Peregrine was Hampshire man enough to know that to terrify only meant to tease, but he was in no mood to justify himself to old Patience, so he galloped off to Portsmouth, and only returned with the doctor to hear that Madam Woodford was in bed, and her daughter with her. She was somewhat better, but still very ill, and it was plain that this was no moment for pressing his suit even had it not been time for him to return home. Going to fetch the doctor might be accepted as a valid reason for missing the evening exhortation and prayer, but there were mistrustful looks that galled him.
Anne’s return was more beneficial to Mrs. Woodford than the doctor’s visit, and the girl was still too ignorant of all that her mother’s attacks of spasms and subsequent weakness implied to be as much alarmed as to depress her hopes. Yet Mrs. Woodford, lying awake in the night, detected that her daughter was restless and unhappy, and asked what ailed her, and how the visit had gone off.
“You do not wish me to speak of such things, madam,” was the answer.
“Tell me all that is in your heart, my child.”
It all came out with the vehemence of a reserved nature when the flood is loosed. ‘Young Madam’ had been more than usually peevish and exacting, jealous perhaps at Lucy’s being the heroine of the day, and fretful over a cold which confined her to the house, how she worried and harassed all around her with her whims, megrims and complaints could only too well be imagined, and how the entire pleasure of the day was destroyed. Lucy was never allowed a minute’s conversation with her friend without being interrupted by a whine and complaints of unkindness and neglect.
Lady Archfield’s ill-usage, as the young wife was pleased to call every kind of restriction, was the favourite theme next to the daughter-in law’s own finery, her ailments, and her notions of the treatment befitting her.
And young Mr. Archfield himself, while handing his old friend out to the carriage that had fetched her, could not help confiding to her that he was nearly beside himself. His mother meant to be kind, but expected too much from one so brought up, and his wife—what could be done for her? She made herself miserable here, and every one else likewise. Yet even if his father would consent, she was utterly unfit to be mistress of a house of her own; and poor Charles could only utter imprecations on the guardians who could have had no idea how a young woman ought to be brought up. It was worse than an ill-trained hound.”
Mrs. Woodford heard what she extracted from her daughter with grief and alarm, and not only for her friends.
“Indeed, my dear child,” she said, “you must prevent such confidences. They are very dangerous things respecting married people.”
“It was all in a few moments, mamma, and I could not stop him. He is so unhappy;” and Anne’s voice revealed tears.