Madam: A Novel

by Mrs. Oliphant

John Trevanion sprang from his chair. “Be silent, woman!” he cried; “how dare you speak so to me?”

“I’ve said it before, and I will again!” cried Russell—“a man not half her age. Oh, it was a shame!—and out of a house like Highcourt—and a lady that should know better, not a poor servant like them that are sent out of the way at a moment’s notice when they go wrong. Don’t lift your hand to me, Mr. John. Would you strike a woman, sir, and call yourself a gentleman? And you that brought me here against my will when I was happy at home. I won’t go out of the room till I have said my say.”

“No,” said John, with a laugh which was half rage, though the idea that he was likely to strike Russell was a ludicrous exasperation. “No, as you are a woman I can’t, unfortunately, knock you down, whatever impertinence you may say.”

“I am glad of that, sir,” said Russell, “for you looked very like it; and I’ve served the Trevanions for years, though I don’t get much credit for it, and I shouldn’t like to have to say as the lady of the house forgot herself for a boy, and a gentleman of the house struck a woman. I’ve too much regard for them to do that.”

Here she paused to take breath, and then resumed, standing in an attitude of defence against the door, whither John’s threatening aspect had driven her: “You mark my words, sir,” cried Russell, “where that young man is, Madam’s not far off. Miss Sophy, that has her wits about her, she has seen her—and the others that is full of fancies they’ve seen what they think is a ghost; and little Miss Amy, she is wrong in the head with it. This is how I find things when I’m telegraphed for, and brought out to a strange place, and then told as I’m not wanted. But it’s Providence as wants me here. Mrs. Lennox—she always was soft— I don’t wonder at her being deceived; and, besides, she wasn’t on the spot, and she don’t know. But, Mr. Trevanion, you were there all the time. You know what goings-on there were. It wasn’t the doctor or the parson Madam went out to meet, and who was there besides? Nobody but this young man. When a woman’s bent on going wrong, she’ll find out the way. You’re going to strike me again! but it’s true. It was him she met every night, every night, out in the cold. And then he saw Miss Rosalind, and he thought to himself—here’s a young one, and a rich one, and far nicer than that old— Mr. John! I know more than any of you know, and I’ll put up with no violence, Mr. John!”

John Trevanion’s words will scarcely bear repeating. He put her out of the room with more energy than perhaps he ought to have employed with a woman; and he bade her go to the devil with her infernal lies. Profane speech is not to be excused, but there are times when it becomes mere historical truth and not profanity at all. They were infernal lies, the language and suggestion of hell even if—even if—oh, that a bleeding heart should have to remember this!—even if they were true. John shut the door of his room upon the struggling woman and came back to face himself, who was more terrible still. Even if they were true! They brought back in a moment a suggestion which had died away in his mind, but which never had been definitely cast forth. His impulse when he had seen this young Everard had been to take him by the collar and pitch him forth, and refuse him permission even to breathe the same air: “Dangerous fellow, hence; breathe not where princes are!” but then a sense of confusion and uncertainty had come in and baffled him. There was no proof, either, that Everard was the man, or that there was any man. It was not Madam’s handwriting, but her husband’s, that had connected the youth with Highcourt; and though he might have a thousand faults, he did not look the cold-blooded villain who would make his connection with one woman a standing ground upon which to establish schemes against another. John Trevanion’s brow grew quite crimson as the thought went through his mind. He was alone, and he was middle-aged and experienced in the world; and two years ago many a troublous doubt, and something even like a horrible certainty, had passed through his mind. But there are people with whom it is impossible to associate shame. Even if shame should be all but proved against them, it will not hold. When he thought an evil thought of Madam—nay, when that thought had but a thoroughfare through his mind against his will, the man felt his cheek redden and his soul faint. And here, too, were the storm-clouds of that catastrophe which was past, rolling up again, full of flame and wrath. They had all been silent then, awestricken, anxious to hush up and pass over, and let the mystery remain. But now this was no longer possible. A bewildering sense of confusion, of a darkness through which he could not make his way, of strange coincidences, strange contradictions, was in John Trevanion’s mind. He was afraid to enter upon this maze, not knowing to what conclusion it might lead him. And yet now it must be done.

Only a very short time after another knock came to his door, and Rosalind entered, with an atmosphere about her of urgency and excitement. She said, without any preface:

“Uncle John, I have come to tell you what I have made up my mind to do. Do you remember that in two days I shall be of age, and my own mistress? In two days!”

“My dear,” he said, “I hope you have not been under so hard a taskmaster as to make you impatient to be free.”

“Yes,” said Rosalind. “Oh, not a hard taskmaster; but life has been hard, Uncle John! As soon as I am my own mistress I am going, Amy and I, to—you know. I cannot rest here any longer. Amy will be safe; she can have my money. But this cannot go on any longer. If we should starve, we must find my mother. I know you will say she is not my mother. And who else, then? She is all the mother I have ever known. And I have left her these two years under a stain which she ought not to bear, and in misery which she ought not to bear. Was it ever heard of before that a mother should be banished from her children? I was too young to understand it all at first; and I had no habit of acting for myself; and perhaps you would have been right to stop me; but now—”