The Daltons Volume I Part 41

Such men, he rightly judged, were dangerous a.s.sociates to his son, the very worst acquaintances for Kate, in whom already he was deeply interested; but still no actual stain of dishonor, no palpable flaw, could be detected in their fame, till the arrival of Lord Norwood added his name to the list.

To receive a man of whose misconduct in England he had acquired every proof, was a step beyond his endurance. Here or never must he take his stand; and manfully he did so, at first, by calm argument and remonstrance, and at last by firm resolution and determination. Without adverting to what had pa.s.sed between the Viscount and himself, the letter he addressed to Lady Hester conveyed his unalterable resolve not to know Lord Norwood. Lady Hester's reply was not less peremptory, and scarcely as courteous. The correspondence continued with increasing warmth on both sides, till Sir Stafford palpably hinted at the possible consequences of a spirit of discordance and disagreement so ill-adapted to conjugal welfare. Her Ladys.h.i.+p caught up the suggestion with avidity, and professed that, whatever scruples his delicacy might feel, to hers there was none in writing the word, "Separation."

If the thought had already familiarized itself to his mind, the word had not; and strange it is that the written syllables should have a power and meaning that the idea itself could never realize.

To men who have had little publicity in their lives, and that little always of an honorable nature, there is no thought so poignantly miserable as the dread of a scandalous notoriety. To a.s.sociate their names with anything that ministers to gossip; to make them tea-table talk; still worse, to expose them to sneering and impertinent criticisms, by revealing the secrets of their domesticity, is a torture to which no mere physical suffering has anything to compare. Sir Stafford Onslow was a true representative of this cla.s.s of feeling. The sight of his name in the list of directors of some great enterprise, as the patron of a charity, the governor of an hospital, or the donor to an inst.i.tution, was about as much of newspaper notoriety as he could bear without a sense of shrinking delicacy; but to become the mark for public discussion in the relations of his private life, to have himself and his family brought up to the bar of that terrible ordeal, where bad tongues are the eloquent, and evil speakers are the witty, was a speculation too terrible to think over; and this was exactly what Lady Hester was suggesting!

Is it not very strange that woman, with whose nature we inseparably and truly a.s.sociate all those virtues that take their origin in refinement and modesty, should sometimes be able to brave a degree of publicity to which a man, the very hardiest and least shamefaced, would succ.u.mb, crestfallen and abashed; that her timid delicacy, her shrinking bashfulness, can be so hardened by the world that she can face a notoriety where every look is an indictment, and every whisper a condemnation?

Now, if Lady Hester was yet remote from this, she had still journeyed one stage of the road. She had abundant examples around her of those best received and best looked on in society, whose chief claim to the world's esteem seemed to be the contempt with which they treated all its ordinances. There was a dash of heroism in their effrontery that pleased her. They appeared more gay, more buoyant, more elastic in spirits than other people; their increased liberty seemed to impart enlarged and more generous views, and they were always "good-natured," since, living in the very gla.s.siest of houses, they never "s.h.i.+ed" a pebble.

While, then, Sir Stafford sat overwhelmed with shame and sorrow at the bare thought of the public discussion that awaited him, Lady Hester was speculating upon condolences here, approbation there, panegyrics upon her high spirit, and congratulations upon her freedom. The little, half-shadowy allusions her friends would throw out from time to time upon the strange unsuitableness of her marriage with a man so much her senior, would soon be converted into comments of unrestricted license.

Besides and perhaps the greatest charm of all was she would have a grievance; not the worn-out grievance of some imaginary ailment that n.o.body believes in but the "doctor," not the mock agonies of a heart complaint, that saves the sufferer from eating bad dinners in vulgar company, but always allows them a respite for a dejeuner at the court, or a supper after the Opera, with a few chosen convives, but a real, substantial grievance, over which men might be eloquent and ladies pathetic. Such were the different feelings with which two persons contemplated the same event. Sir Stafford's thoughts turned instantly towards England. What would be said there by all those friends who had endeavored to dissuade him from this ill-suited union? Their sorrowful compa.s.sion was even less endurable than the malice of others; and Grounsell, too, what would his old friend think of a catastrophe so sudden? In his heart Sir Stafford was glad that the doctor was absent; much as he needed his counsel and advice, he still more dreaded the terror of his triumphant eye at the accomplishment of his oft-repeated prediction.

From George he met no support whatever. He either believed, or thought that he believed, Norwood's garbled explanation. Intercourse with a certain set of "fast men" had shown him that a man might do a "screwy"

thing now and then, and yet not be cut by his acquaintance. And the young Guardsman deemed his father's rigid notions nothing but prejudices, very excellent and commendable ones, no doubt, but as inapplicable to our present civilization as would be a coat of mail or a back-piece of chain-armor. George Onslow, therefore, halted between the two opinions. Adhering to his father's side from feelings of affection and respect, he was drawn to Lady Hester's by his convictions; not, indeed, aware how formidable the difference had already become between them, and that, before that very night closed in, they had mutually agreed upon a separation, which while occupying the same house, was essentially to exclude all intercourse.

One consideration gave Sir Stafford much painful thought. What was to become of Kate Dalton in this new turn of affairs? The position of a young girl on a visit with a family living in apparent unity and happiness was very wide apart from her situation as the companion of a woman separated, even thus much, from her husband. It would be equally unfair to her own family, as unjust to the girl herself, to detain her then in such a conjuncture. And yet what was to be done? Apart from all the unpleasantness of proposing an abrupt return to her home, came the thought of the avowal that must accompany the suggestion, the very confession he so dreaded to make. Of course the gossiping of servants would soon circulate the rumor. But then they might not spread it beyond the Alps, nor make it the current talk of a German watering-place. Thus were his selfish feelings at war with higher and purer thoughts. But the struggle was not a long one. He sat down and wrote to Lady Hester.

