“What’s odd and rude is their leaving us here, without paying us common civility! I’ll stand it no longer!” cried the irascible man; and opening the door, he proceeded along the corridor which led to the hall, followed by his expostulating daughter.
Unfortunately, their course lay past the library; and more unfortunately still, the library door happened to be very slightly ajar.
“Can’t you manage some way of getting rid of these miserable Bardons?” were the words, pronounced in an irritated tone, which struck like a pistol-shot on the ears of the countess’s guests.
It was as though that pistol-shot had exploded a mine of gunpowder! To the earl’s amazement the library door was suddenly flung wide open, and, quivering with irrepressible rage, the fiery old doctor stood before him.
“Manage!” exclaimed Bardon, in a voice of thunder; “there is little management required in dismissing those who, had they known the despicable pride which inhabits here, would never have stooped,—never have stooped,” he repeated, “to degrade themselves by crossing your threshold! You have dared to apply to us the epithet of miserable,” continued Bardon, bringing out the word as with a convulsive effort, and fixing his fierce eye upon the disconcerted peer; “I retort back the opprobrious term! Who is miserable but the miserable slave of pride,—the worshipper of rank, the gilded puppet of society, who claims from his ancestors’ name the importance which attaches to nothing of his own? This is the first time, sir, that I have visited you, and it shall be the last,—the last time that you shall have the opportunity of insulting, under your own roof, a gentleman whose pretensions to respect are, at least, as well grounded as yours, and who would not exchange his independence of spirit for all the pomp and pageantry which can never give dignity to their possessor, nor avert from him merited contempt!” With the last words on his lips, Bardon turned and departed; his loud, tramping step echoing along the hall, before the earl had time to recover his breath.
Annabella, agitated and excited, appeared about to hurry after her guests, but with an imperious gesture Dashleigh prevented his wife from doing so. Bitterly mortified at what had occurred, irritated, wounded, and offended, the countess burst into a flood of passionate tears.
Pride reigned triumphant that day in the Hall. He had worked out his evil will. He had steeped hearts in bitter gall; he had loosened the bond between husband and wife; he had brought envy, hatred, malice, and all uncharitableness, to rush in at the breach which he had insidiously made.
The countess spent the rest of the day in her own apartment. She would not appear at her husband’s table, nor entertain her husband’s guest. She had not learned to bear or to forbear; least of all was she prepared to submit her will to that of her imperious lord. Even when the breach between them appeared to be healed, it left its visible scar behind; the wound was ready to break out afresh, for the soft balm of meekness and love had not been poured upon it, and what else can effectually cure the hurt caused by the envenomed shaft of pride?