Mrs. Molesworth

“ But Mary saw the softening expression that came over his face, and smiled slightly, but bitterly. And then Mr Cheviott saw that her paleness was not that of timidity or ordinary agitation, but of intense, wrathful indignation, and he thereupon hardened his heart.
“Why,” said Mary, after a little pause, and her voice, though low, was distinct and clear—“why, may I ask, do you say that it is especially on my sister’s account that you are glad to find that I possess what you so kindly call so much power of perception?” ”

“ Two minutes after Miss Winstanley left the room Captain Beverley entered it.
“Alys,” he said, as he came in, “Laurence said you wanted me, so here I am. Why, what’s the matter, child?” he added, with a quick change of tone as he caught sight of her face. She was not crying, but her cheeks were burning and her eyes gleaming, and as she looked up to answer her cousin, he saw that she was biting her lips in a quick nervous way to keep back the tears—a gesture peculiar to her from childhood.
“Everything is the matter,” she said, bitterly. “I feel as if I should never trust any one again. ”

“ Should you be afraid of marrying a poor man—a really poor man?”
Lilias smiled.
“I half fancied there was something of that kind,” she said. “No,” she went on, “I should not be afraid of marrying you as a poor man. I have no special love for poverty in the abstract. I know too much of it. And I am no longer, you know, what people call ‘a mere girl.’ I am two-and-twenty, and have had time to become practical.”
“It looks like it,” said Arthur, smiling too.
“But my practicalness makes me not afraid of poverty on the other hand,” pursued Lilias. “I have seen how much happiness can co-exist with it. ”

“ How shall we ever get on without Miss Western?”
“I shall have to make the best of Mrs Golding, I suppose,” said Alys, in a melancholy voice. “But she fusses so! Oh, Laurence, isn’t it a pity? Just as I have found a girl who could be to me the friend I have wished for and needed all my life, a friend whom even you, now that you know her, approve of for me, that she should have this prejudice against knowing us. Indeed, it must be more than prejudice. She is too sensible and right-minded to be influenced by that.” ”

“ Of course it is natural I should feel pain in parting from Alys, whom I can never be with again; but, besides that, I am sorry to have done with the whole affair—the queer incongruous life, the old kitchen in the evenings, and Mr Cheviott and his books in the corner, the feeling I am of use to her, to them both, that they would have been wretchedly uncomfortable without me, and that even now that I am away for an hour they will be missing me. What queer, inconsistent complications we human beings are! ”

“ Mr Cheviott did not at once reply; he seemed as if reflecting over what she had said.
“I wonder what he is thinking about,” thought Mary. “He must know we are poor. We have made no secret of it to Captain Beverley.”
“Shall we try again?” said Mr Cheviott, suddenly. “If I do my best, there is no saying but that, in time, I may catch a little of your verve, Miss Western.”
“You think I have a superabundance of it,” said Mary, good-humouredly; and, “Yes,” she added, when they stopped again, “that is better, decidedly.” ”

“ Arthur shuddered.
“For shame, Laurence,” he said, angrily. “Do you think it’s good taste, or good feeling either, to sneer in that way when you must—when you cannot but see what all this is to me?”
“It is not pleasant to myself,” observed Mr Cheviott, “which never seems to occur to you, as I said before. My allusion to Alys’s death should remind you of this. As things are, nothing—really nothing else than the death of the creature dearest to me on earth can clear me from the odious position I am placed in.” ”

“ You ill, Alys, and Miss Western nursing you. I could fancy it had always been so—in a dreamy, vague sort of way.”
“I know how you mean,” said Mary.
“Shall you be sorry when it is over, Laurence,” said Alys, “and we are back again at Romary, without our guardian angel?”
“One is always sorry, in a sense, when anything is over, at least, I am. I suppose I have the power of settling myself in a groove to an unusual degree,” said Mr Cheviott, evasively.
“You certainly have not the power of making pretty speeches,” said Alys. “I called Mary ‘our guardian angel,’ and you call her a ‘groove’.” ”

“ Arthur was startled. He felt that already he had all but gone too far, and Mr Cheviott’s words recurred to him. “If the girl be what you think her, would she accept you if she knew it would be to ruin you?” Recurred to him, however, but to be rejected as a plausible piece of special pleading. “Ruin him,” yes, indeed, if she, the only woman he had ever cared for, threw him over, then they might talk of ruining him. And were there no Lilias in the world, could he have asked Alys to marry him—Alys, his little sister—now that he knew what it was to love with a man’s whole love? ”

