Lady Chiltern

“ Cheveley has handed over to Lord Goring the document that was in her possession, and he has destroyed it.
sir robert chiltern. Are you sure of this, Gertrude?
lady chiltern. Yes; Lord Goring has just told me.
sir robert chiltern. Then I am safe! Oh! what a wonderful thing to be safe! For two days I have been in terror. I am safe now. How did Arthur destroy my letter? Tell me.
lady chiltern. He burned it.
sir robert chiltern. I wish I had seen that one sin of my youth burning to ashes. How many men there are in modern life who would like to see their past burning to white ashes before them! ”

“ The husband and wife are left alone. lady chiltern stands like some one in a dreadful dream. Then she turns round and looks at her husband. She looks at him with strange eyes, as though she were seeing him for the first time.]
lady chiltern. You sold a Cabinet secret for money! You began your life with fraud! You built up your career on dishonour! Oh, tell me it is not true! Lie to me! Lie to me! Tell me it is not true!
sir robert chiltern. What this woman said is quite true. But, Gertrude, listen to me. You don’t realise how I was tempted. Let me tell you the whole thing. [Goes towards her.] ”

“ If there is not, the Ambassador will certainly have to be recalled. Pray point out Mrs. Cheveley to me. I should like to see her.
lady markby. Let me introduce you. [To mrs. cheveley.] My dear, Sir Robert Chiltern is dying to know you!
sir robert chiltern. [Bowing.] Every one is dying to know the brilliant Mrs. Cheveley. Our attachés at Vienna write to us about nothing else.
mrs. cheveley. Thank you, Sir Robert. An acquaintance that begins with a compliment is sure to develop into a real friendship. It starts in the right manner. And I find that I know Lady Chiltern already. ”

“ PHIPPS. It was brought by hand just after your lordship went to the club.
LORD GORING. That will do. [Exit PHIPPS.] Lady Chiltern's handwriting on Lady Chiltern's pink notepaper. That is rather curious. I thought Robert was to write. Wonder what Lady Chiltern has got to say to me? [Sits at bureau and opens letter, and reads it.] 'I want you. I trust you. I am coming to you. Gertrude.' [Puts down the letter with a puzzled look. Then takes it up, and reads it again slowly.] 'I want you. I trust you. I am coming to you.' So she has found out everything! Poor woman! Poor woman! ”

“ Gertrude, what you tell me may be true, but it happened many years ago. It is best forgotten! Mrs. Cheveley may have changed since then. No one should be entirely judged by their past.
lady chiltern. [Sadly.] One’s past is what one is. It is the only way by which people should be judged.
sir robert chiltern. That is a hard saying, Gertrude!
lady chiltern. It is a true saying, Robert. And what did she mean by boasting that she had got you to lend your support, your name, to a thing I have heard you describe as the most dishonest and fraudulent scheme there has ever been in political life? ”

“ Then Lady Chiltern argued the matter on views directly opposite to those which she had put forward when discussing the matter with her husband. ”

“ The action is rapid, the interest of the story sustained to the very end, and the dialogue always to the point. Each of the principal characters concerned in the carrying out of the plot is a distinct individualised type. What each one says or does is entirely in keeping with his, or her, personality. And that personality is in each case a well-marked and skilfully drawn one. The four personæ who are engaged in conducting the intrigue of this comedy are Sir Robert Chiltern, Lady Chiltern (his wife) , Lord Goring, and Mrs Cheveley. ”

“ I never change.
mrs. cheveley [Elevating her eyebrows.] Then life has taught you nothing?
lady chiltern. It has taught me that a person who has once been guilty of a dishonest and dishonourable action may be guilty of it a second time, and should be shunned.
mrs. cheveley. Would you apply that rule to every one?
lady chiltern. Yes, to every one, without exception.
mrs. cheveley. Then I am sorry for you, Gertrude, very sorry for you. ”

