laughter at this ]
ter of him, " Nor was I speaking of mere acqi
JANES TASTE OF RESPECTABILITY. in
to spend your life in wandering. * The rolling stone gathers no
moss.' *
" Thank heaven, it does not," says Theobald, wilfully mis-
applying the proverb. " There's that one blessing in being a
professional tramp ; you never get mow-grown. Jane, my love,"
and he turns with an expression singularly irritating to Miss
Charlotte, towards his wife, " what do you think of Theobalds'?
I have been hearing Blossy's commentaries. Let me hear yours."
Now Jane, ten short minutes ago, had resolved to strive her '
uttermost not to play the hypocrite, but by all lawful means to
conciliate her husband's sisters. She desired, for Blossy's sake,
that they should tolerate her. She hoped that they would, at
least, be won by the child's grace and beauty and sweetness
into overlooking her demerits. But Miss Charlotte's biting
speeches, the chilly condescension of Miss Theobald, have
already sufficed to turn every good disposition of this ignorant
impulsive creature's heart to galL Theobald was right on points
of social wisdom. When was he not rightl Mrs. Grundy, once set
at defiance, can never be conciliated more in this life ! The Miss
Theobalds were just as much her antagonists as was Mrs. Cros-
bie, as would be every woman in Chalkshire. And she would
treat them all alike !
"What I think of Theobalds 1 Well, my dear, I think it
smells damp."
The sisters exchange a petrified glance.
" That shows its antiquity, Jenny," says Theobald. " Badge
of blue blood for a house to smell mildewed. How do you like
this room % Nice old carved ceiling, isn't it 1"
Jane looks up at the dingy arabesque above her head, at the
heavy centrepiece, the cupids exercising their dislocated arms
and legs in the corners. "I don't think I am any judge of carved
ceilings, 11 she remarks, coolly.
" I dare say not/' exclaims Miss Charlotte. " Such a ceiling
as this is a Work of Art. Such a ceiling as this is never to be
met with out of a gentleman's house."
H3 OUGHT WE TO VISIT HER t
" When all these heavy hangings are cleared away,* Jane pro
ceeds, "and when we get modern furniture, and white curtains,
and plenty of flowers, and line yes, line the walls with looking-
glass, I think the room may be pretty. It hasn't a bit the look
of a room that people could live in now."
Anne Theobald rises to her feet, her soul, being weaker, more
horror-stricken even than Charlotte's by such unexampled au-
dacity. " If you will permit me, Francis, I will ring for the
carriage. You and Mrs. Theobald will, doubtless, be glad to be
alone to talk over your domestic arrangements."
And the icy tone, the formal " Mrs. Theobald," are deadlier
thrusts, covert though they may be, than any of Miss Charlotte's
open ones. Even Theobald winces for the moment under their
effect
The ladies go upstairs to put on their bonnets, and Jane, grimly
invited thereto by Miss Charlotte, accompanies then. Stout
heart though she has, she feels a greater coward than she ever felt
in her life before as soon as she has quitted the protecting pre-
sence of Blossy and Theobald, and finds herself alone with her
sisters-in-law. Every blind is down, every window closed
throughout the house. At three in winter, at six in summer, it
is an article of the Miss Theobalds' faith that outer air shall be
excluded from curtains and French polish. The indescribable
mustiness of old wood pervades the staircase ; a mingled flavour
of dry-rot, lavender, and feather beds is in the sleeping-rooms.
Jane feels as though she would stifle ! They conduct her through
two or three smaller chambers to the purple, or best, room of the
house. It is of the same dimensions as the drawing-room, and
contains a huge four-post bedstead, the like of which Jane never
saw in her life before a four-post bedstead draped with purple
damask, and covered with a purple satin counterpane, upon
which repose the crape bonnets and mantles of the Miss Theo-
balds. They are arranged with extraordinary neatness each
sister's bonnet exactly over her own long black mantle and, to
JANES TASTE OF RESPECTABILITY. 1 13
Jane's fancy, look, in this dim light, unpleasantly like the dead
and " laid-out " bodies of former Theobalds.
" Our cousin James died here," remarks Miss Charlotte. "I
conclude you and my brother will choose it for your own room.
The nursery has been got ready for the child at the farther end
of the house."
" Blossy always sleeps at my side," says Jane. " This is a
very handsome room, certainly ; but perhaps one with rather
more light and air in it would do better, for her. ,,
" I think, Charlotte," says Miss Theobald, suavely, " you will
be wise to offer no opinions at all on matters connected with
taste. I really think so."
And then, each before a separate glass, the sisters silently
make ready for their departure. The toilette-tables are precisely
alike. The Miss Theobalds' dresses are alike. Everything in
the room, even to the purple watch-pockets above the pillows,
seems mysteriously duplicated. If two dead cousin Jameses
were suddenly to rise up and take possession again, Jane feels
there would be nothing startling or out of place in the appari-
tion.
" Now, if you could hurry a little, Anne," Miss Charlotte's
voice rings through the gloom. "How in the world can it
matter at this time of night whether your bonnet-strings are
geometrically even or not ] You know what Thomas is if the
horse is kept."
Anne Theobald, thus admonished, begins groping about, all
in a flurry, for a pin ; and Jane, perceiving her need, politely
takes one from her own waist-belt and offers it.
" I thank you," says Miss Theobald, opening her dreary eyes
wide. " I am in mourning. I want a black one."
Jane shrinks away, conscience-stricken.
Mr. Theobald is waiting at the house-door when they come
down, so has the advantage of a few pleasant words alone with
his sisters ; for after a chill good-night Jane flies off to Blossy,
anywhere, where her relations are not.
8
H4 OUGHT WE TO VISIT HER f
" You have the same old trap still, I see, Charlotte V Cheer-
folly he speaks, as a man determined neither to give offence nor
to take it.
A pause broken only by the clink of Theobald's eye-glass as
it falls down against his waistcoat-buttons. Thomas, the white-
gloved serious coachman, stands outside, a figure of wood, hold-
ing open the door of the heavy old-fashioned brougham. Dio-
cletian, the white-stockinged serious cob, stands also, looking
straight away, down his own melancholy Roman nose, into
futurity.
" Have you given Francis the key, Anne V Miss Charlotte
asks at length, her voice duly subdued by reason of Thomas's
presence.
Miss Theobald draws forth a rusty big key from her pocket,
and places it, with Bluebeard solemnity* in her brother's hand.
"The cellar key, Francis. You are aware that under poor
cousin James' ahem ! under the peculiar circumstances of your
inheritance, even the wine in the cellar becomes yours."
"I hope there is plenty there," says Mr. Theobald. "About
the quality of it I have no doubt."
"Well, no," Miss Theobald assents. "Most things in this
house, I believe, are genuine."
" Although they may not suit the modern fast school of ideas !"
Miss Charlotte, loquitur.
Theobald upon this takes the initiative.
"Jane has excellent taste in everything that may be called
decorative art, my dear Charlotte you were alluding to Jane,
were you not? indeed she has excellent taste on most points,
I think. The drawing-room really does want brightening up
and modernising. You'll agree with Jenny, I'm sure, when you
see the changes she makes/'
" It is a painful thing to us to see change of any kind in Theo-
balds, a very painful thing." Miss Theobald enunciates this
truth after the manner of some men when they give out a text
JANE'S TASTE OF RESPECTABILITY. 115
and follows it up with a sigh. " However, what must be, must
be !" she adds, after a minute's uncomfortable silence.
" Yes," says Charlotte, taking up the ball, "what must be,
must And our duty is to make the best of it. Francis," laying
her thin hand, with as near an approach to affection as she is
capable of, on Theobald's arm, " I wish you to understand one
thing. We have been long estranged from you, and the fault,
as you know, has not been ours. But now that you have re-
turned to your early home, I wish and mean to do my duty
towards you towards you, and towards those belonging to you,
as well"
Theobald groans in the spirit ; the recollections of his youth
furnishing him with only too many illustrations of what his
sister Charlotte understands by that terrible word " duty." " I
am quite sure you'll get on with Jenny in time, both of you,"
he remarks, evasively.
44 No," answers Charlotte, " that we shall never do. I will
speak for myself. I shall never get on with your wife, or like
her, any more than she will like or get on with me, while I live.
These things cannot be, Francis. She belongs to another class ;
she belongs to another world than ours."
"To quite another world 1" Mr. Theobald responds, under his
breath.
" But she is your wife she is my sister-in-law. And, since
you have brought her here to live, I must do my duty in taking
her by the hand as best I can."
" You are extremely good, Charlotte. Just be kind and amia-
ble in your own manner to her, and poor Jenny will ask no
more. She does not expect, I do not myself expect, to be noticed
by any of the people in the neighbourhood.''
" You will be content for your wife to live, and for your child
to grow up not visited V
" I shall be perfectly contented for our neighbours to please
themselves. Jane and I will run after none of them, you may
be quite sure. If the neighbourhood doesn't like us, or we don't
82
n6
OUGHT WE TO VISIT HER f
like the neighbourhood* we shall always hare one alternative
open to us^-to leave it,*
" But in the meantime I apeak honestly, as a tnie friend,
Francis, in the meantime, let jour wife keep herself quiet and
retired, and I will do what I can, in the way of getting her
called on t among our friends. Of a few people I may say I am
sure, and in time n
* Charlotte ! w interrupts Mr. Theobald, and, dark though it is,
his gla^s oes mechanically to his eye, aa it always does when
he is about to say something emphatic, " let us come to a clear
understanding at once in this matter- Have the kindness not
to canvas, please, among your friends on mine or on Jenny's
behalf. I married 1 ' he forgets to whisper, and Charlotte steps
forward and shuts the door upon the greedily- listening Thomas
" I married, you know, beneath me, or what the world would
call beneath me, but I married to please myself, and it has
pleased me, enormously, ever since. I wouldn't exchange my
actress-wife for any lady in creation "
" Good heavens, the servants !" says Miss Theobald, glancing
nervously in the direction of the kitchens.
" I wouldn't exchange my Bohemian way of life to be made
Archbishop of Canterbury to-morrow. You see in me that
very rare thing, a contented man. As to living quiet, keeping
dark, as you advise, Charlotte, until we know whether we are
approved of or not, I'm afraid it wouldn't suit either Jane or
me. We saw as we came through the town that the Lidlington
flower-show is advertised for to-morrow, and we mean to go to
it, meet the whole county face to face and decide for ourselves
how we like their looks. We are people, both of us, who re-
quire amusement, and amusement we take, whenever it happens
to come within our reach."
There is another ominous silence. " The flower-show ! You
are going to the Lidlington flower-show ! Our cousin Jamea
was buried only the beginning of the month," Miss Theobald
utters at last, in a hollow voice.
APPROPRTA TED ANGELS. 1 17
" I have said my say, and I have offered to fulfil my duty,"
remarks Miss Charlotte. " Perhaps the time may come when
you will look back to this night with regret, Francis. Perhaps
it may. I hope sincerely for your sake it will not Anne, I
think we can say good-night There is nothing further to de-
tain us."
Mr. Theobald helps them into their carriage, and gives a sigh
of relief as Diocletian's camel-like stride bears them slowly
away down the avenue. Jane and Blossy come rushing out of
the drawing-room to meet him.
" What was all that long parley about f Jane asks. " Blossy
is starving for food, but I was afraid to move till they were
gone."
" My sisters were giving me the key of the cellar," Mr. Theo-
bald answers ; " likewise the pleasant hope that it is well-filled.
We will proceed thither at once, also to the kitchen, and see
with our own eyes that the chops are properly cooked."
" But first let's open all the windows," cries Jane. " Let's
have a little of the sweet wholesome air of heaven through the
house. I am choking choking, and so is Blos.*
" It's your first taste of respectability, my dear Jane," says
Theobald, gravely. " You will get accustomed to the flavour
in time, I have no doubt"
CHAPTER XH.
APPROPRIATED ANGELS.
The summer flower-show is one of the great events of the year
to Lidlington and its inhabitants. Every grade of Chalkshire
society, gay people and serious, gentle people and simple, go
alike to this innocent feast of roses. Only they go in batches,
each batch at its appointed hour ; and, as far as possible, manage
not to jostle each other in their exits and their entrances.
Thus the ultra serious-minded, good or quiet set, of the Miss
irs the excellent gifts of nature, that neither spi
-not new bonnets and dresses. And next to them, sc
lently, as to shake hands at the gate, come the sp
social trimmers, Mrs. Crosbie among them ; peopl
to make the best of both worlds, especially the p:
without committing themselves irretrievably to i
then in flocks the World, Foolish virgins in su
eta and fresh dresses, attended by slim young soldiers
adlington barracks, with mammas full-blown and gor|
papas in white waistcoats and frock-coats. And the
3, and ices are eaten, and flirtations carried on, anc
*rs occasionally glanced at, till Ave o'clock, at which
: the Lidlington miUiiiera 1 girls and apprentices at six]
ad, and the military drums and fifes are replaced
nan brass band, and Society vanishes.
rVe are a little late, Emma, 31 Mrs, Crosbie remarks, on
of June, when Francis Theobald and his wife are aboi
3 their first appearance in Chalksbire, in the corned
l Life. "But I'm glad to see the Archdeacon still ]
e he is among the cut-flowers dear old man,*
low d ye do, Mr. Archdeacon T a dexterous aid em
: having straightway brought Mrs. Crosbie and Ej
lg the cut-flowers too. *' Dear Mm. Lumly pretty w
APPROPRIA TED ANGELS. 1 19
allows her to turn her eyes and thoughts to more mundane
objects.
Mrs. Crosbie and Emma are nearly as gaily clothed as the
flowers themselves to-day. When they were abroad and among
foreigners, they used to look ill-dressed. At the Lidlington
flower-show, where nearly everyone is attired by Miss Fletcher,
and judged by the Miss Fletcher standard, they are quite the
two best-dressed women present Whatever the artistic faults
of her flounces or ribbons, such perfect, such radiant content-
ment is on Emma's face, as renders her, for once, an absolutely
pretty girl. We borrow from the French that phrase of " beaute
du diable 19 beauty of youth. Surely there is the beauty of love,
too ! Surely the homeliest human face, under the sway of the
divine passion, possesses a comeliness of its own, independent
of lines and colouring. Emma Marsland's engagement with
Eawdon is still not formally given out. Faithful to the last to
her own high sense of honour, Mrs. Crosbie has decided that,
" until the written consent of the guardian in Jamaica is gained,
it is Mr. Crosbie's wish that dear Emma shall remain free in
the eyes of the world." But every one within a dozen miles
round knows quite accurately how matters stand : every one,
as the two young people walk about together this afternoon,
will look upon them as affianced lovers. And Miss Marsland's
delight at the prospect is overpowering. Her breath, every now
and then, comes short as if she were walking up-hill. She
turns cold she turns warm, so warm that she gets nervous
about the seams of her gloves, and has to cramp her poor little
fat hands into a position that, but for love, would be unen-
durable. When, and oh! when will the laggard Eawdon
appear, and the delightful duty of trotting him out before the
assembled world of Chalkshire begin 1
Kawdon, during the whole past fortnight, has fulfilled every
duty of his new position in life with punctilious care, has done
everything (the writing of love letters included) that even his
mother's heart could desire. To-day, for the first time, he
i2o OUGHT WE TO VISIT HER ?
rebelled, and rebelled openly. He would do any other mortal
thing that Emmy asked him to do. He would not go to a
flower-show at two and remain till five. Let the ladies proceed
thither alone, as his mother was determined neither to miss the
Archdeacon, the geraniums, nor the regiment, and he would
follow yes, he promised solemnly to follow, and in time to
have an hoifr, or more, of the band and the promenading, if
that would content them, and to be their escort home.
Alas, the band plays on and on, until a good half of the
programme is exhausted ; the last of the Archdeacon's (or
semi-serious) set vanished long ago, the tide of fashion is at its
height ; and still Mrs. Crosbie and Emma walk about unat-
tended by Emma's recreant lover !
" Oh, mamma, if he shouldn't come at all ! and when I had
looked forward so much to the flower-show, and got this bonnet
to please him, although I know blue isn't my colour. I don't
mind so much for myself, but think how everybody will talk
about our being here alone !"
And Emma's heart is swelling and her lips beginning to
quiver, when a sudden turn round a marquee brings her ab-
ruptly face to face with the woman she has learned to dread the
most on earth Jane Theobald.
"Mamma," she gasps, stopping short "Do you see the
Theobalds ! What shall we do V
" We shall pass quietly on, my dear Emma," answers Mrs.
Crosbie, without a change of colour, without a flutter of the
Hervey eyelid, "and we shall see nobody. A cut would be in
the worst possible taste until we know for certain what every-
body else means to do. We shall," attuning her voice into a
discreet monotone as the distance lessens, "just walk quietly
on and see nobody."
And they do so. The hot blood flames over Jane's cheek, but
she looks steadily into the faces of both as they pass. Mrs.
Crosbie gazes placidly on towards the north pole : Emma's eyes
are never raised from the ground. The deed is done. Not even
APPROPRIATED ANGELS. 121
by the coldest, most frigid salutation is Francis Theobald's wife,
the Princess Czartoriska of Spa, to be recognised here, on the
sacred soil of Chalkshire.
" So that is settled V says Jane, bravely, yet with a certain
passionate tremor in her voice, " I like to know exactly how I
stand, and now I do know it"
" Let us hope we can. exist without the Crosbie patronage, my
dear," says Theobald kindly. " You are the prettiest, and the
best dressed woman here, Jenny. Let that support you, even
under Mrs. Crosbie's neglect."
" Neglect ; I call it an insult," says Jane, very low. " You
told me I should have sermons preached to me when I came to
Chalkshire, and so I have. Fortunately for my poor compre-
hension, they are sermons easy to understand."
Before Theobald can answer, a friendly hand is laid on his
arm. "How are you, old fellow?" says a friendly familiar
voice close behind them. " Mrs. Theobald, too ! This is a
pleasant surprise. Who would have thought of meeting you in
such a place as Lidlington."
" Brabazon ! Brabazon in the flesh ! And what the deuce are
you doing in this part of the world V answers Mr. Theobald,
when his eyeglass has enabled him to recognise the new comer s
face.
And then they all shake hands, and Jane's volatile spirit rises
twenty degrees on the instant If she has more foes, she has
more supporters in this land of strangers than she knew of.
Captain Brabazon is one of the people the Theobalds speak
of as an old friend. Two years ago they spent a summer in his
society in Ems, and since that time have twice met accidentally,
and had jovial times together in Brussels and Paris. They
have never asked, or wanted to ask, who Captain Brabazon is ;
Captain Brabazon has never asked, or wanted to ask, who they
are. Out of England such details, even among Englishmen,
are void of interest. A. is a pleasant fellow, or has a pretty
wife ! B. likes to invite them to dinner, or to go with them to
Brabazon, for the first time, tells the Th
regiment he belongs, and adds that he is i
Lidlington. Awfully slow quarters; brains
fruitless devices for destroying time ; looks nj
interposition of providence having met Mr. an
Then, naturally, he joins them in their walk.
They come across other officers of the regin
the Colonel himself ; Captain Brabazon intro
The Colonel, a susceptible Irish bachelor of
smitten by Jane on the spot, and joins them
altem from the Lidlington barracks wants i
introduced to Mrs. Theobald. She is the pret
best dressed woman, the newest woman in the
as one, no insignificant section of society goes
aider herself " launched *
Launched 1 The mammas and daughters ^
gress askance from beneath their parasols
blankly, how all this is going to end ! It has
rally received opinion in the neighbourhood i
say owing to any special or underhand in flu
Frances Theobald will not be called upon,
"We should certainly not condemn pers*
class, because they are artists/ 1 Mrs, Crosbie hiu
APPROPRIATED 4NGELS. 123
through the outspokenness of Mr. Crosbie and Bawdon, partly
through the grudging admissions of Emma Marsland, that she
is pretty. And all the mammas and daughters in the neigh*
bourhood of Lidlington are, at least, ready to endorse Mrs.
Ciosbie's sentiments.
They would not condemn, they would be very sorry to con-
demn a person in Mrs. Theobald's position merely on account
of her lowly birth or antecedents ; still they cannot see, taking
all the circumstances of this particular case together, that they
are called upon to associate with Mrs. Theobald herself.
But what if Colonel Mauleverer, what if the whole of the
officers of the regiment hold a different opinion) As the
Colonel walks along, all devotion, at Jane's side, Theobald and
Captain Brabazon following, he takes off his hat to different
ladies, married and unmarried, of his acquaintance, and by no
faintest shade of coolness in the responsive salutations dare any
of them show disapproval of his companion ! In a small place
like Lidlington, the Colonel, above all the unmarried Colonel,
of a regiment is an authority. The situation is grave. Mrs.
Crosbie, watching events from afar, thanks her good genius that
she ventured upon no stronger measure than " not seeing" Jane
a while since.
" It really seems, Emma, love," she remarks, u it really seems,
and very glad I am of it, that this poor Mrs. Theobald is to
receive a little notice after alL"
"I never doubted that she would," answers Miss Marsland,
whose spirit is growing bitter under Bawdon's continued
absence ; " I never for a moment doubted that Mrs. Theobald
would be run after by gentlemen."
But Mrs. Theobald is destined to "receive notice" from a
power higher still than Colonel Mauleverer, a power whose
social dictates no one in Chalkshire has ever yet thought of
disputing. It comes about thus : and to give due dramatic
effect to the scene of Jane's solitary triumph, I should premise,
that not only Mrs. Crosbie and Emma, but pretty nearly every
124 OUGHT WE TO VISIT HER:
other matron and maiden at the flower-show, are ranged around
as spectators :
" You most have an ice, Mrs. Theobald," says Colonel Maule-
verer, as they pass before the refreshment-tent, the only really
cool place in the gardens, and near, but not too near to the band.
" I want you to listen to this next set of waltzes. Our band-
master has written them, but they are not christened yet. Do
you think you could help him to a name V
" Certainly," says Jane, without hesitation. " Call them by
the Christian name of the prettiest and most popular woman
in the neighbourhood. Nothing can be simpler."
" The prettiest and most popular woman in the neighbour
hood ! Well, says the Colonel,, gallantly, " as Mrs. Theobald
only arrived yesterday, I suppose one would have to fix upon
Lady Kose Golightly."
"And they must be the 'Lady Kose Waltzes/ of course,"
interrupts Jane. "That is to say, if 'Lady Kose' is not too
much of a fine lady to allow it 1"
" Lady Rose % Oh, she is less of a fine lady than any one in
Chalkshire. Lady Rose is a charming little woman. I'm sure
you and she would get on capitally."
"But Lady Rose!" says Jane, with due emphasis on the
' " Lady." " I know nothing about the aristocracy, or about aris-
tocratic titles myself, but musn't her father have been an earl or
duke, or some tip-top swell of the kind V '
Colonel Mauleverer wonders for one moment who this pretty
ignorant woman at his side was ! Well, never mind, she is a
pretty woman, and a delightfully unaffected one, too. Fancy,
here, in Chalkshire, meeting any human being who could un-
blushingly own to knowing nothing of the aristocracy !
" Lady Rose Golightly is a daughter of the Duke of Malta.
She is not a dozen yards away from us the little lady in white
and green, and with a great plate of strawberries in her hand
we shall be close to her directly. A daughter of the late, a
sister of the present, Duke of Malta. When she came out more
APPROPRIATED ANGELS. 125
than ten years ago Lady Kose is now nine-aud-twenty she
had offers from half the noble houses in Europe, and said ' no'
to all of them. Was she ambitious % Was she in love ? No
one but Lady Rose knew. She remained unmarried till she
was three or four-and-twenty, then, one fine morning, married
poor young Golightly of the Blues, and separated from him in
six months. In ten words, there is Lady Rose's history. ,,
" Is she thought pretty X 1
Oh, tastes differ/' says the old Colonel, too well informed to
praise one woman to another. " She is before you, Mrs. Theo-
bald. What is your opinion T
" I don't think one woman can ever judge of another. It is
what I should call a washed-out face. Hair, complexion, eyes,
all the same colour."
" The Beaudeserts are all like that. Some people admire the
style. To me bright colouring is the first beauty a woman can
possess."
"And why doesn't she live with her husband Lady Rose, I
mean?"
" Ah, that is the question why 1 Golightly's friends say one
thing ; Lady Rose's another. For my part," adds the Colonel,
" I can never believe in any of these sad stories that the fault
is on the lady's side."
"And I," says Jane, "believe that, in ninety-nine cases out
of a hundred it is. But, perhaps, Colonel Mauleverer, you
speak as a bachelor V
" Alas, Mrs. Theobald, I do ! Mine is an untoward fate. I
roam in search of domestic blessedness round the world, and
whenever I meet a woman I could like well enough to live and
die with, I am certain to discover that she makes some other
fellow's happiness already."
" How touching ! You are quite positive, I suppose, that all
these appropriated angels would charm you equally, if they
were free T
This interesting conversation has brought them close beside
126 OUGHT WE TO VISIT HERt
the chief refreshment stall ; and Jane is enabled to inspect, at
first hand, the charming little woman with whom, according to
Colonel Mauleverer, she would be sure to get on so capitally.
Lady Rose Golightly is decidedly not a pretty woman, and
yet she is more than a pretty woman. She has the gift of fasci-
nation, Wherein does this fascination lie 1 You will find no
two people give you the same answer to that question* A small
hand and foot ; a short upper lip ; quantities of flaxen Bond
Street hair : these exhaust the catalogue of charms Lady Rose's
greatest admirers are able to make out for her. And against
these, what defects i A complexion marred by a dozen London
seasons, whose ravages no art can hide ; over-prominent grey
eyes, from which neither stimulants nor belladonna can dispel
the weariness ; a figure ; but no, I stop. Lady Rose is
fascinating. No one in the world, or at least in Chalkshire,
denies that ("though, if she were not a duke's daughter, my
dear madam, we should see how much of the fascination is
genuine!") At this present moment, pretty girls, nice girls,
girls in their first fresh bloom, left neglected, Lady Rose, in her
draggled green-and-white muslin she wears out her old
dresses down in the country and with the sun lighting up
every imperfection of her faded face, is surrounded.
She accords to Jane a single cold look out of half-closed eye-
lids, nods, and gives a pleasant "how d'ye do/' to Colonel
Mauleverer. Then, suddenly, she sees Captain Brabazon and
Mr. Theobald ; and in a second a curiously vivid flush of colour
has risen over Lady Golightly's cheeks.
" Will you come and have a turn with me, Captain Braba-
zon?" little Brabazon having manfully passed through the
competitive crowd and reached her side. " Oh, yes, I've done
my strawberries till I begin another plate. Meantime, I want
to ask you something."
She puts up her parasol, and goes forth abruptly into the
blazing sunshine, Captain Brabazon, envied by everybody,
accompanying her
APPROPRIATED ANGELS. 127
" Who are these new people that you and Colonel Mauleverer
are walking about with V
"They are remarkably nice people, 9 answers Brabazon, not
feeling very sure what ground he stands on. "I knew them
first at Ems, afterwards in Paris. They are as nice people as I
ever met in my life, and *
" Oh, I am sure of all that. Their name isf
u Theobald. He tells me he has just come into a little
property in this neighbourhood. The place itself is called
* Theobalds.' Inherits it from a cousin who meant to cut him
oft; but hadn't time. Apoplexy. Codicil not signed. Old will
torn up. Heir-at-law. Quite a romantic story."
" And the " Lady Rose looks straight away before her as
she asks this, "the young lady in the extremely brilliant silk
is Mrs. Theobald P
" Mrs. Theobald is the lady who was walking with Colonel
Mauleverer/'
" Who was she, do you know f
Captain Brabazon believes, from internal evidence only, that
Mrs. Theobald was something connected with the stage. " May
be wrong, but believes it was something of the kind, still "
u You are right, I'm sure," interrupts Lady Rose Golightly.
u She has the indescribable look all those people have ; and,
indeed, I remember hearing at the time that Mr. Theobald had
made some unfortunate marriage. I knew Francis Theobald
very well, in town, a good many years ago." She volunteers
the statement in answer to Captain Brabazon's look of inquiry.
** And, of course, I recognised him just now. But I thought it
wise to make a few domestic inquiries before renewing the ac-
quaintance. So they have come to live in this neighbourhood,
have they % A pleasant acquisition to the Chalkshire society."
" Very," says Captain Brabazon, sententiously. Five minutes'
conversation with Theobald have sufficed to make him doubtful
as to whether Chalkshire society and his friends, the Theobalds,
will get on or not
I
128 OUGHT WE TO VISIT HER t
"I think I may as well ask Mr. Theobald to join our party
to-morrow. Anything in the shape of a new face is pleasant in
Chalkshire. One could ask him to dinner without his wife,
surely T
" One might ask him," returns Captain Brabazon, with em-
phasis. He has an immense admiration for Jane, would do and
say much to have the chance of taking her in to dinner.
" But you don't think he would accept Do you mean that V 9
" Well, Theobald is a queer compound. The veriest Bohe-
mian that ever lived, in many things, and yet punctilious, punc-
tilious to a fault, on some points. You must allow, Lady Eose,
it would look rather like a slight to his wife to leave her out in
a first invitation."
"A first invitation !" For an instant the corners of Lady
Rose's lips quiver. "I thought I told you I knew Francis
Theobald well in old days 1 However, in one sense you are
right. This is my first invitation to him as a married man, and
I suppose it will be as well to ask her, too. Only mind," she
adds this after a minute's pause, " mind one thing, Captain Bra-
bazon, I shall look to you to take Mrs. Theobald completely off
my hands, if I do ask her. You fully understand that V
Captain Brabazon accepts the charge with rather suspicious
readiness, and Lady Rose retraces her steps towards the refresh-
ment tent. The Theobalds are still there ; Jane eating ice, and
surrounded by a ring of the same courtiers who, five minutes
before, were fighting to hold Lady Rose's parasol or hand her a
teaspoon ; Theobald in a corner, discussing with the Colonel
over the propriety of getting up a little loo, as an enlivenment
to the dulness of the barracks at Lidlington.
He is the handsomest man present, the only man worth look-
ing at in all this dreary provincial crowd, Lady Rose thinks,
promptly. Her heart gives a thump as loudly as can be ex-
pected of a heart that has thumped so many years, and for so
many different objects. She remembers her of a time, long
distant, when a certain little romance was being enacted in her
APPROPRIATED ANGELS. 129
life, with a certain person for hero. Could those love-lit days
but come again ! Nay, could but .a single gleam of the old
divine refractions light up the prose of her disillusioned, fast-
waning youth ! Lady Rose walks straight up to Theobald, the
crowd dividing for her on either side, but when she reaches him
stands dumb. Lady Rose Golightly dumb, shy, and with a
blush like a girl's upon her sallow cheek !
" I never, myself, care for more than five," says Theobald's
voice. It seems to come to her from the other side the grave.
" Unless, of course, you have Irish loo, then "
The importance of the subject brings Mr. Theobald's glass
into his eye, and by chance Lady Rose Golightly comes within
its focus. She, says, " How d'ye do, Mr. Theobald V in a voice
admirably divested of all emotion ; she gives him her hand ;
they make one or two common-place remarks, like people who
parted from each other yesterday. Then each stands silent,
looking into the other's face, and Colonel Mauleverer oppor-
tunely begins asking Lady Rose's opinion about the waltzes
that have just been played, and the name that has been pro-
posed for them.
Lady Rose, who has not listened to a bar, pronounces the
waltzes a complete success. If they may be called by her name ]
Why, it would be only too great a flattery to her. She will tell
Herr Bergmann so, herself ; and over Lady Rose Golightly trips
to the German band-master, who takes his hat off to the ground,
and blushes all over his bald Teutonic forehead with delight at
this public tribute paid to his genius by the great lady of the
neighbourhood. Then she comes back to Theobald, and the
Colonel, divining, perhaps, that he is not wanted just at pre-
sent, disappears.
" You find me very much changed, Mr. Theobald % Should
you have known me, I wonder, if I had not spoken first 1"
" I should have known you anywhere, and under any circum-
stances. I see no change m you, Lady Rose."
Except that she has grown yellow and thin, and older by
9
seven years ago this month. It was on the J
never saw you, to speak to, since."
" Lady Cameron's was the last London parfr
went," Theobald answers, quietly. " From that c
as completely as though I had never had a pla
world and everything belonging to it"
** From one section of the world you ku
managed to exist in a different one, it seems/ 1
"Yes, I have managed to exist. So have yo
There is* or Lady Rose imagines there to bi
preach in Theobald^ voice. And all her woma
to him mote and more, Alas, if Lady Bose
happy a man Theobald's actress-wife has made
" We spend our lives, most of us, it seems ti
bald, in making mistakes and repenting of thei
41 In repenting sometimes in repairing then
he asks.
" Oh, there are mistakes that never can be
Lady Hose Golightly, in a tone of subdued pal
employs when she has occasion to speak of hei
"But what am. I thinking of all this time," sh
to ask about your wife 1 Mrs. Theobald is hen
t .tip s*.r\A T fkJ** 1
APPROPRIA TED ANGELS. 13 1
Rose is not a woman of half measures. For good or for evil,
whatever she undertakes she carries out thoroughly. She has
renewed her friendship with Francis Theobald ; has discovered,
at the end of three minutes, that her feeling for him ispretty
much what it always was ; and for his sake resolves to behave
well (Lady Rose's doctrines on this point of "behaving welT
are somewhat broad) to his wife.
"Shall we take a turn round the gardens, Mrs. Theobald F
she asks Jane, presently. " I don't know whether you have
noticed the azaleas ? They really are beautiful. There is one
plant from my own garden that I am conceited about, if you
will let me show it to you."
And then, full in the face of everybody, Mrs. Crosbie, Miss
Marsland included, " the young person in the extremely brilliant
silk," and Lady Rose in her dirty, green-and- white muslin, walk
forth into the sunshine together, friends.
Lady Rose is all sweetness and condescension ; Mrs. Theobald
is shy, and does not warm readily into talk. She is perfectly
ignorant of great ladies and of their attributes, and is not sure
whether she ought to say "my lady sometimes, or not ; and
besides, it is such a very new sensation to Jane, this of being
patronised ! Lady Rose thinks her a fool ; one of those brain-
less dolls men marry for the sake of their pink cheeks and blue
eyes, and pities Theobald more and more.
" This is the azalea I spoke of. But perhaps you don't care
for such things 1 I am foolish about flowers. I am obliged to
create interests to fill up my life. You have children, I think V
" I have one child,' 1 answers Jane ; " a little daughter of
three."
" Ah ! that must be a great resource, I am sure. Don't you
find it so V 9
Jane is silent. She has never looked upon Blossy in the
light of " its " being a resource against ennui.
" Sometimes I have thought a child would have made me
happier, but really one cannot tell I fancy there must be
92
i; 132 OUGHT WE TO VISIT HER t
j a great deal of anxiety with children when they are ill, and
j. anxiety kills me. I have such wretched nerves. Still, one
r wants something to interest one, and nothing does interest one,
V Mrs. Theobald, does it P
i ' Jane answers rather stupidly, "She is sure she doesn't
% know," and Lady Rose goes on :
"What one wants of course is constant excitement if ex-
f citement would only last ! I was a little amused at Hurling-
h ham last season, just while it was new. Then I got sick of it.
^ Everyone shoots so well, and the pigeons die so monotonously.
y You like a pigeon match f
f. "I wouldn't be at such a cruel thing, if I was shot for it
r* myself !" cries Jane, with warmth.
t . " Ah ! tender-hearted. I have heard some people are
I . like that I don't know at first that I quite liked seeing the
? ' poor little wretches tumble over, but I got used to it I get
used so soon to everything, good and bad alike. Even the
p- opera doesn't please me as it once did. You are fond of music ?
f You play and sing? No 1 Then you draw, perhaps 1"
$ " a I do nothing," answers Jane ; " I haven't an accomplish*
f : ment belonging to me, except the one I learnt in my profession
I when I was a girl dancing !"
i. " And that, I am sure, you do to perfection. I only wish I
, did any one thing well, instead of everything badly. But I
L- have never had time for real application. Now would you like
l" to see the calceolarias P
Not a solitary idea have they in common, these two young
women, who are destined to be placed in such curious juxta-
position or rivalry. By the time they have got through the
calceolarias they are reduced to monosyllables ; by the time they
find themselves, with relief, at the refreshment-tent again, are
silent
" Thank heaven that duty is over !" thinks Lady Rose, as
Theobald and Captain Brabazon come forward to meet them.
" I need never say as much to her again while I live. Now for
the reward."
LADY ROSE GO LIGHTLY. 133
And, conscious of her own rectitude in haying behaved well
to Theobald's wife, away Lady Rose Golightly walks, with
Theobald himself, to the shadiest, most sequestered portions of
the Lidliilgton nursery-gardens, and is seen no more.
CHAPTER Xm.
LADY ROSE GOLIGHTLY.
Just at this juncture Rawdon Crosbie makes his appearance
on the scene.
He joins Emma at once ; meekly receives his scolding for
being late ; then, with the best grace he can, resigns himself to
the prospect of being exhibited, as an engaged man, before all
Emma's little Lidlington world for the remainder of the after-
noon.
" You look very nice indeed, my dear Emmy, now that you
are not lecturing ;" this he remarks after they have made the
round of the gardens, and have been seen and smiled at by
everybody. " I never knew you wear a prettier bonnet or
dress/'
Ever since he met Mrs. Theobald in Spa, Rawdon has been
going into raptures about the becomingness of pale blue and
pink roses. So, to please her lover, Emma has caused this
combination to be worked into form by Miss Fletcher, not in
common cheap materials, like Jane's, but in richest silk, laces,
and furbelows, and with the result he sees.
"lam glad you like me, Rawdon. Mamma thought so much
blue might make me look loud. Apropos of that well no
apropos of nothing but who do you think is here and not in
mourning % Mrs. Pippin says she thinks it hardly decent
your Spa friend Mrs. Theobald I*
The tell-tale blood dyes Rawdon's brown face up to the
temples ; otherwise he keeps himself in hand welL "Mrs-
Theobald % What ! without her husband, or with him !*
around her. Colonel Mauleverer, little Capta
fluttering train of subalterns, all eager for her
looking her best in the delicate mauve dress (ho
remembers her showing it to De Lansac !) wl
called " that extremely brilliant silk," and with
tion, and so large an audience, A woman who
an actress at heart retains her actress instind
surely as a woman of fashion retains hers, Tfi
Golightly, alone, she was ill at ease, awkward t
With half a dozen men contending for her fav
hundred eyes looking on, Jane breathes her o\
laughs her own laugh, talks her own language, i
Rawdon Croabie stops short, and watches her
scions face with feelings of most unwarrante
How utterly the Spa ball, and the walk home in
how utterly all the sweetness, the romance of
quaiutance must have died from this light-mindt
woman's memory, whilst he
" Come away, Emma !" the tone of his voice
Miss Maraland jump. ** There's nothing in wors
ladies to flock round a regimental band as they i
test it If women only knew," assuming the tn
already, u what men sav of ths aftprwnr^Q I"
LAD Y ROSE GOLIGHTL V. 135
inquires if his mother and Mrs. Theobald have met and recog-
nised each other ]
"We we did meet Mr. and Mrs. Theobald/' answers Emma,
evasively. "But that was before we saw any one speak to
them, and mamma thought it as wise to take no decisive step
towards renewing the acquaintance ; you understand, Rawdon V 9
"I understand nothing, unless I am told it plainly," answers
Rawdon. "You met Mrs. Theobald before you knew Lady
Rose Golightly was going to notice her and cut her. Is that
itr
" I hope I know too well what is due to myself to cut any
one. There were other people passing at the time, and neither
mamma nor I looked in the direction of Mr. and Mrs. Theo-
bald. Simply that."
"Did she spe youT
" How can I tell you, since I was not looking in their direc-
tion r
After this the lovers walk back, without the interchange of
many more sentiments, towards the point from whence they
started. Mrs. Crosbie forms one of the knot of dowagers who
are obstructing the entrance of the refreshment-tent, at this
hour the most popular tent in the garden. And here Rawdon
disburthens himself of his betrothed, then rushes off, forgetting
all his anger of five minutes ago, to search for Jane to find
out whether that light-minded, fickle young woman means to
be offended with him or not !
He has not far to seek. Mrs. Theobald is eating a strawberry
ice just outside the tent, with Captain Brabazon holding her
parasol, and evidently making all the running he can during
the absence of the Colonel She looks round, she sees Rawdon
Crosbie intently watching her, and a smile and flush of recog-
nition light up her face. Two seconds more and he is at her
side.
" You see we have kept our word we have really taken pos-
session of our Chalkshire estates," Jane remarks, as they shake
x^u vcioiuu 01 tne Horrible Czartoriska
be detailed in another minute for Captain Br
He makes an absurdly stiff little speech welcon
shire ; asks for Mr. Theobald, for Blossy. -
" Theobald is here, or was here five minutes ;
home at Theobalds. I feel an inch taller, Mr. (
you, when I speak of Theobalds as home ! 1
for us, vagrants, to possess twenty-two milder
whole legion of domestic rats, of our own !"
" Theobalds is a charming old country-house,
Captain Brabazon* 4t I hope you will let me rid*
as soon as you are settled, Mrs. Theobald 1"
" Come and see ns at once," Jane answers, w
heartiness. " We are as much settled as we aTe
in this life, The Colonel has promised to breai
Sunday, you -bad better come with him. Mr. i
find your way to Theobalds without being a
turning to young Rawdon with an air of farni
that is not lost upon more than one of the byst;
For Rawdon, himself, he does not know ho
Nothing can be more pointedly amicable than
her reception of him, and still, in her voice, in
lurks that same demure, half -mocking expression
LAD Y ROSE GOLIGHTL V. 13/
who everybody is, and I want to hear all that you have been
doing since I saw you. Good-bye for the present, Captain
Brabazon. We shall expect you on Sunday, mind. Oh, my
parasol, please !" And then away she walks, Rawdon Crosbie,
with feelings of oddly mixed embarrassment and triumph, at
her side.
" Ah, let us wait here a little," cries Jane, as the band just at
this minute begins to play the overture to " Robert le Diable."
" Hackneyed and hurdy-gurdied though it is, I am never tired
of that poor old opera. It reminds me of so many jolly days."
And she stops precisely opposite Emma Marsland, Mrs. Cros-
bie, and half a dozen of their more intimate friends, and with
the most innocent face imaginable, and keeping time with the
fingers of one slim hand upon the palm of the other as if the
music were the only thing in the universe of which she were
conscious listens.
Rawdon listens too ; does not, that is to say, hear a solitary
note that is played, but is sensible of a murmur of subdued
feminine talk in which his own name frequently occurs, and
feels, although he never once looks in their direction, that the
eyes of Emma, of his mother, and of his mother's friends, are all
riveted upon his hot face. For four or five mortal minutes Jane
keeps him at his post (strange how callous the kindest-hearted
women are about inflicting this sort of torture on men they
really like); then, after a whisper that sends the hot iron deeper
and deeper into Emma's spirit, she moves away, followed, of
course, by Rawdon, among the crowd.
"The overture was worth stopping for, Mr. Crosbie, was it
not 1 I could teil by your face how you enjoyed it."
" What have I done to make you so cruel, Mrs. Theobald ? I
went to say good-bye to you in Spa, and you had gone to break-
fast in the woods with De Lansac! I meet you again in
Chalkshire, and the only way you can amuse yourself, as soon
as you can find time to spare me a word at all, is by laughing
at me."
notice if you mean to do anything so dreadfu
" I do not, indeed. I leave sentimental i
Lansacs and Colonel Mauleverers of the w
men you prefer, Mrs. Theobald."
" Ah, you've been watching me, have you
allow that, Master Rawdou, Children of youi
better than to spy the actions of their elders,"
How well they suit each other, this unequa
and girl, whom Fate, with her accustomed i
results, persists in throwing together ! They st
the flower-stalls in the I e vel-sun I ight ; they t
jest^ laugh, are happy. It might be Arcadia to
instead of the Lidlington nursery-grounds* Jai
their arrival at Theobalds yesterday; desert b
the dark to the cellar, and how Theobald, mi
" respectable country girls' 1 hired by Miss {
cook his own mutton chops; and how, all throu,
kept fearing that the rats meant to carry away
*' The only excitement I can look forward i
catching* If you have any terriers bring thei
morning, please. Oh, and I am going to make a
know a uarsnin fmm * ^*""ncultu, but I am g
ga: ..Aii-. --J -
LAD Y ROSE GOUGHTL Y. 139
leave of absence he does not add, a week predestined to driv-
ing Emmy about in his mother's pony-carriage, and paying
morning calls of a certain prophetic and mournful character to
Emmy's friends.
" Well, that will do capitally, then," cries Jane. " I suppose
one can make a garden in a week 1 But mind, I shall want you
for the real hard work, the digging and turf-cutting, and all
that."
" I'll work eight hours a day, with spade and pickaxe, as long
as Mauleverer and Brabazon are not my fellow-labourers,"
answers Rawdon, trying rather unsuccessfully to conceal the
ridiculous satisfaction which the proposal causes him.
They walk completely round the garden, naturally meeting
the whole of Mrs. Crosbie's acquaintance as they walk, and just
as they are returning into the neighbourhood of the band are
overtaken by Theobald and Lady Rose Golightly. It is now
five o'clock, and Lady Rose is on her way to her carriage. She
has grown younger by a dozen years during the last half -hour ;
her eyes sparkle, a bloom that, for once, owes nothing to art, is
on her face. She is sweeter, more generously condescending
than ever in her demeanour towards Francis Theobald's wife.
" I have been asking your husband if you will dine with me
to-morrow, Mrs. Theobald, and he refers me to you. Oh, indeed,
you must come, I want so much to show you The Folly, the
ugliest house in England, I call it, and we shall be quite a small,
friendly party. Mr. Crosbie," she has already shaken hands
with Rawdon, " I suppose one mustn't give you any bachelor
invitations now?"
" Why not V says Rawdon, looking innocent in an exactly
inverse ratio to how he feels. Bachelor invitations, bachelor
parties, are the very things of all others concerning which, at
the present time, Miss Marsland holds the strongest opinions.
"Ah, why ! Your own conscience may answer that. Luckily,"
goes on Lady Rose, with a laugh, " I have nothing to do with
other people's consciences. I find my own quite as much as I
her tablets from her pocket, and writes down
newly-invited guests.
" We shall be a very nice little party, I thin
Theobald, Colonel Mauleverer, Captain Braba;
Crosbie, Loo Childers Loo is coming to stay
row and myself. Two, four, seven, an unev
no matter. * Saturday, 30th of June, Mrs. and
good heavens! what have I done 4 }" Lady '.
back to another page of lier tablets, and lool
full of genuine horror. " ' Saturday, 30th
that is to-morrow 'Mrs. and Miss Coventi
o'clock! 1 "
" You have asked Mrs* Coventry Brown to a !
exclaims Rawdon. " Oh, Lady Base, this is fat
u But what can I do % I utterly forgot her e
invited every one else, I can't put her off now.
" A sudden death in the family % n
"And be cross-questioned next morning by th
and Pippin families as to details. 'When did 1
did he die I 1 ( What depth of mourning do hie
to wear 4 ! 1 No, no ; I candidly confess I'm mu
coward to run any risk of that kind. Mrs, Cot
the Mrs. Candour of this neiglibourhnn^ " i ***
LAD Y ROSE GOLIGHTL V. 141
voice. "We won't be offended. Anything better than putting
us at the same table with virtuous people !"
"Well, I'm sure, Theobald !" cries Jane, the indignation
flaming hot over all her honest face.
" My dear Mrs. Theobald I was only jesting/' interrupts Lady
Rose, with ready tact. " Mrs. Coventry Brown is a somewhat
heavy old lady, whom I have contrived, with my usual wisdom,
to introduce into an otherwise charming little party. Nothing
remains for us all but to bear the infliction as best we can, and
pray that she may, at least, leave early. Now, are you going
homer
Jane answers that they are going home as they came, on foot.
It is a walk of about two miles across the fields from the Lid-
lington flower-show to Theobalds.
" But why not let me drive you V says Lady Rose, still ad-
dressing Jane, not Theobald. " Take me out of my way? Not
a bit. I pass your gates/'
Jane, upon this, reluctant she knows not why, says " Yes,'
and bids good-bye to Rawdon Crosbie.
" Till to-morrow/' adds Lady Rose, nodding to him gaily, as
she seats herself beside Mrs. Theobald in the carriage. " And
mind, I shall put you on duty, Mr. Crosbie ! I shall make you
take you know whom, to dinner."
And then away dashes Lady Rose Golightly's barouche, with
its high-stepping grays and fine London footmen, and with Mr.
and Mrs. Francis Theobald inside.
"Birds of a feather/' remarks Mrs. Coventry Brown in a
whisper to Mrs. Crosbie, as these two ladies watch the scene,
breathless from afar. " Birds of a feather ! Ah, my dear friend,
we all know what Lady Rose is, at heart. ,,
But Rawdon's mother is silent. Dimly it dawns upon her
that the vexed question of whether Jane shall or shall not be
noticed will have to be reviewed from a higher stand-point than
she has hitherto taken.
" Ought we to visit her ] It is a matter purely of right or
CHAPTER XIV.
DOMESTIC AND RETROSPECTIVE.
" Theobald," says Jane abruptly, " I should lib
meaning, you hear me, the meaning of Lady R
civility. Taken a fancy to me ? Yes, that's sue!
thing to happen. She and you were friends, rath
I dorft believe it was rather : I believe you ai
were once a great deal more to each other than
thing about, and I think it would be fairer j
juster to me* Theobald that you should say so a
t straightforward way."
Mr. and Mrs, Theobald are jogging along in ahir
the up and down Chalkshire lanes to Lady Rose's
Jane exceedingly upright, mindful of the flower;
and of her fresh muslin dress ; Mr. Theobald, lav
and white-tied, leaning back, with his legs upon
seat, in as comfortable a position as his wife's agg
of temper and the jolting of the fly will permit
" Yes," goes on Jane, as her husband remains a
sure of it ! And what is more, I shall show Lady R
that I am sure of it, unless you take the trouble
me."
DOMESTIC AND RETROSPECTIVE. 143
life belonged to me. It is extremely flattering, of course, if I
had only the sense to appreciate it, that I should have been the
rival or the successor of the Duke of Malta's daughter."
"The rival! Jenny, child, would you like to hear exactly
how much Lady Eose and I ever had to say to each other) I
can tell you in three words." It is a maxim of Francis Theo-
bald's that nothing baffles curiosity, eludes pursuit, and gene-
rally mystifies the human intelligence like truth. And so, by
sheer force of habit, and without deliberate intention either of
baffling, eluding, or mystifying Jane, he tells the truth now :
or as near the truth as a one-sided version of a " history" enacted
by two persons can ever be expected to arrive.
" We were both rather young" I don't know how it happens,
but Jane's hand is in Theobald's during the whole of the nar-
ration " both rather young, and one, I can answer for it, ex-
traordinarily foolish. In those days, Jenny, I was, as you know,
an officer in her Majesty's household troops, and wore moss
rosebuds in my button hole, and spent my nights at balls, and
my afternoons in the park and at kettle-drum teas. Oh ! you
may look incredulous, but 'tis true. Kettledrumming was just
coming into fashion when I was a youngster, and whatever was
the fashion, the young fool Francis Theobald did "
" Even to falling in love with Lady Rose Golightly V inter-
rupts Jane.
" She was not Lady Rose Golightly then, and I don't know
that I ever fell in love with her. Mind, I only say I don't know
perhaps I did. I imagined so at the time, and that comes
very nearly to the same thing, doesn't it % You see, she was one
of the prettiest women in London n
" No one would think so now."
" And the most run after. A duke's daughter, too ! and I
dare say I was snob enough didn't Carlyle, or some one," (Mr.
Theobald is not a reader of books) " remark once that we are all
snobs at heart t to be influenced by that Well, I used to meet
her everywhere through the whole of one season, and she would
144 OUGHT WE TO VISIT HER f
always give me her best dances, and throw over earls and mar-
quises by the dozen for me fact, Jenny* I assure you and then
at last, one fine night, just about seven years ago it must have
been, my eyes were opened and I found out no very startling
discovery you will say that I bad been a donkey I Lady Rose
Beaudesert was engaged to the hereditary Prince of Hollen-
zotfenstein. The wedding was to take place in the third week
of July, and the bridesmaids were to wear mauve silk dresses
with white tunics, and dear little mauve wreaths and veils '
" Tour voice shakes as you talk that nonsense, Theobald,"
"The springs of this vehicle would make anything shake,
Jenny."
"Lady Rose had jilted you- I hate her no, I don't I love
her for behaving so badly that you must hate her Tell me that
you hate that woman, Theobald V
" No, Jane, I can't tell you that. Till I saw her yesterday I
had clean forgotten that there was such a person as Lady Eose
in existence."
"And at the timer
" At the time .... as you really seem determined to have
the story in full .... at the time I went one fine evening to
a ball at the Camerons, the Lucius Camerons you know no,
you don't know, but that's nothing to do with the story I went
to a ball at the Camerons, and was told by all my best friends,
before I got half way up the staircase, that Lady Rose Beaude-
sert was engaged and I had better go and offer my congratula-
tions. You see, people knew we had been a good deal together
I had ridden with her and her brother only that morning in
the park and were naturally amused at the situation. Nothing
more ridiculous than the position of a jilted man, unless, per-
haps, it's the position of the man for whom he has been jilted.
But I think, as far as I can recollect, that I got through it pretty
well. Lady Rose was standing at the farther end of the ball-
room, and I went up to her at once, and said a few things, as
nicely as I could, about my hopes for her happiness. Her
DOMESTIC AND RETROSPECTIVE. 145
mother, the good old dowager duchess peace be to her ashes
for the part she played towards me ! was on one side, the
' hereditary Prince with the number of syllables in his name on
the other. I was introduced to him, and he bowed, extremely
graciously, and smiled I bowed and smiled, extremely gra-
ciously, to him. And then I had one last waltz with Lady
Rose. I never spoke to her again from that night till yesterday.
The story is told."
" And having failed to marry so high you married so low !"
says Jane, half moving away her hand. " Having lost the Duke
of Malta's daughter, you took .... a ballet girl !"
If there be truth in the taunt, no shadow of change on Mr.
Theobald's good-looking face betrays that it has struck home.
" There was never any question of my marrying the Duke of
Malta's daughter, Jenny. I never thought of marrying any one
until you put marriage into my head. We amused each other,
and danced with each other, for a whole London season. Then
Lady Rose got engaged to her Prince (by the way, she didn't
marry him, I wonder how that was X) and I took to another way
of life altogether."
" The life you were leading, I suppose, when you came across
meT
"Exactly. Jenny, how all this talk brings back the old
days ! How plainly I remember you 111 get made justice of
the peace, and have these infernal roads levelled ! how plainly
I remember you as you looked that day when I met my fate at
the Royal ! I had gone with Jack Thornton to see his burlesque
rehearsed, but all I saw was you. You wore a green merino
frock with darns in it, Mrs. Theobald. You had shabby pink
roses in your hat ; and I stood, in vain, trying to contain my
feelings, in the slips, and fell in love with you as you
danced !"
A blush like an April sunshine crosses Jane's face. Sweet,
trebly sweet, from their rarity, are words like these from Theo-
bald's lips ! She can forgiveshe thinks she can forgive Lady
10
OUGHT WE TO VISIT HER t
Rose all that poor, stunted, artificial ball-room flirtation, on the
strength of them !
M I can never believe yon fell in love with me, looking an
hideous as I must have looked that day/* and her hand returns
to his, " When I was dressed I wasn't ugly, I know, but the
prettiest girl that ever lived couldn't look well dancing batte-
meats in a green merino dress and a shabby hat. 17
" Jenny, did I or did I not come and speak to you the moment
the class broke up f
" That was no thing. Any one might have done that without
falling in love/*
" And didn't you say that for no earthly consideration would
you allow me to see you home, and then didn't I see you home
it rained, too all the way to Waterloo Road, and I held my
umbrella over your head, and got wet through myself V
"And then how soon you began to get jealous," adds Jane ;
"jealous of old Adolphe Dido, who had known me since I was
a baby, because he called me 'my dear as if every one in a
theatre didn't call every one else * my dear ;' jealous of poor
little Montague Stokes, because he happened to be my lover in
the piece ; jealous of everybody. You have quite left off being
jealous, Mr. Theobald, by the way !"
" Yes, my dear Jane," says Theobald, and he draws his wife
to his side, to the detriment of her muslin frills, and kisses her.
" I leave that branch of domestic duty to you, now."
CHAPTER XV.
THE CIGARETTE OF PEACE.
The house in which Lady Rose Golightly lives was built by the
good old duke, her grandpapa, while he was still Marquis of
Fitzgermain. It goes by the name of Beaudesert's Folly, and
its architecture bears a modest resemblance to that of the
Brighton Pavilion, which royal building was, indeed, erected by
THE CIGARETTE OF PEACE. 147
the gracious prince and friend of the Beaudesert family at about
the same date as the " Folly."
" Mine is the most ridiculously ugly house in England, 19 Lady
Rose says, herself, probably with justice. And still, every
received canon of art, of taste, put aside, Beaudesert's Folly is
not without a certain specious attractiveness of its own. It was
built to humour the whim of a certain French lady, in whose
opinions art went for little indeed, pleasure for everything;
built, as its name implies, for the sojourn of " Folly" during six
or eight summer weeks. And it, at least, fulfils the object of
its existence. There is a panneled gewgaw banqueting- room,
all white and gold, and blue and crimson, and with so many
stained " Gothic" windows opening to the ground, that to dine
there is the next thing to dining in the open air itself. And
there is a small amber Chinese drawing-room, faded from its
pristine beauty, but whose warm colouring and subdued light
doubtless suited the swarthy complexion of its first occupant,
as they now suit the London-bleached cheeks of Lady Bose
Golightly. And drawing-room and banqueting-room alike open
upon a terrace ; and in the garden outside plays a fountain, so
close that you can hear the cool splash of the water as you dine.
.... What astonishing effects these panneled walls, that
garden terrace, might produce if they would only break sud-
denly into speech before some of the discreet Chalkshire people
Mesdames Coventry Brown and Crosbie, for instance, or the
venerable Archdeacon and his wife when these worthy souls
come to pay their little court to Lady Rose ! For history, how-
ever many hard things it may have to say of the Beaudesert
family, has always allowed them the negative virtue of knowing
how to enjoy themselves, and three successive Beaudesert gene-
rations have now, during about ten weeks of the year, enjoyed
themselves at The Folly !
Under Lady Rose's regime fewer cakes are eaten, perhaps,
less ale drank, than under the regime of her predecessors
(although many a lively dinner-party, or impromptu supper, is
10 2
143 OUGHT WE TO VISIT HER t
held in the banqueting-room of The Folly, whereof the Chalk-
shire world knows nothing). The house was made over to her
for her lifetime by her brother, the present duke, at the time of
her marriage made over with the strictest legal prohibitions
against poor George Golightly's ever having the right to cross
its threshold without his wife's consent. And a very pleasant
little summer retreat, or harbour of refuge, Lady Rose finds it
now in her life of quasi-widowhood. When she is in want of
money Lady Rose is often in want of money and has let her
town house, there is always the ridiculous minaretted roof of
The Folly to shelter her ; when she turns sick of everything in
town dress, lovers, rouge, scandal, herself ; herself most of all
there are always the roses and carnations of The Folly gardens
to nurse her back to peace. A distinct vein of poetry runs
through the many-coloured composite of which Lady Rose
Golightly is formed. Woman of the world, steeped to the lips
in worldliness though she is, she can feel nature, June nights,
July flowers, the love-song of the thrush and nightingale, still.
But then she must feel it all in company ! Carnations in the
afternoon ; a French dinner and champagne, and four or five
pleasant men and women, bringing with them the last stories
from town, afterwards. The love-songs of the nightingale ; but
songs from human lips as well ; and coffee on the terrace and a
stroll through the moonlit gardens, and a cigarette or two, and
Badminton to finish the evening.
I repeat it, less cakes and ale are consumed now than for-
merly at The Folly ; but cigarettes, champagne, and sentiment
have replaced them. The Lady Rose Golightly of our virtuous
Victorian era, in short, has succeeded the noisy male Beau-
deserts and their associates of other days. But what a world
of social reform, what a revolution, not in manners only, but in
morals, is implied in those few words.
" Every one is here, I think, Mrs. Brown, except the Theo-
balds. As they are strangers in the land I suppose we must
give them ten minutes' law still f
I
THE CIGARETTE OF PEACE. 149
The amber and muslin curtains of Lady Rose's drawing-room
are closed just sufficiently to soften the effect of western sun-
beams upon evening complexions, without excluding the cool
flower-scented air from the garden ; and Lady Rose, never so
charming as in her own house, is chatting away that dreariest
prelude to pleasure in human life, the interval before dinner.
" The Theobalds !" repeats Mrs. Coventry Brown, turning
herself slowly, as on a pivot, in her mulberry satin. She is a
vast, mild, pulpy-looking blonde, this Oracle before whose
utterances all Chalkshire trembles, a scantily-draped blonde of
fifty, with white roses mysteriously pinned upon a bald head,
with great wide-open yellow eyes, a soft purring voice, and a
creamy smile. " I did not quite catch you, dear Lady Rose. Is
it possible the poor Miss Theobalds feel equal to going into
society already?"
" Oh, I don't mean the Miss Theobalds," Lady Rose answers ;
" I am not good enough to aspire to intimacy with the Miss
Theobalds. The people I expect are the new arrivals, Francis
Theobald, of Theobalds, and his wife."
" Ah ! Indeed !" Mrs. Coventry Brown draws her lips close,
runs her eyes round the room, then drops them upon the fine
massive fore-ground of her own bare arms, and gives the white
roses on her head a little depreciatory shake. " Mr. Fran is
Theobald was at the flower show yesterday, I believe?" sh
remarks, an obtrusive emphasis on the " mister."
"And his wife too ; didn't you see her? They came away
with me. She is rather a nice-looking person -ah ! there's a
ring ; it must be them. Don't you agree with me, Mr. Crosbie?"
Lady Rose appeals to Rawdon Crosbie, who has instantly
hovered near at the mention of Jane's name. " Mr. Theobald's
wife is rather a nice-looking person ?"
Rawdon thinks Mr. Theobald's wife one of the prettiest
women he ever saw in his life, and being too young and too
unversed in the world's ways to discern the error of honest par-
tisanship, says so, boldly.
15* OUGHT WE TO VISIT HER f
"Well, there I cannot agree wit a you/ 1 cries Lady Ttoee, a
little shaiply. '* She has a nice complexion, certainly, and a
pair of blue eyes but no features. And then 3 such an absence
of style!"
" But * my dear Lady Rose, what can one expect V* purrs Mrs,
Coventry Brown in a woolly whisper. *' The marvel h, I think
(and a great relief it must he to the poor Miss Theobalds), that
a person from such a position as that should be noticeable at all,*
" Come, come, Mrs, Brown, no scandal about Queen Eliza-
beth ! I have theatrical blood in my own veins, you know f
Lady Rose is fond of thus openly adverting to the one notorious
blurr upon the Eeaudesert scutcheon ; "and I never will hear a
word against the sock and buskin. If Mrs. Theobald is nice, I,
for my part, shall like her just as well as if she were the daughter
of a prince. But then, I care nothing for birth. I am an out-
and-out republican."
Now Mrs. Coventry Brown's father, men say, began life
humbly in the retail hosiery business. Her husband, all the
world knows, was a Manchester cotton-seller. She is therefore
aristocratic to the backbone, and the very word " birth" jars
harshly on her susceptibilities.
" I think we must admit, my dear Lady Rose," a peony flush
rising over her large blonde face, " I think we must admit that
there are parvenoos and 2wrvenoos. Also that it is a duty" I
am afraid Mrs. Coventry Brown pronounces it "dooty," for
when she is vexed she forgets her pronunciation sometimes
u to make distinctions between them."
Before Lady Rose can answer, the door is thrown open, and
the innocent objects of the discussion make their appearance.
Theobald debonair, self-possessed, graceful, a man of men now
as ever in Lady Rose's sight ; Jane, shyer than she would be if
she were facing a couple of thousand spectators from behind
the foot-lights, upon his arm. She has never, it must be borne
in mind, entered a drawing-room containing ladies, unless it be
the public drawing-room of a foreign hotel, until this moment.
THE CIGARETTE OF PEACE. 151
Theobald married her from the stage, an ignorant child of six-
teen, and has introduced her to no society, save the society of
men, since. She knows not a law, a tradition of what, with
pleasant irony, is called our social intercourse. And yet, by
accident, inspiration who shall say what teaches women (never
men) the secrets of a class to which they were not born ? she
transgresses against none of them. Some subtle intuition, some
acute rendering, perhaps, of the glances Lady Rose bestowed
yesterday upon the "extremely brilliant silk" has made her
dress in simple white muslin to-night ; white muslin high to
the throat, relieved only by a knot or two of blue ribbon, and
with some carnations from the garden at Theobalds in her hair.
She looks a girl of seventeen ! A pang of envy contracts Lady
Kose Golightly's heart as one of the mirrors with which the
room is lined reflects Jane's blooming face in dangerously close
contrast with her own faded one. Alas ! there is the difference
of a dozen years at least between them. But then, recollects
Lady Rose, youth does not invariably ride the winning horse in
these days. Above and beyond all things, what men desire
most is to be amused. Could a red-and-white, uneducated
creature like this amuse any man, above all a man as fastidious
as poor Francis Theobald once was in his tastes 1
She advances and receives Jane with marked cordiality ; the
Oracle, while the reception goes on, holding her rose-crowned
head aloft, and keeping her tawny eyes well fixed upon nothing-
ness. Colonel Mauleverer, Captain Brabazon, Bawdon, all
come forward. Jane's shyness begins to vanish ; and Lady
Bose, I must say, seems bent upon fulfilling the pleasant, hollow
duties of a well-bred hostess to the uttermost.
" Loo, my dear," and she turns to a lady who, till now, has
been talking to Colonel Mauleverer in the background, " Let me
introduce you to Mrs. Theobald. My own familiar friend/'
this with a smile to Jane, " Miss Childers."
Loo Childers, the familiar friend (" the lost soul," say unkind
tongues) of Lady Bose Golightly, is one of those mature girls of
152 OUGHT WE TO V7SIT HER*
the world whereof the present age is so fertile. If the semi-
detached matron be the salt, the wholly-detached maiden may
surely be called the pepper of society in oar times. Lou
Child era, the second daughter of an exiled and impoverished
peer, knows everybody, goes everywhere* does everything \ even
to writing a book of travels. She is a couple of years younger
than Lady Rose, and pretty in a certain quaint style, A com-
plexion tanned by yachting, yellowed by cosmetics, by late
hours, by hard work of all kinds, but good still under the
chandeliers ; hair of dazzling gold, save near the roots, where
the natural brown is apt to assert itself ; a somewhat over-full
figure a speaking smile, arid the best cut foot in London ;
these are Loo Child era 1 personalities. And in a certain kind of
race, not the race matrimonial, nineteen out of twenty young
and handsome girls might compete with Loo Childers in vain.
No doubt about her power of amusing men. Why, she amuses
herself, to the never-ending astonishment of poor, disillusioned,
unamusable Lady Rose. " How I wish I had your irrepressible
taste for life, Loo ! If you were in my place, I wonder if even
you could amuse yourself f she said once. " Of course I could,"
was Loo's answer ; I should run about all over the world, and
take Mr. Golightly with me." But, unfortunately, that is not
quite Lady Rose Golightly's idea of amusement.
Dinner is announced while Miss Childers is still talking,
good-naturedly patronising, to Jane, and Rawdon Crosbie's
heart beats high with hope. He has overheard Lady Rose tell
off the martyred Colonel to Mrs. Coventry Brown. He has a
vague idea that she intends to keep Captain Brabazon for her-
self, and that in the disposal of the intervening, unimportant
couples Jane will fall to him. He finds that he has reckoned
without his hostess. Lady Rose gives a quick little look at
Captain Brabazon. "Now," the look says, "take the poor
person you made me invite off my hands ; talk to her ; keep
her quiet, as you promised, for the rest of the evening." Another
moment and Jane, on Captain Brabazon's arm, is leaving the
THE CIGARETTE OF PEACE. 153
drawing-room, and Rawdon is crashed ! He doesn't care what
becomes of him ; he would just as soon take Mrs. Coventry
Brown as any one else now.
"Mr. Smylie," says Lady Rose's pleasant voice, "will you
take Miss Childers T Mr. Smylie is the curate of the parish,
asked, at the eleventh hour, as a safe and canonical make-
weight against Mrs. Coventry Brown. "Mr. Crosbie Miss
Brown. And last of all, Mr. Theobald, will you take me V
So the party is arranged. The dining-table is round, and as
Theobald is on Lady Rose's right, and as Jane must not be next
her husband, and as the Theobalds must be parted as widely as
possible from the Coventry Browns, it becomes almost mathe-
matically demonstrable that Rawdon Crosbie's place shall be
between the Oracle and her daughter. And here, accordingly,
he finds himself ; Jane nearly opposite, with Brabazon and Mr.
Smylie on either hand.
He has never loved any member of the Brown family. Oh,
how fervently he hates them now ! Augusta Brown is a white,
purring yellow-eyed little woman, half the size and age of her
mother, but precisely like her in all essential points ; and before
they have done their soup she has launched forth some very
small, very under-bred jest at Rawdon respecting his coming
marriage.
" I beg your pardon, Miss Brown," he says, with the look and
manner of a decidedly dangerous young bear. " I did not quite
follow the drift of your remark t"
She repeats it, adding a hope that she will be " allowed to
officiate as bridesmaid ;" and Rawdon, glancing across the table,
sees Mrs. Theobald watching him, a smile lurking in the corners
of her lips. His mood upon this changes. He makes the
sprightly Augusta some confidential and amicable reply, puts on
an air of gratitude when, a minute later, Mrs. Coventry Brown,
herself, turns and whispers her word of nauseous congratulation.
