With the freshness of youth and of her naturally happy temper, she was delighted with the whole, to her a perfectly new spectacle, and every body was pleased except Lady Katrine, who, in the midst of every amusement, always found something that annoyed her, something that “should not have been so.” She was upon this occasion more cross than usual, because this morning’s uniform was not becoming to her, and was most particularly so to Miss Stanley, as all the gentlemen observed.
Just in time before the ladies went to dress for the ball at night, the precious box arrived, containing the set of sapphires. Cecilia opened it eagerly, to see that all was right. Helen was not in the room. Lady Katrine stood by, and when she found that these were for Helen, her envious indignation broke forth. “The poor daughters of peers cannot indulge in such things,” cried she; “they are fit only for rich heiresses! I understood,” continued she, “that Miss Stanley had given away her fortune to pay her uncle’s debts, but I presume she has thought better of that, as I always prophesied she would——generosity is charming, but, after all, sapphires are so becoming!”
Helen came into the room just as this speech was ended. Lady Katrine had one of the bracelets in her hand. She looked miserably cross, for she had been disappointed about some ornaments she had expected by the same conveyance that brought Miss Stanley’s. She protested that she had nothing fit to wear to-night. Helen looked at Cecilia; and though Cecilia’s look gave no encouragement, she begged that Lady Katrine would do her the honour to wear these sapphires this night, since she had not received what her ladyship had ordered. Lady Katrine suffered herself to be prevailed on, but accepted with as ill a grace as possible. The ball went on, and Helen at least was happier than if she had worn the bracelets. She had no pleasure in being the object of envy, and now, when she found that Cecilia could be and was satisfied, though their ornaments were not exactly alike, it came full upon her mind that she had done foolishly in bespeaking these sapphires: it was at that moment only a transient self-reproach for extravagance, but before she went to rest this night it became more serious.
Lady Davenant had been expected all day, but she did not arrive till late in the midst of the ball, and she just looked in at the dancers for a few minutes before she retired to her own apartment. Helen would have followed her, but that was not allowed. After the dancing was over, however, as she was going to her room, she heard Lady Davenant’s voice, calling to her as she passed by; and, opening the door softly, she found her still awake, and desiring to see her for a few minutes, if she was not too much tired.
“Oh no, not in the least tired; quite the contrary,” said Helen.
After affectionately embracing her, Lady Davenant held her at arms’ length, and looked at her as the light of the lamp shone full upon her face and figure. Pleased with her whole appearance, Lady Davenant smiled, and said, as she looked at her—“You seem, Helen, to have shared the grateful old fairy’s gift to Lady Georgiana B. of the never-fading rose in the cheek. But what particularly pleases me, Helen, is the perfect simplicity of your dress. In the few minutes that I was in the ball-room to-night, I was struck with that over-dressed duchess: her figure has been before my eyes ever since, hung round with jewellery, and with that auréole a foot and a-half high on her head: like the Russian bride’s headgear, which Heber so well called ‘the most costly deformity he ever beheld.’ Really, this passion for baubles,” continued Lady Davenant, “is the universal passion of our sex. I will give you an instance to what extravagance it goes. I know a lady of high rank, who hires a certain pair of emerald earrings at fifteen hundred pounds per annum. She rents them in this way from some German countess in whose family they are an heir-loom, and cannot be sold.” Helen expressed her astonishment. “This is only one instance, my dear; I could give you hundreds. Over the whole world, women of all ages, all ranks, all conditions, have been seized with this bauble insanity—from the counter to the throne. Think of Marie Antoinette and the story of her necklace; and Josephine and her Cisalpine pearls, and all the falsehoods she told about them to the emperor she reverenced, the husband she loved—and all for what?—a string of beads! But I forget,” cried Lady Davenant, interrupting herself, “I must not forget how late it is: and I am keeping you up, and you have been dancing: forgive me! When once my mind is moved, I forget all hours. Good night—or good morning, my dear child; go, and rest.” But just as Helen was withdrawing her hand, Lady Davenant’s eye fixed on her pearl bracelets—“Roman pearls, or real? Real, I see, and very valuable!—given to you, I suppose, by your poor dear extravagant uncle?”
Helen cleared her uncle’s memory from this imputation, and explained that the bracelets were a present from General Clarendon. She did not know they were so “very valuable,” but she hoped she had not done wrong to accept of them in the circumstances; and she told how she had been induced to take them.
Lady Davenant said she had done quite right. The general was no present-maker, and this exception in his favour could not lead to any future inconvenience. “But Cecilia,” continued she, “is too much addicted to trinket giving, which ends often disagreeably even between friends, or at all events fosters a foolish taste, and moreover associates it with feelings of affection in a way particularly deceitful and dangerous to such a little, tender-hearted person as I am speaking to, whose common sense would too easily give way to the pleasure of pleasing or fear of offending a friend. Kiss me, and don’t contradict me, for your conscience tells you that what I say is true.”
The sapphires, the ruby brooch, and all her unsettled accounts, came across Helen’s mind; and if the light had shone upon her face at that moment, her embarrassment must have been seen; but Lady Davenant, as she finished the last words, laid her head upon the pillow, and she turned and settled herself comfortably to go to sleep. Helen retired with a disordered conscience; and the first thing she did in the morning was to look in the red case in which the sapphires came, to see if there was any note of their price; she recollected having seen some little bit of card—it was found on the dressing-table. When she beheld the price, fear took away her breath—it was nearly half her whole year’s income; still she could pay it. But the ruby brooch that had not yet arrived—what would that cost? She hurried to her accounts; she had let them run on for months unlooked at, but she thought she must know the principal articles of expense in dress by her actual possessions. There was a heap of little crumpled bills which, with Felicie’s griffonage, Helen had thrown into her table-drawer. In vain did she attempt to decipher the figures, like apothecaries’ marks, linked to quarters and three-quarters, and yards, of gauzes, silks, and muslins, altogether inextricably puzzling. They might have been at any other moment laughable, but now they were quite terrible to Helen; the only thing she could make clearly out was the total; she was astonished when she saw to how much little nothings can amount, an astonishment felt often by the most experienced—how much more by Helen, all unused to the arithmetic of economy! At this instant her maid came in smiling with a packet, as if sure of being the bearer of the very thing her young lady most wished for; it was the brooch—the very last thing in the world she desired to see. With a trembling hand she opened the parcel, looked at the note of the price, and sank upon her chair half stupified, with her eyes fixed upon the sum. She sat she knew not how long, till, roused by the opening of Cecilia’s door, she hastened to put away the papers. “Let me see them, my dear, don’t put away those papers,” cried Cecilia; “Felicie tells me that you have been at these horrid accounts these two hours, and—you look—my dear Helen, you must let me see how much it is!” She drew the total from beneath Helen’s hand. It was astounding even to Cecilia, as appeared by her first unguarded look of surprise. But, recovering herself immediately, she in a playfully scolding tone told Helen that all this evil came upon her in consequence of her secret machinations. “You set about to counteract me, wrote for things that I might not get them for you, you see what has come of it! As to these bills, they are all from tradespeople who cannot be in a hurry to be paid; and as to the things Felicie has got for you, she can wait, is not she a waiting-woman by profession? Now, where is the ruby-brooch? Have you never looked at it?—I hope it is pretty—I am sure it is handsome,” cried she as she opened the case. “Yes; I like it prodigiously, I will take it off your hands, my dear; will that do?”
“No, Cecilia, I cannot let you do that, for you have one the same, I know, and you cannot want another—no, no.”