Molly Elliot Seawell

“ It never occurred to Throckmorton to feel jealous of any woman’s wit. One of his greatest charms to Judith was that he was not in the least afraid of her. Her quick feminine humor, her natural acuteness, her knack of pretty expression in speech and writing, appeared in their true light, as mere accomplishments, contrasted with Throckmorton’s firm and masculine mind. The conviction of his mental grasp, his will-power, all that goes to make a man fitted to command a woman, had in it a subtile attraction for Judith, like the spell that beauty casts over a man. ”

“ The certainty one has of happiness is the life of love; but that certainty I never had. I never knew whether Jacqueline’s love would be enough for me, even had it been mine; and I could never shake off a horrible fear that mine would not be enough for her.”
Judith, who had listened silently to this, suddenly leaned forward and gazed at him involuntarily. The thought in her mind was, that no ordinary woman would be enough for Throckmorton. He could give much, but he would ask for much. Like all men of commanding sense and character, he was exacting. ”

“ Throckmorton reminded himself that miracles sometimes happened in love. He did not suffer himself to think what Jacqueline would be twenty years from then. Time is always fatal to women of her type. Even her beauty was essentially the beauty of youth. In twenty years she would be stout and florid. Here Throckmorton, in his reflections, unexpectedly went off on Judith. Hers was a beauty that would last—the beauty of expression, of esprit. Then his thoughts, with a sort of shock, reverted to Jacqueline.
As for Freke, Throckmorton did not once connect him with Jacqueline. ”

“ So far, though, from making me suffer more, the hope of befriending him is the only hope I have left in the world. I wonder how it feels to have one’s heart aching and throbbing for another woman’s husband—to be counting time by the times one sees him? For assuredly a few words spoken by a priest can not change this.” She struck her heart. “And in everything Jacqueline will be blest above me. See how poor and straitened we are, and Jacqueline’s life will be free from any care at all! However, to be loved by Throckmorton must mean to be rich and free and happy.” ”

“ Temple were anxious about Jacqueline, but by no means despairing. Neither of them thought that anybody could die without having anything ostensibly the matter. Judith, on the contrary, thought this the most alarming thing about Jacqueline. There she lay, steadily losing her hold on life, without any reason in the world that she should not be up and about—except, indeed, that sickness of the soul which saps the very foundations of life. This fear that Jacqueline was slipping away from them impelled her to write Throckmorton a few lines—guarded, but without disguising anything. ”

“ He was charmed with the simplicity of the people at Barn Elms—the simplicity of genuine country people, whose outlook is upon nature. He had often heard that country people never were really sophisticated, and he began to believe it. Even in the stirrings of his own heart toward the place of his boyhood, after the lapse of so many busy and exciting years, he recognized the spell that Nature lays softly upon those whose young eyes have seen nothing but her. Throckmorton, in spite of a certain firmness that was almost hardness, was at heart a sentimentalist. ”

“ Jacqueline herself was deeply interested in this gown; more so than in any particular of the coming wedding. Judith had marked off for herself a certain task of work each day upon the embroidery of the gown. Every night, when she stopped at the end of her task, it was as if another stone were laid upon her heart. Throckmorton had noticed her industry, and had admired her handiwork, which she proudly showed him. ”

“ In her quiet life Judith had never been brought face to face with any terrible emergency, and this one unnerved and horrified her so that for a time she was as helpless as Jacqueline. She walked the floor, struggling with the wild impulse to send for Throckmorton; that he alone could tell them what to do; and else she and the poor child would sink under the horror of the situation, for to her simple and straightforward mind both conscience and the social code were unalterably opposed to considering a divorced man as a single man. ”

“ The shock, the horror of it, the willingness to idealize the dead man, had made her quietly assume the part of one who is done with this world. And Nature struggles vainly with Fate. Judith, in her black gown, and a widow’s cap over her chestnut hair, with her pretty air of wisdom and experience, fancied she had sounded the whole gamut of human love, grief, loss, and joy. Neither Millenbeck, nor anything but Beverley’s child and his father and mother and sister, mattered anything to her, she thought. ”

“ But she, after a little pause, laid her hand on his shoulder—he was not a tall man, like General Temple, and she could easily reach it—and said: “I hope you—will find Judith, George Throckmorton.”
He went forth and struck out toward the belt of fragrant pines, where he knew Judith oftenest walked. It was spring again—April, with the delicious smell of the newly plowed earth in the air, and [Pg 302] the faint perfume of the coming leaves—the putting-forth time. The entrancing stillness that all people born and nurtured in the country love so much was upon the soul of Nature. ”

