Ellen Middleton-A Tale Part 9

"No," he said, as if he had not remarked my agitation, or else that it had calmed his. "No; Alice's character is perfectly good; but, in visiting her, you would be liable to fall in with persons whom it would be in every way unpleasant to be thrown amongst."

I remembered the two men at Salisbury, and felt this might be true; there was something so plain, and indifferent, too, in his manner of doing justice to Alice, that it removed my suspicions; and when he said--

"Well, now, for Heaven's sake, let us leave off talking on a subject on which it seems we are always destined to quarrel."

I smiled, and made no effort to pursue it farther, but listened to his account of the society at Brandon.

"Lady Wyndham (he said) is as you can see in looks, the very reverse of her husband--quite guiltless of his insipid comeliness. I have never found out anything beyond that; for she is as stern and as silent as he is communicative, perhaps on the system of compensation, and from a strict sense of justice to society."

"And the Miss Farnleys (I said), we have just made acquaintance; but I am quite disposed to like or dislike them, according to the report you make of them."

"The Miss Farnleys (he replied) have been brought almost entirely abroad, and are, perhaps, not spoilt, but certainly fas.h.i.+oned by this circ.u.mstance. The oldest is not the least affected in manner, nor indeed in conversation, except that one is willing to attribute to affectation the very silly things which an otherwise intelligent person is in the habit of saying."

"What kind of things?"

"Why, for instance, she will tell you that she cannot exist without flowers, and therefore keeps loads of them in her room at night, though they give her a raging headache. But don't think her silly (though it is difficult to help it, I own), for this very girl, when she broke her arm last year, submitted to the most painful operation without a groan, in order that her father, who was ill at the time, should not be agitated or alarmed, though, when he left the room, she fainted from the intensity of agony. Do not think her wicked, if she tells you that she pines to be overturned in a carriage, or to be wrecked at sea; if she boasts that she throws out of window the medicines that are prescribed for her, or that she swallows poison, to try how she feels after it; for she risked her life a few months ago to save a drowning child; and when the village near their country place was on fire, she went about among the distracted people like an angel of mercy. Do not, therefore, think her silly, wicked, or mad, whatever she may say to you, but only wonder where she learnt that to seem so was a charm."

"And her sister, that girl with a Grecian profile and straight eyebrows?"

"That girl, who sometimes is hardly pretty, and at other times perfectly beautiful, is very clever, though she too says silly things now and then, but quite in a different line. She is original and agreeable, though she lisps and drawls, till the spirit within her is roused. She is very provoking if you dislike her; still more so, perhaps, if you like her. In short, I hardly know which to recommend you to do; only, I am sure if you do like her, you will like her very much, and will better spare a better woman--Lady Wyndham, for instance."

"And that little Miss Moore, who is sitting over her book with a look of such intense enjoyment in her large eyes, what account do you give of her?"

"Oh, everybody doats upon the little Irish girl; n.o.body can tell exactly why. It is, I suppose, because her eyes speak to you whether her tongue does or not. It is because she unites the most contrary extremes, and leaves you to puzzle over them; because she sails into the room, with her little stately manner, and salutes you with a formal curtsey; and then, under all this air of dignity, you discover the very merriest-hearted little romp that ever existed. You must be fond of her. As refined in mind and in manner as the most fastidious could require, she has, at the same time, the humour, the native fun of her country--it sparkles in her eyes--it bubbles in her laugh. She is a little patriot, too: when Ireland is mentioned, you will see her cheek flush, and her spirit rise. It is the only strong feeling she seems to have; for, otherwise, like the jolly miller of Dee, she cares for n.o.body, and if others care for her, she does not appear to thank them for it. I have often heard men say, how in love they would be with Rosa Moore, if it were not for this thankless, hopeless, remorseless indifference. Now, I think this is a mistake; for I believe her great charm really lies in that very recklessness of what others think of her, or feel for her, in the eager, child-like impetuosity with which she seeks amus.e.m.e.nt, and in the perfect self-possession with which she treats everything and everybody."

"And Mrs. Ernsley, Henry; what do you say of her?"

"Mrs. Ernsley? It is much more difficult to say what she is, than what she is not; so allow me to describe her in negatives. She is _not_ handsome, for her features are bad, and her complexion is sallow. She is not plain, for she has pretty eyes, pretty hair, a pretty smile, and a pretty figure.