Naturally a.s.suming that all the reasons which had such force for himself would weigh equally with her, he dwelt less upon the arguments for Kate's departure than upon the mode in which it might be proposed and carried out. He adverted with feeling to the sacrifice the loss would inflict upon Lady Hester, but professed his conviction in the belief that all merely selfish considerations would give way before higher and more important duties.

"As it is," said he, "I fear much that we have done anything but conduce to this dear girl's welfare and happiness. We have shown her glimpses of a life whose emptiness she cannot appreciate, but by whose glitter she is already attracted. We have exposed her to all the seductions of flattery, pampering a vanity which is perhaps her one only failing. We have doubtless suggested to her imagination dreams of a future never to be realized, and we must now consign her to a home where all the affections of fond relatives will be unequal to the task of blinding her to its poverty and its obscurity. And yet even this is better than to detain her here. It shall be my care to see in what way I can I was about to write 'recompense;' nor would the word be unsuitable recompense Mr. Dalton for the injury we have done him as regards his child; and if you have any suggestion to make me on this head, I will gladly accept it."

The note concluded with some hints as to the manner of making the communication to Kate, the whole awkwardness of which Sir Stafford, if need were, would take upon himself.

The whole temper of the letter was feeling and tender. Without even in the most remote way adverting to what had occurred between Lady Hester and himself, he spoke of their separation simply in its relation to Kate Dalton, for whom they were both bound to think and act with caution.

As if concentrating every thought upon her, he did not suffer any other consideration to interfere. Kate, and Kate only, was all its theme.

Lady Hester, however, read the lines in a very different spirit. She had just recovered from a mesmeric trance, into which, to calm her nervous exaltation, her physician, Dr. Buccellini, had thrown her. She had been lying in a state of half-hysterical apathy for some hours, all volition, almost all vitality, suspended, under the influence of an exaggerated credulity, when the letter was laid upon the table.

"What is that your maid has just left out of her hand?" asked the doctor, in a tone of semi-imperiousness.

[Ill.u.s.tration: 318]

"A letter, a sealed letter," replied she, mystically waving her hand before her half-closed eyes.

The doctor gave a look of triumph at the bystanders, and went on:

"Has the letter come from a distant country, or from a correspondent near at hand?"

"Near!" said she, with a shudder.

"Where is the writer at this moment?" asked he.

"In the house," said she, with another and more violent shuddering.

"I now take the letter in my hand," said the doctor, "and what am I looking at?"

"A seal with two griffins supporting a spur."

The doctor showed the letter on every side, with a proud and commanding gesture. "There is a name written in the corner of the letter, beneath the address. Do you know that name?"

A heavy, thick sob was the reply.

"There there be calm, be still," said he, majestically motioning with both hands towards her; and she immediately became composed and tranquil. "Are the contents of this letter such as will give you pleasure?"

A shake of the head was the answer.

"Are they painful?"

"Very painful," said she, pressing her hand to her temples.

"Will these tidings be productive of grand consequences?"

"Yes, yes!" cried she, eagerly.

"What will you do, when you read them?"

"Act!" e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed she, solemnly.

"In compliance with the spirit, or in rejection?"

"Rejection!"

"Sleep on, sleep on," said the doctor, with a wave of his hand; and, as he spoke, her head drooped, her arm fell listlessly down, and her long and heavy breathing denoted deep slumber. "There are people, Miss Dalton," said he to Kate, "who affect to see nothing in mesmerism but deception and trick, whose philosophy teaches them to discredit all that they cannot comprehend. I trust you may never be of this number."

"It is very wonderful, very strange," said she, thoughtfully.

"Like all the secrets of nature, its phenomena are above belief; yet, to those who study them with patience and industry, how compatible do they seem with the whole order and spirit of creation. The great system of vitality being a grand scheme of actionary and reactionary influences, the centrifugal being in reality the centripetal, and those impulses we vainly fancy to be our own instincts being the impressions of external forces do you comprehend me?"

"Not perfectly; in part, perhaps," said she, diffidently.

"Even that is something," replied he, with a bland smile. "One whose future fortunes will place her in a station to exert influence is an enviable convert to have brought to truth."

"I!" said she, blus.h.i.+ng with shame and surprise together; "surely you mistake, sir. I am neither born to rank, nor like to attain it."

"Both one and the other, young lady," said he, solemnly; "high as your position will one day be, it will not be above the claims of your descent. It is not on fallible evidence that I read the future."

"And can you really predict my fortune in life?" asked she, eagerly.

"More certainly than you would credit it, when told," said he, deliberately.

"How I should like to hear it; how I should like to know" She stopped, and a deep blush covered her face.

"And why should you not know that your dreams will be realized?" said he, hastily, as if speaking from some irresistible impulse. "What more natural than to desire a glance, fleeting though it be, into that black vista where the bright lightning of prophecy throws its momentary splendor?"

"And how know you that I have had dreams?" said she, innocently.

"I know of them but by their accomplishment. I see you not in the present or the past, but in the future. There your image is revealed to me, and surrounded by a splendor I cannot describe. It is gorgeous and barbaric in magnificence; there is something feudal in the state by which you are encompa.s.sed that almost speaks of another age."