Sin was too surely sorrow, though it neared her only in imagination. In a few weeks she seemed to have almost outgrown girlhood; her steps were measured, her smile was seldom and lacked mirth. The revelation would have done so much; the added and growing trouble of Mutimer’s attentions threatened to sink her in melancholy. She would not allow it to be seen more than she could help; cheerful activity in the life of home was one of her moral duties, and she strove hard to sustain it. It was a relief to find herself alone each night, alone with her sickness of heart.
The repugnance aroused in her by the thought of becoming Mutimer’s wife was rather instinctive than reasoned. From one point of view, indeed, she deemed it wrong, since it might be entirely the fruit of the love she was forbidden to cherish. Striving to read her conscience, which for years had been with her a daily task and was now become the anguish of every hour, she found it hard to establish valid reasons for steadfastly refusing a man who was her mother’s choice. She read over the marriage service frequently. There stood the promise—to love, to honour, and to obey. Honour and obedience she might render him, but what of love? The question arose, what did love mean? Could there be such a thing as love of an unworthy object? Was she not led astray by the spirit of perverseness which was her heritage?
Adela could not bring herself to believe that ‘to love’ in the sense of the marriage service and to ‘be in love’ as her heart understood it were one and the same thing. The Puritanism of her training led her to distrust profoundly those impulses of mere nature. And the circumstances of her own unhappy affection tended to confirm her in this way of thinking. Letty Tew certainly thought otherwise, but was not Letty’s own heart too exclusively occupied by worldly considerations?
Yet it said ‘love.’ Perchance that was something which would come after marriage; the promise, observe, concerned the future. But she was not merely indifferent; she shrank from Mutimer.
She returned home from the lecture to-day full of dread—dread more active than she had yet known. And it drove her to a step she had timidly contemplated for more than a week. She stole from the house, bent on seeing Mr. Wyvern. She could not confess to him, but she could speak of the conflict between her mother’s will and her own, and beg his advice; perhaps, if he appeared favourable, ask him to intercede with her mother. She had liked Mr. Wyvern from the first meeting with him, and a sense of trust had been nourished by each succeeding conversation. In her agitation she thought it would not be hard to tell him so much of the circumstances as would enable him to judge and counsel.
Yet it was with relief, on the whole, that she turned homewards with her object unattained. It would be much better to wait and test herself yet further. Why should she not speak with her mother about that vow she was asked to make?
She did not seek solitude again, but joined her mother and Alfred in the sitting-room. Mrs. Waltham made no inquiry about the short absence. Alfred had only just called to mind the newspaper which Mr. Keene had given him; and was unfolding it for perusal. His eye caught a marked paragraph, one of a number under the heading ‘Gossip from Town.’ As he read it he uttered a ‘Hullo!’ of surprise.
‘Well, here’s the latest,’ he continued, looking at his companions with an amused eye. ‘Something about that fellow Eldon in a Belwick newspaper. What do you think?’
Adela kept still and mute.
‘Whatever it is, it cannot interest us, Alfred,’ said Mrs. Waltham, with dignity. ‘We had rather not hear it.’
‘Well, you shall read it for yourself,’ replied Alfred on a second thought. ‘I think you’d like to know.’
His mother took the paper under protest, and glanced down at the paragraph carelessly. But speedily her attention became closer.
‘An item of intelligence,’ wrote the London gossiper, ‘which I dare say will interest readers in certain parts of—shire. A lady of French extraction who made a name for herself at a leading metropolitan theatre last winter, and who really promises great things in the Thespian art, is back among us from a sojourn on the Continent. She is understood to have spent much labour in the study of a new part, which she is about to introduce to us of the modern Babylon. But Albion, it is whispered, possesses other attractions for her besides appreciative audiences. In brief, though she will of course appear under the old name, she will in reality have changed it for one of another nationality before presenting herself in the radiance of the footlights. The happy man is Mr. Hubert Eldon, late of Wanley Manor. We felicitate Mr. Eldon.’
Mrs. Waltham’s hands trembled as she doubled the sheet: there was a gleam of pleasure on her face.
‘Give me the paper when you have done with it,’ she said.
Alfred laughed, and whistled a tune as he continued the perusal of Mr. Keene’s political and social intelligence, on the whole as trustworthy as the style in which it was written was terse and elegant. Adela, finding she could feign indifference no longer, went from the room.
‘Where did you get this?’ Mrs. Waltham asked with eagerness as soon as the girl was gone.
‘From the writer himself,’ Alfred replied, visibly proud of his intimacy with a man of letters. ‘Fellow called Keene. Had a long talk with him.’
‘About this?’
‘Oh, no. I’ve only just come across it. But he said he’d marked something for Mutimer. I’m to pass the paper on to him.’
‘I suppose this is the same woman—?’
