The Palliser Novels (52 page)

“I think I do.”

“To my thinking she is the finest of God’s creatures that I have known. It may be that in her future life she will be severed from me altogether; but I shall not, therefore, think the less well of her; and I wish that you, as my friend, should know that I so esteem her, even though her name should never be mentioned between us.” Seward, in some few words, assured him that it should be so, and then they finished their journey in silence.

From the station at Ely, Grey sent a message by the wires up to John Vavasor, saying that he would call on him that afternoon at his office in Chancery Lane. The chances were always much against finding Mr Vavasor at his office; but on this occasion the telegram did reach him there, and he remained till the unaccustomed hour of half past four to meet the man who was to have been his son-in-law.

“Have you heard from her?” he asked as soon as Grey entered the dingy little room, not in Chancery Lane, but in its neighbourhood, which was allocated to him for his signing purposes.

“Yes,” — said Grey; “she has written to me.”

“And told you about her cousin George. I tried to hinder her from writing, but she is very wilful.”

“Why should you have hindered her? If the thing was to be told, it is better that it should be done at once.”

“But I hoped that there might be an escape. I don’t know what you think of all this, Grey, but to me it is the bitterest misfortune that I have known. And I’ve had some bitter things, too,” he added, — thinking of that period of his life, when the work of which he was ashamed was first ordained as his future task.

“What is the escape that you hoped?” asked Grey.

“I hardly know. The whole thing seems to me to be so mad, that I partly trusted that she would see the madness of it. I am not sure whether you know anything of my nephew George?” asked Mr Vavasor.

“Very little,” said Grey.

“I believe him to be utterly an adventurer, — a man without means and without principle, — upon the whole about as bad a man as you may meet. I give you my word, Grey, that I don’t think I know a worse man. He’s going to marry her for her money; then he will beggar her, after that he’ll ill-treat her, and yet what can I do?”

“Prevent the marriage.”

“But how, my dear fellow? Prevent it! It’s all very well to say that, and it’s the very thing I want to do. But how am I to prevent it? She’s as much her own master as you are yours. She can give him every shilling of her fortune to-morrow. How am I to prevent her from marrying him?”

“Let her give him every shilling of her fortune to-morrow,” said Grey.

“And what is she to do then?” asked Mr Vavasor.

“Then — then, — then, — then let her come to me,” said John Grey; and as he spoke there was the fragment of a tear in his eye, and the hint of quiver in his voice.

Even the worldly, worn-out, unsympathetic nature of John Vavasor was struck, and, as it were, warmed by this.

“God bless you; God bless you, my dear fellow. I heartily wish for her sake that I could look forward to any such an end to this affair.”

“And why not look forward to it? You say that he merely wants her money. As he wants it let him have it!”

“But Grey, you do not know Alice; you do not understand my girl. When she had lost her fortune nothing would induce her to become your wife.”

“Leave that to follow as it may,” said John Grey. “Our first object must be to sever her from a man, who is, as you say, himself on the verge of ruin; and who would certainly make her wretched. I am here now, not because I wish her to be my own wife, but because I wish that she should not become the wife of such a one as your nephew. If I were you I would let him have her money.”

“If you were I, you would have nothing more to do with it than the man that is as yet unborn. I know that she will give him her money because she has said so; but I have no power as to her giving it or as to her withholding it. That’s the hardship of my position; — but it is of no use to think of that now.”

John Grey certainly did not think about it. He knew well that Alice was independent, and that she was not inclined to give up that independence to anyone. He had not expected that her father would be able to do much towards hindering his daughter from becoming the wife of George Vavasor, but he had wished that he himself and her father should be in accord in their views, and he found that this was so. When he left Mr Vavasor’s room nothing had been said about the period of the marriage. Grey thought it improbable that Alice would find herself able to give herself in marriage to her cousin immediately, — so soon after her breach with him; but as to this he had no assurance, and he determined to have the facts from her own lips, if she would see him. So he wrote to her, naming a day on which he would call upon her early in the morning; and having received from her no prohibition, he was in Queen Anne Street at the hour appointed.

