Mrs. Oliphant

“ Merridew remarked all with a vigilant mother’s eye, and as I gazed across at her in her pew, it was all but impossible for me to believe that this was the same woman who had clung so convulsively to my arm, whose face had been so worn and hollowed out with suffering. How could it be the same woman? She who had suffered poor John Babington to love her—and then had cast him off, and married her friend’s lover instead; who had established so firm an empire over a man’s heart, that, after twenty years, he had remembered her still with such intensity of feeling. ”

“ They always do in the fabulous period in all histories; and there was once somebody who was—or at least he said he was—in love with me. There, the murder is out,’ she said, pushing her chair a little further back into the dark corner; and, to my amazement, her voice was full of agitation, as if she had been telling me the secret of her life.
‘My dear Lady Isabella,’ I said, ‘do you really expect me to be surprised at that?’
‘Well, no, perhaps not,’ she said, with another laugh. ‘Not at the simple fact. They say every woman has such a thing happen to her some time in her life. ”

“ They are not on the Green, though they are undeniably a part of Dinglefield, but stand on the Mercot Road, a broad country road with a verdant border of turf and fine trees shadowing over the hedgerows. The Merridews live in the one, and in the other are Mrs. Spencer and Lady Isabella. The house of the two ladies, which has been already described, is as perfect in all its arrangements as if it were a palace: a silent, soft, fragrant, dainty place, surrounded by lawns like velvet; full of flowers in perfect bloom, the finest kinds, succeeding each other as the seasons change. ”

“ Mulgrave, will you look if I am torn?’ cried another. Then pair after pair of dancers came whirling along, making progress dangerous. Such a sight at any time, when one is past the age at which one takes a personal interest in it, is apt to suggest a variety of thoughts; but at this moment! Lottie hovered about me, a kind of avant-coureur, clearing the way for me. There was something amazing to me in her excitement, especially as, just at the moment when she was labouring to open a way for me, Ada Gresham went flying past, her blue eyes shining, her cheeks more like roses than ever. ”

“ Ellen grew paler and paler as I spoke. ‘Giving up?’ she said aghast. ‘I—I would give up anything. But I have got nothing, except John,’ she added, with an uneasy little laugh. ‘And you say he is shutting himself out of the world. Oh, I know what you are thinking of—the kind of world one reads about in books, where gentlemen have clubs, and all that sort of thing. But these are only for you rich people. He is not giving up anything that I know of.’
‘What do the other young men do, Ellen? Every one has his own kind of world.’
‘The other young men!’ she cried indignant. ”

“ It was Ellen Turner, her cheeks blazing red with anger, though the sight of Jane cowed her. ‘What have you been doing, you little flirt?’ cried old Mrs. Mowbray. ‘If a man speaks to me, ain’t I to give him a civil answer?’ cried the girl, standing still, and preparing to give battle. Jane did not say a word. She shook herself free of the old lady without knowing what she did, and went in to her mother, without as much as a look at the other. As soon as she had disappeared John showed himself out of the darkness like a spectre. ”

“ The great point in the landscape is a royal castle, the noblest dwelling-place I ever saw. We who live so near are learned in the different points of view; we know where to catch it shining like a fairy stronghold in the white hazy country, or stretching out in gray profile upon its height, or setting itself—here the great donjon, there a flanking tower—in frames of leafy branches. I had left my little carriage and my stout old pony on the road, and had wandered up alone to have my last peep before winter set in, when suddenly I saw Nelly before me. ”

“ Peace is very pleasant, my dear, when you are old. You don’t quite appreciate it yet, as we do.’ And then she paused again and seemed to listen, and permitted herself the faintest little sigh.
‘I think I am older than you are, Lady Denzil,’ I said.
Then she laughed in her natural soft way. ‘I dare say you are,’ she said. ‘That is the difference between your restless middle age and our oldness. You feel old because you feel young. That’s how it is; whereas, being really old, we can afford to be young again—sometimes,’ she added softly. ”

“ And then before my eyes, as, I am sure, before hers, there glided a vision of Ellen Babington in her profound mourning, rustling past Mr. Merridew on the stairs, with heaps of costly crape, no doubt, and that rich black silk with which people console themselves in their first mourning. How could they take it all without a word? The after-pang that comes almost inevitably at the back of a sacrifice, was tearing Mrs. Merridew’s heart. I felt it go through my own, and so I knew. She had done it nobly, but she could not forget that she had done it. Does one ever forget? ”

“ Then I recognized the truth of Lady Denzil’s words. I had nobody to restrain me: no husband at home to find fault with anything I might do; nobody to wonder, or fret, or be annoyed by the burden I had taken upon me. The recollection made my heart swell a little, not with pleasure. And yet it was very true. Poor Mr. Mulgrave, had he been living, was a man who would have been sure to find fault. It is dreary to think of one’s self as of so little importance to any one; but perhaps one ought to think more than one does, that if the position is a dreary one, it has its benefits too. ”