‘No doubt.’
‘You think it’s true?’
‘True? Why, of course it is. A newspaper with a reputation to support can’t go printing people’s names at haphazard. Keene’s very thick with all the London actors. He told me some first-class stories about—’
‘Never mind,’ interposed his mother. ‘Well, to think it should come to this! I’m sure I feel for poor Mrs. Eldon. Really there is no end to her misfortunes.’
‘Just how such families always end up,’ observed Alfred complacently. ‘No doubt he’ll drink himself to death, or something of that kind, and then we shall have the pleasure of seeing a new tablet in the church, inscribed with manifold virtues; or even a stained-glass window: the last of the Eldons deserves something noteworthy.’
‘I think it’s hardly a subject for joking, Alfred. It is very, very sad. And to think what a fine handsome boy he used to be! But he was always dreadfully self-willed.’
‘He was always an impertinent puppy! How he’ll play the swell on his wife’s earnings! Oh, our glorious aristocracy!’
Mrs. Waltham went early to her daughter’s room. Adela was sitting with her Bible before her—had sat so since coming upstairs, yet had not read three consecutive verses. Her face showed no effect of tears, for the heat of a consuming suspense had dried the fountains of woe.
‘I don’t like to occupy your mind with such things, my dear,’ began her mother, ‘but perhaps as a warning I ought to show you the news Alfred spoke of. It pleases Providence that there should be evil in the world, and for our own safety we must sometimes look it in the face, especially we poor women, Adela. Will you read that?’
Adela read. She could not criticise the style, but it affected her as something unclean; Hubert’s very name suffered degradation when used in such a way. Prepared for worse things than that which she saw, no shock of feelings was manifest in her. She returned the paper without speaking.
‘I wanted you to see that my behaviour to Mr. Eldon was not unjustified,’ said her mother. ‘You don’t blame me any longer, dear?’
‘I have never blamed you, mother.’
‘It is a sad, sad end to what might have been a life of usefulness and honour. I have thought so often of the parable of the talents; only I fear this case is worse. His poor mother! I wonder if I could write to her! Yet I hardly know how to.’
‘Is this a—a wicked woman, mother?’ Adela asked falteringly.
Mrs. Waltham shook her head and sighed.
‘My love, don’t you see that she is an actress?’
‘But if all actresses are wicked, how is it that really good people go to the theatre?’
‘I am afraid they oughtn’t to. The best of us are tempted into thoughtless pleasure. But now I don’t want you to brood over things which it is a sad necessity to have to glance at. Read your chapter, darling, and get to bed.’
To bed—but not to sleep. The child’s imagination was aflame. This scarlet woman, this meteor from hell flashing before the delighted eyes of men, she, then, had bound Hubert for ever in her toils; no release for him now, no ransom to eternity. No instant’s doubt of the news came to Adela; in her eyes imprimatur was the guarantee of truth. She strove to picture the face which had drawn Hubert to his doom. It must be lovely beyond compare. For the first time in her life she knew the agonies of jealousy.
She could not shed tears, but in her anguish she fell upon prayer, spoke the words above her breath that they might silence that terrible voice within. Poor lost lamb, crying in the darkness, sending forth such piteous utterance as might create a spirit of love to hear and rescue.
Rescue—none. When the fire wasted itself, she tried to find solace in the thought that one source of misery was stopped. Hubert was married, or would be very soon, and if she had sinned in loving him till now, such sin would henceforth be multiplied incalculably; she durst not, as she valued her soul, so much as let his name enter her thoughts. And to guard against it, was there not a means offered her? The doubt as to what love meant was well-nigh solved; or at all events she held it proved that the ‘love’ of the marriage service was something she had never yet felt, something which would follow upon marriage itself. Earthly love had surely led Hubert Eldon to ruin; oh, not that could be demanded of her! What reason had she now to offer against her mother’s desire? Letty’s arguments were vain; they were but as the undisciplined motions of her own heart. Marriage with a worthy man must often have been salvation to a rudderless life; for was it not the ceremony which, after all, constituted the exclusive sanction?
Mutimer, it was true, fell sadly short of her ideal of goodness. He was an unbeliever. But might not this very circumstance involve a duty? As his wife, could she not plead with him and bring him to the truth? Would not that be loving him, to make his spiritual good the end of her existence? It was as though a great light shot athwart her darkness. She raised herself in bed, and, as if with her very hands, clung to the inspiration which had been granted her. The light was not abiding, but something of radiance lingered, and that must stead her.
Her brother returned to Belwick next morning after an early breakfast. He was in his wonted high spirits, and talked with much satisfaction of the acquaintances he had made on the previous day, while Adela waited upon him. Mrs. Waltham only appeared as he was setting off.
Adela sat almost in silence whilst her mother breakfasted.
