He that will not when he may; vol. I

by Mrs. Oliphant

She was driven almost wild by this reply. “Sir William will never consent—he will never consent to it,” she cried.

“That’s none of my business—nor my child’s,” said Spears. He forgot the respect with which she had inspired him. “Here’s the difference between your class and mine, my lady,” he said with some scorn. “I consider the one thing needful in a marriage is love—on both sides. In our rank of life we don’t consider much more. We don’t ask questions about a girl’s ancestors or her fortune. Most likely there’s none of either sort, as in this case—but where there is love, what more is wanting? You will never persuade me to interfere.”

“Marriage!” she repeated, in a voice of dismay. Of course that was what it must come to. She cast a look of dismay and almost horror at the girl who would, if this were so, take her own place, and hold her position in the world. She rose up suddenly from her rude seat, feeling that her limbs still failed her, but that in any case she could stay no longer here. “Oh, there is a great deal more wanting—a great deal more,” she cried. “Life is not so simple for us. A woman should know what she undertakes—what weight she will have on her shoulders. There are other things to be taken into consideration in such a life as ours.”

“You think so,” said Spears. What he intended to be a superior smile dwindled into something like a sneer. He did not like this assertion, which he could not contradict. After all, it was true enough that his own existence was far more elementary and primitive than the other, and he did not like the thought.

“You do not know,” said Lady Markham, “you cannot understand the difficulties of people who are looked up to by a whole district, who have the comfort of others, the very life of many in their hands. But why should I speak of this?” she said. “I thought you understood, but you do not understand. Now it is war between us, as you said. I want to harm no one, but I must do what I can for my boy.”

She made them a curtsey which (for she could not be uncivil) included both father and daughter, then drew down her veil with a trembling hand and hurried away.

Spears went after her to the door. He was furious at this calm assertion of something higher, larger, and more elevated in her different rank; yet he could not help a certain reverence, an unwilling worship of the lady, of whom he had once said regretfully that nothing like her was ever produced in his own. He went to the door, and gazed after her as she went along, her steps still hurried and agitated, but her natural grace coming back to her. “Looked up to by a whole district—the comfort of others, their very life in her hands.” Ah! there might be something in that after all. He felt in his own veins a fulness, a swell of rising blood as of a man able to bear others upon his shoulders, and fearing no responsibility. That should come in the new world to which he was bound. There he too would cease to be a single unit among other isolated individuals, and would become a head also, a leader, the first of a community. He felt as if she had dared him to it, and he would achieve it. But as he stood there half-angry, half-stimulated, he was aware of his daughter behind him, straining on tiptoe to look over his shoulder—and turned round, looking at her with a new principle of judgment and discrimination in his eyes.

“Was it really Lady Markham? Is she Mr. Markham’s mother?” said Janet, breathless with excitement. “Oh, how pretty she must have been, father! She’s not a bit nicely dressed, not what I would call equal to her situation. But she looks a real lady. Don’t you think you would know she was a real lady, whatever she had on?”

“I don’t know what you mean by a real lady. You are quite as silly as the rest, you little fool.”

“Oh, but you do know,” cried Janet. “Miss Stichel puts on lovely things, but she never has that look. Was that the lady that was so kind to you in the country?—in that beautiful grand house?”