"You have heard," he goes on, not daring to look at her, "that I have forsworn marriage. Marriage," passionately, "kills love, and I would rather, ten times over, suffer what I have suffered—and God knows that is not a little!--than a day should come when, having known such divine happiness as I should know were you mine, we should grow cold and weary; when our passions should turn to indifference, to disappointment and heart-burnings, and end, perhaps, in our cherishing feelings of vindictive spite and bitterness against each other, and in my thinking every woman pleasanter and fairer than you, end in your believing me to be the greatest brute under heaven!"
"Oh!" utters Virginia, as she raises her eyes to his face with a look of pained wonder.
"I have seen it a thousand times," he continues vehemently. "I have known men passionately, madly in love with women, ready to count 'the world well lost,' to sacrifice all the future only to call that idol of the moment theirs. I have seen them marry. I have watched the weariness that comes from security even more than from satiety. I have seen the links that were forged in roses become gyves of iron—tenderness and courtesy give place to rudeness and contempt. I never saw but two people perfectly happy, and they," lowering his voice, "were not married. I have sworn a thousand times never to court wretchedness for myself and a woman I loved by loading her and myself with chains. My idea has been this. Some day I may meet with a being who, under natural circumstances, she keeping her freedom and leaving me mine, I might love with all my heart and be faithful to until the day of my death. I would give her all I possessed. I would devote myself to making her happy; if she had to sacrifice anything for my sake, I would atone to her for it by my unwearying love. But," his voice mastered by emotion, "how dare I say such words to you? In the sphere in which you live they would be considered a dastardly insult—one must not dare to move one step from the beaten track of custom. The world would scoff at the idea that my love for you is more sacred and reverent than that of a man who, inspired by a momentary passion for a woman and desiring her, obtains his end by a simple and speedy means, without reflection as to the possible misery of both in the future. And yet," his lips quivering, his face growing deathly white, "I believe I could love you more dearly, love you longer than husband ever loved wife."
Virginia sits rooted to the spot, a deadly anguish strangling her heart. Then, whilst the divine strains of music still flow on, she feels herself drawn to his heart; his lips meet hers in one long kiss that steals her very soul away from her. He is gone—the music has ceased—the night grows chill—she shivers. "The world well lost," she mutters to herself, and then, with listless steps, and strange, affrighted eyes, she drags herself up stairs to her room.
PART II.
In a charming house, surrounded by an acre of ground, turned into a small paradise, a house not more than two miles from Hyde Park Corner, live Philip Vansittart and Virginia Hayward. The neighbourhood knows them as Mr. and Mrs. Vansittart, and has not the very remotest conception that in so perfectly ordered an establishment, there is anything which they would designate as "odd." If anything could arouse suspicion in the breasts of the servants who wait upon them, and the tradespeople who serve them it would be the extraordinary tenderness subsisting between them; the excessive courtesy and consideration of Mr. Vansittart for Mrs. Vansittart, and the entire absence of that familiarity commonly seen between affectionate husbands and wives, which almost invariably engenders subsequent contempt.
The house is furnished with exquisite taste. Mr. Vansittart is continually bringing home artistic treasures to add to its embellishment. Mrs. Vansittart has a carriage and a fine pair of horses. She seldom, however, drives into town except to the play, or to dine. A great many gentlemen of distinction and rank come to the house, who treat Mrs. Vansittart like a queen, and a few ladies; clever, literary ladies, ladies holding peculiar views—very rarely the consorts of distinguished and well-born men.
Is Philip happy? Is Virginia happy? To this I can only reply by another question. Is any one Happy? They love each other with unfailing tenderness—they are all the world to each other—the thought of separation would be death to them. And yet the heart of either is gnawed by a secret worm. In the midst of his busy life, Philip can never forget that he has sacrificed the woman whom he adores from the very bottom of his soul, and the horrible suspicion will stab him, that he has sacrificed her needlessly. They are living as husband and wife, and yet no feeling of weariness, of satiety, comes near them—each day draws them nearer together; makes them find fresh points in each other to love and admire. Were she his wife, occupying her proper sphere in society, sought after, courted, admired, he with no feeling of self-reproach, she with no consciousness (which she must feel though she never betrays) of cruelty and selfishness on his part; might they not be even happier? He forgets to tell himself that they are happy because no tie binds them—nay, he says secretly in his heart that that tie is the only thing wanting to make their felicity perfect. Now, it is too late. The world knows the truth—marriage can never whitewash Virginia in society's eyes—no future can condone the crime of the past. He has settled every farthing he has in the world upon her—no mean fortune—he loads her with gifts—he is perpetually thinking of her pleasure and amusement, and yet, for ever, the load of his debt to her weighs down his soul.
And Virginia? Paul is all in all to her; he is her heart, her soul, her conscience, and yet he cannot shield her from the fate which he has brought upon her. What must inevitably be the sufferings of a proud and pure-minded woman, who knows herself to be an object of scorn to her sex? How would a man, naturally honorable and high-minded, feel, if, in some fatal moment, he had been tempted to commit a forgery, or take an unfair advantage at cards, and was afterwards shunned by every man friend; thrust out of every club, banned utterly from the society of his fellows, except those with whom it would revolt him to associate? This is the only case that can parallel that of a woman who has lost the world for a man's sake; and men who have a difficulty in realizing how great is the sacrifice they compel or accept from a woman, would do well to consider this.
Virginia suffered many a bitter pang when she showed herself in public with Philip. She quivered under the open stare, or the look askance of members of her sex; if she showed a brave front, it was that of the Spartan boy! Philip was particularly fond of the opera and the play; he would not have gone without her; so she accompanied him, and made no demur. Of course every relation and friend she had in the world shunned her as though she were a leper, which indeed, morally, she was in their eyes. She loved society; no woman was more calculated to shine in it, and from this she was cut off. True, they constantly entertained brilliant and clever men, whose conversation and company were very agreeable to her; but, however much a woman may like, may even prefer the society of men, it is a bitter thought to her that she cannot command that of her own sex. And, though men treated her with even a greater and more delicate courtesy than they would perhaps have shown their own women, Virginia was none the less keenly conscious of the moral ban under which she lay.