Julia Kavanagh

“ Cornelius devoted to it his brief holiday in the autumn.
"You look pale and ill," said Kate; "you want rest."
"I feel in perfect health; work is my holiday," was his invariable reply.
And to work he fell—harder than ever.
"Yes, yes," she sadly said, "the fever is on you."
The fever was indeed on him; that strange, engrossing fever to which passion is nothing; which to the strong is life, but death to the weak. ”

“ What was it to me that Cornelius left me his love and his kindness, when I knew and felt, with a keener bitterness than words can convey, that I had for ever lost his esteem? Did I, could I, care for an affection from which the very life had departed? No; child as I was in years, something within me revolted from the mere thought of his tenderness and endearments. If he believed me guilty, then let him hate and detest me: sweeter would be his aversion than such fondness as he could bestow on one whom, the more he forgave her, the more he must despise. ”

“ As she sat leaning back in her chair, her hands clasped on her knees, even that simple attire and careless attitude could not disguise the elegant symmetry of her figure; her hands were small and perfect.
"Well!" said Cornelius in a low tone.
"Well!" replied his sister, smiling at the fire with sorrowful triumph in her clear eyes; "she is like her father; she has his eyes; pity she has not his hair, instead of those pale and sickly flaxen locks. Come here, little thing," she added, looking up at me, and holding out her hand.
I hesitated.
"She is very shy, Kate," said Cornelius. ”

“ Kate sat in her usual place, her look sadly fixed on her brother. His face was supported and partly shaded by his hand. He neither moved nor spoke. At length his sister rose and went up to him. She laid her hand on his shoulder, and stooping, said gently—
"Cornelius!"
He looked up at her wistfully, and said, in a low tone—
"Kate, I thought her little less than an angel; what a poor dupe I have been!"
"But you will bear it," she said earnestly, "I know you will."
"Yes," he answered, though his lip trembled a little as he said it; "it is hard, but it is not more than a man can bear." ”

“ I was going straight to the stool by Kate's chair, when Cornelius, who sat on the sofa with Miriam, said, making room for me—
"Daisy, come here."
I felt my unhappy face burn with mortification and shame, as I obeyed and sat down by him. He kissed and caressed me very kindly, but though Miriam never turned towards me her face so pale and calm, nor inflicted the look I dreaded, the thought of her secret triumph rendered me dull and joyless.
"You don't seem very merry," said Cornelius, stooping to look into my face.
"The silly thing is afraid of the looking-glass," pitilessly observed
Kate. ”

“ Jealousy is all quickness of spirit and of sense. I reluctantly endured caresses which I knew not to be mine; if I dared, I would have repelled those overflowings of a heart in whose joy and delight I had not the faintest part. Sweeter, dearer to me was the quiet, careless kiss I was accustomed to get, than all this tenderness springing from love to another. I was glad when Cornelius released me from his embrace; glad to leave him; glad to go upstairs and be wretched in liberty.
Never since Sarah had told me that my father was going to marry Miss Murray, had I felt as I now felt. ”

“ I mean I would rather see you wasting, in successive follies, the best years of your youth, than see you a painter. There comes a time, when, of his own accord, a man gives up passion; but when does the unlucky wight who has once begun to write poetry or paint pictures give them up?"
"Never, unless he never loved them," replied Cornelius, with a triumphant smile; "poetry or painting, which I hold to be far higher, becomes part of a man's being, and follows him to the grave. But it is a desecration to speak of it as a human passion. ”

“ I felt not like you, Cornelius; I would have made myself the slave of him whom I loved, had he wished it."
She folded her hands on her bosom, like one who gloried in her subjection, and continued—
"Proud and wilful as I am, he could bend me to his will. I mistook your energy for power, and thought you could do so too. I mistook my own heart, and thought I could feel again as I once had felt. Since I discovered the twofold mistake, there has been nothing save weariness and vexation of spirit to me. I knew it should end—do not wonder I am now glad and relieved that it is ended." ”

