The Palliser Novels Part 51

"Yes, an accident. You don't suppose that I sat down there meaning to win all that money?" Whereupon he looked at her with scorn.

"Mr Palliser," said Alice, "you have treated me this evening in a manner I did not expect from you. It is clear that you blame me."

"I have not said a word, Miss Vavasor."

"No; you have not said a word. You know well how to show your anger without speaking. As I do not choose to undergo your displeasure, I will return to England by myself."

"Alice! Alice!" said Glencora, jumping up, "that is nonsense! What is all this trumpery thing about? Leave me, because he chooses to be angry about nothing?"

"Is it nothing that I find my wife playing at a common gambling-table, surrounded by all that is wretched and vile, - established there, seated, with heaps of gold before her?"

"You wrong me, Plantagenet," said Glencora. "There was only one heap, and that did not remain long. Did it, Alice?"

"It is impossible to make you ashamed of anything," he said.

"I certainly don't like being ashamed," she answered; "and don't feel any necessity on this occasion."

"If you don't object, Mr Palliser," said Alice, "I will go to bed. You can think over all this at night, - and so can I. Good night, Glencora." Then Alice took her candle, and marched off to her own room, with all the dignity of which she was mistress.

CHAPTER LXIX.

From Baden to Lucerne The second week in July saw Mr Palliser's party, carriage and all, established at Lucerne, in Switzerland, safe beyond the reach of the German gambling tables. Alice Vavasor was still with them; and the reader will therefore understand that that quarrel about Lady Glencora's wickedness had been settled without any rupture. It had been settled amicably, and by the time that they had reached Lucerne, Alice was inclined to acknowledge that the whole thing was not worth notice; but for many days her anger against Mr Palliser had not been removed, and her intimacy with him had been much checked. It was now a month since the occurrence of that little scene in the salon at Baden, which was described in the last chapter, - since Mr Palliser had marched off with his wife, leaving Alice to follow as she best could by herself. After that, as the reader may remember, he had almost told her that she was to be blamed because of his wife's indiscretion; and when she had declared her intention of leaving him, and making her way home to England by herself, he had answered her not at all, and had allowed her to go off to her own room under the full ban of his displeasure. Since that he had made no apology to her; he had not, in so many words, acknowledged that he had wronged her; but Alice had become aware that he intended to apologize by his conduct, and she had been content so far to indulge his obstinacy as to accept this conduct on his part in lieu of any outspoken pet.i.tion for pardon. The acknowledgement of a mistake and the asking for grace is almost too much for any woman to expect from such a man as Mr Palliser.

Early on the morning after the scene in question, Lady Glencora had gone into Alice's bedroom, and had found her cousin in her dressing-gown, packing up her things, or looking as though she intended to do so. "You are not such a fool," she said, "as to think anything of what occurred yesterday?" Alice a.s.sured her that, whether fool or not, she did think a great deal of it. "In point of fact," said Alice, "I can't stand it. He expects me to take care of you, and chooses to show himself offended if you don't do just what he thinks proper; whereas, as you know well enough, I have not the slightest influence over you." All these positions Lady Glencora contradicted vigorously. Of course, Mr Palliser had been wrong in walking out of the a.s.sembly Rooms as he had done, leaving Alice behind him. So much Lady Glencora admitted. But this had come of his intense anxiety. "And you know what a man he is," said his wife - "how stiff, and hard, and unpleasant he can be without meaning it." - "There is no reason why I should bear his unpleasantness," said Alice. "Yes, there is, - great reason. You are to do it for the sake of friends.h.i.+p. And as for my not doing what you tell me, you know that's not true."

"Did I not beg you to keep away from the table?"

"Of course you did, and of course I was naughty; but that was only once. Alice, I want you more than I ever wanted you before. I cannot tell you more now, but you must stay with me."

