A London Life, and Other Tales. Henry Foss James
Mrs. Berrington. I am so sorry—so sorry,' she went on, to change the talk from the subject of her marrying. She wanted to marry but she wanted also not to want it and, above all, not to appear to. She lingered in the room, moving about a little; the place was always so pleasant to her that to go away—to return to her own barren home—had the effect of forfeiting a sort of privilege of sanctuary. The afternoon had faded but the lamps had been brought in, the smell of flowers was in the air and the old house of Plash seemed to recognise the hour that suited it best. The quiet old lady in the firelight, encompassed with the symbolic security of chintz and water-colour, gave her a sudden vision of how blessed it would be to jump all the middle dangers of life and have arrived at the end, safely, sensibly, with a cap and gloves and consideration and memories. 'And, Lady Davenant, what does she think?' she asked abruptly, stopping short and referring to Mrs. Berrington.
'Think? Bless your soul, she doesn't do that! If she did, the things she says would be unpardonable.'
'The things she says?'
'That's what makes them so beautiful—that they are not spoiled by preparation. You could never think of them for her.' The girl smiled at this description of the dearest friend of her interlocutress, but she wondered a little what Lady Davenant would say to visitors about her if she should accept a refuge under her roof. Her speech was after all a flattering proof of confidence. 'She wishes it had been you—I happen to know that,' said the old woman.
'It had been me?'
'That Lionel had taken a fancy to.'
'I wouldn't have married him,' Laura rejoined, after a moment.
'Don't say that or you will make me think it won't be easy to help you. I shall depend upon you not to refuse anything so good.'
'I don't call him good. If he were good his wife would be better.'
'Very likely; and if you had married him he would be better, and that's more to the purpose. Lionel is as idiotic as a comic song, but you have cleverness for two.'
'And you have it for fifty, dear Lady Davenant. Never, never—I shall never marry a man I can't respect!' Laura Wing exclaimed.
She had come a little nearer her old friend and taken her hand; her companion held her a moment and with the other hand pushed aside one of the flaps of the waterproof. 'And what is it your clothing costs you?' asked Lady Davenant, looking at the dress underneath and not giving any heed to this declaration.
'I don't exactly know: it takes almost everything that is sent me from America. But that is dreadfully little—only a few pounds. I am a wonderful manager. Besides,' the girl added, 'Selina wants one to be dressed.'
'And doesn't she pay any of your bills?'
'Why, she gives me everything—food, shelter, carriages.'
'Does she never give you money?'
'I wouldn't take it,' said the girl. 'They need everything they have—their life is tremendously expensive.'
'That I'll warrant!' cried the old woman. 'It was a most beautiful property, but I don't know what has become of it now. Ce n'est pas pour vous blesser, but the hole you Americans can make——'
Laura interrupted immediately, holding up her head; Lady Davenant had dropped her hand and she had receded a step. 'Selina brought Lionel a very considerable fortune and every penny of it was paid.'
'Yes, I know it was; Mrs. Berrington told me it was most satisfactory. That's not always the case with the fortunes you young ladies are supposed to bring!' the old lady added, smiling.
The girl looked over her head a moment. 'Why do your men marry for money?'
'Why indeed, my dear? And before your troubles what used your father to give you for your personal expenses?'
'He gave us everything we asked—we had no particular allowance.'
'And I daresay you asked for everything?' said Lady Davenant.
'No doubt we were very dressy, as you say.'
'No wonder he went bankrupt—for he did, didn't he?'
'He had dreadful reverses but he only sacrificed himself—he protected others.'
'Well, I know nothing about these things and I only ask pour me renseigner,' Mrs. Berrington's guest went on. 'And after their reverses your father and mother lived I think only a short time?'
Laura Wing had covered herself again with her mantle; her eyes were now bent upon the ground and, standing there before her companion with her umbrella and her air of momentary submission and self-control, she might very well have been a young person in reduced circumstances applying for a place. 'It was short enough but it seemed—some parts of it—terribly long and painful. My poor father—my dear father,' the girl went on. But her voice trembled and she checked herself.
'I feel as if I were cross-questioning you, which God forbid!' said Lady Davenant. 'But there is one thing I should really like to know. Did Lionel and his wife, when you were poor, come freely to your assistance?'
'They sent us money repeatedly—it was her money of course. It was almost all we had.'
'And if you have been poor and know what poverty is tell me this: has it made you afraid to marry a poor man?'
It seemed to Lady Davenant that in answer to this her young friend looked at her strangely; and then the old woman heard her say something that had not quite the heroic ring she expected. 'I am afraid of so many things to-day that I don't know where my fears end.'
'I have no patience with the highstrung way you take things. But I have to know, you know.'
'Oh, don't try to know any more shames—any more horrors!' the girl wailed with sudden passion, turning away.
Her companion got up, drew her round again and kissed her. 'I think you would fidget me,' she remarked as she released her. Then, as if this were too cheerless a leave-taking, she added in a gayer tone, as Laura had her hand on the door: 'Mind what I tell you, my dear; let her go!' It was to this that the girl's lesson in philosophy reduced itself, she reflected, as she walked back to Mellows in the rain, which had now come on, through the darkening park.
II
The children were still at tea and poor Miss Steet sat between them, consoling herself with strong cups, crunching melancholy morsels of toast and dropping an absent gaze on her little companions as they exchanged small, loud remarks. She always sighed when Laura came in—it was her way of expressing appreciation of the visit—and she was the one person whom the girl frequently saw who seemed to her more unhappy than herself. But Laura envied her—she thought her position had more dignity than that of her employer's dependent sister. Miss Steet had related her life to the children's pretty young aunt and this personage knew that though it had had painful elements nothing so disagreeable had ever befallen her or was likely to befall her as the odious possibility of her sister's making a scandal. She had two sisters (Laura knew all about them) and one of them was married to a clergyman in Staffordshire (a very ugly part) and had seven children and four hundred a year; while the other, the eldest, was enormously stout and filled (it was a good deal of a squeeze) a position as matron in an orphanage at Liverpool. Neither of them seemed destined to go into the English divorce-court, and such a circumstance on the part of one's near relations struck Laura as in itself almost sufficient to constitute happiness. Miss Steet never lived in a state of nervous anxiety—everything about her was respectable. She made the girl almost angry sometimes, by her drooping, martyr-like air: Laura was near breaking out at her with, 'Dear me, what have you got to complain of? Don't you earn your living like an honest girl and are you obliged to see things going on about you that you hate?'
But she could not say things like