“ Temple is, I pretended that my heart was broken; but I tell you, Beverley Temple never touched my heart, either in life or death, although I did not know it then. But for—for some time the deceit has lain heavy upon me. I am tired of pretending to be what I am not. I wish for life, for love, for happiness.”
She stopped and threw herself into a chair with an abandon that Throckmorton had never seen before. Still, he did not utter a word. But Judith knew that he was keenly observing her, feeling for her, and even deeply moved by what she told him. ”

“ Sometimes Judith and Throckmorton, smiling, would watch them. Jack liked Mrs. Beverley immensely, but he confided to Jacqueline that he was a little afraid of her—just as Jacqueline candidly admitted she was in awe of Major Throckmorton. Throckmorton, watching this childish boy and girl fun, would sometimes laugh inwardly and grimly at himself. How true was it, as Mrs. Sherrard had said, that Jacqueline would make a good playmate for Jack! And then he would turn to Judith, and try to persuade himself of her sweetness and truth. But love comes not by persuasion. ”

“ He reminded Judith that we should accept peace and tranquillity thankfully, and that it was no sin to be happy; and everything that Throckmorton said commended itself to Judith. For the first time in her narrow and secluded life she enjoyed with him the pleasure of being as clever as she wanted to be. He was no timid soul, like Edmund Morford, to fear a rival in a woman. ”

“ This suddenly put the notion of a walk into her head. Judith was engaged in reading Napier’s History of the Peninsular Wars to General Temple, and Jacqueline had only herself for company. So, carrying her huge muff in which she plunged her arms up to her elbows, she started off. It was a raw autumn afternoon. The leaves had not yet all fallen, although the ground was dank with them, and the peculiar stillness of a lonely and lowland country was upon the monotonous landscape. The entire absence of sounds is a characteristic of that sort of country, and it makes a gloomy day more gloomy. ”

“ Judith thought that Jacqueline, in her simplicity, had taken it literally; but she had not.
“Once, Throckmorton read some in this book to me. He said that meant human life—that little moment. Why can’t people let other people be comfortable in that least space, instead of—of—killing them as—being so unkind to them?” Jacqueline stopped. Her mind was ever working on that deep resentment against her county people. “And Throckmorton, too,” she continued, after a pause, “you know, Judith, how noble he is—and see how they have treated him!” ”

“ Johnson’s thundering against female fools: “Sir, a man usually marries a fool, with the expectation of ruling her; but the fool, sir, invariably rules the man.” But all this went to pieces when he saw Jacqueline. She was to him as if a figure of Youth had stepped out of a white Greek frieze; and whenever he realized this charm of hers, he sighed to himself profoundly.
People are never too old or too sensible to commit follies, but people of sense and experience suffer the misery of knowing all about their follies when they do commit them. ”

“ The grandfather and grandmother daily more adored the child. Judith thought sometimes they were fast forgetting Jacqueline. The grass was quite green over Jacqueline by this time, and the head-stone had lost its perfect whiteness. But to Judith there was no forgetting. She had loved the child as if she had been her own, and she loved Throckmorton still. Jack wrote to her at intervals, his letters always containing some allusion to Jacqueline. Judith thought sometimes, with wonder, that Fate should not in the first instance have united those two young creatures, boy and girl. ”

“ Judith seemed to be the only person who was concerned to make Jacqueline love him; to regard the girl as a woman, and not as a child. For Jacqueline herself, she was as changeable as the weather. Had she been steadily indifferent to him, Throckmorton would have thought nothing necessary but a manly fight to win her; but sometimes she showed devoted fondness for him, and, without rhyme or reason, she would change into the coldest indifference or teasing irritability. Throckmorton told himself it was the coyness and fickleness of a young girl in love ”

“ Edmund Morford, who was afraid that laughing was injurious to his dignity, tried not to smile, but Freke was too comical for him.
Amid all the laughter and jollity and good-cheer, Jacqueline sat, glancing shyly up at Throckmorton once in a while with a look that Nature had endowed her with, and which, had she but known it, was a full equivalent to a fortune. She had never, in all her simple provincial life, seen anything like this—endless forks and spoons at the table; queer ways of serving queerer things ”

“ Anguish and despair, like other passions, spend themselves. Judith had ceased to weep, and lay on her bed with a sort of icy torpor upon her. Little Beverley, who rarely stirred in his sleep, waked up and called for his mother; but even the child’s voice had no power to move her. The little boy, finding himself unnoticed, crawled out of his small bed and came to his mother’s side. The sound of his baby voice, the touch of his little warm, moist hands, awakened something like remorse in her. ”