“ It seems more than one had any right to expect,’ said Ellen. Her hands were clasped in her lap, her fingers twisting and untwisting unconsciously, her head raised, and her eyes fixed, without seeing anything, upon the blue sky outside. She was rapt in a pleasant dream of virtue rewarded and goodness triumphant. A smile went and came upon her face like sunshine. ‘And yet,’ she cried, ‘to hear people speak, you would think that it was never the right men that got on. Even in sermons in church you always hear that it is rather a disadvantage to you if you are nice and good. ”

“ The time had almost run on to the length of Jacob’s wooing when one day Ellen came to me, not running in, eager and troubled with her secret as of old, but so much more quietly than usual, with such a still and fixed composure about her, that I knew something serious had happened. I sent away as quickly as I could the other people who were in the room, for I need not say that to find me alone was all but an impossibility. I gave Chatty, now a fine, tall girl of twenty, a look, which was enough for her; she always understood better than any one. ”

“ It is only baby that cannot live without his mother. Baby and Harry. What is Gerald? I know he wants me.’
‘But he can wait,’ I cried; ‘and you so young, so delicate, so unused to any trouble!’
‘I can carry my child perfectly,’ said Ada. ‘I never was delicate. There is a train at eleven down to Southampton, I found it out in the book: and after that I know my way. I am a very good traveller,’ she said with a smile, ‘and Gerald must come to settle everything. Give me the biscuits, dear Mrs. Mulgrave, and kiss me and let me go.’
And it had to be so, though I pleaded with her till I was hoarse. ”

“ Looking up the Green, the effect of the sleeping place, with the moon shining on the pale gables and ends of houses, and all the trees in black, and the white stretch of space in the centre, looking as if it had been clean swept by the moonlight of every obstacle, had the strangest effect. I was not in the least afraid. What should I be afraid of, so close to my own door? But still I felt a little shiver run over me—a something involuntary, which I could not help, like that little thrill of the nerves, which makes people say that some one is walking over your grave. ”

“ I could not but think in my heart that it would not be at all a bad thing if Ellen’s marriage did kill this unseen father of hers who had tired their patience so long, and who stamped his foot with rage at the idea that the poor girl might get out of his clutches. He was an old man, and he was a great sufferer. Why should he be so anxious to live? And if a sacrifice was necessary, old Mr. Harwood might just as well be the one to make it as those two good young people from whom he was willing to take all the pleasure of their lives. ”

“ We had been deceived, Nelly and I. And Martha and Llewellyn were two lovers worthy of each other. I fear I was not very charitable to him in my thoughts.
But I could not help being very nervous the day of his arrival. It was a bleak wintry day, Christmas Eve, but not what people call Christmas weather. It rarely is Christmas weather at Christmas. The sky hung low and leaden over our bare trees, and of course there were no cricketers now on the Green, nor sound of croquet balls, to enliven the stillness. I could not rest at home. ”

“ Mamma won’t make them dress in the evenings, as I am sure she should. How are they ever to learn to behave like Christians, Mrs. Mulgrave, if they are not obliged to dress and come into the drawing-room at night?’
‘I dare say they would run out again and spoil their evening clothes, my dear,’ I said.
‘That is just what mamma says,’ cried Janet; ‘but isn’t it dreadful to have always to consider everything like that? Poor mamma, too—often I am quite angry, and then I think—perhaps she would like a house like Mrs. Spencer and Lady Isabella’s as well as I should, if we had money enough. ”

“ It was an exceptional evening: the sunset glowed with all the colour that could be found in a tropical sky, and the whole world was glorified. It drew Mrs. Mowbray out in spite of herself; she had thrown a scarf over her cap and about her shoulders, being so near home, and was ‘stepping westward,’ like the poet, but with the meditative step of age which signifies leisure from everything urgent, and time to bestow upon this great pageant of Nature. To be so at leisure from everything in thought as well as in life is a privilege of the aged and solitary. ”

“ He could never marry either of them; and neither of them, none of the three, were ever to be tempted to marry another. And thus, in a pathetic climax of faithfulness and delicate self-sacrifice, they were to grow old and die. Nelly was no longer miserable when she had framed this ideal in her mind. It seemed to her the most natural solution of the difficulty. The romance, instead of ending in a prosaic marriage, was to last all their lives. And the eldest of them, Llewellyn himself, was but seven-and-twenty! Poor Nelly thought it the most likely thing in the world. ”

“ I am quite pleased with myself. I can’t have been such a fool after all; for—he is not clever, you know—but he is a man a woman need not be ashamed to have been in love with: and that is saying a great deal.’
‘And is it only a “have been?”’ said I; for after all when one had taken so much trouble it was hard that nothing should come of it. I felt as if I had taken a great deal of trouble, and all in vain.
‘Indeed, I should hope so!’ cried Lady Isabella, getting up and drawing her shawl round her hastily. ”

“ When a thing cannot be cured it must be endured, you know. I am out of court— I have no ground to stand upon, and he is master of the field. I don’t mean to make her unhappy whatever happens. Is he here still?’
‘Yes,’ I said trembling. He offered me his arm precisely as Mr. Oakley had offered his to Ursula. ‘Then we’ll go and join them,’ he said.
This was how it all ended. There was not a speck on his boots or the least trace of disorder. Instead of roaming the woods in despair, as we thought, he had been quietly drinking Lady Denzil’s delightful tea and playing chess with Sir Thomas. ”