Then, swiftly right, left he drives home two small shafts of
sarcasm, pointed enough to make their way even through the
154 OUGHT WE TO VISIT HERt
tough armour of self-conceit with which the Coventry Browns
are panoplied. And then he is left in peace. Mrs. Coventry
Brown, the mother of two marriageable daughters, lays vicarious
liege to the Colonel's time-hardened old heart during the re-
mainder of dinner Augusta picks up whatever stray crumbs
of attention Captain Brabazon may have to bestow upon her.
Rawdon is left to his own thoughts, and to the occupation of
furtively watching Jane, and comparing her in hk own mind
with this gathering of received, accredited members of society
by whom she is surrounded.
How well she stands the test I With the Coventry Bjwjwns
purse- proud vulgar Pharisees as they are, women mean of soul
and heart as of feature, yet before whose guineas every one in
the county (his own people included) bow down with the
Coventry Browns, Rawdon Crosbie will not even compare her.
But with Loo Childers, with Lady Rose ! Both of these
women are young, still ; both good-looking ; both versed in the
easy graces, the unaffectedness of manner which knowledge of
the world alone can give. But how charmless Jane's presence
renders them in Rawdon's eyes ! Lady Rose wears a rich
amber silk to-night ; an amber silk that in its prime has had
courtly experiences ; with jewels of worth on neck and wrists,
and genuine point lace trimmings on the Charles II. bodice.
Loo Childers is in a brocaded pink " Watteau" that has already
seen no little service during its London campaign. And both
of them . . . the word that is coming is unkind, but it ex-
presses what Rawdon Crosbie thinks . . . both of them look
dirty beside Jane, with her clean cheap muslin, and her girls
face, innocent of all cosmetics but open air and cold water. Is
this superior cleanliness surface-deep only, or does it reach the
heart as well ] Young Rawdon is as yet no moralist ; and all
the observations he makes, on men and manners, are superficial
ones.
With a party of ten people at a round table, conversation
ought to be general ; but from the conflicting nature of the
THE CIGARETTE OF PEACE. 155
elements brought together to-night the talk has an irresistible,
tendency to break up into duets. Lady Kose sets the example.
However the rest may fare, surely Mr. Theobald should be con-
tented ; food cooked by an artist, good wine, neither under nor
over iced, and as perfect a hostess as Lady Rose, devoted to
himself ! The subjects of interest between these two persons
seem inexhaustible. Jane, with the keen sixth sense of nascent
jealousy, can hear them in the midst of all her own lively small
talk with Captain Brabazon. " You remember that evening at
Richmond V "Have you forgot that Derby dayf "You
know, of course, that poor Jack Halliday has married her at
last." " Can you believe that little Lord Alfred has gone on a
mission to the Jews V They have a common past : the one bond
of union that has always been wanting between Theobald and
herself. The badly-used old Colonel, with three pretty womer
at the table, finds himself hopelessly made over to Mrs. Coventry
Brown, and eats and drinks in silence. Loo Childers and the
curate carry on the one really business-like flirtation of the
party.
" If you insist upon giving me Mr. Smylie," said Loo, when
she and Lady Rose talked over the arrangements of the table
at their five o'clock tea " If you insist upon giving me the
curate of the parish, Rose, I shall be obliged to propose to him.
I tell you so fairly, beforehand."
And she evidently means to keep her word.
Mr. Smylie is a very pleasant-spoken, pleasant-looking little
fellow. An aunt, from whom he expects money, did not think
his head strong enough for competitive examinations, so, to
please her, he devoted his youth to hard-boating at Cambridge,
and a few months back entered the church without special bias
for or against the vocation. He has fair curly hair, and a fair
little much-cared-for moustache, which the good old rector has
not had the heart as yet to bid him cut off. Also he has a fair
and boyish complexion, through which blushes not a few mantle
as Loo Childers improves his mind and raises his spirits by
156 OUGHT WE TO VISIT HER t
lively commentaries on the different social events of note that
have come off during the past season in town.
The Misa Coventry Browns, the Miss Pipping all the slow
and Irreproachable young ladies of the neighbourhood, have, in
turn, been recommended to Mr, Smylie since his arrival in the
parish. ih There are the Miss Coventry* Browns, Smylie ; well-
brought up girls. No one ever breathed a word against the
Mbs Coventry Browns ; and, money too ; just the young women
for clergymen's wives. Or if not the Miss Browns, the Miss
Pippins, Less money, certainly, and rather older ; but, if pos-
sible, better suited to a parsonage fireside, and all musical.
With two such families as the Browns and Pippins to choose
from, no parish priest need long be without the blessing of a
good wife/'
And now, yes, by the time they have reached the second
course, Mr. Smylie's depraved heart tells him that the kind of
companion he would prefer by a parsonage fireside is not a
well-brought up Miss Brown, not even a musical Miss Pippin,
but a rattling dread-nought, go-ahead young person of the world,
like Loo Guilders. Such is curate nature !
" You see I am keeping my word, Rose," she whispers to the
hostess as the ladies are on their way to the drawing-room :
Mrs. Coventry Brown, like a full-rigged war ship, sailing first,
Jane's slim figure following so close that she all but trips herself
up over the dowagers spreading train. *' We are getting on
splendidly, considering my inexperience of curates. I mean to
have the final scene in full force when the moon rises."
Lady Rose Golightly sets her face strongly against the mo-
dern fashion of men leaving the dining-room with the ladies :
theory and observation alike telling her that the innovation is
based upon radically false views of human nature. The wine
at The Folly, unlike most establishments without a responsible
masculine head, is unexceptionable (the butler is a servant of a
good many years' standing in the Beaudesert family), and all
the more intimate frequenters ot the house know that their
THE CIGARETTE OF PEACE. 157
hostess regards their absence, for an hour at least, from the
drawing-room, as a matter of course.
So for one hour, for one mortal hour, Jane, unsupported, has
to bear up against the society of her own sex. After showing
her the azaleas at the flower-show, and driving her from the
flower-show back to Theobalds, and now, for form's sake, asking
her to accompany her husband on his first visit to The Folly,
Lady Kose feels that she has, in every possible way, " behaved
well" to Francis Theobald's wife, and troubles her head very
little more about her. For two or three minutes the ladies,
irregularly grouped, remain standing, Mrs. and Miss Coventry
Brown twittering forth their praises of the delightful gardens
of The Folly, and the delightful view from The Folly windows,
Lady Rose responding by languid nonentities. Then all sub-
side, as ladies are prone to do after dinner, into their waiting-
places. Miss Augusta Brown perches herself, with childish
simplicity, on a little ottoman, which immediately commands
the door, and turns over a book of photographs ; Mrs. Coventry
Brown sinks like a big protecting angel in a mulberry satin
upon a sofa near her daughter. Loo Childers and Lady Rose
draw their chairs to the bay window, and looking out upon the
twilight, tempered enough to be admitted freely now, begin to
chat together. Jane is nowhere. Yejs, she is far away from
Mrs. Coventry Brown. That, at all events, she feels, is one
advantage. And she is near enough to hear what Lady Rose
and her own familiar friend talk about. That is another, and
a more doubtful one.
They talk about everything under the sun I mean the Lon-
don sun, to whose pure rays Miss Childers bade good-bye this
morning and they talk about everything with the out-spoken-
ness of their class and generation. People of the stamp of Mrs.
Coventry Brown may hint away reputations if they choose,
thinking ambiguity elegance. Lady Rose and Loo Childers
hint nothing. They call men, things, and actions, by their
i names ; and aft Jane
wider * i wider with
l*n4cr ordinary arranMtaneea, histories of Laid George and
firry, with the fair kdw rightly or wrtrngfuBy h-j^ gi^ g
ca histories, might perhaps however plainly narrated, be
re to her. Bat it happens jut now, that a nnrihlr paizi-
r jit j¬, or, as the newspapers vulgarly call it, **case,*
*rre*t= the attention of the public And to thi* romance* Loo,
from private sources of her own, ia able to add circumstantial
and de tailed information for Lady Rosea benefit So Jane
knows accurately on what ground they tread ; and, I repeal it,
Ler eyea open wider and wider with wonder as she listens*
What manner of women, she speculates, are these who talk 1
11 iirsy were ballet-giils she could ^ac u^u mwuc H uickly
and concisely enough. But they are ladies of birth and educa-
tion, ladies belonging to a world whose inner sanctuaries her
foot may never profane while she lives. And Mrs. Coventry
Brown moral judge and censor of all Chalkshire where is her
morality now] Mrs. Coventry Brown sits, her fat white arms
folded, her yellow eyes gazing through the window, with the
serene consciousness of unassailed virtue, and of being the guest
of a duke's daughter, on her lips. Does she hear and under-
stand ? Does Augusta, listening without a blush, as a well-
brought up girl should be able to listen to anything, understand ?
Jane, outer barbarian as she is, can only wonder. And the
twilight deepens, and the talk flows freer, if that be possible,
than before, and Loo has just reached a culminating point,
which makes even Augusta pause as she turns over the pages of
her book, when in comes a servant bearing lights and coffee,
followed, three or four minutes later, by Rawdon Crosbie.
llawdon glances round the room, sees in a second that Jane
is " shunted," and pursuing his way boldly past Mrs. and Miss
Coventry Brown, gets possession of the vacant chair by her
side. The Colonel and Captain Brabazon make their appear-
ance next and then Lady Rose proposes an adjournment to the
THE CIGARETTE OF PEACE. 159
gardens where the flowers- are smelling sweet, and the stars
shining, and where Jane's oppressed lungs begin once more to
breathe freely.
" I hope I shall never, never find myself alone in a room with
ladies while I live," she remarks to Rawdon, who keeps, jea-
lously faithful, at her side.
" What, not with such exquisite specimens of ladyhood as
Augusta Brown and her mother V
"I wasn't thinking of them particularly. I'm afraid, not
being a lady myself, I should feel out of place among ladies of
any kind just that. By-the-by, Bawdon," what has become
of the formal " Mr. Crosbie V Jane herself could not tell you ;
to call young fellows of Bawdon's age by their Christian name
is, I imagine, one of the habits of old days that clings to her
unawares "by-the-by, Bawdon, how fond you seem to be of
the Coventry Browns. Say a favourable word for me with
them there's a good boy."
" A favourable word from me would go so far ! Mrs. Theo-
bald, it's wrong, under any circumstances, to want to strangle
one's fellow creatures, isn't it 1 You are better posted, I'm sure,
than I am in the whole duty of man."
"You don't want to strangle me, I hope?" says Jane.
" I wanted, desperately, to make an end of Augusta and her
mamma at dinner. Nothing but my regard for Lady Rose pre-
vented me from doing it."
" Oh, you, like everybody else, have a great regard for Lady
Rose Golightly, then ?"
" Sufficiently great to keep me from spoiling one of her nice
little dinner-parties, certainly."
" And Miss Childers ? You admire her too, of course V
" No, I leave that to Smylie. Abject and abandoned though
my own condition was during dinner, I kept my eyes well
opened, you see, on all you people who were amusing your-
selves, Mrs. Theobald."
" Amusing ourselves ! I amused myself chiefly with looking
i6o OUGHT WE TO VISIT HERt
at Mrs. Coventry Brown," says Jane, lightly. M I know that
I've made her my enemy for life as if I had not enemies
enough already ! but I couldn't help it. Talk' of the ballet \
I'm sure no ballet ever furnished a fitter case for the Lord
Chamberlain than Mrs. Coventry Brown in a ball-dress, And
then the three white roses on that dear old bald head ! Yon
are an intimate friend of the family tell me, how are they fas-
tened on 1 Glue, tin -tacks, a spring which f
They jest, they laugh. From the other side the garden. Jane's
clear laugh rings obnoxiously in Mrs. Coventry Brown's ear, as
this admirable woman and her daughter stand alone together
upon the terrace. Two gentlemen are still absent in the dining*
room. Mr. Theobald, for a good many years now, has eschewed
ladies' society, and improves every occasion of keeping aloof
from them as long as possible ; the curate, much as he admires
Lady Rose's friend, admires Lady Rose's claret more. As a
natural consequence, Mrs. Coventry Brown and her daughter
stand deserted, while the dresses of Lady Rose, Loo Childers,
and Jane may be seen, each with an attendant black coat, flit-
ting slowly about among the garden shadows.
" I call it most discreditable of him," says Mrs. Coventry
Brown. " Lady Rose is eccentric ; we all know what the Beau-
deserts are," raising a significant finger to her forehead, " and a
woman of her rank can, or thinks she can, invite anybody.
There was the old Duke used to have Giles the tobacconist to
dinner, and, what was more, invite very good people to meet
him. But for Rawdon Crosbie an engaged man and such a
fortune as Emma Marsland's at stake ! I shall make a point of
driving over to The Hawthorns" The Hawthorns is the name
of Mr. Crosbie's place " and letting poor dear Mrs. Crosbie
know my opinions."
"Rawdon Crosbie is a horrid bear," says Augusta. "I'm
sure, how Emma Marsland could have accepted him ! but then
she never had another beau, that's one thing. What a tawdry
made-up creature that Loo Childers is, ma ! I could see the
THE CIGARETTE OF PEACE. 161
paint on her face at dinner, thick ; and how she flung herself
at Smylie ! And, law, how low she talks, ma ! Did you hear
what she was telling Lady Kose f
" It might be low for you, child, or for me," answers " ma" in
a tone of admonition. " But these things are very different for
the aristocracy. Bonny swore, Augusta evil be to him that
evil thinks. The aristocracy, my dear, see so much of fashion-
able levity that they cease to think any harm of it If you've
a chance, Gussy, make friends with Miss Childers. She is the
daughter of a peer, recollect She might be of great use in
getting us introductions the next time we go to town."
It is ten o'clock before Theobald and the curate make their
appearance on the lawn. At a quarter past ten Mrs. Coventry
Brown's carriage, to Lady Rose's intense relief, bears its precious
freight out of The Folly gates. Colonel Mauleverer's dog-cart,
the Theobalds' hired fly, and the Crosbies' phaeton, drive up to
the side entrance about eleven. And all this time Lady Eose
has not had Ave minutes alone with Theobald ; all this time
Mr. Smylie's affections are not legitimately compromised !
Everybody is loitering still, glad to enjoy freedom and fresh air
out of doors ; and Loo Childers and the hostess walk round to
the side of the house to see their friends depart The dog-cart,
with Mauleverer and Brabafcon, starts first ; then Jane bids
good-night, and gets into the hired fly, Theobald preparing to
follow.
" You are all going shamefully early," says Lady Rose, not
offering to shake hands with him " This is the best hour of
the twenty-four. Loo and I are just going to light the cigarette
of peace. Oh, yes, Mr. Smylie, you may be shocked, but we
are desperate smokers both of us ! Won't you stay and keep
us in countenance V
" It's nearly Sunday morning already, I'm afraid," says Mr.
Smylie, blushing up to the roots of his flaxen hair in the dark.
" Sunday ! Well, what of that 1 Do you never smoke on
Sunday 1 Now, if you stop, we can take you home by a short
XI
i6i OUGHT WE TO VISIT HERt
way, can't we, Loo ? through the back garden and over the
fields. We shall take care of you till you are in sight of your
own church spire, Mr. Bmylie, I promise."
The curate hesitates, and is lost.
" No use to ask you to join us, of course V* says Lady Hose,
looking up suddenly into the face of her old lover, " Theo-
balds Isn't half a mile further than Mr* Sniylie s house . . if you
will!"
Her voice sinks : the kindly starlight poetizes the age, the
sallowness of the face that once, for a brief space, was the one
beloved face on earth to Francis Theobald-
He baa not an ounce of sentiment in his composition ; but a
man may like a cigarette, in the company of a pleasant woman,
on a summer night, without possessing much sentiment.
" Jenny would be afraid to drive home by herself," he re-
marks, but with more compliance than there ought to be in his
voice.
" Oh, not in the least ! I am afraid of nothing," cries Jane,
very short and cold. " Tell the man to drive on, please."
And, really before Theobald's conscience has had time to turn
round, Mrs. Theobald has driven away : thrown him into the
very open jaws of temptation. Such is the consequence of
one's wife having a fiery temper !
Close beside The Folly gates, on the way towards Theobalds,
rises one of the stiff ; break-neck hills for which Chalkshire is
famous. The fly commences the ascent at the rate of about a
mile and a half an hour, and Jane is just communing within
herself as to whether she shall or shall not cry over Theobald's
wicked defection, when a tall man's figure makes its appearance
walking quietly along at the side of the carriage. She chokes
back her rising tears, and leans her face out eagerly. It is
Theobald, rescued from the hands of Lady Rose and Loo
Childers alas ! it is only Rawdon Crosbie : Rawdon Crosbie,
whose fate it seems to be to come across Mrs. Theobald at all
times when an upholder or a friend is wanted. Now she must
THE CIGARETTE OF PEACE. 163
drill herself sharply : show never a suspicion of the cruel
demon of jealousy that is taking possession of her thoughts.
" You here, Rawdon T There is a change, a ring of subdued
sadness in her voice, and Rawdon Crosbie interprets it not un-
favourably to himself. "Is this the road that leads to The
Hawthorns V
" All roads lead to The Hawthorns, or can be made to lead
there," says Rawdon. "Are you aware that you went away
without wishing me good-bye, Mrs. Theobald f
" Did I ? oh, where's the use of so many formalities between
friends % You were saying good-night to Lady Rose and Miss
Childers that's the truth. How could you remember to think
of poor insignificant me V
The hill that Rawdon has always thought the longest, weariest
pull in Chalkshire, is climbed only, too quickly. The flyman
mounts on the box : the jaded horses stop for a minute to get
back their breath. A delicious calm and sweetness broods
over all the wide-spread upland. The chirping of a grass-
hopper close at hand, the tinkle of a distant sheep-bell
among the chalk-hollows : every softest sound, far or near, is
heard with curious distinctness through the dead quiet of the
night
" And we must say good-bye really," cries Jane, giving Raw-
don her hand, " I am not going to be so rude, you see, this
time."
. . . All she wants is to be alone ; alone with her own thoughts,
her own sorely wounded heart. Rawdon Crosbie is no more to
4 her than one of the stiff, wind-shorn elm trees that are ranged
like sentinels along the straight white road; but her hand
trembles as it rests in his ; and he stands (the discreet family
coachman drawing his own deductions as he watches events
from the phaeton) and gazes in a sort of dream at the dingy
hired fly that bears her from him. . . .
" Now I call this delightful," says Loo Childers, when the
sound of carriage-wheels has died away. " Why isn't there a
11 2
1 64 OUGHT WE TO VISIT HER?
rule that no party shall ever consist of more or less than four
people 1 Have you got your cigarette-case, Rose V
No ; Lady Rose's cigarette-case is indoors, and Loo, accom-
panied by the curate, goes in search of it. Towards midnight
they all drink Badminton and smoke the cigarette of peace to-
gether on the terrace, and at some later hour of the night or
morning start off in the yellow moonlight to look for the spire
of Lidlington church.
So ends Mr. and Mrs. Theobald's first experience of one of
Lady Rose Golightly's nice little dinners.
CHAPTER XVI.
CHAMPAGNE FROM TUMBLERS.
Miss Charlotte Theobald is not a woman to be turned from
the performance of any righteous duty by a single rebuff. What-
ever the shortcomings of Francis, whatever the levity of his un-
fortunate wife, Miss Charlotte remembers that he is her brother
still, and as such entitled to her advice and surveillance. The
elder sister, a wiser woman in her generation, is for leaving the
new owners of Theobalds as much as possible to themselves.
" We shall never think with their thoughts, nor they with ours,
Charlotte. We have paid our first visit, they have returned it ;
and we were out. The thing is done. Causing scandal in the
neighbourhood V The domestic concerns of Mr. and Mrs. Fran-
cis Theobald are already furnishing conversation for a good
many idle Lidlington tongues. " But then we always knew they
must cause scandal ! When Francis refused to wear mourning
for his own first cousin it was easy to foresee the rest. A man
who can turn a sacred duty into a jest once, will do so again ;
and the best and most prudent thing for us is to leave them as
much alone as possible."
But it is not in Charlotte Theobald's nature to leave anything
or any person alone so long as she has the power to disturb it
CHAMPAGNE FROM TUMBLERS. 165
She has heard of the flower-show, of Lady Rose Golightl/s
dinner-party of everything: has even heard that they have
hired another cook ; " on their income attempting to keep three
servants at Theobalds !" She must give Francis her mind on
all these points. He may go to ruin he may go to ruin, as he
has been going there throughout his whole life 1 But it shall
never be said that inertness, indifference on the part of his sis-
ter Charlotte, helped to grease the wheels for him in his descent.
Accordingly, on the Saturday succeeding Lady Rose's dinner,
the white nose of Diocletian, at two precisely, stops before the
front door of Theobalds, and Miss Charlotte, in a severe voice,
inquires if her brother is at home and disengaged 1 It may or
may not be an ill-bred thing to ask for the master of the house
instead of the mistress. Miss Charlotte comes not as a fashion-
able visitor, but as a Christian ; a relative performing a solemn
and imperative* duty. She wants to see her brother, not her
brother's wife. And, as I have said, she asks for him ; and is
admitted.
During the past six days the Theobalds have settled down as
much, to use Jane's own words, as they are ever likely to settle
in this life. And already the dingy old house is metamorphosed.
Doors and windows stand open to the breath of heaven; flowers
are in every available nook and corner ; heavy curtains, Indian
rugs, have been swept away; heavy furniture transferred to
garrets. The impress of Jane's airy, artistic taste is over alL
Mr. Theobald is in the pleasantest room in the whole house ;
a small breakfast parlour, opening out from the big, dreary
drawing-room, and looking across the garden towards the west
Here Jane has collected together every tolerably pretty thing
she has been able to find : a clock from one room, an inlaid
table from another, mirrors from them all. " We shall live in
one room," says Jane, not in twenty. Let us try, if we can, to
make that one room habitable." Miss Charlotte casts her eyes
around her with horror. The drawing-room looking-glass ! The
best bedroom clock 1 The table from the study I Why, Theo-
166 OUGHT WE TO VISIT HER 1
balds is dismantled ; its altars are desecrated, its gods laid low,
to please the sacrilegious fancy of a dancing-girl another
daughter of Herodias! The remains of a meal breakfast,
luncheon, as you may like to call it is on the table. Theobald
and little Captain Brabazon, both in American rocking-chairs
(these are new; Theobald made it his especial jduty to send to
London for easy chairs), are smoking, their legs comfortably ele-
vated, beside the open window.
" Dear ! What an atmosphere !" says Miss Charlotte, drawing
back with a start, closely followed by one of her most vigorous
sniffs.
Theobald throws away his half -finished cigar, and rises to
meet her. Captain Brabazon, dreadfully frightened, prepares
for instant flight. " We shall see you to-night, then, Theobald?
Eight, sharp, mind. Til just run and say good-bye to Mrs. Theo-
bald." And then off he rushes, following the course of Mr. Theo-
bald's cigar, through the open French window, into the garden.
" Sit down, my dear Charlotte ; Jenny will be here directly.
I can recommend you that chair," pointing to the one lately
occupied, and well impregnated with smoke, by Captain Bra-
bazon.
" I thank you, Francis. Rocking-chairs make me sea-sick,
but I will get near the window. I am not accustomed to tobacco-
smoke."
Miss Charlotte takes the smallest, most stiff-backed chair she
can find, seats herself on its extreme edge, and looks aggressively
about her. " You are intimate with the regiment already, it
seems," she remarks, after a minute or two.
" Yes ; they are a very nice set of fellows," answers Mr. Theo"
bald. " I knew one of them, Brabazon, the man you saw here
just now, abroad."
" Indeed. It runs away with a great deal of money entertain-
ing the military, Francis."
" Not in the way I entertain, Charlotte. One or two of them
drive over to dinner, and we give them the same dinner we
CHAMPAGNE FROM TUMBLERS. 167
should have had ourselves ; or Brabazon breakfasts with me, as
he did to-day without any invitation at alL w
" Breakfast ?" Miss Charlotte looks with a scared eye to-
wards the table. " Oh ! you call this breakfast 1 Cold pie,
chickens, wine, at breakfast ! I'm afraid you must find Han-
nah Budd, the servant we engaged, a very inefficient cook for
you."
" Hannah Budd is certainly not a cordon bleu," answers Mr.
Theobald. " However, we have been lucky enough to pick up
a very tolerable cook for an Englishwoman who was leaving
the Crown Hotd, at Lidlington. So we are all right."
" And you have dismissed Hannah Budd, I presume 1 One
of the most respectable girls in the parish f
" No. Blossy took a fancy to her it's very'seldom Blossy
takes a fancy to any one and so the girl stays as nursemaid.
How is Anne, in this hot weather pretty well T
" Anne does not complain more than usuaL You intend to
keep three women servants, then f
" At present, my dear Charlotte. But, from what I can re-
collect of English housekeeping, the more servants one has, the
more one wants, or the more they want ; so I dare say a scullery-
girl and a maid for my wife will be added to them soon."
" And do you imagine, Francis, that Theobalds and three ser-
vants, to say nothing of officers about the house from morning
till night, are going to be kept up on six hundred a year ?"
Mr. Theobald's glass goes into his eye : he surveys Charlotte's
face and figure with attention. Placidly it occurs to him to
wonder whether any other man living has, could have, such a
sister as this !
" Because if you think so, I do not," pursues Miss Charlotte,
as he continues silent. " I had heard already, every one in the
neighbourhood knows, the kind of house you keep, and I con-
sider it my duty, pleasant or not pleasant, to tell you that it
can't last. That is the object of my visit."
" Thanks, thanks." murmurs Theobald ; but faintly.
168 OUGHT WE TO VISIT HERt
u I have one or two other things to say to you. Anne ad-
vised me to hold my tongue. But I am a very different person
to Anne. I never shuffle out of what is right because it hap-
pens to be disagreeable. You have resumed your intimacy with
Lady Rose GolightLy, I am told, Francis T
She has scored a point against him at last. Too sweet of
temper, too thoroughly gentle of mood, is Francis Theobald
to say a deliberately harsh thing to any woman ; but just for
one second it does enter his soul to bid Charlotte mind her own
business and be pleased to leave him in peace. Ever since
his return from the memorable Sunday morning walk his
domestic life has been rendered bitter to him on the score of
Lady Rose Golightly. Jane is not a woman to let jealousy con-
sume her heart in silence, as so many women do in romance.
She has given Theobald her opinion with entire frankness as to
the conduct of Lady Rose, Loo Childers, himself ; has warned
him that if he goes to bachelor entertainments at The Folly, or
in any other way " than as a married man should " encourage
Lady Rose's attentions, et caetera, et csetera. And now here is
Charlotte, most unnatural combination, joining issue with Jane
against the common enemy, and the giver of the very best little
dinners in Chalkshire ! I repeat it, if strong language could
ever find its way to Francis Theobald's lips, now would be the
moment
Miss Charlotte sees that she has gained vantage-ground, and
proceeds :
" I have not forgotten" alas, when does she forget anything?
" I have not forgotten the talk there was about you and Lady
Rose Beaudesert, years ago. And, I can tell you, your renewal
of intimacy with a woman who treated you as she did then will
be neither to your nor to your wife's credit. The people in this
neighbourhood think nothing of Lady Rose Golightly."
"They seem rather glad of her acquaintance," Mr. Theobald
finds courage to assert.
"In a certain way they may be. I know her extremely
CHAMPAGNE FROM TUMBLERS. 169
slightly myself. We visit, of course ; we have never courted
her intimacy. Anne and I do not run after the fag-ends of the
aristocracy. Yes, in a certain way, I daresay people are glad
to know her because of the handle to her name. But no one
respects her, and it will do no one any good to be taken up by
her. Lady Bose Golightly will ask Tom, Dick, and Harry to,
her table if they amuse her for the moment"
"Which shows that she has excellent discrimination," ob-
serves Mr. Theobald, seriously. " If Tom, Dick, or Harry
would only amuse me, I should pretty soon ask them to Theo-
balds.*
" You seem to be doing so, already. But let us talk sense, if
you please. Unhappily placed as your wife is, Francis, and
though I have met with rebuff from you already, I feel it my
duty now to give you a very plain and straightforward piece of
advice. Whatever you may do yourself, don't associate her
with the men and women who go to The Folly."
" With Mrs. Coventry Brown, for instance V Theobald sug-
" Mrs. Coventry Brown met you by mistake. Do you think
Lady Bose did not turn the whole thing into a joke to the first
person she met on Monday morning 1 The people your wife
will be invited to meet will be the riff-raff Lady Bose gets down
from London, and whom she is ashamed of asking the decent
people of the neighbourhood to sit at table with."
"Charlotte!"
" Francis, this is a matter of conscience. You must excuse
me if my language is not over-nice. Now, can you " more
upright than ever rises Miss Charlotte's slender figure; how she
can poise herself on that half -inch of chair at all is a question
for an acrobat " can you, on your solemn word, declare that
you consider the goings-on of Lady Bose Golightly and her
friend Miss Childers to be correct V
"Good God, Charlotte, how do I know? What judge am I
of the correctness of anybody's conduct V
i?o OUGHT WE TO VISIT HER f
" Oh T It's very fine to turn it off in that way, Francis, This
chant abl en ess towards evil is just the cant, the curse, of the
day. Do you consider that Lady Kose Golightly's life of riol-
iVkjf, separated as she is from her husband, is the life of an
honest, sober-minded, virtuous, Christian matron P
For a moment Mr Theobald seems really nonplussed He
strokes his moustache thoughtfully.
u It appears to be a question requiring a great deal of con-
sideration, 11 says Miss Charlotte, spitefully. "I should have
thought a plain * yes ? or 'no 1 could be spoken without so much
hesitation.'*
"But everything depends upon the side from which such
questions are viewed, " says Mr. Theobald,
"Not at all, interrupts Miss Charlotte, ** Fixed Principles
are Fixed Principles. "
"Yes," says Theobald, crossing his arms and beginning to
look argumentative. " And really when one reflects on the
uncertainty of human life, the instability of human possessions,
one is at a loss to understand how men can burthen themselves
with anything of the kind."
" Men ! Burthen themselves ! With Principles !" ejaculates
Miss Charlotte a sniff for every full stop.
" You spoke of fixed principles, my dear Charlotte."
" I speak of outraging common social decorum when I speak
of the kind of life that goes on at The Folly."
" But your reading must have informed you, my dear sister,
that all social restrictive rules are arbitrary, a matter of climate
more than anything else. The Fee-jee people think it indecorous
for relatives to eat from the same dish. In some parts of Peru
a man is held a rascal for life if he chance to cut his top teeth
first ; while among the Chinese, where the seat of Intellect is
held to be in the stom . . ."
" Francis," cries Charlotte, her pale sharp face on fire, " let
me beg of you to stop this ill-timed buffoonery ! Anne was
right. She knows your nature better than I do. What good
CHAMPAGNE FROM TUMBLERS. 171
can there be in talking reason, in offering advice, to a man whc
has not one serious idea of life or its responsibilities !"
" What good, indeed V echoes Mr. Theobald, almost plain-
tively ; " I'm sure in this hot weather it's distressing to me to
think of your even making the effort and it was quite a chance
your finding me at home. Jenny and I will be in town all next
week. Now let me give you a glass of wine? Oh yes, but you
must. ,,
And he rises, and, before Miss Charlotte can hinder him, opens
a fresh bottle of champagne and pours out a tumbler full, which
he hands to her.
" Champagne ! In a tumbler !" ejaculates Charlotte Theo-
bald, horror-stricken. " I should lose my senses for the day if
I drank it*
" And if you were to lose them ? It does all of us good,"
says Theobald cheerfully, "it does all of us good to lose our
senses sometimes. Besides, it's more than half froth ; why
Blossy takes quite as much as that"
Miss Charlotte turns the glass a little on one side, and, eye-
ing the contents as if she were measuring the exact strength
and cost of the wicked broth, sips about a dessert spoonful,
then sets the glass down on the table with a little push, as
though putting the very suggestion of evil resolutely from her.
At this moment the ring of young voices, the sound of Blossy's
trilling laugh, make themselves heard from the gardens of
Theobalds the grey old gardens through which during so
many years neither young voices nor a child's laugh have rung.
"Ah ! here are people who won't refuse champagne when it's
offered them," says Theobald. "I had better help myself
before any of them come in."
" And I will wish you good-day, Francis," cries Charlotte,
rising. " I had hoped, I must say, to have had some serious
conversation with you to have found your house, at least, free
from company."
" Company ? there's no one here but the lad, Rawdon Raw-
172 OUGHT WE TO VISIT HER?
don Crosbie,* says Theobald unconcernedly. What is Rawdon
to him but a harmless sort of young fellow, who runs about at
Jenny's bidding as a good many young fellows have done be-
fore, but who, unlike some of his predecessors, does not play at
ecarte % " He has been here every afternoon for a week past,
helping Jenny in what she calls her gardening."
" Mr. Rawdon Crosbie comes here every afternoon % Gardens
every afternoon with your wife % Has Mrs. Crosbie, have the
ladies of the family, called on you f
" No," answers Mr. Theobald. " Thank heaven, they have
not"
"Are you aware, Francis, that Rawdon Crosbie is an engaged
man?*
" I've heard something of the kind. But I should be sorry
to believe it, poor young fellow, at his age."
Yes, Anne Theobald was right When Miss Charlotte is
again seated in the brougham, with the nose of Diocletian
turned homeward, she acknowledges to herself that Anne was
right, that interference in the affairs of a man like Francis is
hopeless. They think not the same thoughts, scarcely do they
speak in the same language. Champagne from tumblers in the
middle of the day ! Rawdon Crosbie gardening for a week
together with Mrs. Theobald, and Francis thanking heaven that
the ladies of the Crosbie family have not called upon her !
Were the case one of sharper defined offence, of recognised,
orthodox wrong-doing, Charlotte Theobald would perhaps feel
more leniently, would at least know on what ground she stood.
Criminals one may exhort : for criminals one may pray. For
people who drink champagne at noon from tumblers, yet live
contentedly together and with their child, hardened Bohemians
who have kicked over the traces of conventionality without
as yet breaking any of the ten commandments, what shall be
done?
Sourer and darker than ever become poor Miss Charlotte's
views of human life and human nature as she drives along the
HAS SHE ASKED YOUf 173
sultry Chalkshire roads, and exercises her spirit in vain attempts
to solve the question.
CHAPTER XVII.
HAS SHE ASKED YOU?
" 111 tell you what I think," cries Jane, suddenly throwing down
the rusty old spade with which she was pretending to dig. " 111
tell you what I think, Rawdon. Well give up all our grand
ideas of parterres and flower-beds, and turn the whole clearing
into a croquet ground ! We can easily dig up the grass from
the hedges, or somewhere, and we'll just have a border of roses
and mignonette here, and a summer-house on the other side in
the shade. It wouldn't take long to finish."
Mrs. Theobald's ideas on rural matters are about as definite
as those of her husband on duty. She never left London till
she married ; she has lived either in London or in hotels abroad
since. Must roses be sown like sweet-peas, or planted like
oaks? Jane knows not. She believes blindly in. Rawdon's
knowledge on such points, and says, *' Make a croquet lawn
here," or " Have a border of roses there," with perfect confidence
as to results.
Blossy at a few yards' distance is making a magnificent garden
on her own principles : pinks, geraniums, every flower she has
been able to gather, stuck, on half -inch stalks, into the dry
earth. And Rawdon also . . . Rawdon is making a garden in
his imagination, the flowers of which have about as much chance
of coming to good as Blossy's ! Children happy and at play, all
of them ; but with a difference. Jane's impossible roses,
Blossy's rootless geranium stalks, may be succeeded by new
toys to-morrow. Rawdon's visionary flowers are of a kind that
fades slower, and are more difficult to replace. There is a cer-
tain species of aloe that puts forth its petals once only in a
i74 OUGHT WE TO VISIT HER t
hundred years. There is a certain species of happiness, let
cynics say what they will, that blossoms once, and once only,
in a man's lifetime.
" It wouldn't take long to finish," Jane repeats. " Now sup-
pose we were to set about a croquet lawn at once, when would
it be done V
"Well, we might get the ground levelled this autumn," says
Eawdon, " and lay down the turf early in spring. Then, if we
have a good spell of wet weather afterwards, you might reckon
upon having something like a lawn by summer."
" By next summer ! A year hence ! And pray, why not plant
the grass at once %"
" Planting grass, Mrs. Theobald, is an operation in horticul-
ture not carried on, as a rule, under a July sun."
" But, you see, I don't believe in rules ! If I want to have a
croquet lawn directly, do you mean to tell me it would be im-
possible for you to make one V
She throws back her head the better to look at him from
under the broad brim of her garden hat, and Rawdon acknowl-
edges, meekly, that he was wrong. What can be impossible
that a pretty woman bids one do with such a look as that ! No
doubt, to please Mrs. Theobald, turf laid in July would thrive
well ; and shall he shouldering his spade go off to the com-
mon and begin cutting some at once %
" Not this very second ; we have not got the balls yet. And
besides, I don't know anything about croquet till some one
teaches me. I have watched people play at Cremorne and the
Crystal Palace often, but I never could make head or tail of
what it all meant. By-the-by, Rawdon, when I've got the lawn,
and the balls, and know how to play, who shall I have to play
croquet with V
Jane can never get the better of the accusative case ; but
Rawdon's ear had grown used to this and all other little gram-
matical slips.
" You will have me, Mrs. Theobald, for one."
HAS SHE ASKED YOVt 175
44 You when you are married ! Very likely, indeed ! w
" When I am married/' says Rawdon stoutly, " you know that
I am going to bring my wife tasee you. You can have both of
us if you choose.*
44 1 dont think three a particularly good number for any
game," says Jane coolly, 4 * and I don't want to count on remote
chances. Who else is there 1 Captain Brabazon, and the Colo-
nel, and the youngsters of the regiment "
" And I am to put down turf for Brabazon, and the Colonel,
and the youngsters of the regiment! No, Mrs. Theobald.
There are some actions not even you could make me commit."
" You think so V says Jane, looking at him rather saucily.
44 Wait till you are tried, Master Rawdon Crosbie ! Yes, you,
till you are married, the people of the regiment, until the regi-
ment goes away. It would be hardly worth the trouble of
making a croquet-ground for such a short time, would it % But
then there's Min when her engagement is over, I mean to ask
Min down to stay with me. Yes ; first thoughts are best. Til
keep to wtat I said."
44 And I am to start for the common at once V says Bawdon,
his spade still across his shoulder.
44 Don't be foolish. Of course there's no good beginning any-
thing fresh now, and next week we shall be away. Did I tell
you we were going up to town on Monday) Well, we are ;
Theobald and I, for the week. If you can spare time, by-the-by,
from your military duties *
" If I can spare time !" cries Rawdon.
" You may really go about a little with me to the theatres
while we are there. No ; there's no good beginning anything fresh
to-day, but if you are really bent on being useful I'll tell you
what you can do. Take me over to the Lidlington croquet-
ground. I think you have told me that a member may take in
a visitor once 1 and 111 judge for myself whether I am likely to
care for the game or not"
Take Mrs. Theobald to the Lidlington croquet-ground ; the
1 76 OUGHT WE TO VISIT HER I
ground nf me of the moat exclusive clubs in England ; of which
his mother is secretary ; of which six old ladies form the com-
mittco, with Mrs. Coventry Brown at their head ! Oh, that he
had been ordered to cut an acre of turf from the common, to do
anything, everything but this 1 Rawdon Crosbie stands irreso-
lute, getting redder and redder j Jane watches him narrowly.
*' Have I asked anything very startling, Mr. Crosbie % Did
you not toll me that a member can introduce any visitor he
chooses 1 You'll have to introduce two visitors, by-the-by, for
1 shall take Blossy."
" I shall he delighted, Mrs, Theobald, delighted , , . only it
is so much pleasant or, don't you think so, here, in the cool by
ourselves 1"
** Pleasant, but slow. We have had a cool garden, and nothing
but a cool garden, for five days, remember."
" Yet 1 think I remember your telling me you considered gar-
dening was the best fun you had ever had in your life !" cries
Kawdon, piqued.
4% So I might, the first day, or even the second. As long as
we were only rooting up and cutting down, it was fun, rather.
I think one would be tired of anything in a garden, except the
fruit, after two days. I should. I like human faces, and that
is why I mean to have a croquet -ground. .Now, don't argue,
my dear child, but come."
As they enter the breakfast-room by the French window, Mr.
Theobald returns to it by the door, after seeing his sister to hei
carriage. %% You have missed one of your relatives, Jenny.
Charlotte has been here, making tender inquiries for you and
ttlossy. You saw Brabazon as he went out Y'
*" Yes. He said he had left you with a lady whose smoking
education had been neglected, and I kept my distance accord-
ingly/'
" l\vr Charlotte ! Her education has been uegleeted in a
gvvvl many ways. I made her have some champagne, and she
took a teaspoouful like a dose of salts. Help yourself, Crosbie ;
HAS SHE ASKED YOUt 177
you look warm. Hard at work at Mrs. Theobald's wonderful
flower-garden still ]"
" We are going to have no flower-garden at all, but a croquet-
ground," says Jane. And then she explains her reasons for the
change of plans, and her intention of visiting the Lidlington
croquet club this afternoon.
" Don't have me proposed as a member, Jenny," remarks Mr.
Theobald, as he kindles a fresh cigar, and returns to his rocking-
chair. " I remember the Lidlington croquet people of old. More
black-balling goes on among them, in one year, than in all the
London clubs put together/'
" Black-balling ? Good gracious, I hope I shan't be black-
balled off the ground !" cries Jane, who has rather hazy ideas
respecting this form of ballot.
" Well, no ; as Crosbie is a big fellow, there won't be much
danger for you. But look after Blossy. A blackball would take
her off her legs like a shot. Bloss, have some champagne 1 * No,
tawberries.' Well, come and eat your ' tawberries' then, and
don't dirty your frock, before going with your ambitious mother
among the nobility and gentry."
" I'm sure 1 have no ambition ! I'm sure I never want to go
among nobility, or gentry either, after last Saturday I" cries
poor Jane, with her usual ludicrous inability to repress the
truth.
In ten minutes' time Bessy's strawberries are despatched, and
garden hats and dresses exchanged for walking ones. Just as
they are leaving the house, however, Jane remembers that she
has something still to say to Mr. Theobald, and returns alone
to the breakfast-room. u I shall find you when I come back,
Theobald V She has flown to his side, and is holding her face
down to his level, for a kiss.
" If you are back in time. Brabazon has asked me to dine
at the mess this evening."
" So he told me. Why didn't you say you were going before
Rawdon Crosbie ?"
12
178 OUGHT WE TO VISIT HER1
"Because because I forgot all about it, my love," says Mr.
Theobald, putting his arm affectionately round his wife's slim
waist
" Oh ! Very strange you should forget ! Theobald, upon your
solemn word of honour, are you asked to anything else r i Is
there to be any adjournment afterwards to Lady Hose's V
Now, oddly enough, such an adjournment is in contemplation.
Jane has made one of the sharp guesses at truth for which she
is famous. The Folly is situated conveniently close to the Lid-
lington barracks, and Lady Rose not unfrequently invites some
of her military acquaintance to come in after dinner, and finish
their evenings with a quiet little round game at her house.
Such an adjournment is in contemplation for to-night, and
Theobald, exactly half an hour ago, heard of it from Captain
Brabazon for the first time. It is a plan by no means to his
taste. Play is not play, but the business, the one absorbing
interest I had almost said the one passion of Francis Theo-
bald's life. He would not exchange a barrack-room and serious
loo, played by men, for Vanjohn in a drawing-room with the
prettiest women in England, if his own personal inclinations
were consulted.
"You can't say no. She has asked you again," cries Jane.
" That makes the second time in eight days. I know little
Dolly Standish has told me she gets them all in there after
dinner, and once won thirty pounds, herself, in one pool ! Oh,
I hate a woman who gambles ! I hate her ! Now, has she
asked you 1 I know she has. A woman who could make you
stay, as Lady Kose did, smoking cigarettes till two o'clock on a
Sunday morning, is capable of anything. Has she asked you ?"
"She has not asked me, Jane," answers Mr. Theobald,
steadily, and with rigid fidelity to the letter of the truth. ^
" Brabazon asked me to dine quietly at the barracks it is not
even their guest-day. Lady Rose is your nightmare, Jenny."
"Indeed she is not Indeed, Lady Rose Golightly never
crosses my thoughts. I wished she crossed yours as seldom I"
IN THE CAMP OF THE PHILISTINES. 179
And saying this, but with her misgivings only half set at rest,
Jane departs.
CHAPTER XVIIL
IN THE CAMP OF THE PHILISTINES.
Saturday is the great day on the Lidlington croquet-ground.
When Jane and Eawdon make their appearance the Miss Pip-
pins, the Miss Coventry Browns, with Mr. Smylie the curate,
little Dolly Standish, the youngest ensign of the regiment, and
other innocuous youths and maidens, are in the middle of a
match for club-gloves. The dowagers, in war-paint and plumes,
sit watchful, on benches in a distant and shady corner of the
field
Eawdon Crosbie's tall figure is at once recognised by every-
body. The lady at his side must, of course, be Emma Marsland.
But who is the child? The new comers advance, under a
steady cross-fire of eyes, towards the players; Bawdon, who
wishes himself a hundred miles underground, doing his best to
look at his ease ; Jane smiling and unembarrassed ; Blossy
tripping on, with her accustomed little ballet-like evolutions, in
front. They advance : and the truth dawns upon the united
intelligence of the Lidlington croquet club.
"It is not Emma Marsland/' says Miss Pippin, the eldest,
plainest, most musical Miss Pippin. "It is the the same per-
son with whom Mr. Bawdon Crosbie was seen to walk about on
the day of the flower-show."
Miss Pippin is not among the players. Miss Pippin has
reached an age when young ladies, on a croquet-field, as in a
ball-room, remain standing until a last set or "scratch" match
has to be made up. Her remark is therefore addressed to the
sympathies of the dowagers.
" The young Mrs. Theobald !" cries Mrs. Pippin, who in her
way as widow of a general officer, and leader of the serio-mun-
dane, " worldly without side-dishes" section of the Lidlington
122
180 OUGHT WE TO VISIT HER?
society is an authority. Very dried-up, very waspish, very
irreconcilable-looking is .Mamma Pippin. Common humanity
makes you bestow a sigh on dear old meek General Pippin, as
you think of the thirty years it took him to die, under Indian
suns, at her side. " Dear me, dear me, dear me," Mrs. Pippin
talks fast, and talks monotonously : her dry little voice is like
nothing so much as the persistent chip, chip, chip, of a mason's
hammer. " Eawdon Crosbie without Miss Marsland and with
the young Mrs. Theobald. What will the club come to next 1
Mrs. Brown, these things ought to be prevented."
Mrs. Coventry Brown's oracular head turns with its oily,
pivot-like action, slowly round. " We have our laws, I believe,
Mrs. Pippin. The club has its laws and its bye-laws, and we
must act according. Anybody can bring in anybody they like
for Once."
A dreadful emphasis is on that monosyllable. " But let
them try it a second time," says Mrs. Coventry Brown's tone,
plainer than words could speak.
" 'Any member of this club shall be entitled to bring in a
friend, as a visitor, once,"' says Mrs. Pippin, as if she were re-
peating a rule of English grammar. " But in framing that law
and I ought to know, for I was one of the original committee
in framing that law the projectors of the club assumed assumed
that the friends of members would be persons in society."
" She evidently means to join, too," says Miss Pippin, as Jane
and Kawdon pause beside one group of players.
" I shall immediately order my girls to throw down their mal-
lets if she does," says Mrs. Pippin, fluttering up like a barn-door
mother who sees the safety of her brood menaced. " A person
no one means to visit ! Such a thing never happened to the
club before !"
Eawdon, meanwhile, is explaining the first principles of
croquet to Jane, who listens with attention, and thoroughly re-
gardless of all eyes fixed upon her. " Oh, you must set off at
one stick, and try to reach the other, and ring little bells as you
IN THE CAMP OF THE PHILISTINES. 181
go along, I don't see why I couldn't play croquet, if I tried. I
can play billiards. Theobald says I play a very pretty cannon
game. Get a pair of hammers, or .whatever they are called, and
let us make a start at once."
" I am afraid it is against the rules for any one to touch the
' hammers' until they become members of the club,* says Raw-
don, getting hot and cold as he receives north pole bows from
the Miss Coventry Browns and Pippins. " What do you think
of our Lidlington croquet-ground, Mrs. Theobald ? Nice situ-
ation, is it not V
They are so near the players that Rawdon knows half a dozen
pair of ears at least are listening to him, and he is cowardly
enough to talk company-talk for the occasion. Jane finds him
out in a second.
" The situation is delightful, Mr. Crosbie. A most romantic
view of . . . the Lidlington chimney-pots. Bloss, child, leave
everything you see alone." Blossy, under a general impression
of the scene being one of hilarity and friendship, has taken up
the elder Miss Brown's ball, and is about to bowl it at that
young person's toes. " Good little girls are brought to croquet-
grounds to look, not touch."
Blossy, thus admonished, stands for a moment irresolute, and
with her small hands clutching the ball tight to her chest. Then,
fortunately, a magnificent peacock butterfly flutters past; down
goes the ball, away rushes Blossy in pursuit; little hands
uplifted, little voice giving full cry. The butterfly, with the
reprobate levity of its race, makes straight for the bench of
dowagers, and straight for the bench of dowagers makes Blossy,
much as she would do if it happened to be a bench of bishops.
She runs over one of Miss Pippin's muslin flounces ; she shrieks
her shrill tantivy right into Mrs. Coventry Brown's ear.
Finally, the ardour of the chase over, the prey run to earth in a
boundary hedge near at hand, she dances back to the bench,
takes up her position exactly in front of the august matronhood
of Lidlington, and there, with one forefinger on her lips, her
i S3 OUGHT WE TO VISIT HER t
blue eyes open and fearless, looks up with the delicious imper-
tinence of her age into their veteran faces,
"Children, dogs, and smoking, not allowed," says Mrs. Pip-
jhu; quoting law twenty-nine of the club. "This must
be seen to, this must be seen to. I shall call a committee-
meetiug."
Sonic thing in the chip, chip, tone of voice, for certainly she
cannot grasp the meaning of the words, takes Elossy's fancy,
and forth trills her laugh ; that sweet, flute-like laugh of a little
child which for pure merriment, I think, is like no other sound
this dull old earth of ours ever hears.
" Heavens look at Bless V* cries Jane, as she turns her head,
and at once realises all the danger of the situation. *' Bloss
among the old ladies ! If they attack her she will show fight. I
must go."
And now comes the very crucial test of Bawdon's courage.
Where Mrs. Theobald leads he is of course bound to follow, and
so has to march up straight, face to face, with that serried and
terrible phalanx of the enemy. He takes off his hat to no one
in particular, he knows that he is blushing up to the roots of
his hair.
"How do you do, Mr. Rawdon Crosbie?" cries Mrs. Pippin,
starting up so abruptly as seriously to endanger the equilibrium
of the whole bench. "How is your mamma? How is Miss
Marsland 1 We see you so seldom on the croquet-ground that
I had really forgotten whether you were a member of the club
or not. Lydia, my dear ! Lydia ! It is high time for us to go."
And off Mrs. Pippin walks ; doubtless to acquaint her girls
(young creatures ranging from five-and-twenty upwards), what
danger threatens them. Miss Lydia Pippin, after a furtive
prussic-acid stare at Jane, follows ; the dowagers, each after a
furtive prussic-acid stare, follow likewise. No more uncharit-
able than other old ladies are the Lidlington matrons, but of all
human feelings what is so contagious as the spirit of persecution ]
Mrs. Coventry Brown is left alone.
IN THE CAMP OF THE PHILISTINES. 183
Not a woman to fly in the hour of peril is Mrs. Coventry
Brown. Young Rawdon Crosbie, the secretary's son, may bring
doubtful characters upon this croquet-ground if he chooses. Not
an inch will Mrs. Coventry Brown retreat before them. She
spreads out the skirts of her voluminous silk dress ; folds her
big fingers in their cruelly small, salmon-coloured gloves, one
over the other ; draws down the corners of her mouth tight ;
and glares up, as though, under existing circumstances, it were
an effort to her to tolerate the existence of creation at large,
towards the sky.
If an artist wanted to embody the British dragoness that
guards our hearths and homes, the female Philistine, the uni-
versal Mrs. Grundy, what a model would Mrs. Coventry Brown,
in her chocolate silk, and salmon-coloured gloves, and with all
the might of rampant virtue upon her brow, offer for his pencil
at this moment !
Jane and Rawdon take possession of another bench at about
three yards distant, and Jane begins to give her opinions audibly
on croquet-fields, men, and women ; especially on women. She
is in her most amusing vein ; I think I may call it the vein
savouring most freely of old professional days ; and Rawdon
laughs aloud ; Mrs. Coventry Brown does not laugh. To these,
ere long, runs up little Ensign Standish, mallet in hand.
" So glad to see you on the field, Mrs. Theobald. If you join
in the next game, will you let me be on your side V 9
For Dolly Standish is as deplorably ignorant as most young
men on all the nicer questions of our social distinctions and
moralities.
" I am not to play to-day," answers Jane, speaking with syl-
labic clearness. "lam not to touch a mallet at my peril until
I am a member, Mr. Crosbie says."
" Then be a member/' cries the little ensign. " Be a member
at once, Mrs. Theobald."
" Be a member ! That's very easy to say. First catch your
hare. I must find a proposer to begin with, Mr. Crosbie tells
fB4 OUGHT WE TO VISIT HER f
me, next a seconder, and, lastly, I must make up my mind be-
forehand to be blackballed."
" Blackballed ! you blackballed P Dolly Standish evidently
considers the joke a good one.
Mrs* Coventry Brown, listening with the very ears of her
soul, arrives at promptest resolutions OH the moment,
" PI I propose yon," goes on the little ensign, " and Crosbie
will he your seconder. The thing is done."
" Except the blackballing/' says Jane.
"And except that Standish, being only an honorary member,
can neither propose nor second any one," adds Rawdon, who
feels singularly ill at ease in bis own mind-
But now approaches a fresh ally for Jane in the person of Mr*
Smylie. The curate, like the ensign, is deficient, as yet, in Ms
knowledge of the more finely graduated lights and shadows of
our social intercourse. He knows that Lady Eose Golightly is
tolerably advanced in her opinions, tolerably fast in her paces ;
he knows, in love though he may be, that Miss Guilders does
not lag far behind her friend ; and he knows, also, that neither
his rector nor his parishioners gainsay his daily visits to Beau-
desert's Folly.
" To be intimate at such a house, my dear Smylie, to enjoy
the society of a woman like Lady Rose, is good in every way
for a young fellow just starting in his career. Never run after
titles mean thing, Smylie, mean thing, to run after titles but
lose no opportunity of cultivating the acquaintance of high-born
and refined women. It is the best form of culture a young fel-
low of your age can have."
If the society of Lady Rose and Loo Childers is absolutely an
education for himself, how (oh ! illogical Smylie) can this young
and pretty woman, whose blue eyes are smiling at him now, be
detrimental to society at large 1
" You are just the man we want, Smylie," cries Dolly Standish;
" Mrs. Theobald is going to join the club."
IN THE CAMP OF THE PHILISTINES. 185
An inarticulate protest rises from the soul of Mrs. Coventry
Brown.
"Crosbie is her proposer, will you be her seconder) De-
lighted, of course. Then well see about writing her name down
at once."
And away they go little Standish, the curate, Bawdon to
the rustic croquet-house close at hand, where an official sheet
of paper, ready for the names of aspiring members, lies, with
official pens and ink, on the table. Another minute and the
deed is done ; Francis Theobald's wife is at the mercy of a club
whereof Mrs. Crosbie is secretary, and Mrs. Coventry Brown
the leader and patroness. Then Mr. Smylie and the ensign
have to return to their match and to the young ladies who await
them, and Bawdon comes back to Jane.
" Your name U posted, Mrs. Theobald. This day week, I hope,
you will be a member of the club."
"You need not put such spiteful emphasis on the 'hope/
Why should I not be a member? Nobody knows me, and
therefore I conclude nobody will take the trouble to blackball
me."
" I'm afraid people will take a great deal of trouble to do
malicious things," says young Bawdon, who has been watching
Mrs. Coventry Brown's face, and feels the strongest misgivings
as to the issue of next Saturday's ballot.
As he speaks, a sound, whose import Jane knows only too
well, makes itself heard ; a certain little chuckling sound, half
exultant, half defiant, by which it is Mrs. Theobald's habit to
relieve her feelings whenever any very piquant bit of mischief
she may happen to be engaged upon is consummated. During
the past five minutes Blossy's mind and fingers have not been
idle. The croquet-balls forbidden, the butterfly out of sight,
Blossy at once looked about for some other way of diverting
herself, and the means lay at hand thus: Mrs. Coventry Brown,
as I mentioned, is arrayed in a chocolate-hued silk, of costly
and massive texture ; texture that yields not the seductive frou-
x86 OUGHT WE TO VISIT HER}
frov, dear from time immemorial to French story-writers, but
that rather bristles and stands out aggressively against all
comers. And this silk is garnished round its two-yard- long
tram with a flounce ; in the professional language of Miss Flet-
clier, " a bias, treble-fluted flounce/' to the common eye of man
a flounce surmounted by a kind of battlement of small three-
cornered hats. To Blossy, quick as lightnmg, came the horrid
temptation of turning each of these fiutings or cocked hats into
p little dish for a dirt pie. Blossy, when bent on wickedness, has
the movements of a mouse, the fingers of a pickpocket. Stealthily
watch i Jig the enemy's eye, she has been edging round on her
knees, her dimpled hands filled with gravel from an adjacent
path, during the past five minutes that her mother has ceased
to watch her, and lo! the result is betrayed by her usual chuckle
of triumphant mischief. The awful chocolate flounce stands stiff
on ends as ever, but in every three-cornered battlement rests a
little heap of dirt, neatly confectioned into the proper " pie "
shape by Blossy's fingers.
Mrs. Coventry Brown looks down, and for a moment is stag-
gered, can scarce take in the enormity of the offence. What,
this child of vagrant parents, this offspring of a dancing-girl, to
offer such an insult to Her] She clutches her skirt, and Blossy's
handiwork flies forth in clouds.
" Bloss, my sweet," cries Jane, in her clear, pleasant voice,
" take care what you are doing ; you will get the dust into your
eyes."
Blossy wrinkles up her nose, shows her white teeth, and grasps
a handful of gravel, evidently preparing for fresh labours. Raw-
don Crosbie rushes forward and snatches the child up in his
arms.
" If I had left her another minute it would have been all over
with her," he tells Jane as they walk back across the field ;
Blossy, in his arms, alternately pulling his moustache (such
moustache as Rawdon Crosbie can boast) and bestowing re-
sounding kisses upon his sunburnt cheeks. " I was watching
LOVERS. 187
the Coventry Brown eye. Another minute, Blossy, and you
would have been eaten, straw hat, boots and all."
"And I shall be blackballed to a certainty," says Jane.
" However, if I am, there'll be one comfort I can say it was
all the fault of Blossy's dirt pies."
CHAPTEK XIX.
LOVERS.
Emma Marsland possesses one of the first great qualifications
necessary to insure success in human life. She can eat under
the most trying circumstances. Dinner-time comes at The Haw-
thorns, ten minutes past dinner-time comes, and Rawdon is still
absent.
" I don't see why we should wait any longer," says Mr. Cros-
bie, stopping short in his walk up and down the drawing-room,
and appealing with all the animus of a hungry man to his wife.
"Rawdon gets more unpunctual every day he lives."
Mrs. Crosbie glances at the heiress.
" What do you say, Emmy, dear % Shall we give Rawdon
another five minutes' law or not T
" The fish will be spoilt if we do," says Emmy, without look-
ing up from her crochet work.
Upon this unromantic decision old Crosbie rings the bell with
a will ; and two minutes later the trio the place of the absent
Rawdon yawning wide are seated at the dinner-table.
In spite of being over-boiled, the turbot is excellent, and
Emma is helped to it twice. She takes a goodly slice of mutton,
a portion of duck with peas, tart, cream, cheese, dessert, and
the appropriate fluids. Then she begins to feel sentimental, and
to wonder what her truant lover is about. The conversation, at
no time particularly brisk at The Hawthorns, flows with greater
stagnancy than ever in Rawdon's absence. Mr. Crosbie has
iSS OUGHT WE TO VISIT HER t
remarked during the meal that he met the rector to-day t and
thought him looking much too red in the face for health ; and
not a good red either. A man who has one apoplectic warning
should be more careful in what he eats and drinks. Mrs. Cros-
bie tells them she has paid a visit to Miss Fletcher and finds
that the old-fashioned Pamela hats are coming in indeed, are
" well worn " already does Emma believe it ? Emma contri-
butes her quota to the general stock of ideas by observing that
to-day is Saturday, she quite forgets it till now. What more
can be expected of any respectable country family than that
each mem her thereof should furnish forth one intelligent and
original remark during the solemn hour of repast %
They go up to the drawing- room, and at eight precisely, glo-
rious summer night though it is a servant brings in the lamps
and lowers the blinds, and Emma resumes her lace-work.
44 Where in the world can Kawdon be 1" thinks the poor little
heiress as nine o'clock, half-past nine, comes, and still Kawdon
is absent. " Double, treble, draw the stitch through and turn.
.... At the side of that designing, wicked Mrs. Theobald !
Yes, her heart tells her so ... . two, three, and a loop ....
and it was she, herself, who began the acquaintance. Oh, the
bitterness of it ! Why can't this sort of people be suppressed
by Acts of Parliament ] . . . . Too long, one treble, and purl.
.... Why] Why, because men make the laws, to be sure.
Ah, what a world it would be if women could legislate ! No
ballet-girls, no adventuresses, everybody married, nothing but
domestic happiness, family dinners . . . ."
" There is Kawdon's step," says Mrs. Crosbie's tranquil voice
as she looks up from a letter that has come to her by the
evening post. " I felt sure he would not be late, and I really
think we must not scold him too much, Emmy. Even Mr.
Crosbie, when he was a young man, was late for dinner some-
times."
" I don't call this being late for dinner, mamma ; I call it
forgetting dinner altogether."
LOVERS. 189
And from Emma's tone it is plain that to forget dinner alto-
gether is to her mind about one of the darkest signs of degene-
racy our fallen nature can show.
In' five or six minutes' time the drawing-room door opens
and the culprit appears. He looks a little frightened, and de-
cidedly red ; but he looks something else happy. Happiness
is the one feeling most difficult for human features to mask ;
and Rawdon is not by nature a good dissembler. He has dined
alone with Jane and Blossy, gaily planning over all they will
do and see together next week in London, and Jane and Blossy
have wandered back with him, in the starlight, long past the
boundary line that divides Theobalds from The Hawthorns. A
morsel of heliotrope that Jane has worn (though Blossy's hand
gave it him) is in his button-hole. If he had to proceed to the
scaffold, if he had to sign his marriage settlements and proceed
to church, a quarter of an hour hence, it would be the same.
Rawdon Crosbie is happy now, and his face betrays him.
" I am so sorry I was late, mother. You did not wait dinner,
I hope r
" We waited ten minutes. Really, Rawdon, I think you might
be more punctual, knowing what your father's temper is. . If
you have not dined, you had better have some cold mutton now."
" Thanks. The fact is yes, 111 have something by and by."
He has got close to Emma, but she does not raise her eyes
from her work. He sits down, he looks at her, and feels most
uncomfortably guilty. Conscience, reflected from Emmy's
sombre face, tells him that he is not behaving well, that this
kind of thing cannot last. He must turn over certainly he
must turn over, a new leaf after next week !
44 And what have you been doing with yourself, Emmy f he
asks, in the most affectionately lover-like tone he can compass.
44 1 have been doing the same as usual," answers Emma, coldly,
44 1 practised all the afternoon." The dismal diurnal exactitude
with which Emma practises is a thing, in itself, to give a man
a distaste to life. "Of course, if I had known you did not
190 OUGHT WE TO VISIT HEM T
intend to take me for a walk, I should have gone to Miss
Fletcher's with mamma. I particularly wished to see her new
summer bonnets, but as you said nothing about not returning,
I kept at home. I have not left the house to-day.*
And as she reflects upon the magnitude of the sacrifice, Emma
really looks as if she could cry.
"It was the merest accident that kept me,* 1 begins Eawdon*
C1 T met some one I wanted to speak to, and the hour for dinner
passed, and and there I was. 1 *
He Is by no means an adept at prevarication, and it suddenly
oceusa to lam how very fruitless prevarication must be. Are
not half the old ladies of Lidlington, is not the posting of Jane's
name in the croquet-club, witness to the manner in which hia
afternoon has been spent?
" There you were where V says Emma, putting down her
work and looking straight into her lovers face. i; I did not
quite hear what you said."
Eawdon hesitates ; to tell the truth he dare not, to tell an
untruth he is ashamed. For once, at least, in his life, his mother
helps him out of a scrape. " I have just had a letter, Eawdon
Emmy, guess from whom I have had a letter ] I would not
tell you till Eawdon returned. From Alfred Hervey, my dear.
His mother is in town, and they propose that you and I shall
run up on an impromptu visit next week, and go to the opera,
the exhibitions, the theatres ; wherever we like. Xow, what do
you say, Emmy 1 Are we to go ]"
" Are we to go 1" cries Emma, her eyes sparkling. u Mamma,
can you ask me % That dear old Adonis ! How nice of him
to think of it! How lucky I had my new dress home to-
day !"
u And Eawdon, being so near London, can be our escort
everywhere," says Mrs. Crosbie, looking at her son.
" In the daytime, mother, to exhibitions, or anything of that
kind, I shall be delighted," says Eawdon. " Eut I have had so
much leave of late, and the trains to Woolwich are so incon-
LOVERS. 191
venient, I am afraid you must not depend upon me of an
evening."
"I am quite sure we can depend upon Major Hervey, mamma,"
cries Emma. " We need put Eawdon to no inconvenience what-
ever. I do like going to public places with Adonis," adds the
heiress, warmly. "Adonis knows everybody, and everybody
knows him. Only to be seen with him makes one feel, doesn't
it, mamma, as though one was Some-one \"
Kawdon gives a little dry laugh. " And so the Herveys have
really sent us an invitation !" he remarks. " The first time in
their lives I ever knew them send us anything ! Be sure you
take care of the letter, mother. An offer of hospitality from
such an unwonted quarter is a curiosity."
Mrs. Crosbie folds the letter gravely, restores it to its enve-
lope, and puts both into her work-case. " The Herveys have
not means, as you very well know, Bawdon, for lavish expendi-
ture. But you have taken up all your father's prejudices, and
a very great misfortune for yourself it is that you should have
done so, against the best, against the only really good connec-
tions you have. Our dear old relative, Mrs. Hervey, is staying,
as she always does, at Maurice's, with Maria, and the proposal
is that Emma and I should stay there for a few days too, and
go about London a little with her and Alfred."
" Paying for our own lodgings, and for our dear old relative's
cabs and theatre tickets," says young Eawdon. "Ah, I can
believe in the invitation now."
" The Herveys are people possessing too much delicacy of
feeling ever to allude to money," says Mrs. Crosbie. " If you
only knew, Rawdon, as I often tell your father, what a pain-
fully commercial habit of mind is evinced by the continual use
of that word ' pay !' "
" Money or no money," cries Emma, " I know that I am only
too glad to go, dear mamma. The invitation is to you and me,
is it not 1 or is Rawdon included % I was wondering, this very
afternoon, how long it would be before I saw Major Hervey
i 9 2 OUGHT WE TO VISIT HER t
again. I really think next, I mean, to you and papa that I
am fonder of him than of any one else in the world,"
The colour rises on Rawdon Crosbie's face. For an instant
hope, with a rush, takes possession of his heart Is the recovery
of his lost liberty still possible % The feeling is succeeded next
moment by a revulsion of curiously sharp jealousy. Could
Adonis Hervey ever, in truth, become his rival with Emmy, h%&
little, docile, loving, faithful Emmy? He is not mercenary
enough to care for Emmy's thirty thousand pounds. He cer-
tainly does not care for herself as a man should care for the
woman at whose side he means to pass thirty or forty years of
life. But still so contradictory is everything belonging to love,
and love's twin-sister, vanity the thought* the bare possibility
of her marrying anyone but Mr, Rawdon Crosbie, is wonder-
fully distasteful to him !
" And T, Emmy," he whispers, " what place do I hold \ A
place immeasurably below Adonis Hervey, I suppose V
" I was not talking of you at all," says Emma, coldly and
aloud. " I like you, of course. There is no obligation as re-
gards my feeling for Major Hervey."
Mrs. Crosbie, seeing that a pretty little lover's quarrel is
imminent, rises, like a wise woman, and saying she must talk
over the proposed visit with Mr. Crosbie, prepares to leave the
room. " Supposing Mr. Crosbie says yes, Emmy \ for, alas !
we have not spoken to papa yet but supposing Mr. Crosbie
says yes, do you think we could manage to go with Rawdon on
Monday r
" I don't know about going with Rawdon, mamma. As far
as the packing is concerned, I could be ready."
" You forget that to-morrow is Sunday, Emmy," remarks
Rawdon, when Mrs. Crosbie has left them alone together.
" Even for Adonis Hervey's sake you surely would not be so
wicked as to pack on Sunday V
" I hope you will never do anything worse," says Emma, who
LOVERS, 193
is not to be jested back into good humour. " Fray, what did
you do last Sunday, Rawdon V
" I went to church twice, and had cold meat for dinner," an-
swers Rawdon, promptly. u What do we do every Sunday of
our lives V
"And in the evening) But I don't ask it's quite imma-
terial to me. Thank goodness, we are both of us free agents
still!"
Rawdon, not knowing very well what answer to make to this,
puts his arm quietly round the heiress's waist and kisses her.
Emmy's anger disperses like a mist before the sun. A heroine
of her very unheroic mould, a heroine whom fate itself cannot
render oblivious of the dinner-hour, is not likely to be long
implacable with the lips of the man she loves upon her cheek.
" Upon my word, sir," she cries, a proper shade of indignation
in her voice, " you are getting extremely free and easy in your
manners, I think."
"Do you wish to quarrel with me, really, Emma? Say yes
or no."
