“Certainly not,” said the young man. “She is my mother; that ought to be enough for anybody. And I shall have her come to see me the same as if she were a duchess; but, still, there is no need of publishing to everybody what she is when she is at home.”
“That is true, that is true,” said the Signor. “Then you really think there is a chance that this is how it will end?”
“Master,” said Purcell, pausing at the door before they entered. It was one of the Italian traditions which had lingered in the Signor’s habitual bearing, to stand still now and then as he was walking, by way of giving emphasis to a sentence. They paused now, looking at each other before they went in, and the colour came to the young fellow’s face. “Master,” he said, “it may look self-sufficient—but how can it end otherwise? There is no one else who will offer her what I can offer her; and it would be like saying she had no sense, which is very far from the case, to think she would stand out for ever. She is a lady, she is above me in birth; but, thanks to you, I know how to behave like a gentleman; and surely, sooner or later, this is how it must end.”
“Amen, with all my heart,” said the Signor, turning in at the door, which old Pick held open behind, waiting, as one who knew his master’s way.
It was Mr. Ashford who had intoned the service that afternoon, and his attention had been so caught by Polly’s entrance that he had made a kind of stumble in the beginning—a pause which was perceptible. After that, during the singing of the anthem and at other moments when his attention was free, he had looked down upon that gorgeous apparition from his high desk with a look of compassion on his face. The compassion, it is needless to say, was not for Polly, who wanted none of it. He watched her behind his book, or behind the hand which supported his head, with the most curious alarmed attention. And when he passed her with her husband going out, Mr. Ashford looked at her in a way which Polly thought to be flattering. “That’s one as takes an interest in us,” she said. “It’s Ashford, the Minor Canon. It must be you he takes an interest in,” whispered the Captain, and Polly laughed and tossed her head. Mr. Ashford went home with the same strange look on his face, softened, and touched, and pitiful. “Poor thing,” he said to himself, “poor girl!” and when he got in he sat for a long time in the centre window, in the dark, looking out, and trying to think out some way of help. What could he do for her? Poor thing! with all her better instincts and higher feelings, with her impulse of taking care of everybody and keeping her father and brother right, what would become of her now? Mr. Ashford asked himself, with many an anxious thought, what could be done? A man could do nothing—where it was a girl that was in the case a man was more helpless than a baby. He could do nothing to help her; he could not even show his sympathy without probably doing more harm than good to the sufferer. He sat in the window-seat, gazing out on the dusk and the dim horizon, as if they could help him in his musings. If he had only had a mother or sister—any woman to whom he could have appealed, he thought he must have done so on behalf of this girl. But he had neither sister nor mother. He was a man very much alone in the world. He had a brother, a poor clergyman, with a large family, and a wife, who would not understand in the least why Ernest should interest himself in a stranger—a girl. If he wanted some one to spend his money upon, why not take one of the children? he thought he heard her say; and certainly she would not understand, much less respond to, any appeal he could make to her. What could he do? If any other suggestion swept across Mr. Ashford’s face in the dark or through his heart, nobody was there to see or divine it. He sat thus without ringing for his lamp till it was quite late, and was much discomposed to be found sitting in the dark when a messenger arrived with a note from the Deanery about the extra service for the next saint’s-day. He was annoyed to be found so, being conscious, perhaps, of reasons for the vigil which he would not have cared to enter upon; for he was shy and sensitive, and it had often happened to him to be laughed at, because of his undue anxiety about others. “What is it to you?” had been often said to him, and never with more occasion than now. For, after all, what did it matter to the Minor Canon what became of Lottie Despard? Whether she and her stepmother should “get on” together, or if they should never “get on,” but yet might manage to live under the same roof a cat-and-doggish life—what was it to him? One way or other, it would not take sixpence out of his pocket, or affect his comfort in any way. But yet he could not get it out of his head. No one in the house had thought of coming to his room to light his lamp, to see that all was in order for him. He was not served with precision, as was the Signor, for he was fond of saving his servants trouble and making excuses for them. And when the man came from the Deanery and followed the maid into the study, where she went groping, declaring that her master was not at home, the Minor Canon was uncomfortable, finding himself thus taken by surprise. “You need not wait for an answer. I will send one in the morning,” he said, when the candles on the writing-table had been lit with a match, and he had read the note. He felt that his confused and troubled thoughts might be read in his eyes. But nobody had any clue to the subject of these thinkings; and how could anyone suspect that it was a matter of such absolute indifference to himself that was occupying his thoughts—a thing with which he had nothing in the world to do?