“ I now never went near Cornelius unless when sent by Kate. At first I had hoped he would miss me, but sufficient companionship to him was the charmed presence which haunts the lover's solitude; he asked not why I staid away, and pride forbade me to return.
Passion had seized on him, and she absorbed all his faculties save one: he remained faithful to Art. He was a most enamoured lover, but not even for his mistress did he leave his easel, or lose an hour of daylight. She did not put him to a test, of which it was plain that, of his own accord, he would never dream. ”

“ I am quite resolved not to think of Hymen until, love apart, a woman may take some pride in me."
"They are all alike, all alike," again said Kate; "love for a bit, ambition for life."
Cornelius laughed.
"Miriam would despise me," he observed, "if I could sit down in idleness.
Besides, love is a feeling, not a task: it may pervade a lifetime; I defy
it to fill an entire day without something of weariness creeping in.
There is nothing like work in this world,—nothing, Kate." ”

“ I never felt as if poor Daisy could be such a little traitor. How did he do it, Cornelius?"
"He? really, Kate, I don't know how he did it, for I don't know who he is."
"Some jealous, envious, mean, paltry little fellow of a bad artist," hotly answered Kate. "I can tell you exactly what he's like: he squints, he limps, he wears his hat over his eyes, and is always looking round to see that no one is watching him—I see him—you need not laugh, Cornelius, I can tell you sow he did it; he came in by Deborah's window, and escaped across the leads. ”

“ It is the very shadow of love; and who yet watched the birth of love in a human heart?
I loved Cornelius as an ardent and jealous daughter loves her father, and I was miserable because he bestowed on another that which I neither could wish for, nor even imagine the wish to claim. As was my love, so was my jealousy, filial and childlike: a jealousy of the heart, in which not the faintest trace of any other feeling blended. It was sinful, but it was pure. I did not suffer because Cornelius was in love with Miriam, but because he loved her. ”

“ I sat apart on a low stool, unheeded and silent; I know not what impulse made me look up in the face of our guest and say earnestly—
"Cornelius is gone to see Miss Miriam."
Mr. Smalley started like a man who has received an electric shock. He looked at me, at Kate; her face gave sorrowful confirmation of all he could suspect and dread. He said not a word, but turned very pale.
"Mr. Smalley," said Kate, "have a glass of wine."
He did not answer, he had not heard her; like one in a troubled dream, he passed his handkerchief across his moist brow and trembling lips. ”

“ I cried, giving free vent to the gathered resentment of weeks and months,—"if she does not hate me, Cornelius, why was she so glad when she thought me disfigured with the small-pox, that she should come up to look at me? Why did she give me a dress in which I looked so ill, that you know Kate has never allowed me to wear it? Why did she make you send me to school? Why did she come back from Hastings and make you leave by the Stolen Child? Why did she want you to discontinue teaching me? Why is there never a day but she reminds you that I am sickly, plain, and sallow?" ”

“ If, at twelve, I could have understood and separated feelings that blend so strangely in the heart, I know that I would not have envied Miriam one spark of the passion, but I know that I would still, as I did bitterly, have grudged her every atom of the tenderness. If I did not feel jealousy in that mysterious intensity which has stung so many hearts to madness. I felt it in its calmer bitterness and more patient sorrow. The peculiar agony of this tormenting passion seems to me to lie in the blending of two most opposite feelings: love, from which it springs, and hatred, which it engenders ”

“ Cornelius had detected my jealousy, treated it as a jest, and forgotten it; Kate had, I believe, vaguely conjectured its existence, but I was little with her and on my guard; the only one who really knew what I suffered and why I suffered, was the one who had first inflicted and who now daily embittered the wound. Yes, Miriam knew it: I saw it in her look, in her speech, in her manner; and, if anything could render me more unhappy, it was the consciousness that my miserable weakness lay bare for her to triumph over.
Thus, and more than thus, I felt. Our true life lies in our heart ”

“ With this he turned from me, and removing Medora from the easel, he began looking out for another canvas of the same size. Miriam had looked on, seated on the couch with motionless composure, her calm, statue-like head supported by her hand. She turned round to say—
"What is that for, Cornelius?"
"To begin again, if you do not object. I have already thought of some changes in the attitude."
She looked at him keenly, and not without wonder.
"You soon get over it," she said.
"Why not?" he asked quietly; "do not look astonished, Miriam; I can no more linger over regret than over anger. ”