He had conceived a scheme which he had not made known to Mr Vavasor, and as to the practicability of which he had much doubt; but which, nevertheless, he was resolved to try if he should find the attempt possible. He himself would buy off George Vavasor. He had ever been a prudent man, and he had money at command. If Vavasor was such a man as they, who knew him best, represented him, such a purchase might be possible. But then, before this was attempted, he must be quite sure that he knew his man, and he must satisfy himself also that in doing so he would not, in truth, add to Alice’s misery. He could hardly bring himself to think it possible that she did, in truth, love her cousin with passionate love. It seemed to him, as he remembered what Alice had been to himself, that this must be impossible. But if it were so, that of course must put an end to his interference. He thought that if he saw her he might learn all this, and therefore he went to Queen Anne Street.

“Of course he must come if he will,” she said to herself when she received his note. “It can make no matter. He will say nothing half so hard to me as what I say to myself all day long.” But when the morning came, and the hour came, and the knock at the door for which her ears were on the alert, her heart misgave her, and she felt that the present moment of her punishment, though not the heaviest, would still be hard to bear.

He came slowly up-stairs, — his step was ever slow, — and gently opened the door for himself. Then, before he even looked at her, he closed it again. I do not know how to explain that it was so; but it was this perfect command of himself at all seasons which had in part made Alice afraid of him, and drove her to believe that they were not fitted for each other. She, when he thus turned for a moment from her, and then walked slowly towards her, stood with both her hands leaning on the centre table of the room, and with her eyes fixed upon its surface.

“Alice,” he said, walking up to her very slowly.

Her whole frame shuddered as she heard the sweetness of his voice. Had I not better tell the truth of her at once? Oh, if she could only have been his again! What madness during these last six months had driven her to such a plight as this! The old love came back upon her. Nay; it had never gone. But that trust in his love returned to her, — that trust which told her that such love and such worth would have sufficed to make her happy. But this confidence in him was worthless now! Even though he should desire it, she could not change again.

“Alice,” he said again. And then, as slowly she looked up at him, he asked her for her hand. “You may give it me,” he said, “as to an old friend.” She put her hand in his hand, and then, withdrawing it, felt that she must never trust herself to do so again.

“Alice,” he continued, “I do not expect you to say much to me; but there is a question or two which I think you will answer. Has a day been fixed for this marriage?”

“No,” she said.

“Will it be in a month?”

“Oh, no; — not for a year,” she replied hurriedly; — and he knew at once by her voice that she already dreaded this new wedlock. Whatever of anger he might before have felt for her was banished. She had brought herself by her ill-judgement, — by her ignorance, as she had confessed, — to a sad pass; but he believed that she was still worthy of his love.

“And now one other question, Alice; — but if you are silent, I will not ask it again. Can you tell me why you have again accepted your cousin’s offer?”

“Because — ,” she said very quickly, looking up as though she were about to speak with all her old courage. “But you would never understand me,” she said, — “and there can be no reason why I should dare to hope that you should ever think well of me again.”

He knew that there was no love, — no love for that man to whom she had pledged her hand. He did not know, on the other hand, how strong, how unchanged, how true was her love for himself. Indeed, of himself he was thinking not at all. He desired to learn whether she would suffer, if by any scheme he might succeed in breaking off this marriage. When he had asked her whether she were to be married at once, she had shuddered at the thought. When he asked her why she had accepted her cousin, she had faltered, and hinted at some excuse which he might fail to understand. Had she loved George Vavasor, he could have understood that well enough.

“Alice,” he said, speaking still very slowly, “nothing has ever yet been done which need to a certainty separate you and me. I am a persistent man, and I do not even yet give up all hope. A year is a long time. As you say yourself, I do not as yet quite understand you. But, Alice, — and I think that the position in which we stood a few months since justifies me in saying so without offence, — I love you now as well as ever, and should things change with you, I cannot tell you with how much joy and eagerness I should take you back to my bosom. My heart is yours now as it has been since I knew you.”

