“That is what I feel, dear,” said Mrs. Eastwood, “but Frederick says——”
“Oh, I don’t want to know what Frederick says! I am sick of Frederick—and all men,” said poor Nelly. “Mamma, let us all go away somewhere and hide ourselves from this horrible world——”
“Nelly, Nelly,” said her mother with a smile, “which of us would tire soonest of that? You have other bonds which you forget in your haste—and I have the boys.”
When Nelly was told of these other bonds she held her peace, with a flush upon her face. Yes, she had other bonds, and of all the four unhappy people who lay down under the kindly old roof of The Elms on that agitating night, she perhaps was the most unhappy. A heart running over with love, pity, generous impulses, but obstructed wherever her feet turned, unable to leaven her little world with her own generous thoughts, unable to convince it of what seemed so clear to her, bound down by meannesses, by selfishness at which her soul revolted. The others were free more or less to follow their own instincts, but for her she was in bonds—a spirit imprisoned, writhing under the cords that tied her, struggling with her fate.
“Oh, Nelly,” said Mrs. Eastwood before she went to bed, “what can have become of John Vane? He is the one man in the world I could talk to about it all, and who could tell us what was best.”
Nelly made no reply. Her thoughts, too, had travelled perhaps the same way, but even while they did so it made her heart sore and bitter to think that it was John Vane, and not another, who was “the one man in the world” to help them in their terrible strait.
Innocent slept little that night. Something new was working in the girl’s mind. All the household almost without exception believed that she had been “in love” with Frederick from the time he brought her home; and Frederick himself believed it most completely of all, as has been shown. But Innocent herself had never thought of love, had known nothing of it, nor what it was. She had learned it for the first time that night. The discovery she made was not of anything in herself. She, in her simplicity, in her preoccupation, was as quietly still and affectionate in her emotions as she had ever and always been. But Frederick’s looks, his words, his touch, had startled her in her unbroken virginal calm. He had told her he loved her. Perhaps under other circumstances Innocent would have received this with childlike gratitude, and have said to herself simply that he was “kind”—how kind he was! But there was something in this interview which made so gentle an interpretation of the words impossible. Innocent felt without knowing that there was a difference, and the difference alarmed her, she could not tell why. It did not occur to her to think that the outburst was momentary, nor could she have believed that Frederick himself at that very moment was plotting her banishment. The impression made on her mind was not complex but single. He loved her not as the others loved, with a love which Innocent vaguely knew led to other ties and other consequences. This thought did not move her, as does the first suggestion of love which is destined to be happy; it filled her with fright and pain. She felt by instinct that between her and Frederick there was a gulf which could never be passed—a ghost, which kept them apart from each other; yet they were here, under the same roof, compelled to meet daily—and he loved her! The more she thought of it the more alarmed and sick at heart Innocent grew. How could she avoid him, resist him, put away from her all the old habits which had grown into her life? She who had been used to put her hand in his, to take his arm, to talk to him more freely than to any one else—all this would be impossible if he loved her. She would shrink from the warmer incomprehensible sentiment, but how could she shrink from Frederick? What would they all say? What would they think if she, who had so clung to him, were to turn from him? she could not do it. With an imagination newly awakened, which had sprung up suddenly in self-defence, she saw herself constrained to do as Frederick pleased: led with him where he chose to lead her, drawn into new circumstances which she did not understand, yet shrank from. To put these vague sentiments of fright, repulsion, and alarm into words is to do them wrong, and to give to them a distinctness which they did not possess, but words are the only medium I have for conveying to the reader any idea of the state of confusion, shame, pain, and terror which vaguely filled the mind of Innocent. This terror of Frederick’s love was, perhaps, quite undue and unnecessary, since Frederick had already realized the necessity for quenching anything like love for Innocent, and thought himself quite strong enough to do so. But perhaps it was some subtle consequence of the mistaken notion he had so long entertained of her love for him, which produced this mistaken notion on her part of his love for her, and became the motive of the most decided act of her life. She did not sleep. The long, long winter night, which felt as if it would never end, spun out its lingering hours of darkness, while all these things passed darkly through her mind—but as she waked and dreamed there suddenly occurred to her a way of escape—a prospect of help. She had made a promise of which no one knew—a promise which had never before recurred to her mind from the moment she made it; this promise suddenly returned to her memory in her moment of deepest darkness. She had promised if she needed help, if she wanted change—a thing impossible at that moment, impossible a few hours ago, but now so real and so necessary—to seek it from one man; not the friend for whom Mrs. Eastwood sighed, whom Nelly bitterly and against her will involved in her thoughts; a saviour, whose name occurred to poor Innocent now as a sudden and only refuge in her trouble. When she thought of him, and remembered her promise to him, Innocent fell asleep. She had some one in whose hands she could place her difficulty, and at once her own labouring mind, unused to any such burdens, was eased.
She said nothing to any one of her purpose. She felt instinctively that had she spoken of it she would have been prevented from carrying out her intention. She did nothing, and said nothing, even to Alice, until next afternoon, when Mrs. Eastwood and Nelly went out on some necessary business. They thought it too cold for Innocent, and placed her in an easy chair by the fire, with the storybook which Frederick had been reading to her on the previous night. If anything had been wanting to confirm her resolution, this book would have done it. As soon as they were gone she went to her room and dressed herself carefully. She took care to make no appeal to Alice, who would have stopped her, she knew, and dressed herself without aid, taking out her best dress, the new mourning which became her pale and dreamy beauty. No one observed her as she went out, and very swift and straight, looking neither to the right hand nor the left, she pursued her way. She had gone with Mrs. Eastwood and Nelly more than once to the house where Sir Alexis Longueville had so often something to show his friends—now a new picture, now a rare flower, now some costly and elaborate piece of furniture. He was fond of everything that was rare and costly, and his bachelor house was one of the sights which connoisseurs delighted to be admitted to. It was not very far from The Elms, a detached house surrounded by a garden, which, in its way, was a sight too, notwithstanding the near neighbourhood of London smoke. Sir Alexis lived by himself in this dainty dwelling-place. It was like a child to him; he was constantly making alterations, projecting this and that, improving upon the unimprovable; and the house was a show-house. Nevertheless, when Innocent, young and alone, made her way to the door, and asked for Sir Alexis, the man who opened it to her was startled. Sir Alexis had not always been the irreproachable middle-aged gentleman he was now, and his old servant, as well as his old friends, recollected passages in his life which were not such as to make the visit of a young girl alone a natural occurrence. The servant stared at Innocent, and told her that his master was engaged, and made various excuses. But Innocent was imperious to all such hesitations. She would not tell what her business was, she would not be put off. “Tell him I want him,” she said, walking in, in her simplicity. Such a girl, absolutely pre-occupied, unconscious of any evil, pursuing her object without arrière pensée, without fear or thought of harm, is, I believe, safe to go over the world without let or hindrance. She hesitated only when the man asked her her name. “Say it is Innocent,” she answered at last, with a look of perfect gravity which checked the smile which began to form about his lips.
“A young lady?” said Sir Alexis, when the message was delivered to him. “Alone? it must be some mistake.”
“No mistake, Sir Alexis,” said the man, suffering the incipient grin to show itself, but with a cautious watchfulness lest it should be out of place. “When I asked if there was any name, she gave me a queer name. I don’t know if she’s all right here. She bid me to tell you, Sir Alexis, as how it was Innocent——”