"Thank you, Carr, that is an excellent thought, and what is more you shall escort Lilias or Marjory up to town. They have a standing invitation to my boy"s house, and a little change just now would do--shall I say Lilias?--good."
"Miss Lilias wants a change, sir. She is affected like yourself with, may I call it, an attack of the nerves."
CHAPTER XIX.
Valentine really made an excellent housekeeper. n.o.body expected it of her; her friends, the ladies, old and young, the girls, married or otherwise, who knew Valentine as they supposed very intimately, considered the idea of settling this remarkably ignorant young person down with a fixed income and telling her to buy with it, and contrive with it, and make two ends meet with it, quite one of the best jokes of the day.
Valentine did not regard it as a joke at all. She honestly tried, honestly studied, and honestly made a success as housekeeper and household manager.
She was a most undeveloped creature, undeveloped both in mind and heart; but she not only possessed intense latent affections, but latent capacities of all sorts. She scarcely knew the name of poverty, she had no experience with regard to the value of money, but nature had given her an instinct which taught her to spend it wisely and well. She found a thousand a year a larger income than she and Gerald with their modest wants needed. She scarcely used half of what she received, and yet her home was cheerful, her servants happy, her table all that was comfortable.
When she brought her housekeeping books to her husband to balance at the end of the first month, he looked at her with admiration, and then said in a voice of great sadness:--
"G.o.d help me, Valentine, have I made a mistake altogether about you? Am I dreaming, Valentine, are you meant for a poor man"s wife after all?"
"For your wife, whether rich or poor," she said; and she knelt down by his side, and put her hand into his.
She had always possessed a sweet and beautiful face, but for the last few weeks it had altered; the sweetness had not gone, but resolution had grown round the curved pretty lips, and the eyes had a soft happiness in them.
"Pretty, charming creature!" people used to say of her. "But just a trifle commonplace and doll-like."
This doll-like expression was no longer discernible in Valentine.
Gerald touched her hair tenderly.
"My little darling!" he said. His voice shook. Then he rose abruptly, with a gesture which was almost rough. "Come upstairs, Val; the housekeeping progresses admirably. No, my dear, you made a mistake, you were never meant for a poor man"s wife."
Valentine kissed his brow: she looked at him in a puzzled way.
"Do you know," she said, laying her hands on his, with a gesture half timid, half appealing; "don"t go up to the drawing-room for a moment, Gerald, I want to say a thing, something I have observed. I am loved by two men, by my father and by you. I am loved by them very much--by both of them very much. Oh, yes, Gerald, I know what you feel for me, and yet I can"t make either of them happy. My father is not happy. Oh, yes, I can see--love isn"t blind. I never remembered my father quite, quite happy, and he is certainly less so than ever now. He tries to look all right when people are by; even succeeds, for he is so unselfish, and brave, and n.o.ble. But when he is alone--ah, then. Once he fell asleep when I was in the room, he looked terrible in that sleep; his face was haggard--he sighed--there was moisture on his brow. When he woke he asked me to marry you. I didn"t care for you then, Gerald, but I said yes because of my father. He said if I married you he would be perfectly happy. I did so--he is not happy."
Gerald did not say a word.
"And you aren"t happy, dear," she continued, coming a little nearer to him. "You used to be; before we were engaged you had such a gay face. I could never call you gay since, Gerald. You are so thin, and sometimes at night I lie awake, and I hear you sigh. Why, what is the matter.
Gerald? You look ghastly now. Am I hurting you? I wouldn"t hurt you, darling."
Wyndham turned round quickly. He had been white almost to fainting, now a great light seemed to leap out of his eyes.
"What did you say? What did you call me? Say it again."
"Darling."
"Then I thank my G.o.d--everything has not been in vain."
He sank down on the nearest chair and burst into tears. Tragedies go on where least expected. The servants in the servants" hall thought their young master and mistress quite the happiest people in the world. Were they not gay, young, rich? Did they not adore one another? Gerald"s devotion to Valentine was almost a joke with them, and Valentine"s increasing regard for him was very observable to those watchful outsiders.
Certainly the pair stayed in a good deal in the evenings, and why to-night in particular did they linger so long in the dining-room, rather to the inconvenience of the kitchen regime. But presently their steps were heard going upstairs, and then Valentine accompanied Gerald"s violin on the piano.
Wyndham played very well for an amateur, so well that with a little extra practice he might almost have taken his place as a professional of no mean ability. He had exquisite taste and a sensitive ear. Music always excited him, and perhaps was not the safest recreation for such a highly strung nature.
Valentine could accompany well; she, too, loved music, but had not her husband"s facility nor grace of execution. In his happiest moments Gerald could compose, and sometimes even improvise with success.