“ Her voice was low and quivering.
“Hard!” repeated Mary, with amazement in her tone. She hard to Lilias! What fearful injustice—for a moment she felt too staggered to speak—how could Lilias misjudge her so? What a world it must be where such near friends could make such mistakes! Had she ever so misjudged any one? And, by an association of ideas which she herself could not have explained, her mind suddenly reverted to that never-to-be-forgotten scene in the Romary library, and the look on Mr Cheviott’s face which she had determined not to recognise as one of pain. ”

“ Would she really be so glad to be home again? She had used Mr Cheviott’s expression, and it led her into the train of thought which had suggested it to him. Yes, there was truth in what he said. In almost every kind of life, in almost any circumstances, even if painful in themselves, there grows up secretly, as the days pass on, a curious, undefinable charm—a something it hurts us to break, though, till the necessity for so doing is upon us, we had been unconscious of its existence.
“It must be that,” said Mary. ”

“ You, the man who, in deference to contemptible class-prejudice and to gratify some selfish schemes, did not hesitate to trample a woman’s heart under foot, and to spoil the best chance for good that ever came to a man you profess to care for—you, selfish, heartless, unprincipled man, dare to tell me, Mary Western, that you love me! Are you going out of your senses, Mr Cheviott? Do you forget that I am Lilias’s sister? ”

“ At night will return.’”
“Yes,” said Mary again. “It is like what my little sister Francie once said, ‘What a sad thing pastness is.’”
“How pretty!” said Mr Cheviott. “Pastness! Yes, it is a sad thing, but fortunately not an ugly thing. Distance in time as well as in space, ‘lends enchantment to the view.’ How strangely little things affect us sometimes,” he went on. “There are occasions, little events of my life, that I cannot recall without an indescribable thrill, neither of pleasure nor pain, but a strange, acute mixture of both. ”

“ To be rich! How extraordinary the idea seemed to her—no more furrows on her father’s face of anxiety as to the future, no more daily worries for her mother about butchers’ and grocers’ books and servants’ wages and everlasting new boots for the boys; plenty of books and music, and pretty dresses even, which in her heart Mary was by no means given to despise, for herself and Lilias; a first-rate governess for the girls—unlimited power as well as will to help their poorer neighbours—a pretty and luxurious home, something like Romary, perhaps! ”

“ But I will trust you, Arthur—I will trust you!”
“Two years!” thought Mary. “That part of it can be nothing but a pretext. And if Lilias goes on trusting and hoping, it will make it all the worse for her in the end. She has never had any real trouble, and she thinks herself stronger to bear it than she really is. I have always heard that that terrible sort of waiting is worse for a girl than anything. Oh! Lily, what can I do for you? ”

“ A new sensation seized Lilias—a strange rush of indignation against this man, so false, yet so wanting in self-control and delicacy as to parade his grief for the girl he imagined he had lost, to the girl whose heart he had gained, but to toss it aside! She turned upon him fierily.
“No,” she said, “she is not dead, nor the least likely to die. I have nothing more to say to you, Captain Beverley. Be so good as to let me pass.” ”

“ It is not easy, even with the most unselfish and “managing” of mothers, with the most—theoretically, at least—indulgent of fathers; with two pair of fairly clever hands, and two or three numbers of the latest fashion books, it is not easy, out of what a girl like Alys Cheviott would have thought a not extravagant price for a garden-hat, or a new parasol, to devise for one’s self a ball-dress, in which to appear with credit to one’s self and one’s belongings, on such an occasion as a Brocklehurst ball. ”

“ Papa feels it more than mamma, I sometimes think, only he is naturally so easy-going. And poor mamma, even if she does feel it, she would not show it. She is so unselfish; and how hard she works for us all! I don’t think she could work so hard if she felt as depressed as I do sometimes—especially about the younger ones.”
“But you do work hard also, Lilias,” said Mary, “and you are nearly always cheerful. You are unselfish too. Oh! Lilias, I should so like to see you very, very happy!” ”

“ I cannot but confess that I was astonished at his devotion and tenderness to her, and they are deeply attached to each other,” said Mary, her colour rising a little as she spoke. “I am afraid, mother, I sometimes am too wholesale in my opinion of people. Once I take a dislike to them it is difficult for me to see any good in them. I want to correct this in myself.”
“You are so honest, dear,” said her mother.
“And as for my doing good to Alys Cheviott,” continued Mary, “it seems to me rather that she might do me good. She is so simple, so unselfish and unspoiled.” ”

