Miss Gage

“ Miss Gage rose from the harp, and they sat round the fire for a chat, but there was no time for any more conversation, for Margaret's carriage was announced.
Captain Gage told her that she must [Pg 71] soon come to see Bessy again. Elizabeth took an affectionate leave of her, and Hubert led her into the hall and wrapped her cloak all round her, much as one would muffle up a little child, talking and laughing all the time, and stopping to gather her flowers from the creepers in the hall in the intervals of handing her gloves, and winding her boa round her neck. ”

“ After tea, Hubert Gage asked his sister for some music.
[Pg 65]
"Will you have the harp?" said Miss Gage ringing the bell, "I will just give my father his book, and then play what you like. My harp, Davis."
"Why don't you keep it down here?" asked her brother.
"Ah! you know nothing of female politics," said Miss Gage, smiling; "the young ladies like me a great deal better for keeping my harp, and some other things in the background."
"But the young gentlemen don't;" said Hubert, as he stood leaning on the harp. ”

“ It was a little remarkable that only one woman ever joined this community. Mrs. Lamb merely followed wheresoever her husband led,—"as ballast for his balloon," as she said, in her bright way.
Miss Jane Gage was a stout lady of mature years, sentimental, amiable, and lazy. She wrote verses copiously, and had vague yearnings and graspings after the unknown, which led her to believe herself fitted for a higher sphere than any she had yet adorned. ”

“ Gage and Harriet would instantly [Pg 246] begin to talk to the visitors, and endeavour to amuse them until Miss Gage should arrive. Not at all; they had seen enough of company, to know how much they might leave undone; a code much more extensively put in practice than that which might teach people how much to do.
Mr. Gage stared across at Mrs. Somerton. Harriet with her head drawn up, surveyed Blanche.
At last, Mr. Gage said to Harriet, "Have you any idea where Bessy is?"
"I suppose," said Harriet, "that she is somewhere among the hot-houses. Hubert said something about the American plants. ”

“ Miss Gage finally consented on condition that she could spend the summer with her folks on Long Island. There's quite a family of them, and they seem to care a good deal for each other. Mrs. Van Dorn wants someone to run up and down for her, read to her, fan her sometimes and go out driving with her. She doesn't get up until after eight, and has coffee, fruit, and rolls brought up to her room. And she's a great hand for flowers—her vases must be washed out and filled every day. Then she comes down on the porch, wants the paper read to her and likes to talk over things. ”

“ Hubert," said Land, "such a fine young gentleman. A sailor like his father—they are a fine family. Miss Gage is the handsomest young lady in the county."
Margaret felt interested in the Gage family, she begged Land to point out to her where they sat at church, that she might know them by sight. They came to some fields which took them another way to Ashdale.
"Is this field, my uncle Grey's?" asked Margaret, "what a large pond! I say, Land, when I was a little girl I could skate very well. Could you get me a pair of skates? I will give you the money." ”

“ They were invited to the breakfast, very reluctantly, on the part of Harriet; who superintended everything, and who hated them because they happened to have five very plain children.
"Don't tell me, Uncle Gage, that it is not their fault!" she exclaimed, when Captain Gage ventured to remonstrate with her for her dislike. "Good people, always have handsome children. Your children were all handsome!"
Captain Gage was silenced by this logical inference, "his children were good looking, he must confess." ”

“ Miss Gage clasped them up, rather carelessly, as Margaret thought, and then held a taper to the bust of Nelson. "That is my hero, of course," she said, "that, and the gallant King Christian IV.; here is a small oil painting of his Danish Majesty. Have you read Carlyle on 'Hero Worship?'"
"No," Margaret said, "she feared she had read very little. It was so difficult to find books, or time to pursue any study at school but those assigned to you."
"I do believe," said Miss Gage, "that you are wise enough to begin your education just where everybody ought to begin it ”

“ In a feeling more akin to awe than anything else, Sim Gage bent over, looking down at the clear oval face, the piled dark hair, the tender contour of cheek and chin of Mary Warren, as beautiful a young lady as any man is apt ever to see ”

