The Two Guardians Part 31

"I don't know." Not her considering "I don't know," but the dry, provoking end-of-the-matter answer of half sullen days gone by.

"If you really thought it positively wrong," proceeded Caroline, "not another word would I say: but I don't see how you can without condemning all gaeties, and that I know you do not."

"I only think it a--a waste of time--a great deal of nonsense," said Marian, faltering for an answer; "and really I have spent so much money; I do not like to throw away any more."

"O, you do not know how we have settled that," said Caroline, beginning to be hopeful now that she had something tangible to attack. "The dresses for the morning will be nothing,--only a white skirt and green polka, which will do to wear for ever after, and a little ruff, very pretty, and no expense at all; and a little alteration will make our court dresses perfectly suitable for Queen Elizabeth's ladies. You need not be at all afraid of being ruined."

Marian saw that, though there would be many a little expense to make a mickle one, yet it would still only cost her Mrs. Jameson, instead of the gifts to the poor people; but as this was what chiefly justified her in her own eyes, she would not admit the conviction, and answered, "Those things that are altered and adapted really are as costly in the end as if they were new altogether. Besides, I could not, I really could not shoot before such an a.s.sembly."

"I should so like to see you get the arrow."

"O Caroline, that would be worse than anything!"

"Well, then, don't get it; shoot as badly as you please: only do be kind and make one of us, or you will spoil the whole concern."

"How can that be? What difference can my dressing up or shooting make to any one?"

"Why, for one thing, if you are not one, as you must be, living with us and all, Julia will be obliged to ask that Miss Grimley; don't you know her?"

"What, that old young lady who has been figuring in the newspaper so long as getting all the archery prizes?"

"Yes, the veteran archer, as Elliot calls her; and Mr. Faulkner says, if she appears in character at all, it must be as Queen Elizabeth herself dancing a stately pavise to the sound of the little fiddle. She is some connection of theirs, and must be asked, if you will not take it; and she is almost as bad as Queen Elizabeth herself, and will give none of us any peace about the dresses, O Marian! Julia said she should esteem it as a real kindness from you if you would be Lady Anne, if only for the sake of keeping her out!"

"I think it would be very absurd for a person who hates the whole concern to be dragged in, for the sake of keeping out one who likes it!"

"Then you are still resolved? Well, I had not much expectation, but still I was half inclined to hope you would relent, if you did not think it a point of principle, when you knew that it would be a real favor to me."

"To you, Caroline! you do not care for such trumpery."

"I do care about seeing my friends mortified and vexed," said Caroline, mournfully.

"Your friends!" exclaimed Marian, in a voice of contempt.

"Yes, as much as kindness can make them."

"And esteem? O Caroline!"

"Kindness--readiness to oblige," repeated Caroline.

"They are my friends, and I am very fond of them."

Caroline went away without another word, and Marian felt that her words implied that she preferred readiness to oblige, to rigid, unbending superiority in goodness. Marian felt it, and was disappointed in Caroline, and pleased to have kept her determination, without asking herself how far it was satisfied pride in obstinacy.

This was the last time for many weeks that Caroline lingered talking in Marian's room. The old chill had come on again. Both knew, though neither said so, that it was not so much because it was a display and expense that Marian refused, as because it was the Faulkners' party. If it had been Lady Marchmont's, it would have been very different. Now Caroline liked the Faulkners; they were all good natured, and much more agreeable than any others in the neighbourhood--than any, indeed, with whom she had yet been brought into close intercourse. She thought Marian was unjust and ungracious, both to them and to her; that she had been prejudiced from the first, and now was very decidedly making herself disagreeable by a rigidity in trifles, which was almost positive unkindness. Caroline's home, as has been shown, was neither a very happy, nor a very satisfactory one; so that of late she had learnt to look upon her brother Walter and Marian as her chief comforts, and was now much more hurt and disappointed at Marian's conduct than she was willing to show. It was particularly unfortunate just at this time, when there was so much to invite and gratify her at High Down, when she was in especial need of a true and affectionate friend and counsellor, and when Walter was absent, being engaged in preparing for his ordination, which was to take place in the course of the autumn.