“ I see it all; he found it out at the ball. Very likely he went there for the purpose of finding it out, having heard rumours of it, and at once used all his influence, whatever it is, to make that poor fool give it up. And yet he isn’t a poor fool! That is the worst of it; there is so much good in him, and Lilias cares for him—yes, that is the worst of it. Mother, she does care for him. Will it break her heart?”
And Mary, in her innocence and ignorance, looked up to her mother who had gone through life, who must know how it would be, and repeated, wistfully, “Mother, will it break her heart?” ”

“ It would be wretchedly dull in these stupid lodgings without you, my dear, to argue with and contradict, and look at.”
“You need not be afraid. I am not going to desert you,” said Lilias, laughing, as she left the room.
“That girl really grows prettier and prettier,” said Mr Greville. “She is much more amusing, too, than her sister Mary. I fancy Mary is something of a prig; there was no getting a smile out of her the last time she was over with us. Lilias is brighter than ever I knew her, full of fun and pleased with everything.” ”

“ For the moment a species of recklessness seemed to have taken possession of him; he felt as if he cared little what was said or thought of him.
“Even Alys,” he thought to himself, “when, or if, she comes to hear of my attempt at interference, will find no words hard enough for me. Why can’t a man start clear in life, I wonder, without being weighted with the follies of those before him?”
Mrs Greville was all excitement and curiosity.
“My goodness, Mary,” she exclaimed, “wonders will never cease! Lilias’s conquest is nothing to yours. Mr Cheviott of Romary himself! ”

“ Suddenly Mary looked up. Her tears somehow or other, had restored her self-control; the very shame she felt at Mr Cheviott’s hearing her sobs reacted so as to give her confidence.
“Why should I be ashamed? It is very natural I should cry after all the worry I have had the last few days; and who has caused it all? Who has broken Lily’s heart and made us all miserable? Why should I care what such a man as that thinks of me?” ”

“ Why do you want him to marry?”
“Just because it would be nice, that is to say, if his wife were nice, and I don’t think Arthur would marry any one that wasn’t,” said Alys. “She would be in a sort of way like a sister to me, you know, Laurence.”
“Those dreams are seldom realised,” observed Mr Cheviott, cynically. “As nature did not give you a sister, I would advise you to be content with what she did give you, even though it is only a very cross old brother. But what has put all this of Arthur’s marrying into your head just now, Alys? ”

“ Mary, speak, child, tell me what it means,” said Mrs Western, with the petulance born of extreme anxiety. “It cannot be that Lilias has refused him?”
“No, mother, it is not that,” said Mary, “I wish it were.”
“What is it, then? Can he be so utterly base and dishonourable?”
“Not of himself,” replied Mary, bitterly; “weak fool that he is, he is not so bad as that. No, mother, he is not, or has been made to think he is not, his own master; it is all that man—that bad man’s doing.”
“Whose doing?” said Mrs Western, bewilderedly. “That Mr Cheviott—Mr Cheviott of Romary. ”

“ Was it possible that in the cruel, almost insulting things she had said to him she had been influenced by some utter misjudgment of his motives?—was it possible that they were good and pure and unselfish?—could his cousin be a bad man, from whom he was chivalrously protecting Lilias’s innocence and inexperience? No, that was impossible. No man with Arthur’s honest eyes could be a bad man; but, if not this, what other motive could Mr Cheviott have that was not a mean and selfish one? Mary felt faint and giddy as these thoughts crowded upon her ”

“ One cannot be too careful. And you know, my dears, I have always said if ever you do marry I hope and trust it will be some one quite in your own sphere.”
“Mamma!” exclaimed Lilias, growing scarlet, and with a touch of indignation in her tone, “why should you allude to such a thing? Just because a gentleman happens to have called to see papa on business—as if we could not have spoken two words to him without thinking if we should like to marry him.” ”

“ It is a sore feeling to be, in one sense, ashamed of one’s home. I hope Captain Beverley will not come again.”
“He is almost sure to do so,” said Mary. “I wish you would not feel things quite as you do, Lilias; I can sympathise with you to a certain extent, but, after all, there is nothing to be really ashamed of. And if Captain Beverley, or any one, judges us by these trifling outside things, then I don’t think their regard is worth considering.”
“But it is just by these things that people are judged, and that is where the real sting of poverty like ours lies,” persisted Lilias. ”