CHAPTER XXXII.
WHAT ROLLO HAD TO MARRY ON.
The moment after a man has made a proposal of marriage, and has been accepted, is not always a moment of unmitigated blessedness. There are ups and downs in the whole business from beginning to end. Sometimes the man has the best of it, and sometimes the woman. When either side has betrayed itself without a response on the other, when the man seems to waver in his privilege of choice, when the woman hesitates in her crowning prerogative of acceptance or rejection, then there are intervals on either side which are not enviable; but when all these preliminaries are over, and the explanation has been made, and the two understand each other—then the lady’s position is, for the first few days at least, the most agreeable. She has no parents to interview, no pecuniary investigations to submit to, nor has she to enter upon the question of ways and means, settlements and income for the future. But when a man who knows he has nothing to marry upon is beguiled by circumstances, by a sudden emergency, or by strain of feeling into the momentous offer, and, after the first enthusiasm of acceptance, looks himself in the face, as it were, and asks himself how it is to be done, there is something terrible in the hours that follow. How was it to be done? Rollo Ridsdale left Lottie at her door, and went across the road towards the Deanery in a state of mind which was indescribable. He was not an immaculate man, nor had he now spoken of love, for the first time; but yet he was real in his love, and the response had been sweet to him—sweet and terrible, as conveying every risk and danger that life could bring, as well as every delight. He had lingered with his love until the last available moment, and yet it was a relief to turn his back upon her, to go away into the chaos of his own life and try to find a way out of this maze in which he had involved himself. How was he to marry? what was he to do? He felt giddy as he walked along, steadily enough to outward seeming, but in his soul groping like a blind man. He had asked Lottie Despard to marry him, and she had consented. He wanted nothing better than her companionship, her love, the delight and comfort of her to be his own; but, good heavens!—but, by Jove!—but, in the name of everything worth swearing by—how was it to be done?—how was he to marry? what was he to do? The happiness was delicious—it was a taste of Paradise, a whiff of Elysium—but——. Rollo did not know where he was going as he crossed the Dean’s Walk. He went—steadily enough, his legs carrying him, his knowledge of the place guiding him mechanically, but his whole soul in a maze of thought. How was he to do it? How could he, a man with nothing, not much better than an adventurer, living upon chances and windfalls—how could he weight himself with the support of another—marry a wife? It was preposterous, it was terrible—yet it was sweet. Poor child, she was in want of his arm to shelter her, in want of some one to take care of her, and he could not tolerate the idea that anyone but himself should give her the succour she needed; but how was he to do it? The question seemed to get into the air and whisper round him—how was he to do it? He had nothing, or what to such a man was nothing, and worse than nothing. He managed to live no one could tell how. True, in living he did not know how Rollo managed to spend a good deal of money—more than many a family is reared upon; but there is proportion in everything, and he never could tell from one year’s end to another how he had got through. And he had asked a girl to marry him! He groaned within himself when he came back to this centre thought, this pivot of all his reflections, though it was sweet. He had asked her to marry him; he had pledged himself to take her away out of her troubles, to throw open a refuge to her, to make her escape practicable: speedily, certainly, easily, so far as she knew—and how was he to do it? If the question went through his mind once, it flew and circled in wavering rounds about him, like a moth or a bat in summer, a hundred times at least as he went from the Chevalier’s lodge to the Deanery door. He had no time for thinking, since the hour of dinner approached, and the Dean waited for no one; but he thought and thought all the same. What was he to do? He marry! how was he to do it? Yet it must be done. He did nothing but ask himself this while he brushed his hair and tied his evening tie. He had nothing, not a penny—he had a valet and a dressing-case, with gold tops to all the bottles, and the most expensive clothes from the dearest tailor—but he had nothing, and everybody knew that he had nothing. The situation was appalling. A cold dew came out on his forehead; he to do such a thing! but yet he had done it—he had committed himself—and now the question that remained was—not how to get out of it, which under any other circumstances would have been his clear duty, but how to do it? This was the problem he tried to solve while he was dressing, which flitted about his head while he sat at dinner, between every mouthful of his soup, and fluttered all through the dessert. How was he to do it? And when the evening was over—when Lady Caroline had gone to bed, and the Dean to his study, Rollo at length ventured out into the Deanery garden with his cigar, in spite of the black looks of Mr. Jeremie, who wanted to shut up the house and get to bed himself at a reasonable hour, as a dean’s butler has a right to do.
