“I believe there is nothing silly you wouldn’t do, if it came to that,” said Matilda, shaking her head. It was an unwise suggestion she had made; but after a while Nancy calmed down, and gathered up her leaves again, and proceeded to arrange them as was her custom. She had altogether given up the beautiful chalk cartoon which Matilda admired, for this rubbish. How silly it was, her sister thought; though, indeed, her ladyship was to blame, who had encouraged Nancy in this nonsensical occupation. “What is going to be the good of all that?” she asked at last, with a touch of sarcasm in her voice. “You can’t frame it and put it up on the wall, to make a room look nice. It’s only lumber, and gathers dust.”
“I am drawing something for Lady Curtis to work,” said Nancy, with some solemnity. “When I go into the house the first time, I shall take something with me to give her. I suppose you will say that is silly too, but I like to do it. She thinks they are good for something. She was quite interested, you know. Did I tell you, Matilda, she called me, my dear?”
“Oh, yes, you told me, sure enough,” said Matilda, with a little impatience, “three times over;” and she got up to put away the seventh chemise along with the others. It was trimmed with her own work, nice little scallops worked in buttonhole stitch, with three holes in each curve, very neat and strong; and she was pleased, at once with the feeling of successful production and personal property. She gave the little heap another affectionate pat as she laid this one on the top. Seven new chemises, every stitch of which would bear inspection! Matilda felt that she had justification for a little pride. She did not sit down again to begin another, but put on the kettle, that it might come to the point of perfect boiling before she made the tea; and it was pleasant to see her moving about in the pleasant firelight, her substantial and round, but neat person, clothed in a black and white gown, her brown hair smooth and shining. Matilda was very particular about the due amount of crape on her Sunday dress, and you may be sure would not put off her mourning a day sooner than the most rigid rule allowed. But in the house, with all her little domestic occupations, she thought the black and white best. “For crape goes if you look at it, and black so soon gets rusty,” she said. It looked more natural, as well as more cheerful and pleasant that the fire should have something to brighten upon and throw ruddy tints over; and it was comfortable to see her make the tea. What a lucky New Zealander that man would be who got Matilda, with all her nicely trimmed chemises, for his wife!
But with Nancy, poor Nancy! it was altogether another affair. It is a rash thing to come out of the world in which you were born. She had done it unintentionally, vowing with vehement asserverations that nothing would change her. And how she had struggled against all poor Arthur’s attempts! how she had clung, as it were, with clutching of desperate hands to the fabric of her original home! Those very corrections which she made in Matilda’s honest diction, had she not hotly resented them, fiercely refused them when Arthur had tried to suggest them to herself? But all that was changed. Nancy had drifted away from her own world—drifted into his; if she clutched at anything now, it was not at her old ark, but at the slippery rocks and sands of the other hemisphere on which she had been cast ashore. Falling upon it in her first footing, she had secretly kissed the soil as conquering invaders have done to avert the evil omen. She belonged no longer to that old universe which had been buried with the father and mother, the last lingering traces of which were to be carried away in Matilda’s trunks along with her careful outfit; but the other world had not yet received the trembling unavowed neophyte. Even now, rather than be brought into it by any formal force, by sense of duty, by the necessity laid upon her husband and his family, or by their pity, or by anything that could be construed into either, Nancy would have kept her wild word, and rushed away into the distant wilds with her sister. Had there been a word, or thought, of “arrangement,” of negotiation, even of right on the other side to claim her, or of right on her side to a certain place as Arthur’s wife, no request, no persuasion would have induced Nancy to accept what was thus settled for her. She did not even know what she would accept as a solution of the difficulty—even Arthur, did he stand before holding out his arms to her, might by some chance glance, some inadvertent word, turn her from him instead of bringing her to him. Her mind was still high-fantastical, though changed in so many other ways. But all that had happened since she came to Oakley had chimed in with her humour. The advances she had made in knowledge of her husband’s surroundings, and in the favour of his family had been of a kind that pleased and flattered her. The Curtises had been aware of no reason for modifying their criticism of her, or pretending to a liking they did not feel; but they had all “taken to” Nancy; and Lady Curtis had called her “my dear!” How haughtily would she have rejected that expression of kindness had it been applied to Arthur’s wife in the old days; but as given to the young stranger at Oakley, whose looks and ways had attracted my Lady, it was sweet. Yes! she had attracted them, she herself, not anything outside of her. Lucy—Lucy, indeed, had made doubtful response; but Sir John had “raved about her,” and Lady Curtis called her my dear! These thoughts made Nancy’s countenance glow.
And the three intervening days passed quickly in the excitement that possessed her; everybody seemed to know that she was going to the Hall on Saturday. The Doctor’s wife, who had kept aloof “till she saw what other people were going to do,” called at the door in her husband’s phaeton, and left a stately card, which seemed to Matilda, when it was brought to her, much more impressive than Lady Curtis’s. And kind Mrs. Rolt ran over twice a day at least, and asked what she was going to wear. “If it is wet, Sam shall drive you there, before he goes to Oakenden,” she said. She was as fussy about it as if Lady Curtis had been the Queen; and, indeed, she was the Queen of the district, and made the laws for the neighbourhood.
“You will have everybody coming to see you now,” said Cousin Julia. “When Lady Curtis calls on anyone, everybody goes. Yes, it is silly perhaps; but then we think a great deal of Lady Curtis, my dear. She is very amiable, and so clever. Did you ever hear that she sometimes writes for the Reviews? She does indeed; and one must have real genius, you know, to do that; not like little bits of newspapers. And people must have some sort of rule—some will not call unless they have an introduction, and some will call on everybody. But we make Lady Curtis our rule. If she goes, we all go.”
“You did not wait till Lady Curtis came,” said Nancy gratefully.
“Oh, no! I don’t think I could have done it. I fell in love with you the first time I saw you my dear. I told Lucy of it directly. So pretty, I said, (as you are, though people don’t generally say it to your face like me), and quite a lady. ‘Then, of course you should call. I wonder you did not call instantly,’ said Lucy; and I did not lose much time, did I, Mrs. Arthur? Then, of course, I was dying to know who you were.”
“You are very—very kind; but how could you know who I am? I am nobody,” said Nancy with a smile; and then she added impulsively, “but I am so glad you thought me—a lady.” When these unadvised words were out of her mouth, Nancy changed colour, and grew defiant. But her horror at her own mistake was entirely turned away by Cousin Julia’s soft disposition, which was well fitted to be a buckler against wrath.
“As if there could be any doubt of that!” she said, “Lady Curtis says you have such pretty manners, and Sir John! Sir John is really not himself. He thought you must be young Seymour’s wife, whom I was telling you of, who made such an admirable marriage. He married one of the Glencoe family, quite a near relative of the Earl, the most unexceptionable delightful match. How we all thought of poor Arthur when young Seymour was married! But I told Sir John (now you must not be vain, my dear, but of course one must say what one thinks) I told Sir John you were a great deal prettier than Mrs. Henry Seymour; not quite so tall perhaps, but much prettier. What is the matter, my dear, you turn white and you turn red?”