Alice consented to come down to breakfast without any immediate continuance of her active preparations for going, and at last, of course, she stayed. When she entered the breakfast-room Mr Palliser came up to her, and offered her his hand. She had no alternative but to take it, and then seated herself. That there was an intended apology in the manner in which he offered her toast and b.u.t.ter, she was convinced; and the special courtesy with which he handed her to the carriage, when she and Lady Glencora went out for their drive, after dinner, was almost as good as a pet.i.tion for pardon. So the thing went on, and by degrees Mr Palliser and Miss Vavasor were again friends.

But Alice never knew in what way the matter was settled between Mr Palliser and his wife, or whether there was any such settling. Probably there was none. "Of course, he understands that it didn't mean anything," Lady Glencora had said. "He knows that I don't want to gamble." But let that be as it might, their sojourn at Baden was curtailed, and none of the party went up again to the a.s.sembly Rooms before their departure.

Before establis.h.i.+ng themselves at Lucerne they made a little tour round by the Falls of the Rhine and Zurich. In their preparations for this journey, Alice made a struggle, but a struggle in vain, to avoid a pa.s.sage through Basle. It was only too clear to her that Mr Palliser was determined to go by Basle. She could not bring herself to say that she had recollections connected with that place which would make a return to it unpleasant to her. If she could have said as much, even to Glencora, Mr Palliser would no doubt have gone round, - round by any more distant route that might have been necessary to avoid that eternal gateway into Switzerland. But she could not say it. She was very averse to talking about herself and her own affairs, even with her cousin. Of course Lady Glencora knew the whole story of Mr John Grey and his rejection, - and knew much also of that other story of Mr George Vavasor. And, of course, like all Alice's friends, she hated George Vavasor, and was prepared to receive Mr John Grey with open arms, if there were any possibility that her cousin would open her arms to him also. But Alice was so stubborn about her own affairs that her friend found it almost impossible to speak of them. "It is not that you trouble me," Alice once said, "but that you trouble yourself about that which is of no use. It is all done and over; and though I know that I have behaved badly, - very badly, - yet I believe that everything has been done for the best. I am inclined to think that I can live alone, or perhaps with my cousin Kate, more happily than I could with any husband."

"That is such nonsense."

"Perhaps so; but, at any rate, I mean to try. We Vavasors don't seem to be good at marrying."

"You want some one to break your heart for you; that's what you want," said Lady Glencora. In saying this she knew but little of the state of her friend's heart, and perhaps was hardly capable of understanding it. With all the fuss that Lady Glencora made to herself, - with all the tears that she had shed about her lost lover, and was so often shedding, - with all her continual thinking of the matter, she had never loved Burgo Fitzgerald as Alice Vavasor had loved Mr Grey. But her nature was altogether different to that of Alice. Love with her had in it a gleam of poetry, a spice of fun, a touch of self-devotion, something even of hero-wors.h.i.+p; but with it all there was a dash of devilry, and an apt.i.tude almost for wickedness. She knew Burgo Fitzgerald to be a scapegrace, and she liked him the better on that account. She despised her husband because he had no vices. She would have given everything she had to Burgo, - pouring her wealth upon him with a total disregard of herself, had she been allowed to do so. She would have forgiven him sin after sin, and might perhaps have brought him round, at last, to some life not absolutely reckless and wretched. But in all that she might have done, there would have been no thoughtfulness, - no true care either for him or for herself. And now that she was married there was no thoughtfulness, or care either for herself or for her husband. She was ready to sacrifice herself for him, if any sacrifice might be required of her. She believed herself to be unfit for him, and would have submitted to be divorced, - or smothered out of the way, for the matter of that, - if the laws of the land would have permitted it. But she had never for a moment given to herself the task of thinking what conduct on her part might be the best for his welfare.