" I wish a great many things, 1 ' answers Emma, with one of
those little pouts which I am afraid need the adjunct of beauty
to be irresistible.
" You had better tell me what they are."
" Well, in the first place I wish, as I have told you before, you
wouldn't wear nasty withered bits of weed that you get, good-
ness knows where, in your button-hole."
And before Rawdon can defend it, his morsel of heliotrope,
sweet with a sweetness other than its own, is snatched from him
by his betrothed's plump fingers, and flung with a gesture of
unmistakable contempt across the room.
He gets up in a moment ; searches for, finds, restores the
withered weed with tender care to his button-hole.
" Impertinent, of course, to ask who gave it you f Emma re-
marks after a minute's silence.
" Not at all, my dear Emma," answers Rawdon, gravely, but
13
194 OUGHT WE TO VISIT HER f
with good temper. "Ask me anything you choose, and I will
answer you ; truthfully, if I can."
"Well, then, I do choose to ask you, where did you get that
miserable bit of heliotrope fromf
* I got that miserable bit of heliotrope," says Rawdon, " from
the prettiest girl in all Chalkshire ; from the smallest, sweetest
hand I ever kissed in my life."
" The prettiest gtrlf cries Emma, relieved of her worst fears.
" Little Laura Pinkney, I suppose 1" Laura Pinkney is the rec-
tor's granddaughter ; a child of ten, who has long been one of
Rawdon's sweethearts.
" Laura Pinkney or someone else, Emmy. These things are
quite immaterial to you, you know. Thank goodness, we are
both of us free agents stilL"
But amicable though his tone is, he walks to the window,
draws up the blind, and stands there, watching the stars, instead
of returning to his betrothed's side. The touch, the smell, of
that bit of half-dead heliotrope have brought back so vividly to
him another alas, for Emmy a dearer presence than hers !
Rawdon watches the stars. Emma, with the kind of prescience
love lends at times to the least clever people, watches the ex-
pression of his face.
" And how are your friends, those poor Theobalds, getting
on f she asks him abruptly, at last " You see them sometimes,
of courseT
" Of course," answers Rawdon, with tolerable presence of mind.
" No one is going to calL Mamma was right, as she always
is in such things, in holding back when we met them at the
Spa. Just at first, after the flower-show, people seemed a little
uncertain ; indeed everyone is quite well disposed towards him,
poor man, and one can't help feeling sorry for the Miss Theo-
balds. Such a mistake their coming into a neighbourhood
where everything was known, wasn't it ?"
"An egregious mistake! By the way, what is it that is
known, Emmy % I have never found out yet."
LOVERS. 195
" How affected you can be when you choose, Rawdon !
You know quite well that I am speaking of Mrs. Theobald's
antecedents."
" Ah, Lidlington has a right to be critical on that point," says
Rawdon drily. "A society of which Mrs. Coventry Brown is
the leader, and Lady Rose Golightly the shining, but somewhat
erratic light, has a right to inquire rigidly into antecedents
both as regards birth and conduct !"
" And the Coventry Browns so entirely disapproved of what
they saw of her," goes on Emma, ignoring his remark altogether,
" that evening you met them at Beaudesert (I say nothing of
Lady Rose's taste in leaving me out of the invitation !) the
Coventry Browns so entirely disapproved of her style and man-
ner .... and now people say the house is full of officers,
from morning till night."
" What falsehoods will people not say V 9 cries Rawdon, with
imprudent warmth.
"If she had dressed plainly, and kept very quiet, and
considering the Miss Theobalds, and everything, in time,
perhaps, they might have lived their false position down.
Mamma, herself, says so. But Mrs. Theobald being what
she is "
" A pretty woman, who does not dress plainly, and who has
her house full of officers from morning till night, the Lidlington
ladies can't find it in their hearts to forgive her," says Rawdon.
" Well, I dare say that is natural enough. Emmy, my dear," a
sudden, obstinate disregard of consequences taking possession
of him, " I hope, by-the-by, you will give your vote to Mrs.
Theobald when she is balloted for at the Lidlington croquet
clubT
" When she is balloted for, yes I" says Emma calmly. " Poor
thing, I am afraid she would have to search far for a proposer
and seconder \"
" Not so far as you think, perhaps. Now let us let us sup-
pose Mrs. Theobald's name had been put up to-day ; proposed
132
/
196 OUGHT WE TO VISIT HER t
by Mr, Rawdon Crosbie, seconded by the Reverend Samuel
S my lie, what would you dof
"I don't choose to suppose impossibilities/' replies Miss
Maryland with cold distinctness, * When yon forget yourself
sufficiently to commit an action so un worthy of your own dig*
nity and of mine, it will be time enough to think of what my
conduct should be. Let us talk on more sensible subjects, if
you please."
When Mrs. Crosbie returns Rawdon is still star-gazing, Miss
Mars land once more counting the stitches of her lace- work.
Never in this world did two engaged people look less like lovers.
Mrs. Crosbie's face grows stern. "Papa says 'yes,' Emmy,
dear* We have leave from Monday till Friday evening, Eaw-
don, if you want something to eat, you had better go to the
dkiing-rooDi at once, I have ordered the cold mutton to be
taken in for you. You kept your father waiting ten minutes
for his dinner. Have the kindness not to keep him again at
prayer time."
Rawdon vanishes. But he has not very much appetite for his
cold mutton.
CHAPTER XX.
FRIENDS.
Reader, do you know what it is, after some opera or ball, to be
haunted, against wish or will of yours, by the importunate
burthen of a single tune \
Rawdon Crosbie is so haunted now.
He gets up in the morning, breakfasts, prosecutes his court-
ship, dines, sleeps, dreams, all to the tune of Jane. Her face,
her laugh, her trick of voice and manner are never absent from
him. A dozen times a day he gives stealthy looks at the stolen
silver locket. (Poor Emmy remarks that Rawdon has always
the scent of those new vesuvians about him now.) He treasures
jealously a morsel of flower, a " withered weed" that she has
FRIENDS. 197
worn in her waist-belt, or that Blossy's little hand has plucked
for him. The prose of his life, in short so intensely prosaic
hitherto, has become a poem :
" The light that never was on sea or land "
shines for a brief space across the dead level of his path and
makes it lovely.
How will it end % How do all such hallucinations end when
the tune has worn itself silent, the light died out, the poem
lapsed back into dullest, tritest prose % What fate can there be
in store for Eawdon Crosbie but this that Jane, when she finds
out his folly, will laugh at him, and that Emma, excellent little
forgiving Emma, will become his wife ? Well, and in the mean-
time he would change places with no crowned head in Europe.
The ratified blessings, the heavy responsibilities of life will rest,
securely enough, no doubt, on his shoulders some day. But
the " some day" has not come. And, meantime, he holds the
present, the golden, stolen midsummer hours, between his
hands ; and Jane receives him always with a smile of welcome ;
and he is to meet her in London, he is to go with her to the
theatre, three evenings, at least, next week ! The prospect ot
escorting his mother and Emma to exhibitions, of family
luncheons with the Herveys ; even the prospective patronage
of his cousin Adonis, the man Eawdon Crosbie dislikes most on
the face of the earth, is not sufficient to damp him.
Sunday drags its accustomed slow length along at The Haw-
thorns, and Eawdon behaves himself beautifully : goes to church
twice, at Emma's side, eats his cold, two o'clock dinner, at
Emma's side, listens to plans for the ensuing week's pleasure
with those dear Herveys, all with exemplary patience. At last
comes evening ; Emma must assist the maid in laying things
ready no sin in merely laying things ready for to-morrow's
packing ; and Eawdon is free. He is free, goes out of doors, lights
his pipe, falls at once into a reverie, and a quarter of an hour later
finds himself looking over the fence which divides his father's
last field from the kitchen garden of Theobalds.
^^i
/
house full of officers at this moment ?
He hesitates ; half turns away ; gh
the grey old walls of Theobalds ; then
amidst the apple trees quite close at 1
beside her.
"Dordy, Dordy!" sings out Miss
approach her tongue can make to Ran
forward, with hands of welcome outs
and unbolts the garden-gate for him.
the matter does he want to have a ch
" I was not quite sure about your ntu
Mrs. Theobald/' Something in Jane's
the reason of his coming. "And as I ^
the plantations, I thought "
t( Pray don't apologize/* interrupts Ja
for our number in Maddox Street, yo
pocket-book, I wrote it down for you j
" Of course you did,** and Eawdon tr
foolish as h% feels. (1 Really, I must
troubling you so much. I "
the ffAfcp ib** ~~ -
FRIENDS. 199
perhaps you would like some of cousin James** raspberries 1
Blossy and I have just found out that they are getting ripe/'
Jane turns, as she speaks, into a narrow side-path, Blossy
following, with her tiny hand fast held in Bawdon's. The
kitchen-garden of Theobalds is an exceedingly old-fashioned
one, and something of the quaint, home-flavour that once be-
longed to the word " garden" clings to it still There are tall,
ill-bearing apple trees, amidst whose branches Francis Theo-
bald perched when he was an urchin ; cucumber frames of a
style of architecture of thirty years ago ; beehives ; narrow
cinder paths leading from the main walks among the raspberry
and gooseberry bushes, and even some unpretending flowers,
such as marigolds, columbines, and bachelor's buttons, ranged
along the outer edges of the vegetable beds.
" People may talk as they like about fine lawns and parterres,"
cries Jane, her mouth full of raspberries ; " a kitchen-garden
is much more to my taste. To see all the good old lettuces and
cabbages yes, and the very smell of the raspberries reminds
one of Covent Garden."
" And is that an advantage f asks Bawdon, for ever on the
point, yet never reaching the point, of being disenchanted by
Jane's want of refinement.
" Certainly it is, to a cockney like me. My jolliest hours
were all spent within half a mile of the Covent Garden cab-
bage-baskets. Bloss, Miss, you have eaten enough ; yes, but
you have. I don't want to have you sick to-morrow. Bawdon,
be good enough to take Blossy in your arms, and carry her
bodily away from the raspberries. We may as well go and have
another look at our magnificent garden that was to have been,"
she adds. " Likelier than not it will never be a garden, or a
croquet-ground either, in my day. I begin but I've no heart
to finish things."
Evidently there is something amiss with Jane s spirit to-night
Bawdon who knows nothing about the hour at which Mr.
Theobald came home this morning, nor of the confession wrung
t
own ridiculous secret.
. . . When they reach the garden "
they sit down, beneath the turf bank \
of Rawdon Crosbie's life have alreac
their talk comes round to a subject k
with boys and girls of their age, but of
don's shyness, or to Jane's matter-of-fi
and girl have never spoken yet
The hour, the solitude, a certain wis!
on his companion's fair face, lend Rawd
flow warmly, readily, from his lips, as w
flow from the lips of the least eloquent i
to talk about something which they the
and so for the time believe in.
"You should put all that in a book," r
He has been making her some effusive sf
sibility of love, genuine love, losing its 1
hand of time or circumstance. "You
well, and I dare say it wouldn't look sill]
" Although in real life you would call
he asks her.
FRIENDS. 201
sternness ; lines that can make you imagine what Jane will be
when she is an old woman are round her lips.
"I don't know what you mean by definitions. I know I
don't believe in men's love and in men's constancy, except in
books. Why should I? Fm almost twenty years old. I've
lived every day since I could run alone. What I say I say out
of my own experience of the world, not out of mawkish, bread-
and-butter novels."
" One may have reached twenty, and in a certain sense have
lived every day of one's life, and yet still have something to
learn," remarks Eawdon Crosbie.
" Of a man that may be true. A woman of twenty knows as
much of life as she will ever know, unless she is a fool, and I
don't take fools into account"
Now, all this conversation, interesting no doubt from different
causes, to the two persons who are holding it, is profoundly dull
to Blossy's intelligence. Blossy, newly torn away from rasp-
berry bushes, has for the first three minutes no feeling, thought,
emotion, but raspberries; and sits longing for those lost delights,
a fruit-stained finger between her fruit-stained lips. Then a
small white moth flutters forth from a holly hedge close at
hand, and Blossy's eyes and soul follow it. The moth's flight
is upward. At the awful height of six or eight feet Blossy
can trace it no further against the dome of primrose sky. All
she can see is a star that has newly come out, overhead, and at
this she gazes, steadfastly, for another second or two. But
stars are stupid things ; not eatable like raspberries, not chase-
able like moths. Blossy's thoughts and eyes soon fall to earth
again, and before three more minutes have fled the well-known
sentiment of Dr. Watts respecting Satan and idle hands is veri-
fied.
I have said that Blossy Theobald when bent on mischief has
the movements of a mouse, the fingers of a pickpocket. Like
all healthy children of her age, she is a thorough bandit at
heart. To conquer, destroy, possess, are the primitive instincts
t
202 OUGHT WE TO VISIT HERt
of Blossy's nature. And with that peach-blossom face, those
heaven-blue eyes of hers, she commits her crimes so innocently!
Nestling close at Rawdon's side, her soft fingers creep over his
waistcoat, find their way into his waistcoat pocket, abstract its
contents, before either he or Jane have noticed what she is
about Her laugh, her little trilling laugh of exultation, first
arrests Jane's attention.
" Bloss, you have been at mischief ! Oh, I see you, you young
thief, with your fist doubled up. You've been picking Rawdon's
pocket Now, open your fingers directly."
Mechanically, Eawdon Orosbie's hand goes to his waistcoat
pocket The locket that he stole in Spa, his treasure, his amulet
is gone.
"Blossy, you little sinner ! Give me back my property; Fll
never love you again, Blossy, if you don't Now give it back at
once."
His eagerness tells Blossy that she has got hold of something of
importance ; and her fingers close tighter over their prize. " Me
teep him for mine own self," she remarks, in her language,
nodding triumphantly at Rawdon and putting herself into an
attitude of resistance.
"Give it to mamsey, Bloss," says Jane, whose system of
education is not based on rigidly exact principles. " Mamsey
shall keep it," holding out her hand ; " and Bloss shall have
twelve raspberries."
Bloss hesitates for a moment, then peeping through her fingers
and finding nothing particularly seductive in the appearance of
her booty, strikes the bargain. Rawdon Orosbie's secret, her
own sorely missed, long hunted-for locket, is in Jane's hands.
" Mrs. Theobald, give it me 1 Please, give it me !" cries Raw-
don, his face flaming with blushes like a guilty schoolboy's. " It
is nothing it is something I value particularly it's of no value
to anyone but me !"
This piques Jane's curiosity, of which she possesses her full
woman's share. " Nothing ! Something I Of no value ! Of
"If AS THE DOLL GOT A HEART r 203
great value ! I suppose I may see what kind of thing it is, at
least r
" No, please don't." In his eagerness, Rawdon has seized her
hand and covered it with his own, " Til never forgive you I
mean you'll never forgive me if you see it."
The situation becomes critical. Blossy has flown back to the
raspberry beds, liberally to carry out her part of the compact,
and they are alone ; Rawdon holding Mrs. Theobald's hand and
pleading to her as if his life depended upon the prayer. " 111
never forgive you, sir, if you don't let go my hand." He obeys
her instantly. " As to seeing, what can there be to see % Now,
trust to my honour. Ill never tell Miss Marsland. I promise
faithfully."
And she looks.
CHAPTER XXL
"has the doll got a heabtT
There is a dead silence for a minute : a minute an hour it
seems to Rawdon Orosbie, uncertain that instant disgrace and
dismissal may not await him on this discovery of his crime.
" And what put it into your head to take property that did
not belong to you inquires Jane, coldly, at last
" I I don't understand you," he begins.
u Oh, come, no pretence i This locket is mine, and you took
it, you know you did, the morning you left your card on us at
Spa. I missed it from my box directly we got back, and accused
Blossy, the nurse-girl, half the waiters in the hotel, of the theft
De Lansac and I hunted for it everywhere."
At the name of De Lansac, Rawdon begins to recover his
presence of mind. " I have no wish to pretend anything, Mrs.
Theobald, but I would suggest that there may it is just possible
that there may be two silver lockets in the world, each fashioned
in the shape of a heart"
204 OUGHT WE TO VISIT HERt
n
" But not each with a J. T. cut on the face," says Jane, holding
up the locket and examining it closely. " I have had this poor
little old heart since I was a girl ; I should know it among a
thousand. De Lansac had the initials cut for me in Paris, ages
ago.
She unfastens a ribbon from her dress, passes it through the
ring of the locket, then ties it with deliberate care round her
throat. " Come, don't let us quarrel. Don't be foolish enough
to deny that you were less honest than you might have been,"
she remarks at last, Rawdon all this time having maintained a
grim and moody silence.
" No, Mrs. Theobald, I deny nothing. If I had known the
peculiar, the tender interest that attaches to that poor little old
heart, you may be very sure I should have left it alone !"
" You would have done wisely," Jane answers him. "Honesty
is generally the best policy. I don't know, at the same time,
what I have said to you about tender or peculiar interest % The
locket is mine, not yours ; consequently, its rightful place is
not your pocket ! Simply that"
Bawdon plucks up small tufts of grass and flings them from
him, disdainfully. " I agree with Dundreary," he bursts out,
after a minute ; " there are things no fellow can understand, and
one of them is I haven't a prejudice, I hope I haven't a preju-
dice belonging to me but how Englishwomen can look yes,
can look at foreigners with the favourable eyes they do is a
marvel that passes my comprehension."
" It might do that, I should say, without being much of a
marvel," observes Mrs. Theobald with composure.
" But women there's no ddubt of it judge by some standard
of their own : some standard we know nothing about. That glib
fluency that passes for wit, that accurate knowledge of tuckers
and flounces, those graces learnt from a posture-master "
" Don't talk so quick, pray ! You'll hurt yourself. And before
you go any further, would you kindly say who " (alas for Jane's
cases !) " who all this fine sarcasm is directed against V
"HAS THE DOLL GOT A HEART?" 205
u Against all foreigners who worm their way into English-
women's hearts," says Rawdon, losing his head completely.
" Do you by any chance mean De Lansac, Mr. Crosbie V
" You know best, Mrs. Theobald. I spoke of foreigners who
have wormed their way into Englishwomen's hearts. If Mon-
sieurif the person you mention, comes, as I suppose he does,
under that category, certainly I mean him."
Forth flares Jane's hot temper ! up starts the angry blood
upon her cheek " And what possible interest can you have in
the subject V she cries. " What right have you to speak slight-
ingly of anyone, English or foreign, who happens to be dear to
mef
" What right !" Her flushing face, her indignant voice goad-
ing him on into more absolute loss of self-command. " What
right ? An easy question for you to ask now ! It would be
more to the point to ask me what thought, what object, what
interest I have left that is not wrapt up in you !"
"Mr. Crosbie!"
" Oh, it is just as well said," cries Rawdon, waxing desperate.
" From the first hour I saw you, my life, and everything belong-
ing to it, have been set adrift. And if I could choose ... if I
could choose " . . . and his anger cools, his tone softens, in spite
of himself, " I would not have it different ! The gain has been
greater than any loss you can inflict upon me now."
Jane, on this, turns round and looks at him fulL "Well,
whatever else I thought, I did not think you would be such a
fool as this !" she cries with blunt, unaffected astonishment
" I suppose not," he answers. "I suppose that's always the
proper thing for women to say. Lead a man on until he makes
the besotted idiot of himself I have done, and then be surprised
at his idiocy!"
"I don't understand what you mean by 'the proper thing.'
Your opinions are formed, you see, on women of your own class
of life, of whom I know nothing! If you mean that I, Jane
Theobald, would lead you, or any other man, on, knowingly
t
2o6 OUGHT WE TO VISIT HER J
into talking rubbish, you make a ridiculous mistake. Nothing
bores me more than Scenes ! If you had known a very little
more of the world you would never have so misunderstood me/'
" And you have thought I could be alone with you as I have
been for hours, for days, alone, here, with you, and not grow
to care for you more than I ought V*
Ought ! Oh dear me, don't let us get upon moral stilts, in
addition to everything else !" says Jane, with a laugh that cuts
him horribly. "It isn't the right or the wrong of your talking
so, it's the absurdity of it that takes away my breath !"
Not a very exalted standpoint, it must be allowed. And yet
if Jane had planted herself upon the highest of all ground, had
addressed him from the topmost pinnacle of a very Mont Blanc
of virtue, Bawdon Crosbie could not have been made to feel
the wrongness of his position with more galling completeness.
" The absurdity of a man of my age losing his senses under
the constant influence of a face like yours !" he remarks.
"A face a face yes, that's all men think of!" cries Jane.
"A pink and white complexion, a pair of blue doll's eyes, a
stray dimple or two, are excuse enough for anything. Has the
doll got a heart % Oh, not worth the loss of time to guess at
that! And as women go as women go," she adds, a little
bitterly, "men are right, I dare say, in their way of judging
them."
Something in the tone of her voice softens Rawdon's anger
more and more. " And you T he asks her, " you, Mrs. Theo-
bald % Is it loss of time to speculate if you have a heart, I
wonder V
She turns pale : he can see the change of hue even in that
indistinct light ; she flushes, rosy red. After a minute : " From
most men," she exclaims, " from most men 1 should just call a
question like that balderdash the kind of stuff that passes cur-
rent, with weak Ifemonade, between the dances at a ball ! With
you, I am sure I don't know why, I can talk differently to how
I ever talked before. I like you. There's the truth. I liked
"HAS THE DOLL GOT A HEART r 207
you, from the first, for your pluck in standing up for me and
coming to see me, in spite of your sweetheart and your mamma.
I like you because you are good to Blossy. I like you for every-
thing I"
Bawdon Crosbie heaves a miserable sigh. He knows, too well
he knows, what these candid admissions must herald.
" And so Til say to you what I'm sure I never thought to have
said to anyone while I lived. I have a heart . . . and it's fulL"
As she says this, each word seems to be wrung from her lips
with an effort. "Fuller than it can hold . . . the worse for
me, perhaps, already."
She has made him the confession for his good; honestly,
frankly, to cure him of his folly. And the result is the direst
failure that ever honest truth-telling brought about Till now,
Bawdon's feelings have been he himself could not have told
you what A compound of admiration for Jane's beauty, of
boyish vanity, of generous revolt against the treatment she has
met with at the hands of Emma and his mother. In his new-
born passionate jealousy, a flood, no longer of vague sentiment,
but of love the word must be written love, strong in very
proportion to its hopelessness, goes forth from his heart towards
this woman who has faltered out her hapless secret to him alone
here, under the starlight, in the fragrant night. Ah, he sees
everything with fatal clearness now ! He knows what premo-
nition, acuter than reason, made him hate De Lansac from the
first.
" So I hope you will believe me, when I repeat that I never
led you, or anyone else, on, knowingly," says Jane, a kind of
shyness, very unusual with her, in her manner.
" Believe you, Mrs. Theobald ? I believe only too easily," he
answers. " If I had chosen to keep my eyes open, I might have
seen from the first what was in store for me.'*
" But it's all over now, Bawdon. You have forgotten to be
wise for a moment, as we all do sometimes, but I am your friend
and comrade the same as ever. I only hope,'' she goes on "I
2o8 OUGHT WE TO VISIT HER t
only hope that in the future you will be made as happy by Miss
Marsland as I wish you to be."
" The future don't talk to me of the future !" Eawdon in
terrupts. " How, in God's name, can I be happy away "
44 Away from a woman who does not care for you," says Jane,
with kindly, cruel firmness, " and with one who does 1 Ah, you
will learn how in time, my dear boy !"
44 1 may learn many things," says Eawdon, slowly and with
emphasis. " I shall never learn to forget you, and all the hours
I have spent with you."
And he rises, and walks away along the path by which they
came, Jane following him in silence.
44 1 suppose it will be better for me not to come and see you
any more/' he remarks, when they have reached the garden
gate.
4fc I suppose so/' says Jane, not without a falter in her voice.
44 Not this week that you will be in London, of course. Well,
then, I may as well say good-bye to you now."
44 Good-bye, Eawdon."
He takes her hand, holds it for a moment with a grip of iron
in his own, then goes, without another word.
"Dordy, Dordy!" cries Blossy from among the raspberry
bushes, amazed at seeing her playmate leave without his accus-
tomed kiss.
But Eawdon never turns his head ; straight onward, towards
home, towards Emma, towards duty, he marches, nor looks
behind him more.
He must never in this moment's exceeding bitterness he
tells himself, he must never look back more. The light has
gone suddenly out, the tune stopped ; the one chapter worth
reading in his life's dull book is shut, " clasped with a clasp/'
and there is an end of it ! He must never look back more.
And he looks back, before he has gone a dozen steps, and
with jealous eyes watches the figures of Jane and of her child
until the falling shadows hide them away out of his sight
AMONG " THE PROFESSION." 209
CHAPTER XXII.
AMONG "THE PBOFESSION."
It is curious how many old friends we are sure to encounter
when we have come lately into money ; curious how well every-
body remembers our face, how eager everybody seems to be to
renew the pleasure of our acquaintance.
Before Mr. Theobald has been twenty-four hours in town he
has made half-a-dozen engagements. After congratulating a
man upon a crusty cousin's demise, what can come more natu-
rally to the lips than to ask him to dinner ) He must run down
and mess with his old regiment at Aldershot ; must dine at the
Hag, and have a little quiet play afterwards, with Lord Barty
Beaudesert ; must join a jovial "literary" party, given by the
friend of his youth, Jack Thornton, at Richmond. Quite easily,
and without an effort, Francis Theobald, actually possessed of
six hundred, and ready to spend at the rate of six thousand a
year, finds himself drawn towards the world, the associates that
knew and ruined him in his palmy days. And equally without
an effort does his wife gravitate back towards hers ; the world,
the associates of that painfully ungenteel period when Jane
wore shabby boots and a darned merino frock the world that
was so all-sufficient for her before her marriage brought her
within the possible reach of people who visit and are visited !
Not a creature but who is in or connected with the profession
does Jane know in London : Uncle Dick, " the person who
plays the trombone in an orchestra ;" Uncle Dick's wife, once
an actress whom the town ran after, wardrobe-keeper now at
one of the minor theatres ; Miss Minnie Arundel (nee Mary
Johnson) ; and their friends. And oh, how happy, how
thoroughly, vulgarly happy, Jane is among them all! She
goes with Miss Arundel to rehearsal ; she sups on the humble
fare, the cold roast pork and pickles of old days, at Mr. Richard
Johnson's, and, while Uncle Dick sips his gin-and- water, listens
to his wife's stories of how Juliet Montmorenci will not wear
/
to
210 OUGHT WE TO VISIT HER t
such a dress in the forthcoming piece, and how Carlotta de Vere
insists upon wearing such another, and how that artful Aurora
Stanley, a favourite of the author's, has got her part written up
expressly to admit of a pink satin train, since last rehearsal.
And then the pleasure of exhibiting Blossy before all these
people, the pleasure of seeing Blossy hugged, of hearing herself
called " my dear 9 by every kindly, albeit out-at-elbows, soul she
meets within theatrical precincts !
We can none of us let the Mrs. Coventry Browns of the earth
look to the fact be much more exalted, much more refined,
than our earliest associations. Jane feels a glow of pride in
keeping so completely on a level, still, with hers. Mrs. Crosbie,
the Miss Theobalds, every person and thing connected with
Chalkshire Philistinism, cease as utterly to trouble her con-
science during these few happy days % as though she had never
known the blessings of Chalkshire or of Philistinism at all She
almost forgets her new-born distrust of Theobald and Lady
Rose. She entirely forgets poor young Rawdon's confession of
Sunday evening, and his present banishment
Is not that the way with most of us, Reader 1 A. and B. like
each other, quarrel, part ; and to-morrow A. is philandering,
unconcerned, among other scenes and people, and B. debating,
frenzied, between a revolver and prussic acid. Admirable pro-
vision of nature, that the balance of suffering should be so nicely
adjusted!
Rawdon Crosbie does not quite hover 'twixt bowl and dagger
yet ; but he really does hesitate between emigrating to a sheep
farm in South America and insisting that Emma Marsland shall
marry him in three days. Some kind of action, desperate and
immediate, it seems to him he must have, to fill the blank that
Jane has left in his existence. Oh, the dreary sight seeing with
his affianced ! Oh, the pictures at the Royal Academy, the
family luncheons with those dear Herveys ! Oh, the intoler-
able pain and burthen and weariness of everything !
He straggles on for three whole days, submitting, rebelling,
AMONG " THE PROFESSION? 21 1
growing worse in every way, hourly. On the afternoon of the
fourth, Thursday, can bear up no longer, and finds himself
knocking at the door of the Theobalds' lodgings in Maddox
Street
" Yes, Mrs. Theobald is at home, and will see him." So the
servant girl who has taken in his card brings him word. He
enters, walks up the stairs, with the sensation, stout young fel-
low though he is, of his legs trembling under him, and finds
Jane, in her walking dress, just ready to go out ; finds her
blooming, in excellent spirits, cordial.
" I was afraid I didn't know whether you would admit me
I couldn't keep away any longer," he explains, lucidly, as he
held her hand in his.
Jane is simply taken aback by the change on the lad's face.
Rawdon Crosbie looks older by a dozen years than when she
saw him last in the garden at Theobalds, He has lost flesh, in
the quick way some people do under any wear and tear of the
spirit ; his eyes have grown hollow ; in the excitement of see-
ing Jane again his sunburnt cheeks turn to a kind of sickly
greenish yellow. Not, I must say, in beauty has Rawdon gained
under the influence of the tender passion, and still, so pitifully
inclined are women's hearts, he has acquired interest no good
looks could have lent him in Jane's sight She likes the poor
boy as she never did before at this moment, is sorry for him,
feels a pang or two of remorse even, as she reflects upon her
own amusements, and the heartless way in which she has for-
gotten, not only his possible sufferings, but his very existence
during the past four days.
" Of course you couldn't keep away. Why should you % You
banished yourself, remember. I only ventured a mild 'yes*
when you swore you would never come and see me again. You
find me all alone, Rawdon," and now she takes her hand from
his, and widens the space between them. "Theobald is out
and Blossy has been seized upon bodily, and carried off to my
Uncle Dick's till to-morrow.''
14-2
i
212 OUGHT WE TO VISIT HER t
Kawdon makes no reply. He stands upright as a ramrod,
and looking poor young fool that he is into her fair un-
troubled face with the kind of hungry look we give to anything
we love overmuch after long separation. Long separation ! and
it is only since Sunday that he has been parted from her ! Only
four days. And his life, thirty or forty years, is to be so parted.
And he will have to live through it all The myriad-tongued
roar of Eegent Street ebbs and swells. The sun is shining
cheerfully 'through the open window, as it is shining, we may
be sure, on many a pair of happy lovers, on many a dead face,
throughout the length and breadth of London. Down in the
street an organ-grinder, ignorantly ironical, is playing the same
Grande Duchesse waltzes to which they first danced together
in Spa. ... all the world, in short, going on as it usually goes
towards four o'clock of a summer's afternoon, and one perfectly
insignificant gunner-boy acting his little part in the great
drama, and believing that no one ever felt, suffered, despaired
as he does at this moment !
"If you had been five minutes later, you would have missed
me," says Jane, in her bright voice. " I am just going round
to the Royal for Min. Did I tell you Uncle Dick has got her
an engagement there for the new extravaganza 1 Such a start
for her, poor old Min ! Thirty shillings a week, and the pros-
pect of a leading part after Christmas. Are you free for an hour?
If you are, you may walk to the Royal with me. I should like
you and Min to see what you can make of each other."
Rawdon is tacitly engaged is under orders, that is to say, to
dine with his mother and Emma at six o'clock, and to go with
them and the Herveys afterwards to the theatre. So he answers
unhesitatingly that he is free, and ready ready 1 heavens ! how
weak on some occasions, is human language ! to accompany
Mrs. Theobald wherever she chooses.
** I suppose you are not disengaged for the evening as well V
Jane goes on. " No use to ask you though. Nobody is ever
disengaged at the eleventh hour in London."
AMONG " THE PROFESSION.* 213
44 But I don't belong to London," says Rawdon. " I came
up from Woolwich an hour ago, intending, I am sure I don't
why, to stay till to-morrow morning, and I have no engagements
of any kind . . . that can't be broken."
u And none that you mind breaking 1 Then, Til tell you
what you may do. Min is not acting to-night : it's a benefit,
and she doesn't appear ; and so, at her own request, I'm going
with her to the Prince of Wales's to see ' School.' That's the
way with all us actresses." It pleases Jane thus to enroll her-
self among the profession to which, in fact, she never belonged.
" We get a holiday from our own hot theatre for one night, and
the greatest pleasure we can have is to go to another hot theatre,
to see another actress act Now, would you like to go with
usf
" Would I like it !" cries Rawdon, flushing up with sudden
animation.
" I can give you a place. We have an order for the stalls, and,
of course, at the last moment, Theobald has played us false.
So Min is going to stay with me till to-morrow. You and she
will fraternise finely, Rawdon, or if you don't it will be your
fault : Min's sure to take to you, because you are in the army.
She takes to all men who are in the army. Min wouldn't give a
thank-you to go anywhere with a London clerk, or anything of
that kind, the people she calls cads ; and as to an actor !
But we mustn't stay chattering here," Jane interrupts herself,
looking at her watch. "Half -past three, already] Then we
have no time to lose ; rehearsal is over at four, and I promised
Min faithfully to be at the theatre to meet her."
She rises, walks up to the glass above the chimneypiece, and
pins on a lilliputian strip of spotted net across her face. " Theo-
bald always tells me to wear a veil when I go out alone in Lon-
don. As if I wanted anything or any person to protect me ! I,
who knew every turning and corner from Piccadilly to St Paul's
by the time I was eight years old. Good gracious, my dear
boy !" Rawdon has followed her, and again set up the lachry-
t
*
214 OUGHT WE TO VISIT HER t
mose gaze at her face. " What are you looking at so 9 What
do you want ? You make me quite nervous."
" Mrs. Theobald," says the poor wretch, * I want to know if
you have forgiven me. I give you my honour IVe thought of
nothing, night or day since, but your anger. Can you forgive
me % Can you ever feel the same to me as you felt before my
rudeness my stupidity on Sunday evening]"
Now, there can be no doubt that a discreet woman of the
world a Loo Childers, a Lady Rose Golightly would know
how to act in such a position as this with exact propriety; would
manage, while teaching a too pertinacious lover to keep within
due bounds, so to temper the lesson as to leave a glimmering
blue line of hope before his mind's horizon. Unversed in the
discriminating tactics of fine breeding, outspoken, whether for
good or for evil, Jane Theobald does nothing of the kind. " If
I hadn't 'forgiven* you, as you call it, I don't suppose I should
have told the girl to let you in. Why in the world should I not
feel the same to you as ever 1 You know I never thought a
great deal of your wisdom, at the best of times."
" And never cared a great deal about my society. Fray, say
it out"
"After the fashion you mean, never, my dear child, and never
should, if I saw you every day for twenty years. I thought I
explained all that to you plain enough on Sunday 1 Now hold
my parasol, please. I can put on my gloves as we go out. And
take my advice," adds Jane, looking with her frank eyes into
his face, " don't go trying anything in the Romeo and Juliet
line before Min. You won't forget it in a hurry if you do, I
can tell you."
They walk leisurely down the shady side of Regent Street,
Jane's hand on Rawdon Crosbie's arm. It- is the most stirring
hour of the afternoon, and London, during these last days of
one of the shortest, gayest seasons on record, is crammed.
What strings of carriages ; what high-stepping horses ; what
towering bonnets ; what golden chignons ! what an affluence
AMONG " THE PROFESSION* 215
of that poor man's bread which well-intentioned people rail out
against as wicked luxury ! Among the motley crowd, will fate
confront them with Mrs. Hervey and his mother, in their jointly
hired, sham-private brougham? young Bawdon speculates; not
without some cowardly trepidation at the possibility, remote
though it be.
No such untoward accident befalls them just at present, but
in walking along from Maddox Street to Drury Lane, Bawdon
comes across more than one of his brothers-in-arms from Wool-
wich ; and the admiring glances bestowed by each young warrior
upon the pretty woman at his side go a long way towards repay-
ing him for his unhappiness of the last four days. He is no
more in reality to Mrs. Theobald than the handle of her parasol ;
this he knows : but Jones of the Engineers, and Brown of the
Artillery, do not know it And blighted though Bawdon's state
may be, it is not so bad as to be quite beyond the alleviations
gratified vanity can offer.
They reach the stage entrance of the Royal, and are admitted
unquestioned by the door-keeper. Jane stops for a minute's
affectionate chat with a little old threadbare gentleman, who
happens to be leaving the theatre just as they enter the very old
Adolphe Dido who taught her to dance when she was a child.
Then, quitting Bawdon's arm, she pushes open a double red-baize
door, and leads the way along a passage and down some steps,
to lighten whose obscurity, even at this blazing hour of the sum-
mer day, a half -turned jet of gas is necessary. Another moment,
and they are in the midst of that atmosphere of carpentery, paint,
and stale gas, those regions of canvas, trap-doors, and weird-
looking stage machinery, which to Jane are the most familiar
and cheerful surroundings the world can afford.
The rehearsal of the extravaganza is still going on, and to
Bawdon's unprofessional eyes a pale and funereal piece of busi-
ness it seems, with the yawning background of empty house, the
orchestra playing just and only just sufficiently loud to mark the
time, the middle-aged heroine, the pathetically prosaic crowd of
i
*
216 OUGHT WE TO VISIT HER t
girls, who are to shine forth as fairies, in tinsel and arsenic-green,
under the witching influence of lime-light " I'm glad we are in
time for the finish," Jane whispers to him, as they pause in an
unoccupied corner of the stage. " You'll see Min directly yes,
there she is, on the prompt side, in a lilac dress and pink bonnet
Now, mind, I expect you to lose your heart to her on the spot"
Rawdon's eyes have to grow accustomed to the dusky light
around before he can discern any of the people on the stage with
clearness, and then then he certainly does not lose his heart to
Miss Minnie Arundel. She is like her sister, but without a tithe
of Jane's grace and originality ; she is Jane vulgarised. A bright-
expressioned yet faded-looking little woman of five or six and
twenty, with brown hair cut in a line across her forehead, fine
stage eyes, marred somewhat for daylight use by the ineffaceable
traces of bismuth beneath the lower lids, an expressive large
mouth, and shapely white teeth, of which, whether before or
behind the footlights, she makes the most : such is Miss Minnie
Arundel
Rawdon does not lose his heart, perhaps because he has not
above an inch of that organ left to lose, but he feels himself drawn
towards the smiling face of the poor little humble actress as if
by magic. Her bonnet is too showy a pink, and her dress too
showy a lilac ; and her mouth is too large, and her cheeks have
been too long familiar with red paint and pearl powder to have
any more natural bloom left than those of a ball-going young
lady after four or five London seasons. But, taken altogether,
poor Min's is a good face, fresher, in one sense, than Lady Eose's
or Loo Childer's. She speaks, having come forward in the very
unimportant part assigned to her in the piece ; her voice is sym-
pathetic, the same kind of clear tuneful organ as Jane's, and
ftawdon'8 predilection for her is complete.
" And that is my uncle Dick," said Mrs. Theobajd, when Raw-
don has sounded as many notes of praise as he can compass on
the score of Miss Arundel's charms. " Isn't he a dear old fellow 1
? You are looking in the wrong direction ; musician number three
AMONG " THE PROFESSION." 217
in the orchestra, just behind the author. There he is wiping his
trombone at this moment."
Musician number three is wiping his trombone, then his fore-
head, with a blue pocket handkerchief, large enough for a mode-
rate sized mainsail, and relieved by orange spots. Honest,
worthy Uncle Dick with that shining warm face of his (that has
something of Jane in its expression) and that greasy coat-collar,
and that blue and orange pocket handkerchief ! If there were
no Francis Theobold, no Emma Marsland in the world Rawdon
Crosbie would give every terrestrial possession for the hope of
calling Jane " wife." But it does occur to him strongly, that he
would rather Francis Theobald than himself should have the
privilege of calling musician number three " Uncle."
" He took Min and me when we were little," says Jane, as
though she divined his thoughts, " took us, when he had work
enough to do to get bread for himself, and brought us both up for
the stage. Our father was killed by the fall of a lift ; he was a
scene-painter . . . did I ever tell you the family history ? and
mother was dying of consumption, and then Uncle Dick came to
the front, and paid God knows how for everything she wanted,
and took us home when she was buried. I know he doesn't
come within a hundred miles of what you or Theobald would
call a gentleman, poor old fellow ; and I know if he was a soberer
man it would be all the better for himself. But if ever I get to
heaven," says Jane, warming, "it will be a very poor place to me
I've told Theobald so, often unless Uncle Dick gets there too;
yes, and is thought good and refined enough, every way, for
general society. ,,
The sentiment is not expressed in particularly orthodox
language, but the moisture in Mrs. Theobald's blue eyes shows
how much she is in earnest. Rawdon asks, penitentially, to be
introduced to Mr. Richard Johnson.
"Not to-day," says Jane, nodding to Uncle Dick, as, the
rehearsal over, the musicians scuttle, like mice, through the
orchestra door. " Nothing puts the dear old soul out more than
/
v
218 OUGHT WE TO VISIT HER t
to bother him when he is sjeepy after rehearsal Some evening,
when we are in town next, 111 take you to his house to supper,
perhaps unless you get married meantime. Now come, and 111
introduce you to Min, and we can settle about to-night."
Miss Minnie Arundel and Rawdon fraternise, as Jane pre-
dicted at once. A young fellow of two-and-twenty who should
not fraternise with Minnie Arundel must be a very great philo-
sopher, or a very desperate fool, indeed ; perhaps both. She is
sure she remembers his face down at Aldershot Crosbie in
the Blues, is he not ? Oh, Artillery. Well, at all events, she
acted once with some Crosbie or Crofton, was it? in some
regiment or other, and he was about Rawdon's height She is
certain, raising her dark eyes to his face, Kawdon would act
beautifully in tender, sentimental parts. Would he like some
lessons from her \ Very much, indeed. What a pity she has no
time to give him any just at present !
" If you chaff the poor child like that you'll frighten him away
at once, Min," says Jane gravely. " He is not used to it Kaw-
don belongs to a very serious family indeed."
" Then how comes Rawdon to be running about with you,
Jenny dear?" asks the actress.
They issue forth from the theatre together, and proceed, all
three, in the direction of Jane's lodgings. Miss Arundel, as I
mentioned, is clad in most of the colours of the rainbow ; the
nameless untidiness of her dress, the freedom of her demeanour,
her short cut air, her bismuthed eyes, all speak in plainest lan-
guage to what profession, and to what lowly rank of the pro-
fession, she belongs. Now would be the time for the jointly-
hired Hervey-Crosbie brougham, with its grand mock-private
coachman, to pass along ! The awful vision of such an encounter
darts, unbidden, across Rawdon's brain, and with it the re-
collection that at this very moment he should be at number
one-hundred-and-five, Bolton Row, apparelled in black suit and
white cravat for a family entertainment.
"You will dine with us at six,* wrote Emma, in her little love-
AMONG "THE PROFESSION." 219
. ..
despatch of orders, " and we will go to whatever theatre Major
Hervey takes a box for afterwards. But come as much sooner
as you like. I shall dress early."
And here he is, sauntering cheerfully along at the side of Miss
Arundel and Jane, through Leicester Square, just as though time
and liberty were his own possessions still ! He takes out his
watch with a sudden twinge of conscience, as the wording of
Emma's note recurs to his mind, and discovers that it is already
half -past five.
" If you want to run away, run," says Miss Minnie Arundel,
as if she were speaking to a child of six. " Little boys need never
take out their watches twice in my society."
Rawdon explains, addressing Mrs. Theobald, for he is afraid
of the lurking mockery in Min's black eyes, that he has an
engagement an unimportant one, but from which he must
needs free himself before he goes away to his hotel to dress.
" I thought you told me, an hour ago, that you had no engage-
ment at all 1" Jane remarks.
" No engagement that could not be broken/' answers Rawdon
Crosbie.
" All engagements can be broken, if one has moral courage-
moral courage, and sufficient means to pay the forfeit-money,"
says the actress, whose turn of mind sharp contact with the
world has rendered commercial
" Moral courage and sufficient means to pay the forfeit-money."
Rawdon hails a hansom, promising to call by half-past seven at
Jane's lodgings ; and as he rattles quickly along towards Bolton
Row he ponders long and deeply over the practical wisdom con-
tained in Miss Minnie Arundel's remark.
1
220 OUGHT WE TO VISIT HER t
CHAPTER XXIIL
THOSE DEAR HERVEYS,
Ton he can no longer hide from himself in what position he
standi If he did ro t realise the truth before, this sweetness of
reconciliation, this hour and a half spent at Jane's side, have
brought him to see it in its very nakedness at last, As much
mad passionate devotion as Ms nature is capable of, he, Emma
Marsland's lover, is lavishing upon a woman the tips of whose
fingers he will never be allowed to kiss while he lives. Now,
what does honour at a pass like this bid him do ?
" All engagements may he broken, if one has moral courage
moral courage, and means sufficient to pay the forfeit-money."
Has he such moral courage and such means'? Courage to
break the heart of a good and amiable girl who, until she became
his betrothed wife, was his sister and best friend ; means to pay
the forfeit (not the loss of Emma's fortune, let me do Rawdon
justice, this is the lightest of his considerations) : the forfeit of
self-respect, of credit before his own family and before the world,
which breach of faith so flagrant must entail 1
Well, then, shall he tell the truth, the absolute, honourable,
ridiculous truth, and let Emma deal with the future of both as
she chooses % "I thought I loved you, my dear Emma," such a
confession must run. " I was sure, at all events, that it was
my mamma's wish we should marry ; and as you have thirty
thousand pounds, and as I knew that you had long ago bestowed
your affections upon me, I proposed. And on the day you
accepted me, my dear, I fell in love with some one else need-
less, I believe, to mention her name and have been stealthily
seeing her and falling deeper and deeper in love ever since. She
laughs in my face ; was good enough, a few days ago, to tell me
that her heart was not in her own keeping, and I think this has
had the effect of rendering my passion for her a little the stronger.
The possession of a torn glove, of a faded flower that she has
THOSE DEAR HER VE YS. 22 1
worn, renders me happier than would the gift, my dear Emma,
of your hand and of all the substantial blessings your hand
would bring with it However, as I am trying to act like a man
of honour, you see, I tell you the truth. Do with me, decide for
me, as you think best."
If he said this to Emma Marsland nay, if he embodied the
spirit of this in terms of the nicest circumlocution and delicacy
he would be a brute ; and if he continues to tread the path
wherein he finds himself at present, he will be a scoundrel
And . . . the cab turns with a jerk round the corner by Devon-
shire House into Bolton Row, just at this point of his meditations
. . . and what the dickens, thinks Rawdon, descending suddenly
from theory to practice, what the dickens can he say, short of
absolute falsehood, that shall account to poor Emmy for his
desertion of the family dinner-party and the family theatre-
going to-night 1
He stops at number one-hundred-and-five, and, bidding the
cabman wait for him, runs up the steps and gives a knock,
whose loudness and decision are in a direct inverse ratio to his
actual frame of mind. Number one-hundred-and-five, Bolton
Row, is a lodging-house, but a lodging-house of the most private
and elegant kind ; the master of which, Mr. Maurice, after two
o'clock in the day, transforms himself into a stately and im-
posing-looking family butler. Mr. Maurice has been in the
confidence of the Hervey family during the last half -century :
needless to say that he knows all about the impending marriage
between Rawdon Crosbie and Miss Marsland. " I am to dis-
charge the cab, Mr. Rawdon %" This with a glance at Rawdon's
morning coat, as Mr. Maurice, dignified and in full dress, stands
on the summit of his own door-steps.
"No," answers Rawdon, shortly; "the cab will wait. My
mother is at home, Maurice V
" The ladies are in the drawing-room, dressed for dinner, sir."
And up the stairs walks Maurice, a model of all the respecta-
bilities, in his patent shoes and black suit ; Mr. Rawdon, in his
/
nr
222 OUGHT WE TO VISIT HER?
disreputable Oxford mixture, and with conscience to match,
following.
He is ushered into the drawing-room, and for a moment sees
neither Emma nor Mrs. Crosbie ; sees only towering pyramids
of silver-grey moire\ held aloft by a much grander-looking young
gentleman than himself, whose insignia of office, a yard measure,
lies, with laces, ribbons, and other adjuncts of female dress, on
an adjacent table.
" Rawdon, at last," says Mrs. Crosbie, advancing, and giving
her son three fingers, but too engrossed in the thrilling perplex-
ities of millinery to notice whether he is in orthodox sables or
not " Take care where you step, Rawdon. You find us in the
middle of a most important matter. Yes," addressing herself
to the shopman, " I am almost sure the moire' is not the right
shade. I am thankful I saw it at home before having it cut
At a little distance it might be taken for dirty white. Emma,
my dear, you are nearest to Mrs. Hervey ; ask if she does not
think the dress, especially for the occasion, will have too much
the appearance of dirty white V
Emma, who is looking rather less attractive than usual, in
ribbons of the wrong colour, stoops, on this, to a very handsome,
very deaf old lady in an arm-chair, and shouts out the desired
question : " Does Mrs. Hervey not think, when the moire* is
made up, and considering the occasion it is wanted f or" here a
meaning smile is furtively addressed by poor Emmy to Raw-
don " that it will have rather too much the look of a dirty
whitef
" Considering what occasion 1* says the old lady, raising her
eyelids about the eighth of an inch. " Lower your voice, my
dear Miss Marsland, and I shall understand ; I never can hear**
when people speak so loud."
Old Mrs. Hervey is one of the most marvellous specimens of
antique beauty ever seen. She is a Hervey by blood it is an
hereditary custom among this people to intermarry and has
e typical family face. A delicate, longish nose, that, if it only
THOSE DEAR HERVEYS. 223
stood out sufficiently, would be a noble one ; a mouth whose
thin lips, even in extreme old age, keep their high-bred, scornful
curves ; a complexion of marble, discoloured merely, not seamed,
by age ; eyebrows elevated, as though in pity of the rest of the
world for not being Herveys ; long-cut eyes, cold and black as
jet, and the " Hervey eyelids." Her dress is of pearl-coloured
satin ; Elizabethan ruffles of softest lace are round her throat,
and un wrinkled jewelled old hands ; above her forehead ascends
such a structure of snow-white hair the most expensive colour
in the world, by the way and yellowish Mechlin as Vandyke
would have loved to paint. A marvellous specimen of antique
beauty, preserved as only the antiseptic virtues of a cold heart
could preserve any creature for more than seventy years, and
likely to last another decade or so with ease.
What shall kill a woman who has been strong enough to out-
live youth and love, joy and sorrow, all hopes, and all regrets j
The friends and lovers of Mrs. Hervey's youth, her husband,
her blooming sons and daughters (of whom only one wreck
remains), all these were gone from her, hushed in the mould,
long ages ago. And Mrs. Hervey not only lives on, but enjoys
life ; think of that, reader, of twenty-five enjoys life still !
divides her time between Bath, Cheltenham, and London;
plays short whist with just as wholesome a gusto as erewhile
she played long ; goes to the theatres of the day to see French
actresses and English breakdowns, as once she went to see* Sid-
dons and Kemble in their prime ; lives in the world, and keeps
the world's pace still. A wise old philosopher, who conquers
time by accommodating herself to time's changes just that.
This gift of long living would probably, if we understood it
better, turn out to be only the gift of superior pliability. Mrs.
Hervey has seen all fashions, in manners, art, dress, morals, and
has conformed herself to each in its turn. When she was born,
George the Third and good Queen Charlotte had long been
holding their model court of dull decorum and strictest domestic
fidelity. Her early youth was spent under the influence of the
i
224 OUGHT WE TO VISIT HER*
regency ! Then, by the time she was middle-aged, had come a
turn in the kaleidoscope, and the bits of glass were back in the
old George the Third or courtly domestic pattern. And now,
here we all are wearing high heels to our shoes again ; and
requiring high-rouged pleasures ; and abjuring domesticity ;
and going, by way of aesthetic entertainment, to see Mademoi-
selle Boulotte !
Mrs. Hervey has known virtue to be in vogue and vice at a
discount, and again vice regnant and virtue nowhere, not once,
but a good many times during her life ; the change recurring,
indeed, almost with as periodic a regularity as large bonnets and
small ones. And she has been a citizeness of the world, loyally
following the world's current always.
At her request a box has been taken for the French plays to-
night.
" Boulotte is really an amusing creature," says Mrs. Hervey ;
" and as the play is in another language we need understand
no more about her than we think fit We are sure of a better
audience there than at any theatre in town ; all the best people
go to have a look at 3oulotte, and a good audience is what a
little country mouse like Miss Marsland should be taken to see."
It is some minutes before Rawdon, nervously watching the
clock upon the mantelpiece, can get a chance of speaking. The
silver-gray moire* so a whisper from Emma informs him is to
be " mamma's wedding dress I mean the dress worn by mamma
at our wedding." And, having firmly resolved to become the
possessor of this moir6, Mrs. Crosbie rings every disparaging
change that she can think of with respect to it into the ears of
the long-suffering silken-tongued shopman. It will certainly
look too much like dirty white for a bridal occasion. The water
is not large enough. Every here and there yes, but Mrs.
Crosbie is certain of it every here and there you can see a
decided unevenness in the cord. Emma joins in chorus. The
silken-tongued shopman explains ; the ladies return to the
charge ; retire ; make a feint of withdrawing wholly from the
THOSE DEAR HERVEYS. 225
bargain ; at last get the dress, " as it is the close of the season,
not from any flaw in the article," for two guineas less than its
original price. And then come the ribbons and the laces, and
the trimmings, all of which must be had at close-of-the-season
prices too.
Sick, and disgusted at heart, boiling over with impatience he
dare not show, young Eawdon listens. Oh, the paltriness, he
thinks, the vulgarity, the sordid smallness of all this huckster-
ing ! Unless women wish to make the men to whom they
belong despise them utterly, never should they suffer them to
be present at these sorts of commercial transactions. Why
Helen herself would have lost half her lovers could her lovers
have heard her haggling, an hour at a time, with a smirking
man-milliner, over silk dresses and ribbons ! But then men-
milliners belong to such a much more advanced stage of civil-
isation than Helen's !
At last it is over. The grandly-dressed young gentleman
gathers up his remaining wares, and bows himself backwards
from the room. And Rawdon, lashed by this time into a very
fever of impatience, may speak.
" I'm extremely sorry, Emma, but your note did not come
soon enough. I am engaged for to-night."
"Engaged!" cries Emma, dismally. "Oh, Rawdon, how
horrid of you ! Oh, mamma, what shall we do V
" Thirteen guineas for fifteen yards and a half," says Mrs.
Crosbie, holding the dress between her shapely fingers, and
looking up dreamily at the ceiling ; " that comes to less than
eighteen shillings a yard. There can be no doubt of it, Emmy,
silks are to be got cheaper in Tottenham Court Road than at
the West-end shops. And if one has the credit of always dealing
at Howell and James's," adds Mrs. Crosbie, " who can say where
any particular thing comes from 1 Rawdon, I trust you admire
the dress in which 1 mean to do honour to a certain great
occasion T
" I don't know which to admire most, mother," answers Raw-
'5
226 OUGHT WE TO VISIT HER t
don, "the dress, or the principles of economy you displayed
in buying it I hope the bride-cake and favours are to be bar-
gained for in the same praiseworthy spirit V
The bride-cake and favours ! Yes ; his projects of truth-tell-
ing, of paying forfeit, should honour bid him do so, have come
to this already. Chafed in temper, wearied in spirit, though
Rawdon Crosbie may be, the sight, the very rustle of these
wedding-garments, seem (boy that he is still at heart) to have
irrevocably sealed his doom ! Half an hour ago reprieve might
have been possible. He can hear the " never, never," sounding
from every fold of the gray moir6, held, like the web of fate,
between his mother's hands. . . The more reason, thinks Raw-
don, with another glance at the clock, to make the most of this
dwindling span of liberty that is still his ; of this evening, this
whole, intoxicating, unlawful, most delightful evening, from
half-past seven till twelve, that he is to pass at Jane's side !
There is silence after his little question about the bride-cake
and favours ; silence relieved after a few moments by a depre-
cating " ahem " from behind Mrs. Hervey's easy chair.
" After the breaking off of Miss Copplestone's marriage," says
a Hervey voice " after the breaking off of Adelina Copple-
stone's marriage with the Hon. Charles Gascoigne, I remember
the cake was put up for sale in the window of the chief con-
fectioner at JEarrAwgate. It was thought rather bad taste on
the part of the Copplestone family; still, as dear old Lady
Copplestone said, * What is the use of a wedding-cake except at
a wedding V And a doctor, or a solicitor, or some such person,
eventually bought it, at cost price, on the occasion of his daugh-
ter's marriage."
Old Mrs. Hervey opens her eyes, which have been closed ever
since she gave her final opinion on the silver-gray moire*.
"What in the world are you talking about, Maria? You speak
more unintelligibly every day. Repeat your observation, pray,
and distinctly. It drives me distracted to hear people mumbling
their words, as if they were ashamed of them."
THOSE DEAR HERVEYS. 227
Upon this the narrative has to be repeated, vociferated, syl-
lable by syllable into the old lady's ear.
" Who are the Copplestones, and where is the point V is her
chilling commentary. "Don't get into the habit of telling
pointless stories, my good Maria. Life is quite tedious enough
already, without that."
"My good Maria" is old Mrs. Herve/s unpaid white slave,
or companion, and another Hervey. She is a young lady of
dim and shadowy age, who, until a few years ago, haunted the
ball-room walls of one of our inland watering towns with
mournful tenacity, and from whose heart a solitary matrimonial
hope has not yet fled. Tall, and waspish of figure, acid of ex-
pression, sallow with the sallowness engendered by a life to
which exercise and fresh air are alike unknown, my good Maria
has certainly not her share of the family looks. She will tell
you confidently that she had ' eyelashes, complexion, anima-
tion once ; but adds, with pathetic truthfulness, that she lost
them all after measles. And old Mrs. Hervey will not allow
her to patch up deficiencies by art. " In our position, my good
Maria, the less we try to attract the attention of others, the
better taste we shall show." As a consequence, Maria's face
is like her whole, flat, disappointed, colourless existence a
blank.
She is the most useful Companion to Polite Society, or Ad-
denda to the Peerage extant ; old Mrs. Hervey knows that no
money could ever refill her good Maria's place, did she lose her :
has the nobility by heart, and is a positive new edition, with
notes of the ' The Landed Gentry of Great Britain and Ireland.'
' Who's Who V is no mystery to Maria Hervey. She can tell you
to a nicety where everybody was born, and where their grand-
father was buried, and the exact date when plebeian blood from
the veins of a " solicitor or doctor, or some such person," first
made its way into the family. Especially are the marriages and
burials of defunct Herveys her glory and delight. With her
own fair fingers she has drawn out a miraculously minute and
15-2
r^i
228 OUGHT WE TO VISIT HER t
widespreading genealogical record, showing forth all the noble
families who, from the time of Edward the Sixth downwards,
have contracted alliances with her ancestors. She etches little
pen-and-ink bits of architecture on card (mostly constructed on
the principle of the famous leaning towers of Bologna), and
presents them to strangers, as the tombs or birthplaces of the
Herveys. She knows English history well, in as far as it forms
a frame- work or back-ground to Hervey existence; can tell you
accurately at what siege one of her forefathers devoured his own
leathern doublet, and at what battle another, both arms shot
away, managed to get his bridle round his neck, and thrice
shouting " Pour y parvenir !" the family motto, rushed on, fol-
lowed by every Hervey on the field, to a glorious martyrdom.
"An invaluable dictionary of reference, though somewhat
badly bound," Mrs. Hervey says of her in her pleasant, cruel
way. To be ill-favoured in person is, in the old lady's eyes, the
worst crime a woman and a Hervey can commit " If my good
Maria married, it would positively take a library to replace her.
Happily, there is little chance of that"
Between Maria and Bawdon Crosbie there has long existed
bitter blood ; on Maria's side at least When Bawdon was a
small boy he once sent Miss Hervey a valentine, drawn by him-
self, in which occurred a richly illuminated device of a Hervey
swimming towards the ark after the Deluge, with the family
pedigree between his teeth. And Maria never could get over
the affront. She spits forth a little mild venom at him now.
u Bawdon spoke of bargaining for the bride-cake and favours,
ma'am. I mentioned the Copplestones, to show that there may
be extraordinary instances of such things going cheap. Adelina
Copplestone was an heiress," adds Maria, with spiteful retro-
spection, " and changed her mind about the Hon. Charles Gas-
coigne quite at the last, Bawdon."
" And did the Hon. Charles drown himself, Maria V Bawdon
asks. " You know how interested I am in every detail connected
with the aristocracy."
THOSE DEAR HERVEYS. 229
Before Maria can answer, Mrs. Crosbie, waking at length from
the contemplation of her moire, remarks that her son is not in
evening dress. Is Rawdon aware that in another five minutes
dinner will.be on the table ?
And now, his mother asking him questions, the eyes of Emma,
of old Mrs. Hervey, of Maria, all fixed upon him, Rawdon must
put his defalcation in the best light he can. If Emmy's note
had come one post earlier an engagement to dine with an old
academy chum starting for China next week an engagement
there is no getting out of. He meant to say a simple honest
" no," and started by saying it. Before he knows where he is,
he finds himself drawn on into half-a-dozen small white lies; very
small, very white ones ; but that are lies notwithstanding, and
that, sooner than he wots of, may rise up in judgment against
him.
" Whatever pleases you, pleases us/' cries' Emma, doing her
best to be dignified and cool. " Fortunately, we are not left
quite without an escort. Fortunately, Major Hervey has not
thrown us over at the last."
A loud double knock comes at the house-door at this very
moment. " There is Alfred," says the old lady, raising her eye-
lids about the sixth of an inch. " Punctual to the moment as
usual. You young men of the new school, Rawdon Miss Mars-
land, you allow me to lecture, I hope 1 might take an example
in punctuality from Alfred."
Rawdon, who wants neither examples nor lectures, either,
just at present, takes his leave with all the haste he can ; and
closely following his departure, Major Hervey, Alfred Hervey,
the celebrated Adonis, and flower of all the Herveys, is ushered
with ceremony by Mr. Maurice into the drawing-room.
Adonis is a small, very well-made man, who dresses, and pads,
and dyes for thirty-eight, and is in reality slightly over fifty ;
like his mother, but with every peculiarity of the Hervey face
accentuated the contemptuous eyebrows more upraised, the
lids more drooping, the delicate greyhound nose flatter to the
230 OUGHT WE TO VISIT HER 1
face. Not a handsome man, above all in profile ; and yet one
who, if only a fraction of his own modest hints are to be be-
lieved, has proved more destructive to women's hearts and to
the domestic peace of households than any acknowledged beauty
man in London.
No one knows how or why Alfred Hervey was first christened
Adonis. I believe that he, himself, originated and stood spon-
sor for the name in the first instance, and that society at large
adopted it as a covert weapon of ridicule afterwards. But the
Hervey construction of intellect would never allow any mem-
ber of the family to realise the possibility of his or her being
ridiculed.
"These sobriquets are a sort of heirloom with us," says
Adonis, pulling down his long purple-black whiskers, and giving
you a supercilious stare from under his heavy eyelids. " Be-
collect the celebrated handsome Hervey time of George the
First % Not our branch of the family came over three hundred
years before they were heard of still, the Hervey name aw;"
all Major Hervey's speeches "urn" and "aw" themselves into
nonentity before he has done with them " the Hervey family.
This kind of sobriquet er quite an heirloom in the family."
He advances to his mother and goes through the form of im-
printing a salute upon her white old cheek. Then, having lan-
guidly bestowed his small gloved hand upon Mrs. Crosbie (and
a forefinger upon Maria), on his way, comes to Emma's side ;
poor little Emma, who from behind the window-curtain has
been watching the hansom that bore Bawdon away, and at the
present moment is trying with all the fortitude she possesses to
keep herself from tears.
Adonis expresses his happiness at finding the heiress alone.
He whispers, so close that his whiskers tickle her ear, that she
never before looked so charming. He makes her feel, without
uttering Bawdon Croahie's name, that her lover is a monster of
' and bad taste for having left her.
m you know, thou, that Bawdon has deserted us fox
THOSE DEAR HERVEYS. 231
good V cries Emma. " I suppose you know that we are thrown
altogether upon your tender mercies, Major Hervey 1"
" Rawdon rushed past me an avalanche, upon my word, an
avalanche on the stairs, " says the beau. " His pace and size"
(Adonis has an irrepressible dislike for men a head and
shoulders taller than himself), " his pace and size er made me
retreat as far as possible, but I presumed, en passant, from
Rawdon's appearance, that he could scarcely be thinking of
spending the evening in the society aw of ladies."
" And so we have no one to take care of us but you. Think
of that, Major Hervey, ,, says Emma, piteously. " Four forlorn
ladies all under your charge."
Old Mrs. Hervey, whose power of hearing is curiously capri-
cious, turns her head round, on this, towards her son and Emma.
" What is that you are saying, Miss Marsland V* she asks, in
her silvery, well-bred, insincere old treble. " Four ladies under
Alfred's charge ! In virtue of my pre-adamite age you reckon
me as two, I conclude f
Emma answers that Rawdon's place with a little tremble of
the voice, this Rawdon's place being left vacant, she imagined
Maria would like to occupy it.
" You are very obliging, my dear," says the old lady, calmly ;
" very obliging, but I think not. Our good Maria has letters to
write this evening."
Our good Maria, used though she is to being left at home on
every occasion when her services are not absolutely wanted,
bites her lip, and colours.
" I think I should like to go to the theatre this once," she
says, faintly, and gives a glance towards her one hope in exist-
ence Major Hervey.
"Five people are a wrong number for any box," answers
Adonis, with cold-blooded promptness. "Even with four
impossible for everyone to see the stage."
" But I don't care for seeing the stage. I prefer a back place.
I prefer p
232 OUGHT WE TO VISIT HERt
" My good Maria," says the old lady, suavely, "let us have no
discussion. You have your letters to write, and we will tell you
to-morrow morning what we think of Mademoiselle Boulotte."
So it is settled. They go down to dinner in old Mrs. Hervey's
parlour, which she kindly lends to her relations during their
stay in town, as a dining-room. Mrs. Crosbie, that is to say,
orders the daily dinner (and pays for it), and the old lady and
Maria are saved the trouble of ordering theirs. The Herveys
have a perfect genius for doing kindnesses of this unostentatious
sort to their friends.
Emma is placed next to Adonis, and by the time dinner is
over has almost ceased to regret young Rawdon's absence. She
loves Rawdon Crosbie, heart and soul ; loves him as youth loves
youth. But the flatteries, the tender whispers of the hardened
old heiress-hunter at her side, do not fall altogether powerless
on her ear. Long ago, before it was at all a settled thing that
she was to be Rawdon's wife, Emma, in her inmost heart, knew
that if she chose she might be Major Hervey's ; I think, had
decided that such a fate would be endurable. Such love as she
felt for Rawdon she could, of course, never feel for this elderly
Adonis ; but she admired him, took him at his own valuation,
said to herself that even Rawdon would be improved could he
only adopt the finished dress, the Grandisonian manner, the
exquisite refinement of style of Major Hervey. "Wherever
Adonis goes people look at him, and every one knows him, and
he knows every one, and it makes one feel like Somebody to be
with him." To many a plain little country girl, as well as
Emma Marsland, these are powerful attractions for a man who
lays himself at her feet to possess.
By the time dinner is over Emmy has got over her disap-
pointment at her lover's absence ; by the time they are leaving
their box at the theatre has almost forgotten the existence of
any other man in the world but Major Hervey. The house,
as old Mrs. Hervey foretold, is crowded with the best people
in London, from royalty downwards. Bows and smiles of
THOSE DEAR HERVEYS. 233
recognition come to Adonis from every side. He points out to
Emma's dazzled gaze lords, ladies, foreign ambassadors, two
cabinet ministers, and a dean in disguise, all looking delighted
with the vivacities of Mademoiselle Boulotte. Poor Rawdon !
sacrificing himself at the dull altar of friendship with that
academy chum of his who is bound for China ! Emma cannot
but feel some twinges of remorse as she thinks of him, and re-
flects upon her own enjoyment, her own readiness to be consoled
by other society in his absence.
When they are leaving the theatre old Mrs. Hervey declares
herself ready for supper. (Think, Reader, of the constitution
such a declaration implies ! After seventy years' eating and
drinking, to be able to dine at six and cry out for supper at
eleven !) " You young people have grown too delicate, or dine
too late, to care about supper," she remarks. " In my day we
would have given nothing for Siddons herself unless we had
supped afterwards. What do you say, Miss Marsland? Shall
Alfred take us somewhere I suppose such places exist where
we can have another hour of each other's society, and a chicken
salad as well f
Emma, seldom averse, as we have seen, to the pleasures of the
table, gives an animated " Yes" to this proposal ; and Adonis is
called upon to think of some restaurant to which ladies, at this
hour of the night, may with propriety the parenthesis from
Mrs. Crosbie be taken for refreshment
He answers, with withered playfulness, that he considers
upon his soul, he considers his mother the fastest debutante of
the season. At this hour of the night where may ladies be
taken without impropriety %
"Well, really," Adonis asks, "where may ladies nowadays
not be taken without impropriety 1 You know, there's that
corner place close to the Haymarket Wilmot's Wilcocks
what the deuce is the name of it ? Corner place . . . where
you are not inordinately poisoned, for an English restau-
rant ; . . Wilcocks, of course, it is. Liable to mixed company
234 OUGHT WE TO VISIT HER t
actresses, and that sort of thing ; still, every one goes to
Wilcocks's every one. Major Hervey's particular friend, the
Marchioness of Yeriphast, and her cousin, Lady Carolina, were
there together only the other night and the best of the joke
was, poor Lady Carolina ran across her own husband had it
from the Marchioness herself."
"Well, wherever such distinguished examples lead, we, surely,
may follow," says the old lady, gaily. Mrs. Hervey is really the
liveliest companion imaginable to go about London with ! Has
always, stupidly, left her purse behind her (a family trick of
f orgetfulness observable in Adonis also) ; but, except as regards
the payment of money, ready and full of spirit for everything.
