Chapter Twenty Four.
A Crisis.
“I will take a year out of my life and story.”
One chilly morning, a week or so after these events, Virginia was sitting in the drawing-room, with a heap of patterns in her lap. She was choosing her wedding gown, and as she laid the glistening bits of silk and satin on the table before her, she sighed at the thought that there was no one to help her, no one to take an interest in her choice. Ruth was gone, and Virginia missed her sorely, feeling as if the loneliness, the uncongeniality of her home would be intolerable but for the thought of the release so soon coming. She felt that, though her little efforts in the village had had some reward, within doors she had never felt naturalised, never been able to produce any impression. Her father never showed her nearly as much affection as her uncle did, and she could not know how much this was owing to a sense of his own deficiencies towards her. He was exceedingly irritable, too, and difficult to deal with, discontented wholly with life; while Miss Seyton’s sarcastic tongue always seemed to pierce the weak places in Virginia’s armour, and when she was inclined to be cheerful, her talk implied such alien views of life and duty that she made Virginia wretched.
Dick had been offered some appointment in London, provided that he could pass a decent examination next spring, but his sister could not perceive that he made much preparation for it. She also began to suspect that he and Nettie Lester were more together than was good, and to wish for an opportunity of hinting as much to Cheriton, whom she instinctively felt to be the best depositary of such a vague suspicion.
But Cheriton was much less well again; he had been obliged to give up going to Paris, and the whole family were suffering anxiety on his account, more trying, perhaps, though less openly acknowledged, than that caused by his actual illness. Virginia was not quite the girl to deal successfully with her home troubles. Ruth, who did not care a bit whether she could respect her relations or not, had made herself more agreeable to them; while Virginia was timid and miserable, afraid of being unfilial, and yet perpetually conscious of defects. Of course, if she could have felt that Alvar had really comprehended her troubles, they would have weighed more lightly; but though his tenderness always made her forget them for a time, she never had the sense of taking counsel with him.
Now, as she turned over her patterns, her first thought was which he would prefer, and as her aunt came in and with irresistible feminine attraction began to examine them, Virginia said,—
“I shall wait till Alvar comes, and ask him whether he would like me to have silk or satin.”
“He will tell you that you look enchanting in either. That will be a pretty compliment, and save the trouble of a choice.”
“Oh, no,” said Virginia, “Alvar has a great deal of taste, and he likes some of my dresses much better than others. I wonder if Cherry is better to-day.”
“Probably, as I see his most devoted brother coming up the garden.”
Virginia’s face flushed into ecstasy in a moment. She sprang to the garden-door, scattering her patterns on the floor; while her aunt looked after her, and muttered more softly than usual as she left the room, “Poor little thing!”
Alvar looked very grave as he came towards her, as if he hardly saw the slender figure in its fluttering delicate dress, or noticed the eager eyes and smiling lips; but, as usual, he smiled when he came up the steps, and seemed to put aside his previous thoughts, and to adopt the courteous manner which made Virginia feel herself held at a distance.
For once, she was more full of her own affairs than of his. “Look,” she said, picking up her silks, “do you see these? Which do you like best?”
Alvar twisted the patterns over his fingers as he stood in the window and did not at once answer.
“How is Cherry?” she said. “Is he better to-day?”
“Perhaps—a little,” said Alvar. “But the doctors have seen him again, and they say that he must not stay here—that he must go abroad for all the winter.”
“Do they?” said Virginia; “that looks very serious.”
“Ah yes,” said Alvar a little impatiently, “but my father—they all talk as if it would kill him to go; he will get well away from these bitter winds—and—and the businesses that are too much for him.”
“Yes,” said Virginia slowly, perceiving that Alvar did not quite understand how startling a sound being ordered abroad had to English ears after such an illness as Cheriton’s. “What does he say himself about it?”
“He dreads it very much; but we will go to Seville, and then he must find it pleasant.”
Virginia started; she changed colour, and her heart began to beat very fast.