‘You don’t look well, dear?’ said the latter, coming to the little room upstairs soon after the meal.
‘Yes, I am well, mother. But I want to speak to you.’
Mrs. Waltham seated herself in expectation.
‘Will you tell me why you so much wish me to marry Mr. Mutimer?’
Adela’s tone was quite other than she had hitherto used in conversations of this kind. It was submissive, patiently questioning.
‘You mustn’t misunderstand me,’ replied the mother with some nervousness. ‘The wish, dear, must of course be yours as well. You know that I—that I really have left you to consult your own—’
The sentence was unfinished.
‘But you have tried to persuade me, mother dear,’ pursued the gentle voice. ‘You would not do so if you did not think it for my good.’
Something shot painfully through Mrs. Waltham’s heart.
‘I am sure I have thought so, Adela; really I have thought so. I know there are objections, but no marriage is in every way perfect. I feel so sure of his character—I mean of his character in a worldly sense. And you might do so much to—to show him the true way, might you not, darling? I’m sure his heart is good.’
Mrs. Waltham also was speaking with less confidence than on former occasions. She cast side glances at her daughter’s colourless face.
‘Mother, may I marry without feeling that—that I love him?’
The face was flushed now for a moment. Adela had never spoken that word to anyone; even to Letty she had scarcely murmured it. The effect upon her of hearing it from her own lips was mysterious, awful; the sound did not die with her voice, but trembled in subtle harmonies along the chords of her being.
Her mother took the shaken form and drew it to her bosom.
‘If he is your husband, darling, you will find that love grows. It is always so. Have no fear. On his side there is not only love; he respects you deeply; he has told me so.’
‘And you encourage me to accept him, mother? It is your desire? I am your child, and you can wish nothing that is not for my good. Guide me, mother. It is so hard to judge for myself. You shall decide for me, indeed you shall.’
The mother’s heart was wrung. For a moment she strove to speak the very truth, to utter a word about that love which Adela was resolutely excluding. But the temptation to accept this unhoped surrender proved too strong. She sobbed her answer.
‘Yes, I do wish it, Adela. You will find that I—that I was not wrong.’
‘Then if he asks me, I will marry him.’
As those words were spoken Mutimer issued from the Manor gates, uncertain whether to go his usual way down to the works or to pay a visit to Mrs. Waltham. The latter purpose prevailed.
The evening before, Mr. Willis Rodman had called at the Manor shortly after dinner. He found Mutimer smoking, with coffee at his side, and was speedily making himself comfortable in the same way. Then he drew a newspaper from his pocket. ‘Have you seen the “Belwick Chronicle” of to-day?’ he inquired.
‘Why the deuce should I read such a paper?’ exclaimed Richard, with good-humoured surprise. He was in excellent spirits to-night, the excitement of the day having swept his mind clear of anxieties.
‘There’s something in it, though, that you ought to see.’
He pointed out the paragraph relating to Eldon.
‘Keene’s writing, eh?’ said Mutimer thoughtfully.
‘Yes, he gave me the paper.’
Richard rekindled his cigar with deliberation, and stood for a few moments with one foot on the fender.
‘Who is the woman?’ he then asked.
‘I don’t know her name. Of course it’s the same story continued.’
‘And concluded.’
‘Well, I don’t know about that,’ said the other, smiling and shaking his head.
‘This may or may not be true, I suppose,’ was Richard’s next remark.
‘Oh, I suppose the man hears all that kind of thing. I don’t see any reason to doubt it.’
‘May I keep the paper?’
‘Oh, yes. Keene told me, by-the-by, that he gave a copy to young Waltham.’
Mr. Rodman spoke whilst rolling the cigar in his mouth. Mutimer allowed the subject to lapse.
There was no impossibility, no improbability even, in the statement made by the newspaper correspondent; yet as Richard thought it over in the night, he could not but regard it as singular that Mr. Keene should be the man to make public such a piece of information so very opportunely. He was far from having admitted the man to his confidence, but between Keene and Rodman, as he was aware, an intimacy had sprung up. It might be that one or the other had thought it worth while to serve him; why should Keene be particular to put a copy of the paper into Alfred Waltham’s hands? Well, he personally knew nothing of the affair. If the news effected anything, so much the better. He hoped it might be trustworthy.
Among his correspondence in the morning was a letter from Emma Vine. He opened it last; anyone observing him would have seen with what reluctance he began to read it.