" Now, what do you say, Juliana ; may we venture with
safety T
And Mrs. Crosbie, the still small voice drowned, I fear, in the
music of that delicious word " Marchioness," has not strength of
mind to say " No."
So to the corner place near the Haymarket, where you are not
inordinately poisoned, but where actresses and that sort of
thing may have to be encountered, the coachman of the mock-
private Hervey and Crosbie brougham is ordered to proceed.
CHAPTER XXIV.
A MIDNIGHT MEETING.
And Eawdon % Driving back, as quickly as a well-bribed cabby
can drive him, to his hotel, Eawdon orders some food, rushes up
to dress, swallows a beefsteak, tough and gory as a British steak
should be, and arrives at the Theobalds' lodgings in Maddox
Street exactly a quarter of an hour behind the appointed time.
When the door opens the two ladies are in the act of descend-
ing the stairs. Jane is simply dressed in white, no ornaments
in her brown hair, a bouquet of flowers, fresh from Covent
A MIDNIGHT MEETING. 235
Garden this morning, in her hand. Miss Minnie Arundel is a
vision of grandeur awful to behold ! hair raised in elaborate
pyramids at the back ; hair descending in fluffy clouds to the
eyebrows ; a satin train ; a pannier, trimmed with tulles and
laces ; rouge ; pearl-powder; a strong odour of Guards Bouquet;
a laced pocket-handkerchief ; a pair of costly opera-glasses, and
a fan. It is a theory of Min's that if you hide handsome
presents under a bushel you may just as well never get hand-
some presents at all. (Not an incorrect theory, surely ; see the
court newspaper, if you would learn how even the brides of
refined society display their trophies to an admiring world.) And
to-night, with some covert design, perhaps, of bewildering Raw-
don's infantine mind, she has literally hung herself round with
spoils.
How can so much grandeur ever be compressed within the
narrow limits of a four-wheeler % Jane gets in first ; Miss
Arundel follows ; the cab is more than full ; laces, tulles and
ribbons puff forth through the open windows on either side.
"And 111 go on the box/' says Rawdon, as he stands, his
opera-hat under his arm, his slim, six-foot figure very upright,
on the pavement.
" Indeed, you'll do nothing of the kind," cries Jane. "I felt
a drop of rain on my face as we came out You must get as
close to me as you can, and we'll let Min have a whole side to
herself and her finery."
Rawdon, not very reluctantly, obeys ; the cabman shuts the
door with a bang, and off they start. Perfumed clouds of gauzy
material pervade the whole cab, settle on the young artillery-
man's knees, ascend and touch his chin : he can scarce get a
glimpse of the poor little happy over-rouged, over-dressed
woman opposite, to whom they belong.
" We were just beginning to think what we should do if you
didn't come," she cries shrieks, rather in vain efforts to out-
voice the rattling of the cab. " What made you late % Did the
extremely serious family enter objections at the last?"
i
236 OUGHT WE TO VISIT HER t
" Why, Min, you little goose \" says Jane, " the serious family
are all safe down in Chalkshire. Do you think Eawdon would
dare be dancing attendance upon you and me if his lawful
owners were in London."
And Eawdon volunteers no explanation. Oh, what spirits he
is in ! How thoroughly he enjoys his drive with Jane and her
sister in this dingy four-wheeler, and through unfashionable
London streets, redolent of the dust and heat and closeness
normal to London streets of a July evening ! Min loses her
fan, her opera-glasses, the order for the theatre, before tfcfey have
gone a hundred yards ; and Rawdon must help her to search
for each in its turn. And the fan is found hanging on her
wrist, and the opera-glasses how in the world did they get
there % are in Kawdon's hand, and the order is inside her own
glove. And then how they both laugh, as if they had been
saying or doing something wonderfully witty, over each dis-
covery !
** I'm sure I hope you are going to behave yourselves like
rational beings at last," says Jane, when they are entering the
theatre. "Kawdon, give Min your arm, and lead the way
oh ! but I wish it, please. Just as if I would take our only
beau away from Min !"
And so they proceed to the stalls. Here Miss Arundel draws
back for her sister, who, as a married lady, enters and takes
her place first The natural consequence of this is, that Raw-
don, following last, is divided, during the whole of the evening,
from Mrs. Theobald.
He feels certain that the arrangement was preconcerted be-
tween the sisters ; turns furious ; turns sulky. Then resolving
to show that he, in his turn, can be indifferent, begins to flirt
with all his might with Miss Minnie ArundeL
This is exactly the object for which Jane invited him to
accompany them. Poor old Min must be amused ! She looks
round at him with one of her friendliest smiles, leans over, and
whispers, that unless they behave better she shall feel it her
A MIDNIGHT MEETING. 237
duty her positive duty, " as a friend of Mr. Crosbie's family,"
to divide them. And Rawdon's ill-temper flies.
Jane, in her simple dress, looks doubly fair to him, contrasted
with the marvels of hairdressing and millinery presented by
her sister. Amidst the mingled odours of Miss Arundel's laced
handkerchief and of the dainty pink play-bills with which the
stalls are rustling, Rawdon can detect or, the same thing,
imagines he can detect the faint country smell of the flowers
in her hand. He whispers, flirts, looks tenderly into Miss
Arund^L's black eyes. But Miss Arundel is not here at all !
And the theatre, and the soft-playing orchestra, and the well-
dressed people, and the pink play-bills, are not real. And he
stands with Jane alone, as he stood in the starlight at Spa, or
in the silent old garden at Theobalds. She listens to his plead-
ing at last. There is no Francis Theobald, no Emma Marsland,
in the world, and . . .
" You are talking great rubbish," says Miss Arundel, coquet-
tishly, in answer to one of his most high-flown compliments.
" Who would have thought a child of your age had learnt the
ways of this wicked world already V
Well, the evening passes only too quickly, and although he
does not speak a dozen words to Jane, proves certainly one of
the red-letter evenings of Rawdon Crosbie's life. ** Excellent
company to be at a play with," is Miss Minnie Arundel. She
is the humblest of all humble actresses herself; but not a point,
not a delicate shade in the acting of artists gifted with superior
powers to her own, is lost upon her. And Kawdon, quick to
see as others see, to feel as others feel, enjoys with her enjoy-
ment. A pleasant and appreciative companion ; a cool, softly-
lit theatre ; a luxurious stall ; the perfect representation of the
most perfect love-story ever put upon the stage, and the pre-
sence, divided from her though he may be, that constitutes the
whole world to his foolish boy's heart . . . What happier even-
ing is Rawdon Crosbie ever likely to know %
When it is over, and they are leaving the theatre, the question
i
25* OUGHT WE TO VISIT HER f
d sapper arises .as in anc&Ler ease we kziov of, or ratter the
q^esckn of where they shall scp 5^F*? cr hsnz Luked upon as
a naittr of course by Mis Miz^aie ArnadeL
She proposes one or two niff vrZI-ksevn places of popular
ecsersazzunenx. hat as each prcpitsaZ Jaae vVa* bo- head.
* I haren "l raach belief in yc*=r rc:t2zdaoas. Mis. and
I d:ti van: to take this j::c fr"-i az:yr~*er* oczrageoDUjfast.
HavdcD and I haw characurs 10 lose. rfcEae=iber- T
"Gi. I dcart kaov anyxiiiiS i'r.zrz: dhankaers/ cries Mm.
wish her beany lang*i " Tie ccsscrc: xbas e maam me is.
here caz. w* frt the bess s=p2* azii lie sax t^nawnwit Of
prirrsfc. if "aw vazaed to oo lib* ?V*r ia srot and T vhh a
j^arae a* Eavd:& -if expsosc was z: zc-y*ss* ve oci*n xo go
: Wiiaaefc*"*. Wikorks"* is a zj-to* tu*c cjdk 10 the Hay-
mazk5. r M5 Arzadei bassos x* exr".&-T : * a x^** vier*
y^L set lb* -recy beaxiesu gm-fTiS Tb* iass tini* I szrd iber*.
I anf Tgmw* B'^TTirtr.ke, r bai IrrL:* Frs5 RtmstT visa
is. Jrsi ba* r.n Lb* az25T..=*^r a: ii* fr.ceK* eoas. tzl kacw:
ami I sax i&I y:t he yirvd :n rwr atm* nc raxk aikd iz&e
rr ae rrtmtf & lake same loxke.*'
"^Tiisx ry aZ TTrtfcTt* j ts e: :: w ijrnri?* t: rort* ays
HaranL. * E^r saz. * *lL if v* are T*rr :a;iy. tbt: * zsay
n x see same "wry* :c rtri az mL*. ix ' C*Lly. Tr-'-.^r r-ii^.V
-p* ffliaX biro n: :ak i: t:cli xb=OL :nn. r
* Hessjg CftiarV* 7bf bsa vLnar.* say* Kit. ir aZ sarrozny.
* H* ax iul ^-Hnif. a: Tini* , I izjfir Vt viC "irbsL b* vnf 3
"Lbt * wf"^"= c ibe dyscal. ^V^^ . Ttm-S ** iiu.-vf o)K as
3dket of sue Fwauk ry *r.r*~ i*. Fre JliLnsLy iinHiii. r
^tiF a unmet x tf; icsi !Lavi.':c Lat^ t:^"^- ^jjf zuzsel
as laaus- ai a sLl. "Si "ST-'i^-t *^ '^ itify A r 1- *
TSuy s flB^T. n*x hkTzur vi^id 5:c lb* af5ar-Ti s ibe
ftniiat ic ""aues*. sxt irn "aif r::oi& iiLry n.Tirr. V-r, vh:
S{^aaBny uim* si hnme Tza.'Zte: zzZJkZCs&jitSL- ujiiiif jfHXue
c 11 i- TniiEr ran a "t-V HiLrru* ii'rtjf zx. zza xeubt
- *" t ^"'f "ait dEzxnat a aut ;c *uif mas: ossira^ue
A MIDNIGHT MEETING. 239
in the rooms. " You are cool there, close by the ferns and
fountain, and out of the way, and have the advantage of seeing
all the company as they pass in and out" And accordingly at
this table fatal little marble table, when will Rawdon forget
it 1 they take their places and prepare to look over the carte.
At Rawdon's request, Miss Arundel undertakes to preside at
the entertainment ; and this, Reader, is the barbaric bill of fare
selected by her :
Fried kidneys Min knows nothing about gastronomic laws
of sequence, but orders things pell-pell, just as they strike her
fancy fried kidneys ; sausages ; cold duck ; fried potatoes ;
cherry tart, and cream ; Stilton cheese, pulled bread, radishes.
And champagne to begin, continue, and finish the repast with.
Barbaric, but not unappetising; and Rawdon, after his
wretched dinner, is hungry, and the ladies who dined early, are
hungrier still ; and they all sup, not fashionably, dallying with
a fork and bit of bread over a mayonnaise, but with a will
The viands are good; the champagne, if not of the very
choicest brand, is sparkling, sweet, and heady. By the time the
stage of cherry tart is reached they are all in the highest spirits,
and making, I will not say more noise, but more open demon-
stration of light-heartedness, than the finest breeding might,
perhaps, approve of in a public supper-room.
However, there is no one present to be shocked. The ladies
of rank and title have, it would seem, gone elsewhere to-night.
There is certainly no outward sign of their presence among the
company at Wilcocks's.
" You told us we should be sure of a good supper here, Miss
Arundel," says Rawdon, " and we are having a most excellent
one. But where are the heavy swells ? What a pity your friend
with the aristocracy at his fingers 1 ends is not here. He might
tell us whether we are supping among common people like our-
selves, or dukes and marchionesses in disguise."
" The aristocracy will come by-and-by in crowds," says the
little actress, jealous for the reputation of Wilcocks's. "At this
240 OUGHT WE TO VISIT HER f
moment I can see ladies in opera cloaks, getting out of a private
carriage. Min is so placed as to command a view of the pave-
ment outside the restaurant " Yes, here we are, in great form
black velvet and marabout feathers ; scarlet hair and scarlet
ribbons ; venerable old party in point lace ; oppressively fine
gentleman, with Dundreary whiskers. The heavy swells are
coming in earnest at last."
"Better late than never," remarks Rawdon cheerily. Have
I not said that the champagne has taken favourable effect on
the spirits of them all ? And, leaning back in his chair, he
turns, in order to get a fuller view of the new arrivals.
They enter in a group of four. Little Major Hervey first, in
finished evening dress, with eyelids drooping, with his long flat
nose in the air, his opera-hat under one arm, Mrs. Crosbie, affable,
yet slightly rigid of demeanour, as though prepared for contin-
gencies, upon the other ; Emma and old Mrs. Hervey follow
behind.
" Well I they are queer-looking samples, I must say,* cries
Min, when she has examined them critically. " Unless Wilcocks
gets better specimens of the aristocracy than that I shall take
my patronage elsewhere. Have some sweets, my dear boy?"
liberally piling up the plate of the unhappy young gunner with
cherry tart and cream. " Oh, nonsense about having done. You
must be in love, as well as engaged, if you can't eat. I want
you to keep me in countenance. Jenny, my dear, pass over the
champagne the evening is only just beginning."
Only just beginning ! A chill of horror passed through Raw-
don Crosbie's suddenly-sobered veins at the thought
WITH DO UBTFUL ASSOCIA TES. 241
CHAPTER XXV.
WITH DOUBTFUL ASSOCIATES.
A waiter bows the new-comers forward to one of the centre
tables. They take their places ; Major Hervey - scanning the
carte at arm's length, and with uplifted eyebrows orders one
or two of the dishes " that we may hope will be least likely to
poison us ; with wine, whatever it is, that is sure to poison us !"
and then the ladies begin to look a little about them at the sur-
rounding company.
" I trust Alfred has done right in allowing us to come here, ,,
whispers Mrs. Crosbie to old Mrs. Hervey, who generally man-
ages to get back her sense of hearing in public places. "Do you
really think all these . . . persons look correct 1"
"In the present day, my dear," answers the old lady cheerfully,
" it is quite impossible to say who is correct and who is incorrect.
There used to be a costume, for the members of each world, but
fashion has changed ; class trenches upon class more and more,
and we must go with the times. I hope they will serve us with
a tolerable mayonnaise. I protest Mademoiselle Boulotte has
given me quite an appetite." ,
But Mrs. Crosbie, at once less of an optimist and less of a
cynic than the older wuman, is not so easily made comfortable.
If she could but be assured of the presence of a marchioness, a
Lady Carolina, nay even of a plain knight's wife, in these heated
flaring supper-rooms, she would be satisfied. For it is not so
much evil itself, evil in the abstract, as the fear of doing what
no one else does, of being seen where no one else is seen, that
ever lies with heaviest weight on Mrs. Crosbie's conscience.
" I wish Rawdon had come with us," she remarks, leaning
forward and addressing Major Hervey, who is with Emma upon
the other side of the table. "lam sure at these sorts of doubtful
places one cannot have too strong an escort of gentlemen."
" Oh, mamma, I think we are getting on delightfully !" cries
16
242 OUGHT WE TO VISIT HER t
Emma. Major Hervey is unfastening the heiress's glove, and
either his elderly eyes do not see very clear, or some peculiarity
about the button-hole causes the process to be unusually slow.
" If Rawdon chose to have a stupid engagement elsewhere, why
why "
The words die on her lips ; her face turns to a sickly pallor,
then crimson. " Why, there is Eawdon himself !" gasps out Miss
Marsland, sinking back in her chair, and giving fiery glances
across at the corner table, where her lover sits facing her; facing
her, but I am bound to say looking, soldier though he be, as if
he would fain sink bodily down through the floor ; and with his
eyes ignominiously fixed upon the heap of cherry tart and cream
with which Min's friendly hand has loaded his plate.
" Rawdon !" repeats Mrs. Crosbie, getting ready her double
eye-glasses. " Now I call this a very timely rencontre. With
his academy school friend, no doubt f
"Rawdon is with Mrs. Theobald," says Emma, her voice
trembling. " Mrs. Theobald and a Person a Person who is no
doubt Mrs. Theobald's sister, the actress. Oh, I'm sure of it,
mamma, from the likeness. Oh, how dreadful !" And Emma's
very breath fails her, so vehement is her righteous indignation.
" Yes, there is our young Rawdon," says Major Hervey, with
charming amiability. " Saw him the moment we came in. Per-
haps," he pointedly addresses Mrs. Crosbie, not Emma, "as
Rawdon is in another kind of society, it is a case urn in
which recognition may be er as well left alone V
Mrs. Crosbie turns her head, gracefully severe in its black
velvet bands and marabout feathers, and for the space of some
moments gazes stonily through her glasses on the culprits : on
Mrs. Theobald, whose blue eyes return the gaze as steadily as
on the day when she was first mistaken in Spa for a princess ;
on Rawdon, purple with confusion ; on Min, duly informed by
Jane of the serious family's advent, and upon whose expressive
mouth the broadest merriment is visible.
" I must ask you to conduct us from this place, Alfred." And,
WITH DO UBTFUL ASSOCIA TES. 243
as she speaks, Mrs. Crosbie turns slowly round again from the
awful sight of Rawdon's iniquities. " You are, of course, not
aware in what society Kawdon is ? An inhabitant of our own
neighbourhood, whom we do not visit, and a person whom I be-
lieve I can have no certain knowledge on such a point whom
I believe to be . . . theatrical ! I must ask you to give Emma
your arm, and conduct us to our carriage at once."
Adonis now leans across the table, and in four words puts
the situation before old Mrs. Hervey: " Kawdon supping with
actresses." Awkward position ; but still ^donis believes his
mother will agree with him 1 one in which good taste bids one
aw see nothing, and act er just as if nothing had hap-
pened. And his fingers, whjch still enclose Emma's wrist, give
her a tenderly reassuring little pressure as he says this.
" Of course, of course we see nothing," says the fine old
Pharisee, pleasantly. " Miss Marsland, my dear, you have the
gas immediately before your eyes. You had better come on
this side. These things occur every day, and Kawdon has far
too much good taste, I am sure, to recognise us. Yes, Mademoi-
selle Boulotte has given me quite an appetite. She is the best
actress I have seen the last hundred years."
Emma, however, is neither a Pharisee nor a woman of the
world, but a girl, very warmly, very earnestly in love, and trem-
bling in every fibre with anger and jealousy. " Thanks, Mr.
Hervey. I think I shall be glad to change my position." And
she rises, and with cool, insulting emphasis of manner, turns her
back deliberately upon her lover and his friends, then draws her
chair to old Mrs. Hervey's side. " These things may happen
every day," adds Emma, in a voice of suppressed passion ; and
somehow, as she says this, she knows that her eyes seek Major
Hervey's for support. " They will not happen to me twice ; I
am very sure of that"
Mrs. Crosbie's maternal heart gives a throb of cold terror. Is
the price of this escapade, this crowning folly of Bawdon's, to be
16 2
244 OUGHT WE TO VISIT HER t
Emma Marsland's thirty thousand pounds, and all the county
position, all the sacred blessings of existence that thirty thou-
sand pounds can bring with them 1
" Don't you think the fault may be a little ours in coming
here, my dear Emma? We must scold Alfred for that. As
regards Rawdon, young men "
" If they be men of honour, speak the truth, at least," cries
Emma, with greater spirit, perhaps, than she had ever shown in
her life before. " Rawdon could not come with us, remember,
because he had to dine with a school-friend who was going to
China to China, indeed ! However, it will be a question to
settle between Rawdon and me ; between Rawdon and me,
alone," adds Emma, indignantly. " Don't let anyone's supper
be spoilt by talking about it now."
And so, the shoulders of the three ladies set resolutely against
the faces of the foe, supper is eaten. Major Hervey seems to
be in unwonted spirits, and never lets the conversation flag for
an instant. Disregarding the poisonous nature of the dishes
bet before him, he even eats and drinks ; shows his magnificent
teeth to the gold, as he smiles at Emma and his own stories ;
and all the time manages to give an occasional glance of insolent
admiration in the direction of Jane and of her sister, that makes
young Rawdon's blood boil.
What an anti-climax to the evening that began so happily at
the Prince of Wales's listening to a delightfully-acted love idyll,
dreaming a still more delightful idyll of one's own ! Were he to
follow impulse merely, Rawdon Crosbie would march straight,
with his companions, from the rooms ; spare Jane the humilia-
tion, covert though it be, with which his own ludicrous position
is clothing her. But, with Min's laughing eyes fixed upon him,
he dare not thus show the better part of valour. All he dare do is
sit still ; return the glances of Adonis, with savage interest ; force
himself to laugh and jest, with the best grace he can ; drink
champagne, every glass of which seems to make his soul flatter
WITH DOUBTFUL ASSOCIATES. 245
and flatter ; and watch the back of Emmy's scarlet streamers
and of his mother's marabouts.
Jane at length brings his sufferings to an end. " If we have
all finished ... it seems a pity to hurry when we are so com-
fortable . . . but if we have all really finished, we may as well
be off. I don't want Theobald to get home before I do." And
Rawdon acquiescing only too promptly, she rises (by a furtive
turn of the head Emma's jealous eyes can watch every movement
of her rival's slight, graceful figure), coolly surveys herself, as she
adjusts her opera cloak in a neighbouring mirror ; then, with an
air of calmest appropriation, puts her hand within Rawdon's arm,
and, followed by Min, who bestows a saucy smile of adieu upon
the family party as she goes by, leaves the room.
Rawdon pays the cost of the entertainment to the head waiter,
who stands, bill in hand, at the door, and to whom the actress
gives a friendly " Good-bye, Charles," at parting. And then they
go out into the night.
Min is in the sort of wild spirits that succeed naturally to a
pleasantly spent evening, and an excellent supper and heady
champagne; and she "chaffs" Rawdon unmercifully. His
mamma, his sweetheart, the gentleman with the eyelids, the lec-
ture that awaits him, Rawdon, to-morrow all are pantomimed
by Miss Arundel, for his benefit, as they stand outside the door
of Wilcocks's, waiting for an empty cab to pass along. But Jane
is dead silent, and continues so during the whole of the drive
back to Maddox-street.
" Thanks for a very jolly evening," says Min, when Rawdon,
after dismissing the cab, is preparing to wish the ladies good-
night at the door of Theobald's lodgings. "I suppose we shall
see each other again before we die V
" A great many times, I should hope, if life is to be worth
holding," answers Rawdon Crosbie.
" I'm going to the Chalkshire races, with Jane and Theobald,
if I shouldn't see you before, and then but no," cries the little
-actress, looking up into his face with an air of mock pity; " after
246 OUGHT WE TO VISIT HER t
to-night's experience we won't make plans. Cruel to talk of
what the future might bring forth to any one in your precarious
situation/'
And then, with all her satins and furbelows rustling, away
Min runs up the stairs ; and Rawdon, whose present fate appears
to be to feel like a culprit before every one, is left alone with
Jane. Maddox-street, at this hour, is almost silent. An occa-
sional passer-by on foot, the distant drone of carriage- wheels in
Regent-street, are all that break the quiet. They are as much
alone as they were on Sunday evening, in the moss-grown garden
at Theobalds.
a That was a queer kind of meeting for us all to-night, I must
say," remarks Jane, amicably, yet with a certain tone in her voice
that Rawdon has learnt to dread. " Why didn't you tell me your
people were in town V
" Oh, I I thought I had mentioned it Yes, my mother and
Emma came up on Monday. They are spending a few days
with our relations, the Herveys."
He does his best to speak lightly, as if nothing of any moment
had occurred, and fails egregiously.
** The Herveys. Are those the people I saw them with at the
sapper-rooms?"
Fes."
Jane hesitates for a minute before she speaks again. A street
lamp immediately opposite shines full upon her face, and Raw-
don can see a tell-tale quiver about the corners of her lips. She
hesitates, but for a minute only ; then, in her usual impetuous
fashion, breaks forth thus : " I'm sorry this has happened, Raw-
don, because it's going to bring things to a smash between you
and me ; and yet, in another way, I'm glad. It has opened my
eyes pretty sharply to something good for me to see. Now, my
dear child, listen, and take the best bit of advice that has ever
been given you in your life yet. Cut me. I'm a bad business,
as far as you are concerned. Have nothing more to say to me."
He makes no answer, and probably Jane expects none. She
WITH DOUBTFUL ASSOCIATES. 247
must guess pretty accurately, one would think, what the poor
young fellow feels just at this moment.
" Of course I knew how we stood towards each other before
this, or I ought. I've had lessons enough on all useful subjects
of late ; but it never came home to me like it did to-night. For
there was Min, you see ! I've been so long out of the profession
that I seem neither one thing nor the other to myself at least.
Min is the real genuine article, an actress in heart, soul, body,
Min shows me what / am to people like your mother and Miss
Marsland. Rawdon, if we had been if poor Min and I had been
a pair of escaped convicts," cries Jane, with a half-fierce, half -sad
sort of a little laugh, " we could scarce have been looked at with
eyes of more pious horror. Why, even you n
"Mrs. Theobald!
" No ; hear me out. Even you knew too well what was due
that's the word I think 1 due to yourself and to the girl you
mean to marry to leave our side and speak to her. Well, you
see, I don't mean to be placed like that again, 'not never no more,'
as Blossy says. If those ladies were anything to you but what
they are I should say simply, ' Choose between them and me, and
I am the best worth choosing.' I can't say that as it is, can I V 1
Yes ; she can say what she likes ; she has only to speak to
command him in all things, cries Rawdon's heart ! But his lips
do not give utterance to this avowal of disallegiance.
* fc And so, what I do say is cut me. I'll give you another bit
of wise and wholesome advice. Run away to-morrow morning,
early, to Miss Marsland, and make the prettiest apology you can
for being seen with such doubtful associates. Tou broke some
lawful engagement, by the bye, Master Rawdon, did you not,
in order to go to ' School ' with us f
" I would have broken any engagement, lawful or the reverse,
on the chance of going anywhere with you," answers Rawdon
Crosbie.
u I thought so. Theobald says I have instinct, no reason. I
suppose it must have been instinct made me guess how the land
248 OUGHT WE TO VISIT HER t
lay as I sat humbly looking at the tips of your mamma's mara-
bouts. Well, apologize ! Say you will never do it again say
we over-persuaded you ; put as much blame on Min and me as
you like ! But make things straight, if you can, and get Miss
Marsland to name the wedding-day as soon as possible. Good-
night."
" And you think you think that you are going to be rid of me
like this !" cries Rawdon, hotly ; and as he speaks he leans his arm
within the door, so as to hinder Jane, if she wished to do so, from
shutting it. " Be a little franker, Mrs. Theobald ! Say, straight
out, you are tired of me ; say that, from some cause or another,
you .want me out of the way for a time, and 111 stop away till
you bid me come back "
"And suppose I am not tired of you, and suppose I have no
reason whatever for wishing you out of the way?" she interrupts.
u Don't be a fool a second time, Rawdon. Take what I say
in plain good part, as I mean it Miss Marsland lives in a world
that is not the world of women like Min and me, and you
cannot, honestly, remain her sweetheart and my friend. You
have to make your choice. Well, there can't even be a question
as to where your choice must lie. I am nothing to you ; Miss
Marsland is, or will be, everything. Cry Peccavi, Rawdon, as
you ought, and be quite sure although, most likely, we shan't
know each other to speak to in the time to come that I shall be
your friend at heart always. Now, really, good-night. I am
standing in a draught"
But Rawdon's arm does not move.
" I have only one thing more to ask you. When is this cut
eternal, of which you talk so cheerfully, to take place ? I like
to know accurately on what ground I stand."
" When 1 Why, when you are married, to be sura Do you
think I would speak to any man whose wife n
"No," interrupts Rawdon, quickly, " of course you would not;
I know that only too welL But suppose I never have a wife at
all ] Oh, such a contingency is quite on the cards, Mrs. Theo-
WITH DOUBTFUL ASSOCIA TES. 249
bald ! I promise to follow your advice before I go back to
Woolwich to-morrow morning. If truth-telling can set things
straight," almost with a groan he brings out this, "well and
good. But suppose truth-telling results, as it will very probably
do, in things becoming more crooked than before, will you cut
me then?'
"It makes my head ache to think of so many 'ifs' and
' ands/ " says Jane, a little coldly. " Do what you know to be
right, without thinking of anything but that it is right, and be
kind enough to forget that there is such a person as Jane
Theobald in the world."
" Forget !" but now Rawdon takes his arm away from the
door. " Yes, that sort of cold-blooded advice is so remarkably
easy to give ! When may I see you next V he persists. " When
may I come down to Theobalds to tell you . . . that I have
forgotten you? Sunday? No? Monday then? I know I
can get leave on Monday."
"Leave from whom? Your commanding officer, or Miss
Marsland ? Kawdon, child, don't play fast and loose with your
conscience any more. What earthly thing can you want at
Theobalds now?"
" I shall want to tell you the result of your own good advice,
in the first place."
" I shall guess that, when I hear the wedding bells ringing in
Lidlington church."
" And if no wedding bells are ever rung with which I am con-
cerned ? Oh, Mrs. Theobald, don't trifle with me don't torture
me ! Tell me when I may come and see you next V
For a brief space Jane remains silent ; then, " You will not
come to see me, and you will not write to me for one clear
f ortnight, ,, she tells him firmly. " By that time you'll know, I
suppose, whether you are in a position to have doubtful asso-
ciates or not. And then, the odds are, my dear boy, you will
cut me, or I you, which will come to the same thing. Now,
good-bye." For a moment she lets Kawdon hold her hand, then
250 OUGHT WE TO VISIT HERt
moves away from him into the house. " Perhaps, if the Fates
are kind," turning to give him a last smile over her shoulder,
" the cut eternal won't come till after the Chalkshire races ! I
hope it won't for Min's sake."
And with this exceedingly small crumb of consolation, young
Rawdon Crosbie is forced to be satisfied.
CHAPTER XXVI.
RAWDON CRIES PECCAVI !
By eleven next morning, angry, repentant, resolute, all in a
breath, he calls in Bolton Row.
"The ladies up yet?" Yes, it is Mr. Maurice's belief that
the ladies har up ; yes, it is Mr. Maurice's belief (solemn is
Maurice's tone, and ominous, as of a man aware that family
feuds are brewing) that the ladies will be able to see Mr. Rawdon
Crosbie. But he will just inquire.
Mr. Rawdon Crosbie is kept waiting a couple of minutes or
more, on the door-step a council-of-war, he feels sure, going on
as to whether he shall be admitted at all then is ushered, not
upstairs to his mother's drawing-room as usual, but into old
Mrs. Hervey's parlour on the ground-floor.
This looks significant : a kind of " scene in the front grooves,"
introduced to allow the machinists to prepare some imposing
set picture in the background : and Rawdon collects his strength
together for the ordeal which he knows to be forthcoming. The
sitting-room communicates with another by folding-doors, which
at the present moment are closed. Maria Hervey, alone, sits at
a small table near the window, pretending to write.
She rises, gives Rawdon a clammy hand, and pointedly cool
reception ; then takes a chair, at as safe and uncontagious a
distance as the dimensions of the room will permit, and looks
RA WDON CRIES PECCA VI! 251
at the hearth-rug. Evidently this ancient maiden has heard of
last night's misadventure, and will contract as little contami-
nation as possible from a person of Rawdon Crosbie's desperate
and abandoned character. He is not in a temper to derive
amusement, as he generally does, from Maria's hatred for him ;
and inquires, somewhat curtly, for his mother and Emma. " He
must return to Woolwich by the mid-day train, and has not
much time to lose, so "
" Your poor mamma, I believe, purposes to see you shortly,
Rawdon," interrupts Maria, without lifting her eyes from the
hearthrug. " I am quite unable to inform you whether Miss
Marsland will feel equal to the reception of visitors to-day."
"Equal? Why, what's the matter P says Rawdon, deter-
mined to set things straight, even with Maria Hervey. " Emma
seemed to be enjoying very excellent health and spirits when I
saw her last, at about one o'clock this morning."
" Oh ! Really ! It is not my wish to hear anything of . . .
of the occurrence to which you allude. Miss Marsland has been
very far from well, for some hours past out of one hysterical
fit into another her strength quite exhausted. Indeed, I
believe it is Mrs. Hervey's intention, should no amendment take
place, to send for the family apothecary."
" And I, of course, shall only be in the way," says Rawdon.
" So, unless there is a chance of my mother being able to see
me for five minutes, I may as well be off at once."
Our good Maria, upon this, rises and leaves the room.
Stealthy whispers are audible through the folding-doors ; the
rustle of a silk dress is presently heard, ascending the stairs.
Then comes the sound of descending footsteps. An instant or
two later the door opens, and in walks not Mrs. Crosbie, but
Adonis Hervey. Adonis, who on ordinary occasions is never
ready for the eye of man, much less of woman, before two, or
three o'clock in the afternoon.
He enters : for once in his life lifts his eyelids sufficiently to
give Rawdon Crosbie a steady stare.
252 OUGHT WE TO VISIT HER f
u Good morning to yea."
u Good morning."
Major Hervey extends a couple of chill, thin fingers, which
his young relative barely touches in return ; then there is
silence. Rawdon, his back to the empty fireplace, keeps his
head at the altitude of five feet eleven, superbly aloft Adonis,
at the altitude of five feet four, stands languidly pulling his
scanty, purple-black whiskers for a minute or two, then sinks
down into the nearest arm-chair, suppresses a yawn, and begins
to contemplate his nails.
" Deuced foolish little rencontre that, last night eh, Raw-
don T Something in the shape of one of his long, delicate
nails seems to be amiss ; for, as he speaks, Major Hervey sur-
veys it closely, and with an air of discontent
Rawdon, who, as we have seen, is in no humour this morning
for circumlocution, responds brusquely, " What rencontre V
** Why, running across you and your friends in those infernal
supper-rooms Wilmots, Wilcocks what the deuce is the name ?
Ladies would go know what ladies are when they take a thing
into their heads.* I omit the multitudinous " urns" and " ahs 7 '
with which Major Hervey interlards conversation. "Mrs.
Crosbie terribly cut up, poor thing ; Miss Marsland hysterical.
Tried to reason with them my mother tried to reason with
them singular tact and experience in these little matters, my
mother. No use." Major Hervey shakes his head with an air
of bored but well-bred sympathy.
44 1 am really very much indebted to you, and to Mrs. Hervey
also, if you have been trying to reason on my behalf," says
Rawdon, coldly. " At the same time I must confess I cannot
see how, or why, any argument was necessary. Perhaps you
would be good enough to speak in plainer language 1 I am a
very poor hand at expounding riddles. Has my mother has
Miss Marsland sent me any message through you ? and, if so,
would you. as my time is short, be good enough to deliver it in
three words V
RA WDON CRIES PECCA VI / 253
Major Hervey takes out a gold toothpick, and looks at it
attentively ; then (remembering, perhaps, of what some mortals'
teeth are made) returns it to his waistcoat pocket "lam con-
siderably older than you, my dear Eawdon," he remarks at last,
resting an elbow on each arm of the chair, and joining the ex-
treme tips of his fleshless white fingers.
Eawdon does not dispute the proposition.
" Considerably older, and you will forgive me for saying so
considerably .worldly-wisef. This foolish little rencontre
the society deuced nice society, in its way which Miss Mars-
land saw you in last night um ah. Deuced bad thing, I'm
afraid, for your prospects as an engaged man, Eawdon I"
" I am much obliged for your solicitude, Major Hervey ; at
the same time, I must repeat, I think you are expending it
needlessly."
" You think so ? Ah, you have much to learn, my dear friend
much to learn ! Women women," says Major Hervey, com-
placently, " have been the study of my life. I have had extra-
ordinary opportunities especially as regards phases of jealousy
of analysing their little weaknesses "
Eawdon looks at his watch impatiently.
"And I seldom find myself wrong in any conclusions I arrive
at with respect to them. This foolish contretemps of last night
is one of the worst things just one of tlie worst things that
could have happened for you at the present time. You under-
stand me?"
" I hear you."
" And, really, the whole affair is too puerile ! For don't
don't for a moment think," adds Adonis, with a little outbreak
o." boyish expansion, " that I put myself in the position of a
mentor. On the contrary, personally speaking, I only commend
your taste. That blonde, with the figure and the blue eyes
my dear Eawdon, all I regretted was, that circumstances did
not permit me to ask for an introduction."
" You would have asked in vain, I'm afraid," says Eawdon,
254 OUGHT WE TO VISIT HER t
with the air of a young emperor. " I am not in the habit of
introducing men I meet in public places to the ladies of my
acquaintance."
" Ah ! dog in the manger, on principle, eh ? Wise rule, I
dare say, for you. Who is your other friend, Rawdon the
little thing with black eyes and the fan ? Your mother #oor
dear soul ! has been telling me about the blonde (upon my
word, in a certain demi-monde style, she's as fine-looking a
woman as I've seen out this season) ; but the other? we only
surmise as to the other."
" The little thing with black eyes and the fan is a Miss John-
son, tolerably well-known in theatrical circles as Miss Minnie
Arundel," Eawdon answers, holding his nose still in air, but
keeping his temper miraculously.
" So we imagined and feared ! Absurd positively absurd !
the dread women all have of actresses as if they hadn't just
as much, and more, to fear from the women of their own world !
Well, and this Mrs. . . . Mrs. Theobald? From what your
mother tells me, she appears to be the lawfully- wedded wife of
a man I remember once in Paris. Tall man yellow hair eye-
glass ? Exactly. Didn't know him personally ; never saw him
at the Embassy ; not in my set at all. Man with a story attached
to him turns the king a little too easily at ecart6 1 No 1 Well,
if not that, something of the kind." This is the true Hervey
mode of suggesting away character. "And now, it seems,
married married to a dancing- girl ! Rawdon, my dear fellow,
take the advice of a man old enough to be your elder brother,
and follow out your good mother's wishes. I came down at
her request, poor soul, to speak to you. Drop the acquaintance
of this too-charming Mrs. Theobald until after your marriage,
at least."
"And then resume it, of course V 1 Rawdon asks.
" Oh, then do as you think fit," says Adonis with a satyr-like
little chuckle. " A married man is in a very different position
to an engaged one. How is your excellent father, Rawdon V
RA WDON CRIES PECCA VI! 255
Major Hervey suppresses another yawn, and really looks ready
to sink with fatigue. The discharge of all this heavy family
duty has evidently been too much for his strength. " Fewer
gouty symptoms than when I was last in Chalkshire V
Boiling over with indignation, but still managing to keep his
temper outwardly, Rawdon gives as succinct an account of Mr.
Crosbie's gouty symptoms as can be given short of positive
rudeness ; and his mentor closes his eyes and leans his head
back in his chair. After two or three minutes thus spent, the
door again opens noiselessly, and Maria, putting on a face and
voice as though some one lay dead in the house, informs Rawdon
that, if he walks softly, he may go up and see his poor mamma
in the drawing-room.
He goes up, and finds his poor mamma waiting in state to
receive him, an open letter in her hand. Emma, with emerald-
green ribbons in her hair, and with swollen red eyes, reposes on
the sofa, a shawl over her feet, and a smelling-bottle applied to
her nose. Why should a man be made to feel himself a brute
by the mere fact of a young woman holding a smelling-bottle
to her nose and having swollen eyes 1 As Rawdon came up
the stairs his spirit was rebellious, his heart, under the influence
of Major Hervey's good advice, hard as the nether millstone ;
and now, at the first sight of Emma, and of her poor little
nicely-got-up apparatus of affliction, he softens into repentance.
" Why, Emmy, what is all this % Something new for you to
have hysterics," he cries, coming up to her side, with hand out-
stretched.
By way of answer Miss Marsland raises her handkerchief to
her face. " Fve been very foo foo foolish I" she sobs ; " it
will never happen no, no, mamma dear, it will never happen
again. Ah ! w
" My dearest girl," says Mrs. Crosbie, leaning soothingly over
her future daughter-in-law, "be composed. Rawdon, have the
goodness to stand aside. With her disposition to faintness.
Rawdon, the result of painful nervous excitement, our dear
256 OUGHT WE TO VISIT HER?
Emma requires air. Be perfectly composed, my love, and allow
me to speak. Now, remember your promise !"
Thus appealed to, Miss Marsland buries her head down on
the sofa-cushion and applies her salts-bottle to her nostrils with
such vigour that her poor swollen eyes wink again. Very few
women look their fairest under the influence of strong mental
excitement, and Emmy is no exception to the rule.
"Dear Emma has gone through a most distressing night,"
says Mrs. Crosbie, regarding her son with icy sternness ; " but
she does not judge you, Emma is too generous to judge you,
unheard. For what occurred yesterday evening, the humiliat-
ing circumstances under which we met you, sir, I leave you to
make your apologies to her, and to her alone ; but I have a
word or two which we both Emma, my love, which we both
think it is my duty to say first I have had a letter from Mrs.
Pippin, Rawdon."
" A letter from Mrs. Pippin !" repeats Rawdon, with unaffected
innocence.
" And she tells me but I almost refuse to believe it ; yes,
even on Mrs. Pippin's word, and in spite of what I saw last
night, I almost refuse to believe such an accusation against my
own son that you you have put this woman's name up for
ballot at our Lidlington Croquet Club."
" Seconded by that shameful Mr. Smylie," cries out Emma
from the depths of the sofa-cushion ; " and just going to take
his priest's orders ! I'm sure the bishop ought to be written to."
" Is it true 1 Is this scandalous accusation true V 9 says Mrs.
Crosbie, as the culprit stands, silent with the silence of conscious
guilt " If you have done this thing, you will not, I should
hope, be ashamed to acknowledge it."
" Ashamed ! What of V answers Rawdon. He speaks with
an attempt at cheerfulness, but his voice is very far indeed from
natural His mother's ice-cold face, those quivering green rib-
bons, those plump white fingers passionately twitching round
the salts-bottle, are by no means reassuring objects for him to
RA WDON CRIES PECCA VI! 257
look at " If by ' this woman' you mean Mrs. Theobald, cer-
tainly I proposed her as a member of the Lidlington Croquet
Club, and Smylie seconded the proposition. Let me see," he
goes on, with the audacity of desperation, " that was on Satur-
day last. I think I said something to you about it at the time,
Emmy ] Mrs. Theobald will be balloted for to-morrow. 1 *
"Mrs. Theobald balloted for I Rawdon, if it were not that
this person had been put up by you, by my son, I doubt if the
form of a ballot would be gone through at alL You are not
aware, perhaps, that there is a rule empowering the club, under
certain most rare, most aggravated circumstances, to dispense
with a ballot altogether. Well, there is such a rule then ;
number twenty-three. ' If any person notoriously '"
"Mother, stop !" interrupts Eawdon, the blood rushing hotly
across his face, " I will hear no one no, mother, not even you
speak lightly of Mrs. Theobald."
" I do not speak lightly of her, Rawdon, I do not speak lightly
of any one, upon my own responsibility. I trust I know my
Christian duty too well for that. If you had heard me out you
would have been aware that the severest word employed in rule
twenty-three is * ineligible.' ' If any person notoriously ineli-
gible shall -'
" Yes ; but why is Mrs. Theobald ineligible 1 Before I ac-
knowledge myself to be in the wrong in proposing her, let me
know in common fairness on what grounds my offence is based.
Why is Mrs. Theobald notoriously ineligible !"
" Simply because she is not visited in the county. Your own
good sense, your own good taste might supply you with that
answer."
" The answer is no answer. You make up your minds, all of
you, not to visit A., B., or C. ; and then when you are asked
what her crime is, you say, ' Oh, she is not visited.' Is this
justice, is this honesty V 9
" Rawdon/' says Mrs. Crosbie, chillingly, " I am in no humour
for hair-splitting. You have acted, I am willing to hope and
17
J
258 OUGHT WE TO VISIT HER1
believe, under evil influence, and in a manner that you yourself,
a few years hence, will be the first to condemn. Hear what
our relative, hear what dear Alfred Hervey, a man of the
world, a man accustomed to the highest rank of society, thinks
about it"
" I have heard, mother. No number of years, I hope, will
ever bring me to the way of thinking of Alfred Hervey. "
" Acting under evil influences, I repeat, you have foolishly
betrayed your father and me and all of us into a most painful,
I might say a most lowering position ! You must very well
know, Rawdon, your ignorance of common decency cannot be
so great but that you must very well know the Lidlington
Croquet Club can never admit the person you have proposed as
a member V
For a minute or two Rawdon makes no answer. " I don't
seek to change your opinions, mother/' he breaks forth at last.
" Blackball Mrs. Theobald, taboo her, persecute her as you like
it is no business of mine. One thing only I think I may fairly
ask you before the subject is done with for ever." For ever !
The green ribbons flutter up suddenly ; and Emma looks, very
full and steadily, at her lover. " What is the charge brought
against her % I have listened to a great many hints, I have seen
a great many shakes of the head, from the day when we mistook
her for the Princess Czartoriska in Spa till now. I have never
heard one fair above-board statement yet. WJiat is Mrs. Theo-
bald's crime ? Why is she not to be visited 1 Why is she not
to be a member of the Lidlington Croquet Club V
"Do you wish a subject of this nature to be discussed in
Emma's presence, sir?"
" Most certainly I do. Why not V
" Well, then, in the first place, Mr. Francis Theobald's wife
does not belong by birth to the same station of life as ourselves."
" Birth ! And Mrs. Coventry Brown is the leader of the
Lidlington society."
" Her ideas, her habits, her associations must be . . . fast 1
RA WDON CRIES PECCA VII 259
I detest the word, Rawdon, but you oblige me, you oblige me to
use it*
Eawdon Crosbie on this looks straight into his mother's face ;
then he bursts into a laugh. " Fast ! Mrs. Theobald fast !
Mother, let me ask you who at the present time is the most-
sought-after woman throughout the length and breadth of
Chalkshire? Who dines everywhere, from the Archdeacon's
upwards and downwards ? Whose name have we vainly tried
to get at the head of our croquet list ? Who is the show-guest at
our little entertainments ? To whose table do we move heaven
and earth to obtain an invitation? Visiting Lady Rose Golightly,
associating with her, courting her, as we do, have we the right I
put it to you, mother, as a question of abstract justice the right to
condemn any woman upon the bare supposition of her being fast?"
Just for one instant Mrs. Crosbie does not find a fitting
answer come readily to her lips. Emma, who is at all times
beautifully superior to argument, hastens to her relief.
" We must take the world as we find it, mamma. Major
Hervey said so this morning. Every one in the county knows
Lady Rose Golightly, and no one in the county knows Mrs.
Theobald. What has abstract justice got to do with people's
visiting lists? I suppose Rawdon thinks we ought to set
ourselves above the Archdeacon and every respectable person
in the neighbourhood 1"
" It would be a hard matter, my dear Emma, to know what
Rawdon does think," says Mrs. Crosbie, with cold dignity.
" But it is not at all a hard matter to know how this quixotic
championship of unpopular persons must end. I am far from
accusing Rawdon of anything as yet but boyish folly ; but folly
beyond a certain point becomes guilt yes, Rawdon, guilt!"
And Mrs. Crosbie's voice trembles ; her eyes fill. u And now,
to-day, while there is still time, and here in our dear Emma's
presence, I ask you to draw back from an acquaintance I fear
I must say an intimacy which can only end in discredit and
anhappiness to us all 1*
172
?6o OUGHT WE TO VISIT HER ?
With true maternal instinct she has made the very most that
can be made of the situation. In argument the advantage is
wholly on Rawdon's side: recriminations, anger, are thrown
away upon him : at this sudden softening of his mother's tone,
at this first sign of tears, this first quiver of her lips, all his
boyish heart gives way ! He made himself Mrs. Theobald's
champion in the beginning more from a freak of obstinacy than
of set purpose. That he has gradually fallen away from the
narrow path, from his plighted word to Emma, ever since, his
conscience knows only too welL And horribly sharp is the
prick conscience gives him at this moment.
U I came here half an hour ago, mother, prepared to ask
Emma to forgive me, prepared to tell you how annoyed I was
about about the way we met last night. If you had let me see
you at once, instead of putting me through a homily from Major
Hervey, matters might have been sooner mended perhaps."
" I don't see that at all !" cries Emma, suddenly sitting very
upright, and putting down her smelling-bottle. " Oh, mamma,
indeed you must let me speak now, please. It is very easy for
Rawdon to talk, in that airy kind of way, about matters being
mended sooner, and to sneer at Major Hersrey for his advice.
Major Hervey has been most kind, and I value his opinion
most highly. Major Hervey would not have excused himself
from escorting us to the theatre on a paltry pretext, and then
have gone to a public supper-room and any one, Freddy
Pippin, or any one from Chalkshire, might have been there and
seen you with a creature like that !"
The scorn, the emphasis with which Emma brings out this
deadliest epithet of her vocabulary is startling.
"Alfred Hervey," observes Mrs. Crosbie suavely, " is a Man of
the World, my dear Emma. Alfred knows the value of eti-
quette, as Rawdon will have to learn it in time. My dear,
dear old uncle, your godpapa, sir, Canon Hervey, used to say
that good manners are the small-change of good morals. ' In
our transitory state we have not time, we have not wisdom,'
RA WDON CRIES PECCA VI! 261
the venerable man used to say, 'to decide, on the spur of the
moment, whether any intended action be intrinsically right
We can always say to ourselves, Is it usual, for persons moving
in a certain refined sphere of life, to do so-and-so 1 And we
shall rarely, if ever, find ourselves misled in the result,' "
"Mrs. Theobald herself is bad enough in all conscience,"
cries Emma, appositely. " Mrs. Theobald has only to move her
head or open her lips for you to see what she is. But the other
person with the dreadful painted eyes, and covered with cheap
trash, and the rouge evident, and I heard her call you ' Raw-
don !' Yes, though my back was turned, I heard her call you
' Rawdon !'"
Poor Emma's voice chokes as she recalls this crowning
enormity on the part of Rawdon's companion she lifts her
handkerchief once more to her eyes ; and Mrs. Crosbie steais
discreetly from the room. And now comes the real tug of war,
the crucial test of courage for young Rawdon.
"The 'other person/ Emma, of whom you speak in such
strong language, is Mrs. Theobald's sister, Miss Minnie Arundel,
a poor little, very hardworking, very unpretending actress. The
world of an uneducated girl like this is not your world n
" You may well say that, I think !"
" Her ideas of conventional propriety are not yours. Perhaps
it would be correcter to say that she has no ideas of conven-
tional propriety at all. I was introduced to Miss Arundel at
rehearsal for the first time yesterday afternoon, and I think
about two minutes after my introduction to her she called me
by my Christian name."
" And what business had you to be introduced to any Miss
Arundels, pray ? And how, as your engagements would not let
you come to Bolton Row till six, had you time to go to all these
horrid rehearsals, and theatres, and things V
Rawdon hesitates. He has determined to set himself straight
with his betrothed, so far as this setting straight may be accom-
plished by absolute truth-telling. But absolute truth-telling
i
262 OUGHT WE TO VISIT HER f
is no such easy task he finds now that it has to be put into
practice.
" One can never exactly say how anything happens in this
world, Emmy. I met Mrs. Theobald, and she was going to call
for her sister at the Koyal, and *
" Spare yourself all this, Rawdon !" cries Emma, with rising
passion. " You used to meet Mrs. Theobald, accidentally per-
haps, day after day in Qhalkshire. It is possible. I will allow
that it is possible. You could not have met her accidentally in
the streets of London. Of her want of principle and of right
feeling in trying to entrap the attentions of an engaged man, I
won't speak. Thank heaven, I have nothing to do, even in
idea, with such women ! But you, Rawdon yes, for the time
has come when I mean to speak in plainest language you must
make your choice between your present associates and me ! w
"Emma
u If I were your wife I would bear your neglect in silence,
and as duty bade me." And in saying this Emma really
believes herself to be uttering the truth. " But I am not your
wife. My duty, thank heaven, is to myself only still ; and I
repeat, you will have to make your choice between your present
associates and me !"
She stops, fairly out of breath ; her brow liberally moistened
with agitation ; the green ribbons standing up on end ; her
swollen pink eyes fixed angrily upon her lover's face. Never,
it must be confessed, has Emmy looked less lovely in Rawdon's
sight than at this moment ; never has the contrast seemed
sharper than between her and Jane !
Jane. . He thinks of her as she stood last night, her lip
trembling, her fair face kindling, as she made use of nearly the
same words as Emma is using now the same words, but with
what a difference of tone and spirit !
" You have to make your choice, and there can't be a question
as to where your choice must lie. Do what you know to be
right, and forget that there is such a person as Jane Theobald
in the world."
RA WDON CRIES PECCA VII 263
A desperate resolve comes upon him to take his betrothed at
her word ; free himself at any cost ; say one bitter good-bye ;
for the last time hear Jane Theobald's voice, feel the clasp of
Jane Theobald's hand ; then emigrate to California, Tasmania
to any place where engagements, marriage, and all other social
difficulties may be escaped from ! But just at this point Emma
gives a convulsive sniff, and once more arms herself with the
handkerchief and salts-bottle, and Bawdon's better angel touches
his heart again.
In this engagement of his he does not stand, it must be
remembered, in the position of most engaged men. Emma
Marsland dear, good, little, plain, long-suffering Emma was
his sister until the last few mistaken weeks that she has become
his sweetheart. Emma to Rawdon Crosbie really means home,
father, mother ; everything in the world the lad holds dear
save one thing. There is something monstrous in the idea of
any lasting quarrel between him and the poor child whose love
for him has been as the love of a spaniel for its master from the
day when she first ran, panting, after his cricket-balls, and stuck
fish-hooks into her patient, little, stupid, fat fingers in vain
attempts at making flies !
" You take things altogether too seriously, Emmy. You must
get out of this habit of making mountains from molehills ! Just
because of that ridiculous meeting we all had last night it was
very ridiculous, Emma, confess it to talk about my 'choosing*
between you and any one ! On your word of honour, now, in
cold blood, do you mean to tell me you would be glad to have
your freedom back V
All this time he has been standing, frigid and distant, a couple
of yards or more away from her. He comes close now, and
stoops until his lips are very near Miss Marsland's cheek. Her
breath comes thick and fast; her easily-agitated heart begins to
palpitate. Never has the affectionate little heiress loved Eaw-
don better than at this moment of acutest jealousy I And still
she is stubborn will not retrograde one inch from the position
c
-
- . -. - v.-i. .a mZZt&l *
ij\ &r I ]
'-. :' .1 1
freedom! Ok! Mil
la ghe mj-bod y ^4 if j
.:.': the oUv v'i c&rr-e to L.r.i :.. Y :: ~e:r ziub rr. :r en-
*'* /w;/i oy Lrn I^--t roigh:. thar. I t, i^ :y V^s Arm del L'vme,
K.r.r.oa, oo;.fetS that you were." 7
" It .?. r.'A a o :^:ion a: all o: Mi=s An:: irb exer: that I
am -/jrr/ for your t..-te in being se-L ~i:h. such a Creature !"
'.r. K:o;;.a. k^^plng Rawd;ri well to ibe r :::::. however dis-
o ir-.*v; h.V; maybe herself. "It :.- a :_ue-::-u o: Mrs. Theo-
bald. Do you mean to give Mrs. Theobald up. Rawdo::. or do
you not V
"'Give up' a lady who has a husband, borne, chili already,
and who care.s about as much for me as I do lor . . . Mrs.
Pippin ! Do be reasonable, Emma. Do reiiect a little on the
absurdity of what you are saying.''
RA WDON CRIES PECCA VI / 265
" I am perfectly reasonable, and I have reflected well over
everything. Will yon give up calling at the Theobalds 1 house
when you are in Chalkshire ? If you meet her at any time, or
in any place, and I am with you, will you pass by without
recognising her ? That is what I want to know."
" Emma," answers Rawdon but he draws away from her, he
takes his former frigid attitude as he speaks ; " do you think
you are acting generously, fairly; acting as one woman should
towards another in making that request? I I" oh, how
horribly hard it is to him to say this ! "know that my ac-
quaintance, such as it is, with the Theobalds, cannot continue
on its present footing. You have decided, between you, God
knows why ! that Mrs. Theobald shall not be visited, and, if you
wish it, I shall, of course, have no choice but to leave off calling
at their house."
" If I wish it ! As though there could be a doubt on the
subject."
" It matters little whether there is or not, Emma," cries Kaw-
don, waxing hot. "After what occurred last night, the deliber-
ately insulting manner that my mother and all of you thought
fit to put on, there would be precious little chance of my being
admitted at Theobalds if I did calL Mrs. Theobald herself has
told me that much."
" Has she, indeed ? Excessive impertinence, I consider it, on
her part, towards the whole family, then," says Emma, colour-
ing scarlet.
" You think so, after the treatment she has received from the
whole family during the past three weeks 1 However, this is
beside the question. As far as I am concerned, I can promise,
with the most perfect safety, never to bring Mrs. Theobald and
you into any sort or kind of collision again."
" And you will never call at their house, and if you meet her
when you are with me in Chalkshire, or anywhere else, you will
not bow !"
Eawdon turns sharply round from Miss Marsland ; and in
s&5
OUGHT WE TO VISIT HER*
vide to tell
that if
: en ed race m a
" - Baki liiuwifTf, in 90
m i i$ad to do, what db noi do,
1 -a nari ?
. fledge of Me *
1 . - -- and
Eninc! =*rerka to exact iw t a
"tainin^ so
A i -.: . . rate falsehood to
Jet A r -od many little white Eea h
of late forced Mm into telling. Shall
white, perhaps, than ite
narr.r^r I
" You seem to require a lor.z time to consider a nest siniT *r
matter."' says Emma, nor. perhaps, in her swedes: t-:ne. " Wl ^:
in the world can 70a be deliberating about ? Is * yes ' such .1
very difficult word to speak T
" To such a question as you have askeii me I think it is a very*
difficult word to speak '."
" Then I can tell you. Rawdom that you stand quite alone in
your opinion. Mrs. Hervey. and Alfred Hervey, and everybody
eonsider that I am perfectly justified, under the circumstances-
in requiring that your acquaintance with the Theobalds shall
tome, at once and for ever, to an end."
After this Rawdon Crosbie softens no more. He turns, he
looks, I must say with no particularly lover-like expression,
straight into Mis3 Maryland's face.
u Mrs. Hervey, Major Hervey, and everybody ! You have
been holding a delightful family conclave, then, upon my con-
duct, and the fitting punishment to be awarded me ! n
" I don't know what you mean by a family conclave. Major
Hervey saw how dreadfully hurt I was last night, and came
home with us, although he was engaged to two different balls,
RA WDON CRIES PECCA VI! 267
and stayed till nearly two o'clock, talking. He was here directly
after breakfast again to-day, and I'm sure has said everything
that is nice and considerate to mamma and me."
" And he advised you what terms you should dictate to me,
Emma ? Let us have the truth out."
" Major Hervey has been excessively kind and considerate,"
says Emma, rather doggedly. "Whatever opinions he gave
about your conduct were given with the greatest delicacy and
forbearance."
u And he considers you justified in asking me to break off my
acquaintance at once and for ever with the Theobalds V
" Most decidedly he does."
"Very well, then, Emma. You have thought fit to consult
Major Hervey on a matter that concerns you and me alone ;
Major Hervey, I have no doubt, has prepared you for the pro-
bable result. I will not, under any pressure whatsoever, break
off my acquaintance with the Theobalds, either in Chalkshire
or elsewhere. And wherever and whenever I may meet Mrs.
Theobald, I shall hold myself only too much honoured if she
will condescend to notice me."
" This this is quite sufficient !" cries Emma, starting to her
feet. " We need have no more discussion. From this moment
forth everything is at an end between us."
" That is as you like," says Rawdon. " If you choose to give
me up because I refuse to offer a gratuitous insult to a perfectly
innocent woman "
"Innocent!"
"Yes, innocent! By heavens!" getting hotter and hotter,
" and not only so, but honester, truer, better, in every way, than
half the people you and my mother court as associates ; if you
feel yourself justified in breaking off our engagement for such
a cause as this, do it You will, at least, have the good opinion,
the delicate sense of honour, the worldly knowledge of Major
Hervey to support you !"
An hysterical sob, a whole crescendo passage of hysterical
i
263 OUGHT WE TO VISIT HER?
f-fitm from Mira Maryland, conclude the scene. Enters Mrs.
Crosbie, with a conciliatory, well-timed speech. Enters Maria
Hervey, with a vinaigrette. Adonis, languidly repressing die
chronic yawn, appears on the staircase; and Raw don, uncertain
whether lie is the most miserable or the happiest man alive,
rushes, without uttering a word of explanation or farewell, past
them all, and from the house,
CHAPTER XXVIT.
BLACKBALLED,
A liberal handful of active envy, hatred, malice, and all
uncharitableness does undoubtedly leaven every human com-
munity. And still it is but a handful. The majority, the cart-
less, forward-pressing majority of the world, are indifferent
towards every man and woman who does not actually jostle
their elbows or tread on their toes in the crowd. Let Jews.
Turks, Heretics, un visited people of all grades and degrees, take
what comfort they may from the thought.
During the past five days Rawdon Crosbie's audacity in pro-
posing Mrs. Theobald as a member of the Lidlington Croquet
Club, the laxity of the Reverend Samuel Smylie in becoming
her seconder, have been canvassed with angry heat by some few
persons, intimate friends, mostly, of the Crosbie family. Society
at large has felt only a mild and lukewarm interest in the sub-
ject. " Rawdon Crosbie running after this young Mrs. Theobald !
not very much to be wondered at, under the circumstances, is
it?"
" Ah, well, I don't know. Miss Marsland is a most amiable
girl, and over head and ears in love with him."
44 Yes, but her freckles ! And poor Mrs. Crosbie's way of bring-
ing him up has been so sadly ill-judged. You really cannot, in
these days, keep a young man for ever in leading-strings.''
BLACKBALLED. 269
" Some one told a lady, who told the rector, who spoke of it
to my sister, that Mrs. Theobald stands a good chance of being
blackballed."
" Not very flattering to the Miss Theobalds. But pride, even
spiritual pride, deserves a falL ,, .
" And not very flattering to Mr. Smylie. By the bye, have you
heard that he is decidedly ritualistic V
" And engaged to this London friend of Lady Rose Golightly's !
She looks old enough to be his mother, and fast . . why, my
dear, if one may believe half they say n
And so on. Some people have heard, vaguely, that Jane stands
a chance of being blackballed. One or two may have made up
their minds how they shall individually vote. A few old women,
of both sexes, have daily cackled at un-official meetings called
together in Mrs. Pippin's drawing-room. The world at large has
not taken the trouble to think on the subject at all ; perhaps, if
closely questioned, would tell you that blackballing, of its very
nature, is a mistake ; and that of two evils, to admit a doubtful
candidate to a croquet-club" particularly as croquet is an out-
of-door game" may be the least.
Such is the inchoate or jelly-like state of public feeling when
Mrs. Crosbie and Emma return to Chalkshire on Friday night.
By noon next day Mrs. Pippin, Mrs. Crosbie, and other nota-
bilities having met in the interval public feeling has become
organised ; uncertainty nourished into determination.
Eawdon Crosbie committed a grievous act of folly, no doubt,
about that a grievous act of folly in nominating such a person
at all ; but Mrs. Crosbie distinctly states that he did it under
undue pressure. And Rawdon Crosbie is but a boy ! Now, the
thing to decide is, what will be right (putting all small feeling
aside) for the club to do ] Christian charity ... ah, it will be
much more really charitable to exclude her, poor thing; she
would never have a creature to speak to on the ground. And one
must draw a line that's the real fact, my dear Mrs. Grundy, one
must draw a line somewhere. If you admit a candidate of
ir stamp of this Mtl Wm
admit *
T Iij nijilil ill ihiai in win ill I laialj f n In im
m Jane 3 favour. By huo on Friday tiejr me even. A* the
... a draws on, it bid longer a Batter of uiMjeilainty at all.
Only, for tiie Mmb Theobalds sfce, and KWiidmim, the car-
Enstances of the nommaiaoA, a deqrjnaafa me mixed up in
' i ii In in IbIm llialliiM^ * T^bMj^ Crosbie'* adwice.
;_ .tit f or the ballot approaches let e**ry member of the
. . . .by tacit understanding, have an engagement elsewhere aad
eave the field Mj^ Pippin has kindlyvolanteered a five o^oek
tea, aith muse. Charming I Let na all be engaged to Mra.
... * fit* o'clock tea. The ballot mil fall through, aimplj
h vast of balloting members, and Mrs. Theobald can beap-
pr.eL iii a perfectly polite and ^auy-lie note not tnat she has
been blackballed, but that, from unf'.r^een cirr-cn'ii^tanccs, the
neia was empty at the u^ual hour fur balloting:, and her election
did not take place. Depend upon it. after one such hint as thi
ehe will never seek to put herself forward again.
And Mrs. Crosbie. being a really popular woman, as well as a
clever tactician, it is decided that her advice shall be acted on.
Most of the Lidlington ladies, young and old, are sure, now
they have seriously thought thing- over, that they would sooner
banish Jane's pretty face from their own hunting-grounds than
not At the same time they would rather ecect her banishment
by a covert than by an open blow. Which of us wuuld not sooner
dispatch an enemy by Sydney Smith's plan ring a nice clean-
hand] ed little belL which shall cause him to drop down dead in
Japan than by such disgusting, open-handed means of destruc-
tion as a pistol or poison ? Xo blackballing: only a five o'clock
tea, with music, a Mrs. Pippin's ; and a polite, lady-like note to
acquaint the victim with her fate. It must be acknowledged that
Mrs. Crosbie has lighted upon a most delicate and yet efficient
way of helping the club and its members out of their difficulties.
But whoever, in Lidlington society, acts without Mrs. Coven-
BLACKBALLED. 271
try Brown acts without his host ! Driving, majestic, through the
town, in her gorgeous carriage, with its gorgeous liveries, a gor-
geous parasol uplifted over her big white face and rose-decked
bonnet driving, majestic, I say, as is her Saturday afternoon
wont, through the town of Lidlington, Mrs. Coventry Brown is
stopped by some stragglers from the croquet-ground, on their way
to Mrs. Pippin's high tea and music, and learns what is going on.
" An excellent idea of Mrs. Crosbie's exclude a person, not
generally visited, from the club, and yet spare the members the
painful onus of blackballing !"
Mrs. Coventry Brown looks upon the idea as contemptible.
Why, pray, should a club, more than an individual, shirk a positive
dooty 1 Nothing, in a case of this kind, like striking one good,
decisive blow taking the bull by the 'orns. As for Mrs. General
Pippin putting herself forward to give an imprompter five o'clock
tea, all Mrs. Coventry Brown has to say is that she considers it,
personally, in the light of a direct and intentional impertinence,
The Pippins have been invited to her house to dinners, luncheons,
evening parties, times out of mind. Well, she expects no return.
She knows what the Pippins' means are. An Indian General's
widow, and only two female servants kept, and the Miss Pippins
make, or more often turn, their own dresses. Still, when the
Pippins do give an entertainment, however humble, not to go
through the form the form of inviting their best friends, is to
display their own ignorance. Mrs. Coventry Brown would not
have gone had she been asked. Nothing more painful to Mrs.
Coventry Brown than to feel that you are depriving a family of
necessities with every mouthful of cake you eat. Oh, dear no !
not for worlds would she have gone ; but for the Pippins' sakes,
she wished they had shown the common decency and gratitude
to have asked her. What she will do is drive to the Club
croquet-ground, and, with her own hand, put in a black-ball for
Mrs. Theobald. Mrs. Crosbie, and every other member of the
Lidlington Croquet Club, may hold their shilly-shally opinions
as to righ t and wrong. Mrs. Coventry Brown holds hers, and acts
272 OUGHT WE TO VISIT HER?
upon them : will keep out doubtful characters from every section
of society over which she has control Much has been given her
much is expected of her ; much it is her bounden " dooty" to per-
form. She goes to the croquet-ground ; with a sense of righteous
pleasure tingling at her very finger-ends, puts in her black-ball,
and actually walks twice up and down the hot pavement of Lid-
lington High Street, for the sake of publishing what she has
done, afterwards.
And so, when Jane and her husband return home late that
evening, Jane learns her fate. No cards, no invitations lie on
her table, as might be the case were she a visited woman, a Lady
Rose Golightly, after a six days' absence ; only a business-like
letter, written in Mrs. Crosbie's clearest hand ; every " t" crossed,
every "i" dotted, and containing a short, cuttingly polite state-
ment as to the result of the ballot.
"She must have been a little goose ever to put herself in the
power of all those old dragonesses ! But she is a goose ! These
pink-and- white sort of women always are. You should have had
more discretion, Mr. Smylie, than to become her seconder. "
Lady Rose Golightly speaks ; Loo Childers and Mr. Smylie
listen. It is nine o'clock in the evening ; the hour, this July
time, for coffee on The Folly terrace. Lady Rose and Loo, in
their Charles II. dinner-dresses, look extremely picturesque in
the becoming half light, reclining back in the easiest of all garden
chairs, and each with a porcelain coffee-cup in her hand. A
heightened tint (of rouge, or emotion, which 1) is on Lady Rose's
sallow cheeks ; she has her chair placed so that she can watch the
side-entrance to the gardens the entrance at which any one
walking over from the direction of Theobalds to pay an evening
visit at The Folly would be sure to ring.
" Yes, indeed, Mr. Smylie," adds Loo. "And then after putting
yourself forward as her seconder, not to have the moral courage
to vote for her ! So like a par ... I beg your pardon. You
know, I never did care for anything ecclesiastical before you.
BLACKBALLED. 273
Honestly, now, why did you not defy all the bigotry and virtue
of Lidlington, and go and vote for poor Mrs. Theobald this
afternoon V
Mr. Symlie answers, looking a good deal ashamed of himself,
that he thought it best to be guided by the opinions of his friends.
Mrs. Pippin a very motherly person, Mrs. Pippin warned him
that he had gone too far already. The rector advised him to
spend the afternoon by visiting some of his outlying parishioners
across the common.
" And you listened to them ? Well, well * He who fights and
runs away.' No doubt you showed the better part of valour,
Mr. Smylie," says Lady Rose. a I wonder, if the Lidlington cro-
quet people had you and me in their power, Loo, whether Mr.
