Annabella Milbanke

“ It seems an instinct with some natures to delight in showing a power to tease, and it had become stronger with the countess since her disappointment regarding her romance. She was like a child playing with fire-arms, ignorant of their dangerous nature. Annabella knew the weakness of her husband’s nerves, but not the full strength of his pride. ”

“ A wash, a change of clothes, and a half-hour of solitude had done much for Milbanke. He felt more normal, less alienated by unfamiliar surroundings than he had done in the first confused moments that had followed his arrival. The vague sense of disappointment and apprehension, the vague suspicion that Asshlin had undergone an immense alteration still tormented him—as half-apprehended evils ever torment the minds of those who see and study life as a thing apart from human nature ”

“ There was a wait of some seconds while his listener digested the information; then she nodded her head with slow impressiveness.
"I seen it meself," she said again. "Sure, I seen it as plain as daylight. 'There's somethin' on his mind,' I says to meself. An' if it isn't the poor masther's death,' I says, 'thin it's nothin' more nor less than the natural feelin's of a single gentleman that finds himself wid two grown daughters.'"
It was characteristic of Milbanke that he did not smile. ”

“ Sadly and silently she dropped into the dark abyss the love token of the unhappy Annabella.
More than an hour elapsed before the silence again was broken. The thin air of these upper regions had become intensely cold, and Mabel shivered in her spring attire. The balloon was drifting steadily on before the night breeze, as was marked by its dark globe appearing to blot out one constellation after another from the sky as it swept on, the sole object that broke the immense expanse of the star-lit heavens. ”

“ The soft tinkling of the distant sheep-bell, the low of the cattle in the [237] meadow, and the monotonous hum of the bee, came softly blended together to the ear. The bright mantle of sunshine fell on fruit-trees laden with blossom,—the hawthorn white with May’s perfumed snow, the fragrant lilac, the laburnum dropping its showers of gold! Annabella gazed from the open casement of her apartment upon a lovely and varied prospect, but she had not the slightest perception of what lay directly before her eye.
Another loud ring! The countess turned her head with quick impatience. ”

“ Miss Milbanke turned her head.
“So that is George Gordon’s,” she said. She had felt a slight thrill, an emotion new to her, while the other sang. “Mr. Hobhouse, what does he look like?”
The young man, who was by nature and liking something of an artist, took a folded paper from his wallet and spread it out beneath a lamp.
[17] “I made this sketch the last night I saw him in Greece,” he said, “at Missolonghi, just a year ago.”
Lady Caroline Lamb and Miss Milbanke both bent to look at the portrait. ”

“ He was desirous to avoid an argument, and rather to have recourse to persuasion. “You have so many other resources,” he began, “so many pleasures—”
“Not one of them,—not all of them together to be compared to this!” exclaimed Annabella with animation. “I value the smallest bay-leaf from Parnassus more than the strawberry-leaves on a ducal coronet!”
The Earl of Dashleigh was offended. “I am aware, madam,” he said stiffly, “that you take a pride in disparaging the advantages of high social standing. A lofty position has no charms for you.” ”

“ Annabella’s manner towards her husband has undergone a change since their re-union in the fisherman’s cottage. She is gradually resuming her playfulness of conversation, and the wit in which the earl delights still sparkles for his amusement; but there is more, far more of submission to his authority, and of deference to his wishes in her demeanour; Annabella no longer desires to forget that her vow was not only to love, but to obey.
This change is chiefly owing to that which has passed over the earl himself. His spirit by intense [265] suffering has been purified, exalted, refined. ”

“ Outside his own country, he is merely a subject of a great Empire, possessing, perhaps, a sharper wit and a more ingratiating manner than his fellow-subjects of colder temperament; but in his natural environment he stands out pre-eminently as a peculiar development—the product of a warm-blooded, intelligent, imaginative race that by some oversight of Nature has been pushed aside in the march of the nations.
Milbanke made no attempt to formulate this idea or any portion of it, as he paced steadily forward across the darkening sands ”

