Sword and Gown Part 6

CHAPTER X.

There is a pleasant theory--that every woman may be loved, once at least in her life, if she so wills it. It must be true: how, otherwise, can you account for the number of hard-featured visages--lighted up by no redeeming ray of intellect--that preside at "good men's feasts," and confront them at their firesides? How do the husbands manage? Do they, from constantly contemplating an inferior type of creation, lose their comparing and discriminating powers, so that, like the Australian and Pacific aborigines, they come to regard as points of beauty peculiarities that a more advanced civilization shrinks from? Or do their visual organs actually become impaired, like those of captives who can see clearly only in their own dungeon's twilight, and flinch before the full glare of day? If neither of these is the case, they must sometimes sympathize with that dreary dilemma of Bias which the adust Aldrich quotes in grim irony--[Greek: _Ei men kalen, exeis koinen, ei d'

aischran, poinen_] (Whether of the two horns impaled the sage of Priene?) Some, of course, are fully alive to the outward defects of their partners; but few are so candid as the old Berks.h.i.+re squire, who, looking after his spouse as she left the room, said, pensively, "Excellent creature, that! I've liked her better every day for twenty years, but I've always thought she's the plainest-headed woman in England!" Fewer still would wish to emulate the st.u.r.dy plain-speaking of the "gudeman" in the Scottish ballad, who, when his witch-wife boasted how she bloomed into beauty after drinking the "wild-flower wine,"

replied, undauntedly,

"Ye lee, ye lee, ye ill womyn, Sae loud I hear ye lee; The ill-faured'st wife i' the kingdom of Fife Is comely compared wi' thee."

He could stand all the other marvels of the Sabbat, but _that_ was too much for his credulity.

No doubt many of these Ugly Princesses are endowed with excellent sterling qualities. The old Border legend says there never was a happier match than that of "Muckle-mou'ed Meg," though her husband married her reluctantly with a halter tightening round his neck. But such advantages lie below the surface, and take some time in being appreciated. The first process of captivation is what I don't understand--unless, indeed, there are sparkles in the quartz, invisible to common eyes, that tell the experienced gold-seeker of a rich vein near.

Well, we will allow the proposition with which we started; but do you suppose its converse would hold equally good--that every woman could _love_ once if she wished it? Nine out of ten of them would, I dare say, answer boldly in the affirmative; but in a few rather sad and weary faces you might read something more than a doubt about this; and lips, not so red and full as they once were, on which the wintry smile comes but rarely, could tell perhaps a different story. The precise mould that will fit _some_ fancies is as hard to find as the slipper of Cendrillon; and so, in default of the fairy _chaussure_, the small white foot goes on its road unshod, and the stones and briers gall it cruelly.

With men it does not so much matter. They have always the counteracting resources of bodily and mental exertion, against which the affections can make but little head. Indeed, some of the most distinguished in arts, in arms, if not in song, seem to have gone down to their graves without ever giving themselves time to indulge in any one of these.

Perhaps they never missed a sentiment which would have been very much in their way if they had felt it. If all tales are true, mathematics are a very effectual Nenuphar. But with women it is different. _They_ can't be always clambering up unexplored peaks, or inventing improvements in gunnery, or commanding irregular corps, or bringing in faultless reform bills, or finding out constellations, or shooting big game, or resorting to any of _our_ thousand-and-one safety-valves to superfluous excitement. Are crochet, or crossed letters, or charity-schools, or even Cochins and _Creve-coeurs_, so entirely engrossing as to drown forever the reproaches of nature, that will make herself heard? If not, surely the most phlegmatically proper of her s.e.x does sometimes feel sad and dissatisfied when she thinks that she has never been able to care for any one more than for her own brother. It must seem hard that, when the frost of old age comes on, she shall not have even a memory to look upon to warm her. But in the world here, such temptations to discontent abound; but the most guileless votary of the _Sacre Coeur_ might confess regrets and misgivings like these without meriting any extra allowance of fast and scourge.