“Mi querida!” said Alvar, taking her hand. “I feel that I—affront you—I do not know how to ask you to let me go; but how can I send my brother away without me? For his sake I expose myself perhaps to blame from your father—”
“I don’t quite understand,” said Virginia, withdrawing a little, and speaking with unusual clearness. “Did Cherry ask you to go with him?”
“Ah, no. He refused and said it must not be. But he told Jack that he hated the thought of going to Mentone or any such place alone. My father is too unhappy about him to be his companion, and Jack must go to Oxford. So, when I told him how the wish of my heart was to show him my Spanish home, he owned that he should like to see it. The climate will not cure him if he is dull and miserable.”
“Certainly you must go with him,” said Virginia steadily, though she felt half suffocated.
“Ah, mi reyna!” cried Alvar, his brow clearing; “you see my trouble. Without your approval I could not go!”
Virginia turned round and fixed her eyes on Alvar with a look never seen before under their soft fringes. The sharp agony of personal loss and disappointment, the feeling, horrible to the gentle modest girl, that the loss and the disappointment reserved all their sting for her, the outward necessity of the proposal, and the inward knowledge that Alvar wronged her by his feeling, though not by his act, drove her to bay at last. She would have shared in any sacrifice, but she instinctively knew that Alvar was making none. The vague dissatisfactions, the dim misunderstandings, the unacknowledged jealousies of many months, all rushed at once into the light. Her love was too passionate to be patient, and her self-control broke down at last.
“Yes,” she said, “of course you must go with your brother. I see that. I admit it quite. But—Alvar—that’s not all. I have seen for a long time that our engagement was a tie to you—it was a mistake. I don’t blame you—you did not understand—but it is better to end it. I release you—you are free!”
“Señorita!” cried Alvar, flashing up, “I have given no one the right to doubt my honour. You mistake me.”
“No,” said Virginia, “I do not mistake. I know—I know you mean rightly—I ought not to wonder if you don’t—if you don’t—” she broke off faltering and trembling, humiliated by the sense that she had not been able to win him.
But Alvar’s pride had taken fire. “I am at your service,” he said proudly, “since you mistake my request.”
“I will not hold you back one day,” she answered. “Nor do I blame you. Don’t mistake me. You have done all for me that you could; but our ideas are different, and I feel convinced we should only go on making each other unhappy. It is better to part.”
“Since it is your wish to have it so,” said Alvar in a tone of deep offence, but with a curious pang at his heart. “I was your true lover, and I would never have caused you grief. But since I did not satisfy you, I withdraw. I force myself on no lady.”
“Indeed—indeed,” faltered Virginia, “I do not blame you; it is perhaps my fault, that—that we have so often mistaken each other.”
“It is that to you—as to my father I am a stranger,” said Alvar. “I will go—it is as you wish.”
He took up his hat, paused, made her a formal bow, and went out. Virginia sprang after him; but he did not look back. She felt herself cruel, exacting, selfish, and yet she knew that her causes of complaint were just. She had sent him away from her, and she would never see him again. As he passed out of sight, she ran down the steps, whether after him or away from the house, she hardly knew. The trailing overgrown roses caught in her dress and held her back. She turned, and all the desolation of the untrimmed garden and unpainted house seemed to overwhelm her spirit. The wind came up in long, dismal rustles, the sky was grey and cold. As she paused, she saw her aunt’s still graceful figure in its shabby dress cross the lawn, her face with its fair outline and hard, bitter look turned towards her.
“She lost her lover!” thought Virginia, and her own future flashed upon her like a dreadful vision. She turned and fled up to her own room, where every other thought was destroyed by the sense of loss and misery. It was in the middle of the afternoon that she was startled out of her trance of wretchedness by a call in her aunt’s voice, “Virginia, Virginia! Come here, I want you particularly.”
Virginia obeyed passively. She might as well tell her aunt of the morning’s interview then as put it off longer. As she came into the drawing-room, Miss Seyton left it by another door, and she found herself alone with Cheriton Lester.
“Thank you for coming down,” he said, eagerly. “I want to explain; I think there has been a great mistake.”