Smylie would have courage enough to brave public opinion and
save us from being blackballed)"
" There would be so much chance of Lady Rose Golightly's
being blackballed !" says the curate, rather subserviently. " The
complaint of the Lidlington croquet- players is that they have
never yet had the honour of putting Lady Rose's name at the
head of their list of members."
" Next to the Venerable the Archdeacon's lady, and two above
Mrs. Coventry Brown. No, I don't aspire to such big capitals.
When I come into the country it is for quiet meditation, not
social distinction. Social distinction !" repeats Lady Rose, in
a tone that 'tis pity none of the Chalkshire magnates can hear.
"Yes, to think of the absurd presumption of these people in
blackballing any one ! I should say Mr. Theobald's wife is just
as good in every respect, social or otherwise, as any of the rest/'
"She certainly is better-looking," remarks the vacillating
Smylie.
" Mr. Smylie ! I am shocked and surprised at your levity,"
cries Loo, with an air of admonition. " I was talking to a lady
to-day (I mention no names, your own conscience may tell you
who it was a very nice old lady, the mamma of many daughters),
and she told us did she not, Rose % that the parishioners think
18
274 OUGHT WE TO VISIT HER f
seriously of lending a round-robin about you to the bishop. A
horrid whisper is abroad that Miss Maryland's engagement to
that poor little Artillery boy is broken o% apropos of Mrs, Theo-
bald* The next thing we shall hear is that the Reverend Samuel
Smylie is to be sequestrated I believe that is the right term 1
for a like cause.* 1
4t Yes, I think so much of Mrs. Theobald of anything but "
Mr, R my lie gets into such an agony of blushing that Loo* out
of sheer compassion, comes to his relief*
** Of anything but paying visits at The Folly, I suppose 1 You
certainly don't do much besides, just at present, Well, I am not
sure that that betters your condition. Scylla or Gharybdis
The Folly or Theobalds which should you say was the lesser
danger for Mr. Smylie, Rose 1"
A ring comes at the garden gate as Miss Childers speaks ; a
deeper colour it cannot have been rouge, after all rises to
Lady Rose's cheek. Loo Childers puts down her coffee-cup on
the small garden -table that stands between the two ladies, and
discovers suddenly that she feels chilly, and must return to the
drawing-room for her shawl.
The curate accompanies her. (They are lovers, lawfully
plighted, let me hasten to explain. Mr. Smylie's conduct is above
suspicion. " As soon as ever you get a bishopric I promise faith-
fully to marry you," Loo has told him. " Indeed, when you
become dean, if you are a very rich and flourishing sort of dean,
I don't say that we may not begin to buy our furniture.") An-
other minute and Francis Theobald is at Lady Rose's side.
He has been absent six days, and she is glad eagerly glad
to see him, and shows it. He takes the chair left vacant by
Miss Childers. Fresh coffee, with its attendant chasse, is brought
out upon the terrace ; and then, at Lady Rose's bidding, Mr.
Theobald lights his cigarette, and begins gradually to feel happy.
When he left home, Jane, not yet recovered from Mrs. Cros-
bie's note, was in one of her fine, hot, outspoken bad tempers ;
Blossy fractious after the journey. The cook, only half- expecting
BLACKBALLED. 275
them, had given them greasy mutton-chops for dinner; and
nothing unhinges Francis Theobald's moral nature like greasy
mutton-chops. The old house, unduly shut up during the past
week, was smelling more like a mushroom-bed, and less like a
human habitation than ever. What a contrast with everything
about Lady Hose's well-appointed, quiet, luxurious little house-
hold ! Theobald feels fonder of Lady Kose herself than he
has ever felt since the renewal of their acquaintance, out of
pure gratitude for his own personal refreshment
"And so you and Barty have become fast friends again, I
hear," she remarks. The lawfully-engaged lovers show no dis-
position to re- appear ; and Theobald and his hostess are thus
forced into one of those dual solitudes which, of a summer's
night, and with a cigarette, and good coffee, and an easy-chair,
are really not unpleasant " You will be able to renew your
acquaintance with Arthur soon. He is to be in Chalkshire for
the races at least I conclude so. Arthur never writes ; but our
friend Mrs. Crosbie tells me the race-stewards have 'taken the
liberty of advertising his Grace's patronage.' By the bye, Mr.
Theobald, how glad I am that you are to be one of this party
on board the ' Lais' !"
"Am I to be one of the party on board the ' Lais' V asks Mr.
Theobald.
" So Barty says. I heard from him to-day, and, as far as it
is possible to decipher one of Barty's scrawls, I make out that
you have promised to join us all at Cowes the first week in
August"
" Lord Barty was kind enough to ask me when I saw him in
London," answers jTheobald ; "but as to my promising Lady
Rose, I never promise anything. All my views of life are short.
I hold that for a married man there is no such thing as a future.
He may propose "
" But his wife disposes," interrupts Lady Rose, with her little
bitter laugh. " So I am told. My own experience of marriage
is too limited to allow me to generalise. Without promising,
182
weai ind vvnllalig^ i
LiM at Cow^sT
Mr. Th* bald holds his c %aietle at ina*! h mtTl. and looks
at it at&aiOTelj through kit afcnrt wighud **m*~ * grey eyes,
tie kn ?ws ? retry clearly what poor Jenny 1 * iwrjnmr are on the
: married men enduing immmIj into which their wives
do not enter. In hi* heart be man than naif believes poor
Jenny to have right on her aide. 80. franda Theobald, weak
though be be in many things, k a man of tokrahly strong will
on points that involve his own personal gratification ; and the
virion of die 'Lais/ and of tike kind of people Lord Baxty
Beaudeser: will be likely to collect together on board the *Lais/
is nnt I must admit an altogether unpleasiiig one to his mind.
"I can understand a wife no: liking her husband to go to
ladies' parties without her." cries Lady Rose, divining hi
thoughts divining the cause of his hesitation. "If I if I "
'pathetically 4 * had married differently, I daresay I might have
felt the same. My life has put me out of the way alas ! of
all common jealousy. But a thing I cannot understand is. a
wife quarrelling with bachelor-parties ; and Barry's are purely
bachelor parties. Loo and I come across them sometimes by
accident, as we mean to do now, but they are bachelor-parties
still. What can a woman expect who will not let her husband
associate with men] that he shall sit at home and embroider
slippers, or what V 1
" I have never embroidered slippers yet." says Theobald, with
undisturbed composure ; " but I daresay it would be nice
employment for wet days. I must ask Jenny to buy me some
needles and canvas."
That one word "Jenny," the tone in which it is spoken,
makes Lady Rose Golightly quiver as with a sudden bodily
pain. Can it can it be possible that this man, with his refined
tastes, his remembrance of better things, can be faithful at
heart to the low-born girl whom he degraded himself by mar-
BLACKBALLED. 277
rying? Faithful! Lady Rose has been nurtured, theoretically
and practically, in a school that knows not the meaning of the
word in connection with the love of man for woman. Francis
Theobald has sufficient pride to speak with kindness of his wife,
and to seem, at least, to defer to his wife's wishes. Well, the
weakness is amiable ! Lady Rose shifts her tactics.
" 1 half hoped Mrs. Theobald would have walked round with
you to The Folly this evening ; but I did not ask her to do so
in my note." My note % Then the call is not unpremeditated.
" I know Mrs. Theobald hates cards, and some of the people
from the Fort are coming in to have a little ecarte by-and-by. I
mean, one of these days, to have a party expressly for Mrs.
Theobald, with no gambling allowed. Talking of gambling, if
you do go*down to Cowes beware of Barty's loo and lansquenet !
He tells me Harry Desmond and little Lord Verreker are to be
there ; and we all know what that means ! The very atmo-
sphere of the ' Lais' is a demoralisation to people with gambling
propensities. "
The suggestion is well-timed, the bait cleverly thrown out
Curious with what aptitude some of these shallow but tortuous
women and when you pierce through her veneer of artificial
liveliness, artificial sentiment, artificial everything, Lady Rose
is radically shallow curious, I say, how the shallowest women
can acutely gauge and play upon every weakness of the man
who moves their fancy for the hour. Straightforward, full-
hearted Jane, with the intuitions of love itself to guide her,
cannot make the same good use of her husband's foibles that
Lady Rose can. Imagine Jane, even to keep him out of a
rival's reach, allying herself to the seductions of loo and
lansquenet !
"Then, as I have decided gambling propensities, the best
thing for me will be to steer as clear of the * Lais' as I can,"
says Theobald, " unless, indeed, you will solemnly promise to
take care of me, Lady Rose."
Lady Rose's hand, her one beauty untouched by time, happens
1T*Q
278 OUGHT WE TO VISIT HER t
to rest on the back of Mr. Theobald's chair. He turns towards
her as he speaks, and his lips are only a few inches away from
the soft little white fingers, and a certain diamond ring that
gleams and sparkles in the uncertain light.
"And if I do promise," she asks, almost in a whisper " if I
do undertake the tremendous responsibility of looking after
your morals, you will go V
" Well, the question is, would Lady Hose's presence, on board
the * Lai's/ or anywhere else, make my safety certain V 1 says Mr.
Theobald, in his half -tender, half -sarcastic voice the voice
which, after all, Reader, has been the one true note of music in
this woman of fashion's hideously unmusical life !
She hesitates ; she gives a quick-drawn sigh. To sigh effec-
tively is an accomplishment requiring much experience and
much practice. Lady Rose Golightly has had both, and does
it well. She falters. "Yes no. Everything depends, does it
not, upon what one means by safety V
And then her tone softens abruptly ; the diamond on the
small white hand flashes closer before Francis Theobald's near-
sighted eyes, and both are silent
" We must take the world as we find it," said Emma, with
wisdom learnt from an Adonis Hervey. "Everyone in the
county knows Lady Rose Golightly, and no one in the county
knows Mrs. Theobald. What has abstract justice got to do
with people's visiting lists V
Not very much,- it must be confessed.
CHAPTER XXVin.
ALONE.
A fortnight passes on, and the blow struck by Mrs. Coventry
Brown proves, as she predicted it would prove, a decisive one.
"The bull has been taken by the 'orns" to some effect.
ALONE. 279
There had been a vague feeling in the neighbourhood, before,
that Francis Theobald's wife must be blackballed, because she
was not visited. There is a settled conviction now that she
must not be visited because she has been blackballed !
" Blackballed ! and by the Lidlington Croquet Club! How
distressing for those worthy ladies the Miss Theobalds ! How
much the husband is to be pitied ! And I am told there is a child,
too, a little girl ! So very sad ! But this is the Nemesis thai
overtakes men who fly in the face of Providence by making such
dreadful marriages ! They say he spends his time almost entirely
with Lady Rose Golightly. Well, can you wonder at it ] Lady
Rose is a charming woman refined, sympathetic, accomplished.
And to a man in the cruel position of Francis Theobald what
what can home be like V
Home, I must say, has been rendered pretty warm to Francis
Theobald ever since the evening of his return from London, the
evening when Lady Rose's diamonds sparkled on The Folly
terrace. There are wives, chiefly in fiction, who endure the
vagaries of truant husbands, and nurse their own jealousy in
silence patient Grizeldas of the earth who, by continuous,
sullen long-suffering, the " constant dropping" of injured eyes
and tear-stained cheeks, do frequently bring their husbands to
grief and. desperation in the end. And there are wives who
rebel passionately under neglect, speak their minds out, take
rash reprisals, and not unfrequently come to desperation and
grief themselves.
Jane is one of these. Concealment of any kind is a physical
impossibility to her. If she suspects, she gives broadest utter-
ance to her suspicion. If she means to retaliate, she warns
you beforehand that she will do so. The tell-tale, blushing
cheek, the lucid eyes, the rash, frank tongue, the transparent,
passionate spirit all about Jane is in accord, and all just as
the great fashioner, Nature, made it ! She knows no laws but
those of impulse ; never in her life did a prudent thing your
Grizeldas are miracles of prudence and up to the present time
- ir^ 79 nsn - MEM*
~r? l "r :::-
- . _ _o a ~
t'-^ JLZ V-.I-
;.. *r: .^
::.-: v. -,;.-;. Je:.:.y.~ a&y ; Tie.r-^1 ^- _- --tir? L:^ :~_ ^~tii *n
.: f .i '.\jz\ \iAjy,~w:.n. "I w.Llrr L.vr .-*:. y :~.: jiz.ce we
.'.-Vi; r^eeii ;^firr.'r'i I uve Lad trc._ y :lr .ii~c ::_:l..^ Said to
/:*e V
" I Lever fcaid yet. because I Lever :i:ugh: yet, that it would
L, \,'ji\'.j'i.z Ujt me to leave you," ^l= wers Jai^c
" A:.d you dou't tbinii so low, my aer.r. I Tvas talking of
ALONE. 281
scoldings, lectures, declarations of hatred, et cetera. Leave !"
Mr. Theobald looks really amused. " You leave me ! Come
and give me a kiss, Jane, and don't be a little fooL We shall
have Blossy threatening to run away, on strike, if she doesn't
get all she wants, next."
" Poor Blossy ! how much better it would have been for me
if I had never had a child."
Such a speech from Jane, still more the tone in which it is
made, startles Mr. Theobald a little from the calmness, real or
assumed, with which, up to the present moment, he has been
sipping his tea.
" Better for you if you had never married Blossy's father, you
mean. Out with it, Jenny. Don't think of my feelings. . You
know that is what you are burning to say."
" If I was burning to say it, I should say it. No, I can never
wish I hadn't married you. The years before we set up being
respectable, the years before we came to this hateful place, are
to the good, all of them !" Her voice changes ; her blue eyes,
flashing with temper a second ago, soften now, as only blue eyes
can soften, into tears.
" And Blossy is the sole impediment, then, that you want
removed out of the way Y
" What wicked, awful words for you to speak ! Poor baby;
she is the only thing I've got to live for the only thing, I'm
sure, that keeps me here !"
" You wish no one gone at all, then V Mr. Theobald asks, not
without a smile.
"I wish Lady Rose Golightly was dead. You hear me?
Dead ! Be as shocked as you like !"
" I am not in the least shocked, Jenny. If fate obeyed the
amiable wishes of women in this respect, I don't believe there
would be a hundred of you left on the face of the earth, under
eighty, at all events."
" What would you do I ask myself that often in this detest-
able life of ours what would you do if there was no Lady Rose
282 OUGHT WE TO VISIT HER t
Golightly ? And you, who used to say you were bored by ladies'
society ! I know now how much truth there was in that little
parable."
Jane, by this time, has risen. She flings down her work, and
begins to pace up and down the room, her hands clasped behind
her. She gets angrier and angrier every moment.
" Shall I tell you how often you have been to The Folly during
the past fortnight, Theobald F
"Three or four times at most, Jenny; and each time, you
know, Lady Rose would have been only too delighted to see
you if you would have gone too."
" Me ! Yes, Fm so likely, after that first dinner party, to try
another taste of society, to put myself in the power of ladies
anymore. You have been there, in fourteen days, exactly seven
times, to my knowledge. Seven times, since I came back from
London, I have spent my evenings alone."
"I dined on Friday with Mauleverer, my dear Jane " *
" With no ' adjournment/ as you call it, to The Folly after-
wards F
Theobald is silent I will do him the justice to say that he is
really taken aback at the extent of his own misdeeds, as set
before him by his wife. Whatever Francis Theobald does, he
does with the eyes of his conscience shut, neither counting up
the cost nor measuring the risk ; and then, it must be remem-
bered, married men at all times are apt to diverge with an
unconscious simplicity that no woman, certainly no wife can
understand, towards the paths wherein they should not walk !
Either our social by-laws make the downward road smoother to
men's feet, or the stakes to be forfeited on their side the game
are less tremendous, or the weakness, born of selfishness, lays
them more open to the wiles of the enemy. . . . Certain it is,
that no woman could drift, inch by inch, towards the goal
whither Francis Theobald is innocently drifting now, and not
know it.
To the utmost extent that his temperament allows him to
ALONE. 283
love anything, he loves Jane and Jane's child. For Lady Rose
(I do not say for the mistress of Beaudesertfs Folly) he cares
not a straw, and still it has got to his spending seven evenings
out of fourteen, with morning and afternoon visits unreckoned,
at Lady Rose's sida
One of three things passion, vanity, or solid self-interest
must be present before a woman will risk the shattering of her
household gods. A French cook, admirable wines, loo, 6cart6,
and the easiest lounging chairs in the world, are sufficiently
powerful agents to lead astray the facile Rip Van Winkle nature
of Francis Theobald.
He is silent : and Jane pursues her advantage. " Yes, seven
evenings out of fourteen. When Blossy is gone to bed, and the
rats begin to get well about, do you know that this ancestral
abode of yours (in spite of its smell of blue blood), is not
cheerful, Theobald]"
44 1 never thought it was cheerful, my dear. If you remember,
my first advice after Cousin James's death was to sell it, let it,
get rid of it in any way we could, and live abroad as we had
always done, only "
" Only, I, like a fool, proposed that we should try to make a
home in England, and turn respectable !" cries Jane, with bit-
terness. " I thought, living a quiet country life, you would be
less likely to gamble away your last inheritance than you would
be at the kind of places we lived in abroad. I thought the child
would be brought up better. I thought "
44 You thought Mrs. Grundy was not such an utter brute as
she is," says Theobald, kindly; and rising, he comes to his
wife's side, and puts his arm round her waist " If you had
only listened to me, Jenny, you would have been wise in time.
Do you remember my saying that, after being happy as Pariahs,
we should be fools to try to set up as Brahmins 1 Do you
remember my telling you we should never get on among a
society of which all the members were better off than ourselves,
both as regards this world and the next?'
284 OUGHT WE TO VISIT HERt
"Oh, I'm not talking of such rubbish as * society' now!
Every fine lady in Chalkshire might have blackballed me,
refused to visit me though as to the next world," in fiery
parenthesis this, "you may think as you like, but I would back
my chance against most of theirs yes, I say every fine lady in
the county might have turned her back upon me, and I should
have only laughed at them. What have ladies ever had to do
with me, or with my life % But you you "
He whispers a tender, a perfectly sincere, assurance of his
unchanged love ; he would kiss her, but she snatches herself
from his arms ; she stands flushing, trembling ; eager oh, how
eager, to return to their shelter, but with her jealous heart
holding her aloof !
" I like reality, Theobald ! Sham, made-up speeches have
110 effect upon me. I've heard too many of them on the stage.
Swear to me never to set your foot within The Folly doors
again, and I will believe that you care for me as you used I"
"Don't inveigle me into rash vows, Jane," says Theobald,
with charming good humour. " You know how often I've been
made to swear I would never tpuch a card again, and you know
how all the oaths have ended !"
"And you are afraid your new passion will prove as much
too strong for you as the old one did, I suppose T
" Passion ! Jane, what a silly girl you are. When will you
learn that life is life, not a melodrama ? / feel a passion for
any woman for Lady Kose Golightly, most of all !"
"Then," says Jane, with admirable swiftness of reasoning,
"why do you spend seven evenings out of fourteen at her
house V
" We do a great many things without any particular reason,
and certainly without any particular gratification, Jenny."
" Ah, Pm glad to hear you say that." Jane retreats a step
or two farther off, and looks hard into her husband's unruffled
face. " I'm glad to hear The Folly dinners give you so little
gratification. You'll be the less angry with me for what I am
ALONE. ( 285
going to do. Theobald," taking a couple of envelopes from her
pocket, " I got a note this morning from Lady Golightly. You
know its contents, probably \ Well, and I've written my answer.
Shall I read it to you P
" It might make things clearer to my understanding, my love,
if you were to let me hear the question first ; but just as you
like/'
" Do you mean to tell me, on your word of honour, you don't
know what her note is about I"
"Have I ever shown symptoms of possessing the gift of
clairvoyance, Jenny V
" Do you, or do you not V
Mr. Theobald puts up his eyeglass to look at nothing in par-
ticular, and stands the picture of a bullied, innocent husband.
" Do I, or do I not ? Jenny, if I were to be killed for it at
this moment, I couldn't answer that question. Do I, or do 1
not what V*
" I will save you the trouble of thinking. It will be a pity
for you to fatigue your brains about such a trifle ! This is her
note though, in spite of all you say, yes, and if you were to say ,
fifty times as much, I will never believe, intimate as you are,
that you have not read it already, perhaps dictated it I believe
you dictated it :
" ' My deab Mks. Theobald,
u * Will you and Mr. Theobald dine with me on Monday
at eight ? We shall be quite a small party ; and, knowing your
predilections, I mean the rule of the evening to be, "No cards."
*" I am yours truly,
"'Kose Golightly.' "
"It is a friendly enough note in its way," says Francis
Theobald.
" And here is my answer :
" * Mrs. Theobald does no* accept Lady Kose Golightly's
invitation to dinner/ n
286 OUGHT WE TO VISIT HERt
For a moment Theobald stands like a man who has had a
blow. His nonchalance, his look of innocence, both take flight \
an ominous, deep flush spreads gradually over his face. ** You
have no intention of sending that note, I presume, Jane 1"
" What should I have written it for, else % I shall walk over
to Lidlington, and post it with my own hands this afternoon."
" You will commit the unwisest action of your life if you do.
Refuse Lady Rose's invitation if you like the only woman,"
adds Mr. Theobald, actually beginning to lose his temper, " the
only woman in this blanked neighbourhood who has shown
you a civility ; but refuse it with common politeness. Why,
that note is the note of a madwoman !"
Never since she was married to him has Jane seen such energy
on Theobald's face, heard such energy in his voice.
" Mad you think me mad, do you % Then all I have got to
say on the subject is, I very much prefer my own madness to
the sanity of other people."
" Jenny, you are a foolish, hot-headed girl, but you will never
do such a thing as this. I don't want you to accept Lady Rose's
invitation. I would rather, on every account, you did not accept
it Stay away 111 stay away too, if you choose ; but put your
refusal into decent terms. That is all I ask of you. 7 '
Now a woman, jealous though she might be, who possessed
tact, discretion, the commonest worldly prudence, would cer-
tainly here yield the point to the extent urged by Mr. Theobald.
But tact, discretion, prudence, are not among Jane's virtues.
She sees how deeply Theobald, usually so indifferent to all things,
is in earnest, and forms deductions in her own quick, unrea-
soning fashion as to the earnestness of his regard for Lady Rose.
u You are wonderfully anxious to spare her feelings, it seems.
How much have you thought of sparing mine during the past
fortnight T
" All this is simple childishness, Jane. We were not married
yesterday that you should cry if you lose me out of your sight.
Besides," goes on Theobald, losing his coolness more and more,
ALONE. 287
" you are really the last woman living who should be touchy in
such small matters! When did I find fault with your intimacy
with De Lansac Brabazon young Crosbie with scores of
other men you have had dangling in attendance upon you at
different times f
Jane colours over brow, cheek, and neck ; then she turns
white with passion. " Rawdon Crosbie Brabazon ! And you
dare you dare liken my. intimacy with them, with any man,
to yours with Lady Rose % Do you degrade me, even in your
own mind, then, to the level of fine ladies % Oh, I have looked
into Lady Rose's eyes, I have heard her and her friend Miss
Childers talk ; I know what fine ladies are ! Do you degrade
me, even in your own mind, I say, to such a level as that?"
In truth he does not. The shot, discharged at random, has
struck home. In this poor ballet-girl, whom he took, at sixteen
years old, to be his wife this ballet-girl, with
"Her unromantic style, her ^grammatical lips,"
Theobald has trust most absolute trust such as men do not
always have, it may be, in far better born, more highly educated
wives. Jane unfaithful! Jane, with all her tempers, and
jealousies; and ignorance, upon a level with Loo Childers and
Lady Rose %
" As to De Lansac, 9 she goes on, U I blush I blush for you
that you should bring his name into such a discussion. Why^ut
for his generosity ''
44 Yes, I know, I know," cries Theobald, not looking by any
means at his ease. " For heaven's sake, Jane, don't let us have
any theatre scenes of ' powerful domestic interest !' You know
quite well I meant nothing serious by what I said. The whole
thing is preposterous. Lady Rose Golightly sends us an invita-
tion to dinner ; you decline it, and I suggest that you should
make use of the common stereotyped phrases of civilised life in
doing so."
" Civilised life ! I don't belong to civilised life. My note
expresses what I mean, neither more nor less."
288 OUGHT WE TO VISIT HER t
M I have no doubt it does. But you should remember that
there is some one else to be considered. You should remember
that it will expose me to ridicule as well as yourself."
" Oh, I should have thought nothing could make you ridiculous
in Lady Rose's eyes."
" Once and for all, Jane, do you mean to send that atrocious
note or not V
"I do. I will not stoop to be civil to anyone on this earth
whom I hate. I mean to post the note with my own hands this
afternoon."
"It is not a note you force me into saying so that a lady
could ever, under any circumstances, write to another lady."
" But I am not a lady. You seem to forget that/'
" By God, I wish I could forget it \" cries Theobald, exaspe-
rated past all control. ** Unfortunately, your actions give me no
chance of that."
They are the cruellest words he ever spoke to her in his life,
and when he has spoken them he turns a curious passing like-
ness to his sister Charlotte upon his handsome blonde face to
leave the room.
" Theobald !" she exclaims quickly, "are you going? I . . .
I shall see you again in the afternoon ?"
"I cannot say at all," he answers with cold deliberation.
" Very likely you will not see me. I have engagements that may
keep me away till late."
"You are not you are not going to The Folly?"
" Most undoubtedly I am going to The Folly. Such an insane
note as you have written shall not arrive quite without explana-
tion on my part."
And so he leaves her. - t
The die is cast ; the turning at the cross-roads taken. From
this moment on, until she finish with Chalkshire and with "re-
spectability" for ever, Jane must stand or fall alone.
Alone ! Reader, do you know the fullest meaning of that
word?
HIS GRACE THE DUKE OF MALTA. 289
CHAPTER XXIX.
HIS GRACE THE DUKE OF MALTA.
As soon as Theobald is clear of the house Jane bursts into a
flood of tears ; but they are tears of passion, thunder-showers of
wrath, not the soft and wholesome rain of repentance, and spend
themselves quickly.
By constitution she is the least lachrymose of women ; cries,
as Blossy would, when any passing storm of temper forces her
into such exhibition of weakness, but knows nothing of tears as
a science, never uses them as weapons against her husband or as
a source of strength to herself. Fool that she is the thought
comes across her suddenly, now fool that she is, to do aught to
spoil her face, the best friend she has left her in the world ! Will
swollen eyes bring Theobald home a moment the quicker, or a
red nose make him likelier to stay at home when he does come ?
She goes upstairs to her room, bathes her face with cold water
till it glows like any fresh-gathered rose : by-and-by, when
Bloss/s one o'clock dinner is over, spends an hour or so before
her glass, dressing, and then, the child for her companion, starts
away to the town of Lidlington to post her letter.
The Saturday before the races is always considered one of the
gay days of the year by the good people of Lidlington, and this
afternoon the shops and pavement of the High-street are really
if one compare them to Lidlington in its normal state hilarious.
As Jane walks along, slowly, and with her slender throat erect,
as she has learnt to carry it of late, she meets Mrs. Coventry
Brown's carriage, the Pippin family on foot, her sisters-in-law in
their brougham ; presently, at no very great distance, descries
the approaching figures of Mrs. Crosbie and Emma, Major Her-
vey beside them in the road for the ladies' voluminous silks and
muslins do not give the poor little Adonis room to keep on the
pavement. It is the first opportunity Jane has had of confront-
ing Mrs. Crosbie since the blackballing business, and with the
*9
"**W
290 OUGHT WE TO VISIT HER ?
well-balanced step, the composed mechanical smile, early learnt
in her profession, she advances steadily and bravely to the ren-
contre.
Jane advances steadily ! But Mrs. Crosbie and Emma are not,
it would seem, quite so well nerved for the meeting. At all
events they shirk it, by turning into the Lidlington Circulating
Library, just when they are about half a dozen steps away, Major
Hervey remaining at the door, prepared to give " our young
Kawdon's friend" a superciliously admiring stare as she passes
along.
Adonis, who has been staying for some days with the Crosbies,
is in excellent spirits, excellent temper with himself, although
naturally bored at being so long away from St. James's Street,
and as he stands pulling his jewelled white fingers through his
long purple whiskers, really looks almost young enough for the
part of ardent lover which, ever since the morning of Kawdon's
dismissal in Bolton Bow, he has been enacting.
Of his ultimate success with Emma Marsland, Major Hervey
has now little doubt Her engagement to Bawdon is broken
off definitely ; the letter formally announcing the news of the
rupture has been dispatched to her guardian in Jamaica ; and she
spends any number of hours a day in Major Kervey's society,
and listens patiently to any number of Major Hervey 's twaddling
stories about his own conquests, and does not draw her hand
away if he chance to hold it over-long in his ; does not resent it
even, if her hand is sometimes raised, among the shady walks
and plantations around The Hawthorns, to Major Hervey's
thin lips.
How should this middle-aged Adonis, enveloped in the thick
fumes of his own self-worship, doubt of poor Emmy's growing
affection for him I mean of the growing certainty of his marry-
ing poor Emma's thirty thousand pounds ? It is not a very great
match for a man in his position, if one consider over it. After
being courted by Marchionesses and Lady Carolinas all one's life,
only to marry thirty thousand pounds, and a girl whose family
HIS GRACE THE DUKE OF MALTA. 291
is not mentioned among the * Landed Gentry,' in the end ! But
Major Hervey has a sort of delicate suspicion that his honour,
his honour, is engaged or so he writes to his mother. For
whether they be conscious or unconscious jugglers to their own
hearts, these Herveys always keep on the mask scrupulously
before each other. Through his advice, in some measure, her
foolish entanglement with young Eawdon was brought to an
end ; the poor little girl has learnt to look to him for counsel
and support, and it is too late, his conscience really tells him so,
too late in the day to draw back now.
He remains, caressing his whiskers, at the door of the Lid-
lington Library, but does not obtain his anticipated stare at " our
young Rawdon's friend," Mrs. Theobald's parasol opportunely
interposing itself, not many inches from Major Hervey's nose,
just as she passes him. For the disappointment, however, he is
more than compensated, a minute later, by a sight sweeter to the
Hervey heart than the sight of the prettiest woman in Europe :
his Grace, the Duke of Malta, on foot, alone, and evidently
approaching with the intention of speaking to him.
As the face of his mistress to a lover, as gold to a Jew, as fame
to a poet, as the sun to the earth, is a duke, and a duke who will
condescend to toss him a nod or a word, to Alfred Hervey.
" How are you, Mr. .... Hervey, to be sure Hervey The
labours of a lifetime have mined Alfred Hervey into three or
four of the best London clubs, just as patience, long-suffering,
indifference to rebuff, have brought him upon nodding terms,
with most of their members. " Thought I remembered seeing
you somewhere. Can you tell me who that girl is who has just
passedthe girl in white and blue % There, she is crossing over
the road to the post-office."
Before Major Hervey can recover from his delight at being
recognised sufficiently to answer, Mrs. Crosbie, attracted by the
all-powerful magnetism of the ducal voice, has fluttered for-
ward, with Emma, to the door.
His Grace's reception of them is admirable in its brief aim
j 9 2
292 OUGHT WE TO VISIT HERt
plicity. The Duke of Malta is one of the leaders of a school
whose manners towards the other sex are not formed upon the
exploded model of a De Grammont or a Chesterfield. Such
women as poor Mrs. Crosbie and Emma are intolerable bores
to him ; neither more nor less. His pleasures, associates, sym-
pathies, all belong to a different world to theirs ; a world where
cautious mammas and marriageable daughters are not ; a world,
perhaps, where insolence of manner, coming from a youthful
duke, with an ample fortune still to get through, is leniently
regarded. Though, for that matter, the Duke of Malta seldom
finds himself treated with extraordinary severity anywhere.
Once a year, at the race time generally, the Duke spends
about a week with his sister Rose ; and during this week what
avalanches of cards, cards from the whole Chalkshire society,
lay and clerical, worldly and other-worldly, pour in through
The Folly doors !
" Mr. Crosbie has not yet had the honour of waiting on your
Grace," says Mrs. Crosbie, the Duke having bestowed upon
herself and Emma a nod like a groom's. " We were not aware,
until last night, that your Grace had arrived in Chalkshire, but
Mr. Crosbie will at once n
" Thanks, can you tell me who the girl is who has just passed
good-looking fair girl, in white and blue? There, she has
just crossed over the road, by the post-office."
Emma colours to the roots of her hair. Mrs. Crosbie puts
up her double eye-glasses, clears her throat thinks, perhaps, of
dear old Canon Hervey's infallible recipe for virtuous human
conduct then informs his Grace that the lady's name, to the
best of her belief, is Mrs. Theobald, " a lady only recently come
into the neighbourhood ; and "
"Oh, thctfs Mrs. Theobald, is it P his Grace cuts her short
" Just introduce me to her as she goes by. Not know her ?
Always thought everybody in the country knew everybody.
Mr. . . . Hervey ? yes, Hervey," he turns to Adonis again,,
"just introduce me, will you, to Mrs. Theobald V
HIS GRACE THE DUKE OF MALTA. 293
Mrs. Crosbie and Emma fall back into the obscurity of the
shop, not enlivened by this new proof of the innate depravity
of men's hearts. Major Hervey prepares himself with zest for
his favourite employment of character-blasting.
" Mrs. Theobald is the wife of a Mr. Francis Theobald ; your
Grace may have met the man V His Grace nods. " But is not
visited in the neighbourhood. Belongs ah rather to the
demi-monde, er "
" So I thought/ says the Duke, with his usual habit of frank
interruption. " She hasn't much of the heavy Chalkshire cut
about her. Who was she, do you know 1 I don't remember
seeing her face about in town."
" She was," says Major Hervey, lowering his voice and pre-
paring to wire-draw his subject-matter are not numbers of
people passing and repassing, and must they not all behold him
in this delightful, confidential proximity to the Duke of Malta
" She was, till her marriage since, for aught I know "
" Hallo, Brabazon ! Stop !" cries his Grace, as little Captain
Brabazon at this moment passes down the street. They have
met already at The Folly ; and Major Hervey remarks, with
disgust, that the Duke does not address Brabazon with the prefix
of " Mister," which he so scrupulously accords to himself. "Just
the man I want. Can you introduce me to Mrs. Theobald?"
Captain Brabazon can and will, and launches forthwith into
warm praises of Mrs. Theobald's grace and beauty.
" Mr. . . . Hervey was just telling me some story or other
about her as you came up," says his Grace. " I'm sure I don't
know what it was all about."
" I was merely telling your Grace what Mrs. Theobald was,"
Major Hervey observes, in answer to this pleasantly turned
little speech.
" Oh ! and what was she, then ? We shall have time for the
story, I suppose, before she returns."
" She was," says Adonis, glancing out from the corners of his
cynical old eyes, " in the ' Leg Business,' your Grace."
294 OUGHT WE TO VISIT HER?
His Grace looks stolidly incomprehensive. It is a well-known
joke among a certain set of men in London that Adonis Hervey
will take any impertinence that any man with a title may choose
to offer him : and this on a sliding scale the higher the title
the grosser the impertinence. The Duke of Malta, who recol-
lects this " Mr. . . . Hervey" perfectly, recollects the joke too ;
and being at all times given to humour of a quiet and practical
nature himself, resolves to play upon Mr. Hervey's little pecu-
liarity now.
" ' Leg business !' What on earth do you mean by that % IVe
heard a man called ' a leg/ Mr. Hervey, and I dare say you
have ; but I never knew the term applied to a woman before."
Major Hervey gives a sickly laugh, tat he turns yellow : I
will do him the justice to say that ; he turns yellow.
Years ago twenty, twenty-five years ago, it must have been
a dark story gained currency in the world about Alfred James
Hervey; then, as now, nick-named Adonis. Was the story
true or false % I who write do not know. A gambling scene
a Grif of seventeen, beggared and driven to suicide ; a court-
martial (Adonis was in the army, then), some officer of the same
regiment, not Alfred Hervey, cashiered. These were about as
many facts as ever became positively known to the public at
large. The circumstance occurred the other side the line, and
regiments, like families, have a knack of keeping their untoward
secrets to themselves. But from that day forth Hervey's was
a name with a cross against it. Women shrank from him ;
men of unblemished honour avoided, though they might not
drop, his acquaintance. He did not leave the army ; his
enemies stay, I think it was his friends said he had shown
finer feeling had he done so. Alfred Hervey possessed the
courage that can brave deserved contempt, the moral elasticity
that can rebound from open coldness or veiled insult like india-
rubber. He did not leave the army. In a certain sense he
lived down the story of his youth. And still the story has never
died outright. Still his name is a name with a cross against it.
HIS GRACE THE DUKE OF MALTA. 295
"Alfred Hervey ! Ah, yes, the Alfred Hervey, you know, who
was in that bad card business years ago. Wrong man cashiered
Hervey, it was said, had interest just the kind of underhand
fellow who could wriggle his way through anything.*
This, though he belongs to the best clubs in London, is the
way men speak of him, even now. From this you may perceive
the drift of the Duke of Malta's little pleasantry.
The poor wretch, I repeat, turns yellow. He bites the end
of one of his long dyed whiskers, as though for a moment he
were minded to choke himself upon that savoury morsel Then
he gets back all his coolness, all his presence of mind, and is
Adonis Hervey again Adonis Hervey, in familiar conversation
with his friend the Duke of Malta, observed and envied by all
this provincial herd who are passing and repassing upon their
vulgar business, or vulgarer pleasure, along the High Street of
Lidlington !
" Excellent, upon my soul, excellent ! Don't know when I
have heard a better thing ! I was alluding to the ballet, Mrs.
Theobald's former business ; but ha, ha, ha ! your Grace gave
it the wittiest turn in the world. And apropos, too, the shoe
that does not fit the wife may fit the husband. Your Grace, it
seems, has met this Mr. Francis Theobald)"
"Theobald is one of the best fellows in the world," cries
Captain Brabazon. Every acquaintance honest little Brabazon
possesses is sure to be one of the best fellows in the world. "You
require to know him, certainly ; but if s surprising what sterling
good there is, under all that lazy, Dundreary exterior of his."
" Very surprising, I should say," sneers Adonis. " Well, I
am not acquainted with the man personally ; but I was in Paris
at the same time he was, once, and I know what used to be said
of him there."
Mark, admire the boldness of this, Reader ! Could any one
but a Hervey come thus to the front again after what has just
passed?
"Pleasant person in his way, it was said, but a little too
r -rm
\ 296 OUGHT WE TO VISIT BERT
i lucky! Turns the king a little too often towards the small
y hours of the morning. However, this was only an on dit. I
Ij should be the last man to say anything to Mr. Francis
t?- Theobald's disadvantage, now that he has come into a new
\i neighbourhood."
*.; The Duke of Malta stares full into Major Hervey's face. He
\ . has eyes like Lady Rose's ; those opaque-looking, leaden-gray
p orbs, which, more than any other human eyes, seemed endowed
" '" with the faculty of hard staring. " I believe you thoroughly,
( Mr. Hervey. I'm quite sure, if this Francis Theobald was .
\ - what you say, you would "
" I should T asks Adonis, all smirks and courtesy as the Duke
pauses.
'! " Why, hold your tongue and back him, to be sure. Now,
t Brabazon, is our time."
]: And away walks the Duke, Captain Brabazon at his side,
towards the graceful white-and-blue figure now not many yards
distant, leaving Adonis alone in his glory on the library door-
I must have given the reader a very poor and superficial idea
of the Hervey nature, if I need add that Adonis is in still better
temper and spirits with himself than he was ^ve minutes ago.
Did not the Duke jest with him in the most affable and familiar
manner, a credible witness listening ?
" Have you heard the last good thing the Duke of Malta said
to Adonis Hervey?" people will ask. People ! Why, he will,
himself, repeat the impertinence with honourable pride to every
soul he meets when he gets back to London. If the toe of a
duke's boot were, by accident, to propel him over hastily, I be-
lieve the construction of Major Hervey's brain would allow him
to twist the slight mischance into a compliment
And whether we ourselves happen to admire his character or
not, we must confess that such a man goes a very long way in-
deed towards being a philosopher.
"NOTHING IS AGAINST MY PRINCIPLES/" 297
CHAPTER XXX.
"NOTHING 18 AGAIN8T MY PRINCIPLES "!*
Jane is dressed precisely as she was on the day when the Cros-
bies made her acquaintance in Spa; the cheap little striped
muslin, the black lace scarf, the blue gauze bonnet made by
herself all is the same.
But whatever she may happen to wear, magnificent silk, or
plain brown Holland, or twenty-five franc muslin, there is
always something in the walk, the gait, the nameless airy grace
of Francis Theobald's actress wife which, to discriminating eyes,
marks her out as not belonging to that small and whaleboned
section of the world which is called " society." The Duke of
Malta, no unpractised judge of feminine charms (though frigid
as ice to the Chalkshire beauties generally), detects this some-
thing at a glance. The Duke of Malta also decides that the
blooming girlish face is as fair a one as his eyes have rested on
for many a long day; and even before the formality of an intro-
duction is gone through, resolves to accord this Mrs. Theobald,
whom "the neighbourhood" will not visit, the honour of his
ducal and most serious attention.
She stops, seeing that Captain Brabazon means to speak to
her, and her voice, and smile, and frank untrammelled manner,
complete his Grace's conquest.
"I haven't seen you for ever so long. You seem to have for-
gotten your way to Theobalds, Captain Brabazon V
Little Brabazon explains that he has been spending the last
few days in London, but has now returned for the great sporting
event of the Chalkshire year. " You are going to the races, of
course, Mrs. Theobald ?" he adds ; the Duke all this time stand-
ing, his leaden eyes very wide open, waiting to be introduced.
" Then I hope you will do us the honour of coming to lunch in
our tent ? The colonel is going to send you a formal note of
"7SWB
298 OUGHT WE TO VISIT HER?
invitation on Monday, but meantime you will promise lae,
won't you, to make no other engagement V
" There is no other engagement I could make/' cries Jane in
her blunt way. " Who else in Chalkshire but your people would
ask me 1 Yes, I shall be delighted. Only mind, my sister
you know who she is ? Minnie Arundel, of ' The Koyal' will
be with me. If you ask me you must ask Min too.*
Captain Brabazon says everything the occasion requires
respecting the pleasure Miss Minnie Arundel's presence will
confer upon himself and his brother officers. Then, turning
to the Duke, he introduces him to Jane :
"The Duke of Malta, Mrs. Theobald."
Jane blushes violently that loveliest rose-pink blush of hers
then gives Lady Kose Golightly's brother about the very
coolest nod his Grace has ever received from a woman during
his life. Brabazon, not altogether unsuspicious of the bad blood
existing between Theobald's wife and Lady Eose, interprets
both nod and blush aright, and displays more tact than could
have been expected of him by speaking to Blossy, and thus
causing a diversion. The Duke follows suit ; and, stooping,
requests Miss Theobald to accord him the favour of a kiss.
" Ugh !" cries Blossy, wrinkling her nose into a grimace ex-
pressive of profoundest disgust, and clasping five small fingers
tight across her lips. Then, Brabazon pleading in his turn, the
little witch turns to him, and bestows, not one, but half a dozen
kisses upon his smooth pleasant-looking face ; glancing disdain-
fully the while at the Duke, as though to make her preference
for his rival more unmistakably clear to his understanding.
" Your little daughter has learnt the first great lesson of her
sex already, Mrs. Theobald."
" I don't know what you mean."
The Duke repeats his remark, which, like most remarks, does
not gain in brilliancy by repetition ; then, finding that Mrs.
Theobald keeps silent, enlarges upon it. A woman's first instinct
f. is to make men miserable, if she is pretty. Little girl, as pretty
f.
"NOTHING IS AGAINST MY PRINCIPLES 7" 299
a little girl as he ever saw eyes, complexion, hair, the very
colour he admires but a coquette, evidently an arch coquette
by nature.
" The child shows her likes and dislikes, as I do, 9 says Jane.
" She takes to people, or she doesn't take to them, from the first,
and never changes her mind afterwards." ,
" And do you never change, either, Mrs. Theobald V
The Duke throws the tenderest expression he is master of
into his voice; he is a common-looking u horsily "-dressed
young man of five feet four or five, with an unwholesome, reddish
complexion, the lack-lustre, Beaudesert eyes, a thick, short-set
neck, and figure of corpulent dimensions ; and as she listens,
some of the severity in Jane's face begins to relax.
" I ? Why, I change a dozen times a day. I dislike people
furiously in the morning, like them at noon, and begin to dis-
like them furiously again towards evening."
" Good heavens, what time is it now V The Duke takes out
his watch eagerly. " Five o'clock !. Mrs. Theobald, has your
time for disliking people furiously begun yet?"
" H'm ! That depends upon who the people are."
She gives him a relenting look from her blue eyes, though
her lips still keep stern and grave, and the Duke of Malta
knows that the process of wasting in despair is not, just at pre-
sent, going to be added to his experiences.
Do not condemn her too quickly for her weakness, Header.
Recollect that among all the complex desires which bring about
human wrong-doing, none is commoner or more potent than the
seldom enumerated one of desiring to seem worse than we are.
How many men and women can one remember, women espe-
cially, who have studiously lost themselves by acting down to
the standard which the world, justly or unjustly, has apportioned
to them ! Jane is not a coquette, save in innocence, as every
young, and pretty, and high-spirited woman, unshackled by
artificial rules of conduct, must be. Her heart, filled to over-
flowing with its one passionate love, has no restless craving for
v--:?T
300 OUGHT WE TO VISIT HER1
men's admiration. And as to fastness well, if Blossy be fast,
Blossy's mother, compared to the school of Loo Childers and
Lady Rose Golightly, may be reckoned fast likewise. But she
has had a distinct part assigned her to play from the moment
when Mrs. Crosbie threw her upon young Rawdon's chivalrous
pity on the promenade at Spa ; and she is sufficiently actress,
woman, human, to enjoy playing it with thoroughness.
If war was to be waged against her, on a grand and aggressive
scale, by the ladies of Chalkshire, should she not enlist every
husband, brother, and son, willing to enter the lists, for her own
poor little guerilla system of defence %
Well, and when any one of us has once set out briskly along
the downhill road, is not our bad angel, opportunity, always at
hand to loosen the drag from the wheels of our conveyance for
us % Rawdon Crosbie's boyish passion has already put but too
strong a weapon into Jane's hand. And now, at her side, only
too ready to be her devoted servant before men's eyes, if she
will accept his devotion, stands the Duke of Malta ! Not, as
we have seen, a man personally seductive, but a man with the
purest blood I speak genealogically the purest blood of Eng-
land in his veins, a man openly sought after, secretly sighed for
by every gentle feminine breast, high and low, in Chalkshire*
Can Jane resist him %
If she were an unmarried girl again, a friendless, penniless
dancing- girl, as she was when Theobald fell in love with her, and
this ugly little Duke of Malta were to offer her his hand, name,
wealth, in honourable marriage, I believe, from my heart, Jane's
first instinctive answer would be an u tJgh, w like Blossy's. But
she c&nnot resist the temptation of seeming worse than she is ;
of displaying her latest conquest, creditable or not creditable,
full before the outraged, jealous sight of Chalkshire society.
She looks at him, the same covert encouragement still in her
eyes ; and Captain Brabazon seeing,, or saying that he sees, an
acquaintance to whom he must speak, takes his leave and
vanishes down an adjoining street The Duke of Malta and
Jane are left alone.
u NOTHING IS AGAINST MY PRINCIPLES ' f 301
u Time for us to be going home, Bloss. Good evening to you,
Duke !" bestowing a little, stage-learnt salutation, half chilling,
half friendly, upon his Grace.
How prettily that word " Duke " comes from her lips ! How
refreshing it sounds after all the fulsome " your Graces " of
Major Hervey ! How charming is her assumption of their
equality of station !
" If you are going home on foot, Mrs. Theobald, let me be your
escort. Come, come, don't say no part of the way, at least V
" That leaves you a fine loop-hole when you get tired," says
Jane, relenting altogether. " Well, you may come part of the
way, then, as you have put the request in such a mild form."
And so they start ; Jane, poor little fool, walking slower, and
with head more erect than ever ! She jests, she rattles on in her
wildest strain ; her clear, out-ringing laugh startles the whole
High-street of Lidlington out of its decorum. Mrs. and Miss
Pippin see them coming, and run into Smith, the linen-draper's,
whence they may modestly peep forth through the dresses and
calicoes in the windows at the latest Theobald scandal. The
Miss Theobalds meet them, and draw down the blinds of their
brougham, as though they were passing a funeral. By the time
they get clear of the town every one has met them. Jane's
triumph, such as it is, is complete. And a burning sense of humi-
liation and self-contempt at her own heart is the result ! She
looks abruptly round, after some ultra complimentary speech of
her distinguished companion's ; she sees Lady Rose on every line
of his vacuous, vicious face, and becomes all at once conscious
that she abhors him ! Having an attentive duke beside one with
an audience, in the High-street of Lidlington, is such a very
different thing to having an affectionate duke in the same
position, and without an audience, amidst unfrequented green
lanes !
" Don't you think you have come quite far enough V she asks
him, with delightful impertinence. " I do. You know we only
stipulated for part of the way."
" Do you mean to tell me, can you have the cruelty to tell me,
that you would prefer being alone V 1 be replies, m bis tendereet
tone, and looking with warmer admiration than ever into her Face.
" Well, I must say I'm fond of my own company sometimes,*
says Jane, returning the look with one of ice.
He tli inks that she is " playing cold," leading him on by a
little assumed indifference : and, making the acknowledged best
countemiove in such cases, begins to talk on jlifFerent subjects.
This is a specimen of his Grace's conversational powers :
*' Nut r.-n much of ( -halkshlre yet, I suppose P'
"Quite as much as I ever wish to see,* 1 Jane quickens her
pace a little as she says this, and keeps Blossy'a small figure well
ii iter |j used between his Grace and herself,
'Ah find it rather slow work, don't you? 'To bless the
squire and his relations, and live contented with our stations V
Not quite the sort of life you are used to T
" I find it excessively unpleasant. I don't know what you
mean by ' slow.' "
Silence during ten or a dozen paces ; then, " I am to have the
pleasure of seeing you and Mr. Theobald at The Folly, on Mon-
day !" remarks the Duke, returning to the charge again.
" You may sea Mr. Theobald," Jane's lip quivers, but the Duke
does not notice it. He can tell when a woman's lips are red and
full ; no more. The analyzation of finer traits of emotion is not
at all in the Duke of Malta's way. " You may see Mr. Theobald.
You will not see me. I have just been to the post with my
refusal now."
" Your refusal ! Oh, come, that's all nonsense. You must
change your mind now that you know I mean, if I implore "
" I am not going to dine with Lady Rose Golightly/' inter-
rupts Jane, Hushing up, " either on Monday or any other day.
We don't suit each other in the least, your sister and L"
The Duke looks considerably taken back for a moment or two
after this trenchant declaration ; then he shakes his head philo-
sophically: "Curious thing, Mrs. Theobald at least, I don't
"NOTHING IS AGAINST MY PRINCIPLES f 303
know whether it is curious, when you think of it, but it's a fact,
that all women hate each other."
" I am sure I don't," says Jane superbly. " There may be
women whose actions I despise, but I would not take the trouble,
I would not stoop to hate them !"
" Of course. You all say that, and you all do hate each other
just the same. Now, my sister, Kose, to take an instanc/e at
hazard, Rose always seems to me as jolly, kind-hearted a little
soul as lives. But women detest her most confoundedly, on my
soul they do ! I don't know that I ever saw any women but
Loo Childers who could get on with my sister Rose for more
than a week."
" Lady Rose Golightly and Miss Guilders suit each other's
tastes to a ' t, 7 1 should say," remarks Jane, her small nose well
in the air. " You must remember / belong to quite a different
class of life. What can a ballet-girl perhaps you don't know
I was a ballet-girl before I married what can a ballet-girl have
in common with ladies like your sister and her friends V 1
The Duke's great leaden eyes give her a stare of interrogation.
What the deuce is she driving at now % he wonders. Has Rose
been snubbing her for her crimes of superior youth and beauty ?
Or is it possible, in these days, when jealousy is so nearly an ex-
tinct passion, that she can be angered by Rose's innocent and
pastoral little flirtation with Theobald 1 Well, if this be the
case, none the worse for him. For a pretty woman to be jealous
of her own husband can never be to the disadvantage of the pretty
woman's admirers.
"Poor Rose !" he goes on presently, hitting, with one of a fool's
fine instincts, upon just the remark most likely to please his
listener. " What a wreck she is, to be sure ! A dozen years ago
when she was your age, Mrs. Theobald you wouldn't believe
what a pretty woman my sister Rose was."
" Really ! And Miss Childers 1" asks Jane, affecting an air of
compassionate interest. " Was Miss Childers pretty, too, in her
youth?"
3H OUGHT WE TO VISIT HERt
The Duke cannot repress a chuckle. " Her youth ! If Loo
could only hear you % Well, no, I can't say Loo Childers ever
had an ounce of beauty, to my ideas. But she had a good start,
that's what it was. If a woman only gets well away from the
post from the first it goes further for her, Mrs. Theobald, you
may take my word for it, than all the features or complexions in
the world. It is known that so-and-so admires such a woman,
and all the other fellows follow like a flock of sheep. I'm not that
sort of man myself, 11 says the Duke. " I know my own tastes,
and consult no one else's. But most men only consult the fashion.
Well, you see, by some fluke or another, Loo got the best start
of all." The Duke gives it in detail. " And that made her
reputation. * Not admire Loo Childers V the young fools used
to say, ' Why, do you know who says she's the prettiest woman in
London V And to a certain extent the success of her first season
has floated her ever since.' 1
" I am ignorant, deplorably ignorant, of everything belonging
to the aristocratic world," says Jane, with humility. " Indeed,
in the face of such high authority, it seems presumptuous in
me even to offer an opinion. But if Miss Childers was ever the
prettiest woman in London, all I can say is, I am very sorry for
the rest !"
" Poor old 'Loo ! I suppose you know the name she goes by
in town ? Harry Desmond gave it her deuced ungrateful of
him, too, some people thought but 'twas several years after she
first came out, and when her pace had grown rather unlimited.
I don't know whether it's quite fair to repeat it," goes on the
Duke, " particularly here in Chalkshire, and now that Loo lias
sown her wild oats, and seems to be taking to the church. How-
ever, I'm sure you are safe. Well, Harry Desmond ... by
Jove !" the interruption is caused by the Duke's looking sud-
denly back over his shoulder" by Jove, here are some of those
old Lidlington women again !" His Grace makes frequent
use of exceptionally ungraceful words as he talks. " Why these
old Lidlington women are ubiquitous !"
"NOTHING IS AGAINST MY PRINCIPLES / 305
Jane, hearing such forcible language, looks back over her
shoulder too, and discovers Mrs. Pippin and her daughter Lydia
(Lydia, the eldest, plainest, most musical Miss Pippin,) steadily
advancing at some twenty or thirty yards distant. And all her
repugnance to the Duke it might be juster to say, all her
repugnance to the Duke's attentions vanishes like smoke at
the sight. I should be unwilling, most unwilling, on my own
authority, to state that Mrs. and Miss Pippin have followed the
Duke of Malta and Jane of malice prepense. Idle tongues aver
that such little acts of social espionage are to Mrs. Pippin as
the meat and drink of daily life. But, then, idle tongues speak
sometimes of Mrs. Pippin as the Amateur Detective of Lidling-
ton, and even go so far as to call her pleasant villa house with
the flowers on the landing, and the five o'clock teas, and the
musical daughters the Private and Confidential Inquiry Office.
What, however, will idle tongues not say? There are outlying
labourers' cottages in the direction of Theobalds, and Mrs.
Pippin is known to be charitable, after a frugal and admonitory
fashion, to the poor. Who shall say that she is not on her road
with tracts, or good advice, or even a bottle of inexpensive
home-made physic, to some fellow-creature in need of succour
now 1 Whatever their motive, and whether chance or intention
inspired their steps, certain it is that Mrs. and Miss Pippin did
follow the Duke and Jane straight out of the town of Lidling-
ton, have followed them, bit by bit gaining ground, ever since,
and are now almost for their own sakes I should hope not
quite within earshot.
"Poor creature! Poor, unfortunate, misguided creature!"
says Mrs. Pippin, in her dry old voice, as Jane's merry laugh
rings, with a little flute accompaniment of Blossy's, through the
lanes. ** I beg, Lydia, that you will lower your parasol as we
pass them. Quite a mercy neither of the younger girls was
with us !"
A minute or two more bring Jane and her companion to the
big moss-grown gates that shut out the avenue of Theobalds
20
.-. .If
306 OUGHT WE TO VISIT HER t
from the world. Here the Duke, by no means to his satisfac-
tion, is told he must say good-bye ; and here Mrs. and Miss
Pippin, in spite of lowered parasols, find themselves constrained
to hear and witness the following painfully improper parting
scene:
" Come, you small coquette," says the Duke to Blossy, stooping
down until his face is upon the child's level : " will you con-
descend to give me one kiss before I go V
And as he says this he takes a dilapidated rosebud from the
button-hole of his " horsy " shooting-jacket, and offers it with
mock-serious gallantry to her baby hand.
Alas ! no truer daughter of Eve ever lived than Blossy Theo-
bald. She frowns, dimples, takes the dilapidated rosebud ; she
kisses the Duke of Malta on the lips.
"I thought better things of you, BlossT cries Jane. "I
didn't think your kisses were to be bought."
" What is there in the world that can not be bought f remarks
the Duke of Malta.
And Jane, mindful of her audience, smiles approvingly at the
sentiment.
This is bad ; but worse is still to follow. " Then, I may come
and call on you to-morrow V the Duke asks, as he holds her
slim hand at parting. " You are quite sure, Mrs. Theobald, that
Sunday visitors are not against your principles V
Jane pauses a moment for the Pippins to come nearer, then
turns her face with characteristic amiability, full in their direc-
tion.
"Nothing is against my principles !" She enunciates this
statement with deliberation, and in a tone pointedly meant for
the gallery. "Nothing! Sunday, or any other day, I shall be
delighted to see you, Duke !"
Mrs. Pippin and Lydia wait to hear no more.
HOPE OR DREAD t 307
CHAPTER XXXL
HOPS OR DREAD?
Yes, the taming at the cross-roads is taken ; but, did Fate will
it, poor Jane's steps would only too quickly re-travel the road,
even yet Her fierce tragedy mood of the morning has all effer-
vesced into farce as many a tragedy mood of hers has done
already ; and long before she has finished dressing for dinner
she is longing for Theobald's return, with a heart humble and
penitent as a little child's.
" You are young, you are fair," says the pretty face her best ,
friend that looks back at her from her looking-glass. " What
has Lady Rose Golightly, what have all these women who con-
demn you and who envy you, to do, in reality, with your life ?
What are Lady Hose Golightly's charms by the side of yours ?
Win back your sweetheart "to Jane's mind Theobald is her
sweetheart still " not by scenes of upbraiding and jealousy,
but by yourself. Make yourself doubly fair for his return, smile
at him, love him ; and defy all the dukes' daughters in England
to lure his heart out of your hands !"
She dresses herself in white, as Theobald likes best to see her,
a knot of ribbon of his favourite colour in her hair. She puts
on Bloss/s best embroidered frock, and, immensely to Miss
Theobald's satisfaction, a bewitching new pair of pink Morocco
boots ; she brushes the child's yellow hair into the softest little
wavy curls around her baby neck.
What a pretty picture they make I write this, but Jane's
vanity indorses it the mother of nineteen and her daughter !
How she can imagine Theobald looking coolly through his eye-
glass, first at one then at the other, then making some enthusiastic
speech, such as, " That he thinks he has seen plainer people in
his life, taking them both together." And then how she will fling
her arms round his neck and sue forgiveness for her passion ot
the morning sue, and be forgiven !
202
3o8 OUGHT WE TO VISIT HER?
If the terms of peace be that she must apologize for her note
to Lady Rose, Jane, in this revulsion of better feeling, knows
well that she will accept them. Apologize to Lady Rose, win
back Theobald to herself, and, perhaps who knows % the idea
has been often in her mind of late persuade him to go to Lon-
don or abroad in the autumn, and let Chalkshire, Lady Rose
Golightly, and everything belonging to the time which has wit-
nessed their estrangement, be like a bad dream, a tale that is
told, and which shall be repeated no more.
Half-past six comes, but no Theobald ; seven, and no Theo-
bald. Jane, "with a faltering heart, and beginning now to recall
his last words before he left, walks, restless, from room to room,
followed by Blossy, who is on as high a pinnacle of happiness
as an embroidered frock, curls, and pink boots can place any
human heart. Ten minutes past seven corned, but no Theobald.
" And if you please, ma'am, cook says if the fish is kept any
longer it won't be fit to dish, and is master to be waited fori"
Before Jane can answer comes the sound of wheels, rapidly
approaching along the avenue. Blossy, gladly expectant of an
audience, shrieks " Dada, mine boots !" and rushing to the front
door, holds one Lilliputian foot out straight, ready for admira-
tion. Jane contents herself by peeping through the drawing-
room window-curtains. Such a greeting as she has in store for
Theobald cannot be given before the servants on the doorstep.
Her eagerness her foolish eagerness to see him, makes her shy
as a girl awaiting the coming of her lover.
The wheels sound nearer ; a dog-cart emerges through the
trees, enters the gates a dog-cart driven by a servant in the
Duke of Malta's livery, and without Mr. Theobald. A minute
later, and a note, directed by her husband, and to which an
answer is requested, is put into Jane's hands. And this is what
the note contains :
" Dearest Jenny :
" Send me over some evening clothes in my portman-
HOPE OR DREAD t 309
teau, my dressing-case, et cetera. I shall stay at The Folly till
Monday morning.
M Your most affectionate
" N.B. White ties.* " F. T."
" The groom is waiting for an answer if you please, ma'am,"
says Esther, the housemaid, watching her mistress, rather curi-
ously.
Jane has turned, not pale, but ghastly greenish white. Never
surely, during -her nineteen years of life, has colour so unlovely
marred the carnations of her face before ! Nothing of moment
has happened in reality. No materials even for what Theobald
terms "a scene of powerful domestic interest" are here. A
husband, after leaving home in a huff, stops away for dinner,
resolves to stop away a day or two on a visit, and writes back
to his wife for a dress suit and white ties. Nothing of moment
in reality, but to Jane, in her present high-strung mood, it seems
that the gates of Paradise have been suddenly, brutally, shut in
her face, and the gates of the place that is not Paradise set open,
wide as gates can stand. Just that
She folds the note up, restores it to its envelope ; then, won-
derfully calm and self-contained in manner, tells the servant
that dinner may be served at once, as Mr. Theobald will not be
home to-night, and goes away upstairs, not running two steps
at a time as is her wont, but slowly, heavily, as if she had sud-
denly aged by twenty years or so, to fulfil her lord and master's
bidding.
She fulfils it with scrupulous exactitude ; packs up an evening
suit in his portmanteau his dressing-case, white ties, all for
which he stipulated. Then, as a complimentary wif e-like atten-
tion, adds a morning suit, morning ties, linen enough to last
him a week if it should be his sovereign pleasure to stay away
so long. This done, she rings for the girl again, bids her take
down Mr. Theobald's portmanteau and give it to the Duke of
Malta's groom, then walks to her looking-glass, and while the
OUGHT WE TO VISIT HER t
Bound of the wheels tells her that the dog-cart is driving av^
stares with tearless eyes eyes that feel as though they could
never shed a tear again at the colour of her face
What, in God's name, ails her? She feels nothing of the
violent anger that she has felt towards Theobald a doz-en times
d tiring the past fortnight ; she feels no pain of any kind ; only
numb ; nuinb, cold, and just a little sick. She has been too
long without food ; that's what it is. Dinner and a couple of
glasses of sherry, and her colour* of course, will come right
again. And she will spend the evening in looking over her
finery for the races. And to-morrow the Duke will call lucky,
on the whole, perhaps, this getting acquainted with him just
now, And on Monday she will put on her mauve silk dress,
and her Brussels bonnet, and make the Duke walk with her,
and display his devotion again before the eyes of theLidlington
world Can one die because a husband has taste so vile that a
rouged and faded face like Rose Golightly's pleases him better
than one's own fresh charms ] (Nothing about Lady Rose's
French cook and excellent wines, and the loo and ecarte after
dinner. Curious, how even the youngest and fairest woman
will always harp upon the personal influence of a rival, instead
of viewing her fascinations from the matter-of-fact or masculine
stand-point.)
One cannot die ; but on the other hand one cannot eat. Jane
comes downstairs, holding the banister rather tight as she comes,
and finds the dinner theory a failure. She can drink the two
glasses of sherry, and finds herself better when she has drunk
them ; but food offers a resistance to being swallowed, the like
of which she has only once before experienced since she was
born the time when Theobald lay sick unto death at Frank-
fort, and when, during forty-eight agonised hours, the German
doctors bade her, gravely, prepare for the worst.
However, appetite or no appetite, she will not break down
outwardly, and goes with courage through the pretence of every
course ; Blossy all the time singing and dancing, with the
HOPE OR DREAD t 31 1
crashing unconscious cruelty of her age, around the room.
Blossy, indiscriminate between dukes and grooms, has had two
triumphs this afternoon : the gift of his Grace's dilapidated
rosebud, and the admiration of his Grace's groom, to whom,
while Jane was packing the portmanteau, Bloss exhibited her
pink boot on the doorstep. And now she is singing and danc-
ing ballets to the inhabitants of her own world ... to a couple
of bluebottles in the window, to the sparrows twittering on the
branches outside, to the portraits of the Theobald family who
seem to be looking down with prof ounder contempt than usual
upon both mother and child. Happy Blossy ! Fated, I think,
by temperament, the leaven of her father's Rip Van Winkle
nature that is in her, never to suffer any very poignant pain,
mental or moral, while she lives !
Jane feels in a sort of dual trance : she is herself, Jane Theo-
bald, quietly sitting at table with Esther, the housemaid, chang-
ing her plate, and Blossy dancing, and the ancestors glowering
at her from their dingy frames as usual And all the time she
is some one totally distinct from herself ; a woman, with hatred,
with despair gnawing at her heart, a woman who watches the
real Jane Theobald with a kind of hard, queer pity, knowing
that the worst has not come for her knowing, with a shudder
for the fate she cannot avert, what that worst is likely to be !
As the sun goes down the sky grows overcast with leaden
mists, and by-and-by a soft dull summer rain begins to falL
Fragrant garden -scents come up beneath its influence through
the open windows ; the birds, though their roosting-time is
past, give little low rejoicing chirrups among the trees that
overhang Theobalds. To Jane all is black. Neither birds'
song nor scent of flowers reaches her heart Dinner over, she
goes upstairs with the child to her own room, takes out the
materials that are to be confectioned into finery for the races,
and begins to look over some fashion-books her sister sent her
by this morning's post from London. In Ave minutes' time
books and finery are tossed listlessly aside together in a heap
312 OUGHT WE TO VISIT HER ?
1
upon the bed. The sight of new fashions generally kindles
Jane's artistic impulses at once, sets her nimble fingers ready
for thread and needle. All her jaundiced eyes can see in them
to-night are a set of idiots, with patches of pink, blue, or mauve,
stuck on the top of impossible chignons over each simpering
face idiots with deformed waists, and one Chinese foot a-piece
ridiculously pointed forth from beneath their flounced and fur-
belowed robes. They make her sick, as the taste of food, as
the sound of the slow-falling rain, have made her sick already.
Blossy begins to sing the " Ten little Nigger Boys," a melody
Miss Theobald has lately acquired, and which she goes through
with conscientious vigour from the first line to the last. Jane
shrinks from the merry shouting notes as though each were a
blow, and rings for the nurse-girl to take the child to bed.
Mamsey is tired, has a headache ; Hannah will tuck Blossy in
and hear her say her prayers to-night. After this she goes
downstairs ; walks restlessly up and down the gloomy drawing-
room for a while ; then wanders into the adjoining breakfast -
room, takes up her place beside the window, and stands there,
long, blankly gazing out into the darkening silent garden.
She is in the real, not the speech-making or " high f alutin' "
tragedy now ; the dull, apathetic, tearless mood, when any ex-
citement, any stimulus from without, and unconnected with
our own immediate surroundings, comes as a deliverance (a
mood which I have always thought must be the danger-point,
or crime-engendering mood, beyond all others, of our poor frail
natures). An artist, at such a pass, may find safe relief in ex-
pression. If Jane were Qn the stage still, with what inimitable
grace might not her jealous heart goad her into pirouetting to-
night ! In the dumb, pent-in life of ordinary men and women
there are no such legitimate safety-valves. She feels she must
do something speak to somebody ; must act, move, get away
from herself. The thought of sleep, or rather of watching, in
this big lonely house, and listening to the rats at midnight she
has had plenty of experience of such watching during the last
THE SECRET OF JANES LIFE. 3*3
fortnight is intolerable to her ; yet she must bear it alL And
to-night it will be watching for the morning only ; not, as it has
been before, for Theobald. No scene, either of anger or for-
giveness, to look forward to : only the dawn of another day of
separationof another day that he will spend at Lady Hose
Golightly's side.
Yet she must bear it all !
" Must % And why must V cries out her heart, suddenly re-
covering from its lethargy. " Why, with youth and beauty still
to the fore, mope through such an existence as this cold and
unloved and neglected one that she sees opening before her 1
Why not return to the stage, and, at least till she is thirty years
old, live ? No fear of coldness or neglect there. The public is
not Lidlington society ; the public is not Francis Theobald.
Ah, and would not any admiration, any notoriety, be better
than such a life as Chalkshire is likely to offer her ? Why, even
the Duke of Malta . . ."
A ring comes at the front-door bell just at this culminating-
point in her meditations, and Jane's heart beats violently beats
with a sensation which I scarce know whether to class as one
of hope or of dread. " Sunday or any other day I shall be de-
lighted to see you," she had told the Duke at parting. Is he
taking her at her word already 1 A man's quick step sounds in
the hall, approaches along the passage ; the door leading from
the drawing-room opens, and in the shadowy half light she
recognises, not the vacuous red face and corpulent dimensions
of the Duke of Malta, but Rawdon Crosbie.