If we were to reckon up the cases we have heard of women who have "gone wrong," and made, if not _mesalliances_, at least marriages inexplicable on any rational grounds, it would fill up a long summer's day, even without drawing on darker recollections of post-nuptial transgression.

In these last cases, perhaps, the altar and absolute indifference was a more dangerous element than Mrs. Malaprop's "little aversion," which is, at all events, a _positive_, thing to work upon. Lethargies are harder to cure, they say, than fevers. Certainly they have the warning examples of others who have so erred, and paid for it by a life-long repentance; but that never has stopped them yet, and never will. Remember the reply of the _debutante_ to her austere parent when the latter refused to take her to a ball, saying that "_she_ had seen the folly of such things." "I want to see the folly of them too." Few of us men can realize the feeling that, with our sisters, may account for, though not excuse, much folly and sin. They see others happy all around them: it is hard to fast when so many are feasting. So there comes a shameful sense of ignorance--a vague, eager desire for knowledge--a terror of an isolation deepening and darkening upon them, and a determination, at any risks, to balk at least _that_ enemy--and so, like the poor lady of Shalott, they grow restless, and reckless, and rebellious at last. They are safe where they are, but the days have so much of dull sameness that there is a sore temptation in the unknown peril. "Better," they say, "than the close atmosphere of the guarded castle and the phantasms of fairy-land, one draught of the fresh outer air--one glimpse of real life and nature--one taste of substantial joys and sorrows that shall wake all the pulses of womanhood, even though the experience be brief and dearly bought, though the web woven while we sat dreaming must surely be rent in twain--ay, even though the curse, too, may follow very swiftly, and the swans be waiting at the gate that shall bear us down to our burying."

If staid and cold-blooded virgins and matrons are not exempt from these disagreeable self-reproaches, how did it fare with Cecil Tresilyan, in whom the energy of a strong temperament was stirring like the spring-sap in a young oak-tree? Should she die conscious of the possession of such a wealth of love, with none to share or inherit it? She had seen such numbers of her friends and acquaintance "pair off," that she began to envy at last the facility of attachment that she had been wont to hold in scorn. Very many reflections of "lovers lately wed" had been cast upon her mirror, and yet the One knightly shadow was long in coming. Can it be that yonder gleam through the trees is the flash of his distant armor?

I hope this ill.u.s.trated edition of rather an old theory has not bored you much; because it would have been just as simple to have said at once that, as the days went on in Dorade, and they were thrown constantly into each other's society, Major Keene began to monopolize much more of Cecil Tresilyan's thoughts than she would have allowed if she could have helped it; for, though she considered Mr. Fullarton's testimony unfairly biased by prejudice, she could not doubt that Royston was by no means the most eligible object to centre her young affections upon. He carefully avoided discussion or display of any of his peculiar opinions in her presence, and on such occasions seemed inclined to soften his habitually sardonic and depreciatory tone. Once or twice, when they did disagree, she observed that he contrived to make some one else take her side, and then argued the point, as long as he thought it worth while, with the last opponent. Beyond the courtesy which invariably marked his demeanor toward her s.e.x, this was the only sign of especial deference that he had shown. She never could detect the faintest approach to the adulation that hundreds had paid her, and which she had wearied of long ago. Nevertheless, she knew perfectly that on many subjects, generally considered all-important, they differed as widely as the poles.

Perpetual struggles between the spirit and the flesh made Cecil's heart an odd sort of debatable land; if she could not always insure success and supremacy to the right side, she certainly did endeavor to preserve the balance of power. Personally she rather disliked Mr. Fullarton, but she seemed to look upon him as the embodiment of a principle, and the symbol of an abstraction. He represented there the Establishment which she had always been taught to venerate; and so she felt bound, as far as possible, to favor and support him; just as Goring and Wilmot, and many more wild cavaliers, fearing neither G.o.d nor devil, mingled in their war-cry church as well as king. (Rather a rough comparison to apply to a well-intentioned demoiselle of the nineteenth century, but, I fancy, a correct one.) Thus, if she indulged herself in a long _tete-a-tete_ with Keene, she was sure to be extraordinarily civil to the chaplain soon after; and if she devoted herself for a whole evening to the society of the priest and his family, the soldier was likely to benefit by it on the morrow. Unluckily, the sacrifice of inclination was all on _one_ side.

