During this week Hester observed that Robert Streightley was more silent and dispirited than usual, and that not a day elapsed without his receiving a letter from Mr. Guyon. She felt some curiosity concerning the nature of these communications, for she by no means imputed them to Mr. Guyon's affection for his son-in-law; but she was quite satisfied to wait for its gratification. Mr. Thacker was expected at Middlemeads, and she knew that she should discover much, if not all she wanted to know, from that gentleman; over whom her sagacity, firmness, and coolness of disposition, being qualities which he particularly admired, had secured her considerable and increasing influence. It was finally settled that Mr. Guyon should not visit his daughter at her country residence until the close of the season; an arrangement to which Mrs. Stanbourne's arrival had largely contributed. He was not afraid of her now; he had carried his point, and her influence was no longer to be dreaded; but he disliked her excessively, to an extent which amounted to antipathy; and he would not have encountered a week in a country-house in her society, and exposed to her observation, for any but a very large consideration. A slight to his daughter was a small one, so Mr. Guyon stayed away; and his daughter was decidedly relieved by his absence.
The apprehensions with which Katharine had regarded Mrs. Stanbourne's visit were fully realised. Her true friend discerned the change in the girl, for whom she felt sad and genuine interest; the woman whose life was full of duty steadily done perceived at once that in Katharine's that mainspring was wanting. She had felt apprehensive before; but her fear for Katharine's future grew with every hour of personal observation, with every fresh evidence of her total indifference to her husband which presented itself. She studied Robert Streightley closely, and she found in him much to like, to respect, and to esteem, but still something which puzzled and distressed her. She could not comprehend that a man could bear indifference, hardness, almost disdain, from a woman upon whom he had lavished such proofs of love, with so much submission as Robert endured them from Katharine withal. "If the man had done her a wrong, and she was graciously exercising some forbearance towards him, his manner might be what it is, with some reason and appropriateness; but as things are, I cannot understand it. It is ruinous to her, fostering every evil tendency in her nature, putting her in a false and unnatural position; and it is positively unmanly on his part."
Mrs. Stanbourne meditated a good deal upon these things before she made up her mind to speak to Katharine. "Entre l'arbre et l'écorce ne mets pas le doigt," was a wholesome saying, and she bore it in mind; but "a word in season, how good it is!" had equal wisdom and superior authority; and compassionate affection for the young wife, who was blindly laying waste her own life and another's, who was pursuing the phantoms of pride, vanity, and pleasure, and turning her back on love and duty, carried the day over caution and mere worldly prudence. "I will tell her the truth," said Mrs. Stanbourne to herself. "It may turn her against me, she is so proud, and so violent in her temper; but no matter for that, if my speaking the truth may only do her good, and spare her something in the future. Katharine used to love me once, I sincerely believe; but I doubt whether she loves any one now. What can have come over the girl?"
Among the many valuable qualities possessed by Katharine's one true friend, tact was conspicuous; and she exercised it on the present occasion. She selected her opportunity well, and she employed it with admirable discretion. There was no assumption of superiority, no "lecturing" tone in the grave, kind words which she addressed to Robert Streightley's wife, and in which she appealed to her sense of right, of duty, of delicacy, and of gratitude. Katharine could not deny the truth of any thing she said. She had married Robert Streightley because he was a rich man, and she had given him nothing in return, not only for all the money, but for all the love, which he lavished upon her, that it was in her power to withhold. The interview was a painful one to both parties; especially painful to Katharine, who had to hide from her friend the real motive which had actuated her in her marriage and in her subsequent conduct--a motive in which not only did there not exist the smallest excuse, but which in reality increased her guiltiness towards the man whom she had married. She could not deny the truth; she could not impugn the force of the contrast presented by his conduct, which Mrs. Stanbourne painted to her in all the glowing colours of generosity, devotion, patience, and forbearance. Katharine felt, as she promised, that she never could forget the picture as drawn by her friend; it appealed to all that was best in her nature; it touched her innate nobility of soul. Nor did she forget it: in the time to come she bore it, every hue, every tint, in her memory.
Mrs. Stanbourne was surprised and delighted at the result of her hazardous interposition.
"I will not pretend to feel towards him what I do not feel," said Katharine, in her softest tones, as their conversation drew to a close; "but I will be more considerate of him--I will be less selfish--I will try to make him happier."
"Do so, my dear Katharine," said her faithful friend, "and depend on it, your own happiness will be the result. You have only to do your duty to your husband, and the feelings to which you could not pretend, and ought not to feign, will arise in your heart spontaneously. Try to make him happy, because it is right and you owe it to him, and you will soon find your own happiness centred in him as his is in you."
The elder lady kissed the younger gravely, and left her. Katharine covered her face with her hands, and burst into tears. She very rarely wept; and now, though she thought, "Ah, if she only knew--if she only knew that love is dead for me!" there was refreshment in the transient passion of grief and self-reproach, and a new dawn of better days in the frank resolution with which Katharine determined on the fulfilment of her promise.
Mr. Thacker's promised visit to Middlemeads was duly paid. He seldom allowed himself a holiday; but this visit was an agreeable combination of pleasure and business, in which he thought he might very safely indulge. Besides, to have it known that he was staying with Streightley of Bullion Lane; to have letters addressed to and to date them from "Middlemeads, Bucks;" to do the grand seigneur for a few days, and simultaneously to do a very excellent stroke of business,--all these things were pleasant to Daniel Thacker's soul. He arrived late, only in time to dress for dinner; during which repast he contrived to impress Mrs. Stanbourne, next to whom he was seated, with a holy horror of his appearance, manners, and conversation; for Mr. Thacker had what his sisters were in the habit of calling his "company manners" towards ladies, and which consisted either in repulsive insolence and would-be sarcasm, or rather more repulsive adulation. Something had tended to put Mr. Thacker into great spirits on this particular evening. The dinner had been very good, the wines excellent; there was an air of luxurious refinement all around him, and his immediate proximity to Mrs. Stanbourne was specially grateful. He knew her as a woman of mark even among persons of mark; and "he liked that kind of thing, damme!" as he was accustomed to remark in moments of confidence. It mattered little to him that he received at first merely polite and at last chilling monosyllabic replies to his advances; he saw his way towards concocting a paragraph for the fashionable weekly paper in which his name should be included amongst a list of "swells" as being entertained at Middlemeads; and for what Mrs. Stanbourne really thought of him he cared but little. With the person with whom it was essential to him that he should stand well, he made much greater progress. Before the ladies retired for the night, and while Katharine was playing, he had flung himself on an ottoman where was seated Hester Gould, and had said in the nearest approach to a demi-voix which with his natural nasal intonation he could command----
"Are you an early riser, Miss Gould?"