The ‘young woman’ was less easily subdued. She wrote to her relations that it had been all a mistake, but that family reasons had made it impossible for her husband and herself to disclose the true state of affairs before. That instead of being Mrs. Francis Lindores, she was Mrs. Thomas Francis Lindores Torrance, of the Towers, her dear husband being the son of Thomas Torrance, Esq., of the Towers, and of Lady Caroline Lindores, the daughter of the Earl of Lindores, from whom dear Tom took his second name, as they might see in any peerage; that her mother-in-law and all her new family were very nice to her, and that she was going off upon a visit with Lady Edith Erskine, who was her aunt, and dear grandmamma the Countess. And she ordered for herself at once new cards with Mrs. F. T. Lindores Torrance upon them, which she thought looked far more distinguished-looking than the original name. But when Mrs. Tom became aware that dear grandmamma and her dear aunt meant to conduct her to an educational establishment, where she was to pass at least the two next years of her life, the young woman rebelled at once. She had never heard, she declared, of a married woman going to school; that her place was with her husband; that she had passed all the standards, and learnt to play the piano, and had taken lessons in French; that no woman, unless she were going to be a governess, wanted more; and, finally, that she flatly refused to go. It was more difficult, much more difficult, than with Tom to convince his wife: for she was still more ignorant than Tom, and thought his giving in ridiculous, and did not see why, with him or without him, she should not go and take up her abode at the Towers, ‘and look after things,’ which she felt must be in great want of someone to look after them. She was made to yield at last, but not without difficulty, declaring to the last moment that she could not be refused alimony, and that she would take her alimony and go and live independent at home till her husband came to claim her, rather than go to school at her age. But Beaufort managed this too, to the admiration of everybody. He brought to bear upon the young woman pressure from her ’ome, where her mother, under his skilful manipulation, was brought to see the necessity of going to school, and declined to receive her rebellious daughter. This was at the cost of another allowance from Tom’s estate, for it was not fit that Tom’s mother-in-law should continue to earn her bread poorly without her daughter’s assistance, in a poor little confectioner’s shop. Beaufort managed all this without even betraying the name of this poor old woman, or where she lived, to the researches of the Lindores, for Lady Car was very tender of her boy’s name even now.
And she was taken home—to Easton, which she loved: and said she was much better, and was able to be out on her husband’s arm, and sit on the lawn and watch the sun setting and the stars coming out over the trees. But she had got her death wound. She lay on the sofa for months, for one lingering winter after another, smiling upon all that was done for her, very anxious that Janet should go everywhere and enjoy everything, and that Beaufort should be pleased and happy. She asked nothing for herself, but gave them her whole heart of love and interest to everything that was done by them. She had her sofa placed where she could see them when they went out, and smiled when Beaufort said, always with a slight hesitation, for he thought it was not right to leave her, that he was going to ride over to the club, or to spend a day in town. ‘Do; and bring us back all the news,’ she said. And when Janet went away with compunctions to go to balls with her grandmother, Lady Car was the one who explained away all objections. ‘Quite pleased to have you go—to have Beau to myself for a little,’ Lady Car said sometimes, a little vexing her child; but, when Janet was gone, urging Beaufort to the pleasure he longed for but did not like to take. ‘It is just what I wanted that you should go to town: and you can bring me back news of my little Den.’ Sometimes they were even a little piqued that she wanted them so little—poor Lady Car!
And thus quite gently she faded away, loved—as other people love, not as she loved: cherished and revered, but not as she would have revered and cherished; with a husband who read the papers and went to his club, and got very gracefully through life, in which he was of no importance to anyone, and her only son banished in Africa shooting big game. Janet was a good child, very good: but her mother never knew how near the girl was to her in the shadowy land where people may wander side by side, but without the intervention of words or some self-betrayal never find each other out. Perhaps had Janet found the courage to fling herself down at her mother’s side, and say all that was in her heart, the grasp of that warm hand might still have brought Lady Car back to life. But Janet had not the courage and everything went on in its daily calm, and the woman whose every hope had faded into blank disappointment, and all her efforts ended in failure, faded away. During the first summer Lady Car still went out to dine, and walked a little about the garden with her husband’s arm; the next she was carried out to her sofa on the lawn. All went so very gradually, so very softly, that no one noted. She was very delicate. When that gets to be fully recognised, there seems no reason why it should not go on for ever; not so happy a state as perfect health, to be sure, but with no reason in it why there should be any further change.
One evening she was out of doors longer than usual—a soft lingering summer night—so warm that even an invalid could get no harm out of doors. She loved so to see the daylight gradually fade away, and the stars come out above, and over all the wide champaign below a twinkle of little human lights here and there. She took almost a childish pleasure in those lights, thinking as much of the villages and scattered houses—identifying their humanity low down among the billows of the wood or the sweep of the upland slopes—as of the stars above. ‘The greater and the lesser lights,’ she said, and then murmured low to herself, ‘Compensations,’ under her breath.
‘What do you mean by compensations, Carry?’
‘I do not much believe in them,’ she said. ‘Nothing can compensate for what one loses. It is better not. Looking to the east, Edward, see, there are no lights, but only that silvery misty greyness where any glory might lie hidden only we see it not. Now I have come so far as this I think I like that best.’
‘So far as what, Carry’ Something cold and chill seemed to come over them like a cloud. ‘It is growing chilly, you ought to come indoors, my love.’
‘Yes, presently. I have always been fond of the lights—like a baby; but look the other way. You would say at first there was nothing to be seen at all; but there are all the shades of greyness from one tint to another, and everything lying still, putting out no self-assertion, content to be in God’s hand. And so am I, Edward.’
‘Yes, my love.’