The antagonists had never, as yet, come into open collision. It was not respect or fear that made them shy of the conflict, but rather a feeling, which neither could have explained to himself, resembling that of leaders of parties in the House, who decline measuring their strength against each other on questions of minor importance, reserving themselves for the final crisis, when the want-of-confidence vote shall come on. Once only there was a chance of a skirmish--the merest affair of outposts.

Keene had been calling on the Tresilyans one evening, in the official capacity of bearer of a verbal message from Mrs. Molyneux. It was the simplest one imaginable; but as graver emba.s.sadors have done before him, liking his quarters he dallied over his mission. (If Geneva, instead of Paris, were chosen for the meeting of a Congress, would not several knotty points be decided much more speedily?) When, at last, all was settled, it seemed very natural that he should pet.i.tion Cecil for "just one song;" and you know what that always comes to. Royston never would "turn over" if he could possibly avoid it; he considered it a willful waste of advantages, for the strain on his attention, slight as it might be, quite spoiled his appreciation of the melody. Perhaps he was right.

As a rule, if one wanted to discover the one person about whose approval the fair _cantatrice_ is most solicitous, it would be well to look _not_ immediately behind her ivory shoulder. At all events, he had made his peace with Miss Tresilyan on this point long ago. So he drew his arm-chair up near the piano, but out of her sight as she sang, and sat watching her intently through his half-closed eyelids.

I marvel not that in so many legends of witchery and seduction since the _Odyssey_ the [Greek: _thespesie aoide_] has borne its part. "But," the Wanderer might say, replying against Circe's warning, "have we not learned prudence and self-command from Athene, the chaste Tritonid? Have not ten years under s.h.i.+eld before Troy, and a thousand leagues of seafaring, made our hearts as hard as our hands, and our ears deaf to the charms of song? Thus much of wisdom, at least, hath come with grizzled hair, that we may mock at temptations that might have won us when our cheeks were in their down. O most divinely fair of G.o.ddesses!

have we not resisted your own enchantments? Shall we go forth scathless from aeaea to perish on the Isle of the Sirens?" But the low, green hills are already on the weather beam, and we are aware of a sweet weird chant that steals over the water like a living thing, and smooths the ripple where it pa.s.ses. How fares it with our philosophic Laertiades? Those signs look strangely unlike incitements to greater speed; and what mean those struggles to get loose? Well, perhaps, for the hero that the good hemp holds firm, and that Peribates and Eurylochus spring up to strengthen his bonds; well, that the wax seals fast the ears of those st.u.r.dy old sea-dogs who stretch to their oars till Ocean grows h.o.a.ry behind the blades; or n.o.bler bones might soon be added to the myriads that lie bleaching in the meadow, half hidden by its flowers. It was not, then, so very trivial, the counsel that she gave in parting kindness--

[Greek: _Kirke euplokamos, deine theos audeessa_.]

Are we in our generation wiser than the "man of many wiles?" Dinner is over, and every one is going out into the pleasance, to listen to the nightingales.

"It will be delicious; there is nothing I should like so much; but I--I sprained my ankle in jumping that gate; and Amy" (that's "my cousin who happens to sing"), "I heard you cough three times this morning. _You_ won't be so imprudent as to risk the night air? Ah! they are gone at last; and now, Amy dear--good, kindest Amy!--open the especial crimson book quickly, and give me first your own pet song, and then mine, and then 'The Three Fishers,' and then 'Maud,' and then, I suppose, they will be coming back again; but by that time, they may be as enthusiastic as they please, we shall be able to meet them fairly."

Things have changed since David's day; spirits are raised sometimes now, as well as laid, by harp and song. In good truth, they are not always evil ones.

