“I will say nothing till I have spoken to her,” replied the young man evasively. “When can I do this?”
“I cannot possibly fix a time. She is not in a mood to be approached now; any violent shock in her present state might have a fatal result. It would, in all probability, quench for ever the feeble spark of light that still remains, and might bring on a crisis which no skill could alleviate. On the other hand, if we could apply the test at the right moment, the effect might be unexpectedly beneficial. I say unexpectedly, because, for my own part, I have not the slightest hope of any such result.”
“Has her memory quite gone, or does she recall any passages of her past life accurately?”
“Not accurately, I fancy; she seems to have some very vivid impressions of the past, but whether they be clear or not I cannot say. The balance of the mind is, I believe, too deeply shaken for clearness, even on isolated points, to survive in any of the faculties. She talks frequently of going over a great waterfall with her nurse, and describes scenery in a way that rather gave me a hope once. I spoke to her guardian, however, and he said she had never been near a waterfall in her life; that it was some picture which had apparently dwelt in her imagination.”
“He might have his own reasons for deceiving you in that respect,” observed Clide. “His name, you say, is Par…?
“Percival—Mr. Percival.”
“Humph! When people change their names, they sometimes find it convenient to retain the initial,” remarked Clide.
He went home and desired Stanton to look out for a lodging as near as possible to the asylum. A tolerably habitable one was found without delay, and he and his valet installed themselves there at once. The very next day he received a letter from Sir Simon Harness, informing him that Lady Rebecca seemed this time in earnest about betaking herself to a better world, and had desired him, Sir Simon, to be sent for immediately. The French dame de compagnie who wrote to him said they hardly expected her to get through the week.
M. de la Bourbonais had never been a social man since he lived at Dullerton. He said he did not care for society, and in one sense this was true. He did not care for it unless it was composed of sympathetic individuals; otherwise he preferred being without it. He did not want to meet and talk with his fellow-creatures simply because they were his fellow-creatures; there must be some common bond of interest or sympathy between them and him, or else he did not want to see them. When, in the early days at The Lilies, Sir Simon used to remonstrate with him on being so “sauvage,” and wonder how he could bear the dulness, Raymond would reply that no dulness oppressed him like uncongenial company. He had no sympathies in common with the people about the neighborhood, and so he would have no pleasure in associating with them. There was truth in this; but Sir Simon knew that the count’s susceptible pride had influenced him also. He did not want rich people to see his poverty, if they were not refined and intelligent enough to respect it and value what went along with it. He had studiously avoided cultivating any intimacies beyond the few we know, and had so persistently kept aloof from the big houses round about that they had accepted his determination not to go beyond mere acquaintanceship, and never stopped to speak when they met him out walking, but bowed and passed on. But of late Raymond began to feel quite differently about all this. He longed to see these distant acquaintances as if they had been so many near friends; to meet their glance of kindly, if not cordial, recognition; to receive the homage of their passing salutation. It was the dread of seeing these hitherto valueless greetings refused that prevented him stirring beyond his own gate. He marvelled himself at the void that the absence of them was making in his life. He did not dream they had filled such a space in it; that the reflection of his own self-respect in the respect of others had been such a strength and such a need to him. Up to this time Franceline had more than satisfied all his need of society at home, with the pleasant periodical addition of Sir Simon’s presence, while his work had amply supplied his intellectual wants; but suddenly he was made aware of a new need—something undefined, but that he hungered for with a downright physical hunger.
Franceline’s spirit and heart were too closely bound up in her father’s not to feel the counter-pang of this mental hunger. She could not help watching him, though she strove not to do it, and, above all, not to let him see that she was watching him. She might as well have tried not to draw her breath or to stop the pulsations of her heart. Her eyes would fasten on him when he was not looking, and she could not but see that the expression of his face was changed. A hard, resolved look had come over it; his eyebrows were always protruded now, and his lips drawn tight together under the gray fringe of his mustache. She knew every turn of his features, and saw that what had once been a passing freak under some sudden thought or puzzling speculation in his work had now become a settled habit. She longed to speak; to invite him to speak. It would have been so much easier for both; it would lighten the burden to them so much if they could bear it together, instead of toiling under it apart. But Raymond was silent. It never crossed his mind for a moment that Franceline knew his secret. If he had known it, would he have spoken? Sometimes the poor child felt the silence was unbearable; that at any cost she must break it and know the truth of the story which had reached her in so monstrous a form. But the idea that her father knew possibly nothing of it kept her back. But supposing he was silent only to spare her? Perhaps he was debating in his own mind what the effect of the revelation would be on her; wondering if she, too, would join with his accusers, or, even if she did not do this, whether she might not be ashamed of a father who was branded as a thief. When these thoughts coursed through her mind, Franceline felt an almost irresistible impulse to rush and fling her arms around his neck and tell him how she venerated him, and how she scorned with all her might and main the envious, malignant fools who dared to so misjudge him. But she never yielded to the impulse; the inward conflict of lodgings and shrinkings and passionate, tender cries of her heart to his made no outward sign. Raymond sat writing away at his desk, and Franceline sat by the fire or at the window reading and working, day after day. The idea occurred to her more than once that she would write to Sir Simon; but she never did. She did not dare open her heart to Father Henwick. How could she bring herself to tell him that her father was accused of theft? It was most probable—she hoped certain—that the abominable suspicion had not travelled to his ears; and if so, she could not speak of it. This was not her secret; it was no breach of confidence towards her spiritual father to be silent, and the selfish longing to pour out her filial anger and outraged love into a sympathizing ear should not hurry her into a betrayal of what was, even in its falsity, humiliating to Raymond. It was hard to refrain from speech when speech would have been a solace; but Franceline knew that the sacrifice of the cup of cold water has its reward, just as the bestowal has. Peace comes to us on surer and swifter wing when we go straight to God for it, without putting the sympathy of creatures between us and his touch.