CHAPTER XXX1L
THE SECEBT OF JANE'S LIFE.
The servant follows with a lamp, and Eawdon sees Jane's face
advancing out of the gloom, unsmiling, but with a look of
7-^
3H OUGHT WE TO VISIT HERt
kindly surprise better than any set smile of welcome, to meet
him.
" Bring in tea at once, Esther," she cries. " Mr. Crosbie, you
find me all in darkness. I'm alone ; Theobald is dining out to-
night, and I forgot how late it was. I hope, in common charity,
you will stay and drink tea with me?"
She shakes his hand warmly, but her own hand is deathly
chill ; there is an evident flurry and want of ease in her manner,
and Rawdon Crosbie looks at her narrowly.
" Has anything very dreadful happened?" he asks, as soon as
the servant has left them alone ; " has anything very dreadful
happened, that you have gone back to calling me 'Mr. Crosbie' f
"Oh, thousands of things have happened," Jane answers
lightly. "I've got news of all sorts to tell you. If you hadn't
come, I meant to have written you one of my lovely epistles.
The fortnight expired yesterday, you know, and I was just
beginning to think you had forgotten about the races. Min is
coming down on Wednesday for the day, and Captain Brabazon
has invited us to lunch with them on the course. And Rawdon,
my dear boy don't lose your breath but his Grace the Duke
of Malta is in Chalkshire, and he and I are tremendous friends
already."
" The express leaves Lidlington at nine forty-five," remarks
Kawdon, " and it is about nine now. If I hurry I shall be in
time for it. Good-night, Mrs. Theobald."
" Good-night, before you have said 'How do you do? Why,
you don't mean to say you are going to Woolwich to-night ?"
" I am going back by the mail at eleven," says Kawdon ; " at
least, I intended to do so. I ran down, hoping to pay you a
visit of an hour or so, Mrs. Theobald ; but, under existing cir-
cumstances, I see I may as well be off at once. With the Duke
of Malta for your friend, what room can there be left for me
in "
" My affections ?" interrupts Jane, with a laugh. " Oh, you
don't know how elastic my affections have become how warm
THE SECRET OF JANES LIFE. 315
and genial my heart is growing to every one ! . . . And so you
really took the trouble to come all this way to see me 9 Is this
a good sign, or a bad one, Rawdon? What have you been
doing with yourself ? How has the world been using you since
that evening when I preached you the memorable sermon by
gaslight in Maddox Street V
She talks cheerfully, but with too many words, with too
palpable an effort at naturalness to be thoroughly natural
Rawdon Crosbie discerns. And how pale she has grown !
pale, and with what dark rings round her eyes I She looks
older by any number of years than on the night when they
danced the ' Grande Duchesse 1 waltzes, and walked back to the
Bellevue together, her hand upon his arm, the June moonlight
kissing her soft young happy face.
" I hope you think me looking my best, Mr. Crosbie ! I'm
just in the humour for compliments this evening, so please tell
me something flattering."
" I think you looking desperately ill,** answers Rawdon, with
concern he neither dissembles, nor seeks to dissemble, in his
voice. " This bleak Chalkshire air can surely not agree with
your
" No ; that's just what it is," says Jane, with a short laugh.
" The bleak air of Chalkshire does not agree with me. I was
thinking how I could best have a change from it at the very
time when you came in."
" And Blossy, does she want change too ? And" (suddenly
recollecting the existence of the master of the house) " and Mr.
Theobald r
" Blossy is perfectly well, thanks," answers Jane ; the servant
at this minute brings in the tea-things, and she speaks with
calmness and deliberation ; " and Mr. Theobald too. I told
you, did I not, that he is dining at The Folly to-night ? Chalk-
shire is Mr. Theobald's native air, you see ; it is not mine. That
makes all the difference. Have you been to any of the theatres
since I saw you, Rawdon % Have you seen Min in her new
316 OUGHT WE TO VISIT HER t
part? All the papers speak highly of her except one, and we
know well enough who the miserable wretch was who wrote
that Even poor good old Min is not without her enemies."
Then, without waiting for one of her questions to be answered,
she crosses the room abruptly, and seating herself at the table,
begins to pour out the tea.
Never in her life, perhaps, has Jane looked fairer than she
does at this moment, despite her pallid cheeks and hollow eyes.
If her beauty hitherto has had one definite fault, it has been in
its overflow of health and freshness. A harsh critic might at
any time have called it milkmaid beauty, without great exag-
geration. Paler, thinner, graver, Jane has advanced from beaute
de diable to loveliness or so Eawdon Crosbie thinks.
He watches her, with the lamplight bringing out the soft
contours of her white dress and whiter throat and arms, and
knows how much the madness which has overtaken and made
shipwreck of his life has, after a fortnight's separation, abated ;
watches her, and thinks that to hold the place in her regard de
Lansac holds to be de Lansac himself, Frenchman, adven-
turer, no matter what the man may be he would gladly lay
down all that, six weeks ago, made life of value in his eyes.
"I was fool enough to quarrel with my dinner to-day," cries
Jane, in her usual unromantic style, " and I am going to make
up for it now. I hope you are bread-and-butter hungry. It
seems our fate to eat odd kind of meals together," she goes on,
as Kawdon takes his place beside her at the tea-table. " Do
you remember our supper that first night at Spa, and how
shocked you were at having to eat with your fingers ? Ah ! I
have risen in the world since then. I can offer you a white-
and-gold plate and a real silver tea-spoon now.' 7
"And white-and-gold plates and real silver tea-spoons are
such essential conditions of enjoyment," says Eawdon Crosbie.
" We spent a very jolly evening, I must say, though you were
in such a queer temper. Do you remember how angry you were
when I told you not to tread on your own toes, and to take de
THE SECRET OF JANES LIFE. 317
Lansac's dancing for your model \ Do you remember the girl
in white-and-scarlet you so nearly fell in love with?"
" So very nearly," answers Rawdon. " What a blessed thing
it might have been for me if I had asked her to dance, as I
intended !"
" Perhaps. I can never go into the might-have-beens of life.
The facts as they are are enough for me rather too much, just
at present. If I hadn't left the stage, I might have been a
second Taglioni by this time. ,,
"Heaven forbid!" says Rawdon, hastily. "I mean, how
much better it is that you should be what you are !"
" You think so. Taglioni made heaps of money ; and money,
my dear child, money is everything. As the Duke of Malta
says, what is there in the world that money can't buy ?"
" And has it got to your thinking with the Duke of Malta's
thoughts, already, Mrs. Theobald V
" Of course. Where is the good of having noble acquaintance
if you don't try to raise yourself to their standard?"
" I must remember that sentiment of yours. The next time
I talk to anyone with a title Lady Rose Golightly, for instance
I must try to put it into practice."
No want of colour is in Jane's cheeks now. At Lady Rose's
name the blood rushes with painful vividness over her face and
throat. " Lady Rose is a very fitting sister for the Duke of
Malta !" she remarks quietly, but with a curious quiver of the
lip. " What were we talking about ? Oh, the white-and-scarlet
girl you so nearly fell in love with at Spa. Let us keep as long
as we can to pleasant subjects to any subject that is not
Chalkshire ! First though," she puts out her hand and lays it
kindly on young Rawdon's wrist, " I want you to tell me a little
about yourself. How are your affairs getting on, Rawdon?
Badly, I'm afraid, as you have not cut me."
" On the contrary," answers Rawdon promptly, " my affairs
are getting on a thousand times better than I could have hoped,
inasmuch as you have not cut me ! As I walked up in the rain
318 OUGHT WE TO VISIT HER f
from the station I was in fear and trembling, Mrs. Theobald
I hardly dared to ask whether you were at home, it seemed so
unlikely that you would be good enough to receive me n
"After being blackballed by the Lidlington Croquet Club, do
you mean? If you knew how lightly that weighed on me !
and it was all Blossy's fault . Don't you remember the dirt
pies ? I felt it just a little, perhaps, when your mamma's note
first came. Oh, it was a very civil note, Kawdon. You needn't
fire up about nothing. I don't think I should mind it much if
I was set in a pillory and pelted now. But this is no answer
to my question. How are your prospects looking 1 How is
your engagement how is everything at home getting onf
" My prospects," says Rawdon, " are that, barring accidents,
and if the usual death-rate of our regiment prevails, I may
become a captain by the time I am five-and-forty. My engage-
ment is broken off, and no one at home has written to me
during the last ten days."
" Cheerful ! And our friend with the eyelids, Major Hervey,
what of him ?"
"Our friend, Major Hervey, is staying, I believe, at my
father's. I ought not to include him in the ' no one.' Major
Hervey writes me charming little notes of sympathy and
admonition, which I find very useful indeed as pipe-lights."
Jane looks at him searchingly. " Rawdon, my friend," she
cries in her incisive way, " do you know that you are jealous of
Major Hervey 1 Don't deny it ; don't be ashamed of it You
are jealous, and you have a right to be jealous. This stupid
lover's quarrel between you and Miss Marsland would have
been made up long ago, only for him. I saw them together for
a minute, to-day, in Lidlington, and in that minute I jumped
to my own conclusions. Major Hervey intends that Miss
Marsland shall be his wife."
" I have not the slightest concern with Major Hervey*s inten-
tions," says Rawdon, in a tone that he by no means succeeds in
rendering indifferent "Miss Marsland is as free as air to
THE SECRET OF JANES LIFE, 319
choose or accept whom she wilL She has rejected me, and for
me that is sufficient."
" Miss Marsland rejected yon? Yes ; but did you tell her the
truth 1 Did you apologize humbly, as I advised you, for being
in such bad company that night at Wilcocks's f
" I told Miss Marsland the truth about the past, the present,
and, as far as I was able to look forward, the future ; and on
the strength of that truth she rejected me."
"And you are contented that it should be so? You are
happier in your mind now that you have broken with every-
body who cares for you in the world?'
" I am singularly happy this evening, Mrs. Theobald. And
I hope I have not broken quite with everybody who cares for
me in the world V
" You are a fool !" says Jane, a little sadly. " It seems to me,
sometimes, that every man and woman on the earth is a fool.
What we can't have we want : what we can have we don't care
for."
" Then our best wisdom is to apply to ourselves the French
axiom," remarks Eawdon ; " ' Quand on n'apas ce qu'on aime,
ilfaut aimer ce qu'on a.'"
The words are not out of his mouth before Jane bursts into
one of her wildest laughs. To talk sentiment, as Eawdon has
already found to his cost, is, at all times, to tread on thinnest ice,
with this least sentimental of God's creatures.
u I think if I was dying it would make me laugh to hear you
talk French ! ' Ce qu'ong aime ! Ce qu'ong a 1' I wonder why
all Englishmen have such a ridiculous accent ?"
" For the same reason, probably, that they know nothing about
flounces and bonnets, and tread on their own toes when they
dance," says Eawdon ; his old animus on the subject reviving on
the instant.
" Probably," remarks Jane, coolly. "Well, these things are their
misfortune, not their fault It is not given to every man to
be "
320 OUGHT WE TO VISIT HER?
" A Monsieur de Lansac, perhaps V suggests Rawdon, as she
hesitates.
In a second her face grows grave. " You are quite right there,"
she replies. " It is given to few men, indeed, to be a Monsieur
de Lansac. Oh, how good it is to hear his name to think of
him only, in this horrid place, among all this horrid Chalkshire
respectability !"
" Yes, that is a theme on which you are always warm !" Raw-
don exclaims, bitterly.
"Warm! I should think I was warm ! If you only knew
how and why I first got to care for de Lansac ! I was near telling
you once, that evening when" she turns her head a little aside
"when Blossy found my silver amulet in your pocket. You
remember V
" Yes, I remember/* says Rawdon, fixing his eyes coldly and
sternly on her face. " The amulet I had the folly to rob you
of ! the treasure which, as M. de Lansac's gift, was so inex-
pressibly precious to you !"
" ' De Lansac's gift !' ' Inexpressibly precious !' What non-
sense are you talking now?' cries Jane, looking up at him with
her unabashed blue eyes. " Did I ever tell you the locket was
de Lansac's gift, pray V
" I believed certainly I believed, from the value you put upon
it, that it must be so," answers Rawdon Crosbie.
" Then you believed wrong. See what comes of being over-
wise. Once, long ago, I lost that locket from my chain- it was
in Paris and de Lansac was with us. Well, I never was so
wretched about anything in my life, and when we got it again, by
paying at least three times its worth, de Lansac had my initials
cut on it for me. That is the whole story of my 'inexpressibly
precious treasure/ Mr. Rawdon Crosbie."
" I beg pardon, humbly, Mrs. Theobald. You must allow that
it was not likely I should be able to evolve the story out of my
own conscience."
u I don't know what you mean by ' evolving.' It isn't likely,
THE SECRET OF JANES LlPE. 321
blinded with prejudice as you are, that you should guess any
truth about such a man as de Lansac. You know what he is, of
course % Oh, I repeat," cries Jane, "I repeat, how good it is to
think of him, and of all the happy days we spent together in this
wretched place ! A foreign adventurer yes," giving weight to
every syllable as though the Pippins were still her listeners, " a
foreign adventurer, living about in Ems, Spa, Baden Baden no
particular principles; no particular country; no particular
friends, relatives, or connections. An adventurer ; for anything
I know to the contrary what would be styled, by people like
you, a chevalier $ Industrie?
Rawdon is silent. He cannot forget that the possible chevalier
d'industne was the intimate associate in Spa of Francis Theo-
bald Francis Theobald, who is dining with the Duke of Malta
to-night ; whom every one in Chalkshire would call "friend,"
were they not choked off by the legitimacy of the bonds that knit
him to Jane and Blossy.
" But I don't care a rush for all that," she goes on. " I don't
care a rush whether people are reckoned virtuous or the reverse.
If the wine suits my taste, I don't look at the lable on the bottle.
De Lansac saved Theobald once from ruin could a man of the
nicest honour have done more ? And I shall love him to my life's
end. You wouldn't care to hear how it happened, I suppose V
" I care to hear anything in which you are deeply concerned,
Mrs. Theobald."
"Well, I hadn't been married six months we were spending
the winter in Homburg and one night, or rather one morning
at day-break, Theobald came back home, and told me quietly that
we were beggars. He had been at a dinner-party given by de
Lansac at his lodgings, and after dinner they had played banco.
I don't know the game myself ; I never learnt, and I never will
learn one card from another, but I believe there is something in
it, isn't there, that is called following your money) Theobald,
it seems, had done this, and had followed it to such purpose as
to lose every farthing we had in the world. I can't tell you'how
21
"11
322 OUGHT WE TO VISIT HERt
much that was. I was a little fool, just past sixteen. I knew no
more about money then than Blossy knows now. But all was
gone, he told me ; yes, to our last hundred-franc note."
" And in M. de Lansac's pocket, naturally V puts in Kawdon,
as she pauses.
" In de Lansac's pocket, naturally. Theobald and he had got
intimate durin j the winter. When we first knew him he lived in
the same hotel where we lived; and after breakfast that morning
I can see it all, as if it happened yesterday he came in to visit
me. I was alone, and de Lansac put out his hand to me, English
fashion, as I had taught him, and inquired in his usual friendly
way for Monsieur Theobald.
" I blush, to this day I blush, when I think of my answer,"
goes on Jane. " Could he have the vileness to pretend friend-
ship for us still ? I asked him. From the first hour we met him
he had caused everything to go wrong with my life. He had
robbed me of my husband, had lured Theobald night after night
to the gambling-table, and now that we were ruined through him,
he had come here to exult and triumph over us in our misery?
" Poor de Lansac ! He heard me out patiently, but with a face
white as any stone. When I had done, spent all the boiling
passion that was at my heart, and you know no, I believe you
don't know yet what I can be when my blood is up : ' Madame/
said he, in his quiet polished way, 'I think you are unjust in say-
ing that any influence of mine has been wanted to give M. Theo-
bald the taste for play. As regards the money that nominally
changed hands last night/ he added, 'why the whole thing was a
jest, a pleasantry. Your husband, Madame, had dined too well,
played like a^child, a madman, but by good fortune his LO.U.s
found their way, all of them, into my pocket, and I have brought
them back to him.'
"And as he said this, he took some small bits of scribbled paper
from his memorandum-book, folded them neatly, tore them
across, then flung the torn pieces into the fire. That is the story
of how T came to love de Lansac"
THE SECRET OF JANES LIFE. 323
Jane has moved from the tea-table in the course of her narra-
tive, and stands now beside the wide-open window stands there
looking out with flushing cheeks, with moistened eyes, into the
darkness. And, as she stands thus Rawdon's suspicions on the
subject of de Lansac begin to waver.
That she has told him the truth, in the main, he never doubts.
Jane's worst enemy would find it hard to suspect her of delibe-
rate falseness. But is it the whole truth 3 Watching her fair
flushed face, Rawdon Crosbie, with the self -torturing cleverness
of jealousy, asks himself this question. Could de Lansac's gene-
rosity have been so purely disinterested ? or did she hold his
heart captive too (in this easy fashion she has of holding men's
hearts captive), half-unconscious, careless at least, that she was
doing so, and receiving his chivalrous devotions to her husband's
interests as a matter of course %
"Theobald took it all as Theobald takes everything," says Jane
presently. " 'Honour among thieves, my dear Jenny.' " When-
ever Jane narrates she gets dramatic instinctively. You would
think it was Theobald's lazy, pleasant, half-sarcastic voice that
speaks. " ' Honour among thieves. It's a proverb, the truth of
which I have often doubted, my dear, but our friend's example
shows that there may be something in it after all. De Lansac
considers, evidently, that we are bound, as vagabonds, by a com-
mon freemasonry, and gives us the benefit of the guild.' So Theo-
bald jested the obligation away at the time. Afterwards, when
we got a little better off in the world again Theobald has come
into one or two windfalls, you know, but they've all managed
to disappear in the same way he was able to be of use to de
Lansac. If one wrote figures down upon a piece of paper we
might be quits. But I think one can never cry quits really as
regards an action like de Lansac's," says Jane. "More than
that, I wouldn't like to cry it. I should be very sorry to be rid
of my debt, and all the gratitude and affection my debt has
brought with it"
Her unashamed eyes, her steadfast voice, nay, the mere men-
212
324 OUGHT WE TO VISIT HER f
tion of that one word, " affection," make Rawdon waver more
and more. And still he does not yet light upon the truth. It
may sound cynical, paradoxical, to say that the very last person
men ordinarily dream of being jealous of is ra husband. But
in ninety-nine cases out of a hundred I believe this to be the
truth. Throughout Rawdon's relations with Jane the first
five minutes in the Spa ball-room over Mr. Francis Theobald
has, in truth, been a personage who has never troubled his
thoughts at all. A clothes- wearing man, with a drawl, an eye-
glass, a couple of inches of brain, a general talent for keeping
conveniently out of the way this, if he had been obliged to
clothe his ideas on the subject with words, would probably have
been Rawdon Crosbie's analysis of Jane's husband.
That such a nonentity, moral and social, could, after four
years of marriage, fill a heart like Jane's " fuller than it could
hold" of passionate love, is a contingency too wildly remote ever
to have crossed young Rawdon's imagination.
" And so I hope," Jane goes on, " I hope you will never make
spiteful speeches again about de Lansac. If you had been in a
fitting temper to listen I should have told you all this long ago ;
yes, on that very evening when Bloss rescued my poor old silver
amulet out of the hands of the Philistines "
" The Philistines being "
" Mr. Rawdon Crosbie, aye, for you are a Philistine, Rawdon,
heart and soul, and you will be one till you die, the better for
you. If you had kept my locket, some day or other Mrs. Raw-
don Crosbie would have found it. ' Who gave you this thing,
sir ? But I insist upon knowing 1 (and now it is Miss Mainland's
voice that speaks). ' It belonged to a woman once ! Who was
she? What was she? Where was she?' 'My dear, I scarcely
remember ; when I was a lad I had so many of these trifles,' et
cetera. And Mrs. Rawdon presents it to one of her numerous
children to hang round the cat's neck."
"Yes, that is all so likely. It is so perfectly certain that
Mrs. Rawdon Crosbie will ever exist ! In the meantime, Mrs.
MR. THEOBALD FOLLOWS UP HIS LUCK. 325
Theobald, though you have put the subject aside very dex-
terously, I think you have not told me the romance about the
locket itself ?"
" Did I promise to tell it you ? I certainly don't remember
doing so. However, as it seems you will have long-winded
stories to-night, I suppose I may as well set your curiosity at
rest. To begin with, then, there's no romance at alL It was
only . . . only the first present Theobald ever made me. I
was walking along the Strand with him one evening before we
were married, looking into the shops, and when we got to a
jeweller's window he asked me to choose whatever I liked there
for myself. I wouldn't have taken any expensive present from
him ; I can't tell you why perhaps because I'd seen so much,
of what expensive presents came to with other people. But
this little locket was secondhand, and ticketed ' seven shillings
only/ so I said it was just the sort of thing I wanted, and he
went in and bought it for ma"
Jane's eyes are downcast now, her tongue falters, her breast
heaves. And in this moment Kawdon Crosbie first discovers
the secret, the anomaly of her life she is in love with Theobald
still I
CHAPTER XXXIII.
MR. THEOBALD FOLLOWS UP HIS LUCK.
Such, reader, is the real, true unvarnished history of this me-
morable Saturday evening. Half an hour later young Rawdon,
musing much on the fatuous constancy and much on the painful
want of discrimination to be met with in woman's nature, is on
his road back to the station. Half atf hour later Mrs. Theobald
stands blankly looking out into the wet dark night again, not
a thought but the miserable ever-present one of Theobald and
of her own corroding jealousy in her heart But such is not
the way that history is written by the wise heads of Lidlington.
The station-master's niece is Mrs. Pippin's housemaid, or the
~u
326 OUGHT WE TO VISIT HER t
Theobalds' cook is first-cousin to Mrs. Coventry, Brown's scul-
lion one need not be mathematically precise as to the channels
through which parochial small-talk diffuses itself
" That small, small, imperceptible
Small-talk, which cuts like powdered glass
Ground in Tophana."
M Rawdon Crosbie came down from London last night, ex-
pressly to call on Mrs. Theobald her husband away from home,
and she received him ! But, then, what can you expect 1 Mrs.
Pippin herself overheard her say, to the Duke of Malta of all
men, that ' nothing was against her principles ;' and, which made
it additionally awkward, dear Lydia was obliged to hear it, too.
Still, Lydia Pippin is no child ; Lydia Pippin must be seven-
and-twenty if she's a day."
" For my part I don't know what society is coming to. A
young woman like Mrs. Theobald to receive a bachelor's visit
at such an hour of the night, and her husband absent !"
" Mrs. Theobald is in the habit of having bachelor parties in
her husband's absence. All actresses, it is well known, have
these free manners !"
' Mrs. Theobald" the story, like a snowball, acquiring bulk
and consistency as it rolls " Mrs. Theobald gave a large bache-
lor party last night, her husband absent ; and, whatever his
faults, poor creature, one must feel for Francis Theobald. Raw-
don Crosbie and a party of young men and actresses (of free
manners) came down to it by the express. Sure of it 1 Ah,
we have our information from only too good a source. Mrs.
Coventry Brown's Sarah ..." and so forth.
Coming out of church, people talk over the latest Theobald
scandal in whispers. It reaches Mr. and Mrs. Crosbie. It
reaches poor Emmy, who indeed has the news "broken" to her,
with the sort of feline tenderness you may see shown to a dis-
abled mouse, by Adonis Hervey. It reaches every house in the
neighbourhood, excepting perhaps The Folly an atmosphere
MR. THEOBALD FOLLOWS UP HIS LUCK. 327
unfavourable to the milk-and-water gossip which forms strong
meat to the unsophisticated palates of the Lidlington babes.
Along the primrose paths of The Folly everything glides at
its usual smooth and tranquil downhill pace. An opportune
acquisition to Lady Rose's little household arrived last night,
in the person of a certain well-known, somewhat too well-known,
London celebrity Colonel Desmond an old and devoted friend
of Miss Childers. " Poor Harry Desmond has got a wife some-
where about in the world, so people can't say anything spiteful
about him and me," Loo will declare. " Delightful to enjoy
one honest friendship without being suspected of base matri-
monial motives ;" and sauntering slowly at Harry Desmond's
side among the roses and butterflies, or reclining in the shadiest
of pagoda summer-houses, while Harry Desmond smokes and
tells her the last news from town, right pleasantly does Loo
improve the shining hours of this Sunday afternoon in Mr.
Smylie's absence.
Lady Rose devotes herself exclusively to Theobald, and if
she does not succeed in amusing him, keeps him at least from
being more than negatively bored. Mr. Theobald is exceedingly
sleepy to-day, if the truth be told. He was up late last night,
Colonel Desmond and the Duke both being fond of a little
play, and won largely, as you will often observe men to win at
cards when they are letting the best stakes of life slip unheeded
through their fingers. The temperature of The Folly gardens
is delicious ; the Duke's cigars are irreproachable ; Lady Rose
possesses that excellent thing in woman, a low-pitched, soothing
voice, and what she says is not of a nature to call for any brain
exertion whatever in the way of replies. Under these favour-
able conditions Francis Theobald, veritable lotus-eater that he
is, dreams through the hours from luncheon till dinner-time,
unruffled in spirit, unvexed by any haunting thought of to-
morrow, or of the domestic jars to-morrow is likely to bring
with it.
He has, by nature, the fatalest short mental vision with
*
328 OUGHT WE TO VISIT HER t
which mortal was ever endowed. It is not that he will not
look ; the man cannot look beyond the present moment. He
has drifted into this friendship, flirtation, intrigue call it by
what name you will with Lady Rose, not caring for her; caring
for Jane in his heart, as he has always done ; but won by the
French cook and round games, and the absolute dulness of
Theobalds, and the necessity (necessity, that has brought many
worthier men than he to grief) of doing something with one's
evenings. And now, not knowing what he risks, not seeing
whither he goes, behold him drifting farther and farther still !
Jenny lost her temper, both of them lost their tempers, about
that ridiculous note yesterday ; the way Lady Rose received it,
Theobald at her side, was angelic no other word befits the
occasion. Wise for him to keep oat of the way till the storm
blows over, as it must do, like all other storms. Poor Jenny !
As it is Sunday, she will be sure to have Brabazon, or Dolly
Standish, or some other young fellow from the Fort, to amuse
her ; and then she will have her finery for the races to think of,
and the races themselves, and the race-ball on Wednesday . . .
but no; everything unpleasant will be forgotten long before
Wednesday or so Mr. Theobald thinks.
At dinner, the Duke, who has been absent the best part of
the afternoon, remarks, oasually, that he was fortunate enough
to find Mrs. Theobald at home when he called on her to-day,
" and I am over head and ears in love with your daughter, Theo-
bald," adds his Grace pleasantly. " She has promised to marry
me when she is eighteen, and her mamma consents. Do you V
Mr. Theobald, thus addressed, puts up his glass, and with the
most perfect equanimity in the world, looks across the table into
the Duke of Malta's face : " I consent to whatever my wife tells
me is best," he remarks meekly. "In everything connected with
domestic matters, I look upon myself simply as non-existent."
Colonel Desmond, knowing pretty well the extent of his
Graces admiration for Mrs. Theobald for indeed the Duke of
Malta is not over reticent in such matters Colonel Desmond
MR. THEOBALD FOLLOWS UP HIS LUCK. 329
gives Theobald a curious kind of look, and turns the conver-
sation. Lady Rose and Loo Childers exchange glances.
At night the Duke is again a heavy loser. When Lady Rose
proposes to Theobald that he should remain at Beaudesert till
the morning of Wednesday, the race-day, it almost appears to
him in the light of a duty that he should follow up his luck and
do so. But he must, of course, go over to Theobalds first, see
his wife, and find out if her plans for the week will be discon-
certed by his prolonged absence.
" Oh, that, of course," cries Lady Rose, wincing in spirit, but
with her softest smile and voice, " and if you can only persuade
Mrs. Theobald to have no better engagement and to dine with
us to-day, do."
So, in the afternoon, Lady Rose's pony carriage is at Mr.
Theobald's disposal, and he drives over to Theobalds. Jane is
not at home.
"Missus have gone out for a walk, and Miss Blossy, too/ 1
Esther, the housemaid, explains to her master, " and the Duke
of Malta is with them, sir," in rather an awe-struck tone, this.
'' The Duke of Malta called soon after Miss Blossy's dinner, and
I heard Missus say they might as well all walk over to Lidling-
ton together."
Mr. Theobald receives the intelligence with perfect sweet
temper, just a little relieved, perhaps, at being quit for the
moment of domestic explanations. He inquires how Mrs.
Theobald is, and Miss Blossy) then saunters, whistling, his
hands in his pockets, into the breakfast-room, and writes the
following affectionate note, which he leaves, folded but unsealed,
upon the table :
"Dearest Jenny:
"lam thinking of stopping at The Folly till Wednes-
day morning. Explain why, when we meet. I shall come over
in good time to drive with you and Min to the course.
u Your most attached husband,
"F.T.
r-is?r
330 OUGHT WE TO VISIT HER t
"If there is anything to bring me back sooner, be sure you
let me know. How about persuading Min to stay for the race-
ball in the evening?"
Having done which, Francis Theobald feels that he has dis-
charged every domestic and social duty that can possibly be
expected of him ; and with the lightened heart that ever waits
on a conscience at ease with itself, goes back to Beaudesert and
to Lady Rose Golightly for another couple of days.
CHAPTER XXXIV.
THE EIGHT AND WRONG OP THINGS.
All grades and sections of Chalkshire society go, as we have
seen, to the Lidlington flower-show : the serious-minded early,
the carnal-minded late ; the halters between ultra-fast and
ultra-slow, the "Mr. Facing-both-ways" of John Bunyan, at
the intermediate hour that corresponds with the vague and
neutral-tinted hue of their philosophy.
But as regards the races it is otherwise. A clever hand may
trim even here, but it must be with a difference. Thus, Mrs.
Crosbie, while disclaiming all prejudice on the score of races as
races has not Mr. Crosbie for years consented to act as one of
the stewards? finds that the glare of the chalk soil on the
Common has a tendency to affect the eyes, and (unless perad-
venture any persons of title offer her a seat in their carriage)
makes a point of paying a round of distant visits with Emma
on the race-day. The Pippin family remain at home, and avoid
subscribing to the fund, on principle, but watch the race-goers
from behind their drawing-room window-blinds, and think no
evil of attending the race ball in the evening. Mrs. Coventry
Brown considers it a duty to grace the course with her presence,
THE RIGHT AND WRONG OF THINGS. 331
but leaves after the cup race, a compromise the fine-drawn deli-
cacy of which it would be hard to over-praise. The absolutely
impracticably unworldly set not only abjure horse-racing itself,
but also the very sight of those who frequent the unhallowed
sport strictly keeping within doors for the day, and putting
up the shutters of such windows as command a view, near or
distant, of the Belial-thronged road.
And this is the set to which Francis Theobald's sisters belong.
Great therefore is the shock occasioned to Thomas, the serious
coachman, when, on the morning of August the first, in this
particular year of grace 187 , he receives orders from Miss
Charlotte Theobald's own fair lips to harness Diocletian, and
bring round the brougham ! Thomas, with whom it is a primary
article of faith that the servants in unworldly families should
have the race-day to themselves, and to the quiet enjoyment of
beer and skittles at adjacent public-houses !
However, what Miss Charlotte rules, not even Thomas, a
despot in his way, may gainsay. Bound comes Diocletian's
Roman nose, a quarter of an hour after the order is given, to
the Miss Theobalds' front door, and forth, a minute later, emerge
the two Miss Theobalds, black-robed, funereal-paced, with crape
veils concealing their maiden faces from the profane eye of man.
" To my brother's. The shortest road," ejaculates Miss Char-
lotte, as Thomas, finger to hat, stands inquiring his whole
mental nature in a state of chaos as to which road he shall
take. " To my brother's, I say. Are you deaf V
And then away, with blinds closely drawn down, the sombre,
old-fashioned brougham starts oft against the tide of race-
going vehicles vans, farmers' carts, ginger-beer trucks, and the
like so not without peril to shafts and wheels and Thomas's
temper, in the direction of Theobalds.
It is exactly half -past ten when Diocletian's melancholy head
enters the great gates from the avenue ; and the first thing that
greets the Miss Theobalds is the vision of two summer-clad,
youthful figures leaning forth, laughing and talking with re-
332 OUGHT WE TO VISIT HER ?
sonant cheerfulness from the drawing-room window, a small
voice within, by dint of the volume and spirit with which it is
executing the * Ten Little Nigger Boys/ giving the impression
of a whole room full of uproarious company in the background.
The figures dart away, the ' Nigger Boys ' have died into pro-
f oundest silence by the time the brougham comes to a standstill.
But if Francis and his wife have any intention of denying
themselves in this open and shameless manner to their own
nesh-and-blood, Miss Charlotte Theobald thanks heaven she has
sufficient moral courage, sufficient sense of right and duty, to
circumvent their intentions !
" Your mistress is at home," she asserts, the moment Esther,
the housemaid, opens the door. " Let me out of the carriage,
Thomas. I saw Mrs. Theobald at the drawing-room window as
we passed."
And straight from the brougham into the house and on to
the drawing-room Miss Charlotte stalks, mutely followed, with
deprecating steps, with various despondent little shakes of the
head, by the elder sister.
What an altered house Theobalds has become, after only four
weeks of misrule a four weeks' reign of Bohemianism and
anarchy ! Its aspect m&es Miss Charlotte choke, and brings
tears to the milder eyes of Annie Theobald. Open windows
and doors let in dust, draughts, sunshine, and general deteriora-
tion as they list. The indecent sound of a servant singing
singing over her work may be heard from the kitchen. A tiny
spade, with earth still clinging to it, a garden hat, a battered
doll, indications of a child's untidy, ungovernessed life, are
everywhere. An old smoking-cap of Mr. Theobald's is stuck,
with a rakish air, on the venerable head of Bloss/s friend the
Mandarin. The very Cupids on the ceiling wear a dissipated
and Bacchanalian aspect. Upon the drawing-room carpet shreds
of muslin and ribbon lie thick as on the floor of a milliner's work-
shop. Odours of millefleurs and musk tell still of the * half-
world* presence of Miss Minnie Arundel.
THE RIGHT AND WRONG OF THINGS. 333
" And this is what Theobalds has sunk to !" says the elder
Miss Theobald, throwing back her veil, and raising her hand-
kerchief to her eyes. " And brought up to such principles as
Francis was ! In less than five weeks they have taken as many
years' lawful wear out of the carpet"
" Theobalds, and all belonging to Theobalds, will sink a good
deal lower yet," is Miss Charlotte's response. " Don't waste
your tears, Anne, pray. You will have a worthier occasion for
them, depend upon it, than a few dozen yards of spoilt carpet. 1 '
After this they relapse into silence, ceremoniously standing,
each of them, as though they were in the house of an utter
stranger, with lips and eyes set, with clasped hands rigid as
stone ; and at the end of two or three minutes' time Jane makes
her appearance.
She wears no finery, has copied nothing from the simpering
fashion-book dolls, after all. A white muslin dress, made up
hastily by her own hands overnight, a sailor's hat trimmed with
a band of blue ribbon, a pair of neatly-fitting primrose gloves
this is Jane's attire for the Chalkshire races ; just the kind of
holiday attire she would have been able to afford in the days
before she ever saw Mr. Theobald, the days when an outing
with Uncle Dick to Sydenham or Epping comprised all that
the poor little ballet-child knew or could have imagined of
possible terrestrial enjoyment
Charlotte Theobald eyes her fixedly, and with cutting minute-
ness. An hour spent with Min, who came down by the earliest
train this morning, determined to lose nothing of her holiday,
an hour of Min's high spirits and lively heart-whole chatter, has
given colour and animation to Jane's face. But the lines of the
face have changed : the softness, the ineffable grace of earliest
youth have fled from it for ever since that evening, four weeks
ago, when she entered this very room, singing, laughing, full of
careless, undoubting trust in the future, upon her husband's
arm.
A form of iciest handshaking is gone through between the
334 OUGHT WE TO VISIT HER?
sisters-in-law. Then, each seating herself upon the edge of a
chair, and keeping frightfully, uncompromisingly upright, the
Miss Theobalds ask after their brother. With a little flush of
the cheek, Jane answers that Theobald has been staying away
from home ; whereupon Miss Charlotte, who knows accurately
where he is, and how long he has been there, inquires into
details.
" Theobald is staying at The Folly," says Jane, in a voice of
tolerably well assumed unconcern. " He has been over there
the last three or four days with the Duke of Malta. But if you
want to see him you will only have to wait a few minutes.
Theobald is to be here in time to take my sister and me to the
races.*
A pause: Anne Theobald fidgets with her bonnet-strings,
glances up at the demoralised Cupids, clears her throat, then
begins some remark as to " the weather having cooled down
since the rain, but "
" I came here to speak to Francis on a most disagreeable sub-
ject," interrupts Charlotte, her eyes still rivetted on Jane's face.
" But in his absence I suppose I must say what I have got to
say to you alone. Indeed, I don't know but that it is best so.
You are going to the races, it appears. And to the race ball
afterwards ? So I conclude." A sniff for every full stop. "Any-
body can go there who likes. There are never any Lady Patron-
esses for the race ball."
" Well, as far as I'm concerned, that is a great advantage,"
says Jane, bravely. " Lady Patronesses remind me of Ladies'
Committees, and Ladies' Committees remind me of blackballing."
" I should have thought you would require nothing to remind
you of that ! Ahem. It is four weeks last Saturday since you
and Francis entered this house."
" Four weeks last Saturday !" echoes Jane ; bitterly recollect-
ing what new experiences of life she has gained during those
four fatal weeks.
" I said to my brother then, in your presence, that as long as
THE RIGHT AND WRONG OF THINGS. 335
you remained in the neighbourhood I hoped we should never
have cause for painful discussions on any subject In hoping
this I was a fooL Mrs. Francis Theobald," bringing out each
syllable with cruel stinging emphasis, " do you, can you, by any
effort, should you think, bring yourself to understand the mean-
ing of the word ' disgrace ' V
Forth flashes the mutinous spirit from Jane's blue eyes. u If
I understand % Upon my word I donl know what you are
talking about. If I understand the meaning of plain English 1
To the best of my belief yes."
( u We have lived in Chalkshire for more than two hundred
years," interpolates the elder Miss Theobald, plaintively, " and
respected by everybody, high and low. I'm sure when poor
mamma died we sent out more than one hundred and twenty
visiting cards of thanks for inquiries, and all the people of the
humbler class besides.")
" Because if you do, you will want little enlightening as to
the motive of our visit. The Theobalds, for generations past,
have borne a good name, and kept up an honourable position in
this county. You have lived here exactly four weeks and three
days, and in those four weeks and three days have succeeded in
dragging our name and our honour into the mud."
" I !" exclaims Jane, every nerve in her body tingling with
sudden passion. " I !"
'* Yes, you. But if you will hear me to the end, if you will
have the goodness to command yourself, you will find that I do
my best to judge you righteously. You don't belong plain
speaking in a matter like this is quick speaking you don't belong
in any way to the world that condemns you here. And I try to
believe, for my brother's sake, and from a sense of my obligations
as a Christian, I try to believe that the scandal you have occa-
sioned has been brought about partly through ignorance. As a
Christian, I say, I try to believe this."
" You are most considerate, I am sure," exclaims Jane, with
quivering lips.
336 OUGHT WE TO VISIT HER ?
u My sister, of course, was for going to the seaside shirking
the pain of our position, as persons of a certain disposition do
shirk all responsibilities, and leaving things to take their chance.
But I," says Miss Charlotte, with animus, " am no coward ! I
will never shirk a trial, however dark, that Providence in its
wisdom may choose to send me. Whatever you do, to whatever
you may sink, you will still be my brother's wife. And I shall
no more think myself entitled to disown you than if your conduct
were honest, your reputation unsullied. ,,
At the word " honest " Jane Theobald rises to her feet. She
rises, stands before her sisters-in-law erect, and speaks out her
answer thus. Jane has great dramatic power by nature. Her
attitude, her face, are at this moment really fine. Every syllable
she utters, though her voice is scarcely raised to common speak-
ing-pitch, falls with extraordinary point and power on her
hearers' ears.
" I do not belong to your world, you say, to the world of your
Chalkshire society ! No, I do not. I belong by birth, by bring-
ing up, by every strongest affection I have, to the class of poor,
hard-working people strolling actors, orchestra-people, ballet-
girls, vagabonds of all kinds. I say this with pride. As far as
want of hypocrisy can entitle any man or woman to the name
'honest/ my world is an honester one, far, than the world of
Chalkshire society/'
At these fearful words the elder Miss Theobald feels herself
actually to shrivel She has the narrowest bit of a soul that ever
mortal absorbed in contemplation of its own gastric imperfec-
tions possessed ; it is not so much intolerant towards, as utterly
incomprehensive of the wants, and sorrows, and frailties of lives
alien to her own. That ballet-girls, strolling actors, and other
dreadful vagrant creatures of the kind exist, Anne Theobald
knows to be a fact a dark but undeniable fact That such
creatures should seek to justify their existence, feel no shame in
it, unblushingly exalt it above a recognised, clerically-organised,
aristocratically-headed countv society, literally stuns her !
THE RIGHT AND WRONG OF THINGS. 337
" We should have done much better to go to Scarborough 1
told you so, Charlotte, and Mrs. Adams' lodgings not let ! I told
you any attempt at interference on our part would be worse
than useless. "
" You always tell me that what involves exertion to yourself
will be worse than useless, Anne," says Miss Charlotte, with an
expression of verjuice. " Pray, if we are not going to stand by
our brother's wife in her downfall, who will stand by her? What's
the use of kneeling and bemoaning our lot as miserable sinners
in church every Sunday, if we abandon the miserable sinners
most nearly connected with our own family to their fate f
Jane's face becomes as red as fire. " Keally, before this agree-
able conversation goes any further, 1 think I must beg for a little
enlightenment," she cries. " Evidently I am the miserable sinner
you speak of with such relish. In what consists my sin % What
is my * dishonesty' of conduct? What is the 'scandal' I have
occasioned in the neighbourhood V
The muscles round poor Anne Theobald's dust-coloured lips
twitch convulsively. " We are sorely chastened, but we should
have accepted the chastisement humbly," she remarks. " We
should have done better, far, to go to Scarborough !"
" What you ask is natural," says Miss Charlotte, addressing
Jane with cold equity. u I wish to be just to all men. I will
repeat to your face, verbatim, what is said of you behind your
back. In the first place there were the discreditable circum-
stances attending your meeting with the Crosbies in Spa. That
stamped you to begin with. Next came your intimacy here with
young Rawdon Crosbie at that time an engaged man though
unvisited by the ladies of the family. You were then seen with
him, I believe with some person of your own connection, at a
public supper-room in London. And then you were blackballed
by the Lidlington Croquet Club."
Anne Theobald's lips again murmur forth something. But the
words " Mrs. Adams" and " Scarborough" are alone audible.
" On Saturday evening last, Rawdon Crosbie came down from
22
-""^W
338 OUGHT WE TO VISIT HER?
London, and (not going near his own people) visited yon, here,
between the hours of eight and ten, your husband absent. It
is also said the Duke of Malta is becoming a constant visitor at
your house."
Miss Charlotte pauses, a little out of breath
" But still, of what am I accused V asks Jane, not moving
from her position. "All this I take to be the prologue the
opening flourish. Of what am I accused V
" You are accused of conduct unbefitting your name and our
brother's station !" cries Anne Theobald, for once in her life
startled into decision. " And I did think you would have re-
ceived our visit in a better spirit we, who have never had the
carriage out on a race-day before. . . . I'm sure Thomas must
have thought of poor Mamma as he drove us alongbut of
course we know that there is such a thing as Higher Duty. Any
one of the actions my sister has named is sufficient justification
to Society for its verdict on you. No one ought, no one could,
visit a woman setting public opinion at nought as you do."
" No one does visit me," says Jane, coolly. " Society has told
me pretty plainly that I don't belong to it : I ask to be judged
by something a little higher than Society's opinions."
"A little higher P gasps Anne Theobald, faintly.
" Yes, a little higher. I ask to be judged by the right and wrong
of things. In the world I come from we may be lax, we are lax
of conduct, most of us, and we know it. But what is wrong for
one is wrong for all. What is right for one is right for alL We
don't shut our eyes in some cases and open them in others. You,
ladies and gentlemen by birth, our betters, our masters, have, it
seems, a sliding scale a very sliding scale," cries poor Jane, " of
virtue ! What was my first sin against Chalkshire respectability ?
That I was not a certain dilapidated old foreign princess that
Mrs. Crosbie wished to scrape acquaintance with at Spa. My
second 1 That I and my sister, an actress, were not ashamed to
be seen at a supper room in London, where Mrs. Crosbie was
not ashamed to be seen herself. My third ) That the Lidling-
THE RIGHT AND WRONG OF THINGS. 339
ton Croquet Club blackballed me ! The Lidlington Club that,
they say, has long striven in vain for the honour of having a
Lady Eose Golightly amongst its members. And this is justice V
She laughs, a scornful miserable little laugh enough, and the
elder Miss Theobald rises from her chair.
"I think you might have spared us this," she, cries in a
trembling voice. "Dispute the first principle of morality
call wrong right and right wrong if you choose. You might at
least, I think, abstain from maligning the society you have
outraged. ,,
" And I," says Miss Charlotte, laying a thin hand on each of
her knees, " I think it would be much better, Anne, if all this
useless talk on abstract subjects were left on one side. What
justice is there in the world, I should like to know % None !
There's a law for the rich and a law for the poor. A law for
men and a law for women. A law for the well-born, a law for
those who are not We are as much hypocrites here in Chalk-
shire as anywhere else. But all that has nothing to do with
the common-sense of things. I will not talk goody talk on a
question that I know to be one of expediency. Lady Eose
Golightly may do as she chooses, and float still, as she always
has floated, because she is Lady Eose Golightly. If you,''
turning harshly to Jane, " continue to act as you are acting now,
you'll go to the Dickens ! Take my warning, or leave it I
have fulfilled my duty ; and I am ready to stand by you if I
can. Anne, we may return home." And with a more vigorous
sniff than usual, Miss Charlotte Theobald starts to her feet ;
then, followed closely and in silence by the elder sister, moves
towards the door.
With her heart swelling until the sensation is one of agony,
Jane stands and watches them. Harsh, unwomanly, unpitying
though Charlotte Theobald may be, Charlotte Theobald's ts,
she feels, the one human hand outstretched upon this earth to
save her. And she half yearns to grasp it ! Miss Theobald's
cold platitudes did but kindle her into fiercer rebellion : the
222
340 OUGHT WE TO VISIT HER ?
coarse sincerity of Miss Charlotte's "You are going to the
Dick-ens!" has all but pierced her heart. "I I am sorry
Theobald is not at home/' she cries, a visible tremour in her
voice.
" I am sorry for it, too," says Charlotte, with bitter emphasis.
" I am sorry your husband does not keep at home. Excuses
enough are made for his conduct by the world : not by me.
Placed as you are, young, ignorant as you are, I say though I
know I stand alone in my opinion that Francis's sin is the
greater of the two."
At these words, words probing to the bottom that hidden,
cruellest wound under which she languishes. Jane remains
mute ; the colour leaving her cheek, her eya* fixed intently,
piteously, upon Charlotte Theobald's hard face.
"Don't don't say anything against Theobald, please," she
falters out at last.
"Oh, I say nothing against anybody," answers Charlotte,
tartly. " I confine myself to facts. Lady Kose was the rain of
his youth. All the world knows that. After Lady Rose Beau-
desert jilted him, Francis never cared a straw again for his
family or his honour, or what became of either. She will be
the ruin of him now. Men never outlive these idiotic sorts of
infatuation !" cries Miss Charlotte, with an angry sniff over the
generalisation.
" I'm sure I wish Francis would let the house, and go away
somewhere," says the elder sister, Jane remaining silent and
passive under this new form of attack. "It was a dreadful
mistake, his ever returning to a neighbourhood where he was
known. Whichever way one turns one sees nothing but un-
pleasantness. Whichever way one turns disgrace . . ."
. . . Looks one suddenly straight in the face, in the gaily-
drest, smiling person of Miss Minnie Arundel ! " Theobald
has come, Jenny!" cries Min, bursting into the room, with the
most delightful self-possession and good-temper. "He drove
up by the stable-road, and has gone to change his coat, and
THE RIGHT AND WRONG OF THINGS. 341
where can I find him some bine gauze for his hat? Theobald
says we shall not have much time to lose."
The severe goddess of good taste has not, it must be confessed,
presided over Miss Minnie Arundel's race attire. It is a rare
thing, indeed, for the poor little hardworked actress to get a
holiday, except on Sunday, and when she does get one she cele-
brates it by as elaborate a display of finery as her finances for
the time being enable her to command. Flounces, furbelows,
paniers, the latest absurdity of a Regent Street bonnet, jewels
of different kinds on throat and wrist, pearl powder, millefleur,
patchouli ! What an apparition to enter the stately drawing-
room, to stand beneath the hallowed, carved ceiling of Theobalds!
Our brother's wife is, alas, an actress ; but indirectly ; by training
only. Here is the veritable thing, fresh or faded, as you will
from the footlights of last nighty surrounded by the very
living, breathing corruption of the atmosphere of the stage.
Charlotte Theobald gives her an acrid stare, just as she would
give an acrid stare to any woman younger, fairer, happier than
herself. The soul of Anne Theobald is, if I may use the
irreverent metaphor, literally taken off its legs. After regard-
ing life, on principle, for half a century as a respectable but
melancholy process through which the human race has to
moulder, patiently dyspeptic, into another world, now to be
brought into closest contact, under one's very roof-tree, with
an actress! A creature "with borrowed colour and curl,"
whose business it is, professionally, to put a false light and
glitter and gloss on human life, and whose triumphs consist in
enabling men, for a brief space, to forget the tomb, indigestion,
and other conditions of mortality ; a creature with " Sufficient
unto the day is the evil thereof,* for her acknowledged motto ;
and whose place in the great scheme of a decorously-organised
universe is nowhere ! I say, to be thrown thus suddenly across
this living, over-drest, pearl-powdered antithesis to every belief
and prejudice of her being, takes Anne Theobald's tottering soul
off its legs.
n
342 O UGHT WE TO VISIT HER f
"Come, Charlotte, come ;" she gasps, putting her hand on her
sister's arm, as if for support. "We have been here too long
already."
But Charlotte Theobald walks back a step, and looks once
more into Jane's face. " Good-bye to you," she says, and gives
her her thin right hand. The word heartiness would be mis-
applied to any action of Charlotte Theobald's; but there is
honesty, a certain kind of remote sympathy, even, in its grip.
" It isn't likely I should pay another visit to Theobalds under
present circumstances ; but when you want a friend mind
what I say when you want a friend, and the time may come
sooner than you think you'll know where to find one."
And then the sisters depart.
This is the last compromise between Jane's two lives ; her
last, cold-hand shake, so to speak, with the world of convention-
ality to which she was not born, and which, from this day forth,
shall be burthened by her presence no more.
CHAPTER XXXV.
WIVES AND HUSBANDS!
A broiling sun overhead, dust in your eyes, nostrils, throat ;
men with blackened faces and banjos ; small girls in dingy
spangles holding forth tin cups, with shrill professional whine ;
dishonest directors of itinerant roulette boards ; honest country
merchants of cholera-ripe plums and apples ; the bill vendors
with their " Cards of the running 'orses, weights, name, and
colours of the riders f the mob, with its hoarse throat, ever
ready to yell down the latest failure, or to yell in the latest
success (like some other more highly cultivated mobs). Is not
the description of one race-course the description of all 1
To Miss Minnie Arundel the day is one of unalloyed delight.
She loves, she doats on races at all times, and has quite an
WIVES AND HUSBANDS! 343
amazing little stock of "horsey" expressions, which she fits in,
generally upside-down, to show her knowledge of everything
that is going on to the young men with whom she talks. But
the delights of the Chalkshire race-course exceed any that she
has tasted even on the classic ground of Epsom, Ascot, or Good-
wood. Officers of all grades of the service, London swells, and
even titles of moderate rank, have held Miss Arundel's cham-
pagne-glass and lost gloves to her before now. Never until this
first day of August, 187 , and upon this Chalkshire race-course,
did she taste the supreme ecstatic sweets of a duke's attention !
Actresses are but mortal, very mortal ; and when we consider
that every lady, young and old, here present would welcome the
Duke of Malta's attendance by her carriage side in breathless
triumph, we should really be lenient in our judgments upon
poor Min.
" Am I to call him my Lord Duke, or your Highness, or what,
Jenny V* she whispers to Jane, after the first flurry of introduc-
tion. " These things may all come easy enough to you with ,
Theobald for a coach, but remember I never spoke to anything
higher than a baronet in my lif e."
" Call him what you like, my dear," is Jane's answer ; " so
long as you take him off my hands. Only, don't let him go,
Min ! We may not enjoy ourselves particularly. That we
can't help. But ours shall be the best attended carriage on the
race-course. Don't let the Duke go."
And well does Miss Arundel succeed in carrying out the
letter and spirit of the injunction. While private carriages
stand in a row, their occupants neglected, Francis Theobald's
hack sociable is surrounded. Not once during the day, save so
far as a cat may allow a mouse to get back 'its liberty, is the
Duke let go.
This is how women of Jane's temperament walk on to perdi-
tion. Their hearts may be breaking with love or jealousy;
Jane's heart is breaking to-day ! But they will show a brave
front before the transgressor, before their sisters, before the
344 OUGHT WE TO VISIT HER t
world. If they are to die, it shall be in harness. Some vanity
shall be gratified, some duke shall not be "let go 17 till the last.
What cares Jane in truth for the Duke of Malta, Colonel
Mauleverer, Brabazon for any of the men whom by a smile, a
word, a look she manages to keep in attendance ? Why, if she
followed inclination, she would sooner talk to young Eawdon
than to any of them Rawdon, jealously hovering round, but
seldom approaching her carriage sooner still would be left
alone. If she were alone must not Theobald, of very necessity,
keep by her side % Ah, but the Chalkshire world is looking at
her ; Mrs. Coventry Brown's carriage is actually next to the
hack sociable ; Lady Rose Golightly's not twenty yards distant
And Theobald himself shall not Theobald be taught, by his
own vision, that though he neglect her, other men do not ; that
let his faithlessness, his indifference, be what they may, the
means of reprisal lie, fatally ready, to her hand)
Theobald, during the early part of the day at least, keeps
aloof from Lady Rose Golightly's carriage, and near his wife's.
Whatever anger he felt against poor Jenny for her obstinacy
about the note, died before Lady Rose's dinner reached its
second course last Saturday. He drove up to Theobalds this
morning in the perfectly affectionate and conciliatory frame of
mind that good husbands are wont to feel after short absences
from home. And Jane's reception of him, Jane's changed face,
the way in which, Miss Arundel being present, she tolerated,
but shrank from his kiss, have touched him much more deeply
than Jane herself suspects.
As long as the world lasts the difficulty of women understand-
ing and making allowance for men's feelings, in matters per-
taining to love, will probably be one of the great sources of
darkness and confusion in the social arrangement of things. A
woman loving a man, Jane loving Francis Theobald, could not,
after a quarrel, exist three days away from him (two miles dis-
tant) and seek no reconciliation. But Francis Theobald, who
loves Jane quite as much, I should say, as most men love their
WIVES AND HUSBANDS! 345
wives, has not only existed unreconciled, but happy ; nay, has
very nearly forgotten that the quarrel ever took place. The
renewal of his old flirtation with Lady Rose has amused Mr.
Theobald a little ; his teurte with Lady Rose's brother has
amused him a good deal more. The French cook, the wines,
the general lotus-eating life of Beaudesert's Folly have, in every
way, been an agreeable episode to befall one in these Chalkshire
wilds. Still, what so Mr. Theobald would argue what has
any of this got to do with Jane % his sweet and blooming Jane,
his wife, his property ? As well think he would love Blossy less
because he had been amusing himself pleasantly for a few days
away from home ! But how bring the property, above all, if it
be property, of Jane's illogical temper, to understand this ?
Mr. Theobald keeps near his wife's carriage ; more than once,
when a vacancy occurs, gets possession of a place beside Jane.
" Forgive me, Jenny," he whispers to her at last, several little
jests and complimentary speeches on her appearance having
fallen blankly to the ground ; " I see you are angry about some-
thing or another forgive me !" holding out a lavender-gloved
hand that the crowd sees not, but that Jane sees, of reconcilia-
tion.
In every quarrel of their lives, hitherto, Mr. Theobald has not
needed to sue long for pardon. A word, a look of his, has been
enough to bring Jane, always, with passionate repentance, to
his arms. But jealousy, save of the most trivial and ridiculous
nature, has never been the cause of their dissensions till now.
" I don't know what you mean by ' forgive.' " She lowers her
parasol, so that no one but Theobald can see her face or hear
her voice. " You have taken your way, I shall take mine. It's
too late in the day to talk about forgiveness now."
" Jenny I Too late ever to talk of forgiveness between you
and me t"
Every fibre of her heart thrills to his voice. If they were
alone, instead of with these thousands of eyes around them, who
knows but that salvation might come to her, even yet?
346 OUGHT WE TO VISIT HER?
"Jenny, my love, before the day is over, you'll promise to
forgive me, won't you?" And Mr. Theobald's hand shifts its
position, and, accidentally or otherwise, touches his wife's arm.
Such miracles as take place around us, to which no one gives
heed ! Here, under the open eyes of Chalkshire, is a tender little
love scene going on between man and wife, between Mr. and
Mrs. Theobald, of all couples in the world !
"I cannot forgive without conditions . . ."says poor
Jane, her breath coming thick and fast
" Mrs. Theobald, what do you say to lunch?" asks the
old Colonel's chirpy Irish voice. " Sorry to disturb you, Theo-
bald thanks." Mr. Theobald, like a well-bred husband, retir-
ing the moment his place is wanted. " If you and Miss Arundel
are ready to honour us with your presence ? The cup race won't
come off for another half-hour, and this is the hottest time of
the day. It will refresh you to get under shelter."
Colonel Mauleverer opens the door of the sociable. Jane and
her sister descend, and walk down the course to the tent of the
regiment, some twenty or thirty yards distant. Jane is escorted
by Colonel Mauleverer, the Duke of Malta on her other side ;
Brabazon brings Miss Minnie ArundeL Certainly they are the
two " best attended" women on the course. The moral sense of
Chalkshire is scandalised by this flagrant setting at nought of
public opinion. Young men, in these days, seem to have for-
gotten the A B C of good manners. Impossible for a regiment
to receive more attention than has been received by this one
from families of the highest standing in the neighbourhood.
And see the return they make for it ! Persons of unenviable
notoriety openly invited to lunch before a lady present has
received an invitation ! Will anyone enter the regimental mar-
quee second to Mrs. Francis Theobald and her sister? On this
point the moral sense of Chalkshire maintains wise silence until
the moment of temptation comes.
The marquee is just a degree or two hotter than the race-
course ; but the lunch, the iced champagne, are unexception-
WIVES AND HUSBANDS! 347
able, and Min is soon in a seventh heaven of demonstrative
enjoyment. A colonel of a regiment cutting her chicken, a
duke replenishing and again replenishing her champagne glass !
Can life have any brighter half-hour in store for Miss Minnie
Arundel ! If Blanche Bolingbroke, who boasts so ridiculously
of the one lord of her acquaintance, could but see her ! But
there is a single drop wanting in every cup of mortal happi-
ness.
"You are eating nothing, Mrs. Theobald," says kind little
Captain Brabazon, who has made his way to Jane's side. " I'm
afraid this blackhole of ours is too hot for you. Come over by
the doorway, where you'll have more air."
"I don't know what you mean by 'nothing/* says Jane.
"I've been eating steadily ever since I came. Lobster salad?
Well, if there's one temptation more than another that's too
strong for me, it's lobster salad just the smallest help, though."
44 And come over by the doorway. You will have as much
draught as you like there."
44 Yes, by Jove, it's the only cool place going," cries that most
foolish of ensigns, Dolly Standish, edging up to Jane as Braba-
zon goes away with her plate. " I haven't been able to speak
to you to-day, Mrs. Theobald ; other fellows never gave me a
chance. Theobald coming to lunch with us, I hofce? Oh, no I
there he is, opposite, in Lady Rose's carriage."
Jane raises her eyes, and blushes as though she were convicted
of a crime. Yes, there is Theobald, placidly eating his chicken
and drinking his champagne in the society of Lady Rose, Colonel
Desmond, and Loo Childers, to outward seeming as well-assorted
a little party of four as could be found upon the race-course.
" I take it for granted that you will belong to us at the races
to-morrow V 9 Lady Rose said to Theobald when she parted from
him last night. It was settled that he must leave Beaudesert
at an hour next morning when not the very warmest friendship
could make Lady Rose Golijghtly visible. 44 Although you say
differently, you must remember that I look upon you as my
'*m
348 OUGHT WE TO VISIT HERf
guest still, and I take it for granted that you will lunch with us
at the races to-morrow."
And Theobald, who through Brabazon had already heard of
Jane's engagement, answered with a dubious u Yes." He was
not responsible, no head of a family could be responsible, for
what might happen in any given interval But if the Fates
proved favourable, and if everybody lived, and if Lady Rose
remained of the same mind still, he would be charmed.
Well, everybody has lived, and Lady Rose has remained of
the same mind, and the Fates, it may be assumed, have proved
favourable. At all events, he is " her guest" still.
How could it be otherwise ? When Jane and Miss Arundel,
with their staff of attendants, walked away to the marquee, what
was Theobald to do ? Keep guard over the empty carriage till
their return ! Form an insignificant unit in the train of his
wife's admirers ! Jealous wives forget the positions into which
their own love of attention, their own levity, may force the most
exemplary husbands. The only course open to Mr. Theobald
was to saunter up to Lady Rose ; be met with honey-sweet
smiles of welcome ; finally, under gently imperious command,
take his place in her carriage, have a snowy white damask
placed over his knees, and eat, drink, and be merry, as his wife
is doing in the regimental marquee almost immediately opposite.
"I would go and ask Theobald to join us, only he looks so
happy where he is," says the foolish ensign. " A pity to disturb
people when they are happy. "
" A thousand pities !" cries Jane, her eyes kindling. " Par-
ticularly when every one else is happy too."
She eats her lobster salad when Captain Brabazon brings it
to her, takes a glass of champagne another ; begins to be in
spirits. Her clear outringing laugh makes itself heard across
the course as far as Lady Rose Golightly's carriaga
" Our friends in the marquee seem to be having a very jovial
party. I feel quite jealous at not being invited," says Lady
Rose, - -'*'
A DA YLIGHT ORGIE. 349
Her tone is the perfection of well-bred amiability. And still
the " very" is italicised ! Still, the next time poor Jane's laugh
rings aloud, its merriment jars with a degree of discordance in
Mr. Theobald's ears. However contented he may be in great
things, however callous to the world's moral disapproval of his
choice, a man who has married beneath him is never quite
without some trivial vulnerable points. Lady Rose surely
ought to know enough of human nature generally, and of
Francis Theobald's nature in particular, to be aware of this.
CHAPTER XXXVI. ^
A DAYLIGHT ORGIE.
Once during the day, generally immediately before the cup
race, it is a received Chalkshire opinion that ladies, well escorted,
may be seen, for a quarter of an hour or so, on foot. Accordingly,
while Jane and her sister are still in the marquee, some half-
dozen of the Chalkshire notabilities pass backward and forward
along the course ; among them Mrs. Coventry Brown, with Mr.
Crosbie papa, not Rawdon for her attendant swain.
The race day is the one day of the year on which Mr. Crosbie
is allowed to take his pleasure abroad as a bachelor, and " moult
tristement" that pleasure is taken, if one may judge from the
sombre expression of his honest red-and-tan old English face
to-day.
The thermometer at the present hour of the afternoon stands
at about a hundred and ten in the sun ; and Mrs. Coventry
Brown's too solid flesh is rapidly suffering decrease of tissue
through evaporation. Her peach-coloured gloves cruel ene-
mies to Mrs. Coventry Brown, at all times, are kid gloves seem
to have grown a couple of sizes smaller than when she left home : ]
this morning ; the white tulle that envelopes her face become* jj
350 OUGHT WE TO VISIT HERt
gelatinous ; her brow is bedewed, her complexion redder than
the roses in her bonnet She is glad of any excuse to give her
bulky limbs pause in their walk, and an excuse fortunately pre-
sents itself, in the hum of convivial voices, the peals of hearty
laughter, that are issuing from the regimental marquee just as
she and Mr. Crosbie pass along.
"A very uproarious party, upon my word and of both
sexes ! But that's the worst of races, Mr. Crosbie. I always
leave my own girls at home. In my position, as a head of
society, Pm obliged to patronise the public amusements of the
neighbourhood, but I always say a race-course is no place for
the young and innocent"
" So people tell me," says old Crosbie. " So people tell me,
Mrs. Brown. For my part I think all places are much the same.
Everything depends upon the spirit you look at them in."
" Ah, my dear Mr. Crosbie" the big blonde head gives a Lord
Burleigh shake under its superimpendent flower-garden " that *
may be all very well, my dear friend, for you and me ; but the
young, the young, alas ! are only too open to corrupt influences.
Now, what" Mrs. Coventry Brown's voice lowers, her great
yellow eyes glare with feline fixity before her "what do you
call a scene like this T
" Well, ma'am, I believe I should call it a rather noisy lunch
party," says Mr. Crosbie, glancing towards the officers' tent and
at a certain girlish figure that stands, with fair flushed face, a
champagne glass in her hand, just within the entrance.
"And I," says Mrs. Coventry Brown, "should call it a orgie!
Yes, a daylight orgie ! Mr. Crosbie, you are a steward of these
races. Then allow me to tell you this : I have seen the cup run
for, as a dooty, and subscribed handsome to the race fund for
years ; but if this kind of thing is going to be tolerated pub-
licly . . . how do you do, dear Lady Rose?" in a parenthesis of
eager smiles, the great yellow eyes having succeeded in arresting
a languid look of recognition from Lady Rose Golightly ; " Miss
Childers, delighted to see you looking so well ... if this kind
A DA YUGHT ORGIE. 35 1
of loose manners is going to be tolerated publicly, Mr. Crosbie,
the sooner persons of character withdraw their patronage from
the Chalkshire races the better."
She returns to her carriage, but keeps Mr. Crosbie in solemn
conversation for another five or six minutes after she has entered
it ; and when the poor old fellow leaves her, his face betokens
pretty clearly what kind of agreeable utterances the oracle has
been giving forth. He takes a turn or two along the course,
his hands behind him, his eyes moodily fixed on the ground,
then walks up abruptly to his son (who, as Mrs. Coventry
Brown took care to point out, is always to be found in Jane's
neighbourhood), and, for the first time to-day, addresses him
point blank.
" I should be glad to have a few words with you, Kawdoii, if
you have five minutes to spare."
" Five minutes or an hour," answers Rawdon promptly. " It
seems to me the races lag a little, father ; don't you think so 1
Too long ah interval between each raceor what is it I"
Old Crosbie answers, crustily, that the races are conducted as
they always have been and as they always will be, while he has
anything to do with them. He wants no new-fangled opinions
upon any matter that is under his control and management
However, he puts his hand, with a friendly enough gesture,
within young Rawdon's arm, and thus linked together, the
father and son walk away towards a quieter portion of the
course.
Very glad the Chalkshire world is to see that they are upon
speaking terms still. Mrs. Crosbie will not admit her son to her
presence did you not know that % Oh dear, yes he has not
been near The Hawthorns, although, unhappily, he still comes
into the neighbourhood ! for a fortnight past becomes hysterical
if his name is even mentioned. And no wonder. Thirty thou-
sand pounds, and as nice a girl as Emma, transferred, by the
lad's own folly, to that ridiculous old Major Hervey. But the
father, it seems, is more lenient hopes still, perhaps, to patch
352 OUGHT WE TO VISIT HER?
matters up. At all events, it is a relief, a very great relief, to
the charitable dispositions of the Chalkshire world, to see that
poor Mr. Orosbie and his son speak still !
" Rawdon," says Mr. Crosbie, as soon as they find themselves
among the ginger-beer stalls and Aunt Sallies of the back
regions, and well beyond the range of friendly listening ears,
" this is not the time or place I should have chosen for speaking
to you; but as you don't come to my house I have no choice
left, and what I have to say won't take very long. You are
making a confounded idiot of yourself, sir !"
Rawdon is silent. From the time he was five years old he
has been in the habit of disputing first principles with Mrs.
Crosbie. With his father, his kindly, honest, narrow-minded,
unintellectual old father, Rawdon is never able to find a word
of argument.
" Yes, a confounded idiot ! A confounded idiot !" Eloquence
is not a natural gift of Mr. Crosbie's. " I am no more straight-
laced than other men. You have never found me backward in
indulgence towards any of your follies ; no, nor in money either ;
and from the first, as I told your mother, I thought you too
young to be engaged. Still, it was your own doing. You chose
to propose to Emma, and she accepted you. Well, I won't talk
of the delicacy or the generosity you should have felt towards
a girl placed as she is in our house. Common manly feeling,
common self-respect, might have made you behave yourself
with decency as her lover."
" I was unaware that I had not behaved myself with decency,"
says Rawdon, but in no very firm voice. "Emma and my
mother have taken up prejudices which I refuse to share ; just
that"
" It is not 'just that' at all," says old Crosbie, angrily. " For
God's sake, let us have none of your fine rhodomontade hair-
splitting, sir. Stick to the course you have taken, if you
will Don't defend it This woman you have chosen to run
after
A DA YLIGHT ORGIE. 353
" Say nothing against her !" cries Kawdon, flushing. " Say
what you like of me, but not a word against her !"
" Have the civility to hear me out if you please, and you will
find that I am going to say nothing against * her !' This woman
you have chosen to run after may, or may not, be what the neigh-
bourhood says she is. The subject is one I've no interest in.