“ Have you got that girl into trouble?”
“I always hated that phrase,” answered Gage, nonchalantly.
“Why did you come back from Chicago so soon?”
“Why should I stay? A fifth wheel? The entirely superfluous husband of one of the great feminist successes?”
“I asked you why you came back.” She framed each word with an artificial calmness.
“You haven’t taken so much interest in me for years, Helen. It’s true, isn’t it? All a man has to do is to get involved in a scandal to have the women after him.” ”

“ Gage quite seriously. "I am very well pleased; for I have not been used to be ashamed of my sister, and I should care to be ashamed of my sister-in-law; for that I suppose will be the end of it, Bessy?"
"I shall be very glad if it is so," replied Elizabeth.
"He might do worse," said Mr. Gage. "Sailors are so inconsèquent. They often marry the most extraordinary persons—people that one never has heard of. Miss Capel, however, seems highly respectable. But," he added in a low tone, "to put that little doll in competition with such a woman as Harriet! Hubert need not fear me for a rival." ”

“ Margaret listened, her ready mind taking exception to some of the things he said, seeing how he played upon his audience—Walter and Helen listened with intellectual appreciation. But Gage, slouched down in his seat felt envy grow in him. There was before him what he had always wanted. A man who had something indestructible, something immortal to care for. A conviction—and an ideal—an outlet for his soul. He felt himself cheated.
He liked too to listen to the poems about women. No controversial tirades these poems—but verses soft and sweet and pliable as the essence of women—once had been. ”

“ Now Miss Gage had begged Mr. Warde to write to Mr. Grey, that she might know whether it would be agreeable to him that she should make the acquaintance of his niece. He was recognised as such a determined invalid by all the country round, that she never thought of calling upon Margaret, taking it for granted that such a step would be an intrusion upon Mr. Grey's habits. But she wished much to show her every attention in her power, from a sincere desire to make her happier than she was likely to be if always shut up with a nervous old man for her only [Pg 47] companion ”

“ Mr. Grey was very much amused by her account of what she had seen when she came home. He was very careful that she should have plenty of sandwiches, and hot wine and water for luncheon to counteract the cold of the church, and sat listening and smiling to hear her describe Miss Gage's velvet pelisse and little ermine muff. He saw plainly, he told her, that she would like a black velvet gown herself. Margaret coloured and laughed, but could not deny the fact, and the next morning after breakfast, he told Land to go over to the next town and get one. ”

“ She was wondering how much of love was sex—wondering how she could fortify herself against the passing of the charms of sex—wondering why Gage had such a frantic dislike of women like Margaret who hadn’t succumbed to sex—wondering if that was the reason. ”

“ Her hair was frizzed out round her head like some of Van Dyck's early pictures, and the striped camellias put in just behind the ear—she seemed determined to look her best this last evening.
George Gage stared directly. He had a great fancy for seeing women in fine clothes; and clothes that looked as if they cost a [Pg 255] great deal of money. He took her into dinner, and tried to command his temper, and keep up a conversation with her.
"You drove out after luncheon, did you not?"
"Yes. Did not you hear Uncle Gage and me planning a secret expedition together?" ”

“ Gage was all fur and black velvet, yet her regal figure and magnificent stature could not be mistaken.
She was strikingly like her father, with straight features, light brown hair, and calm, clear, full-opened blue eyes; but although it was impossible to deny to her face the regularity of an antique statue, and the sweetness of expression that almost always accompanies regularity, she possessed one drawback in the eyes of Margaret; she must have been two or three and twenty, at least, an age that to a girl of seventeen seems to approach very near to the confines of the grave. ”

“ She cared less about the matter than if an accident had happened to her spaniel, and was turning over in her mind, the trimming she would have to her next bonnet, while she went through the proper exclamations during her uncle's narrative.
[Pg 148]
About this time some races were held, at which all the neighbourhood were to attend. There was a ball in the evening, and Captain Gage desired to fill his house with company, that they might go in a party to the race and ball. Miss Gage asked Margaret to stay with her during these festivities, and her father sent an invitation to Mrs. ”