During their honeymoon it seemed to him one day as he looked at the somewhat impa.s.sive face of the girl for whom he had sold himself body and soul--as he looked and felt that not yet at least did her heart echo even faintly to any beat of his, it occurred to him that he might tell his story in its pain and its longing best through the medium of music. He composed a little piece which, for want of another t.i.tle, he called "Waves." It was very sweet in melody, and had some minor notes of such pathos that when Valentine first heard him play it on the violin she burst into tears. He told her quite simply then that it was his story about her, that all the sweetness was her share, all the graceful melody, the sparkling joyous notes which coming from Gerald"s violin seemed to speak like a gay and happy voice, represented his ideal of her. The deeper notes and the pain belonged to him; pain must ever come with love when it is strongest, she would understand this presently.
Then he put his little piece away--he only played it once for her when they were in Switzerland; he forgot it, but she did not.
To-night, after her confession, when they went up to the drawing-room, his heart immeasurably soothed and healed, and hers soft with a wonderful joy which the beginning of true love can give, he remembered "Waves," and thought he would play it for her again. It did not sound so melancholy this time, but strange to say the gay notes were not quite so gay, the warble of a light heart had deepened. As Wyndham played and Valentine sat silent, for she offered no accompaniment to this little fugitive piece, he found that he must slightly reconstruct the melody. The minor keys were still minor, but there was a ring of victory through them now; they were solemn, but not despairing.
"He that loseth his life shall find it," Wyndham said suddenly, looking full into her eyes.
The violin slipped from his hand, coming down with a discordant crash, the door was flung open by the servant, as Lilias Wyndham and Adrian Carr came into the room.
In a minute all was gay bustle and confusion. Gerald forgot his cares, and Valentine was only too anxious to show herself as the hospitable and attentive hostess.
A kind of improvised meal between dinner and tea was actually brought up into the drawing-room. Lilias ate chicken and ham holding her plate on her lap. Carr, more of a stranger, was not allowed to feel this fact. In short, no four could have looked merrier or more free from trouble.
"It is delightful to have you here--delightful, Lilias," said Valentine, taking her sister-in-law"s hand and squeezing it affectionately.
"Do you know, Lil," said Gerald, "that this little girl-wife of mine, with no experience whatever, makes a most capable housekeeper. With all your years of knowledge I should not like you to enter the lists with her."
"With all my years of failure, you mean," answered Lilias. "I always was and always will be the most incompetent woman with regard to beef and mutton and pounds, shillings and pence who walks this earth."
She laughed as she spoke; her face was cloudless, her dark eyes serene.
For one moment before he went away Carr found time to say a word to her.
"Did I not tell you it was simply a case of nerves?" he remarked.
CHAPTER XX.
Esther Helps was certainly neither a prudent nor a careful young woman.
She meant no harm, she would have shuddered at the thought of actual sin, but she was reckless, a little defiant of all authority, even her father"s most gentle and loving control, and very discontented with her position in life.
Morning, noon, and night, Esther"s dream of dreams, longing of longings, was to be a lady. She had some little foundation for this desire. The mother who had died at her birth had been a poor half-educated little governess, whose mother before her had been a clergyman"s daughter. Esther quickly discovered that she was beautiful, and her dream of dreams was to marry a gentleman, and so go back to that station in life where her mother had moved.
Esther had no real instincts of ladyhood. She spoke loudly, her education had been of a very flashy and superficial order. From the time she left the fourth-rate boarding-school where her father alone had the means to place her, she had stayed at home and idled. Idling was very bad for a character like hers; she was naturally active and energetic--she had plenty of ability, and would have made a capital shopwoman or dressmaker. But Esther thought it quite beneath her to work, and her father, who could support her at home, was only too delighted to have her there. He was inordinately proud of her--she was the one sunbeam in his dull, clouded timorous life. He adored her beauty, he found no fault with her c.o.c.kney tw.a.n.g, and he gave her in double measure the love which had lain buried for many years with his young wife.
Esther, therefore, when she left school, sat at home, and made her own dresses, and chatted with her cousin Cherry, who was an orphan, and belonged to Helps" side of the house. Cherry was a very capable, matter-of-fact hearty little girl, and Esther thought it an excellent arrangement that she should live with them, and take the drudgery and the cooking, and in short all the household work off her hands. Esther was very fond of Cherry, and Cherry, in her turn, thought there was never anyone quite so grand and magnificent as her tall, stately cousin.
"Well, Cherry," said Esther, as the two were going to bed on the night after Wyndham"s visit, "what do you think of him? Oh, I needn"t ask, there"s but one thing to be thought of him."
"Elegant, I say," interrupted Cherry. She was looking particularly round and dumpy herself, and her broad face with her light grey eyes was all one smile. "An elegant young man, Essie--a sort of chevalier, now, wouldn"t you say so?"