As long as you were your own master you might have made a
fool of yourself with her or any other woman you liked, and I
should have trusted to time to give you wisdom. But an en-
gaged man is not his own master. From the day in Spa on
which you asked Emma to marry you you were bound in honour
to respect her feelings, and on that very day, it seems, you fell
into this entanglement Now, what is the end of it? What
is your position? What is the position of all of us at this
moment V
" My position/' says Eawdon, with an uneasy attempt at a
laugh, " is that of a jilted man. You must be aware my letters
to you must have made you aware that the breaking off of the
engagement was Emma's doing, solely/'
" Emma's doing, solely ! Would she would any girl of spirit
remain bound to a man who openly, grossly, showed his in-
difference to her as you did % I don't talk of what happened in
London," goes on Mr. Crosbie, who is not more ultramontane
than other people as to the sinfulness of little sins ; " I don't
talk of their coming across you at those confounded supper-
rooms where that donkey, Hervey, should never have taken
them, though that was bad enough in the eyes of an innocent
girl like Emma ; I speak of what happened before the way in
which you philandered after the woman here in Chalkshire, with
Emma breaking her heart about you at home."
" Breaking her heart ! Well, sir, you must allow at least that
the wound has quickly healed ! If Emma, in a fortnight, can
derive comfort from Major Hervey's attentions, you must allow
that I have not been the means of completely destroying her
happiness !"
23
Ot?GHT WE TO VISIT NEXT
N w. those two syllables - Herrey" embody all the bitterest
_ -nrig animosities of Me, Crofaiea nature. For fir* and
twenty rears the poor man has been snubbed bj the Hervefs*
Lis lent money to the Herreys. has been made to feel that if
there be a point on which the Berrey glory could sustain tar-
nish or decrease, it has been in the connection of the family
with himself, Bawdon's dislike to them is hereditary ; one of
:\^r reaching mysterious taints in the blood which no
courier-training can eradicate.
" Major Hervey I Yes, do you think that lessens my regret
over your folly! For the last ten days IVe had the fellow
staying in my house he's there* with Emma, now, afraid the
lica: i n a provincial racecourse would be too much for his com-
...I suppose, For ten days IVe had the fellow in my
house, drinking my claret with that confounded sneer of hi-.
till I hate the thought oi dinner, on my soul I do ! Hate the
thought of sitting down at my own table ! And now there's
the old woman coming the two old women, by God ! Maria s
the worst oi the two. If Emma marries him, I shall never be
able to call my house my own again, and through you, sir!
Through you. you young jackanapes ! giving up as true and
good-hearted a girl as ever lived, because you must needs make
one in the train of a flaunting, flirting play-actress, like this
Mrs. Theobald P
The rebuke is not couched in very dignified terms, but it cut
Rawdon's heart like a knife. A lad of his age may fall most
insanely, most unlawfully in love, without his whole moral
nature tumbling to pieces. Affection for his father, dislike, jea-
lousy of the Herveys are feelings that have grown with Raw-
don s growth, strengthened with his strength. Never did either
hold more powerful sway over him than in this very hour when
the rupture with all his boyish life, his boyish life and its pre-
judices and affections, is so imminent.
'* I repeat, that it was Emma herself who broke off the en-
gagement," he says, a little sullenly. " You know the story
A DA YLIGHT ORGIE. 355
from the first as well as I do. When we met Mr. and Mrs.
Theobald in Spa, you did not* share my mother's prejudices
against them, sir. If I recollect right, you said you would leave
your card on Francis Theobald and his wife when they returned
to Chalkshire."
" And what prevented me from doing so but your disgraceful
conduct 1" cries old Crosbie, angrier than ever. Like all men
under .petticoat government, he winces sorely at any allusion to
his fetters. " She is not a woman for Emma to know your
mother was right about that she and her goings-on are a
scandal to the neighbourhood ; but for old friendship's sake, I
would have left my card on the man himself, had your dis-
graceful conduct left me a choice in the matter/ 1
For a minute or more young Rawdon makes no reply.
" You have used words I never thought to hear from you,
father," he cries at last, in a queer constrained sort of voice.
" But I suppose it is just as well we should understand each
other thoroughly. I have kept away from home, hitherto *
" You have ! Think what the bitterness of that, alone, has
been to your mother and to me ! My son lurking about the
neighbourhood (you were here on Saturday night don't think
your actions are not remarked) and ashamed to come to his
own father's house !"
"For the present until your feelings towards me become
juster I will keep away still. If ... if Emma marries Major
Hervey, I suppose you and my mother will consider my ' dis-
grace' condoned V
" When you give up your present connections, you mean-
talk common-sense when you give up connections that are
taking you to the devil yes, to the devil, sir ! I have no doubt
we shall have plenty of your company again. When tempta-
tion's over and their prospects in life ruined, most young men
turn filial and virtuous. We have all read the parable of the
Prodigal Son ! w
And with this ends the conversation. ' The tinkling of a bell
232
356 OUGHT WE TO VISIT HER t
announces that the horses are about to be saddled for the cap
race, and, arm linked in arm still, Mr. Crosbie and his son walk
once more along the course, and before the eyes of the Chalk-
shire world.
" But if you want to know how things really stand between
them, look at the expression of poor old Crosbie's face !" The
charitable dispositions of Chalkshire find scope for action in
the thought
CHAPTER XXXVII.
ALL THE FAULT OP THE CHAMPAGNE. .
Yes, Jane has taken champagne enough to be, I had almost
written to feel, in spirits ; three or four glasses, perhaps, not
as much as Mrs. Coventry Brown would take at a ball or dinner
party, but sufficient, in the open air and in Jane's high-strung
mood of mind and body, to affect her potently.
But her pain, though deadened, is with her throughout the
day. She attends, or has the air of attending, with interest to
the races : under good advice "hedges," so that if scarlet-and-
blue is second for the cup she gets a dozen pairs of gloves from
Dolly Standish, and if scarlet-and-blue wins, three dozen pairs
from the Duke of Malta, while if scarlet-and-blue is nowhere
she wins gloves, more than she can count, from everybody.
Her smiles are given to all the different competitors who sur-
round her as lavishly as her bets are made. Never in her life
has Jane Theobald looked fairer, never has her beauty received
more open homage from men ; never have outside feminine
critics been more justified, probably, in pronouncing her vain,
fast, unvisitable.
And still through it all, through the flattery and excitement,
through the noise and glare and intoxication of it all, her pain
is with her still ! She knows by keenest instinct, although her
ALL THE FAULT OF THE CHAMPAGNE. 357
eyes cannot follow his movements, that Theobald remains con?
stantly by Lady Rose, and her heart grows deader and deader.
Almost, I think, might the Chalkshire world hold her sins ex-
piated could they but fathom what this vain, fast, unvisitable
woman suffers.
Theobald remains constantly by Lady Rose, not so much
from any irresistible predilection for Lady Rose's society, as from
the fact that it is less disagreeable to him to sit still in a luxu-
rious carriage than to walk about under the broiling sun, and
in the dirt, heat, and discomfort of a race-course. Horse-racing,
perhaps I ought to say Chalkshire horse-racing, is a form of
gambling Francis Theobald little affects ; and could Jane but
know and understand ! he really finds it a sufficiently difficult
matter to get through all this glare and din and dust with even
a decent outward show of interest. Lady Rose, who, more
years ago than she cares to remember, learned every turn of his
face, every tone of his voice, by heart, knows that he is bored,
better perhaps than he knows it himself ; and a good hour and
a half before the race programme is over, declares herself worn
out by the heat and fatigue of the day, and ready to go.
"Our train starts at five thirty, does it not?" she remarks
carelessly, and addressing Colonel Desmond, who is standing
on the other side of the carriage, looking over a lilliputian bet-
ting book with Miss Childers. " You know you have promised
to be Bradshaw for the occasion. Five thirty. Well, if we start
for The Folly now, we shall not have too much time for getting
clean and having tea before we begin our journey. What do
you say V And she turns to Jane's husband. " Have you had
dust and shouting and heat enough for one day, Mr. Theo-
bald r
About a fortnight ago, it may be remembered, on a starlight
night, when a certain diamond ring sparkled on The Folly
terrace, Lady Rose won a half-jesting promise from Theobald
tbat he would join the yachting party of Lord Barty Beaudesetf
at Cowes. Without any formal renewal of the subject since
-*q
358 OUGHT WE TO VISIT HER f
it has grown to be a tacitly understood thing between them
that the jest has become earnest. But the details of the plan
have remained have been purposely allowed by Lady Rose to
remain in obscurity.
"Mr. Theobald doesn't understand what you are talking
about, Rose," remarks Loo Childers, who, among other duties
of friendship, perfectly understands that of supplying the cue,
or " leading up," to a desired subject upon occasion. " It was
only this morning, you know, that you and the Duke settled it
all."
"Of course after getting Bart/s telegram. What a vile
memory mine is !" cries Lady Rose. " One of the many symp-
toms, I'm afraid, of approaching age. Yes, you are going to be
carried forcibly away to the Isle of Wight to-night," and she
looks again at Theobald. " A case of * Novel and determined
abduction/ for the newspapers."
And then Lady Rose enters into explanations. After Mr.
Theobald had left The Folly this morning a telegram arrived
from Barty to say that some great amateur boat-race was to
take place to-morrow off Cowes any number of thousand
pounds a side, all London coming down, great excitement of the
season and an immediate adjournment from Chalkshire to the
Isle of Wight had been voted by everybody.
"You, as one of the household, included, Mr. Theobald," cries
Loo Childers. " I made myself your proxy, and gave a plumper
for you on the spot. Now it's no use for you to struggle," adds
Loo, looking at him bewitchingly, and Loo can look very be-
witchingly at any man when she likes. " We are all going off
together this evening. Colonel Desmond, the Duke, Rose and
I and you. And don't we mean to enjoy ourselves !"
Theobald answers, with Spartan promptness and decision,
that it is impossible. He would be delighted, as far as inclina-
tion goes, but it is impossible. He is going with his wife to
the Lidlington race-ball to-night.
u Why I thought your taste for balls met with a sudden
ALL THE FAULT OF THE CHAMPAGNE. 359
death seven years ago V remarks Lady Rose. "I thought you
avoided all those sort of festivities on principle."
" Jenny does not avoid them," is Mr. Theobald's quiet an-
swer, given in the tone of a man whose mind is not to be shaken.
" Ah, then I am dumb." A just perceptible change of colour
comes over Lady Rose's face. " The duties of a chaperon before
everything I I must confess, for my own part, the prospect of
not going to the Lidlington ball is about the pleasantest part of
our pleasant little programme. I shall think of you towards
midnight, Mr. Theobald. Whatever else we are doing, we are
pretty sure to be cool, and out of doors. And I shall think of
you, enjoying yourself amongst all the crowded fashion and
beauty of the Lidlington town-hall \"
But she urges the point no more. Lady Rose understands
the principles of social strategy too well to urge anything upon
an indolent man like Francis Theobald. Why, sooner than be
put to the trouble of resisting, he would, likelier than not, take
flight at once, and find shelter at his wife's side during the
remainder of the day.
Lady Rose urges nothing ; only, when the horses are in her
carriage, proposes that Mr. Theobald shall drive with herself "
and Miss Childers as far as Beaudesert Colonel Desmond, who
has bets on the next race, has arranged to return somewhat later
on the dog-cart, with the Duke. Will Mr. Theobald take pity
on her and Loo. in their forsaken condition, and be their escort "
home 1
" You are half my guest still," she pleads ; one of Lady Rose's
greatest gifts is her pleading power ; " so I think I have the
least little right to throw myself on your compassion I" j
Well, Francis Theobald, though rigid as I have shown when
principle is at stake, is not absolutely unassailable on all points.
And in judging of his weakness at this particular moment a "'
critical moment, did he but know it, in his history we should '
bear in mind that he is really bored to extinction, in his mild *
way, by the Chalkshire races; tempted to say "yes" to" any
360 OUGHT WE TO VISIT HER f
proposal that shall involve instant quiet, cleanliness, and cooler
air. " .
" The dog-cart can take you back to Theobalds as soon as
Arthur and Colonel Desmond return," says Lady Rose, watch-
ing his face. " But of course you must go first and see if Mrs.
Theobald can spare you. Loo and I will wait, in anxious expec-
tation, till you return.*
And accordingly, some two hours having elapsed since he left
it, Theobald again makes his way to the sociable, and after a
little patient waiting, queue fashion, among the crowd of young
men who surround Jane and her sister, secures his place once
more by his wife's side.
" Well, Jenny, my dear, how are you getting on? Won plenty
of gloves, Min, I hope V (this in friendly greeting, to his sister-
in-law.) " I just came round to see when you will be thinking
of going, Jane."
v " Whenever you like to have the horses put to we shall be
ready/' Jane answers, with cold politeness.
" Oh, don't think of me. As long as you and Min are amused,
stay. I the fact is" Mr. Theobald lowers his voice so that
only his wife can hear it " the fact is I forgot to bring my
portmanteau away this morning, Jane, and as Lady Rose has
offered to drive me back to The Folly now, I think I may as
well be off. I shall come over on the dog-cart to Theobalds
afterwards, but if you don't like me to leave you "
" Like !" interrupts Jane. Very low, very well contained, is
her voice, but a look of hatred yes, of hatred flashes upon
him from her blue eyes. " And how do you suppose it can pos-
sibly matter to me whether you leave us here or not % Do you
think we could not find plenty of people to take care of us, and
see us home, too, if we wanted them 1"
" I am quite sure you could," says Theobald, and he gives a
glance at Min, who is at this moment holding a lively discussion
with Dolly Standish and other youngsters of the regiment on
some point, presumably connected with horse-racing; a discussion
ALL THE FAULT OF THE CHAMPAGNE. 361
in which everybody seems to speak at once, and of which the
predominant tone can only be accurately described by the word
"loud." .
Dolly Standish and his friends have evidently taken as much
champagne as their modest allowance of brains can stand ; poor
Min is decidedly more rosy in the face; more noisy in her ac-
cents, than is compatible with the strictest refinement.
" I am quite sure you and your sister could, under any cir-
cumstances, find plenty of people to ta'ke care of you," repeats
Mr. Theobald.
The tone of his voice, rather than the words themselves, the
tone and a certain expression in the glance he gives Miss Arun-
del, cause all Jane's hardly pent-up passion to overflow.
" Lucky for us that we can !" she retorts bitterly. " I don't
know how it may be for ladies, of course. Outsiders, like Min
and me, do well to accept whatever attention comes to us."
A hot flush mounts over Francis Theobald's face. Since the
renewal of his acquaintance with Lady Rose Golightly, the
remembrance of Jane's lowly antecedents and connections has
galled him, more times than one. And the sight of her at this
moment, at poor, happy, unconscious Min's side, the audacity
with which she utters that unpleasant word " outsiders/' ably
second the work that the influence of old refined associations
has begun.
"You are a fool, Jane, and by God you'll live to repent
your folly ! If you have no self-respect, have the goodness to
remember, please, that you owe something to me."
This is in whispers. From the proximity of the two heads
the world might really be justified in thinking that Theobald
was committing the worst solecism in manners, a flirtation with
his own wife !
" What I owe to you ? Oh, I like that." Jane laughs ; not
a pleasant laugh to hear. " Surely you don't want a scene of
powerful Domestic Interest before such an audience as this, do
youT
362 OUGHT WE TO VISIT HER /
" I wish, once and for all, that you would drop your theatrical
expressions," is Mr. Theobald's answer. " Do remember, if you
can, Jane, that you have done with the sawdust and the foot-
lights now."
" And suppose I have not done with them ? . . . but why waste
time with any more of this senseless talk? If you are not
interested in the races, I am. Captain Brabazon," turning
pointedly away from her husband, "will you lend me your
card ? Some one has stolen mine, and I can't remember whether
I have taken odds or evens with Kawdon Crosbie for the Gar-
rison Cup. Can you help me ?"
Captain Brabazon leans across with his card and explains :
two of the "odds" having been scratched, and another gone
lame, Mrs. Theobald, by every canon of fair and equitable betting,
must have taken "evens." Kawdon Crosbie's good sense will
show him this, without any reference to cards or betting-books.
"Oh! And that is called honour!" cries Jane. "I learn
some new meaning of words every day, now."
After this, whatever Mr. Theobald has to say must be said,
whether he likes it or not, before an audience.
"Well, then, Jane," he remarks after a minute, "if you really
think you can return without me I may as well start. I see
Lady Rose's horses won't stand."
"Poor dear things !" says Jane, mockingly. "Don't keep
them a minute longer than you can help."
" I shall be back in good time to dress. By the bye, at what
o'clock do we start for the ball ?"
" I've ordered the usual shandrydan at half -past nine,' is
Jane's answer. "But why come back at all? Why not go
direct from The Folly? It will take you out of your way, I'm
afraid, to come all the way round by Theobalds."
" I had not thought of that. You are sure you would as soon
go alone?"
" Oh, quite sure. Do whatever suits yourself bc:tb I shan't
expect you till I see you."
ALL THE FAULT OF THE CHAMPAGNE. 363
A suppressed smile passes over the faces of more than one of
the listeners to the connubial colloquy.
" You are a very fashionable couple, upon my word \ n cries
Minnie Arundel. " When I get a husband, I know I shall take
care how I allow him so much liberty."
And Theobald returns to Lady Rose. Never did her languid,
high-bred smile, her thousand refinements of voice and manner,
strike him with so marked a contrast as at this moment !
"You have got your leave, then?" she asks in a whisper,
when Mr. Theobald has again taken his place in her carriage.
" Yes, I have got my leave," he answers. "Leave of a very
elastic nature, if I like to avail myself of it."
In doubling, to get clear of the crowd, Lady Rose's coachman
brings his horses close alongside of the Theobalds' sociable. Just
then, an old apple- woman gets in the way and is all but run
over by the high- stepping greys ; a crowd gathers round with
the ever-ready indignation of a British crowd against the bloated
aristocracy they worship the barouche must come to a stand-
still For the space of one minute Lady Rose Golightly and
Jane Theobald are separated by, at most, half-a-dozen feet.
" Who, in the world, are those flash-looking people Theobald
has picked upT asks Min, of the Duke of Malta.
" Those flash-looking people are my only sister and her most
particular friend," answers his Grace, with a grin ; thinking
what a good story he will make afterwards of the actress's
mistake.
Jane bursts out laughing. " You have put your foot into i%
nicely now, Min," she cries ; then turns, and looks with cool,
deliberate steadiness into Lady Rose Golightr/s face.
Lady Rose's patrician head bows graciously. (Forgiving
creature that she is ! Think of bowing at all, after that atrocious
note of Mrs. Theobald's.) Jane's slight figure remains upright
as a dart. Never was the cut direct given with more uncom-
promising point and directness. Mr. Theobald, who happens
to have his eye-glass in use at the moment, evidently discerns
364 OUGHT WE TO VISIT HER1
what is going on ; for he bends forward and says a word or two,
very low in tone, very tender of manner, to his " hostess." Then
the crowd separates for a second the eyes of the two women
meet : a look of intolerable triumph is in Lady Rose's ; and the
barouche sweeps on.
Not again, in this world, shall the two unequally matched
rivals cross each other's path.
More dust and heat, and yelling of the crowd ; more bets,
more flirtation, more champagne. Oh, throbbing feverish tor-
ture of it all ! will it never end 1 It ends at last. Miss Minnie
Arundel, with whom, whatever pleasure she may be tasting,
business is still paramount, looks suddenly at her watch, and
finds, to her dismay, that she must start at once if she mean to
catch her train for London, and be in time for the first piece
to-night
" Oh, bother the first piece !" says the Duke of Malta, grace-
fully. By the time the day has advanced thus far, the Duke of
Malta never for a moment leaves Jane's carriage. "Nobody
ever thinks of being in time for first pieces. Stay over the race
ball, of course Mrs. Theobald will bring you and 111 give you
lots of dances." So, whatever the rest of the Beaudesert party
may intend, his Grace, it seems, has not formed any definite
resolution about going to Cowes to-night. " Manager make a
row] Oh, bother the manager !" This is the style of his
Grace's vinous talk. " I'll square it all off with him."
"Will you, indeed?" says Min, with a saucy glance at the
Duke of Malta's red, half -tipsy face. " I don't think, as matters
stand just at present, I should advise you to try the experiment.
Rawdon, my dear boy," to Rawdon Crosbie, who is keeping
jealous guard over the side of the carriage farthest from the
duke : " if you can find our coachman, and if, by any accident,
our coachman can stand, have the horses put to, and then see
us through the crowd there's a good child. I haven't a minute
to lose."
Rawdon Crosbie finds out the coachman, fortunately still able
ALL THE FAULT OF THE CHAMPAGNE. 365
to stand, then mounts the box, and escorts the sisters until
they are clear of the race-course. He would escort them to
the railway station, and take Mrs. Theobald home, if he
were allowed to do so. But Jane says no, and says it
peremptorily.
" I have had ferocious looks enough from papa, as it is," she
tells him, in her usual gay, half -bantering tone ; " and shall
probably get plenty more from the rest of the family before the
day is out. I don't want to add to my crimes by being seen
4 philandering' with you all over the country.'*
" Have you the slightest intention of giving me one dance
to-night, Mrs. Theobald ? I hardly like to ask, after the number
I heard you promise to the Duke of Malta."
" Don't you, really 1 It seems you have grown very modest
all at once. Yes ; I can promise you just one solitary waltz,
Mr. Crosbie number five, if you like. Always supposing,"
adds Jane, cheerfully, "that I am admitted to the ball-room
when the time comes ! I have got my ticket, certainly as
Colonel Mauleverer is a steward, there was no difficulty about
that but how can I tell a regiment of old ladies, with Mesdames
Coventry Brown and Pippin for generals, will not be ready to
bar my entrance V
But the moment the carriage drives on, the moment she is
alone with her sister, all Jane's forced spirits fall to the ground.
She sinks back in the carriage, lets the muscles of her face do
what they will with themselves ; she looks thirty years old.
Despite the too visible wear and tear of the hardest profession
in the world, you would think, seeing the sisters for the first
time together at this moment, that Miss Minnie Arundel was
the younger and happier of the two.
The train is already in sight when they reach the station ; the
platform is crowded. Only one more minute's hurried talk can
they have together before Miss Arundel's departure.
"Min," cries Jane, with a sort of burst, and putting her feverish
hand within her sister's arm, " you have seen a little, at least, of
^m
f 366 OUGHT WE TO VISIT HER f
k.
E| my life my ' lady's life* we used to talk so grand about. Jolly
f one, isn't it f
\l . " It would be a jolly one to me, I know," answers Min
)'* promptly. "I should say you've just got every single thing a
woman could wish for."
i\ "My heart's breaking, Min. On God's earth there doesn't walk
4 a more miserable woman than me."
Something in the tone of her voice' makes Min look seriously
into Jane's flushed, faded face.
; t " It's all the fault of the champagne, Jenny. I've felt the same
sort of thing scores of times. Champagne doesn't do by daylight
Take a soda as soon as you get home, with the tiniest little drop
of brandy in it, and then lie down. You'll be right enough long
before it's time to dress."
"Sometimes I think 111 cut it, Min cut my 'lady's life*
and get my bread by the work I was brought up to do. Am I
too old to go back to the stage, do you think 1 Looks are the
thing, you know, for the ballet-going public, not art. And I
haven't lost them. With a blonde wig and plenty of paint I
might look tolerable in a break-down still V
" You'd take the shine out of most of us, if you went back to
the stage to-morrow, Jenny," cries warm-hearted little Min ;
"but you would be a fool ever to think of such a thing. With
a husband to keep you, and means to bring up the child inde-
pendent, how can you ever talk of toiling and slaving at the old
life again for bread f
" Bread is not everything," says Jane.
" Perhaps not," is Min's answer. " But bread, and meat, and
a good glass of wine afterwards, and a house to live in, and a
child, and a husband, and as many silk dresses as one chooses
to buy, are pretty nearly everything, I should say."
"As many silk dresses as one chooses to buy !* Are the womea
better or worse off in the main who can think, with poor igno-
rant Minnie Arundel, that this is the very crown and climax of
all human prosperity 1
SOCIETY IN FULL DRESS. 367
CHAPTER XXXVm.
SOCIETY IN PULL DRESS.
No army of old ladies receives Jane when, four or five hours
later, she drives up to the brilliantly-lighted portico of the Lid-
lington assembly-rooms ; only the pompous head-waiter of the
town, in his way as " exclusive" a personage as Mrs. Coventry
Brown is in hers, and almost as learned as that great oracle her-
self in the awful mysteries of social status and precedents.
" Carriages ordered at two," enunciated the Lidlington Jeames,
in a voice suited to hired coachmen, to the driver of Jane's
shandrydan. " Ladies' cloak room to the left, madam, two steps
down." This in a tone finely discriminative of the precise amount
of condescension required by the occasion to Jane. In another
minute " Mrs. Theobald's" name is shouted forth by waiter No. 2
at the door of the ball-room, and Jane finds herself in the august : .
presence of Chalkshire society in full dress society, bare-shoul- .;'
dered, short-sleeved, plumed the feminine predominating over
the masculine element in the proportion of about three to one. -
It is late (till the very last moment Jane waited in her ball-
dress and flowers at the hall-door of Theobalds, hoping against
hope that Theobald, at the eleventh hour, would relent and call ;
for her). The second dance had been danced. Every available \
cavalier is walking about the ball-room, his partner on his arm. '*
A few old gentlemen stand around the doorway, patiently gazing \
at nothing over each other's bald heads. Knots of ladies, old, :
young, and middle-aged, white, black, and coloured, are every- '.
where. Jane is alone. ')
She can never outwardly be awkward; thanks partly to the '{
liberal gifts of nature, partly to her early professional training
in that hardest of all arts to be learnt the art of standing
gracefully at ease. As self-possessed as though she were sim-
ply inspecting the house in some interval of the ballet, Jane
368 OUGHT WE TO VISIT HER t
stands, her fair arms folded in the airiest of attitudes, a composed
smile on her lips, and looks about her her heart beating till it
seems to her her tulles and laces can scarcely conceal its beats
upon Chalkshire society taking its pleasure. Theobald is not
here yet, nor any of the party from Beaudesert, neither is Raw-
don Crosbie ; so much she sees at a glance. But Mrs. Crosbie
and Emma, Adonis Hervey, the Pippins, Mrs. Coventry Brown,
all the enemy, in force, are present, and she must stand alone,
the cruel cordon of moral quarantine stretched around her, and
face them.
Right fearlessly does she do it. Colonel Mauleverer, with Lady
Laurie, the wife of the member, upon his arm, passes her close;
and Jane looks exactly one inch above his head. She will recog-
nise no man to-night promptly she decides on this she will
recognise no man so long as he has a lady on his arm ! Captain
Brabazon goes by with a Miss Coventry Brown she sees him
not. Presently approach Mrs. Crosbie and Adonis. Mrs. Cros-
bie's eyes, a little too consciously, seek the farther pple ; Adonis,
from under his heavy lids, gives Jane one of his usual satyr-like
glances of admiration. She is calmly; superbly unaware of their
existence ! Alone, unsupported, not a muscle of her face betray-
ing that she feels her isolation, she stands thus for three or four
minutes stands till the premonitory notes of the next dance set
young men at liberty to follow their own inclinations, and places
young ladies under the sheltering wing of chaperons.
Men are braver oh, constitutionally, braver far than women ;
but then theirs is courage, oftenest, of a grand, and thrilling,
and heroic pattern ; courage that the world hears of. Under
the small lessons read to them by their sisters, I think women
are called upon to show endurance dumbly that men know
nothing of. What man, undeserving of obloquy, ever went
through a five minutes', or a five seconds' ordeal like unto this 1
Aspirant partners throng round Jane eagerly. If a common
ball-room triumph were all the success she coveted, she might
have it, cheaply enough. But Jane the worse for her dreams
SOCIETY IN FULL DRESS. 369
of another sort of victory. Once again .... must I write it ?
for the last time, as she drove hither through the silent lonely-
lanes, Jane's better angel pleaded to her on Francis Theobald's
behalf : " Are husbands of the same flesh and blood as wives f
said the friendly monitor. " If a man err, is it not his mascu-
line, godlike right, that he should be sued to rather than for-
given I Can any wrong-doing, any infidelity of his place him,
as it would you, beyond the reach of pardon ? By your own
obstinacy, your own jealous madness, are you not giving over
the game into Lady Rose's hands? Think twice of it, Jane.
Think twice before you throw up the sponge to fate. To-night
will be the turning-point. To-night you win or lose all" (oh,
too prophetic monitor !). " Right is on your side, aye, and
might, too, the might of youth, and beauty, and great love.
Other champion than yourself have you none. Put away jea-
lousy, pride ; resolve to win your husband back ; resolve to hold
him when you have won him, and you must succeed."
Aspirant partners, I say, throng round her eagerly. She
might fill her card half-a-dozen times over if she chose. But
Jane does not choose. To-night, she thinks, is one of many
possibilities. She will leave as many blanks as she writes down
engagements in her programme.
" And only one square dance for me," says Dolly Standish,
looking as if he could cry. The magic of Jane's blue eyes has
robbed the little ensign of whatever wits he may before have
possessed. " Only these miserable lancers for me V
" If you behave very well, I will give you a waltz by-and-by,"
says Jane. " As to these miserable lancers, if you prefer look-
ing on, instead of dancing them, I shall be contented."
But Dolly Standish will not relinquish his chance of dancing,
though it be only a square dance, with the prettiest woman in
the room, and at once offers Mrs. Theobald his arm.
Few of the sets are as yet made up ; and before Jane and her
partner have walked a dozen steps, they are beset by Dolly's
brother officers with inquiries as to vis-a-vis and side-couplee.
24
37o OUGHT WE TO VISIT HER t
" That's all right," says Dolly, when the required number is
filled in. "All nice people, I think, Mrs. Theobald. Bore
having any but nice people in one's set, isn't it?'
And away he walks, in the ignorance and happiness of his
heart, to the upper end of the room ; there to wait, at Mrs. Theo-
bald's side, for the nice people who are to be their fellow dancers.
But in social arrangements, such as the disposition of lancers,
man as Dolly Standish has yet to learn holds but a subor-
dinate and insignificant part in the order of creation. Their
vis-d-vis, Colonel Mauleverer, keeps his engagement faithfully ;
Captain Brabazon, and some other officer of the regiment, keep
theirs. But the set does not " form." One of the ladies, on
seeing Jane, remembers that she had already promised to be
vis-a-vis to her cousin. A second would prefer, as the night is
warm, getting nearer the door. Bit by bit, the set collapses,
aaelts away into thin air ; and Jane and Dolly Standish are left
alone.
They try another, of which Emma and Adonis Hervey form
part, and where a couple is palpably wanted ; and with the
same result.
Dolly Standish's mouth, always a little open, opens wider and
wider. " I never saw such a extraordinary thing in my
life !" says he, driven by the sincerity of his feelings into strong
language.
" Never mind. You shall have a whole waltz to make up for
it," says Jane, lightly. " Fortunately, one doesn't want a vw-d-
vis for round dances, or you and I wouldn't have much chance,
should we, Dolly V
" I never saw such a extraordinary thing in my life," is
all Dolly Standish can utter.
They sit out the lancers, perforce. Jane dances the next
dance, a galop, with the Colonel, and just as it is finished, Raw-
don Crosbie makes his appearance.
He walks bravely up, before his mother, Emma the
bled world of Chalkshire to Jane.
SOCIETY IN FULL DRESS. 371 .
" Number five is mine, Mrs. Theobald ; I have come exactly
in time for it, I think."
Well, Reader, Jane's pride is smarting sore ; how could it do
otherwise, after the misadventure of the lancers 1 Here, in this
Lidlington ball-room she is in the thick of her foes in the heat
of the battle. Mrs. Crosbie, Emma, Major Hervey confront
her, at this very moment, face to face, and yet yet she can
show generosity ! Shall we put it otherwise descend off moral
stilts, as she would say herself) At every instant she looks for
Theobald's coming, with hope that is fast becoming passionate
looks forward to the victory she means to win to-night over
Lady Rose ; and uneasy conscience, inherent selfish instinct of
" doing as we would be done by f call it by a grand name or
a paltry one bids her act with magnanimity even to Emma
Marsland.
" Number five is yours, or any other number you like. See, 1 '
showing him her card ; "I have left plenty of blanks in my
programme. But, Rawdon, my dear boy," this in a whisper,
" I don't think you have any business to dance with me yet.
I've been thinking over a good many things since I saw you
this afternoon, and I am not going to call myself your Mend,
and help you to make a fool of yourself any longer. You must
go and ask Miss Marsland for number five."
And she is obdurate, accepts Captain Brabazon, who comes
up just at this moment to engage her for the waltz. Rawdon
Crosbie has no choice but to obey.
Emma, with a rather empty card, is sitting beside Mrs. Cros-
bie, the venerable Adonis fluttering in attendance, at the farther
end of the ball-room. The poor little girl's heart begins to
thump violently as she sees her lover can any quarrel, any
estrangement, prevent Emma from regarding Rawdon as her
lover 1 approach.
" Oh, mamma, here is Rawdon, after all ! How nice he. looks !
I never think anyone looks like Rawdon in a ball-room^ Oh,
U2
woria, who never swerve asi
once laid down. Shifty, bro,
whole motley scene of our exis
perplexing problem, may, now
bone as occasion demands
theories do not at any time co,
theampler plan of discarding
Mm. Croabie's theoiies.
"Young women, whose sister
uncles play trombones in orche,
aoeB not wait, "
Mrs. Crosbie enunciated this
P to it since-with the slightes
was uncertain as to Ladyfi^
w. She is by no means a woi
^^^Eawdonwellmarr
^ie's heart, and many ate
We of, has she shed over the
ment B ^ot one sting of 8a
Pain. A woman of colder feelinc
prehension, must inevitably hav
whether she, herself, were not tob
adventure in Spa, she h*A u^...
SOCIETY IN FULL DRESS. 3-/3
and seriously taken up Mrs. Theobald's acquaintance, a recon-
struction of one's moral code might have been forced upon one.
. . - But that is past. And everyone in the neighbourhood
says that Mrs. Crosbie's conduct has been beautiful, taking poor
Emma's part so entirely, although we know what a mothers
heart must prompt ! And if Kawdon is to lose the one great
matrimonial chance of his life, is it not better our dear Alfred
should profit by the misfortune than another? And whatever
chastening Providence may see fit to assign us, if we know that
we have met it in a right spirit, know that we have acted as is
usual for persons in a refined class of life to act, can we not at
least bear our sufferings with conscience undisturbed ?
" Certainly, give Rawdon a dance, my dear Emmy. A family
dissension should never be allowed to show itself before the
world. You agree with me, Alfred V touching Major Hervey's
arm with her fan. " It is wiser and better on every account
that Emma should be seen to dance with Rawdon as usual T
Adonis, raising his eye-lids by about a hair-breadth, gives an
"urn" and an "aw," and a glance of tender reproach, that he
feels must be irresistible, at the heiress. But Emma's heart is
in her mouth. She hears, sees Rawdon only ; and the glance
is lost upon her.
" You are late, Rawdon. We half thought you might have
returned to town. Your father told us he did not observe you
when he left the course."
Mrs. Crosbie's tone is in nowise different to whfit it would be
if they had parted amicably at luncheon ; she extends her hand
courteously to her son. Poor Mrs. Crosbie ! She loves the lad,
I repeat, with such faculty of loving as Heaven has bestowed
upon her, and the moment, doubt it not, is bitter to her. But
nature has compensations for us all. Is not Chalkshire society
looking on ? Must not Chalkshire society be saying how ad-
mirably collected, how Christian, how well-bred is Mrs. Crosbie's
demeanour 1 Considerations like these lend a sweetness and a
dignity to every hard but well-performed duty of human life.
r
374 OUGHT WE TO VISIT HER f
* Well, yes, I am rather late," says Rawdon, whose face is
burning under his sense of guilt, or of shyness, or both. " The
flyman's fault . . had to take the Pippins first . . . obliged
to drive slow because Mrs. Pippin was afraid of the corners. I
I hope, Emmy" standing upright as a ramrod while he pre-
fers the request "that you have a dance you can spare me V 9
Hardly knowing what she does, and without answering a
word, Emma jumps up. Another minute, and Bawdon's arm is
round her waist, and they are whirling away amidst the crowd
of valtzers, while Major Hervey is left to pull down his whis-
kers, elevate his eyebrows, and otherwise maintain his small
dignity, as best he can, at Mrs. Crosbie's side.
Rawdon waltzes on and on, as though he never would leave
off. He knows that leaving off means conversation ; and in
their present agitating position, conversation with Emma Mars-
land is not a thing to be encountered lightly. Emma, however,
at the best of times not a Taglioni, is ere long physically unable
to endure this strain upon her powers. " I can't go a step fur-
ther, Eawdon ! I'm as giddy . # oh, do stop/ 1
And when' they stop she is forced, if she would keep herself
from falling, to cling to his arm with a vigour that puts senti-
mental embarrassments out of the question. Oh, in spite of
giddiness, how blissful this waltz with Rawdon is ! What a
different feeling one has, somehow, towards a lover of two-and-
twenty and a lover of fifty-three ! Oh, if Mrs. Theobald would
but die, or l#ave the country, or anything, how nice it would be
to forgive Rawdon, and wear one's wedding-dress for the right
bridegroom after all !
" There are a good many people here to-night," says Rawdon,
looking straight before him into his partner's face, as he makes
this brilliant remark
"Yes, a good many. Seventeen more than last year, Mrs.
Pippin says."
" I half thought I might have seen you at the races to-day,
Emmaf
SOCIETY IN FULL DRESS. 375
"I should like to have gone. Mrs. Coventry Brown offered
to take me, but mamma and Major Hervey said I should find
the sun too hot, and I didn't want to get my face blistered for
this evening."
" It's it's very pleasant for you and me to be dancing to-
gether again, Emmy V
No answer.
" Emmy, forgive me for what I am going to say. I have no
right to interfere, but I can't help it. Don't make another mis-
take, my dear. I am sufficiently your brother, am I not, to
entitle me to say that) Don't make another mistake."
" Mistake !" falters Emma, her fingers closing tighter on
Rawdon's arm. " Do you mean *
"I mean," answers Rawdon he whispers, but every word
falls clear and distinct on Emma's heart " I mean, after very
rightly discarding a young fool who was not worthy of you,
Emma, don't take an old one who may be less worthy still. That
is all. Now, let us have another turn. You are not angry with
me for what I have said V
Angry ! Why, what she longs for is that he would say more,
that he would take back his forfeited right to guide, control
every action of her life ! Emma has, however, been too tho-
roughly trained in all little conventional feminine falsities to
give outward sign of relenting. Rawdon has sinned. It is Raw-
don's place, Rawdon's duty, to plead for pardon. But oh ! how
freely the pardon would be granted should he plead for it !
And the waltz goes on, and he pleads for nothing, not even
for another dance. The waltz ends, and they walk about the
room together, chatting and laughing almost as in old days-
(So much so, indeed, that the world /infers Rawdon Crosbie is
coming to his senses ; was it likely Mrs. Crosbie's son would
throw away thirty thousand pounds in earnest?) Then Raw-
don takes Emma back to her place and to Major Hervey,
stands dutifully attentive to his mother for about the space of
two minutes ; finally bows himself away with as good a grace
376 OUGHT WE TO VISIT HER*
as he can command, and goes at once in search of Mrs. Theo-
bald.
He finds her in the refreshment-room with Captain Brabant*
a little circle of attendant red-coats flattering aroandL
u I hare kept the next dance for yon, Mr. Crosbie,' cries Jane,
when Bawdon draws near. " Don't break my heart by telling
me yon are engaged f or it T
"I am engaged for nothing,** says Bawdon, displaying his
empty card. ** Number fire was promised me by some one. and
I was thrown orer. It s my fate to be thrown over, Mrs. Theo-
bald.*
~ Poor, interesting, blighted being! Wefl, yon shazrt be thrown
orer any more at least, not for number six. And is s a quad-
rille, too a dance involving rit-dHrtiL That makes it all the
more flattering that I remembered to keep it for yon.*
Bat Jane has not the slightest intention, really, of dancing
number six with anybody- When Captain Brabaam has gone
away to dance his dory-dance of the evening with Lady Laurie,
she teCs Bawdon the story of die lancers : quietly, bat wish a
certain tremble about the hps that he has fearni to interpret ;
and adds that she has no wish just now to brave any more
square dances. Under different circumstances, towards ske end
of the evening, perhaps, with some very distinguished and im-
posing partner, she may be tempted to try her &se again. At
present she prefers returning to the ball-room if BawdA will
be so good as to tab her there imi leekm^ on. Ths 2$ the
Snt time,, he must recolkcs, that she has ever ceen in a fu3-
l tadks and gentlemen, UzeiTasated
i not got everything to see as?! jear-L 1
ay leturnta the hallux m, ami Janes *fcc*==c*u;'
ger waaehfglnean of the ocvrvay.
is thu stk of a new antcval iar teE-siit face
She answers *Y T ami *V kaj-
^Bawdansmys,
at ccociige s be faipertcneci, I
SOCIETY IN FULL DRESS. 377
should ask who it is V he remarks at last. " He who runs may
read that Mrs. Theobald is expecting some one."
"I should think Mrs. Theobald was expecting some one,"
answers Jane readily. " You don't suppose I would come to a
provincial ball to dance with commoners all night 9 I am ex-
pecting his Grace the Duke of Malta ever^ minute."
" The Duke of Malta !" cries Eawdon, not without a spice of
malice. " Why, they all left for the Isle of Wight ages ago.
You may look incredulous, Mrs. Theobald, but it's a fact the
last important and authentic Chalkshire news. Some one told
me of it just as I was coming away from the hotel. Lady Eose
and her whole party left Beaudesert for the Isle of Wight this
evening."
The colour dies on Jane's cheek. " I don't understand you
I don't understand what you mean by 'her whole party,'" she
is beginning ; but even while the words are upon her lips a
reassuring sight cuts her short, the sight of the Duke of Malta's
rosy face, rendered doubly rosy by his white tie and waistcoat
(and the fact of having dined), just within the doorway.
" So much for the last important and authentic Chalkshire
news, Mr. Crosbie ! Lady Eose and her party are not in the
Isle of Wight, you see, after alL"
" The Duke of Malta is not," says Eawdon a little coolly.
" We will wait to see about the rest."
" The rest are not far behind, depend upon it." And in her
jealous imagination Jane already pictures the entrance of Lady
Eose, smiling, odiously triumphant, on Mr. Theobald's arm.
But no Lady Eose, no Mr. Theobald, appears. His Grace,
seeing Mrs. Theobald, advances at once, regardless of assiduous
waiters, of bowing stewards, to meet her ; and before lie utters
a word Jane's heart knows the truth.
The Duke of Malta is alone.
CHAPTER XS3UL
~YOC* aVZXT UTTU TB-'
It -- l v^ rccnrrc&ce faraoyof the Be ill wit family to painv
_ t raae-halL ut d a thrill of |Jmwi runs th rough e*erj
. .- breast, old sad ymmg* at k Grace* unexpected *p-
Mamraas glance at their daughters ; daughters glanc*
state of their gloves and flounces, while each rapidly anna
- wn personal chance of securing the Duke for a partner
The D j.-:e takes not the slightest nodee of any human creature
room, save and except her forwboae sake he came here
Jane
'" You have left plenty of blanks for me on your card, I hope,
M rs* TL e obald f The Duke of Malta's utterance is well, is not
clearer than when we saw him last : has he not dined mean-
while ? ** Never for rive you if you haven't kept me lots of dances.
Got all sorts of penitential messages- for you a note somewhere
oh no. I bade them send the note round to Theobalds. He's
off. you know V
*'OfT!'" repeats Jane. "What are you talking about ? Who's
off?"
" Why. Theobald, of course. Don't faint. Rose carried him
away whether he liked it or not. Plucky little woman, my sister
Rose, when she sets her mind on a thing. And there was Loo
and Desmond they wanted me to go, too, or they were civil
enough to say so ; but I wouldn't have spoilt the pleasant little
party for the world. Besides/ 7 adds the Duke, with as much
tender expression as his very husky voice can compass, " I prefer
being here, Mrs. Theobald."
" You show your taste," says Jane, in a curious, cool sort of
manner with curiously untrembling lips.
"They have gone down to Barty my brother Barty, you
know. I suppose Mr. Theobald told you."
" Mr. Theobald told me nothing "
J
" YOUR SWEET LITTLE YES.* 379
" Barty is at Cowes with his yacht, and they have gone to join
him there -for the present? adds his Grace, in a tone of after-din-
ner playfulness. " I expect to hear they are all off to the Medi-
terranean, or Norway, or somewhere, in a day or two. Fine thing
for the Chalkshire papers, won't it be? 'Grand Sensational
Elopement in High Life ! More than one Respectable Family
plunged into Grief !' Depend upon it, we shall see the whole
story in the ' Lidlington Looker-on,' to-morrow morning. Capi-
tal joke eh T
" A most capital joke," says Jane.
Eawdon Crosbie has retired into the back-ground, and she
stands with the Duke of Malta, alone stands, it is not too much
to say, the observed of every pair of eyes in this Lidlington' ball-
room. His Grace, after a minute, takes her programme in his
hand, and begins scrawling his noble name down for the follow-
ing waltz, and for every other vacant dance he can find ; and
Jane, smiling, looks over it with him, and remarks, u He can
have as many as he likes, and welcome."
. . . Jane smiling ! Yes : like one stricken in hot blood,
who as yet shows not his hurt, the poor girl stands, with these
hundred or so of people watching her face, and gives no sign,
outwardly, of her death- wound. No sign, outwardly ; but, in less
time than it has taken me to write, direst resolve, crude and
wavering in her heart till now, has come to maturity.
What is a man's first, natural, "human'* feeling when news
equivalent to this news which Jane has got (or believes herself
to have got) abruptly reaches him 1 The burning desire -so I
am told of vengeance. Well women, though their passions
be as water unto wine compared to those of men, have passions,
and I suspect, in any great crisis, are apt to feel every whit aa
" humanly.'' Only, a woman's weapons are different. No pistol,
no horsewhip for her ; no banishment of the offender from hearth
and home. But she can take, fair and young as this woman is
she can take deadlier vengeance, stilL And Jane has it in
her to take it Make no mistake about her character, because
1
380 OUGHT WE TO VISIT HER1
hitherto you have seen her light and frolicsome, and playing at
life. Jane has it in her to take the black suicidal vengeance of
reprisals. Theobald has deliberately left her for Lady Rose Go-
lightly : such details as the Duke goes on whispering, half true,
half purposely false, respecting the "Grand Sensational Elope-
ment," leave no doubt upon her mind that the betrayal was
premeditated. And Theobald's world the world, oh monstrous
injustice ! that bows and cringes before Lady Rose Golightly
holds itself outraged by her appearance amongst its quadrilles
and lancers, to-night ! How if she should justify that opinion,
from a height, guilty though it be, that they shall envy still % How
if she should pay back Theobald that which she owes him aye,
to the very image and superscription of the payment money %
" Ridiculous sight, a poor devil in a jealous fit I" remarks his
Grace, presently, in one of his plethoric whispers. "Just as I
was finishing dressing, they told me a young gentleman wanted
to see me, Reverend Samuel Smylie. I didn't want to be
bothered with any young gentleman, or Reverend Samuel Smy-
lies either ; however, he wouldn't go away, and so, after a time,
I went down to the drawing-room and spoke to him. The
curate was sitting by Loo's work-table, crying honour, Mrs.
Theobald, I am sure you won't believe, but 'tis true crying till
the tears ran down his nose, and with an open letter in his hand.
Loo, it seems, had written very pretty of her, I think to say,
' Ta, ta, for ever,' and Smylie had rushed over, like a madman,
just in time to find himself too late. I made matters as pleasant
as I could for him, by saying there were extenuating circum-
stances. Desmond and she had been friends for years. She
had jilted fifty other fellows for Desmond just in the same way
things of this kind always happened for the best, if you only
knew it, et cetera. 'I would have given my life for her, your
Grace !' cried the poor f ooL ' I loved that girl, my God ! and
believed in her, and trusted her P His face was the colour of
a lemon ; his hand twitched so that he could scarce hold the
letter as he stood, blubbering, by the table where Loo and he
" YOUR SWEET LITTLE YES. 9 381
used to carry on their spooning. Never saw such a ridiculous
sight in my life !"
"I should think not!" says Jane, laughing aloud ; "and are
not likely to see such a sight again. People like the Reverend
Samuel Smylie should be put under a glass-case. They are too
good for everyday us&"
And then their waltz begins. The Duke of Malta, despite his
weight and stature, waltzes to perfection, waltzes with a verve
I can find no adequate Saxon word that he can scarcely have
acquired, indeed, in Belgravian drawing-rooms. The town band,
inspired by the knowledge that a duke's noble legs are moving
in harmony to their strains, discourse to the utmost of their
ability. And all Chalkshire is looking on ! And Jane's cheeks
yes, though her heart is broken, though she is going to perdi-
tion fast as human creature can go Jane's cheeks show a livelier
scarlet, her young limbs move with feverish, quickened grace.
Portly Chalkshire Lucretias Lucretias safely anchored, half a
century ago, in life's dullest matrimonial moorings raise fans to
their elderly faces rather than witness so demoralizing a sight !
They dance this waltz ; they sit out the next dance, a galop.
Then succeeded lancers.
"You never commit any of these square abominations, I
should hope ?" remarks his Grace. He has found an armchair
for Jane in one of the most conspicuous parts of the ball-room;
he leans over her, holding her bouquet, and looking as devotedly
gallant as a very hot and rather inebriated little man of twelve-
stone-six can look. u You never commit the atrocity of a square
dance !"
"As a rule, never/' answers Jane. "But I don't mind danc-
ing this set of lancers with you. You meant to ask me for it, by
the bye, didn't you?"
" I meant, and I mean,{to ask you for every dance to-night," is,
the Duke's answer. " At all events, I don't mean to ask any one
in the room but you."
*' I should hope not, indeed," says Jane, with a little toss of
tier head ; " I never think of accepting divided attentions!"
.*!
382 OUGHT WE TO VISIT HERt
" And we are to dance the lancers, you say f
" Yes, we are to dance the lancers. But mind you get the best
people in our set ! all the very heaviest Chalkshire swells. "
And, five minutes later, behold Jane in the top set of the
room, the other three ladies consisting of an archdeacon's daugh-
ter, Lady Laurie, and Mrs. Crosbie 1
At all the public county balls it is Mrs. Crosbie's wont to
walk through one square dance, if Sir John Laurie, the member,
be present to ask her. Sir John Laurie is present, and has
asked her to-night ; and their engagement is for this particular
set of lancers. And so irony of fate ! Jane's hand and Mrs.
Crosbie's meet ; they bow, they curtsey, they " visit" each other
at last, under the Duke of Malta's auspices !
Mrs. Crosbie puts a smiling face upon the matter. " A public
ball must always be a public ball, Sir John," she remarks, when,
the lancers over, she makes the circuit of the room, all dignity,
amber satin, and black lace, upon the member's. arm. "The
position was embarrassing, certainly; but in these cases in
these cases," says Mrs. Crosbie, with delightful humility, "I
never take upon myself to assume the initiative. Had dear
Lady Laurie thought it advisable to withdraw from the set, I
should of course have followed her example without hesitation,
and have left the Duke and Mrs. Francis Theobald alone."
" Mrs. Francis Theobald is an uncommonly pretty woman,"
remarks old Sir John.
Quadrille and waltz ; lancers, galop, and quadrille ; much
ear-rending music ; much blood-poisoning carbonic acid ; much
reducing of tulle and tarlatan to rags ; some few light hearts, it
may be, among the crowd ; some tragically heavy ones : thus
the Lidlington race-ball, Jane's last successful appearance before
the Chalkshire public, runs its appointed course.
Under no circumstances of life could Emma Marsland feel
actually tragic, just as she could never, in her lightest moment,
rise to actual farce. But about as intensely, blankly miserable
- YOUR SWEET LITTLE YES? 383
as the Drawing-room Comedy of her existence will admit of,
she does feel to-night She gets a fair number of duty part-
nerspoor Emmy and Adonis is her devoted slave ! Never
for a moment, during the intervals of dancing, are Major Her-
ve/s soft flatteries and wiry whiskers away from the heiress's
ear. And still Emma is miserable. She has been trying sedu-
lously, during the past wretched fortnight, to like Adonis and
to leave off liking Rawdon. Rawdon, so her best friends say,
has behaved with an absence of right principle that makes her
escape a mercy. Rawdon never proposed for herself, but for
her money. He has paraded his shameless admiration for Mrs.
Theobald, and her own humiliation, before the eyes of the whole
county. And Emma, in return, loves him a little better than
ever ! And all that her heart trembles, yearns for, is recon-
ciliation. And Eawdon will not come near her. Rawdon,
lugubrious of face and mien, passes his evening in dancing with
partners like the Browns and Pippins, or in moodily hanging
about such doorways as command a view of the adjoining
sitting-out room. (A room in which, as the night progresses,
Mrs. Theobald and the Duke of Malta chiefly remain : his Grace
talking low and earnestly, getting soberer, evidently, as he
talks Jane listening in silence : not shrinking from the whis-
pers of her companion, as though she loathed them, or from the
glances of any who pass as though they stabbed her ; but with
the strangest look all the time upon her flushed face a kind of
wild, hunted look the like of which I hope you, Reader, may
never be called upon to see on any human face knowing your-
self to be one of the hunters !)
"Our young Rawdon does not seem in very high feather
to-night, Emmy." It has got to be a matter of course,
during the past week, that Major Hervey shall call the
heiress "Emmy/ "Not in such high spirits as when we
came upon him and his friends that night at Wilcocks's. You
remember V
"Is it likely I should forget, Major Hervey %" cries Emma,
' : ^
384 OUGHT WE TO VISIT HER?
who is at last beginning to have doubts concerning the perfect
delicacy and disinterestedness of Major Hervey's conduct.
" But ' women like moths/ you know, Emmy ; women like
moths ever caught by glare ! Yes, begad the same all of
you ; anything with a title I Moths glare-um-er-aw.* (I like,
now and then, to transcribe Major Hervey faithfully.) " His
Grace quite cut Rawdon out best thing that could happen to
him, poor fellow! No real harm in Rawdon deficiency in
brain, perhaps not an uncommon deficiency." In another
minute-and-a-half Major Hervey means to propose, and be
accepted. He can afford to be generously compassionate of
tone towards Emma's discarded lover. " Warned him from the
first most dangerous of all associates demi-monde, and not
demi-monde ! Duke of Malta quite cut him out. Deuced good
thing for everybody except the Duke of Malta/'
Emma turns her head away, impatiently. She has wavered
perpetually, during the past fortnight, in her feelings towards
her elderly adorer ; one day faintly liking, the next faintly dis-
liking him, the next, perhaps, neither liking nor disliking. As
he maunders on now suddenly the revelation comes upon
Emma's heart she knows that he is absolutely obnoxious to
her ! Marry this cynical, dried-up old mummy of a Bond Street
lounger, live his life of eternal pleasureless pleasure, fasten
oneself on, with infinite humiliating pains, to the draggled skirts
of aristocratic London society, and almost, perhaps, in time, be
counted Someone ! Far rather would Emma make her thirty
thousand pounds a free gift to Major Hervey, marry Rawdon
Crosbie on a couple of hundred a year, and travel the world
with him scanty household goods, squalling babies, and all
on a baggage waggon !
So, you see, Emma's heart is in the right place, still.
" Except the Duke of Malta," repeats Adonis, who evidently
thinks he has said a good thing. " For him ... I present his
Grace my felicitations I Emmy, my dear girl, we see this
er too-charming Mrs. Theobald, for whose sake Rawdon
" YOUR SWEET LITTLE YES." 385
has been so ready to quarrel with us all, in her true colouzs
to-night.''
" They are very becoming colours, then," says Emma, a littlo
sharply. " Until to-night I never really knew how handsome
Mrs. Theobald was."
For strange contradiction Emma is disposed not only to
leave off disliking Mrs. Theobald, but almost to become her
champion, now that Mrs. Theobald has left off smiling exclu-
sively on Bawdon Crosbie !
"Well yes," drawls Adonis, raising his eyelids enough to
glance across the room at Jane, who at this moment returns to
the ball-room on the Duke of Malta's arm. " Fine grown young
woman, enough, for those who admire the style. Never discon-
nect' her, myself, from a vision of pink-paper hoops sawdust
ambulating circus shilling admittance. Flaring advertisement
of Miss Aminta Fitz-Somebody, for the astounding backward-
and-f orward trick act You agree with me, my dear Emma ?"
" I think Mrs. Theobald one of the nicest looking women I
ever saw in my life,* says Miss Marsland.
u As you, Emmy, you, are the sweetest, the most generous !
My feelings er." Major Hervey's "urns" and "era" almost
impede his utterance at this tender and thrilling point. " My
feelings, my dear Emma as good a social position as any man
in London and unembarrassed my poor mother, in the natural
course of things, can't last for ever known you, my dearest,
girl, from your infancy to know is to love can endure sus-
pense no longer await your sweet little 'Yes' in breathless
anxiety?"
Major Hervey's cold old eyes have been fixed on the toes oi
his dapper little evening shoes during this impassioned declara-
tion, so he continues in blissful ignorance of the expression of
the heiress's face. Probably, if he saw it, he would continue in
blissful ignorance of what that expression portended. That a
Hervey that he, the pink and flower of all the Herveys could
be rejected by a freckled young woman, with only thirty thouy
25
386 OUGHT WE TO VISIT HER f
sand pounds for her portion, and whose family is not even
alluded to in the pages of the "Landed Gentry" no, it must be
plain language indeed that should bring fact as monstrous as
this home to Alfred Hervey's belief !
" Your agitation is natural, charmingly natural," he whispers,
turning to her with the most loverlike air of appropriation. " I
have been too sudden aw the warmth, the impetuosity of my
feelings! Fault of my character just what Lady Carolina
said to me the other day: 'My dear Major Hervey' Lady
Carolina is one of my oldest, dearest friends ' you are too
ardent, too impulsive/ But I am forgiven by my little Emmy %
Let me have one word, one whispered word, to say that I am
forgiven?"
More unmistakably loverlike grows Major Hervey's manner.
His whiskers tickle his little Emmy's ear ; his withered old lips
are within a couple of inches of her cheek. She looks up ; she
sees Bawdon's eyes, from the other end of the room, watching
her earnestly. And all Emma's resolutions, if indeed they ever
for a moment really wavered, became irrevocably fixed.
" I don't quite see what I can have to forgive, Major Herrey,
but I forgive you all the same. I have had quarrelling enough
of late to last me for the rest of my life."
" Quarrelling ? Never, Emmy, between me and you !"
" No. What could we have to quarrel about % I was think-
ing of Rawdon."
Major Hervey is silent. Has she understood him, or has she
not % Adonis looks doubtfully out of the corners of his eyes at
the thirty thousand pounds I mean at poor Emmy. He raises
his scented handkerchief, with a graceful flourish, to his long
nose "urns," u ahs," clears his throat ; then, in the following
fervent language, brings things to a point :
" We shall live in town, of course miserable if I live any-
where but in town. Nice little house near the parks. All the
best people in London charmed to visit my wife any girl must
command a position as my wife. Out of the season stay about
* YOUR SWEET LITTLE YES." 387
at country houses asked to all the best country houses in Eng-
land My Emma will be glad of the advantages of a town life
when she is married )"
" I I shan't care a bit where I live when I am married," cries
Emma, flaming scarlet, " so long as I marry the right person ;
and unless I do that I'll never marry at all, for no one can say,
I was an old maid of necessity, at least no one who knew about
us here in Chalkshire."
Is the freckled young woman an utter fool? thinks Major
Hervey, his old eyes growing wickeder and wickeder. Must
one say, grossly, "Will you marry me, or will you not?" before
she can sufficiently arouse from her wretched provincial stupe-
faction to answer !
" And am 2" not the right person T he asks, this time throwing
a tenderness impossible even for provincial stupidity to mis-
interpret into his voice.
"No, indeed, you are not/' cries Emma,. promptly. " If you
won't let it pass as a joke, Major Hervey if you insist on mak-
ing me say disagreeable things indeed you are not."
Adonis draws his small person together, as if he had had a
galvanic shock.
" Your manner during the last ten days has been signally at
variance with such a declaration," he remarks
" 1 know it has," interrupts Emma, beginning to fan
herself desperately, and getting hot and confused. " I was so
angry and so miserable after my quarrel with Rawdon ; and of
course I looked up to you almost like I do to mamma ; and you
were always ready to say hard things about Kawdon yes, you
were, Major Hervey and I was wicked enough to be pleased
to hear them ; and now now I think you would have been
much more our friend if you had tried to smooth things over.
If we hadn't all been so hard upon him, everything might have
been set straight that morning he called in Bolton Eow, and he
has never been home for a fortnight ; I'm sure papa looks at
me sometimes as if he hated me, and I've been fond of huT-
252
ever since I was a little girl,* goes on poor Emmy, all without
a vestige of punctuation ; " and whatever Kawdon may feel I
know I can never care for any other man in the world as I do
for him and what's more I never mean to marry any one else.'
To t Li? long outburst Adonis Hervey makes no immediate
reply. Perhaps he has to command the impetuosity of his fad-
ings as a rejected lover ; certainly he has to get his breath after
the stupendous, the inconceivable example of female obstinacy
and ignorance which has been presented to hinu When he
does speak it is in his coldest, acridest voice, with the coldest,
aeridest expression of which the Hervey physiognomy is capable,
"And this is really your determination, my dear Miss Marv
land to wear the willow till you die, for the youth * who loved
and who rode away?*
L * I shall never care for any one but Eawdon Crosbie,* says
Emma. Her round brown eyes are not lovely eyes in them-
selves, but they fill with tears of tenderness and repentance
now, and look lovely. " And I will never many any one else.
Of that I am determined."
Adonis rises to his feet, passes his fingers through his whis-
kers, and looks down with all the contempt his soul is capable
of, at the poor infatuated, idiotic girl who has refused (Great
Heaven 1 and the earth goes on in its appointed course !) to
become the wife of Alfred Hervey !
" Faithful unto death, eh ? Well, I must confess fidelity is
one of the virtues I do not appreciate. Valuable bourgeois
virtue, no doubt ; but um aw never any bourgeois virtues
in the Hervey family."
And, thus saying, leaves her.
He walks superciliously down the ball-room, his opera-hat
under his arm, his own spruce little person bristling with self-
consciousness as usual. He goes forth into the night, gets hold
of the first hack-driver whom five shillings can bribe from his
legitimate fare (even at this moment the Hervey instinct of
money -saving is strong still ; fain would Adonis have the job
I
u GOOD-B YE FOR E VER." 389
done for four-and-sixpence), and drives back to The Hawthorns,
resolved to depart from Chalkshire and from all the infatuated
idiots Chalkshire contains, by the earliest train to-morrow.
During his midnight drive, in this hour of stinging, unlooked-
for disappointment, does it occur to ^fajor Hervey that two
kinds of prizes matrimonial may be drawn by a man for the
comfort and solace of his declining years one of money (in the
drawing of which he has failed) ; the other of a save-all, or
domestic bondslave, such as his own cousin Maria a creature
who, without wages, would cook for you, nurse you, fight the
laundress, and in every other way stand between you and the
depredations of the lower orders ; be content with bachelor
lodgings, never expect to accompany you to dinner parties, and
yet at all times be ready to coach you up in well-invented
dinner-stories relative to the greatness of your joint ancestors \
I say, does the pale ghost of Maria's love, retributive, haunt
Alfred Hervey in this his hour of humiliation and defeat 1
Let us trust so, Eeader. Let us trust that the one hope in
existence even of a Maria Hervey may be realised
CHAPTER XL.
a GOOD-BYE for ever.*
Yet another " sin worth sinning," another dance worth dancing,
is to fall to Kawdon Crosbie's share in this life.
Jane walks up to his side, without the Duke of Malta, and
asks him for it herself -just as he is standing, jealous, miserable,
undecided whether he shall invite the least musical of the Miss
Pippins for the ensuing waltz, or rush away from everybody,
smoke a pipe of despair in the starlight, then return to his
hotel, and have done with ladies and ladies' society for ever.
" Can I have the honour of this waltz, Mr. Crosbie % I see I
may wait for ever if I wait until your highness condescends to
ask me."
39 OUGHT WE 10 VISIT HER t
She looks beautiful, almost startlingly beautiful as she speaks
her lips smiling (Jane knows a good deal about that smiling
art : before the footlights has she not seen ballet-girls practise
it in the face of the most atrocious bodily tortures? here, on the
stage of life with adverse eyes not those of a friendly public
watching her, shall she not show front as brave )) ; the hectic
of her cheeks contrasting vividly with the marble of her round
young neck and arms ; her blue eyes all aglow with feverish
light.
Eawdon looks at her like one who dreams looks at her with
a minglement of feelings that I find it hard to describe in words.
She is nothing to him, and yet, as she stands here at his side,
Smiling into his face, and speaking to him with that voice 01
hers, she is everything. The past, that has been Francis Theo-
bald's, the future, that may be Kawdon does not ask himself
what ! matter nothing. He, he alone in the world possesses
the present moment, and will make the most of it A man
going to execution might surely drink with zest a draught of
rarest wine offered him by some pitying hand upon his road !
She takes his arm ; they stand for a minute or two in silence,
and then the music begins, and they start. If Rawdon live to
be an old man, must not the keen pain, the keenest enjoyment,
of the next five minutes remain no dry mental record, but a
warm and living sensation in his memory % As the waltz pro-
ceeds, he goes again through every scene of their brief friend-
ship. He remembers the first look Jane gave him on the pro-
menade at Spa, the ball and the " Grande Duchesse Waltzes,"
the walk home in the perfumed summer moonlight, their supper
beside the window, the ineffaceable picture of her as she stood,
the half- dead roses in her hair, and smiled good-bye to him in
the early morning on the staircase. He remembers the day of
the Lidlington Flower Show, his jealousy, their walk that for
him might have been in Arcadia among the flowers, and how
they laughed and jested in the level sunlight ! And the hours
alone together in the silent garden of Theobalds, and the night
" GOOD-B YE FOR E VER" 39*
at the Prince of Wales's, and the " sermon by gaslight" on the
pavement of Maddox Street. . .
And now all is over.
Just as unmistakably as a dying man knows that he is dying,
Rawdon Crosbie knows that his ill-starred passion, with all it
has given and all it has taken away, is in its death-agony. He
is drinking the last dregs of the poison-cup, and the poison
tastes like nectar to the last
When the waltz is finished, Jane declares ^erself tired, and
instead of walking about the room on Rawdon's arm, takes
possession of the first vacant chair that comes to hand, Rawdon
placing himself at her side.
They are, as it chances, exactly opposite poor Emmy, who was
partnerless during the last dance, and who is sitting in the same
place where Adonis left her, some quarter of an hour ago.
" Rawdon," cries Jane, apropos of nothing, and turning her ^
eyes full upon the lad's face, "that waltz was our good-bye.
Did you know it ? Not the cut eternal you and I will never
come to a cut, Rawdon but good-bye all the same. Well, when
people go away, they sometimes ask a favour of the friend the
leave, don't they % I want to ask a favour of you."
"Going away!" repeats Rawdon blankly. "And are you
going away, Mrs. Theobald % Are you going to leave Chalk-
shire r
" Yes, I'm going to leave Chalkshire. There was no great love
between us from the beginning ;" Jane has never read Shak-
speare, but she has got a little stock of her own of stage quota-
tions ; " there was no great love between us from the beginning;
and it has pleased God to decrease it on further acquaintance.
Chalkshire air doesn't agree with me, so I'm going" a quiver,
as though some spasm of pain had seized her, contracts her lips
" I'm going to have a change from it. Well, that is not what
I wanted to talk to you abut. If I ask a favour of you, my
dear boy, will you promise beforehand to grant itl You'll
never repent it if you do, Rawdon ; I haven't muci* good left in
392 OUGHT WE TO VISIT HER?
me, I know, but I'm not quite so vile as to want to hurt you.
Will you promise
" Most faithfully," says Rawdon Crosbie, without a second's
hesitation. " You should know that pretty well, I think, with-
out going through the form of asking."
" Go this moment no, not this moment, / want you for a
little while longer but go the moment you leave me to Miss
Marsland, and try once more to set things straight : ask her
once more to forgive you. She will not say 'No* to-night, 111
answer for that."
Rawdon Crosbie turns white to the very lips. " This this
is the last thing I should have expected you to ask me, Mrs.
Theobald."
" No doubt of it," says Jane quietly. " But everything that
is least to be expected is happening to-night. Did you see me
dance my lancers, Mr. Crosbie 1 I was in the same set with
Lady Laurie and a Miss Archdeacon, and your mamma ! And
the set did not melt away like the first one I tried with Dolly
Standish, and the ladies all gave me the tips of their fingers,
and managed not to faint. I have learnt a lesson by that,
Rawdon, my dear. If one would rough-ride the prejudices of
good English society, one must have a Duke of Malta, not a
Dolly Standish, for one's partner."
She laughs rather loudly; Emma Marsland, across the room,
can hear her. But 'tis a laugh from which all the old merri-
ment, all the hearty ring, which once made Jane's laugh so good
a thing to listen to, has fled.
" And so, remembering the lancers, I think we may say that
everything least likely to happen is happening to-night. Raw-
don," after a second or two, " some day or another, a long time
hence it may be, there's just one more thing I should be glad
for you to da But you needn't promise about this do it only
if it seems good to you. Some day or other, then, when you are
a steady old married man, and when you are talking to your
wife about the past, I should like you to say to her that before
" GOOD-BYE FOR EVER. 9 393
I left Chalkshire, I, Jane Theobald, wished her happiness, and
that if I ever gave her pain, I was sorry for it. Do you hear T
" I hear," answers Rawdon, very low, and not once raising
his eyes to Jane's face.
"And, without my making any fine company-speeches, my
dear boy, you must take for granted all the good things I wish
you ! The only happy hours I ever had in Chalkshire were the
hours I spent with you. I shall like, whatever becomes of me,
to look back to them, and to remember how pluckily you used
to stand my friend !" And now she goes on, a little hastily, " I
don't know that there's anything more for us to talk about.
