This beginning was what he liked best.
Edward was moved in a very different way. He would have been magnanimous and given up Cara—that is, having no real right to Cara, he might have given up the youthful imagination of her which had always been his favourite fancy, to his brother, with some wringing of the heart, but with that compensation which youth has in the sublime sense of self-sacrifice. But there is no bitterness greater in this world, either for young or old, than that of giving up painfully to another something which that other holds with levity and treats with indifference. To hear Cara, the sacred young princess of his own fancy, spoken of lightly, and the supreme moment of possible union with her characterised as ‘turning off,’ was a downfall which made Edward half-frantic with pain and shame, and indignation and impatience. She would be to Oswald only a commonplace little wife, to be petted when he was in the humour, standing very much lower than himself in his own good graces; whereas, to Edward she would have been——! but it was Oswald, not Edward, whom she had chosen. How strange they are! all those wonderful confusions of humanity which depress the wisest, the blind jumps at fate, the foolish choices, the passing over of the best to take the worst, which form the ordinary course of existence everywhere, the poor young fellow thought, in this first encounter with adverse events; and this was mingled with that strange wonder of the tender heart to find itself uncomprehended and rejected, while gifts much less precious than those it offers are accepted, which is one of the most poignant pangs of nature:—and these feelings surging dimly through Edward’s mind, filled him with a despondency and pain beyond words. Indeed, he could not have told all the bitterness of the vague heavy blackness which swallowed up the fair world and everything lovely before him. It was not only that Cara had (he thought) chosen Oswald instead of himself, but also that the lesser love was preferred to the greater, and that the thing one man would have worshipped was thrown to the careless keeping of another, as if it were a thing of no price. The personal question and the abstract one twisted and twined into one, as is general in the first trials of youth. He himself unconsciously became to himself the symbol of true love misjudged, of gold thrown away for pinchbeck—and Cara the symbol of that terrible perennial mistake which is always going on from chapter to chapter of the world’s history. Even, for he was generous in the very pangs of that visionary envy, it added another pang of suffering to Edward’s mind, that he could not but consider his brother as the pinchbeck, so far as Cara at least was considered. While Oswald sat smiling to himself through the fumes of his cigar, Edward threw his window open and gazed out into the chill darkness of the winter night, feeling the cold wind, which made him shiver, to be more in consonance with his feelings than the warmth of the comfortable room inside.
Thus the whole little world was turned upside down by Oswald’s light-hearted preference of his own gratification to anything other people might think. He had half-forgotten the appointment he had so anxiously made with Cara when the morning came, having got into full swing with his verses—which was still a more captivating way of expressing his sentiments than confession of them to Cara—
Fair face from old Pietro’s canvas sprung,
Soft as the eve, fresh as the day,
Sweet shadow of angelic faces, young
And heavenly bright as they,
Soul of all lovely things, by poets sung—
He could not content himself with the last line—‘Accept my lay,’ or ‘my humble lay,’ was the easiest termination, but it was prosaic and affected. The consideration of this occupied him to the entire exclusion of Cara, and he only recollected with what anxiety he had begged her to get rid of her aunt and see him alone at a quarter past twelve, having appointed to meet her at noon. He thrust the bit of paper on which he had been scribbling into his pocket, when he remembered, and went off languidly to pay his visit; he had meant to have completed the poem, and read it over to her, but it was clear that this must be postponed to another day.
Meanwhile good Miss Cherry, full of anxieties, had got up much earlier than was necessary, and had spent a long day before twelve o’clock. By way of giving to her withdrawal at that fated hour an air of perfect naturalness and spontaneity, she invented a great many little household occupations, going here and there over the different rooms with Nurse, looking over Cara’s things to see what was wanted, and making a great many notes of household necessities. The one most serious occupation which she had in her mind she postponed until the moment when the lover, or supposed lover, should appear. This was her real object in coming to London, the interview which she had determined to have with her brother. With a heart beating more loudly than it had beaten for years, she waited till Oswald Meredith’s appearance gave the signal for this assault, which it was her duty to make, but which she attempted with so much trembling. By the time Oswald did appear her breath had almost forsaken her with agitation and excitement, and she had become almost too much absorbed in her own enterprise to wonder that at such a moment the young man should be late. She was already in the library when Oswald went upstairs. Two interviews so solemn going on together! the comfort of both father and daughter hanging in the balance. Miss Cherry knocked so softly as to be unheard, and had to repeat the summons before that ‘Come in’ sounded through the closed door, which was to her as the trump of doom.
She went in. Mr. Beresford was seated as usual at his writing-table, with all his books about him. He was busy, according to his gentle idea of being busy, and looked up with some surprise at his sister when she entered. Miss Cherry came noiselessly forward in her grey gown, with her soft steps. He held his pen suspended in his fingers, thinking perhaps it was some passing question which she meant to ask, then laid it down with the slightest shadow of impatience, covered immediately by a pretended readiness to know what she wanted, and a slight sigh over his wasted time. Those who have their bread to work for take interruptions far more easily than those whose labours are of importance to nobody, and Macaulay writing his History would not have breathed half so deep a sigh as did James Beresford over the half-hour he was about to lose.
‘You want something?’ he said, with the smile of a conscious martyr.
‘Only to speak to you, James,’ said Miss Cherry, breathless. Then she looked up at him with a deprecating, wistful smile. ‘It is not very often that we meet now, or have any opportunity for a little talk,’ she said.
‘Yes, Cherry, that is true enough. I have been so much away.’