When he was gone, however, she played a new game with Mr. Marlow. She insisted upon his remaining for the day, but with a fine sense of external proprieties, she informed him that she expected a charming elderly lady of her acquaintance to pass a few days with her, to whom she should particularly like to introduce him.
This was false, be it remarked; but she immediately took measures to make it true. Now, there is in every neighborhood more than one of that class called good creatures. For this office, an abundant store of real or assumed soft stupidity is required; but it is a somewhat difficult part to play, for with this stupidity there must also be a considerable portion of fine tact, to guard the performer against any of those blunders into which good-natured people are continually plunging. Drill and discipline are also necessary, in order to be always on the look out for hints, to appreciate them properly, to comprehend that friends may say one thing and mean another, and to ask no questions of any kind. There were no less than three of these good creatures in this Mrs. Hazleton's immediate neighborhood; and during a few moments' retreat to her own little writing-room, she laid her finger upon her fair temple, and thought them well over. Mrs. Winifred Edgeby was the first who suggested herself to the mind of the fair lady. She had many of the requisites. She dressed well, talked well, and had an air of style and fashion about her; was perfectly innocuous, and skilful in divining the purposes and wishes of a friend or patron; but there was an occasional touch of subacrid humor about her which Mrs. Hazleton did not half like. It gave an impression of seeing too clearly, of perceiving much more than she pretended to perceive.
The second was Mrs. Warmington, a widow, not very rich, and not indeed very refined; gay, talkative, somewhat boisterous, yet full of a sound discretion in never committing herself or a friend. She had also much experience, for she had been twice married, and twice a widow, and thus had had her misfortunes. The third was a Miss Goodenough, the most silent, quiet, stilly person in the world, moving about the house with the step of a cat, and a face of infinite good nature to the whole human race. She was to all appearance the pink of gentleness and weak good nature; but her silence was invaluable.
After some consideration Mrs. Hazleton decided upon the widow, and instantly dispatched a note with her own carriage, begging Mrs. Warmington to come over immediately and spend a few days with her, as a young gentleman had arrived upon a visit, and it would be indecorous to entertain him alone.
Mrs. Warmington understood it all in an instant. She said to her. If, "Ho, ho! a young gentleman come to stay--wanted a duenna! Matrimony in the wind! Heigho! she must be six and thirty--six and thirty from two and fifty leave sixteen points against me, and long odds. Well, well,--I have had my share;" and Mrs. Warmington laughed aloud. However, she would neither keep Mrs. Hazleton's carriage waiting, nor Mrs. Hazleton herself in suspense, for there were various little comforts and conveniences in the good will of that lady which Mrs. Warmington was eager to cultivate. She had, too, a shrewd suspicion that the enmity of Mrs. Hazleton might become a thing to be seriously dreaded; and therefore, whichever side of the question she looked at, she saw reasons for seeking the beautiful widow's good graces. Her maid was called, her clothes packed up, and she entered the carriage and drove away, while in the mean time Mrs. Hazleton had been expatiating to Mr. Marlow upon all the high qualities and points of excellence in her friend Mrs. Warmington. She was too skilful, moreover, to bring her good taste and judgment into question with her young friend, by raising expectations which might be disappointed. She therefore threw in insinuations of a few faults and failings in dear Madam Warmington's manner and demeanor. But then she said she was such a good creature at heart, that although the very fastidious affected to censure, she herself forgot all little blemishes in the inherent excellence of the person.
Moreover, upon the plea of looking at the ground which was the subject of Mr. Marlow's claim, she led him out for a long, pleasant ramble through the park. She took him amongst old hawthorn trees, through groves of chestnuts by the banks of the stream, and along paths where the warm sunshine played through the brown and yellow leaves above, gilding their companions which had fallen earlier than themselves to the sward below. It was a very lover-like walk indeed--one where nature speaks to the heart, wakening sweet influences, and charming the spirit up from hard and cold indifference. Mrs. Hazleton felt sure that Mr. Marlow would not forget that walk, and she took care to impress it as deeply as possible upon his memory. Nor did she want any of the means to do so. Her mind was highly cultivated for the age in which she lived, her taste fine, her information extensive. She could discourse of foreign lands, of objects and scenes of deep interest, great beauty, and rich associations,--of courts and cities far away, of music, painting, flowers in other lands, of climates rich in sunshine and of genial warmth; and through the whole she had the art to throw a sort of magic glow from her own mind which brightened all she spoke of.
She was very charming that day, indeed, and Mr. Marlow felt the spell, but he did not fall in love.
Now what was the object of using all these powers upon him? Was Mrs. Hazleton a person very susceptible, or very covetous of the tender passion? Since her return to England she had refused some half-dozen very eligible offers from handsome, agreeable, estimable men, and the world in general had set her down for a person as cold as a stone. It might be so, but there are some stones, which, when you heat them, acquire intense fervor, and retain it longer than any other substance. Every body in the world has his peculiarities, his whims, caprices, crochets if you will. Mrs. Hazleton had gazed over the handsome, the glittering and the gay, with the most perfect indifference. She had listened to professions of love with a tranquil, easy balance power, which weighed to a grain the advantages of matrimony and widowhood, without suffering the dust of passion to give even a shake to the scale. Before the preceding night she had only seen Mr. Marlow once, but the moment she set eyes upon him--the moment she heard his voice, she had said to herself, "If ever I marry again, that is the man." There is no explaining these sympathetic attractions, impulses, or whatever they may be called; but I think, from some observation of human nature, it will be found that in those persons where they are the least frequent, they are the most powerful and persevering when they do exist.
Not long after their first meeting, some intimation occurred of a claim on the part of Mr. Marlow to a portion of the lady's property--that portion that she loved best. The very idea of parting with it at all, of being forced to give it up, was most painful and distressing to her. Yet that made no difference whatever in her feelings towards Mr. Marlow. Communications of various kinds took place between lawyers, and the opposite counsel were as firm as a rock. Mrs. Hazleton thought it very hard, very unjust, very wrong; but that changed not in the least her feelings towards Mr. Marlow. Nay more, with that delicate art of combination in which ladies are formed to excel, she conceived and manipulated with great dexterity a scheme for bringing herself and Mr. Marlow into frequent personal communication, and for causing somebody to suggest to him a marriage with her own beautiful self, as the best mode of settling the disputed claim.
O those fine and delicate threads of intrigue, how frail they are, and how much depends upon every one of them, be it in the warp or the woof of a scheme! We have seen that in this case, one of them gave way under the rough handling of Sir Philip Hastings, and the whole fabric was in imminent danger of running down and becoming nothing but a raveled skein. Mrs. Hazleton was resolved that it should not be so, and now she was busily engaged in the attempt to knot together the broken thread, and to lay all the others straight and in right order again. This was the secret of the whole matter.