It was cold—but he did not feel the cold—and the wind was still strong, blowing the black branches wildly about the leaden sky. The Dean’s garden was bounded by the Slopes, only a low and massive grey wall, as old as the buttresses amid which the lawn was set, separating it from the larger grounds, which were open to the community—and Rollo leaning on that wall could almost see the spot where he had sat with Lottie, when she had clasped her hands on his arm, leaning upon him with delicious trust, and giving up all her future into his hands. Even then what a difference there had been between them!—she throwing herself upon him in utter faith and confidence, feeling herself delivered completely and at once from all the troubles that overwhelmed her; while he, even in the thrill of pleasure which that soft weight and pressure gave him, felt his heart jump with such sudden alarm as words could not describe. Now, when he thought it over, the alarm was more than the pleasure. Lottie, retired into her little chamber, was at that hour going over the whole scene with the tenderest happiness and reliance—feeling safe with him, feeling free of all responsibility, not even forecasting the future, safe and relieved from all the anxieties of the past, caring for nothing but this moment, this exquisite climax of life, this perfect union that had begun and was never to end. Very, very different were Rollo’s thoughts. How was he to do it? Marry! the very idea seemed impossible. It involved disclosure, and disclosure would be madness. What would his relations say to him?—what would his friends say to him? His tradesmen would send in their bills, his associates would contemplate him with the very horror of astonishment. Ridsdale married! as well cut his throat at once. Had he ever thought of the little ménage on which Lottie’s thoughts (had they been free to plan anything) would have dwelt with simple pride and happiness, he would have been disposed really to cut his throat. In such a case Lottie would have been sure of her own powers—sure that if they were poor she could make their money go twice as far as Rollo by himself could make it go—and could much more than balance her share of the expenses by the housewifely powers which it would have been her delight and her ambition to exercise. But to Rollo love in a cottage was a simple folly, meaning nothing. The very idea was so foreign to him that it never entered into his mind at all. What did enter into his mind, as the only hope in the blank of the future, was of a very different description. It was the original idea which had first of all moved him towards this girl, who gradually had awakened within him so many other sentiments: her voice. Should he be able to produce this as he hoped, then there would be a way of escape from the difficulty. The Manager had behaved like a fool, but Rollo had not changed his opinion. Though he had fallen in love with the singer, and his sentiments in regard to her had thus been modified, he had never changed his opinion. She possessed a magnificent organ; and though (which seemed to him very strange) Handel at present was her only inspiration, yet he felt that with proper care that voice could do anything, and that in it might yet lie all the elements of fortune. Casting about around all his horizon for something like salvation, this was the only light that Rollo perceived. It, perhaps, was not the most desirable of lights. To marry a singer in full heyday of her powers, admired by all the world, and making a great deal of money, was not a thing that any younger son would hesitate to do; but an unknown singer, with all her way to make, and her very education still so imperfect, that was a very different matter; but still it was the only chance. In former times, perhaps, a man would have thought it necessary to pretend at least a desire to snatch his bride from the exposure of publicity, from the stage, or even from the concert-room—a determination to work for her rather than to let her work for him; but along with circumstances sentiments change, and the desire of women for work is apt to be supported from an undesirable side by those who once would have thought their honour concerned in making women’s work unnecessary. In civilisation there can be no advance without its attendant drawback. Mr. Ridsdale had fallen in love, a thing no young man can entirely guard against, and he had engaged to marry Lottie Despard, partly because he was in love with her, partly because she was in want of protection and succour. But he did not know in what way he could keep a wife; and short of breaking his word and abandoning her altogether (things which at this moment it seemed utterly impossible to do), what other way was open to him than to consider how his wife could keep him? This was a great deal more easy. He had nothing—no money, no profession—but she had a profession, a something which was worth a great deal of money, which only required cultivation to be as good as a fortune. Rollo’s heart perceptibly lightened as he thought of this. It did not make the social difficulties much easier, or soften the troubles which he must inevitably have with his family; but still, whereas the other matter had been impossible, this brought it within the range of things that could be contemplated. He could not refrain from one sigh (in the undercurrent of his mind—not dwelt upon or even acknowledged, a thing which he would have been ashamed of had he admitted it to himself)—one sigh that the idea of marriage had come in at all. She might have found in him all the succour, all the companionship, all the support she wanted without that; and it would have done her no harm in her after career. But that was a secret thought—an inadvertence, a thing which he dared not permit himself to think, as it were, in the daylight, in his own full knowledge. He knew very well what a fool he would appear to everybody—how the idea that he, Rollo, with all his experience, should be thus taken in at last, would cause infinite surprise and laughter among his friends—but still there came a gleam of possibility into the matter when he thought of Lottie’s gift. By that means they might do it. It was not quite out of the question, quite impossible. Rollo had been so lost in thought that he had not seen Mr. Jeremie looking out from the window through which he had gone into the garden; but as he arrived at this, which was a kind of conclusion, if not a very satisfactory one, he became at last aware of the respectable butler’s anxiety.