“ They always go to the bad.
mrs. cheveley. As if anything could demoralise Robert Chiltern! You seem to forget that I know his real character.
lord goring. What you know about him is not his real character. It was an act of folly done in his youth, dishonourable, I admit, shameful, I admit, unworthy of him, I admit, and therefore . . . not his true character.
mrs. cheveley. How you men stand up for each other!
lord goring. How you women war against each other!
mrs. cheveley. [Bitterly.] I only war against one woman, against Gertrude Chiltern. I hate her. I hate her now more than ever. ”

“ My heart was very sad at leaving all my dear new-found friends, but Sister Agnes had exhorted me to fortitude before I parted from her, and I knew that neither by her, nor the Major, nor George, nor Dance, should I be forgotten. I saw Lady Chillington for a moment before leaving. She gave me two frigid fingers, and said that she hoped I should be a good girl, and attend assiduously to my lessons, for that in after life I should have to depend upon my own industry for a living. I felt at the moment that I would much rather do that than have to depend through life on her ladyship's bounty. ”

“ Even for her husband and for her little girl—for their having lived as little as for their having died—she has nothing to show. She hasn't so much as a photograph, a lock of hair, or an announcement in a newspaper.'
Chilver thought. 'But perhaps she wouldn't naturally leave such things about the sitting-room of a Brighton lodging.'
'I dare say not. But it isn't only such things. It's tremendously odd her never having even by mere chance knocked against anything or any one that one has ever heard of or could—if one should want to—get at.'
Again Henry Chilver reflected. ”

“ Sir Robert Chiltern. A man of forty, but looking somewhat younger. Clean-shaven, with finely-cut features, dark-haired and dark-eyed. A personality of mark. Not popular—few personalities are. But intensely admired by [Pg 130] the few, and deeply respected of the many. The note of his manner is that of perfect distinction, with a slight touch of pride. One feels that he is conscious of the success he has made in life. A nervous temperament, with a tired look. The firmly-chiselled mouth and chin contrast strikingly with the romantic expression in the deep-set eyes. ”

“ Meanwhile rest assured that in Lady Chillington, however eccentric she may seem to be, you have a firm and powerful friend; while in me, who have neither influence nor power, you have one who simply loves you, and prays night and day for your welfare. ”

“ Lady Chillington sipped her wine absently awhile; Sister Agnes was busy with some fine needlework; and I was striving to elaborate a giant and his attendant dwarf out of the glowing embers and cavernous recesses of the wood fire, while there was yet an underlying vein of thought at work in my mind which busied itself desultorily with trying to piece together all that I had ever heard or read of life in a French school.
"You can run away now, little girl. You are de trop," said her ladyship, turning on me in her abrupt fashion. ”

“ While they were feasting, Mary Chilton slipped away. Down in a lowly bed lay a mother and a young babe, even as that other mother of old; low and mean and poor the surroundings, but holding the hope, almost divine, of a people. ”

“ The man finds out after the marriage; the shallow girl dies un regretted (she turns out as badly as possible) ; the real love comes, and all ends joyfully. It is simple story, prettily told in its little way, and the scene of the reunion is written with genuine feeling—nay, with a touch of real passion. But then Sir Gilbert Chillington never meets Miss Liston now. And Lady Chillington not only behaves with her customary propriety, but is in the enjoyment of most excellent health and spirits.
True art demands an adaptation, not a copy, of life. ”

“ This was at bottom the great result of the first stages of Chilver's now independent, as he felt it to be, acquaintance with Mrs. Damerel—a sudden view of any, of every, dim passage, that was more than a tender acceptance of the particular obscurity, that partook really of the nature of affirmation and insistence. It all made her, with everything that for her advantage happened to help it on, extraordinarily touching to him, clothed her in the beauty of her general admission and her general appeal. ”

“ I am going to get a divorce."
She sat for a time picturing the scene in the sitting-room when they should read it, and a longing which was almost irresistible seized her to go back to that shelter. One force alone held her in misery where she was,—her love for Chiltern; it drew her on to suffer the horrors of exile and publicity. When she suffered most, his image rose before her, and she kissed the ring on her hand. ”