But Alice's love had been altogether of another kind, - and I am by no means sure that it was better suited for the work of this work-a-day world than that of her cousin. It was too thoughtful. I will not say that there was no poetry in it, but I will say that it lacked romance. Its poetry was too hard for romance. There was certainly in it neither fun nor wickedness; nor was there, I fear, so large a proportion of hero-wors.h.i.+p as there always should be in a girl's heart when she gives it away. But there was in it an amount of self-devotion which none of those near to her had hitherto understood, - unless it were that one to whom the understanding of it was of the most importance. In all the troubles of her love, of her engagements, and her broken promises, she had thought more of others than of herself, - and, indeed, those troubles had chiefly come from that self-devotion. She had left John Grey because she feared that she would do him no good as his wife, - that she would not make him happy; and she had afterwards betrothed herself for a second time to her cousin, because she believed that she could serve him by marrying him. Of course she had been wrong. She had been very wrong to give up the man she did love, and more wrong again in suggesting to herself the possibility of marrying the man she did not love. She knew that she had been wrong in both, and was undergoing repentance with very bitter inward sackcloth. But she said little of all this even to her cousin.

They went to Lucerne by Basle, and put up at the big hotel with the balcony over the Rhine, which Alice remembered so well. On the first evening of her arrival she found herself again looking down upon the river, as though it might have been from the same spot which she had occupied together with George and Kate. But, in truth, that house is very large, and has many bedrooms over the water. Who has ever been through Basle, and not stood in one of them, looking down upon the father of waters? Here, on this very spot, in one of these balconies, was brought to her a letter from her cousin Kate, which was filled with tidings respecting her cousin George. Mr Palliser brought it to her with his own hands, and she had no other alternative but to read it in his presence. "George has lost his election," the letter began. For one moment Alice thought of her money, and the vain struggle in which it had been wasted. For one moment, something like regret for the futility of the effort she had made came upon her. But it pa.s.sed away at once. "It was worth our while to try it," she said to herself, and then went on with her letter. "I and Aunt Greenow are up in London," the letter went on to say, "and have just heard the news. Though I have been here for three days, and have twice sent word to him to say so, he has not been near me. Perhaps it is best that he should stay away, as I do not know how any words could pa.s.s between us that would be pleasant. The poll was finished this afternoon, and he lost his election by a large majority. There were five candidates altogether for the two seats - three Liberals, and two Conservatives. The other two Liberals were seated, and he was the last of the five. I continue to hear tidings about him from day to day, - or rather, my aunt hears them and tells them to me, which fill me full of fears as to his future career. I believe that he has abandoned his business, and that he has now no source of income. I would willingly share what I have with him; or I would do more than that. After keeping back enough to repay you gradually what he owes you, I would give him all my share of the income out of the estate. But I cannot do this while we are presumed to be enemies. I am up here to see a lawyer as to some steps which he is taking to upset grandpapa's will. The lawyer says that it is all nonsense, and that George's lawyer is not really in earnest; but I cannot do anything till the matter is settled. Dear Alice, though so much of your money is for a time gone, I am bound to congratulate you on your safety, - on what I may more truly call your escape. You will understand what my own feelings must be in writing this, after all that I did to bring you and him together, - after all my hopes and ambition respecting him. As for the money, it shall be repaid. I do not think I shall ever dare to indulge in any strong desire again. I think you will forgive me the injury I have done you; - and I know that you will pity me.

