And as Durant drove away, with his head full of Lucy, he was suddenly transfixed, shot point-blank, as it were, by the eyes of Mrs. Arthur, raised in surprise and alarm to his face. Nancy! here! It was so incredible, and his mind was so preoccupied, that he almost upset his dog-cart, pulling it up with a jerk, then dropped the reins, which had been held so firmly, on the horse’s neck. He did not know if he was awake or dreaming as he stumbled down, the surprise was so great, the shock so sudden. Nancy! It seemed to him that there was a kind of suggestion of help, a thread of guidance thrown out to him by this sudden apparition. He rushed after her, asking one or two gaping wayfarers who had not perceived her, who the lady was, as he followed her track; but fear had given wings to Nancy, and she had reached shelter before he came in sight. He wandered about aimlessly for some little time, as has been seen, asking vague questions, and gazing about at the houses. But as nobody had seen the lady to whom he referred, and as in his excitement his description, perhaps, was less clear than usual, he made nothing by his inquiries. They pointed out Mrs. Rolt’s house to him, which he knew, and everything in it; and as the evening was already falling, Durant felt himself forced at last to resume his way. He could not make out all that he expected, all that seemed to flutter about through the confusion in his thoughts—possibilities for the future, new lights, new likelihoods; for it must be remembered that his mind was already in a whirl with all that had happened to himself within the last half-dozen hours—more than had happened for the half-dozen years before, or, indeed, during all his life.
There was to be no correspondence; yet Lady Curtis was not surprised to get a letter next day, enclosing one for Lucy.
“Just this once,” he pleaded; “and not for mere gratification of writing to her. There is something I want to tell her. You will not refuse me this once.”
Lady Curtis did not refuse him. She gave the note to Lucy with a smile and a sigh, and a little shrug of her shoulders.
“What is this great thing he has to tell you, I wonder? The same thing, I suppose, that he took so long to tell you the other day.”
“Indeed, it must be something he has forgotten,” said Lucy, with simple seriousness; but she took the note upstairs to read in her own room, running off on pretence of wanting something—a pretence which her mother, with another sigh and shrug of her shoulders, understood well enough. And, indeed, Durant had not failed to take advantage of his opportunity. The little letter was a love-letter, a kind of thing which is too exquisite for common touch; but it had a postscript, which was its raison d’être.
“This is what I shall want to be always telling you, what I shall tell you in my heart daily and hourly till I have you there in real presence, my Lucy,” the deceiver wrote; and then, with a twist of his hand, in a changed writing even, “But I should not have dared to write but for a strange fact I found out after I left you—Arthur’s wife is in Oakley. It seems incredible, but it is true. I saw her on the road. She disappeared at the sight of me by a back-lane, and must have gone into some house. You will tell them or not, as you please; but I must tell you. There seems, I can’t quite tell how, hope for ourselves in it. My darling!” And then the other kind of writing began again, with which we sober-minded persons have nothing to do.
