Clara and her mother, both of them, rushed into the conversation with the same breath as women rush to separate combatants. I should have been very much surprised had I been more deeply interested. But at present I was occupied with that imperturbable, uninterfering quietness with which Alice sat at the table, saying nothing;—how elaborately unconscious and unconcerned she looked!—that was much more important to me than any squabble between Maurice and the Rector’s sister—or than the Rector himself, or any one of the many and various individual concerns which, like the different threads of a web, were woven into the quiet household circle—giving a deep dramatic interest to the well-bred, unpicturesque pose of the little company in that quiet English room.
CHAPTER XVII.
We stayed all that night at Waterflag, as we always did when we dined with the Sedgwicks, and of course I was subjected to a long private and confidential conversation with Mrs. Harley in my dressing-room, when we both ought to have been at rest. She poured out her anxieties upon me as she had done many a long year ago, when all these young people were unconscious little children, and Dr. Harley, poor good man, was newly dead. Only Time had changed both of us since then—she had become an old woman with silver-white hair under her snowy cap. I was old too, though my boy was but a child, and kept me nearer to youth than belonged to my years; but Mrs. Harley was as glad of this outlet to her anxieties, and felt as much relief in pouring these anxieties forth upon somebody else’s shoulders as ever.
“Ah, Clare!” she said, “you have only one, to be sure, and he’s nobly provided for; but we’re never so happy, though we don’t think it, as when they’re all children. There’s nothing but measles and such things to frighten one then—but now!—dear, dear! the charge of all these grown up young people, Clare, is far too much for a poor woman like me. I believe I shall break down all at once, one of these days.”
“Let us take it quietly,” said I, “they are very good, sensible, well-educated young people—they know what they are doing—don’t you think you might trust them to act for themselves?”
“They will, whether I trust them or not,” sighed poor Mrs. Harley. “Ah dear! to think how one toils and denies one’s self for one’s family, and how little account they make of one’s wishes when all is done! I think mine have quite set themselves—all but Clara, dear girl, who is so perfectly satisfactory in every way—to thwart and cross me, Alice—you know how unreasonable she is—I can do nothing with her. Just the thing of all others that I could have chosen for her, and such a nice, excellent, judicious young man. You saw how she behaved to him to-night.”
“But really, Mrs. Harley, if Alice doesn’t like him”—I interposed with humility.
“Oh, nonsense—she does like him—at least, she doesn’t like anybody else that I know of—and why shouldn’t she like him?” asked the exasperated mother. “You know, Mrs. Crofton, that my poor income dies with me—and there is Johnnie, poor child, to make some provision for, and when I die what will she do?—though to be sure,” concluded Mrs. Harley, drawing herself up a little, “I am not the sort of person to marry my daughters merely for an establishment—that never was my way. This case, you must perceive, Clare, is quite different. He is such a very nice—such an entirely satisfactory person; and the position—I was a clergyman’s wife myself, and I would choose that sphere rather than any other for Alice; and as for liking, I really cannot see a single reason why she should not like him, do you?”
“Why, no—except just, perhaps, that—I fear—she doesn’t,” said I, with hesitation; for I confess this superlative mother’s argument quite nonplused me. After all, why shouldn’t she like that good, young, handsome Rector? I reserved the question for private consideration, but was a little staggered by the strength of Mrs. Harley’s case.
“My opinion is that Alice thinks it rather a merit to refuse an eligible person,” said Mrs. Harley—“like all these young people. There is Maurice, too—you will not believe it, Clare—but Maurice has actually had the folly to fall in love with Francis Owen’s sister in Simonborough. I could not believe my ears when I heard of it first. Maurice, who has always been such a very prudent boy! She is a very nice, pretty girl, but, of course has not a penny—and Maurice has nothing but his fellowship. It is a pretty mess altogether. In the very best view of the case, if Maurice even had been content to think like other people, and had a nice living waiting for him, they might both have done better—he might have done a great deal better at least. But, no!—when they find somebody quite unsuitable, that is the very thing to please young people in these days; and there is my son, Clare—my eldest son—who was never intended for any profession but the Church—actually broaching all kinds of wild schemes about work, and talking of going to Australia, or taking a laborer’s hod, or any other wild thing he can think of; it is enough to break my heart!”