“ Mowbray, with the air of one who is making an important discovery; ‘ah! I divine you at last. It is a girl that beguiles you to the Barley Mow! Then it must be a good girl, for they allow no one else there. Bless me! I wonder if it should be Jane!’
‘You know her, madam?’
‘Ah, it is Jane then? Mr. Schoolmaster—I forget your name—you are a man of penetration and sense; I honour you. A man who chooses the best woman within his knowledge—that’s the sort of man I approve of. It happens so seldom. Men are all such fools on that point. So it is Jane!’
Mr. Peters breathed a long sigh. ”

“ There never was a more glorious day; the sky was a delight to look at, and the rich full foliage of the trees clustered out against the blue, as if they leant caressingly upon the soft air around them. The breath of the roses went everywhere, and behind Lady Denzil’s sofa they threw themselves up into space—great globes of burning crimson, and delicate blush, and creamy white. They were very rich in roses at the Lodge—I remember one wall quite covered with the Gloire de Dijon—but that is a digression. ”

“ It reminded me of my window in the Road, where, looking out, I saw the respectable City people—clerks like John Ridgway, and merchants of the same cut though of more substantial comfort—wending their way to their business in the morning, and to their suburban homes in the evening. I do not know that I love the commercial world; but I like to see that natural order of life—the man ‘going forth unto his work and to his labour until the evening.’ The fashion of it is different in a foreign town, but still the life is the same. ”

“ As for Sir Thomas he was never so happy in his life before. He follows little Mary about like an old gray tender knight worshipping the fairy creature. Sometimes I look on and cannot believe my eyes. The wretched guilty mother is dead long ago, and nobody remembers her very existence. The poor soldier has worked himself up to a commission, and may be high in rank before he comes back. If Lady Denzil had been the most tender and devoted of mothers, could things have turned out better? Is this world all a phantasmagoria and chaos of dreams and chances? ”

“ Poor little Mary! after the little gleam of love and of luxury that had opened upon her, to be snatched off into the dreary world of poverty, with a violent mother whom it was evident she feared! And poor mother too! She might be violent and yet might love her child; she might be wicked and yet might love her child. To go and snatch the little creature back, at all hazards, was an act which to the popular mind would always look like a much higher strain of virtue than dear Lady Denzil’s abandonment. I could not defend Lady Denzil, even to myself ”

“ He was more like other people. Harry Gresham was red and white, like a girl, inclining to be stout, though he was not above thirty, and with the manners which are, or were, supposed to be specially English—downright and straightforward. Gerald was a few years older, a little taller, bronzed with the sun, and bearing the indescribable look of a man who has mixed much with the world. I looked at Lottie Stoke when I made my first observations upon the stranger, and saw that she too was looking at him with a strange expression, half of repugnance, half of wistfulness in her eyes. ”

“ To tell the truth, when I tried to put myself in her position, it seemed to me much wiser of Lady Isabella to let it end so. She was very well off and comfortable: she had come to an age when one likes to have one’s own way, and does not care to adopt the habits of others; and what an immense bouleversement it would make if she should marry and break up that pleasant house, and throw herself upon the chances of married life, abandoning Mrs. Spencer, who was as good as married to her, and who, no doubt, calculated on her society all her life. I said to myself—if I were Lady Isabella! ”

“ I wonder how people can talk such nonsense; why, look at John!’
‘But even John has had a long time to wait for his promotion,’ said I, feeling myself the devil’s advocate. I had just checked myself in time not to say that two hundred and twenty pounds a year was not a very gigantic promotion; which would have been both foolish and cruel.
‘Oh, no, indeed!’ cried Ellen; ‘he looks a great deal older than he is. He lived so much alone, you know, before he knew us; and that gives a man an old look—but he is not a bit old. How much would you give him? No, indeed, thirty; he is only just thirty! ”

“ It is so bad for her, knowing the Fortises and all those girls who have everything that heart can desire. I never had that to worry me when I was young. I was only the governess. Janet’s talk will be the worst of all. I could have made the house so nice too, and everything. Well!—but then I never should have had a moment’s peace.’
‘You don’t regret?’ I said.
‘No,’ said Mrs. Merridew with a long sigh. And then, ‘Do you think I have been a traitor to the children?’ she cried suddenly, ‘taking away their money from them in the dark? Would Charles think me a traitor, as they do? ”

“ Mulgrave, I wish you would make Lady Denzil call!’
‘But, my dear, I can’t make Lady Denzil do anything,’ I said; ‘I have no power over her. She comes to see me sometimes, but we are not intimate, and I have no influence. She comes because my people knew the Denzils long ago. She has her own ways. I could not make her do one thing or another. It is wrong to speak so to me.’
‘But you could if you would try,’ said Adelaide; as she spoke, we could hear the sound of the croquet balls from the Lodge, and voices and laughter. ”