On that night, Royston Keene listened to the sweet voice that seemed to knock at the gates of his heart--gates shut so long that the bars had rusted in their staples--not loudly or imperiously, but powerful in its plaintive appeal, like that of those one dearly loved, standing without in the bitter cold, and pleading--"Ah! let me in!" He listened till a pleasant, dreamy feeling of _domesticity_ began to creep over him that he had never known before. He could realize, then, that there were circ.u.mstances under which a man might easily dispense with high play, and hard riding, and hard flirting (to give it a mild name), and hard drinking, and other excitements which habit had almost turned into necessities, without missing any one of them. There were two words which ought to have put all these fancies to flight, as the writing on the wall scattered the guests of Belshazzar--"Too Late." But he turned his head away, and would not read them. He had actually succeeded in ignoring another disenchanting reality--the presence of Mrs. Danvers.

That estimable person seemed more than usually fidgetty, and disposed to make herself, as well as others, uncomfortable. There was evidently something on her mind from her glancing so often and so nervously at the door. It opened at last softly, just as Cecil had finished "The Swallow," and revealed Mr. Fullarton standing on the threshold. The latter was not well pleased with the scene before him. There was an air of comfort about it which, under the circ.u.mstances, he thought decidedly wrong; besides which he could not get rid of a vague misgiving (the rarest thing with him!) that his visit was scarcely welcome or well timed.

Miss Tresilyan rose instantly to greet the intruder (yes, that's the right word) with her usual calm courtesy. Very few words had been exchanged for the last hour, but she was perfectly aware--what woman is not?--of the influence she had exercised over her listener. That consciousness had made her strangely happy. So, _she_ certainly could have survived the chaplain's absence. Royston Keene rose too, quite slowly. There are compounds, you know, that always remain soft and ductile in a certain temperature, but harden into stone at the first contact with the outer air. It was just so with him. Even as he moved, all gentle feelings were struck dead in his heart, and he stood up a harder man than ever, with no kinder emotion left than bitter anger at the interruption. He could not always command his eyes, he knew; and, if he had not pa.s.sed his hand quickly over his face just then, their expression might have thrilled through the new-comer disagreeably.

"Cecil, dearest," Mrs. Danvers said, with rather an awkward a.s.sumption of being perfectly at her ease, "Mr. Fullarton was good enough to say he would come and read to us this evening, and explain some pa.s.sages. I don't know why I forgot to tell you. I meant to do so, but--" Her look finished the sentence. Royston, like the others, guessed what she meant, and _you_ may guess how he thanked her.

Cecil colored with vexation. She was so anxious to prevent Mrs. Danvers from feeling dependent that she allowed her to take all sorts of liberties, and the amiable woman was not disposed to let the privilege fall into disuse. On the present occasion there was such an absurd incongruity of time and place that she might possibly have tried to evade the "exposition," but she happened just then to meet Keene's eye.

The sarcasm there was not so carefully veiled as it usually was in her presence. Never yet was born Tresilyan who blenched from a challenge; so she answered at once to express "her sense of Mr. Fullarton's kindness, and her regret that he had not come earlier in the evening." If Royston had known how bitterly she despised herself for disingenuousness he would have been amply avenged.

Even while she was speaking he closed the piano very slowly and softly.

It did not take him long to put on his impenetrable face, for when he turned round there was not a trace of anger left; the scarce suppressed taunt in Cecil's last words moved him apparently no more than Mrs.

Danvers's glance of triumph.

"I owe you a thousand apologies," he said, "for staying such an unwarrantable time, and quite as many thanks for the pleasantest two hours I have spent in Dorade. Don't think I would detain you one moment from Mr. Fullarton and your devotional exercises. You know--no, you _don't_ know--the verse in the ballad:

'Amundeville may be lord by day, But the monk is lord by night; Nor wine nor wa.s.sail would stir a va.s.sal To question that friar's right.'"

He went away then without another word beyond the ordinary adieu.