'Good-bye for ever' is a nasty thing to say, Rawdon, so we
won't say it ! We won't think that our ' good-bye for ever ' is
really being spoken at this moment."
" And I shall never feel that it has been spoken at all," says
Rawdon, stoutly. "As long as we both of us live, Mrs. Theobald,
I shall never feel that * good-bye for ever' has been said between
you and me."
" You think so now. The day will come yes, Rawdon, yes
the future is uncertain, impossible to say how any of us may
turn out in the future, but the day will come, depend upon it,
when you'll thank your stars 'good-bye for ever' was said be-
tween you and me ; and then Oh heaven ! whatever we do,
don't let us get lachrymose and sentimental !" With a sort of
start Jane interrupts herself thus (almost within earshot, does
not the Duke of Malta stand watching her ?) : " You'll want all
that kind of sugary material, you know, child, for the grand
reconciliation scene in which you and Miss Marsland are com-
ing on ! It won't be a very hard scene to act, take my word for
it People seldom fail in pleading when they really want to be
pardoned. The question is, how am I, outside in the cold, to
know that the pardon is spoken P
She pauses for a minute, then selects a white moss rose-bud
from the flowers she holds in her hand, and gives it to him."
" Here, take this, Rawdon Ihave excellent eyes, I shall see
1
394 OUGHT' WE TO VISIT HEK f
it wherever I may be in the room and wear it until the moment
your sweetheart says * Yes.' Then I, outside in the cold, must
have my sign and the sign shall be, that you take my flower, my
last gift, alas ! from your button-hole, and, in the agitation of
your feelings, let it drop accidentally, of course at your sweet-
heart's feet You promise Y
Before Rawdon has time to answer, the Duke of Malta ad-
vances to claim her, with such an expression of assured success,
such a flush of triumph upon his vacuous Beaudesert face! Jane
rises, takes his arm with a quick, half -sullen air of submission,
then turns once more to Rawdon Crosbie.
M You promise me ]" she repeats *n * whisper. "I shall feel
well, about the only pleasure anything could give me to-night
when I receive my sign."
And he promises. They are the last words ever spoken be-
tween them. Upon the Duke of Malta's arm Jane passes away
among the crowd of dancers ; and in another minute Rawdon
Crosbie has taken the vacant chair by Emma Marsland's side.
In a poem or a play, men, at all stirring moments of the plot,
express their feelings, I remark, in language artistically ade-
quate to the occasion. In everyday commonplace reality, they
talk everyday commonplace still : plead for their mistress's lost
favour much in the same strain and tone as they would ask her
to pass them the toast at breakfast only that in asking for
toast they would probably stammer rather less, and so approach
a degree or two nearer to eloquence.
" What not dancing, Emmy V This is the observation with
which Rawdon, his heart really torn by conflicting emotions,
begins the scene that he knows must, one way or another,
govern the course of his whole future life.
"No, I'm not dancing this time," says Emma; "I have
danced as much as I wished to dance this evening."
" It's getting awfully hot, don't you think so V
" Yes, but if the windows are open on both sides there is such
a draught. It's better to be too hot than to sit in a draught."
u GOOD-BYE FOR EVER" 395
" Well, perhaps it is. You won't give me another dance to-
night, I suppose, Emma V
" Yes, Rawdon, I will if you wish for one."
" I did not like to ask you sooner; I thought Adonis was sure
to have filled all the vacant places in your programme."
" Poor dear Adonis !" What woman can speak of the man
she has refused without some slight inflection of voice betray-
ing his secret) "Adonis does not dance round dances, you
know."
"And you will dance this galop with me, then ?"
"I shall be very happy."
But neither of them rise, and both keep their eyes fixed
rigidly straight before them, as people do who are conscious
that they are not saying what they would like to say if they
dared and knew how.
"Mrs. Theobald is looking very well to-night," remarks
Emma, breaking the ice at last. " I mean as far as looks go.
I I'm sorry for her, Rawdon." Timidly poor Emma volunteers
this, her first concession. " People are saying that Mr. Theo
bald has gone away and left her, and there's such a wretched
look on her face all the time she is laughing and talking with
the Duke."
" You can hardly expect a woman in her position, alone in a
roomful of people who have shunted and blackballed her, to
look very jolly," answers Rawdon.
" If I had to act the last few weeks over again, I know that
I, for one, would behave very differently towards Mrs. Theo-
bald but it's no use looking back now. The past is past and
done with ! " And Emma gives a melancholy sigh as she thinks
of the lovely wedding-dresses from Miss Fletcher's, the orange-
blossoms, the Honiton veil (tried on in strictest confidence before
one's eight bridesmaids), all locked away, painfully spotless,
drearily intact, in the brand new portmanteaux and travelling-
cases that were to have accompanied Mr. and Mrs. Rawdon
Crosbie upon their wedding-tour.
396 OUGHT WE TO VISIT HER t
" 1* the past done with V exclaims Kawdon. " Emma," and
his voice trembles, " is the past, the time when we loved and
trusted each other so well, gone by for ever between you and
me?"
" Oh, Eawdon oh, don't oh, what would mamma think 1
oh, I know the Pippins are looking!" cries Emma, her heart
swelling with a sudden rapturous hope.
" I have been to blame in every way a fool ! I deserved to
lose yon ; I don't deserve your forgiveness, but I ask it ! Emma,
thinking of yourself, and of your own happiness alone, not of
any suffering your answer might cost me, is it possible you can
say you pardon me % Is it possible there is room for me in your
affection yet %"
And now comes to Eawdon Crosbie the most strangely-blent
moment conceivable of pleasure and of pain. For Emma, such
honest love, such tender womanly forgiveness upon her face as
makes her more than pretty, falters " Yes ;" and Jane, standing
outside in the cold just opposite the lovers, that is to say,
animated and radiant on the Duke of Malta's arm must have
her sign ! He takes the flower, as she bade him, from his
button-hole, and holds it irresolutely.
" How odious I used to be about your bits of flower, your
withered weeds!" :ries Emma, presently, poor Emma, who
feels in her immem* new-born happiness that she can never
blame herself enough for the jealousy through which that hap-
piness was so nearly wrecked !
" I'm wiser now, Eawdon. I ask no impertinent questions
about your white rosebud, although I can form a pretty shrewd
guess who gave it you. Your button-hole was without adorn-
ment, sir, when we danced that miserable dance together at the
beginning of the evening."
" I have danced with Lydia pippin, Augusta Brown with I
don't know how many charming creatures since then," says
Eawdon.
And Emmy seems contented. Just at this moment up cornea
" GOODS YE FOR E VER" 397
Sir John Laurie to ask her for the following quadrille, the last
square dance of the evening. Even in the first rose-flush of
enraptured reconciliation, Emma cannot resist the honour of
dancing with the county member ; and as the good old gentle-
man, spectacles on nose, stands writing his name down on her
programme, Rawdon gets an opportunity, unobserved, forgiving
Jane her sign.
In a crowded ball-room, everybody Argus-eyed, watching
everybody else's affairs, 'tis wonderful how little is known really
of what goes on among the different actors. Rawdon Crosbie
is evidently trying to patch things up, wise young man, with
the heiress, in Major Kerrey's absence. That all the world has
teen observing during the past five minutes. Who should
notice such a trivial action as his raising a morsel of half-
dead flower to his lips, holding it to them with great tenderness,
for a second or two, then his sunburnt, unsentimental face
becoming livid the while laying it gently down on the floor,
just beside the hem of Miss Mainland's ball-dress, and letting it
rest there ? Who, I say, should notice such unimportant non-
sense as all this 1
" I'm sure I didn't want any other partner than you to-night,"
says Emmy, turning to her lover. " But one couldn't refuse Sir
John say, Rawdon, could one % "
" Perfectly impossible, my dear Emma, t ow, the right thing,
I suppose, for me is to solicit the honour of lat old Lady Laurie's
hand, and be your vis-d-vis?"
"I hope you are not beginning. to laugh at one, already,
Rawdon?"
" Do I look in such a very laughing mood, then, Emma?"
And Emma, after glancing at his face, is forced to confess, a
little bitterly, that he does not. Rawdon Crosbie, as I have
before remarked, is no expert in the art of feigning emotion.
When the waltz is over, Mrs. Theobald begins to walk about
on the Duke's arm ; after a time, accidentally or otherwise,
passes close to the lovers as they stand talking to Mrs. Crosbie
398 OUGHT WE TO VISIT HER t
at the upper end of the room. She gives Rawdon a furtive
smile of congratulation that, with all its kindliness, cuts him to
the heart Then, Emma chancing at the moment to raise her
head, the eyes of the two young women meet meet, Emma
Marsland may one day be glad to remember, with a look of
forgiveness and reconciliation at last.
It is considered etiquette at the Lidlington public balls for
^ everybody" to leave together. Lady Laurie orders her car-
riage at two ; Mrs. Coventry Brown, and all minor luminaries,
order theirs at the same hour. After her quadrille with Sir
John, Emma has one blissful round dance with her lover, then
quits the ball-room on his arm ; some bald-headed gentleman,
of Chalkshire repute you may be sure, escorting Mrs. Crosbie
poor Mrs. Crosbie, ready to weep with, maternal joy at the
happy turn events have taken, but dignified and well-bred in
her demeanour towards Providence to the last.
In the vestibule occurs the usual crush of cloaked and
hooded ladies, and of gentlemen tripping themselves up over the
ladies' trains. " Charming ball, was it not % " " Oh charming !
Never saw your daughters look so well" " Good-night, dear
Lady Laurie." "Hope you will not suffer from the heat!"
" Hope you will not suffer from the cold ! " So the Chalkshire
notables, treading on each other's satin toes, and murmuring
platitudes in each other's tired faces, fight their way to the front,
and vanish from the stage of this little drama.
" Mrs. Coventry Brown's carriage."
Forth steps the majestic woman, liker to a purring white cat
than ever,withher swansdown cloak drawn up around her throat;
the two youthful white cats, also in swansdown, following.
" Mrs. Pippin's carriage."
The watchful barn-door mamma, and her brood of elderly
chickens, pass away out of our sight
: " Mrs. Crosbie's carriage."
No ; the name, this time, has been shouted wrong. Mrs.
Crosbie's carriage next but one.
" GOOD-BYE FOR E VERP 399
" Mrs. Francis Theobald's carriage stops the way."
She flutters down the steps, in her white dress and flowers, -at
the Duke of Malta's side ; the light from the lamps outside
shining on her ; flushed, successful as women count success
yet with that same hunted look, of which I have spoken, upon
her face still : a vision several persons among this Chalkshire
assemblage are not likely to forget.
The Duke stands bareheaded, eagerly whispering to her for a
minute or mora after she is seated, heedless it would seem of
the string of county carriages, whose progress Mrs. Francis
Theobald's hack vehicle impedes.
He whispers more and more eagerly ; Jane never answers.
At last " If you expect me to remember anything about it, you
had better write the name down," she remarks, in a cold hard
sort of tone ; Eawdon Crosbie is near enough to hear her words
"I never remembered a promise or an address in my life."
She hands the Duke her ball-programme; he scribbles a word
or two on the back, and gives it to her again, with another
last whisper.
And then the door of the carriage is shut, and Jane drives
away, the Duke of Malta watching her progress, into the dark-
ness of the night.
CHAPTER XLL
ALONG THE RAILROAD TO RUIN.
Away into the darkness ; back, through the hush and sweet-
ness of the August night, home. Hannah, the nursemaid, the
only watcher in the grim old house, Hannah, with nerves already
shaken by rats and creaking boards, stares open-mouthed at the
apparition of Mrs. Theobald's face; ghastly, now that it has
cooled from the flush and excitement of the ball ; the blue eyes
weary, yet with an unnatural glow of fire in their weariness ; the . \
400 OUGHT WE TO VISIT HER t
hair pushed back from the temples ; the lips dry and scarlet ;
the whole expression of the face changed.
Will Mrs. Theobald please to take anything % Yes, Mrs. Theo-
bald will take some brandy-and- water when she gets up-stairs ;
the proportion of brandy not small, Hannah ! And then she
submits to having pins taken out, and flowers unfastened ; sub-
mits to Hannah's talk, and and wants nothing more ! Wants
nothing but to be left alone, within locked doors, the reflection
of her own face in the looking-glass, the sight of Blossy, asleep
and rosy in her cot* for company.
In the fine old days, when rack and thumbscrew were called
in to the aid of orthodox social opinions, the accused, we read,
did, after the first great wrench of nerve and muscle, feel little
more ; man's physical capacity for suffering being, thank Heaven,
less boundless than man's capacity for inflicting it Jane should
have gone through the worst by now, if the same law hold good
in the moral as in the material world, which unfortunately it
does not.
" In the infinite spirit is room,
For the pulse of an infinite pain."
She has been in torture throughout the evening ; was in torture
while she danced, smiled, planned, radiant with " success," the
ruin of all her future years ; is in torture now.
The room she and Theobald occupy is the same best or purple
room to which her sister-in-law led her on the night when she
first tasted respectability : there is the ghostly four-poster in
which Cousin James died ; there are the ghostly watch-pockets
there the two prim dressing-tables. Nothing altered outwardly.
Only the life that then was in its spring laid low by sudden
blight, only an unimportant unit about to be added to the sum
of shipwrecked and abandoned human waifs with which the
world's highways are overstocked !
Is it to be wondered at 1 Jane took her brandy-and- water at
a draught as soon as the servant left her alone, and the result of
the stimulant is no merciful stupor, no kindly impairment of
ALONG THE RAILROAD TO RUIN. 401
reason, but rather a quickened power of gauging her wretched-
ness to its depths. Is this crowning act of her history a thing
in any way to wonder at? She remembers a score of children
who learnt in the same class with her from Adolphe Dido, and
who have most of them ended as she will only with less noise
and glitter. Some innate tendency of ballet-girls, probably,
against which, now that the play of life begins to " work close,"
'twere vain to struggle. One's fate ; as well accept fate bravely;
make no whine over it ! And yet, and yet what love, resur-
gent, what yearning towards all things right and honest, were in
her heart four hours ago ! What loathing, what abhorrence, for
the future to which she tacitly stands committed, are in her
heart now !
Taking her candle, she goes up to Blossy's cot and bends over,
looking at her in a sort of blank despair. The child " features"
Theobald, as the country-people say, and the likeness comes out
strongest when sleep has shut the blue eyes, which are her sole
resemblance to her mother. Theobald's fair hair and com-
plexion, his forehead, his print of chin Theobald's whole face
rises before Jane's sight, with cruel distinctness, as she looks at
the baby-face of his little daughter. And she turns from her
abruptly yes, turns from her with a feeling wellnigh of hatred !
How should I write the word, if I did not know that love and
hatred, under the over -mastering influence of jealousy, are ex-
changeable terms 1
She turns from the child, I say, and for an instant stands
motionless ; then, through a half -open door, walks into a small
adjoining room her husband's dressing-room. It is in disorder
Esther, the housemaid, having taken her day's junketing at
the races just as Mr. Theobald left it after dressing this morn-
ing. Three or four summer cravats, failures, are strewn about
the dressing-table ; the gloves in which he drove over from The
Folly lie on the floor. She stoops, and picks one of these gloves
up, in I know not what passion of tenderness, clasps it tight
tight to her breast for a moment, then flings it from her with a
26
402 OUGHT WE TO VISIT HER ?
gesture of abhorrence ! Melodramatic, highly ; but, coming from
Jane, natural If she were dying, the poor theatrical-nurtured
girl must be theatrical still After this shutting and locking
the door, as though she would lock him away from her thoughts
with the action she comes back to her room, and finishes un-
!%
By now a faintest primrose tinge has begun to penetrate
through the heavy window-curtains. Jane draws one back, and
sees the world already entered upon a new day; sees the chill
light resting on the hoar old elms round Theobalds, and on the
faintly-outlined Chalk-downs, that were a thousand years before
she was, and will be a thousand years after she has sinned and
suffered her little hour and gone to sleep again. What matter
her sorrows or her wrongs in this great system of things wherein
she holds so poor a place 1 Of what account are they or she to
any one ? . . . And then return to her mind the protestations of
life-long devotion, the offers of riches, freedom, " position," which
have been incessantly whispered in her ear throughout the even-
ing. And though she loathes the offers and him who made them
alike ; more than this, though with wisdom prematurely learnt
in the sharpest of all schools she appraises"both protestations
and offers at their exact value ; it seems to her that there can be
no going back now, that what is coming is not only inevitable,
but best.
All times of revolution, in nations, or in a girl's ignorant
heart, are times of lightning speed. Four hours ago, reckoning
time by ordinary computation, Jane was swayed by one fierce
passion, simply : in an access of jealousy, desired swift and sure
and desperate retaliation upon one offender. She has gone
through a whole lifetime since then ; will be avenged, not only
for her bruised and despised love's sake, not on Theobald only
now, but on the world; will throw down the gauntlet, not
merely to this Chalkshire respectability, which has flouted her,
but to all respectability. (An old, ever-new story, Reader :
society revolting against the class; the individual revolting
ALONG THE RAILROAD TO RUIN. 403
against, and bo justifying, society.) How puerile, childish,
seems that scheme she once entertained of returning to the
stage ! What go through the bitter toil, the heat, the cold, of
that hardest slavery, to win the applause of a capricious public,
the paltry earnings of some forty or fifty shillings a week ;
while Theobald, by good luck rid without signal disgrace of his
encumbrance, might return, honourably, to the world that had
found no place for her, the world of Lady Kose Golightly !
Work wants a sound heart. If at any time, while he loved
and was faithful to her, Francis Theobald had happened to ruin
himself utterly, yes, to the wanting of bread, never doubt that
Jane would have gone back to the stage short skirts, hard
work, modest pay, and all and have pirouetted bravely for his
support, yes, and have had him wear fine lavender gloves and
embroidered linen, and smoke the best attainable cigars, out of
her poor superfluities !
That is just the sort of stuff she is made of.
Not now, not now !
She moves across to her dressing-table where lie her soiled
ball-gloves, her faded bouquet, her programme ; she takes up
this last, and looks down through the list of dances each
'Valse d' Amour' or 'Galop Infernal' marking a station of her
ourney along the railroad to ruin ! Then turns over to the
other side, and, in the cold green daylight, reads the words the
Duke wrote there in pencil, as he stood bareheaded, the county
watching, I will not say envying, her " success," beside the door
of her carriage.
Only three or four words : the address of a certain hotel in
Brussels, with his Grace's initials scrawled in monogram under-
neath. But Jane's face turns suddenly ashen as she reads them.
Pain, like pleasure, has its intoxications ; pain, hitherto, has
lifted her, in some measure, above the level of her guilt. The
sight of those few words in the Duke's handwriting, and in her
possession, makes her realise, with a shiver of actual bodily
terror, what all this is that is befalling her.
262
1
t 1 1 W . J ! L ' .r ' ' . "* '
4Q+ OUGHT WE TO VISIT HER t
God, can she escape, may she escape? Help her, if she "be
not already past the reach of help \ She hides the programme
out of sight in lier dressing-table draper as though its secret
could he deciphered by any eyes save her own and going tip
to her bed, not to the side where Blossylies asleep, stands,
Iter ashen face growing more ashen, her cold hands clasped
together rigidly; then falls down on her knees and tries to
pray.
She and Min received what would be counted but a heathen
kind of bringing-up from poor, strong-hearted, weak-headed
[Jncle Dick. When the children were young, however, Unci
Dick's wife did, in her scanty leisure, in her unenlightened
way, teach these heaven-forsaken little theatre rats to go on
their knees and repeat a certain form of words at night. And
Jane has clung to the habit since j no power of Theobald's,
even, being able to shake her from what he has often called
"the one mild hypocrisy" of her character.
Hypocrisy to Jane were a physical impossibility. Had Theo-
bald used the word superstition, he might have been nearer the
mark; for, in truth, the "prayer" which has constituted the
sole nourishment of her spiritual life is one I should blush to
submit to the eyes of educated readers, a formula scarcely to be
ranked higher than the distich of which "Matthew, Mark,
Luke, and John" is the first line. And still it is a prayer ; an
outcry of weakness to strength ; an acknowledgment of some-
thing beyond, above, this visible life of ours and its needs. And
formula, superstition, parrot-like repetition of soulless words
call it by what name one will Jane has never, knowingly, laid
her head on her pillow since she was a child without going
through it.
She goes through it now ; now, for the first time in her exist-
ence, probably, learns what prayer means. For she learns that
her formula means nothing ! She is staring at the sickly
daylight on the opposite wall, and kneeling, with her hands
ioined and lips moving, and her heart dumb. Oh, all you
ALONG THE RAILROAD TO RUIN. 405
who have suffered, do you not know the meaning of that awful
impotence \ her heart dumb !
Well, these things cannot be forced. Prayerless, hopeless,
unrepentant, nothing remains for Jane Theobald but to get into
her bed, and watch the green light turn to gold, then to white ;
presently, to hear the birds sing, and then the whistle of the
gardener's boy, as he passes under her window to his work.
After a time, the servants begin to stir in the house, and Blossy,
waking, flings her soft arms round her mother's neck, and asks,
as she has done every morning since Saturday, "Why Dada
him not here?" and must have her game of romps as usual
And Blossy has her game ; sings nigger melodies at the pitch
of her shrill voice ; dances fantasias on the bed, barefooted,
with night-gown artistically upraised in the morning sunshine ;
Jane forced to listen to her, forced to look at her ! For what
might the servants think so low has she sunk already, Jane,
who, as long as she was honest, cared not a straw for the opinion
of the whole world what might the servants think if she rang
earlier than on another morning to have the child taken away
to the nursery %
By-and-by comes her own getting up and dressing. Her
limbs ache as they never ached after any ball before, her hands
tremble, her throat feels parched ; and still, thanks to yester-
day's scorching on the racecourse, or to the fever of the night,
her cheeks retain their colour. When she comes downstairs
she is able to force her voice, as near as may be, into its
accustomed tone. The servants, if questioned hereafter, will
be ready, doubt not, to affirm that " Missus never looked better
nor in better spirits, and took her breakfast hearty, and seemed
quite cheerful with Miss Blossy." Trustworthy, discriminative
souls ! Is it not upon evidence like this that the history of half
our fireside tragedies is written %
And the morning hours drag slowly by. Blossy's dinner-
time comes, and then, as Jane sits at table attending to the
child, and making what pretence she can of swallowing food
406 OUGHT WE TO VISIT HERt
herself, arrives a servant from The Folly with a note the same
that should have been sent over to her last night from Mr.
Theobald.
" Dear Jane," her lord and master writes, " after what you
said to-day, I conclude you will not mind going to the ball
alone. Lord Barty Beaudesert has asked me to stay with him
for a few days on board his yacht at Cowes. I start to-night
Address to me 'On board the Lais, at Cowes,' if you should
have occasion to write. Impossible to say for certain when I
shall be back.
" Your affectionate husband,
"Francis Theobaxd.
" P.S. If you want money, you will find some in my Russia-
leather case ; the key must be in one of my waistcoat-pockets
in the dressing-room."
Well, the postscript is important ; more important, possibly,
than Mr. Theobald imagined when he wrote it. Not many
human actions, virtuous or criminal, can come to fruition unless
they have cash as a basis ; none, certainly, involving railway
fares and steamboat tickets ; and Jane was brought by current
household expenses to her last sovereign yesterday.
Mr. Theobald's thoughtfulness is opportune.
She goes upstairs to his dressing-room, searches for the key,
happily or unhappily finds it, and gets what money she believes
will suffice to carry her to Brussels eight or ten pounds in gold.
This done, she divests herself of the few trinkets she chances
to have about her, her chain and watch, a brooch of some slen-
der value, her rings (except her wedding-ring ; she will wear
that a little longer yet); then puts on her hat and shawl, and
stands ready to go, richer only by those eight or ten sovereigns
and by her wedding-ring than on the day when she came to
Francis Theobald as a bride.
Now there is one last farewell to be uttered farewell between
ALONG THE RAILROAD TO RUIN. 407
mother and child, between soul and body. Get that wrench
over with as little thinking about it as possible, and quickly.
The train by which she means to go is express, exact to a
second. Not too much time left her, as it is, for walking to the
station.
Blossy is amusing herself alone in the breakfast-room down-
stairs. This room, as I have said, is the cheerfullest one in the
house the room into which Jane has collected together every-
thing in the shape of mirror or ornament Theobalds can boast
It makes a charming little theatre for Bloss, who indeed wants
no other entertainment when she has got an abundance of look-
ing-glass to reflect her own small figure, and represent imagin-
ary audiences as she sings and dances.
Especially contented with the world, and everything in it, is
Miss Theobald at this moment. Auntie Min brought her a
gift of gorgeous cherry-coloured sash and shoulder-knots from
London yesterday, requesting, as she gave it, that the finery
should be enjoyed, not locked away, too fine for use, out of
Blossy's jurisdiction. So over her little holland house-frock
the child, in the seventh heaven of enraptured vanity, disports
her grandeur.
Nor is she quite without company.
The paper of the room is of quaint old-fashioned design, all
white-and-gold arabesque, with impossible palm-trees inter-
mingled, and small green monkeys sitting or clinging by im-
possible tails and hands among the boughs. Well, as Jane
enters in her travelling-dress leaden-eyed, leaden-hearted
Bloss, with infinite grace and vanity of gesture, is just exhibit-
ing her ribbons to the monkeys curtseying to this one, extend-
ing a shoulder-knot to that, holding forth the smart fringed
end of her sash, with disdainful sense of superiority, to another.
She takes no notice whatsoever of her mother's entrance, but
continues, self-absorbed and grave, to bestow her salutations
around. So Jane goes up, and lays her gloved hand upon her
head.
OUGHT WE TO VISIT HER f
- Good-bye. Bfoas/ she s^. in. a rai-ar hoarse took :
iratrftrs held of her **gfr^. kisses TT*T*n*r- lips ncr btwr. bat
buries her face for a ^wiwig giw.-nj she .irtfL^j mass rf sDkea
curia.
- Vfrwi- jzbbons petty azbbons!** cries Efcea. ioroV^:g her
rrffed finerr wick tender ifri y t ^ and freeinc fr-i'w-f with, a
Iz^iL? push, from the Fncwn i pcrnw. *** if* doc pcty zhcGn&. 7
Ayd ^fon back *q her bows and curtseys and i' I'-rTF"" 1 ^
before fr^r frf^wrfa the monkeys.
A ^^^ n*al action *wr t TTjr^r_ shas push. ^*?xa inassErs tne vn-
ugae . wc&all the love is contains, to a child sell Toaazed of its
LUC ZLfW pLiythmg ?
Ens to Janes mined heart a deasfcrssab.
E^m tie gfcTi-l wans- her njt : late zhzlii is Tneobalors will
be better onl * both, as regards this wnrLi and tits neaiT witn-
ties ner tnair with, i^* .
S? txxas wrench, is over the one apocd-bye she bid ta apeak.
scoken, Ami now one ims-i rfii* oDen. dayii^hiL imsa the atichs
of TTipn, and oil with, her journey.
CHAPTER TT.TT.
TA5T A33 LJ0S3 WTTH DHSTUY-
Ja5T3 desthxaSiGii is Dover: from, thence, by nizftfc-mail to
Ostend and then on to BrasseLa after which, point; oar story
is not tardier concerned
3ie boa made no plan in detail ; ihe journey, and on reacn-
ing Dover Tma to ber dismay, tna *n* will nave more than
three hours to wait. The Belgian steamer, so one of the rail-
way porters informs her. does net scars tO. seven casengers
ok allowed on board till half-past sx Where is she tso spend
tseav hours * now friT* tnis hideous interval, or. tnn t witncus tncs
of action or movement to deaiim her pain still tha
FAST AND LOOSE WITH DESTINY. 409
remorse that already, the first stage of her journey scarce over,
burns at her heart t
She knows several of the large Dover hotels, having stopped
there often in better innocent days with Theobald ; but, dread-
ing recognition, will show her face at none of these will sooner
bear her three hours' ordeal, alone, unnoticed, in the ladies'
waiting-room at the station. However, the atmosphere of the
waiting-room makes her faint and sick ; after a time, too, she
begins to think (Jane grown a coward in such matters !) that
the austere-looking woman who guards the water-bottle and
tracts, eyes her with suspicion : and so wanders forth into the
streets, resolved, if walking be possible, to pass the remainder
of the time until she can go on board in the open air.
She finds that it is not possible. Walking wants strength,
and Jane, after ten or twelve minutes' trial, discovers, with
terror, that she has no strength left. At last, seeing a small
but decent inn, not far from the harbour, she enters it, and in
a halting voice asks the tawdrily-dressed landlady, who comes
out to meet her, if she can have a sitting-room to herself for a
couple of hours. She has to wait until the departure of the
Ostend boat at seven.
The woman gives her a hard look the logic of a landlady's
facts disinclining her, doubtless, towards female travellers de-
void of luggage or ostensible masculine protection. " A sitting-
room ? Why, yes ; folks can have a parlour to theirselves, of
course, by paying for it, but *
" I will pay you what you choose to ask me," is Jane's answer,
hurriedly drawing out and opening her purse.
At which the hard look mollifies. Next to masculine protec-
tion, what so respectable as a well-filled purse ! " Ah, the young
lady is going across the water, is she 1 'Tis to be hoped, for her
sake, the night will be fine ; but the sailors don't like the look
of the sky, and the wind is changing fast." Then, after lead-
ing her some steps along a stifling beery passage, mine hostess
shows her guest into a stifling beery parlour, overlooking th
a
410 OUGHT WE TO VISIT HER f
harbour and shipping, and redolent of both, and leaves her
alone.
The furniture of this parlour consists of a rickety horsehair
couch, a table, a couple of chairs, and a shelf holding a few odd
volumes of musty leather-bound books. Its adornments are :
Dover Castle in shell-work, a bunch of grotesquely unnatural
feather tulips, and a mezzotint engraving of H.M. King William
the Fourth ; H.M. curveting on a lambswool charger through a
lambswool forest, with the towers of Windsor, royally defying
every rule of perspective, in the background.
Well, before Jane has been here three minutes, it seems to
her as though this miserable place and its belongings yes, even
to the grouping of the unnatural tulips, the simper on the face
of majesty had been familiar objects for years. With such
ease do we attune ourselves, in certain overstrung states of mind
and body, to each successive accompaniment, or background of
our pain ! Her first hope, when the woman left her alone, was
that she might sleep. No matter how uninviting the couch ;
she would rest her throbbing temples on its pillow, in an atti-
tude, at least, of sleep. And sleep will not come near her.
The very attempt at rest has but quickened the unrest of her
brain. No escape that way. She must face conscience, at last :
must bear whatever torture her own thick-coming, morbidly
vivid thoughts have power to inflict upon her.
They shape themselves, bit by bit, into a retrospect, mocking
her sick heart by its brightness, of all the happiest periods of
her life. Blankly staring at the opposite wall, and at the face
of simpering mezzotint majesty, Jane bethinks her of the child-
ish years when she and Min ran wild about the precincts of
Drury Lane and Covent Garden of her shortlived girlish
dreams of theatrical success of that first day when Theobald
" stood, and fell in love with her/' despite her darned merino
and the shabby roses in her hat, from the half-lit slips of the
Royal!
. . She did not care for him so very much, she remembers,
FAST AND LOOSE WITH DESTINY. 411
in the early days of their courtship ; or so, confident of her power,
she used to tell him. She had seen other men she fancied as
well before. Mr. Theobald, if he liked, might go. Presents ?
oh, she wouldn't take a present from a prince ! Give up the
stage and become a lady 1 With her agreement signed, and her,
dresses ready, and success certain, thanks ! The honour of
Mr. Theobald's preference was great, but she preferred liberty
"to honour : was too young to know her own mind yet : Mr.
Theobald might go. And he went : for two days, during which
the world turned black to her, stayed away ; then, suddenly,
when she was beginning to think he had taken her at her word
and gone for ever, made his appearance at the old corner of
Wellington Street, as she was returning home from rehearsal,
and said : " Jane, my dear, I want your answer to a certain
question there can be only one answer for you to give, you
know Will you throw up your engagement and marry me V f
And there was only one answer for her to give. She threw up
her engagement and married him.
She remembers their most Bohemian wedding-day : Theo-
bald, in a morning suit, smoking his pipe until he reached the
vestry-door ; herself in a bonnet made by her own hands, and
a print-dress ; with only just sufficient witnesses in the gloomy
London church to render the marriage legal. She remembers
their honeymoon (the honeymoon that to Jane's heart never
quite waned) on the Continent.
Summer was in its bloom ; they went to Ems, Frankfort,
Baden-Baden. Oh, the sunshine of those days ! Oh, the nights,
white with stars, when, hands furtively clasped, they used to
wander, listening a little to the music, and much to their
own whispers, among dim-lit Kursaal gardens ! Oh, the out-
of-door dinners and suppers, those two alone wanting no
other guest, save the invisible guest, Love, who sat between
them !
She thinks of their winter in Homburg, of her money troubles
light ones in sooth ; was not Theobald her lover still 1 Then
412 OUGHT WE TO VISIT HER?
of her child's birth ; of Blossy's first imperfect words ; of the
day, at ten months old, when, miracle of a baby, Blossy ran
from her knee alone to Theobald's arms. She remembers . . .
Ah, my (rod, no ! These are not things to think of, unless one
would go mad outright. Think, instead, of later cruel days of
the neglect, the faithlessness, that are the justification of one's
guilt. . . . And thought will not be put in shackles. Thought
turns from the living, miserable present; flies back swift-winged,
to the honeyed years that are dead the years, with all their
sins of omission, undarkened by a solitary cloud of coldness or
estrangement
How she has loved life since her marriage ! Homeless, spend-
thrift, vagrant though they have been, how few thorns have
grown among their roses ! They have lived, openly and avow-
edly, for pleasure only, and have found it, or Jane has : pleasure
in her dress and balls and vanities, pleasure in her child and
husband, pleasure in the mere fact of drawing breath, and of
being young and fair.
And now all is over ; not a wreck of the old joy left ; and
through no fault of hers our souls are kinder to us, sometimes,
than life is through no fault of hers. Inch by inch, foot by
foot, she has been hurried towards this precipice, upon whose
last ledge she stands, wanting, striving to regain her footing,
but borne down ever by fate, stronger than her will.
If society if six, four, two nay, if one kindly human heart
had bidden her Godspeed when she came to Chalkshire : if the
harsh judgments wrongly visited on her had been visited,
righteously, on Lady Rose Golightly ; if but why make one's
weary brain wearier with such " ifs V 1 Does right, does jus-
tice exist in the world at all ] " There's a law for the rich
and a law for the poor : a law for men and a law for women : a
law for the well-born, and a law for those who are not." The
words spoken by Charlotte Theobald yesterday return, abruptly,
to her remembrance, and with them returns the thought of
Charlotte Tlwobold's outstretched hand: "If you want a friend,
FAST AND LOOSE WITH DESTINY. 413
and the time may come sooner than you think, you'll know
where to find one."
In that chill offer was there just a last chance of salvation for
her? Is it possible Heaven, is it possible? that it might be
her means of salvation yet %
She starts up from the couch, and for a minute or two walks
up and down the room; then, her heavy limbs aching after even
this exertion, sinks down again into her former place.
Salvation possible, and at the hands of Francis Theobald's
sisters ! What ! return, a suppliant for their compassion ; tell
the truth (even in such a strait as this no plan involving false-
hood crosses Jane's imagination ; to whatever depth she fall,
the one virtue of truth must remain linked to her thousand
other crimes) ; standing in the Miss Theobalds' starched draw-
ing-roomwith the curious self-torturing instinct of the miser-
able, she puts the whole scene before herself in detail looking
into the Miss Theobalds' starched faces, make her confession.
She had abandoned home, child, husband ; deliberately, and of
her own free will, set out upon the path of dishonour ; then, at
the first stage of her journey, pluck failing her, had come back
repentant, to sue for mercy ! What answer would a woman
receive at the hands of such women, of any women, to such an
appeal % Charlotte Theobald would stand by her little doubt
of that as Jane has seen a policeman stand by some wretch
whom the crowd would roughly handle, but whom it is the
policeman's duty to protect and keep intact for the official tor-
tures of the condemned cell or penitentiary . . . She, Jane
Theobald, would be in a kind of select condemned cell, or pri-
vate family penitentiary, for the rest of her life, were she to give
herself over to the law in the person of Charlotte Theobald. A
woman, not of aristocratic birth, who has made one false step,
half a false step, and acknowledged it, and retrograded, must, as
society at present is framed, be branded with a scarlet or other
letter until her life's end.
Why, to go bravely on, run the whole gauntlet of shame, with
a
414 OUGHT WE TO VISIT HER t
shame's chances (not a few, take them altogether) of final success,
were better wisdom, as far as any prospect of social rehabilita-
tion goes.
She raises her eyes, and Majesty seems to give a smile of be-
nign approval at the sentiment !
After a time re-enters the hostess, suspicious, no doubt, that
the solitary female traveller may be making away with the
chairs and tables. The solitary female traveller rests wearily
in the same place on the couch, her head lying back against the
wall, her face fever-red and haggard. Will she take dinner t
tea? Will she take refreshments tartly this of no kind!
Soda-and-brandy. To be sure. Excellent thing a soda-and-B.
before a sea-voyage, and a Captain's biscuit with it. The last
not ordered by Jane, but suggested, as costing an extra three-
pence, by the hostess. In another minute some nauseous com-
pound in a tumbler, with a plate of villainous-looking fossil
sea-biscuits, are set before her.
Jane had scarcely tasted food since her luncheon on the race-
course yesterday. Excitement has been her meat no very
healthy nutriment, as we know, but all-satisfying while it lasts.
It satisfies her still. She swallows the contents of the tumbler;
in spite of its nauseous taste feels strengthened by it Then,
with a sense that consumption of food in some shape is required
of her, puts one of the fossil biscuits into her pocket, and rings
the bell ; desiring to pay quickly that which she owes for her
entertainment and start.
" Use of sitting-room, a shilling. Brandy-and-soda, a shill-
ing. Biscuits, threepence. Attendance, ditto. Total, two-and-
sixpence."
Jane draws forth her purse to requite this last hospitality her
native land shall offer her. It contains only gold yellow
tempting sovereigns ; won, did she but know it, at The Folly
overnight ! And again the hostess's hard eyes soften humanly.
Attendance is charged threepence ; may be made sixpence if a
FAST AND LOOSE WITH DESTINY. 415
guest has a mind to behave handsome ; and will the lady be
kind enough to wait for a minute or so ? She must just step
inside her own sitting-room behind the bar to get change.
The lady waits standing beside the shelf of leather-bound
volumes I have mentioned. . . . And now occurs to Jane Theo-
bald one of those curious chance revelations, which at seasons,
in places the most unexpected, through agencies the most out-
wardly trivial, do shine in our souls in their hour of direst
necessity. She stands, I say, waitinginert, half-stupefied. Her
body is weak, the brandy, of its kind, was strong. And, as she
stands thus, sees a little marker of red ribbon appearing above
the edges of one of the dingy books.
If the ribbon had been black, Jane had probably never noticed
it. The red strikes her attention mechanically. Mechanically
she takes the book an odd volume of sermons by Bishop Por-
teous from the shelf ; opens it listlessly at the place marked,
and reads, in the big pale type, on the yellow-ribbed paper of a
century ago, this passage :
" And as it sometimes happens that they who have the weak-
est and most distempered frames, by means of an exact regimen
and unshaken perseverance in rule and method, outlive those of
a robuster make and more luxuriant health ; so there are abun-
dant instances, where men of the most perverse dispositions
and most unruly turn of mind, by keeping a steady guard upon
their weak points, and gradually but continually correcting
their defects, going on from strength to strength, and from one
degree of perfection to another, have at length arrived at an
higher pitch of virtue than those for whom nature had done
much, and who would therefore do but little for themselves.
" Let us then never despair."
Common enough words, it may be said ; Sunday utterances
of a place-seeking chaplain, who, in the hope of lawn-sleeves
under George III., wrote on the occasion of George II.'s funeral,
that "earth was not pure enough for the deceased king's abode :
his only place was heaven." Jfo matter. They have done good
416 OUGHT WE TO VISIT HER f
________ ^_
work for once; have delivered to one lost soul the highest
message a man's words can ever convey to his fellows : redemp-
tion for the fallen, strength for the weak, hope fox alL u Let us
then never despair.* 1
Jane walks forth from the inn with limbs that know not their
heaviness ; mine hostess watching her departure with sagely pro-
phetic shakes of the head. A wedding-ring was on the girls
finger truly, but people may come to no good even with that !
She walks down to the quay through rain, now beginning to fall
in heavy showers, and heeds it not. Her brain is on fire, her
whole moral nature in a state of exaltation. Material conditions
of fatigue or wet affect her not.
Arrived, with a string of other foot-passengers, by the side of the
Belgian steamer, she stands for a space, because those about her
stand: when her turn comes, files across the gangway like the rest
-From strength to strength : from perfection to perfection.
Let us then never despair/ The words lift her to a kind of
ec*:acy. She repeats them in her heart again and again, as
though to repeat them were of itself an act of salvation ! And
all the time the vessel is getting up its steam fast the vessel
that is to bear her another stage on her journey to Brussels, and
she makes no effort:: does not suggest itself to her half -de-
lirious thoughts to make an effort to leave it "From strength
to strength : from perfection to perfection.*
- Fetter go down below, mum. hadn't you T says a sailors
rough friendly voice. " You're a-getting wet through up here
on deck/
~ Gxtting !" Why. her chest and shoulders are wet to the
skin already, the sensation, as far as she feels it at alL pleasur-
able* However, she obeys instar.i2y; directed by the same
friendly voice, goes below : then m.vkes her way. guided by the
dicker of a lamp through a half-opened door, into the ladies*
cabin. Ladies are ranged around in berths prepared for sea-
sickness ; the stewardess sits chatting to a rosy-faced young
woman, evidently in her own rank of life, who holds a child in
FAST AND LOOSE WITH DESTINY. 417
her arms. Jane sinks down on the sofa just within the door,
and listens hears rather, to listen denotes an act of voluntary
attention hears what the two women talk about. They talk
dramatically, after the manner of uneducated people, about
what "he" said, and " she" said ; they enter, unreservedly and
aloud, into the details of their own private affairs. At the end
of two or three minutes Jane knows that the younger woman is
returning home to her husband, who owns some sort of hotel or
lodging-house in Ostend, and that her name is Smith. And
she is sensible of a certain remote feeling of comfort from the
knowledge. The woman's voice and face are kindly; some
faintest clue to human kinship seems given in the fact of know-
ing her name. If if this queer sensation of weakness should
get worse, one's head more unsteady, it might be well that there
were some one near some pitying Christian woman (not of the
upper or visitable classes) to hold out a hand of succour in one's
need !
Creak, creak, go the boards, resounding under many feet
overhead ; the wind whistles ; the big drops beat against the
skylight
"We shall have a roughish night of it, I'm afraid, ma'am,"
observes the younger woman, clasping the child she holds tighter
to her breast as she addresses the stewardess.
" Yes, and the tide against us, too," answers the latter, with
the equanimity of a human being to whom an extra rough sea
only means extra seasick ladies and extra fees to oneself. " But i
your little maid's a good sailor, Mrs. S." I
" Well, yes, bless her ! She don't often ail, by sea or by land." r
And putting back her shawl with tender hand, the woman
reveals to Jane's aching sight . . . Blossy. Not the veritable
living Blossy (at this moment, doubtless, asleep and rosy in her
cot), but Blossy notwithstanding. To a mother every little child
is in some measure hers, and brings her, even more vividly than
memory can, into the presence of the one she has left. '
'* A big girl, Mrs. Smith," remarks the stewardess, looking
*7
4i8 OUGHT WE TO VISIT HERt
down critically at the small sleeper. " I doubt but she's too
stout for health T
" Not she," cries the mother quickly. " You should see her
shoulders when she stands as upright! and such a pair of
legs ! and only three years old next Michaelmas. Smith was all
for keeping her home with him. I was called away, to poor
father sudden, ma'am, as you know, and Smith wanted to keep
the child home along of him. But, bless you, I couldn't be
happy and her out of my sight ! A young child like that, as I
say, they're well to-day and sick to-morrow/'
The stewardess shakes her head with the habitual melancholy
of her profession : " You may say that, my dear. ' Well to-day,
and gone to-morrow!' And this summer especial. I never
knew so much sickness as there is among the young children
this summer. n
Jane starts to her feet ; she turns abruptly from the sight of
the sleeping child, and gropes her way out of the cabin. The
words of the sermon spoke to her conscience, as we have seen,
but from without artificially. She kept upon the road to
Brussels still. Every fibre of her nature, bodily and mental, is
smitten by the women's careless talk; smitten through the
instinct which lies at the very root and foundation of all con-
science. One blind, mighty hunger to get back to the child
she has abandoned fills her heart. Blossys kisses. Blossy's
songs and dances, the sweets, the quintessence of her woman's
life what mattered the slights of the world, the censure of nar-
row brains and dull malice, nay. what mattered Theobalds in-
fidelity, while she had these I And she has forsaken these : has
t barrier between herself and all that to her is Lie tor ever-
Jh, fool 1 into what black night of hopehss. loveless
te not about to drill ? ITw/~ ay, for she will turn
a her is society, or the reception that awaits
I have Blossy W done nothing (God
:orf eit the pressure of Blossy s arms,
LORD BARTY AND HIS FRIENDS. 419
Her strength seems to have come back by miracle. She reaches
the deck without an effort All that remains now is, to walk
back on shore and to the station, and take the first train that
will bear her, no matter how short a stage, upon her journey
home.
Home ? No, Jane, not so ; not thus may we play fast and
loose with destiny. She reaches the deck, is conscious of a cer-
tain tremulous movement of the vessel ; and, looking quickly
around through the driving rain, sees a gleam of lights, the out-
line of dark moving objects, on either side. A second longer
look conveys to her the whole truth. The steamer at this very
moment is passing outward through the narrow mouth of Dover
Harbour. Return is impossible !
CHAPTER XLIIL
LORD BARTY AND HIS FRIENDS.
The club-gardens at Cowes. Picturesque groups of yachting
people in after-dinner dress. Mingled exhalations of Havannah
cigars, August flowers, and Cowes mud. Conversation a trifle
more animated, perhaps, than the after-dinner conversation of
the same people would be in London, but abounding in much
the same scintillations of wit and intellect. A foreground
group, with whom we have concern Lord Barty Beaudesert
and the guests who, during the last forty-eight hours, have been
enjoying his hospitality and the charms of each other's society
on board the ' Lais/
It is said, pleasantly, by those who should know them best,
their greatest enemies and their greatest friends, that the race
-f Beaudesert has always consisted, in pretty equal divisions, of
knaves and fools. Of the pair of noble brothers who are the
race's living representatives, Lord Barty Beaudesert is not the
fool ! You need but look into his face to see that. Though,
372
wide-awake look,
J^-tenier-redeems
audesert vacnify.
V T wide awake
" known, and wit
"". Klliaid-room,
"* losing of men's ^
/^tffl Laid Barf
e keeps a yacht-
( ^*thewMi
aples of economy "y
***. "Xohons
LardBartyaddsnoth
*. nosp itebIe
fdblegsed with friends
*!^ e r: and ' itm yb,
TheDnndreaiyfeUow
^*tnd, pro Ved
^Beandesert Not;
LORD BARTY AND HIS FRIENDS. 421
the fortune of a man whom all the gods have conspired
to ruin.
Last night 'twas a roughish night at sea, as we know ; but
weather that might cruelly toss a small mail-steamer in the
Channel is comparatively unfelt in the smooth land-locked
roads off Cowes last night after the boat-race, there was a
dinner, with a little loo, when the ladies left, on board the
* Lais ; ' and Theobald won everything. Young Lord Verreker
fell a victim, naturally. For what end do Lord Verrekers of one-
and-twenty exist at all (on board the 'Lais' especially), unless
it be to fall victims 1 But the same fate befell the veterans ;
the same fate befell Harry Desmond and Lord Barty. No
science, no combination of science, could hold its own against
the aces and kings of Mr. Theobald.
I repeat it, a most unfavourable speculation has this Dun-
dreary fellow Kose is soft about proved to Lord Barty Beaudesert
how unfavourable a one is being discussed between Colonel
Desmond and Lord Barty at this moment ; Loo Childers chat-
ting, with the innocent frankness that proved Mr. Smylie's
undoing, to foolish young Lord Verreker ; Lady Rose and Mr.
Theobald talking in low murmurs, on a rustic seat, a little apart
from the rest
When men and women, in real life, not romance, talk together
in this murmuring fashion, I have ascertained, after much close
practical observation, that, in ninety-nine cases out of a hundred,
the exhaustion of tone is accompanied by a corresponding ex-
haustion of ideas. You watch some whispered colloquy, every
word of which, judging from outward manner, should be fraught
with perilous dramatic interest ; you listen, and hear wire-drawn
monosyllables about the last change in the weather, or the
approaching change in bonnets. The interesting murmuring
pair have long ago, to the best of their ability, " said every-
thing." Lady Rose has by no means reached this fatal climax
in a tender friendship. But Theobald reached it long ago. He
is not, as I have often repeated, a ladies' man. With his wife
422 OUGHT WE TO VISIT HER f
lie is never bored ; but then Jane is not a lady ! Jane, in her
ignorance, her originality, her chamelion-like moods of thought
and temper, is always more or less amusing. Lady Eose is not
amusing in the least, when one has had six or seven days of
Lady Rose Golightly. And Theobald dimly suspects in the
inmost recesses of his soul, a horrible suspicion is beginning to
gain ground that Lady Rose Golightly, at thirty years of age,
is capable of far more constant feelings than was Lady Rose
Beaudesert at twenty-two ; capable, it may be, of that last
resource of worn-out women of the world, a serious passion.
But if he were convinced of this, and convinced that he were to
be the object of the passion, Mr. Theobald, you may be very
sure, would get on board the next steamer that leaves Cowes
for the mainland, and bid Lady Rose Golightly, and every per-
son and thing belonging to her, an eternal good-bye !
The murmurs become more and more languid, and Lady
Rose's cunning wastes itself in vain efforts to instil into them
some kind of galvanic light. Sprightliness, sentiment, veiled
half -reproaches, all fall blankly to the ground. At last, happily,
occurs a diversion. A boy in red-and-blue uniform enters the
gardens not twenty steps away from where Theobald and his
companion are sitting, one of the ominous orange-coloured
envelopes we all of us know too well, in his hand.
"Those terrible little telegraph-boys !" says Lady Rose. "I
have never been able to see one of them without a shudder
since I lost my Coco. Coco was my Maltese, Mr. Theobald.
The most beautiful dog in London, and affectionate ! the only
creature, I do believe, that ever loved me on earth."
" Case of a dear gazelle," responds Mr. Theobald, sensible that
some kind of murmured imbecility is expected of him.
" Case of a dear gazelle, as you say. The poor old love was
sickening when I had to leave town, so I gave strict orders to
Burton to let me know if he got worse. On the second day
after I left I got a telegram. Servants are so cruelly incon-
siderate. It would have been just as well, as I had gone, to
LORD BARTY AND HIS FRIENDS. 423
spare me the last sad scene. Two of the first dog-doctors had
seen Coco, and there was no hope. I rushed up to town that
night just in time to see him alive. He died in my arms."
"Happy Coco !" observes Theobald, knocking the ashes from
the tip of his cigar.
"And from that day to this the sight of a telegraph-boy
makes me get cold. I received another most distressing shock,
I remember, when my poor mother had her last fatal illness.
We were in the Highlands, just in the middle of one of the
pleasantest shooting parties. . . . Really, I think there should
be a law that some other hired person should be sent on first,
to prepare one for the telegraph-boys."
*' Or better still, have some hired person to bear one's dis-
tressing shocks for one," observed Theobald, " like the deputy
mourners at an Irish funeral. ,,
"Ah, if civilisation could only arrive at that !"
Lady Kose sighs and looks pensive. Mr. Theobald leans back
on the rustic seat, speculating, perhaps, as to whether civili-
sation will ever allow of tender friendships being done by
deputy, too. The messenger comes nearer. One of the club-
waiters, to whom he has addressed himself, seems to point
among the group we are watching for the person of whom he is
in search.
" How glad I am we did not give a definite * Yes' to Mrs.
Dulcimer ! " says Lady Rose. Mrs. Dulcimer, a lady of nautical
and other reputation, has asked all Cowes to dance on board
her yacht to-night ; but Lady Rose, mindful of Mr. Theobald's
prejudices, has left the question of going open. If her strength
allowed and if dear Mrs. Dulcimer would take so undecided
an answer she would be charmed. But in this hot weather
Lady Rose is such a terribly poor creature ; not knowing, til],
the eleventh hour, what Lady Rose's strength will allow her
to do! "We should be quite sure of being bored if we
wentr
" Quite sure," Mr. Theobald acquiesces ; mentally deciding
424 OUGHT WE TO VISIT HER?
that they would be tolerably certain of t/tat anywhere, and
under any circumstances.
And the messenger, with the orange envelope in his hand,
approaches nearer.
" Really and truly I believe the telegram is for us," observes
Lady Rose, looking over her shoulder with languid interest.
"No, for Barty. Barty gets mysterious messages from his
horrid jockeys and horse-racing people from morning till night"
But no ; the orange envelope is not for Lord Barty Beaude-
sert Finger to cap, the boy addresses his lordship, and, by a
little nod of his lordship's head, has the rightful object of his
search pointed out to him. Another three seconds another
three seconds, the last, of rose-watered boredom, and tender
friendship, and Lady Rose Golightly and the orange envelope
is in Francis Theobald's hands.
"Martha Smith, 4, Rue de la Cloche, Ostend, to Francis
Theobald, on board the ' Lais,' Cowes :
" Sir, A lady named Jane Theobald lies here in my house
dangerously ilL A letter she has about her bears your address.
Please telegraph instructions, or come without delay."
Theobald starts up to his feet, his face turning to the ghastly
corpse-like hue very blonde-complexioned people do turn when
the current of their blood is set suddenly awry. " No bad news
from home, I hope T asks Lady Rose, in her quiet voice, as she
watches him. With the selfishness of a thoroughly ignoble
passion, it seems to Lady Rose Golightly that any bad news
from home for Mr. Theobald must be good news to her.
He does not reply, does not see, hear her. The thought of
Jane, of her love for him, of the first fond days of their mar-
riage ... all that there is yet of good in the man's nature gains
mastery over him, in this moment's sharpest agony, and holds
him dumb.
" I am really afraid you have had bad news, Mr. Theobald,*
cries Lady Rose. And as she speaks she rises, gracefully agi-
and stands beside him.
LORD BARTY AND HIS FRIENDS. 425
He puts the telegram, without a word of answer or of com-
ment, into her hand.
" Most distressing and so sudden !" Thus sympathises Lady
Rose, not lifting her eyes from the paper. " We must hope,
indeed we must hope, that there may be some mistake or ex-
aggeration. So often exaggeration in cases of illness ! Would
it not be well to telegraph for details T
But, even as she says this, Theobald, unheeding her, questions
the boy about the Portsmouth steamers. Quietly he speaks
death itself could not make Francis Theobald outwardly flurried
but in an odd hoarse voice ; Lady Rose can scarcely recognise
it as Theobald's ; and with no faintest return of colour to his
blanched face.
" The steamer, the last steamer to Portsmouth, has not left
yet, but the gentleman won't have a moment to lose if he wants
to catch it The boats start sharp in these flood-tides. Trains
from Portsmouth ] Well, he doesn't know for certain believes
the last steamer from the island runs to catch the mail up."
" Something dreadful is certainly going on," remarks Loo
Childers, pausing in her flirtation with Lord Verreker. " Don't
you think it might be as human for us to inquire what? Just
look at the colour of Mr. Theobald's face."
Lord Verreker, lifting his hand to the foolish lip where one
day there may be a moustache, lisps, " Ya as to be sure ;
inquire, shall vrel" And the pair rise. But by the time they
reach Lady Rose (Loo prepared with charming platitudes,
adapted to any shade of condolence), Theobald is in the act of
leaving.
No human being, not even the faithful friend, Loo Childers,
will ever know what were the last words spoken between Lady
Golightly and the man who was her lover once. But one trifling
circumstance Miss Childers notes and remembers perhaps may
too accurately remember when the faithful friendship shall have
gone the way of all mortal alliances. Lady Rose's handkerchief.
& d&iL " ; perfumed mane] of 1
g] 1 -fell then;
tiofc i
leaves bet
Kr^ g-yea tarn
more colour in her
expmioii. "Quite a
iiid Colonel Banaid hwe by i
and Lady Rose finds herself in the poatian of
rty. ^&tf so exactly what ore nughi expert!
:.--. Theobald cannot eren he M without
1 Martha Smith to Francis
tin ilk*.' to Lord Yerreker. who i B atons to her the
.Tnbric, ** A I. . iy named Jan? The: r- a! i * and so oa
t ighont the telegram,
:.' . : lindt then a low kind of whistle, accompanied
by a singu aed expression : mi tike p*n of
Lord ! rty & I ?ert
" The question that naturally presents itself to an inqn.::
Blind :- what w^ Mri. Theobald doing at Qstend F Loo
I loldera volunteers the ubser ration.
*Ti*e question that presents itself to my niind is was die
rem irks Lord Barry Beandesert,
'" And to mine, too." growl* Hairy Dtssaiond, with a ferocions
poll of his thick moustache,
"And and to mine !" says the little lordling, thinking it
lts at worldly wisdom to copy the cynicism of his elders*
" Whether she is, or is not at Osiend, ilr. Theobald ha*
flown to join her/" 1 says Lady Rose, carelessly, " 4 Poor man J
the h&*te in which he rushed of to catch the boat was reallj
exemplary/
11 Most exemplary, IVe no doubt, 1 * sneers Lord B&rty, looking
ulkier and suMer.
1
LORD BARTY AND HIS FRIENDS. 427
" And you and I may as well be turning our thoughts towards
Mrs. Dulcimer, Loo ? As the evening is tolerably cool, I sup-
pose we may as well go V
Loo assents, with a little look of command at Lord Verreker,
and the two ladies prepare to start.
" 111 just tell you what I think, Kose," says Lord Barty,
unable to smother his ill-humour any longer. "Mr. Theobald
is an old friend of yours, and I renewed my acquaintance with
him to please you, so I don't want to be unnecessarily severe.
But when a man wins the pot of money Theobald won last
night, and gets a telegram enabling him to bolt with it, all I
can say is, it's a convenient sort of telegram, and a
shuffling dirty trick for a man to play."
Thus Lord Barty Beaudesert his finest feelings ruffled by
even an apparent want of delicacy or honour on the part of an
associate.
" Oh, come, Barty, it never does to look too closely into other
people's domestic concerns," answers Lady Kose, lightly. " I
suppose in all cases of really happy wedlock, husbands and
wives understand each other pretty well."
" I should like to know how much of my money the fellow
has got in his pocket at this moment," growls Lord Barty.
"I should like," says Loo Childers, "to know what Mrs.
Theobald was doing at Ostend I"
" And I," says Lady Kose, with a little well-dissembled yawn,
" should like, if possible, to forget the whole subject ! We have
troubled ourselves about Mr. and Mrs. Theobald's domestic
concerns for at least five consecutive minutes. Come, Loo,"
putting her hand within her friend's arm, " if we really mean
to go to Mrs. Dulcimer's, it is time for us to talk toilettes."
And so the ladies depart Good-bye, Lady Kose : may you
enjoy your ball ! May you enjoy the watches of the night the
watches of many another 'dead unhappy' future night that
shall succeed 1
428 OUGHT WE TO VISIT HER t
CHAPTER XLIV.
THE CLOSING SCENE.
In the room of a foreign hotel my story opened ; in the room
of a foreign lodging-house it comes to an end. A cleanly-fur-
nished little bedroom, with nasturtiums twining round the
window-sill ; an engraving or two from Reubens' pictures on
the walls ; a narrow bed with a girl's face resting, awfully
white and still and shrunken, upon the pillow.
The window is open, and from her bed Jane can see a square
of blue sky, framed round by the glowing orange petals and
emerald leaves of nasturtium. The angelus is sounding from
some neighbouring church or convent. A bunch of flowers upon
the mantelshelf till all the sick-room with their faint sweet
autumu odour.
Jane lies white, still, shrunken, but painless no longer racked
by iierce tortures in limbs or chest, no longer pursued by deli-
rious horrors of the brain. Wha: has been her disease ] What,
i:i three cruel weeks, has brought all that brilliant health and
youth of hers to this \ The little Flemish doctor, here in Os-
tend. calls it by one long Latin name : the grand English phy-
sician, summoned to consultation from Brussels, by another.
It must have originated in great mental excitement ; it must
have ori^nnated in exposure to wet and cold. For. having facts
laid before them, 'tis surprising how your really clever doctors
will rind theories to account for them. The truth would seem
to be that Jane Theobald has had nearly twenty years of life,
and is to have no more *. And. when it comes to this, any tech-
nical difference in Latin names really matters slightly to the
persou most concerned.
Nearly twenty years of life. . . . She lies alone Theobald,
to humour her, having gone or promised to go into the fresh
air and, looking up at the sky and listening to the angelus,
THE CLOSING SCENE, 429.
thinks for awhile over those bygone twenty years. Then, with
the prescience that comes to us with exceeding bodily weak-
ness, conies to us oftenest when prescience is no longer of much
practical use, she looks onward to the future.
Distinctly she can see it : Theobald given back to his own
class in life ; Blossy brought up " as a lady f herself forgotten.
Xo, a thousand times, no ! Never that. Herself remembered
by Theobald as one who loved much, sinned much, died well,
we may say opportunely and whom he forgave, tended,
cherished, with tenderness all beyond her deserts, to the last.
But upon this, her hands go to her face, the hot tears start, and,
with a pang of bitterness unutterable, Jane realises how dear life
is, how closely, eagerly she cliDgs to the hope of life yet !
Blossy is well, in London, with Uncle Dick " perfectly happy
and at home/' Min's last letter said, " and learning already to
play the trombone." It is not because of the child that she
yearns for life ; she yearns for it passionately, despite this
deathly weakness that assails her because of Theobald. The
child can have no second mother ; but Theobald . . . the tears
course each other down her cheeks, her wasted frame quivers !
Even death itself the jealousy of this poor ignorant soul can
transcend.
A hushed step sounds outside ; the door opens, shuts, and
Theobald comes up to her bed; Theobald, pale, haggard, unshorn;
with eyes hollow from much watching ; all his dandyism, all his
Dundrearyism gone.
"What, Jenny tears?" In an instant his arms are round
her ; with such small strength as she possesses she has lifted
herself to his embrace. " So this is the use you make of your
liberty, the first time you have been left alone F
" I know, Theobald, Fm a f 00L The bells set me thinking.
I was jusu just wondering how Blossy is getting on."
" By Min's account Bloss was never happier in her life ; but if
you would like to have her here ? "
" Oh, no ; we are better as we are, alone. I'm glad " after a
Ti
430 OUGHT WE TO VISIT HERt
little tired pause this ; Jane speaks but few words at a time,
and those few faintly "I'm glad you sent the child to Uncle
Dick, poor old fellow 1*
" I thought it was what you would have wished, Jenny. Char-
lotte was very good." Theobald's glass goes to his eye, instinc-
tively, at the mention of his sister Charlotte. "When they
first heard of your illness, Charlotte telegraphed to propose that
she should come and nurse you" (Jane gives a little shudder),
" and that the child should go to Anne. But I settled it differ-
ently. Indeed, I had already written to Uncle Dick to take her/
" Is all that long ago, my dear 1 Have I been long here Y
" You have been here three weeks, Jane ; but we needn't talk
about anything that is past now. The past is done with."
" Very nearly, isn't it % The past ended for me, I think, when
I saw the lights fade away in Dover Harbour. They took me
to the cabin, I remember, and I got faint, and Mrs. Smith held
my hand ; and after that everything seems blank till I woke up
here with you. How good it was of you to come over to me so
quick, Theobald !"
" Oh, Jane, child, don't let us speak about my goodness !" is
Theobald's answer.
And then there is silence.
Since she rallied since the fever left her, rather, there has
been no rallying of strength, Jane will often lie for an hour
together supported by Theobald's arms, neither of them speak-
ing. But to-night she seems more restless. Her cheeks during
the last minute have got the colour in them again that Theobald
dreads. A sort of excitement is in her eyes.
"Raise me a little," she says to him, after a time" raise me
and hold me up, sitting. I want to see how I look in that glass
opposite."
He obeys her with difficulty; how firmly, tenderly, to raise a
thing so wasted is not an easy task ; and she looks at her own
image long and wistfully.
Shrunken though she be from all her fine proportions, her
THE CLOSING SCENE. 431
hair cut short to her head, the carnations of her skin turned to
waxen paleness, a stranger seeing Jane for the first time at this
moment, would say there was a pretty woman, or the wreck of
one. Something sweet, and original, and picturesque, makes
her Jane Theobald still, in spite of all that she has lost.
She looks at herself, then round into Theobald' 1 face, and
laughs. A poor little ghost of a laugh, yet it does him good to
hear it once more to hear a laugh of any kind from Jane's
lips.
" What a hideous scarecrow ! Theobald, I am not human."
He answers, as he answers nine out of ten of her remarks, by
a kiss.
" You wouldn't find it easy to pin rc3es among my beauteous
locks now. I should have to take, like Mrs. Coventry Brown,
to tin-tacks and glue."
"Should have!" Oh, the agony of hearing that conditional
tense from lips we love ! Theobald's heart sinks down again to
zero.
" You don't pay me any compliments. You are not like my
poor little good Samaritan, Mrs. Smith. Mrs. Smith did her
best to cheer me this morning. 'I had a cousin, Mim,"'
though she were dying, Jane must be an actress still : the voice
that speaks is Mrs. Smith's " 4 A cousin, Mim, had the rheu-
matic fever as bad as you, and lived years after, and never got
the use of her limbs, and weak-like in her intellick.' Theo-
bald, if I recover, I hope I shan't be 'weak-like in my in-
tellickr"
" Don't jest, Jane don't jest ; I can't bear to hear it."
He lays her tenderly down upon her pillow, rests hisface by hers,
and soon Jane feels tears that are not her own upon her cheek.
... I have never depicted Francis Theobald in any favour-
able light. I have shown him to be weak, selfish, indolent ; a
gambler ; not too exemplary a husband not up to the mark, it
may be, if judged only by the world's code of honour. Yet
even in this man there must be good. Even Francis Theobald
432 OUGHT WE TO VISIT HER1
cannot, surely, be all scam, all froth, inasmuch as he can love
and suffer yet !
And make no mistake as to his position. Do not think that
Theobald holds Jane to his heart, sorrows over her as a man
without hope, "not knowing." Theobald knows all knows
the whole story of Jane's meditated sin against him, painted, in
colours black as night, by Jane herself. During the wild dayB
and nights of her fever, her delirious ramblings (scarce a sen-
tence of which but contained his name and Lady Rose's) told
him much. With her first return to reason, with the first
coherent words she uttered, he knew all. Truth is strong in her
as love ; looking with her wan eyes into his eyes, both were
poured forth to him together. And his answer was to take
her closer than before to his breast, and forgive her. Not
altogether what a man of stoic principles would have done, thus
placed. But Francis Theobald, we have long known, has no
principles worth speaking of. At all events he forgave her.
And with this crowning weakness of his weak unballasted life
I, for one, am not disposed to quarrel
" Theobald," says she, softly, after awhile. " There's just one
thing I want to talk to you about. I should like to have it out
to-night."
" Not to-night, Jenny ; to-morrow you will be stronger. You
know what the doctors say about your being excited towards
evening."
" I know. * Madame is apt to get excited towards evening,'
say you solemnly. ' Then take the greatest care madame does
not get excited towards evening,' answer the doctors more
solemnly still. However, what I'm going to talk about won't
excite me a bit. Theobald" holding his hand between both
her own, and looking at him, fixedly "I don't want to
diei*
Francis Theobald's glass goes to his eye. "There's deuced
little in this world for any one to want to live for," he remarks,
drearily.
THE CLOSING SCENE. 433
" If I was sure certain that my death wouldn't be for the
best ... But of course it would set you free . . . and then
if ever she gets free, as I dare say people like that can,
and "
" What are yoa talking of, my poor child !" says Theobald, as
Jane falters falters, but holds his hand tighter and tighter
between her own. " 'If ever she gets free ! ' Whom do you
mean by 'she'?"
" I mean Lady Kose," cries Jane with a gasp. " Now that
I've had courage to say it, I shall be better. Theobald, some
day when when all this is over, and when Mr. Golightly is got
rid of, you will marry her ! "
" If Mr. Golightly were got rid of, w says Theobald, speaking
more in his natural voice than he has spoken for days, " and if
Lady Kose had a hundred thousand pounds, and I might marry
her next moment, I would not marry her ! I would rather
break stones on the road than spend my life with Lady Kose."
"And yet "
" Jenny, let us have no more * and yets/ Haven't we agreed
that the past is done with 1 We are to go back to the old vaga-
bond days, Jane, you and L I mean to sell Theobalds : I mean
that Chalkshire, and everything belonging to Chalkshire, shall
be as though they had never been."
For a moment she is silent. Then a light, that makes her
look almost like the Jane Theobald she once was, trembles over
all her worn white face.
" The old vagabond days you and me alone, again ? Theo-
bald, never mind the doctors ! I can't die. I don't think I'm a
coward. As long as I could hold your hand, I'd go anywhere,
in this world or the next. . . That wouldn't be death ! But
not alone. . . Oh, my dear, put your arms round me close.
Love me, and I shall live. Love me, Theobald, me alone in the
whole world, and I shall cheat the doctors yet !"
434 OUGHT WE TO VISIT HER9
And she kept her word, Reader; she lives. The men of
science found another many-syllabled Latin word for the cause
of her miraculous recovery. I think, myself, the four letters
L. 0. V. E. spell it in simple English. Houseless, vagabond,
" unvisited" Jane lives, and is a supremely happy woman at
this hour !