"I am here to see the London lawyer, - but not only for that. Aunt Greenow is buying her wedding clothes, and Captain Bellfield is in lodgings near to us, also buying his trousseau; or, as I should more properly say, having it bought for him. I am hardly in a mood for much mirth, but it is impossible not to laugh inwardly when she discusses before me the state of his wardrobe, and proposes economical arrangements - greatly to his disgust. At present, she holds him very tightly in hand, and makes him account for all his hours as well as all his money. 'Of course, he'll run wild directly he's married,' she said to me, yesterday; 'and, of course, there'll always be a fight about it; but the more I do to tame him now, the less wild he'll be by-and-by. And though I dare say, I shall scold him sometimes, I shall never quarrel with him.' I have no doubt all that is true; but what a fool she is to trouble herself with such a man. She says she does it for an occupation. I took courage to tell her once that a caged tiger would give her as much to do, and be less dangerous. She was angry at this, and answered me very sharply. I had tried my hand on a tiger, she said, and had felt his claws. She chose to sacrifice herself, - if a sacrifice it were to be, - when some good result might be possible. I had nothing further to say; and from that time to this we have been on the pleasantest terms possible as to the Captain. They have settled with your father to take Vavasor Hall for three years, and I suppose I shall stay with them till your return. What I may do then will depend entirely upon your doings. I feel myself to be a desolate, solitary being, without any tie to any person, or to any place. I never thought that I should feel the death of my grandfather to be such a loss to me as it has been. Except you, I have nothing left to me; and, as regards you, I have the unpleasant feeling that I have for years been endeavouring to do you the worst possible injury, and that you must regard me as an enemy from whom you have escaped indeed, but not without terrible wounds."

Alice was always angered by any a.s.sumption that her conduct to Mr Grey had been affected by the advice or influence of her cousin Kate. But this very feeling seemed to preserve Kate from the worse anger, which might have been aroused against her, had Alice acknowledged the injury which her cousin had in truth done to her. It was undoubtedly true that had Alice neither seen nor heard from Kate during the progress of John Grey's courts.h.i.+p, John Grey would not have lost his wife. But against this truth Alice was always protesting within her own breast. She had been weak, foolish, irresolute, - and had finally acted with false judgement. So much she now admitted to herself. But she would not admit that any other woman had persuaded her to such weakness. "She mistakes me," Alice thought, as she put up her letter. "She is not the enemy who has wounded me."

Mr Palliser, who had brought her the letter, was seated in the same balcony, and while Alice had been reading, had almost buried himself in newspapers which conveyed intelligence as to the general elections then in progress. He was now seated with a sheet of The Times in his hand, opened to its full extent, - for he had been too impatient to cut the paper, - and as he held it up in his hands before his eyes, was completely hidden beneath it. Five or six other open papers were around him, and he had not spoken a word since he had commenced his present occupation. Lady Glencora was standing on the other side of him, and she also had received letters. "Sophy tells me that you are returned for Silverbridge," she said at last.

"Who? I! yes; I'm returned," said Mr Palliser, speaking with something like disdain in his voice as to the possibility of anybody having stood with a chance of success against him in his own family borough. For a full appreciation of the advantages of a private seat in the House of Commons let us always go to those great Whig families who were mainly instrumental in carrying the Reform Bill. The house of Omnium had been very great on that occasion. It had given up much, and had retained for family use simply the single seat at Silverbridge. But that that seat should be seriously disputed hardly suggested itself as possible to the mind of any Palliser. The Pallisers and the other great Whig families have been right in this. They have kept in their hands, as rewards for their own services to the country, no more than the country is manifestly willing to give them. "Yes; I have been returned," said Mr Palliser. "I'm sorry to see, Miss Vavasor, that your cousin has not been so fortunate."

"So I find," said Alice. "It will be a great misfortune to him."

"Ah! I suppose so. Those Metropolitan elections cost so much trouble and so much money, and under the most favourable circ.u.mstances, are so doubtful. A man is never sure there till he has fought for his seat three or four times."

"This has been the third time with him," said Alice, "and he is a poor man."

"Dear, dear," said Mr Palliser, who himself knew nothing of such misfortunes. "I have always thought that those seats should be left to rich commercial men who can afford to spend money upon them. Instead of that, they are generally contested by men of moderate means. Another of my friends in the House has been thrown out."

"Who is that unfortunate?" asked Lady Glencora.

"Mr Bott," said the unthinking husband.

"Mr Bott out!" exclaimed Lady Glencora. "Mr Bott thrown out! I am so glad. Alice, are you not glad? The red-haired man, that used to stand about, you know, at Matching; - he has lost his seat in Parliament. I suppose he'll go and stand about somewhere in Lancas.h.i.+re, now."

