BOOK VIII.
CHAPTER I.
AMIABLE PEOPLE.
It was November. Rose and Julius had returned to London to continue their felicity in a new sphere: they were quite a model couple, and were so happy that several people "of experience" shook their heads sceptically, and exclaimed:—"Ah, well! early times yet, early times!"
What a world of envy in a little phrase!
Meredith Vyner grew morose. His domestic comfort was now utterly destroyed, for his wife was entirely estranged from him; and he was without hope of her ever returning to the former state of hypocritical fondness. Beyond this, Violet would not remain in the house with her step-mother; so that except in his visits to Rose he saw no one that he loved. Blanche was also separated from him: her husband absolutely interdicted all communication between her and her father. This was the result of a violent quarrel on the old subject of his gambling, and of her father's attempt to get her from him.
Cecil's passion for gambling had returned with more than its former force and recklessness. Vyner had discovered it; had suppressed the allowance; lectured Cecil sharply, and endeavoured to persuade Blanche to leave him. A complete rupture was the consequence.
The miserable old man saw his daughter's impending ruin, and saw that he was impotent to save her from it. This, added to his domestic sorrows, made him morose. He was a changed being. He became dirtier and dirtier. He never quoted Horace. The dust collected on his manuscripts like the grains of snuff upon his waistcoat, without any effort on his part to shake them off. Life to him was purposeless, joyless.
Mrs. Vyner was as lively and dissipated as ever. No care sat upon her brow; no sorrow darkened her existence. For some weeks after the scene between her and Maxwell, he ceased to see her; a circumstance which made her husband for a moment rejoice; he believed that a rupture having taken place, his wife would return to him. The hope was not of long duration. She, at first indifferent, became at last uneasy at Maxwell's absence. She loved him, she was accustomed to his presence, she liked the excitement of his love, with its fierce whims, its brutal expressions, and its passionate, unrestrained vehemence. She missed him.
Unable longer to bear his absence, she wrote a long and touching letter, in which real feeling aided her natural adroitness, and gained the victory.
Maxwell was on the point of giving way, when it reached him. Obstinate, violent, and revengeful as he was, he too was so uneasy at being absent from her, that he was glad to have such an excuse for forgiveness. He felt as if he could have stabbed her to the heart; yet he was softened in an instant by her letter.