Lucy, it may be supposed, was extremely excited by this communication; not just at first, it must be allowed, not till she had read it about six times over did the real point of it strike her mind. At first it was the other part of the letter that occupied her; and when Lady Curtis said, smiling, “What was the great piece of news—an old enough story, I suppose?” Lucy meant no deception in her response. But by and by the fact began to acquire its real importance in her mind. She had no longer a moment’s doubt on the subject; had not instinct whispered it to her at once? Nancy was here, within her reach, within her influence; and only one thing could be meant by this, that the rebellious young woman who had made Arthur so unhappy, had seen the error of her ways, and was willing to depart from them, to seek the favour of her husband’s family, to endeavour to please them, that there might be a reconciliation and universal pardoning of all offences, in prospect. Lucy, when she wholly realized the important fact thus communicated to her, was lost in perplexity. What was she to do? A strange reluctance sprang up in her mind to speak of it, to bring it to any one’s observation. Would it not be better to let this strange young woman, by whom Lucy had at once been attracted and repelled, work out her intentions, whatever they were? It was not natural that the young lady should think with special kindness, or, indeed, without a certain prejudice, of this interloper. Lucy’s feeling, to start with, had been all in her sister-in-law’s favour. Before the marriage had taken place, when the question was whether Arthur should be persuaded or forced into faithlessness to his promise, Lucy had been Nancy’s faithful, if reserved, supporter. She had been horrified by the suggestion that a man’s plighted word and promised love were not binding, when the woman to whom they were pledged was in an inferior class. This doctrine had shocked and revolted every feeling in her heart, and when her family had made ignoble efforts to buy off Nancy, Lucy had been as indignant as Arthur was. But now everything was changed. The resemblances in nature and the diversity in circumstances, which gave her a fellow-feeling with this girl in one stage of her history, gave her a certain sense of repulsion now. She had thought it a mere foolish imagination on her part to identify Mrs. Arthur at the Wren Cottage with Nancy; but even while doing so, Lady Curtis’s ready prepossession in her favour, and the easy fascination she had exercised over Sir John, had given Lucy a slight involuntary prick of displeasure. What did they see in this young woman to be so readily pleased by her? She was pretty. Was that all that was necessary? Lucy was in no way injured by it, it took nothing from her, yet she felt more than half angry at the rapid conquest of her parents which the stranger had made. They were quite absurdly interested in her. Why? Sir John spoke of her as if she had been a princess, and even her mother, who, as a woman, should have had more discrimination, had been disposed to rave about this new face, in which, after all, there was no such dazzling beauty as to carry the world by storm. Lucy had been a little vexed with herself for feeling this, yet she had felt it. She had been inclined in her own person to bestow her attention upon the homely sister, who was a good modest little body and claimed no one’s admiration. And when this strange certainty came to confirm the guess, which even to herself had seemed too fantastic for fact, Lucy felt an instant increase of prejudice, an almost dislike for which she could give no reason, and which was at once impolitic and unkind. Why should her mind turn against Nancy now? Was it not for the interest of the family as well as her own that she should in every way cultivate the possibility of reunion between Arthur and his wife? It must be for Arthur’s good that he should be delivered out of his false position, and should live out his life honestly, having chosen it; and it must be to the advantage of the family that its heir should be replaced in his natural place, both for the present and the future. Finally, there could be no doubt whatever that it would be for Lucy’s own interest in the new development of her lot. If Arthur was like any other young married man, united to a wife whom his parents had learned to like at least, whether they approved of her or not, how much easier would everything be for the now impossible marriage of the daughter who at present was their only hope! But it cannot be said that this suggestion of her own lessened value and importance, and the likelihood that Nancy might free her by taking her place in her father’s house, was at all an agreeable thought to Lucy Curtis. It might promote her “happiness;” but it certainly, for the moment, did not make her more happy. She was unreasonable—as we all are more or less. Yes, she would be glad that Arthur should be “happy,” that all should go well; but to think of her mother’s sudden fancy for this stranger, of her father’s swift subjugation, of Nancy holding her own place at Oakley, doing all the things she had done, accepted by everybody as the young lady of the place, this was hard upon Lucy. For the moment it gave her an almost intolerable prick—though she took herself to task for it instantly with hot rage and self-contempt. How mean and poor, what a wretched pitiful creature she was!
Then, however, after all this feeling, came the practical side of the matter. Should she let her mother know? Lucy had no secrets from her mother, except indeed that one of her love, before her love had been openly asked for—a thing which not the most tenderly confidential of daughters could be expected to disclose. She made an heroic effort to clear from her mind all prejudice, all momentary and accidental irritation of feeling. Which was best? To let this incognito have its full value, to permit Arthur’s wife to have the entire advantage of the effort she was visibly making, and keep her secret? If it were prematurely revealed it was possible that the effort itself would tell against Nancy, at least with Lady Curtis. To let her do her best, to say nothing, to give her the chance of making them her friends, would not that be the kindest thing that Arthur’s sister could do? The conclusion is very easily stated, but it took a long time to arrive at; but it was on this that Lucy decided at last.
“Will you reply for me?” she said to her mother; “no—I am not going to exceed your permission, mamma. I will abide by my promise not to write. Say from me,” said Lucy with a blush, “that I—respond in my heart to all he says; but that, at present, on all subjects it is best not to speak. Will you tell him that word for word.”