“ Milbanke was no poet, yet the scene impressed him. The extraordinary sense of an inimitable and impenetrable peace before which man and man's mere transitory concerns are dwarfed, if not entirely eliminated, touched him vaguely. It was with a tinge of something bordering upon reluctance that he at last drew his eyes from the picture and began to dress. ”

“ She bent down in a sudden impulse of excitement and kissed his upraised head; then with a quick laugh at her own impetuosity, she turned and ran down the first flight of time-worn marble steps.
That was her private and personal reception of the news. Later, returning with her arms full of the roses that ran riot in the garden, she was able to meet Milbanke with a demeanour of dignified calm; and to answer his questions as to whether her boxes could be packed in two days, in a voice that was dutifully submissive and unmoved. ”

“ The eye of the young heiress had not, like that of her cousin Ida, been fixed upon objects so high that the glare of earthly grandeur died away before it like the sparkles of fireworks below. Annabella was completely dazzled by the idea of such a brilliant alliance. Her imagination immediately invested the young earl with every great and glorious quality. Love threw a halo around him, and the maiden fancied that she saw realized in her noble suitor every [62] poetical dream of her girlhood. Nor was love the only chord that vibrated to rapture in the heart of Dashleigh’s young bride. ”

“ Aumerle, who happened at this time to enter the room, “if not she who chooses no guide but her own temper and caprice, who will listen to no advice—not even that of her uncle and her pastor, and who publicly insults the husband whom she is bound in duty to honour? Rise, Ida, rise,” continued the lady, to whose plain sense of right and wrong Annabella’s conduct appeared unpardonable; “I am ashamed to see you on your knees beside a girl who, if she were fifty times a countess, has forfeited claim to our respect.” ”

“ She found herself united to a man at least as proud as herself, though his pride took a different form. As long as the bride was contented simply to please, there was domestic harmony; Annabella was happy in her husband, and he thought that no companion could be so agreeable as his witty and lively wife. But the moment that the countess attempted to rule, the elements of discord began to work. The earl, who never lost consciousness of high birth and distinguished rank, was aware that he had married one who, though of good family, was yet considerably below himself in social position. ”

“ Aumerle, with a touch of sarcasm in her manner; “but I happen to know a good deal more of life than you do, and mind my word, Mabel, when a woman marries she takes her husband for better for worse; she has made her choice and she must abide by it; she only lowers herself by appealing to the world to arbitrate between her and the man whom she has vowed to obey.”
“How has Annabella appealed to the world?” asked Mabel, with but little of respect in her tone. ”

“ In the meantime, Annabella was pacing up and down her apartment with a heart full almost to bursting. “I will not stay here, no, not an hour!” she exclaimed; “he shall find that he has no weak girl to deal with—no slave to submit to his pride and caprice! I have borne much, but this I will not bear. I will not endure to be trampled upon by a tyrant, even though that tyrant be a husband. ”

“ Milbanke looked back into the bright, fearless eyes and healthy, spirited face, and again a touch of aloofness, of age, damped him. There was a buoyancy in this boy and girl, a zest, an enthusiasm outside which he stood the undeniable alien. ”

“ Then the spirit of mischief would breathe out his [64] treason to Annabella: “Your husband, if superior to you in descent, you have now discovered to be so in no single other point. He has neither your wit nor your spirit. He is rather a weak, though an obstinate man, and thinks much more than common-sense warrants of what has been called ‘the accident of birth.’ Have you not much more reason to exult in belonging to the aristocracy of talent, than that of mere rank like him? Do you glory in the name of Countess as you do in that of ‘Egeria,’ by which alone you are known to reading thousands?” ”

“ She is a good tight girl, but a few years older than thyself: she may take a fancy to thee.
BAWLDY.
Ah! Madam Annabell, somebody has been telling you that I hae a fancy for her; for they never devall wi' their havers.—But what is she to do for the crown? for I reckon she maun won it some way or anither.
ANNABELLA.
In a very easy way. Tell her to send me her mistress's striped lutestring gown, for I want to look at the pattern of it, and will restore it to her immediately. ”