A very indiscreet woman was poor Lady Glencora. Mr Palliser's face became black beneath The Times newspaper. "I did not know," said he, "that my friend Mr Bott and Miss Vavasor were enemies."

"Enemies! I don't suppose they were enemies," said Glencora. "But he was a man whom no one could help observing, - and disliking."

"He was a man I specially disliked," said Alice, with great courage. "He may be very well in Parliament; but I never met a man who could make himself so disagreeable in society. I really did feel myself constrained to be his enemy."

"Bravo, Alice!" said Lady Glencora.

"I hope he did nothing at Matching, to - to - to - ," began Mr Palliser, apologetically.

"Nothing especially to offend me, Mr Palliser, - except that he had a way that I especially dislike of trying to make little secret confidences."

"And then he was so ugly," said Lady Glencora.

"I felt certain that he endeavoured to do mischief," said Alice.

"Of course he did," said Lady Glencora; "and he had a habit of rubbing his head against the papers in the rooms, and leaving a mark behind him that was quite unpardonable."

Mr Palliser was effectually talked down, and felt himself constrained to abandon his political ally. Perhaps he did this the easier as the loss which Mr Bott had just suffered would materially interfere with his political utility. "I suppose he will remain now among his own people," said Mr Palliser.

"Let us hope he will," said Lady Glencora, - "and that his own people will appreciate the advantage of his presence." Then there was nothing more said about Mr Bott.

It was evening, and while they were still sitting among their letters and newspapers, there came a shout along the water, and the noise of many voices from the bridge. Suddenly, there shot down before them in the swift running stream the heads of many swimmers in the river, and with the swimmers came boats carrying their clothes. They went by almost like a glance of light upon the waters, so rapid was the course of the current. There was the shout of voices, - the quick pa.s.sage of the boats, - the uprising, some half a dozen times, of the men's hands above the surface; and then they were gone down the river, out of sight, - like morsels of wood thrown into a cataract, which are borne away instantly.

"Oh, how I wish I could do that!" said Lady Glencora.

"It seems to be very dangerous," said Mr Palliser. "I don't know how they can stop themselves."

"Why should they want to stop themselves?" said Lady Glencora. "Think how cool the water must be, and how beautiful to be carried along so quickly, and to go on, and on, and on! I suppose we couldn't try it?"

As no encouragement was given to this proposition, Lady Glencora did not repeat it; but stood leaning on the rail of the balcony, and looking enviously down upon the water. Alice was, of course, thinking of that other evening, when perhaps the same swimmers had come down under the bridge and before the balcony, and where George Vavasor was sitting in her presence. It was, I think, on that evening, that she made up her mind to separate herself from Mr Grey.

On the day after that, Mr Palliser and his party went on to Lucerne, making that journey, as I have said, by slow stages; taking Schaffhausen and Zurich in their way. At Lucerne, they established themselves for some time, occupying nearly a dozen rooms in the great hotel which overlooks the lake. Here there came to them a visitor, of whose arrival I will speak in the next chapter.

CHAPTER LXX.