“ I dare say his room is not half the size of my uncle's kennel: there he sits with all his intimate friends, smoking till the place is like a lime kiln; if I cannot join them, what is to become of me? Mr. Gage, have you a cigar about you? I will lose no time in learning the art again." [Pg 166]
Mr. Gage not noticing the last part of the speech, said "he did not suppose it to be a very likely thing that he should permit his wife to live in a barrack."
"Ah!" said Harriet shaking her head, "I have a conviction, a presentiment, that I shall live in the little lime-kiln we were speaking of. ”

“ Sim Gage for the first time in his life felt the secret quick of his simple, sensitive soul cut open and exposed to gaze. Not even the medical man before him could fail of sudden pity at witnessing what was written on his face—-all the dignity, the simplicity, the reticence, all the bashfulness of a man brought up helplessly against the knife. ”

“ Appleton?’
‘No, Miss Jane,’ answered Mrs. Appleton. ‘Betsy did say they talked of naming him after his uncle, Edward Gage, only Mr. Devereux would not let him stand.’
‘No,’ said Jane. ‘Since he married that dissenting wife he never comes near the church; he is too much like the sour Gage, as we call his mother, to be good for much. ”

“ Gage. "I never saw any thing so wretched as my father's management of his stables. He never bought a horse that he was not palpably cheated; and, if he chanced to buy a good one, the animal would be ruined, with that lame old sailor at the head of affairs."
"Don't say one word against Captain Gage," exclaimed Harriet. "Whatever he does is sure to be better than any body else. I do not mean wiser, Mr. Gage, but better. Perhaps no one else would choose to have a lame sailor with one eye to superintend his [Pg 58] stables. It shows he has more kindness than his neighbours." ”

“ All the time the airy plaits were weaving, which were to form the pretty coiffure, designated as the antique moderne, Margaret was convincing herself that she was not taking all this trouble because Hubert Gage was coming. Nothing could be so unlikely, or so undignified; it was entirely on account of his sister Elizabeth. ”

“ Gage. "He has such a taste for music!"
"Who has, my dear?" asked Captain Gage.
"Lord Raymond, uncle."
"Has he, indeed?—I never knew that before," said Captain Gage. "Why he has [Pg 260] never any music at his house, unless there is a very large party."
"He has no wife, you know, Uncle Gage, and he cannot play the piano himself."
"He must marry a good musician, then," said Captain Gage. "I don't know anything that more contributes to the cheerfulness of a family circle than a little good music."
"So Lord Raymond seems to think," said Mr. Gage, in a low voice to Harriet. ”

“ Peckover urged coolly, having drunk champagne sufficient for a reckless enjoyment of the controversy, "if the girl fancies a change. It's your business to make yourself sufficiently interesting to keep her affection. If you don't, well, I may as well take her on as any other fellow."
"Don't you talk a lot of conceited nonsense," retorted Gage, keeping down his fury with an effort. "The girl's all right: but she's led by your infernal monkey tricks into thinking that I'm neglecting her; so naturally she pretends to take up with you." ”

“ Captain Gage now came into the room, shook hands with Margaret, and assured her that she was looking remarkably well; and then told his daughter that Sir Philip would be down presently; that he had insisted on their not delaying dinner: that he was looking very ill, but that Bessy must not judge of him from his present appearance. And then he hurried out again to see how his guest was getting on.
Elizabeth Gage had not seen Sir Philip d'Eyncourt since she was a child. She remembered then that he had taken great notice of her, as young men [Pg 56] are apt to do of handsome children. ”

“ Gage had made in Dublin.
Margaret felt and looked pained; she disliked all jests upon what she could not help considering as sacred subjects; and she thought a wife's vows too important to become the object of such light discourse. She looked uneasily at Harriet, who stood laughing at all Lady James chose to say, or hint. Mrs. Gage saw this in a moment, and with her usual abruptness, she drew Margaret out upon the terrace.
[Pg 192] "Look you, little Oracle," said she, "I am not used to do any-thing by halves; I love my husband a great deal more than he deserves ”