“ With a sick sensation, Milbanke went slowly forward.
The patient made no attempt to move as he drew near the bed, but his feverishly bright glance seemed to devour his face.
"Here he is, father!" Clodagh exclaimed softly and eagerly. "Here's Mr. Milbanke! Now, aren't you happy? He's not able to move," she explained, turning to the guest. "It gives him terrible agony to stir."
Milbanke had reached the bed; and with a sensation of awkwardness and impotence impossible to describe, he stood looking down upon Asshlin. ”

“ Milbanke," he said quickly, "I have been watching you and thinking about you ever since I came to Venice. And at last I have decided, that I must tell you what my thoughts have been.
"I am not very old—perhaps I have no right to speak. But a man sees a good deal of life, even if he wants to keep his eyes shut; and I have seen a great many people throw away their chances—take the false and refuse the true. I have seen some men do it, and I have seen many women—many, many women." ”

“ Their abominable love is in their own eyes a mere weakness of the flesh; there is no sense of revolt against man and nature and God; they are neither dragged on by irresistible demoniac force nor held back by the grip of conscience; they slip and slide, even like Francesca and Paolo. They pay each other sweet and mawkish compliments. The ferocious lust of Francesco Cenci is moral compared with the way in which the "trim youth" Giovanni praises Annabella's beauty; the blushing, bride-like way in which Annabella, "white in her soul," acknowledges her long love. ”

“ The next object that she drew forth was the faded telegram that, years ago, at the time of Denis Asshlin's accident, had brought the longed-for news that Milbanke was on his way to Orristown. She opened it, read it, then folded it and replaced it with something of uneasy haste; and again burying her hand in the recesses of the case, brought to light another link with the past—a large envelope into which were crushed a number of things, amongst them the first invitation from Lady Frances Hope in Venice; a ribbon that had tied a bouquet of flowers on the dinner-table at the "Abbati" Restaurant ”

“ Milbanke?" he asked in a undertone. "Are you an equally great enthusiast? Does the antique appeal very forcibly to you?"
As he put the question, he was conscious of its irony; but an irrepressible curiosity forced him to utter it. He was still labouring under an intense surprise at Milbanke's choice of a wife; and the desire to probe the nature of the relationship was strong within him.
"Are you like the man in the Eastern story?" he added. "Would you barter new lamps for old?"
Clodagh was walking in front of him as he put the question, and Milbanke was left momentarily behind. ”

“ However unversed she may be in the world's ways, it is scarcely to be supposed that any young girl, under normal conditions, can look upon her own marriage as an abstract thing. But the circumstances of Clodagh's case were essentially abnormal. Milbanke's proposal—and the facts that brought her to accept it—came at a time when her mind and her emotions were numbed by her first poignant encounter with death and grief; and for the time being her outlook upon existence was clouded. The present seemed something sombre, desolate, and impalpable; the future something absolutely void. ”

“ For a while Milbanke sat miserable and undecided; then under the goad of the other's eyes, he did an ill-judged thing. Fumbling nervously for his letter-case, he rose from his seat and walked across to the fireplace.
"There is nothing for you to revenge," he said agitatedly. "There was no play last night. It's cancelled. I cancel it."
With tremulous haste, he pulled out the letter-case, extricated Asshlin's cheque, and dropped it into the fire. ”

“ Behind him came Clodagh, Milbanke, and their following of dogs.
Once again the thought of what the evening held came unpleasantly to Milbanke's mind as the shadow of the gaunt beech trees and the outline of the great square house brought the position home to him afresh. Lack imagination as he might, he realised that it was no light task to thwart a man whose faults had been cultivated and whose peculiarities—racial and personal—had been accentuated by a quarter of a century of comparative isolation. ”