At Lucerne I am inclined to think that Mr Palliser did not much enjoy this part of his tour abroad. When he first reached Lucerne there was no one there with whom he could a.s.sociate pleasantly, nor had he any occupation capable of making his time run easily. He did not care for scenery. Close at his elbow was the finest to be had in Europe; but it was nothing to him. Had he been simply journeying through Lucerne at the proper time of the year for such a journey, when the business of the Session was over, and a little change of air needed, he could have enjoyed the thing in a moderate way, looking about him, pa.s.sing on, and knowing that it was good for him to be there at that moment. But he had none of that pa.s.sion for mountains and lakes, none of that positive joy in the heather, which would have compensated many another man for the loss of all that Mr Palliser was losing. His mind was ever at home in the House of Commons, or in that august a.s.sembly which men call the Cabinet, and of the meetings of which he read from week to week the simple records. Therein were mentioned the names of those heroes to whom Fortune had been so much kinder than she had been to him; and he envied them. He took short, solitary walks, about the town, over the bridges, and along the rivers, making to himself the speeches which he would have made to full houses, had not his wife brought ruin upon all his hopes. And as he pictured to himself the glorious successes which probably never would have been his had he remained in London, so did he prophesy to himself an absolute and irremediable downfall from all political power as the result of his absence, - having, in truth, no sufficient cause for such despair. As yet, he was barely thirty, and had he been able to judge his own case as keenly as he could have judged the case of another, he would have known that a short absence might probably raise his value in the estimation of others rather than lower it. But his personal annoyance was too great to allow of his making such calculations aright. So he became fretful and unhappy; and though he spoke no word of rebuke to his wife, though he never hinted that she had robbed him of his glories, he made her conscious by his manner that she had brought him to this miserable condition.

Lady Glencora herself had a love for the mountains and lakes, but it was a love of that kind which requires to be stimulated by society, and which is keenest among cold chickens, picnic-pies, and the flying of champagne corks. When they first entered Switzerland she was very enthusiastic, and declared her intention of climbing up all the mountains, and going through all the pa.s.ses. She endeavoured to induce her husband to promise that she should be taken up Mont Blanc. And I think she would have carried this on, and would have been taken up Mont Blanc, had Mr Palliser's aspirations been congenial. But they were not congenial, and Lady Glencora soon lost all her enthusiasm. By the time that they were settled at Lucerne she had voted the mountains to be bores, and had almost learned to hate the lake, which she declared always made her wet through when she got into a small boat, and sea-sick when she put her foot in a large one. At Lucerne they made no acquaintances, Mr Palliser being a man not apt to new friends.h.i.+ps. They did not even dine at the public table, though Lady Glencora had expressed a wish to do so. Mr Palliser did not like it, and of course Lady Glencora gave way. There were, moreover, some marital pa.s.sages which were not pleasant to a third person. They did not scold each other; but Lady Glencora would make little speeches of which her husband disapproved. She would purposely irritate him by continuing her tone of badinage, and then Mr Palliser would become fretful, and would look as though the cares of the world were too many for him. I cannot, therefore, say that Alice had much to make the first period of her sojourn at Lucerne a period of enjoyment.

But when they had been there about a fortnight, a stranger arrived, whose coming at any rate lent the grace of some excitement to their lives. Their custom was to breakfast at nine, - or as near nine as Lady Glencora could be induced to appear, - and then Mr Palliser would read till three. At that hour he would walk forth by himself, after having handed the two ladies into their carriage, and they would be driven about for two hours. "How I do hate this carriage," Lady Glencora said one day. "I do so wish it would come to grief, and be broken to pieces. I wonder whether the Swiss people think that we are going to be driven about here for ever." There were moments, however, which seemed to indicate that Lady Glencora had something to tell her cousin, which, if told, would alter the monotony of their lives. Alice, however, would not press her for her secret.

"If you have anything to tell, why don't you tell it?" Alice once said.

"You are so hard," said Lady Glencora.

"So you tell me very often," Alice replied; "and it is not complimentary. But hard or soft, I won't make a pet.i.tion for your confidence." Then Lady Glencora said something savage, and the subject was dropped for a while.

But we must go back to the stranger. Mr Palliser had put the ladies into their carriage, and was standing between the front door of the hotel and the lake on a certain day, doubting whether he would walk up the hill to the left or turn into the town on the right, when he was accosted by an English gentleman, who, raising his hat, said that he believed that he spoke to Mr Palliser.

"I am Mr Palliser," said our friend, very courteously, returning the salute, and smiling as he spoke. But though he smiled, and though he was courteous, and though he raised his hat, there was something in his look and voice which would not have encouraged any ordinary stranger to persevere. Mr Palliser was not a man with whom it was easy to open an acquaintance.

"My name is John Grey," said the stranger.