“Her ladyship, sir, don’t hold with leaving the windows open,” said Mr. Jeremie, who did not hold with staying out of bed to attend upon a young man’s vagaries. There had been nothing of this kind in Miss Augusta’s time—not even when Mr. Daventry came courting. Rollo tossed the end of his cigar over the wall and came in, somewhat relieved in his mind, though the relief was not very great. It left all the immediate question unsolved—what his family would say, and what was to be done in the meantime—but it gave a feeble light of possibility in the future. He had calculated on Lottie’s voice to make his fortune when he thought of it only as a speculator. He had much more right to look upon her as likely to make his fortune now.
In the morning the same thought was the first in Rollo’s mind; but the faint light of hope it gave was surrounded by clouds that were full of trouble. Supposing that in the course of time, when she was thoroughly established in her profession, trained and started, she could manage to attain that most necessary thing called an income, with which to meet the world—this was a contingency which still lay in the future; whereas it might be necessary to act at once. The very urgency and anxiety of Rollo’s thoughts will show that he neither wanted to abandon Lottie nor to allow her to guess that he was alarmed by his engagement to her. The whole scope and object of his deliberations was to make the thing possible. But for this why should he have troubled himself about it at all? He might have “let things take their course”—he might have gone on enjoying the delights of love-making, and all a lover’s privileges, without going any further. Lottie was not the kind of girl who ever would have hurried matters, or insisted upon the engagement being kept. He knew well enough that she would never “pull him up.” But he was in love with Lottie—he wanted to deliver her from her troubles—he wanted to have her for his own—if he could only see how it was to be done. Evidently there were various conditions which must be insisted on—which Lottie must yield to. Public notice must not be called to the tie between them more than was absolutely necessary. Everything must be conducted carefully and privately—not to make any scandal—and not to compel the attention of his noble family. Rollo did not want to be sent for by his father, to be remonstrated with by his elder brother, to have all his relatives preaching sermons to him. Even his aunt Caroline, passive, easy-going soul—even she would be roused, he felt, to violence, could she divine what was in the air. Marry Miss Despard! the idea would drive her out of all the senses she possessed. Kind as she was, and calm as she was, Rollo felt that in such circumstances she would no longer be either kind or calm; and if even Lady Caroline were driven to bay, what would be the effect of such a step on Lord Courtland, who had no calm of nature with which to meet the revelation? Therefore his heart was heavy as he went out, as soon as the bells had ceased ringing for matins, to meet his love on the Slopes. His heart was heavy, yet he was not a cool or indifferent lover. The thought of seeing her again was sweet to him; but the cares were many, and he did not know how to put into language which would not vex or hurt her the things that must be said. He tried to wrap them up in honeyed words, but he was not very successful; and at last he decided to leave it all to Providence—to take no thought for what he was to say. “The words will be put into my mouth at the right time,” he said to himself piously. He could not exactly forecast what shape the conversation might take, or how this special subject should be introduced. He would not settle what he had to say, but would leave it to fate.