“No, I think not,” said Virginia, rather faintly.
“But let me tell you. It is all my fault indeed. Alvar must not be punished for my selfishness. You know, I got a fresh cold somehow, and my cough was bad again, so my father was frightened and sent for the doctors, and they ordered me away for the winter. I must not go to London now, they say—”
“Indeed, Cherry, I am very sorry,” faltered Virginia, as the cough stopped him.
“No, but let me tell you. This was a great shock to me. I want to get to work—and then—my poor father! It seemed to knock me down altogether, and foolishly, I let Jack see it, and said that I hated the notion of any of those regular invalid places, and that going there would do me no good. And then Alvar came and asked me if I should not like to see his friends and Seville, and I said, ‘Yes, if I must go anywhere,’ and he tried in his kind way to make the idea seem pleasant to me, and my father caught at it because he thought I might like it. I shall never forgive myself for making such a fuss! But of course to-day—now I am in my right senses—I should not think of such a thing. If Alvar goes with me, even to Seville, and stays for a few weeks, then, if I am better, he can come home, and I shall not mind staying there alone, and at Christmas Jack might come to me, or my father—it can easily be managed. In short, Virginia,” he added, with an attempt at his usual playfulness, “I want you to understand that I made a complete fool of myself yesterday, and that that’s the whole of it.”
“Did Alvar ask you to come and tell me this?”
“No,” said Cheriton, “he was hurt by your misunderstanding him, he does not know I am here. Jack drove me over. But I shall not agree to any other arrangement than what I have told you, unless,” he added slowly, “things should go badly, and then I know you would have patience.”
“Oh, Cherry,” said Virginia, struggling with her tears, “I hope you don’t think me so selfish as to wish to prevent Alvar from going with you. It is not that.”
“But what is it, then? Can you tell me?” said Cherry gently, and sitting down by her side.
“I have no one to ask,” she said; “but you will think me wrong, and yet—”
“I know too well how difficult it is to be right in matters of feeling, if you once begin to analyse them,” said Cherry sadly.
The gentleness of his voice and the kind look of his eyes gave her courage, and she said, very low,—
“I think I should not make Alvar happy, because he does not care for me. Please understand that he has done all he could; he is very kind to me, but he does not care for me.”
“You know, Virginia,” said Cherry eagerly, “Alvar has different ways from ours. Indeed, he is loving—”
“He loves you,” said Virginia quickly; then, blushing scarlet, she added, “oh, Cherry, I think it is beautiful the way he is grateful to you, and thinks so much of you. Please, please, don’t think I would have it otherwise.”
“I have far more cause to be grateful to him.”
“Yes! I like to think that. But Cherry, when you were ill, he didn’t care for me to comfort him, it was no rest to him to come and see me. He never tells me his troubles. It isn’t as Ruth and Rupert love each other. If I say anything, he turns it aside. It will not make him unhappy to give me up.”
“It made him exceedingly angry,” said. Cheriton, too clear-sighted not to acquiesce in the truth of Virginia’s words, though he was unwilling to own as much.
“I don’t think,” said Virginia, “that I should bear that feeling patiently. Things are very miserable any way, but I think Alvar will be happier without me. It has not turned out well.”
She spoke in a low tone of complete depression, evidently uttering convictions that had been long formed, gently and humbly, but with an undercurrent of firmness.
“I will tell Alvar what you say,” he said. “I quite see what you mean, but perhaps he will be able to show you that you have misinterpreted him.”
“No,” said Virginia, with decision, “do not let him try.”
As she spoke, there was a tap at the door, and Jack opened it.
“Cherry,” he said, “it is so late; are you ready?”
“One minute, Jack,” said Cheriton, “I am coming. Virginia,” he added, taking her hands in his with sudden earnestness, “Alvar will love you enough some day. I am sure of it.”
Cheriton hardly knew what put the words into his mouth; but they chimed in Virginia’s heart for many a weary day, lighted up by the bright, brave smile which had accompanied them.