Royston had a way of repeating poetry peculiar to himself--rather monotonous, perhaps, but effective from the depth and volume of his voice. You gained in rhythm what you lost in rhyme. The sound seemed to linger in their ears after he had closed the door.

As the echo of the firm, strong footstep died away, a virtuous indignation possessed the broad visage of the divine.

"It is like Major Keene," said he, "to select as his text-book the most G.o.dless work of the satanic school; but I should have thought that even he would have paused before venturing, in this presence, on a quotation from _Don Juan_."

At that awful word Mrs. Danvers gave a little shriek as if "a bee had stung her newly." Had she been a Catholic she would have crossed herself an indefinite number of times: will you be good enough to imagine her protracted look of holy horror? Cecil's eyes were glittering with scornful humor as she answered, very demurely, "What an advantage it is to be a large, general reader! It enables one to impart so much information. Now Bessie and I should never have guessed where those lines came from if you had not enlightened us. They seemed harmless enough in themselves, and Major Keene was considerate enough to leave us in our ignorance. So Byron comes within the scope of your studies, Mr.

Fullarton. I thought you seldom indulged in such secular authors?" The chaplain was quite right in making his reply inaudible: it would have been difficult to find a perfectly satisfactory one. However, the hour was late enough to excuse his beginning the reading without farther delay. It was not a success. There was a stoppage somewhere in the current of his mellifluous eloquence; and the exposition was concluded so soon, and indeed abruptly, that Mrs. Danvers retired to rest with a feeling of disappointment and inanition, such as one may have experienced when, expecting a "sit-down" supper, we are obliged to content ourselves with a meagrely-furnished _buffet_. For some minutes after Mr. Fullarton had departed Miss Tresilyan sat silent, leaning her head upon her hand. At last she said, "Bessie, dear, you know I would not interfere with your comforts or your arrangements for the world; but, the next time you wish to have a repet.i.tion of this, would you be so very good as to tell me beforehand? I think I shall spend that evening with f.a.n.n.y Molyneux. I do not quite like it, and I am sure it does me no real good."

She spoke so gently that Mrs. Danvers was going to attempt one of her querulous remonstrances, but she happened to look at the face of her patroness. It wore an expression not often seen there; but she was wise enough to interpret it aright, and to guess that she had gone far enough. It was ever a dangerous experiment to trifle with the Tresilyans when their brows were bent. So she launched into some of her affectionate plat.i.tudes and profuse excuses, and under cover of these retreated to her rest. It is a comfort to reflect that she slept very soundly, though she monopolized all the slumber that night that ought to have fallen to Cecil's share.

What did Royston Keene think of the events of the evening? As he went down the stairs I am afraid he cursed the chaplain once heartily, but on the whole he was not dissatisfied. At all events, the short walk down to the club completely restored his _sang-froid_, and the last trace of vexation vanished as he entered the card-room and saw the "light of battle" gleam on the haggard face of Armand de Chateaumesnil.

CHAPTER XI.

There was in Dorade a stout and meritorious elderly widow, who formed a sort of connecting link between the natives and the settlers. English by birth, she had married a Frenchman of fair family and fortune, so that her habits and sympathies attached themselves about equally to the two countries. You do not often find so good a specimen of the hybrid. She gave frequent little _soirees_, which were as pleasant and exciting as such a.s.semblages of heterogeneous elements usually are--that is to say, very moderately so. The two streams flowed on in the same channel, without mingling or losing their characteristics. I fancy the fault was most on our side.

We no longer, perhaps, parade Europe with "pride in our port, defiance in our eye;" but still, in our travels, we lose no opportunity of maintaining and a.s.serting our well-beloved dignity, which, if rather a myth and vestige of the past, at home, abroad, is a very stern reality.

Have you not seen, at a crowded _table d'hote_, the British mother encompa.s.s her daughters with the double bulwark of herself and their staid governess on either flank, so as to avert the contamination which must otherwise have certainly ensued from the close proximity of a courteous white-bearded Graf, or a _fringante_ vicomtesse whose eyes outshone her diamonds? May it ever remain so! Each nation has its vanity and its own peculiar glory, as it has its especial produce. O cotton mills of Manchester! envy not nor emulate the velvet looms of Genoa or Lyons; you are ten times as useful, and a hundredfold more remunerating.