Then the smile was dropped, the look of extreme courtesy disappeared, the tone of Mr Palliser's voice was altered, and he put out his hand. He knew enough of Mr John Grey's history to be aware that Mr John Grey was a man with whom he might permit himself to become acquainted. After the interchange of a very few words, the two men started off for a walk together.

"Perhaps you don't wish to meet the carriage?" said Mr Palliser. "If so, we had better go through the town and up the river."

They went through the town, and up the river, and when Mr Palliser, on his return, was seen by Alice and Lady Glencora, he was alone. They dined together, and nothing was said. Together they sauntered out in the evening, and together came in and drank their tea; but still nothing was said. At last, Alice and her cousin took their candles from Mr Palliser's hands and left the sitting-room for the night.

"Alice," said Lady Glencora, as soon as they were in the pa.s.sage together, "I have been dying for this time to come. I could not speak before, or I should have made blunders, and so would you. Let us go into your room at once. Who do you think is here, at Lucerne, in this house, at this very moment?"

Alice knew at once who it was. She knew, immediately, that Mr Grey had followed her, though no word had been written to her or spoken to her on the subject since that day on which he himself had told her that they would meet abroad. But though she was quite sure, she did not mention his name. "Who is it, Glencora?" she asked, very calmly.

"Whom in all the world would you best like to see?" said Glencora.

"My cousin Kate, certainly," said Alice.

"Then it is not your cousin Kate. And I don't believe you; - or else you're a fool."

Alice was accustomed to Lady Glencora's mode of talking, and therefore did not think much of this. "Perhaps I am a fool," she said.

"Only I know you are not. But I am not at all so sure as to your being no hypocrite. The person I mean is a gentleman, of course. Why don't you show a little excitement, at any rate? When Plantagenet told me, just before dinner, I almost jumped out of my shoes. He was going to tell you himself after dinner, in the politest way in the world, no doubt, and just as the servants were carrying away the apples. I thought it best to save you from that; but, I declare, I believe I might have left him to do it; it would have had no effect upon you. Who is it that has come, do you suppose?"

"Of course I know now," said Alice, very calmly, "that Mr John Grey has come."

"Yes, Mr John Grey has come. He is here in this house at this minute; - or, more probably, waiting outside by the lake till he shall see a light in your bedroom." Then Lady Glencora paused for a moment, waiting that Alice might say something. But Alice said nothing. "Well?" said Lady Glencora, rising up from her chair. "Well?"

"Well?" said Alice.

"Have you nothing to say? Is it the same to you as though Mr Smith had come?"

"No; not exactly the same. I am quite alive to the importance of Mr Grey's arrival, and shall probably lie awake all night thinking about it, - if it will do you any good to know that; but I don't feel that I have much to say about it."

"I wish I had let Mr Palliser tell you, in an ordinary way, before all the servants. I do indeed."

"It would not have made much difference."

"Not the least, I believe. I wonder whether you ever did care for anybody in your life, - for him, or for that other one, or for anybody. For n.o.body, I believe; - except your cousin Kate. Still waters, they say, run deep; and sometimes I think your waters run too deep for me to fathom. I suppose I may go now, if you have got nothing more to say?"

"What do you want me to say? Of course I know why he has come here. He told me he should come."

"And you have never said a word about it."

"He told me he should come, and I thought it better not to say a word about it. He might change his mind, or anything might happen. I told him not to come; and it would have been much better that he should have remained away."

"Why; - why; - why would it be better?"

"Because his being here will do no good to any one."

"No good! It seems to me impossible but that it should do all the good in the world. Look here, Alice. If you do not altogether make it up with him before to-morrow evening, I shall believe you to be utterly heartless. Had I been you I should have been in his arms before this. I'll go now, and leave you to lie awake, as you say you will." Then she left the room, but returned in a moment to ask another question. "What is Plantagenet to say to him about seeing you to-morrow? Of course he has asked permission to come and call."