Mrs. Lyddell was much displeased with Marian, and showed it by her coldness and formality; and Marian began to live more alone with herself, and at war with the outer world, than she had done even before Edmund's first visit five years ago. Caroline and Clara were a great deal with the Faulkners, either at High Down or at home. Clara was in a perfect transport at being admitted into the number of the archeresses, and had struck up one of her eternal friends.h.i.+ps with Louisa, the second Miss Faulkner; and Marian might very fairly be provoked at seeing how entirely her mind was diverted from all the rationality which she and Caroline had been endeavouring--and as they had hoped, not without success--to infuse into her during the past year. To get Clara to settle quietly down to anything was an utter impossibility; her wisest employment was the study of Elizabethan costumes, her most earnest, the practice of archery. Now Marian always maintained that archery, on their own lawn, and among themselves, was a very pretty sport; and for the sake of consistency with her own principles, she very diligently shot whenever the Faulkners were not there, and did her very best, by precept and example, to make Clara fit her arrows to the string in her own direct and purpose-like way, draw the bow-string to her ear with a steady effort and aim, instead of a fitful jerk or twitch; and in fact shoot, if she was to shoot, like a sensible woman, who really intended damage to the target. Clara was very much obliged, and made some progress; but Marian thus did herself little good with any one else, for her love of the sport, and her excellence at it, made her spirit of disdain all the more marked. Clara, was again, as in former times, her chief friend in the family; for Marian, after the first vexation, held her sense too cheap to blame her for her folly. It was the fault of the others that she had been put in the way of what could not fail to turn her head; so she listened, without showing many tokens of contempt, to her endless histories of dear Louisa, and all the plans at High Down,--of the witticisms that were perpetrated, the antic.i.p.ations of amus.e.m.e.nt and admiration, and of the traca.s.series which Miss Grimley had not failed to occasion. Marian was often entertained, and Clara more than once hoped she was on the point of regretting that she was not one of the favoured eight; but nothing could be further from Marian's mind.

She did not intend to absent herself either from the archery or from the ball, but she must wear her own character, and no other; and people were allowed to a.s.sume fancy dresses or not, just as suited their inclination, so that she was in no fear of rendering herself remarkable.

Caroline and Clara were to go to High Down two days before the great occasion, and stay till the day after; Marian to remain at Oakworthy.

Just before they went, Clara danced into her room, saying, "Marian, do you know some of the officers at Portsmouth have been asked to the ball?

You know there is a railroad all the way. I wonder if Mr. Arundel will be there?"

"Decidedly not," replied Marian.

"What, not when he knows what an attraction there will be?"

"Don't talk such nonsense, Clara; the idea of thinking a man would take such a journey for a ball! Well, I hope you will be very happy."

"O do come and see my dress, Marian, before it is packed up; it is on mamma's bed, and it is so beautiful!"

Marian came, and admired. Caroline was to be Amy Robsart, and Clara, Janet Foster; a part her mother had chosen for her, as more appropriate to a girl not yet come out. Certainly, Tony Foster would scarcely have recognized his demure little Puritan under the little lace hood, the purple bodice, and white skirt, at which Clara looked with such exultation; and Janet was further to be supposed to have taken possession of the Countess's orient neck-pearls, and was to wear them as the only ornament that could with any propriety be bestowed on her. It happened that Marian had a remarkably fine set of pearls. She had few jewels of any kind; but these had been her grandmother's, and there was some tradition belonging to them which no one ever could remember.

Janet's necklace was so much less pretty, that Marian could not help exclaiming that Clara had better wear hers. Clara demurred, for she knew Marian relied on these pearls to help out a dress which had seen more than one London party; but it ended in Marian's having her own way, and being contemptuous at the grat.i.tude with which her loan was received.

Yet she was surprised to find that it was a relief to her that Mrs.

Lyddell departed a little from her cold politeness, and showed herself really pleased and obliged.

Certainly, if Mrs. Lyddell had not in some degree relaxed, those two days would have been very forlorn. As it was, it was very odd to sit down to dinner with only Mr. and Mrs. Lyddell and Elliot, and to have no one but Mrs. Lyddell to speak to in the drawing-room. She was glad when the day came, to have it over; and she was not sufficiently hard-hearted to regret that it was as fine as could be wished. To High Down they went, and everything was just as Marian had expected,--every one walked about and idled, and wondered when the shooting would begin; and when it did begin, no one paid much attention to it except those who were interested in some of the compet.i.tors. Marian watched her pupil anxiously, and Clara, between excitement and nervousness, shot much worse than if she had been in the garden at home, and went so wide of the mark, that Marian was ashamed of her. Caroline did better, but not well; and the prize was of course borne off by Miss Grimley, who was popularly reported to have arrows enough to stock the quivers of two or three cupids.

