She was not jealous, her mingled good nature and self-conceit constituted a panoply against jealousy, while the mutual attraction between the ladies relieved her from the obligation of entertaining the mayor’s friend.
Master Charles had a little more knowledge of the world, but it seemed to him the most natural thing possible, that two elegant young women belonging to another order from that of a good soul like his sister Deb, with a similarity in misfortune, serving farther to unite them, should be irresistibly drawn to each other. He would have been astonished if they had kept apart.
He was not struck by the spontaneousness and equality of the friendship. He did not pause to think that Madam Sundon, who had the reputation with the mayor’s family of being high as well as gracious, and determined and discreet even to hardness, in breaking with her forsworn infatuated husband, was not a likely person to rush without a sufficient motive into an intimate friendship with a young woman in Mrs. Barlowe’s position. The mere circumstance that Mrs. Barlowe’s presence at Nutfield was an abnormal element of daily life, was enough to convince Master Charles that it would fit into the other abnormal elements, as a necessity of the case.
While Miss Kingscote and Master Charles accorded their ready consent to the connection, it would be difficult to tell its preciousness to Lady Bell. It was like sunshine irradiating a dull landscape, like water springing up in a desert, like the restoration of an alien to forfeited privileges, never before held so dear.
The atmosphere of high-bred and refined society was regained. A sense of reliance in the presence of a powerful friend was experienced. The delightful tie of sisterhood, to which Lady Bell had not been born, was acquired. The wholesome antidote of passionate interest in and deep pity for another, tried as sorely as Lady Bell had been tried, was supplied. Lady Bell had the constant example of Mrs. Sundon’s dignified reserve and womanly fortitude. She shared in the higher intelligence of her friend. She received from Mrs. Sundon many pieces of information for which she had been secretly longing. She found the most charming plaything in Mrs. Sundon’s baby.
Such were some of the many benefits which Mrs. Sundon’s unexpected appearance on the scene brought to Lady Bell, and for which she gave thanks.
Mrs. Sundon was never “high” to Lady Bell; not only was she too magnanimous and loyal a woman to forget old service, because its gain had passed away—there was balm to the woman’s wounded spirit in the girl’s enthusiastic admiration and firm faith.
Only slightly separated in years, both of them wives, and unhappy wives, Lady Bell was still half a lifetime younger in experience than Mrs. Sundon.
Next to her child, Lady Bell became the consolation and interest of Mrs. Sundon’s life—blighted by a blight of which she could not speak. Lady Bell, too, had been wounded by the hunters, but her wound had not been dealt by the hand of a friend, and had not pierced to the quick. Mrs. Sundon could not only cherish Lady Bell, she could devise plans for the girl’s restoration to life and happiness.
END OF VOL. I.