"He may come if he pleases. You don't think I have quarrelled with him, or would refuse to see him!"

"And may we ask him to dine with us?"

"Oh, yes."

"And make up a picnic, and all the rest of it. In fact, he is to be regarded as only an ordinary person. Well; - good night. I don't understand you, that's all."

It may be doubted whether Alice understood herself. As soon as her friend was gone, she put out her candle and seated herself at the open window of her room, looking out upon the moonlight as it played upon the lake. Would he be there, thinking of her, looking up, perhaps, as Glencora had hinted, to see if he could distinguish her light among the hundred that would be flickering across the long front of the house. If it were so, at any rate he should not see her, so she drew the curtain, and sat there watching the lake. It was a pity that he should have come, and yet she loved him dearly for coming. It was a pity that he should have come, as his coming could lead to no good result. Of this she a.s.sured herself over and over again, and yet she hardly knew why she was so sure of it. Glencora had called her hard; but her conviction on that matter had not come from hardness. Now that she was alone, her heart was full of love, of the soft romance of love towards this man; and yet she felt that she ought not to marry him, even though he might still be willing to take her. That he was still willing to take her, that he desired to have her for his wife in spite of all the injury she had done him, there could be no doubt. Why else had he followed her to Switzerland? And she remembered, now at this moment, how he had told her at Cheltenham that he would never consider her to be lost to him, unless she should, in truth, become the wife of another man. Why, then, should it not be as he wished it?

She asked herself the question, and did not answer it; but still she felt that it might not be so. She had no right to such happiness after the evil that she had done. She had been driven by a frenzy to do that which she herself could not pardon; and having done it, she could not bring herself to accept the position which should have been the reward of good conduct. She could not a.n.a.lyse the causes which made her feel that she must still refuse the love that was proffered to her; she could not clearly read her own thoughts; but the causes were as I have said, and such was the true reading of her thoughts. Had she simply refused his hand after she had once accepted it, - had she refused it, and then again changed her mind, she could have brought herself to ask him to forgive her. But she had done so much more than this, and so much worse! She had affianced herself to another man since she had belonged to him, - since she had been his, as his future wife. What must he not think of her, and what not suspect? Then she remembered those interviews which she had had with her cousin since she had written to him, accepting his offer. When he had been with her in Queen Anne Street she had shrunk from all outward signs of a love which she did not feel. There had been no caress between them. She had not allowed him to touch her with his lips. But it was impossible that the nature of that mad engagement between her and her cousin George should ever be made known to Mr Grey. She sat there wiping the tears from her eyes as she looked for his figure among the figures by the lake-side; but, as she sat there, she promised herself no happiness from his coming. Oh! reader, can you forgive her in that she had sinned against the softness of her feminine nature? I think that she may be forgiven, in that she had never brought herself to think lightly of her own fault.

If he were there, by the lake-side, she did not see him. I think we may say that John Grey was not a man to console himself in his love by looking up at his lady's candle. He was one who was capable of doing as much as most men in the pursuit of his love, - as he proved to be the case when he followed Alice to Cheltenham, and again to London, and now again to Lucerne; but I doubt whether a glimmer from her bedroom-window, had it been unmistakably her own glimmer, and not that of some ugly old French woman who might chance to sleep next to her, would have done him much good. He had come to Lucerne with a purpose, which purpose, if it might be possible, he meant to carry out; but I think he was already in bed, being tired with long travel, before Lady Glencora had left Alice's room.

At breakfast the next morning nothing was said for a while about the new arrival. At last Mr Palliser ventured to speak. "Glencora has told you, I think, that Mr Grey is here? Mr Grey is an old friend of yours, I believe?"

Alice, keeping her countenance as well as she was able, said Mr Grey had been, and, indeed, was, a very dear friend of hers. Mr Palliser knew the whole story, and what was the use of any little attempt at dissimulation? "I shall be glad to see him, - if you will allow me?" she went on to say.