What matters it if Damascus guard jealously the secret of her fragrant clouded steel, when Sheffield can turn out efficient sword-blades at the rate of a thousand per hour? _Suum cuique tribuito._ Let others aspire to be popular: be it ours to remain irreproachably and unapproachably respectable.

So poor Mdme. de Verzenay's efforts to promote an _entente cordiale_ were lamentably foiled. When the English mustered strong, they would immediately form themselves into a hollow square, the weakest in the centre, and so defy the a.s.saults of the enemy. Now and then a daring Gaul would attempt the adventure of the Enchanted Castle, determined, if not to deliver the imprisoned maidens, at least to enliven their solitude. See how gayly and gallantly he starts, glancing a saucy adieu to Adolphe and Eugene, who admire his audacity, but augur ill for its success. _Allons, je me risque. Montjoie St. Denis! France a la rescousse!_ He winds, as it were, the bugle at the gate, with a well-turned compliment or a brilliant bit of _badinage_. Slowly the jealous valves unclose; he stands within the magic precinct--an eerie silence all around. Suppose that one of the Seven condescends to parley with him; she does so nervously and under protest, glancing ever over her shoulder, as if she expected the austere Fairy momentarily to appear; while her companions sit without winking or moving, cowering together like a covey of birds when the hawk is circling over the turnip-field. How can you expect a man to make himself agreeable under such appalling circ.u.mstances? The heart of the adventurer sinks within him. Lo! there is a rustling of robes near; what if Calyba or Urganda were at hand? _Fuyons!_ And the knight-errant retreats, with drooping crest and smirched armor--a melancholy contrast to the _preux chevalier_ who went forth but now chanting his war-song, conquering and to conquer.

The remarks of the discomfited one, after such a failure, were, I fear, the reverse of complimentary; and the unpleasant word _begueule_ figured in them a great deal too often.

Cecil and f.a.n.n.y Molyneux were certainly exceptions to the rule of unsociability, but the general dullness of those _reunions_ infected them, and made the atmosphere oppressive; it required a vast amount of leaven to make such a large, heavy lump light or palatable. Besides, it is not pleasant to carry on a conversation with twenty or thirty people looking on and listening, as if it were some theatrical performance that they had paid money to see, and consequently had a right to criticise.

The fair friends had held counsel together as to the expediency of gratifying others at a great expense to themselves on the present occasion, and had made their election--not to go.

Early the next morning Miss Tresilyan encountered Keene; their conversation was very brief; but, just as he was quitting her, the latter remarked, in a matter-of-course way, "We shall meet this evening at Madame de Verzenay's?"

She looked at him in some surprise, for she knew he must have heard from Mrs. Molyneux of their intention to absent themselves. She told him as much.

"Ah! last night she did not mean to go," replied Royston; "but she changed her mind this morning while I was with them. When I left them, ten minutes ago, there was a consultation going on with Harry as to what she should wear. I don't think it will last more than half an hour; and then she was coming to try to persuade you to keep her fickleness in countenance."

Now the one point upon which Cecil had been most severe on _la mignonne_ was the way in which the latter suffered herself to be guided by her husband's friend. It is strange how p.r.o.ne is the unconverted and unmated feminine nature to instigate revolt against the Old Dominion--never more so than when the beautiful _Carbonara_ feels that its shadow is creeping fast over the frontier of her own freedom. Nay, suppose the conquest achieved, and that they themselves are reduced to the veriest serfdom, none the less will they strive to goad other hereditary bondswomen into striking the blow. Is it not known that steady old "machiners," broken for years to double harness, will encourage and countenance their "flippant" progeny in kicking over the traces? How otherwise could the name of mother-in-law, on the stage and in divers domestic circles, have become a synonym for firebrand? Look at your wife's maid, for instance.