‘My dear Richard,’ it ran, ‘I write to thank you for the money. I would very much rather have had a letter from you, however short a one. It seems long since you wrote a real letter, and I can’t think how long since I have seen you. But I know how full of business you are, dear, and I’m sure you would never come to London without telling me, because if you hadn’t time to come here, I should be only too glad to go to Highbury, if only for one word. We have got some mourning dresses to make for the servants of a lady in Islington, so that is good news. But poor Jane is very bad indeed. She suffers a great deal of pain, and most of all at night, so that she scarcely ever gets more than half-an-hour of sleep at a time, if that. What makes it worse, dear Richard, is that she is so very unhappy. Sometimes she cries nearly through the whole night. I try my best to keep her up, but I’m afraid her weakness has much to do with it. But Kate is very well, I am glad to say, and the children are very well too. Bertie is beginning to learn to read. He often says he would like to see you. Thank you, dearest, for the money and all your kindness, and believe that I shall think of you every minute with much love. From yours ever and ever,
‘EMMA VINE.’
It would be cruel to reproduce Emma’s errors of spelling. Richard had sometimes noted a bad instance with annoyance, but it was not that which made him hurry to the end this morning with lowered brows. When he had finished the letter he crumbled it up and threw it into the fire. It was not heartlessness that made him do so: he dreaded to have these letters brought before his eyes a second time.
He was also throwing the envelope aside, when he discovered that it contained yet another slip of paper. The writing on this was not Emma’s: the letters were cramped and not easy to decipher.
‘Dear Richard, come to London and see me. I want to speak to you, I must speak to you. I can’t have very long to live, and I must, must see you.
‘JANE VINE.’
This too he threw into the fire. His lips were hard set, his eyes wide. And almost immediately he prepared to leave the house.
It was early, but he felt that he must go to the Walthams’. He had promised Mrs. Waltham to refrain from visiting the house for a week, but that promise it was impossible to keep. Jane’s words were ringing in his ears: he seemed to hear her very voice calling and beseeching. So far from changing his purpose, it impelled him in the course he had chosen. There must and should be an end of this suspense.
Mrs. Waltham had just come downstairs from her conversation with Adela, when she saw Mutimer approaching the door. She admitted him herself. Surely Providence was on her side; she felt almost young in her satisfaction.
Richard remained in the house about twenty minutes. Then he walked down to the works as usual.
Shortly after his departure another visitor presented himself. This was Mr. Wyvern. The vicar’s walk in Hubert’s company the evening before had extended itself from point to point, till the two reached Agworth together. Mr. Wyvern was addicted to night-rambling, and he often covered considerable stretches of country in the hours when other mortals slept. To-night he was in the mood for such exercise; it worked off unwholesome accumulations of thought and feeling, and good counsel often came to him in what the Greeks called the kindly time. He did not hurry on his way back to Wanley, for just at present he was much in need of calm reflection.
On his arrival at the Vicarage about eleven o’clock the servant informed him of Miss Waltham’s having called. Mr. Wyvern heard this with pleasure. He thought at first of writing a note to Adela, begging her to come to the Vicarage again, but by the morning he had decided to be himself the visitor.
He gathered at once from Mrs. Waltham’s face that events of some agitating kind were in progress. She did not keep him long in uncertainty. Upon his asking if he might speak a few words with Adela, Mrs. Waltham examined him curiously.
‘I am afraid,’ she said, ‘that I must ask you to excuse her this morning, Mr. Wyvern. She is not quite prepared to see anyone at present. In fact,’ she lowered her voice and smiled very graciously, ‘she has just had an—an agitating interview with Mr. Mutimer—she has consented to be his wife.’
‘In that case I cannot of course trouble her,’ the vicar replied, with gravity which to Mrs. Waltham appeared excessive, rather adapted to news of a death than of a betrothal. The dark searching eyes, too, made her feel uncomfortable. And he did not utter a syllable of the politeness expected on these occasions.
‘What a very shocking thing about Mr. Eldon!’ the lady pursued. ‘You have heard?’
‘Shocking? Pray, what has happened?’
Hubert had left him in some depression the night before, and for a moment Mr. Wyvern dreaded lest some fatality had become known in Wanley.
‘Ah, you have not heard? It is in this newspaper.’
The vicar examined the column indicated.
‘But,’ he exclaimed, with subdued indignation, ‘this is the merest falsehood!’
‘A falsehood! Are you sure of that, Mr. Wyvern?’
‘Perfectly sure. There is no foundation for it whatsoever.’
‘You don’t say so! I am very glad to hear that, for poor Mrs. Eldon’s sake.’
‘Could you lend me this newspaper for to-day?’
‘With pleasure. Really you relieve me, Mr. Wyvern. I had no means of inquiring into the story, of course. But how disgraceful that such a thing should appear in print!’
‘I am sorry to say, Mrs. Waltham, that the majority of things which appear in print nowadays are more or less disgraceful. However, this may claim prominence, in its way.’
‘And I may safely contradict it? It will be such a happiness to do so.’
‘Contradict it by all means, madam. You may cite me as your authority.’
The vicar crushed the sheet into his pocket and strode homewards.