She is not natural, for her part in society is pre-arranged and continually studied. She is not affected, for n.o.body talks to you with more earnestness, or more of natural impulse and spontaneousness; but still, she is always listening to herself. She is the person who is attracting, who is charming you, natural to a fault, unguarded to excess (she says to herself). Then, she is not a bad sort of woman; she has a great regard for her husband, and takes great pains with her little girls; but she is always playing with edged tools; she is always lingering on the line of demarcation. She is eternally discussing who are in love with her--though she is such a very good sort of a woman--and who would be in love with her if she was not? Above all, she is by no means partial to other women, whether they have stepped over the line, or kept within it. She will hate you, Ellen, depend upon it, with an innocent kind of hatred: she will do you no harm, for she is kind-hearted in reality; only it will be nuts to her if anybody says that Miss Middleton is not near so pretty as they had expected; and she will try to put you down whenever you open your mouth; but don't be put down, and then you will remain mistress of the field, for she will grow so fidgetty, (not cross, for she is, in fact, good-tempered,) that she will lose her self-possession, and then all will be over with her."

"I have not the slightest wish to enter the lists with her.

But now, tell me something of the men who are here."

"That will be quickly done;--Sir Charles is a fool; Mr.

Ernsley is a prig; and Mr. Farnley has a broad kind of humour, and a talent for mimicry, but he is coa.r.s.e and unrefined, which, by the way, is, perhaps, the reason that his daughter thinks it necessary to be so painfully the reverse. Mr.

Brandon, your aunt's brother-in-law, is an agreeable man. Mr.

Manby is a lout."

"And Sir Edmund Ardern?" I inquired.

"Oh, as to Sir Edmund Ardern, I entreat you, on the same principle on which pastry-cooks cram their apprentices during the first few days, to talk to him incessantly. Let him sit by you to-morrow at breakfast, at luncheon, at dinner, walk with him, and ride with him; I shall not come near you, in order that he may have full scope for his fascinating powers; you shall be fascinated till you cry for mercy."

I laughed, but secretly thought that something of the severity of his satire proceeded from the fact, that Sir Edmund was the only handsome and pleasing person in the house, and I did not feel inclined to take entirely for granted, that Henry's judgment of him was correct.

Our _tete-a-tete_ was soon interrupted by the entrance of Mrs.

Ernsley, and the arrival of tea. Mrs. Ernsley threw herself into a large arm-chair, flung her bonnet and shawl on the opposite couch, and then began arranging her hair.

"You look tired, Mrs. Ernsley," said Henry.

"To death," she answered. "Dear Mrs. Brandon has been wondering whether the stars are inhabited or not. It is not fair to make one stretch out one's mind so far."

"What did Sir Edmund p.r.o.nounce on the subject?" inquired Henry.

"That there was much to be said on both sides of the question.

I left them at that point."

"Do you like Sir Edmund?"

"I wish you would not ask me."

"Why?"

"Because he hates me, and I won't own to a _pa.s.sion malheureuse_. He nearly overturned poor Mr. Farnley to-day at dinner, in trying to avoid the chair next me."

"Oh, no; it was in trying to get the one next Miss Middleton,"

observed Rosa Moore, with an Innocent expression of countenance.

Mrs. Ernsley continued without noticing the interruption, otherwise than by a downward movement of the corners of her mouth--"I had a thousand times rather be hated by him, than be liked in the way in which he seems to like any one, _qui lui tombe sous la main_."

"No doubt," said Henry; "next to being loved there is nothing like being hated."

"You think so too, then?" said Mrs. Ernsley.

"Certainly," he replied. "It gratifies one of the strongest tastes, or rather pa.s.sions, of one's nature; that of feeling emotion one's self, and exciting it in others. If I could not see the woman I loved agitated by her love for me, I had rather see her tremble, shudder eyen at my presence, than look as if Mr. Manby had come into the room."

"What a detestable lover you would make!" exclaimed Mrs.

Ernsley. "Always, by your own admission, on the verge of hatred."

He laughed, and said, "It is an old saying, that love and hatred are closely allied."

"Not more so than hatred and contempt," I said; "and in incurring the one, one might, perhaps, gain the other."

Both my companions looked at me with surprise, for I had not joined before in their conversation, and a secret feeling (I was aware of it) had given a shade of bitterness to my manner of saying it.

Mrs. Ernsley seemed to take the remark as personal to herself; but said good-humouredly, though somewhat sneeringly, "Since Miss Middleton has p.r.o.nounced so decided an opinion, we had better drop the subject. What is become of Edward Middleton, Mr. Lovell?"

"He has been abroad for some months," replied Henry; and Sir Edmund Ardern, who at that moment joined us, said, "The last time I saw him was at Naples last February; we had just made an excursion into the mountains of Calabria together."

"A very unromantic one, no doubt," said Mrs. Ernsley, "as everything is in our unromantic days. Not a trace of a brigand or of an adventure I suppose?"

"None that we were concerned in. But we saw an ex-brigand, and he told us his adventures."

"Did he really?" exclaimed Miss Farnley; "and was he not adorable?"

"Not exactly," said Sir Edmund with a smile; "but some of his accounts were interesting."

"Was he fierce?"