Then he again just touched her hand, and left her before she had been able to answer a word.

Alice sat alone for an hour without moving when John Grey had left her, and the last words which he had uttered were sounding in her ears all the time, “My heart is still yours, as it has been since I knew you.” There had been something in his words which had soothed her spirits, and had, for the moment, almost comforted her. At any rate, he did not despise her. He could not have spoken such words as these to her had he not still held her high in his esteem. Nay; — had he not even declared that he would yet take her as his own if she would come to him? “I cannot tell you with how much joy I would take you back to my bosom!” Ah! that might never be. But yet the assurance had been sweet to her; — dangerously sweet, as she soon told herself. She knew that she had lost her Eden, but it was something to her that the master of the garden had not himself driven her forth. She sat there, thinking of her fate, as though it belonged to some other one, — not to herself; as though it were a tale that she had read. Herself she had shipwrecked altogether; but though she might sink, she had not been thrust from the ship by hands which she loved.

But would it not have been better that he should have scorned her and reviled her? Had he been able to do so, he at least would have escaped the grief of disappointed love. Had he learned to despise her, he would have ceased to regret her. She had no right to feel consolation in the fact that his sufferings were equal to her own. But when she thought of this, she told herself that it could not be that it was so. He was a man, she said, not passionate by nature. Alas! it was the mistake she had ever made when summing up the items of his character! He might be persistent, she thought, in still striving to do that upon which he had once resolved. He had said so, and that which he said was always true to the letter. But, nevertheless, when this thing which he still chose to pursue should have been put absolutely beyond his reach, he would not allow his calm bosom to be harassed by a vain regret. He was a man too whole at every point, — so Alice told herself, — to allow his happiness to be marred by such an accident.

But must the accident occur? Was there no chance that he might be saved, even from such trouble as might follow upon such a loss? Could it not be possible that he might be gratified, — since it would gratify him, — and that she might be saved! Over and over again she considered this, — but always as though it were another woman whom she would fain save, and not herself.

But she knew that her own fate was fixed. She had been mad when she had done the thing, but the thing was not on that account the less done. She had been mad when she had trusted herself abroad with two persons, both of whom, as she had well known, were intent on wrenching her happiness from out of her grasp. She had been mad when she had told herself, whilst walking over the Westmoreland fells, that after all she might as well marry her cousin, since that other marriage was then beyond her reach! Her two cousins had succeeded in blighting all the hopes of her life; — but what could she now think of herself in that she had been so weak as to submit to such usage from their hands? Alas! — she told herself, admitting in her misery all her weakness, — alas, she had no mother. She had gloried in her independence, and this had come of it! She had scorned the prudence of Lady Macleod, and her scorn had brought her to this pass!

Was she to give herself bodily, — body and soul, as she said aloud in her solitary agony, — to a man whom she did not love? Must she submit to his caresses, — lie on his bosom, — turn herself warmly to his kisses? “No,” she said, “no,” — speaking audibly, as she walked about the room; “no; — it was not in my bargain; I never meant it.” But if so what had she meant; — what had been her dream? Of what marriage had she thought, when she was writing that letter back to George Vavasor? How am I to analyse her mind, and make her thoughts and feelings intelligible to those who may care to trouble themselves with the study? Any sacrifice she would make for her cousin which one friend could make for another. She would fight his battles with her money, with her words, with her sympathy. She would sit with him if he needed it, and speak comfort to him by the hour. His disgrace should be her disgrace; — his glory her glory; — his pursuits her pursuits. Was not that the marriage to which she had consented? But he had come to her and asked her for a kiss, and she had shuddered before him, when he made the demand. Then that other one had come and had touched her hand, and the fibres of her body had seemed to melt within her at the touch, so that she could have fallen at his feet.