“ Yet how
he rouses the House, moving it to cheers and laughter, and to the rapid
interchange of volleys of "Hear, hear" from opposite sides of the House,
which Chiltern says is the most exhilarating sound that can reach the
ear of a speaker in the House of Commons. Mr. Lowe sits down with the
same abruptness that marked his rising, and rather gets into his hat
than puts it on, pushing his head so far into its depths that there is
nothing of him left on view save what extends below the line of his
white eyebrows. ”

“ Mr. Chilton died the next day—the first head of a family to be taken. The illness which was gradually affecting many of the company, grew out of the colds and run down condition they had reached. It seems like grip or influenza of our modern knowledge, with other complications; its fatality was appalling. Mary Chilton and her mother had need [Pg 80] of the uplifting sympathy and companionship of such friends as Mary Brewster and Susanna White in the dark hours of their sorrow. Theirs was the first test of faith. ”

“ She who had been called Dance went up to the two ladies, curtsied deeply, and began talking in a low, earnest voice. Hardly, however, had she spoken a dozen words when the lesser of the two ladies flung up her arms with a cry like that of some wounded [Pg 30] creature, and would have fallen to the ground had not Dance caught her round the waist and so held her.
"What folly is this?" cried Lady Chillington, sternly, striking the pavement of the hall sharply with the iron ferrule of her cane. "To your room, Sister Agnes! For such poor weak fools as you solitude is the only safe companion. ”

“ At length the silence was broken by Lady Chillington. "Take the child away," she said; "attend to her wants, make her presentable, and bring her to me in the Green Saloon after dinner. It will be time enough to-morrow to consider what must be done with her."
Dance curtsied again. Her ladyship sailed slowly across the hall, and passed out through another curtained doorway.
Dance's first act was to pay and dismiss the driver, who had been waiting outside all this time. Then, taking me by the hand, "Come along with me, dear," she said. "Why, I declare, you look quite white and frightened! ”

“ I, a girl of twelve, was the Janet Hope indicated above, and I had been looking over Chirper's shoulder with wondering eyes while she addressed the card.
"But who is Lady Chillington, and where is Deepley Walls, and what have I to do with either, Chirper, please?" I asked.
"If there is one thing in little girls more hateful than another, it is curiosity," answered Chirper, with her mouth half-full of nails. "Curiosity has been the bane of many of our sex. Witness Bluebeard's unhappy wife. If you want to know more, you must ask Mrs. Whitehead. ”

“ However, she is not a nun, but something like one of those Sisters of Mercy in the large towns, who go about among poor people and visit the hospitals and prisons. She is allowed to live here always, and Lady Chillington would hardly know how to get through the day without her."
"Is she not a relative of Lady Chillington?" I asked.
"No, not a relative," answered Dance. "You must try to love her a great deal, my dear Miss Janet; for if angels are ever allowed to visit this vile earth, Sister Agnes is one of them. But there goes her ladyship's bell. She is ready to receive you." ”

“ Cheveley is one of those very modern women of our time who find a new scandal as becoming as a new bonnet, and air them both in the Park every afternoon at five-thirty. I am sure she adores scandals, and that the sorrow of her life at present is that she can’t manage to have enough of them.
sir robert chiltern. [Writing.] Why do you say that?
lord goring. [Turning round.] Well, she wore far too much rouge last night, and not quite enough clothes. That is always a sign of despair in a woman.
sir robert chiltern. [Striking a bell.] But it is worth while my wiring to Vienna, is it not? ”

“ When I had finished the grapes, I put my plate back on the table.
"Ring that bell," said Lady Chillington. I rang it accordingly, and presently Dance made her appearance.
"Miss Hope is ready to retire," said her ladyship.
I arose, and going a step or two nearer to her, I made her my [Pg 34] most elaborate curtsey, and said, "I wish your ladyship a very good-night." ”

“ It would not seem a difficult manner of attaining immortality, that of stepping from a boat to a rock; most women, being gifted with the ordinary means of locomotion, could do as much; but circumstances decide the value of every action, and so Mary Chilton achieved fame by one of the simplest and most natural acts of her whole existence. There are those who deny the very existence of Mary Chilton and sneer at the tradition that makes a woman lead the way to the florescence of American nationality ”