“ I cannot render the thoughtful look of that child's eyes otherwise than by a stare!"
He spoke quite mournfully: Miriam laughed; her lover looked astonished.
"What about it?" she said.
"Why, that I am painting a bad picture."
"What matter?"
"And the disappointment! the shame!"
"Be more philosophic," she coolly replied: "success is but a chance."
"Begging your pardon, Miriam, it is a chance that falls to the good pictures, consequently it is worth any toil, any sacrifice."
"Yes," she replied, with reproach in the very carelessness of her tone, "you are, like all men, absorbed in your ambition." ”

“ If I had succeeded in inspiring you with an exclusive, all-engrossing passion—even though the cost had been a few pictures less, and the loss of Daisy's heart—know that I would have conferred on you the greatest blessing one human being can bestow on another."
Her eyes shone with inward fire; her cheeks glowed; her parted lips trembled. I do not think we had ever seen her half so beautiful. Cornelius looked at her, and smiled bitterly.
"I pity you," she said, with some scorn; "I pity you, to deride a feeling you cannot feel: know that I at least speak not without the knowledge." ”

“ He laid his hand on her shoulder, and said, with earnest tone and look—
"Kate, I know all you dread; there are obstacles; I see them, and I will conquer them. Obstacles! why if there were none, would anything in this world be worth the winning?"
He had begun calmly; he ended with strange warmth and vehemence, throwing back his head with the presumptuous but not ungraceful confidence of youth. His look was daring, his smile full of trust; to both his sister responded by a mournful glance dimmed with tears. ”

“ Childhood is fatally quick in catching the spirit of contest. I reddened, looked at her, and suddenly pressed my lips to the cheek of Cornelius, conscious this was more than she dare do.
"Be quiet, child!" he said a little impatiently.
I gave him a look of keen reproach; he did not heed it; his eyes were again bent on Miriam; he was again absorbed in her. The child whom he had petted and caressed evening after evening, for two years, was now forgotten as if she had never existed.
"Daisy," said Kate, "come and help me to wind this skein." ”

“ I looked at her wistfully, loath to believe in so hard a sentence.
"It is so," she resumed, sighing: "think of Cornelius as of a very dear friend; love, respect him as much as you will, but expect nothing from him; wean your heart; you must, for his sake, as much as for your own."
"Kate," I replied, "I shall try and not be jealous of his wife."
"My poor child, you do not understand me; indeed it is very difficult; but wives do not like their husbands to care for those who cannot be included in the circle of home; they want to have them for themselves and their children." ”

“ The little studio was burning hot; Cornelius was too much absorbed to be conscious of this, but I felt faint and drowsy. I drew myself up on the couch, laid my head on the cushion, looked at him as he bent with unwearied ardour over his desk, then closed my eyes and fell asleep to the sound of his pen still zealously running along the paper.
I know not how long I slept; I was partly awakened by a sound of whispering voices.
"The dinner will be ruined," said Kate.
"What is a dinner in comparison with a drawing?"
"I don't know—and don't care; a cook has no feelings." ”

“ Was I the first plain girl there had ever been? Should I leave none of the race after me? I felt the more exasperated that the tone of Miriam's voice told me she had not meant to be overheard by me. She had not spoken to taunt me: she had simply stated a fact that could not, it seemed, be disputed. Such reflections are pleasant at no age, but in youth, with its want of independence, of self- reliance, with its sensitive and fastidious self-love, they are insupportable.
Cornelius, unconscious of the storm that was brooding within me, had re- entered the studio and resumed his work. ”

“ Cornelius saw that what I had asked for, and nothing else, I would have. Again he warned me.
"Daisy, you will find it very dull to sit without speaking or moving. I pity you, my poor child."
I was shrewd enough to see through his pity. I looked up into his face, and said demurely—
"I shall not mind it, Cornelius."
"You will mind nothing to have your way—obstinate little thing!—but I warn you: you must come in without knocking, without saying good morning; you must not move, speak, or go in and out; if you break the agreement once, you lose the privilege for ever." ”