‘Betray!’ cried Joyce. She had been humiliated by Greta; she was indignant now. ‘What have I to betray?’ she cried; ‘that I am a waif, and a foundling, and an abandoned creature that belongs to nobody? or that I am a trouble and a charge to everybody that has to do with me, breaking my poor Granny’s heart because she wants me, and a shame to the others that don’t want me? Myself! what is it to betray myself? Oh, you are kind; you are very kind. You were my dear lady that I honoured above everything. But you kiss me to-day because I’m—not Joyce, but Colonel Hayward’s daughter; and you bid me not to betray myself. To betray that I am myself—is that what you mean?’
‘Joyce! Joyce!’ cried Mrs. Bellendean.
Joyce paused for a moment to dry the sudden tears which had betrayed her, coming with a rush to her eyes—girls being such poor creatures, that cannot do anything or feel anything without crying! She had drawn her arm out of her friend’s arm, and her eyes were shining, and a swift nervous movement, scarcely restrainable, thrilling through her. That impulse, as of a hunted deer, to give one momentary glance round, and then turn and fly—the impulse of her mother, which was in all Joyce’s veins, though nothing had occurred till now to bring it out,—took hold upon her, and shook her like a sudden wind. She knew what it was, though no one else had any warning of it; and it frightened her to the depths of her soul.
CHAPTER XXII
Notwithstanding this sense of outrage and injury, time and the hour had their usual effect upon Joyce. There are few things that the common strain of everyday does not subdue in time—few things, that is, that are of the nature of sentiment, not actual evil or wrong. She reconciled herself to the affectionate demonstrations of her old friends, which were such as they had not made in the old times, without at least saying again that these were for Colonel Hayward’s daughter, and not for Joyce; and she learnt to make new ones, or at least to receive shyly and respond as much as her nature permitted to the overtures of acquaintanceship made to her by the society among which she lived. The sense of strangeness faded away; she became familiar with her surroundings, and with the things which were required of her. She acquired, to her astonishment and amusement, and pleasure too, when she had become a little accustomed to her own appearance in them, a number of new dresses and ornaments, the latter chiefly presents from her father, who found it the most delightful amusement to make a little expedition into town—a thing which was at all times a pleasant diversion to him—to go to Hancock’s, or some other costly place, before or after he went to his club, and bring Joyce a bracelet or a ring. These expeditions were not always agreeable to Mrs. Hayward. She said, ‘If you would tell me what you wanted, Henry, I could get it a great deal cheaper for you at the Stores—half the price: these Hancock people are ruinous.’
‘But, my dear, I bought it only because it chanced to take my fancy—in the shop-window,’ said the scheming Colonel, with wiles which he had learned of recent days. His wife knew as well as he did that this little fable was of doubtful credence, but she said no more. After all, if he could not give his child a bracelet or two, it would be a strange thing, Mrs. Hayward said to herself with a little heat. She was determined to be reasonable, but she could not help being slightly suspicious of his meaning, when he announced his intention at the breakfast-table of taking a little run up to town, and seeing how those fellows were getting on. He meant his old cronies at the club, whom he was always pleased to see; but it always turned out that there were other little things to be done as well.
And Joyce was far from being without pleasure in these pretty presents, and in the tenderness which beamed from the Colonel’s face when he stole his little packet out of his pocket with the air of a schoolboy bringing home a bird’s nest. ‘My dear, I happened to see this as I passed, and I thought you would like it.’ She did not know much about the value of these gifts, overestimating it at first, underrating it afterwards—and cared very little, to tell the truth, after the first sensation of awe with which she had regarded the gold and precious stones, when she found such unexpected treasures in her own possession. But what was of far greater importance was the tender bond which, by means of all the kind thoughts which resulted in these gifts, and the grateful and pleased sentiment which these kind thoughts called forth, grew up between the Colonel and his daughter. She became the companion of a morning walk which up to this time he had been in the habit of taking alone—Mrs. Hayward considering it necessary to be ‘on the spot,’ as she said, and looking after her household. The Colonel, who never liked to be alone, took advantage one lovely morning of a chance meeting with Joyce, who was straying somewhat listlessly along the shrubbery walk, thinking of many things. ‘I am going for my walk,’ he said—his walk being a habit as regular as the nursery performance of the same kind. ‘If you have nothing to do, get your hat and come with me, my dear.’ And this walk came to be delightful to both, Joyce making acquaintance thereby with those genuine reflections of a mind uninstructed save by life, which are so often full of insight and interest; while the Colonel on his side listened with delighted admiration to Joyce’s information on all kinds of subjects, which was drawn entirely from books. He talked to her about India and his old friends there and all their histories, enchanted to rouse her interest and to have to stir up his memory in order to satisfy her as to how an incident ended, or what became of a man.
‘What happened after? My dear, I believe he was killed at Delhi, poor fellow!—after all they had gone through. Yes, it was hard: but that’s a soldier’s life, you know; he never knows where he may have to leave his bones. The poor little woman had to be sent home. We got up some money for her, and I believe she had friends to whom she went with her baby. That’s all I know about them. As for Brown, he got on very well—retired now with the rank of a general, and lives at Cheltenham. The last time I saw him, he was at Woolwich with his third boy for an exam. It is either the one thing or the other, Joyce—either they get killed young, or they live through everything and come home, regular old vieux moustaches, as the French say, with immense families to set out in the world. The number of fine fellows I’ve seen drop! and then the number of others who survive everything, and are not so much the better for it after all.’
‘When I read the vision of Mirza to my old granny at home—— at Bellendean—she said life was like that,’ said Joyce gravely,—‘some dropping suddenly in a moment, so that you only saw that they had disappeared.’
‘The vision of—— what, my dear? It has an Eastern sound, but I don’t think it’s in the Bible. Very likely I’ve heard it somewhere: but my memory is rather bad’—(he had been giving her a hundred personal details of all kinds of people, in the range of some thirty or forty years)—‘especially for books.’ Colonel Hayward added, ‘More shame to me,’ with a shake of his grey head.