Clara ran up to Marian, and walked with her a little while; telling her all that had come to pa.s.s during the last two days,--a great deal of bustle, and merriment, and nonsense, which Clara seemed to have enjoyed excessively, and of which Marian could have said, "Every one to his taste." Of Caroline she saw little or nothing; and after wandering about in the rear of Mrs. Lyddell, and exchanging a great many cold salutations, and colder sentences of small-talk, she was very glad to find herself once more in the carriage, though it was only to go home, dine and dress for the ball, and then High Down again.

She wore white, with jet ornaments, and a row of pearls round her hair,--the only thing that saved her from being rather shabbily dressed than otherwise. However, Mrs. Lyddell had long since announced that she had done saying anything about Marian's dress, and f.a.n.n.y had not been a ladies' maid long enough to grow into a tyrant; so that she had her own way, and no one repeated to her, what she knew full well, that her white silk was yellow where it swept the ground, and the lace did not stand out as freshly as once it did.

Mrs. Lyddell and Elliot talked and laughed all the way, quizzing the company very sociably, and both appearing in the highest spirits. Mr.

Lyddell was asleep in his corner; Marian with her forehead against the window, and her thoughts with Gerald. They reached High Down in the midst of a stream of carriages; and Marian, in her plain white, had to walk into the ball-room with Elliot, who had completed his offences in her eyes, by daring to a.s.sume the dress of Sir Philip Sidney. She soon, however, was free of him, for he liked her as little as she liked him, and moreover had to go and perform his part in the noted Kenilworth quadrille. Marian was left standing by Mrs. Lyddell, as she usually did, through the greater part of a ball; for as she never waltzed, there were few dances in which she could take a part. She had made half the Oakworthy neighbours afraid of her; and Mrs. Lyddell, having found that all activity in the way of being a useful chaperon was thrown away, had acquiesced in leaving her to herself, "doing her justice" sufficient by taking her to the ball.

Marian was entertained by the pageant, as she deemed it. It was a very pretty scene, with so many gay dresses, in the bright light; and it was amusing to recognise her acquaintances in the wonderful costumes some of them had seen fit to a.s.sume. She would have liked some one to laugh with, at a shepherdess dancing, crook and all; and she highly appreciated a good-natured old gentleman, who was willing to do anything, however absurd, that could please his friends, and had come out as my grave Lord Keeper himself, with

"His bushy beard and shoe-strings green, His high-crowned hat and satin-doublet."

Caroline looked more like a beauty than she had ever seen her before.

Her fair ringlets and white neck had a peculiar elegance, set off by the delicate fan-like ruff, and graceful head-gear of the Countess Amy. The only fault that Marian could find was, that poor Amy never could have looked as if she had so much mind as Caroline's countenance expressed.

As to her partner, Marian did not behold him with very different feelings, from those with which she would have regarded the real Earl of Leicester, could she have had one peep at the actual pageant of Kenilworth, with its outward pomp, masking the breaking hearts beneath.

Thereupon she fell deep into musings on "Kenilworth," which she had read at home, when, so young and unlearned in novels as not to have a guess at what would happen, when it was all a wonder and fairy-land of delight, and when poor Tressilian's name of Edmund had been his first charm in her eyes, even before she loved him for his deep character and melancholy fate. She thought how unlike all this common-place world was to the world it aped--how far these Raleighs and Sidneys were from being worthy to usurp the name even for one evening! and as to Tressilian, how impossible to see any face here that would even shadow her idea of him!

And yet she did not know; she might have to change her mind. There actually was a countenance handsome, thoughtful, almost melancholy enough for Tressilian himself, with the deep dark eyes, pale, clear, sun-burnt, brown complexion, and jetty hair that befitted her hero; a short beard and dark dress would have completed him, but she almost thought it a pity that such a face should appear above a scarlet coat and gold epaulettes.

However, Tressilian had been moving towards the end of the room where she was standing, and was coming so near that she could not study him after the first; so she turned to speak to Miss Faulkner, who had finished her quadrille, and just as a polka was commencing, she was surprised by finding Tressilian himself standing by her, and asking to have the honour of dancing with her.

"Thank you, I don't dance the Polka," she replied; and as she spoke quick flashes of thought crossed her thus--"I have not been introduced to him--I have met him before--how horrid of Tressilian's face to talk of polkas--ha! it is Edmund!"

Edmund Arundel's eye it was that was glancing at her with a look of great amus.e.m.e.nt at her bewilderment.

"The next quadrille," he proceeded, in the same ceremonious voice.

"O Edmund, Edmund, I did not know you in the least! Who would have thought of seeing you here?"

"Why not? Did you not know we were asked?"

"Asked? yes; but who would have come who could have helped it?"

"I wanted particularly to see you." Then, after speaking to Mrs.